I Just Saw

Trailer for Brief Encounter

2007-02-15T04:05:00.000-05:00

A little V-Day magic, courtesy of David Lean, 1945.Celia Johnson - not unattractive.

Another Woman

2006-12-08T12:29:00.000-05:00

1988

Dir: Woody Allen (The Purple Rose of Cairo; Love and Death; Husbands and Wives; Annie Hall; Crimes and Misdemeanors; Manhattan; Deconstructing Harry; Hannah and Her Sisters)

Shame on me for never having seen this film before. It's so smart and penetrating, a focused piece of psychology that is exactly what quality films should aspire to be. And yet, I had never heard of it before, and only queued it up in the interests of completing Allen's ouevre. A tucked away work of brilliance.

Gena Rowlands plays a philosophy professor who sublets an apartment where she intends to write a book. Next door, and audible through the duct work, a therapist examines Mia Farrow. The patient is pregnant and in the midst of a crushing midlife crisis that flirts with suicide. By eavsdropping on the sessions, Rowlands reexamines her own life, the choices she has made and the coldness of her relations with those around her. It is straight up Bergman (probably why I liked it so), even with the naked narration setting plot points and motivations.

Most of the film consists in frank conversations between Rowland and her husband, former suitor, step daughter or brother. The writing is highly theatrical, dense and intellectual. Indeed, the stage itself becomes an important metaphor in a dream sequence that allows Allen to be even more penetrating in his examination of this woman's psyche without the censoring blanket of convention hanging over the characters.

Ian Holm and Gene Hackman play the men in Rowlands, both as brilliant as you would expect from the amount of talent assembled on the set of this movie. A decrepit John Houseman, in his final performance, plays her bitter and regretful father, with one confessional scene in particular burning right to the core of the audience. No veneer of humor or whismy here, just raw honesty and subtle psychology.

My viewing companion made the important observation that Another Woman may triumph most in its choice to examine the life of a middle aged woman, a subjet matter so rare in film. Bergman does it, and Allen's reverence for the man translates into a highly worthy contribution to the themes that the great Swede explores in his work.

Another Woman is a real gem, a difficult and rewarding viewing experience that (I find myself writing this a lot lately) rates among the best of Allen's incomprable catalogue.

MAP

The Purple Rose of Cairo

2006-12-06T11:00:00.000-05:00

1985

Dir: Woody Allen (Love and Death; Husbands and Wives; Annie Hall; Crimes and Misdemeanors; Manhattan; Deconstructing Harry; Hannah and Her Sisters)

My favorite Fellini film (so far) is Nights of Cabiria. It is hard to find a better juxtaposition of crushing life experience with transcendent human spirit and hope. Comedic and tragic, real and magical, it is a brilliant movie.

The Purple Rose of Cairo is not quite that good, but in its exploration of similar themes it puts in a monumental showing itself. Mia Farrow is a woman in a loveless and abusive marriage during the Depression. She escapes through the cinema and the sweeping lives of playboys and adventurers on the screen. One day, one of the actors in a movie she has seen several times walks off the screen. He himself seeks escape into reality, and the rest of the film explores themes of romance and reality, and the elusiveness of happiness. Allen takes a story that could easily have been one-note and augments it in suprising ways that I will not divulge here. But these twists open up new aspects of his theme, keeping the film from becoming a gimmick and nothing else.

Farrow is never my favorite actress, but she gives one of her best performances here. The standouts are Daniels and Danny Aiello as the abusive husband. The latter provides some moments of true menace among the whirlygig of the films and the romance, a reminder (along with the bread lines) of the harsh reality that films help us escape. The former plays a duel role with sufficient contrast to make it work.

The most overt Fellini reference comes at the end, where Allen lifts the ending to Cabiria. It was, for me, in both instances, one of the best film moments I have ever seen. It melts the heart of even this gruff cynic. Simple, subtle, honest, beuatiful, both endings are the perfect embodiement of "bittersweet." All of the events in both films lead up to that last moment, a testament to the patience of both directors and the focus of their vision.

Purple Rose is without a doubt among Allen's best, less complex or intellectual than some of his others but no less technically sound or well thought out. Romantic comedy at its highest form. A totally satisfying film experience, which is pretty much the point of the film.

MAP

Scary Mary

2006-12-06T07:47:00.000-05:00

It's final's week. You can't expect too much. In the meantime:Dude, weak.

The Young Girls of Rochefort

2006-12-05T19:11:00.000-05:00

1967

Dir: Jacques Demy (The Umbrellas of Cherbourg; Donkey Skin)

Demy's flirtation with the American musical continues, and this time he's got the king of the genre involved. Gene Kelly lip syncs some French, everyone lip syncs some songs, and the return on our investement is a flat, forced film that seems artificial. What should be all charm and lightness ends up being a movie going through the motions.

Catherine Deneuve and Danielle Darriuex are sisters in a small town looking for romance and art through a move to Paris. Their mother owns a cafe, and everyone has either a long-lost love or some mind's eye vision of the perfect mate, and the film slowly brings everyone closer to fulfillment. Musical and dance numbers guide us along, and the choreography stands out here for its mediocrity. At this point in the evolution of musicals, we are well beyond the tired and repetitive ensemble dancing presented here. The songs are better, but not great.

Legrand was much better writing for Umbrellas. In fact, everything was better about Umbrellas. There, genuine emotion and quality acting undergirded a sweet and simple love story. Here, derivative cliche dominates. In Umbrellas, the music furthered characterization and story. Here, the songs are throw away reflections on puppy love and youth. Of course, in both, Demy's unforgiveable penchant for dubbed singing and dialogue detracts. But in Rochefort, the starting position was already poor.

There is some nice spectacle here, some good color and set design. And Gene Kelly, even in a role like this, deserves attention in everything he does. But this film belongs well near the bottom of your New Wave viewing list.

MAP

Various Stuff About Nonhumans That Talk

2006-11-29T06:29:00.000-05:00

Two things. First, dig:

Second, they're going to ruin Marcus's favorite kid's movie:

Sci Fi Channel is planning a miniseries for December 2007 called Tin Man, "a wild SF reimagining of The Wizard of Oz." I assumed this meant a horribly low budget, the special effects of a local car commercial, and adding Cylons from Battlestar Galactica, but Sci Fi promises even more: The miniseries is a sometimes psychedelic, often twisted and always bizarre take on The Wizard of Oz. It centers on DG, a young woman plucked from her humdrum life and thrust into The Outer Zone (the O.Z.), a fantastical realm filled with wonder, but oppressed by dark magic... Remember how you were asking for The Wizard of Oz filtered through the disturbed notebook doodlings of an 8th grader? Well, this is it. Enjoy.

Sorry buddy.

Butterfield 8

2006-11-15T13:19:00.000-05:00

1960

Dir: Daniel Mann (Come Back, Little Sheba; The Rose Tatoo; The Teahouse of the August Moon; In Like Flint)

Elizabeth Taylor took down an Oscar for her preformance as a woman avoiding her traumas with drink and men is this movie adapted from the John O'Hara novel. I read his "Appointment in Samarra" over the weekend, and in both works the underbelly of society life is exposed with merciless honesty. The book, brilliant. This film, pretty good. But Hollywood got a hold of it, and neutered what I wager was a more brutal and engaging novel.

If they gave out Oscars for sexy, then Taylor obviously deserved one here. Her performance is great, the femme fatale with serious wounds lying just below the surface, alluring and dangerous at the same time. You actually understand why all of these men fall in love with her, a rarity in a world where good acting and a pretty face rarely go together, and the pretty face usually gets the role. The opening scene is a pantomime where Taylor wakes up in a room and tries to remember what happened the night before, putting together clues through her hangover. It's the best part of the film.

Another standout is Laurence Harvey as her married, ne're-do-well society suitor. Like his performance in The Manchurian Candidate, Harvey just teems with rage, barely in control of himself as he rails against life and the world. He is one of the great heels in acting history. The sour acting note (and what a stinker it is) is made by Eddie Fisher. The man can't even come close to acting; he is blown out of the water by Taylor. It helps if you are sleeping with the lead actress to get roles I guess (personal memo: sleep with more lead actresses to jump start acting career).

The story shows lots of promise, even if it falls into that obvious kind of psychoanalysis, where the traumas are easy to diagnose and the self-destructive behavior evident to all. The ending is pretty silly as well. I am sure that O'Hara made all of this sound much more deep than it comes across on the screen. The twists on the ill-fated romance of Harvey and Taylor are welcome, and I found myself openly rooting for Taylor to make the correct decisions, even if her instincts were pointing her in the wrong directions. A better treatment could have made this a very engaging plotline.

But still, if you can't enjoy watching Taylor act then you can't enjoy the movies. She owns the screen, portrays a complex charatcer, and the storyline is certainly dark and interesting enough to hold your attention. Serious students of film must reckon with her, and so I recommend this film in the "sometime before you die" category.

MAP

Reds

2006-11-12T12:18:00.000-05:00

1981

Dir: Warren Beatty (Heaven Can Wait; Dick Tracy; Bulworth)

Beatty channels Pasternak in this Zhivago-esque romantic epic about communist agitators in WWI America. Warren has as much to say about politics as the story itself, and at times the film theatens to teeter over into vanity or hero worship. But the ambition of the project and the sincerity of the writing and acting make Reds well worth watching, a movie definitely interested in being important and almost getting there.

Beatty (who also co-wrote the script) is John Reed, the leftist journalist whose chroncile of the Russian Revolution "Ten Days That Shook the World" was an international success. He is a member of a Greenwhich Village Communist clique that included the likes of Emma Goldmann and Eugene O'Neill. Diane Keaton is Lousie Bryant, a young woman who follows Reed to New York and struggles with finding her own voice in the revolution and commanding the attention of her frenetic lover. Much of the script deals with the clash between interpersonal and political passions by Beatty and Keaton, and it is the weaker part of the film. Love stories are hard, and I did not really get the reason that these two loved each other so much.

What did come across, really quite gloriously, was the political moment. The film recieved Oscar nominations in all four acting categories, with Jack Nicholson and Maureen Stapleton joining Keaton and Beatty. Jack is O'Neill, who longs for Keaton but is too cynical and romantic for her high minded politics. He, as you would expect, is electric, an actor really coming to understand his talents. Stapleton won for her supporting role as Goldmann. Even though her screen time is somewhat limited, she too has a fire that burns through the screen. Keaton too is quite good, inhabiting her daft blond routine early on but then finding some inner strength and confidence as her character comes into her own. And Beatty too does a fine job. He cares as much as his character does, and he is at his best when giving pasisoned speeches before Russian factory workers.

His direction too is highly capable. Zhivago really is the proper analogy here, with lots of grand snow blanketed images and tightly packed meeting halls. The project is huge, and for only his second movie he does a fine job. The Oscar winning cinematography is really fitting to the subject matter. The highlight of the entire film may be Beatty's device of using interviews with now very elderly contemporaries of Reed to serve as transitions between historical periods in the script. The interviews are suprising in their honesty; some adored the group, some hated them, some couldn't really remember them. It was that memory element that struck me, a subtle reference to the fact that the characters cared so deeply about the moment, and yet hardly anyone remembers them or their sacrifices anymore. Beatty makes his film to preserve their actions and to glamorize their lives, but even he recognizes the fungibility of memory. A really nice touch that rewarded the viewer throughout the film.

Reds is very accessible, a populist version of a really complex historical epic. There are lots and lots of things to like about it. Just a few notches below brilliant, the film is well worth your time, especially for the acting.

MAP

The Hidden Fortress

2006-11-09T15:07:00.000-05:00

1958

Dir: Akira Kurosawa (The Lower Depths; The Bad Sleep Well; Kagemusha; Ikiru; Red Beard; High and Low)

AK, the master of exploring universal psychological themes, turns in yet another masterpiece in this bittersweet tale of greed and duty. While everyone knows about Lucas' statement that Hidden Fortress inspired Star Wars, the real comparison is to Treasure of the Sierra Madre, where the lust for gold compels men to betray each other and do the most abhorent things.

Lucas was referring to the perspectival elements of this film, how the story is told from two of lower characters' point of view. A couple of shifty and cowardly con artists, the pair stumble upon some hidden gold and a warrior (ah, Toshiro Mifune) who is keen to keep the treasure for the exiled princess who is in his protection. The four set out to transport the riches to safe territory.

What is so compelling about the film is the blend of comedy and penetrating insight. AK has a way of taking stock characters and turning up the volume on their characteristics so that we recognize the archetypal nature of their actions. And yet, nothing feels forced or contrived. The script is both idiosyncratic and universal, a talent that it is hard to describe but very easy to recognize in this film. It is, for example, far more approachable than Madre, which takes the same theme of greed and puts a much more pessimistic gloss on it. It is a change of mood against the typical, highly dramatic treatment of this subject matter from a director who specializes in inhabiting genuine, recognizable emotional states.

Like his other films, I find that uplifiting element very agreeable. There is something life affirming in Hidden Fortress, even at the point that AK crushes our foibles and ridicules our selfish tendencies. The film is profund, and rests in the grey areas of human motivations.

A stunning and extraordinarily entertaining work of art. In the conversation of the man's best films.

MAP

Borat

2006-11-07T05:17:00.000-05:00

Director- Larry Charles (Lots of Sitcoms)

This was a pretty funny movie. I laughed very very hard. The EW cover that said "Is this the funniest movie ever?" was a little off of course. It was not that funny. I would say slightly below Spinal Tap or Bad Santa but a good level above the finest of Adam Sandler dumb comedies. For those of you who live in a cave, Borat is the creation of the Cambridge educated British comedia Sacha Baron Cohen. He is an idiotic Kazakhstani reporter sent to America to explore a foreign nation. Borat's humor works by verbally and physically stumbling into situations where the ignorance of Americans is clearly on display.

The movie is a little bit dumber than the show on HBO was. Borat was one of three characters on Cohen's Da Ali G Show. Some of the scenes in this movie are played more for gross out than sharp political humor. Those toilet humor scenes are less effective because the rest of the movie demonstrates just how smart Borat can be.

Borat is sexist, racist, and pretty much any -ist that is bad that you can think of. His behaviors are more telling about the nature of America than the nature of Kazakhstan of course. Whenever his sexism or racism is greated with encouragement or tacit support it hits you a little bit in the gut. Many say that you could not make Blazing Saddles today because the content seems so racist. I think perhaps its true that getting a studio to greenlight it would be difficult. But if this movie does well, I think there is hope that transgressive comedy that is really offensive can continue to reign.

Platoon

2006-11-04T20:50:00.000-05:00

Director- Oliver Stone (Alexander)

One of my old favorites I revisited recently. This is a complex film. Charlie Sheen is Chris Taylor, a green enlisted man thrown into Vietnam. He has abandoned an elite college and lifestyle in the United States to learn what it means to be at war. His two commanding officers are Tom Berenger's Barnes and Willem Dafoe's haunting Elias. Barnes and Elias represent two forces battling for Taylor's soul. Barnes is the brutal, animalistic and savage win at all costs warriors. Elias is the inherently peaceful and good soul, who is nonetheless skilled at warfare.

The supporting actors are great as well. Kevin Dillon as a bloodthirsty grunt named Bunny and John C. McGinley as O'Neill, Barnes' sycophantic Lieutenant, are both phenomenal. But while the performances are stellar what sets this film apart is its treatment of the material. It deviates from the scope of many Vietnam films, and many war films before it in general.

Apocalypse Now has always struck me as more Conrad and less Saigon City than other war movies. Vietnam is an appropriate setting for the journey into the darkness of Man, but much about the war itself is lost in Coppola's literary treatment of the war. Larger than life figures like Duvall's Kilgore and Brando's Kurtz cover over existing and relevant critiques of class and race inherent to the US's involvement in Vietnam.

The Deer Hunter is also limited in the scope of how it treats characters. It's examination has a definite bent towards class, to be certain, but its study is more about the effect war in general has on people and less about the uniqueness of Vietnam as a political event for shaping a generation. The film reflects less on the question of "Should we have been in Vietnam?" and more on "What is the result for those who fought there?".

The second half of Full Metal Jacket (released a year later than Platoon) is still less a movie about Vietnam and more about war in general. Its end with the gun wielding female character is interesting in terms of the inversion of traditional notions of masculinity and warfighting, but speaks more and more to universal conceptions about war than what specifically Vietnam meant. And the first half of that movie, a stinging indictment of militarism, haunts far more viewers than the tepid second half.

Platoon says a lot of the things that these movies say, and says it better. While on a grand scale I prefer the literary artistry of Apocalypse Now, Platoon punches me right in the gut everytime I see Elias fall as the Viet Cong chase him while the helicopters circle above his bloody body. The tagline for the movie was "This is the first real movie about Vietnam". We can interpret this several ways. One is that its "real" in the sense that its depiction of the battles is realistic. Indeed, military advisers on the film praised its realism over and above that of battle scenes in Apocalypse Now or The Deer Hunter. It also opened up a space for more brutal representations of war like those found in Hamburger Hill. Showing lots of bodies on stretchers goes a long way to counter the objection from visual rhetoricians that war movies valorize violence and combat. In this movie, combat does not seem glorious. It seems horrible and scary. It could also be "the first real movie about Vietnam" because it is a real movie in the sense that it is a truly great film- that it is high art and is really specifically about Vietnam as an Event.

The film is also a meditation on what the idea of "enemy" means. The Viet Cong are depicted and shadowy and faceless. They are efficient fighters. They are not above brutality. But for Stone the enemy is within- within the platoon and within the soul. Stone certainly seems to support both Elias and Barnes as leaders over the indecisive nominal Lieutenant of the platoon whose incompetence results in friendly fire deaths. Elias, for all his goodness, is cut down by Barnes. Is this saying that to survive in war you have to be an overwhelmingly brutal character? Perhaps. But then again the idea of Elias is what motivates Taylor to get through the violence and eventually kill Barnes. After all, it is Barnes who cares not for the slaughter and rape that occurs in a village when the platoon is mad with bloodlust after some of their number are tortured by the VC.

Two things about this film I do not like. The voiceovers to me say things that the director could show. In fact, I think the movie shows all of these things. The voiceovers that talk about how Taylor misses home or how the war is a different world are unnecessary. Any viewer can get this from his mannerisms, his discomfort on the trail, his suffering during the silence of a night ambush. His narration at the end of the film is unnecessary for sure.

The second thing I do not like is the climax. As Barnes is poised to kill Chris, a napalm blast brushes him off of Sheen. Burned near to death by the blast, he is an easy target for Taylor to kill. While Talyor now shows himself capable of really killing, the message is hollow. In order to defeat Barnes, Taylor needed the help of a higher power. One reading is that this indicates that the violence of war is so powerful that to fight it is near hopeless. I hold out hope that the meaning of the scene is that there is a higher power behind all that is good and right even when it shows up in wartime, on a violent palette that at all times tries to cut off and annihilate goodness. The napalm from the heavens is a sign that there is some greater ethics that rewards the followers of Elias and punishes Barnes. The problem, however, is that war is indiscriminate. It spares none. Convenient that in the final pitched battle Barnes and more of his followers fall than adherent of Elias. So while I support the ending message, it contravenes the stark and powerful realism of the rest of Stone's film. I do love this movie, despite the end.

Fidel

2006-11-04T11:52:00.000-05:00

2001

Dir: Estela Bravo (The Cuban Excludables)

Hero worshiping propaganda piece about the long time dictator of Cuba. Not that I am opposed to propaganda; there are plenty of half truths and overgeneralizations on all sides of this particular issue that one more hardly should rankle us. Taken dispassionately, as an argument, this documentary does what most of its kind do; presents the best positive case it can and then conveniently ignores or outright lies about the negatives.

As far as dictators go, Castro is on the more tolerable end. He isn't motivated by race, hasn't slaughtered millions, is not developing chemical weapons or trying to destroy the infidels. In Fidel, we have run of the mill power hunger and political repression. And yet, it is undeniable that he has been on the right side of many international issues. It is his foreign policy that is mostly covered by this documentary. His defense of Angola, his early allegiance with the anti-aparthied cause, and his resitance to right wing regimes in Latin America that were supported by the United States are all the actions of someone who has no political price to pay for standing up to powerful countries. Having the US as an enemy helped him domesticly (what a blessing the embargo was to his stability!), and his patronage by the USSR was guaranteed so long as they were able. Castro had the freedom to become the darling of the international left wing.

This documentary conducts interviews with the usual suspects for Castro praise, Harry Belafonte and Alice Walker and Angela Davies and the like. There are no original Catro interviews here, just snippets of other broadcasts. Essentially, the documentary is a piece of editing, not original film work. The story is coherent, at least, and the pre-revolutionary parts of Castro's life are covered well. But the film is hardly a spellbinding production.

Easily, though, the most interesting part of the film is what is not said. Human rights within Cuba are given about three minutes, perhaps. The film maker acknowledges criticisms of the lack of dissent, the jailing of political prisoners, and the odd fact that a man of the people has rejected democracy for forty years. The responses are two-fold: one, "how can you expect him to be a democrat when the big bad USA is always against him" and two (I kid you not, this is run by Harry Belofonte in the film) "political dissent shouldn't be tolerated in Cuba becuase almost everyone supports Castro." This delicious bit of ironic apologetics is worth watching the documentary for itself. No one hates Castro, and those that do should be locked up because no one hates Casrto.

That segment is a microcosm of the problem with this sort of issue. In a polarized rhetorical setting, you either accept Castro wholeheartedly or completely reject him. You either forgive his intolerable domestic repression or support an embargo on the country. There is no room in this film, or in the world apparently, to both admire his foreign policy and abhor his tactics, to acknowledge his ability to pick a fight but reject his methods of waging it. Fidel is a bad, bad documentary becuase it is unsophisticated. That it reflects our civic discourse is a sad affair.

MAP

AVP: Alien vs. Predator

2006-10-14T14:41:00.000-04:00

2004

Dir: Paul W. S. Anderson (Mortal Kombat; Resident Evil)

I was left out of the great AVP fest in its initial release. And I want to be one of the cool kids. So, On Demand to the rescue. Like the Predator, I have marked my flesh after having won the battle with a most fiendish foe, Paul W. S. Anderson and his deadly weapon of lameness.

It makes sense that the man specializes in video game movies, because this film is a video game narrative. Equip your character, have some training time, and then descend into some sort of dungeon or haunted house or abandoned space station and encounter a series of increasingly powerful monsters, solve puzzles, collect treasure, and then gang up on the big mother monster at the end.

My favorite part of the film? How this ancient pyramid, miles underneath a polar ice cap, is not cold enough that you need a heavy jacket or that we can see your breath. I mean, the most basic scenic element, the freaking cold in the ice palace, is not even done properly. I guess the Predators have a space heater or something. And the purpose behind having the pyramid change configuration every ten minutes escapes me. It seems like a lot of work to build that thing (out of stone, no less, I guess the space age metals they use to build their weapons weren't available, so they made humans cut several thousand tons of rocks and drag them to the pole, dig a giant hole, and build the intricate interlocking pieces to make thousands of configurations there). But if the Predator's know it is going to shift, then what is the advantage?

I know the real reason that Anderson employed that device. Becuase he thought Krull was the best fantasy movie ever, and couldn't wait to employ references to it in AVP. He even has the ornate throwing star/boomerang thing. I kept waiting for a Cyclops and a gay guy in a Robin Hood outfit to swoop in on some fire stallions to save the day. What, Willow was not good enough to rip off, Paul W. S. (meaning, not the good one) Anderson?

What saves this movie from just being boring is the fascinating attempt at anthropology in the script. The Predators had the pyrmaids built. Under an ice cap. As a warrior training camp. Oh, and they are Gods. And the entire history of archaeology couldn't crack that nut. You know what, I love that narrative. It shows the writers were thinking through the plausibility of Alien vs. Predator on Earth. The script meeting must have been: "Hey guys, how is the audience going to buy that the two monsters just happened to show up on the Earth to duke it out? We need to explain how that happened. It'll blow their minds!"

Even the end battle fails to deliver. The Predator essentially becomes Al Harris, all shoulder pads and dreadlocks, unable to beat the Alien without a human's help. This is the guy that took down the Body? The Predators, like the Packers, have really gone down hill.

Thanks, guys. Thanks for making me jealous so that I had to watch this thing. Next time, when you see some piece of crap, just keep it to yourself.

MAP

The Departed

2006-10-12T23:18:00.000-04:00

Director- Martin Scorcese (The Color of Money)

When Martin Scorcese is at the top of his form, few directors can match him. I consider Raging Bull, Goodfellas, and Taxi Driver to be three of my favorite movies of all time. I like these three movies for different yet similar reasons. The first is excellent for its willingness to be overwhelmingly brutally honest about its flawed protagonist. The second is as well done a mob movie as you will find this side of Coppola. And the third is a stirring and frightening tale of urban decay and societal alienation. The Departed is most similar to Goodfellas given the obvious mob link, but I feel there is a little bit of Raging Bull and Taxi Driver in this movie.

This movie was very, very good. The last two Scorcese movies had points to recommend. Daniel Day-Lewis' performance in Gangs of New York was absolutely fabulous, and The Aviator was compelling if somewhat marred by Leonardo DiCaprio's boyish looks. But I can only encourage you strongly to go see this movie. The cast is first rate. Jack Nicholson as mob boss Frank Costello. Ray Winstone as his righthand man. Dicaprio and Matt Damon as moles in the other's respective organizations (the police and mob). The performances are amazing, particularly Nicholson's raucous gangster and Winston'e vicious killer.

But what makes me so adore this movie is how Scorcese respects the audience. He gives us a ton of information in the movie without blatantly pointing it out or noting it. Scorcese makes it clear with a few hints that one character had alcoholic parents, for example, but never comes right out and says it with a big freaking neon sign like so many directors would.

Scorcese also puts together masterful soundtracks. His classic rock music laid throughout Goodfellas was so right, and on this soundtrack he really outdoes himself. There was a moment in this movie late that was so tense, I could not remember feeling so anxious in a movie theater, and this is in no small measure due to the director's skill at picking the right music at the right time.

If there is any bone I had to pick with this movie, I would say there were a few too many climaxes. The third act is relatively long (but does not extend so far as to cause a popular revolt a la Gangs of New York). There is no one scene that has the punch of the series of dead bodies found to Layla in Goodfellas. But this is a quibble. Go see this movie.

In Memoriam: The Crocodile Hunter: Collision Course

2006-10-12T21:35:00.000-04:00

2002

Dir: John Stainton (Crocodile Hunter TV Series; first film)

Every once in a while, I watch a film where the context of viewing overtakes the story itself. For obvious reasons, I sought out Collision Course to have just that sort of experience. Yes, it's a kid's film, an extended version of the TV show, the work of those who are looking to make a quick buck on a franchise. But in this narrow window of history, it is a fantastic time.

It is a fact that Steve Irwin was a tremendous personality, a force that filled the small screen and does a pretty good job commanding the big screen as well. Thankfully, his greatest feature was his combination of enthusiasm with self deprecation. He knows he is a clown, an entertainer that we are laughing even as we admire his courage. So, Irwin thrusts his fingers into crocodile poo and smears it on his shirt, a big grin on his face. But he also holds a snake by its tale and flings it around. Irwin was a showman, a daredevil with an act full of one-liners. I often find myself flipping by his show and watching ten minutes or so. And I pass by lots more stuff than I linger on, so that is worth something.

The parts of the movie that are not directly related to Irwin teasing deadly animals are what you would expect. There are some bad actors playing some bad roles. Some silly humor and some stuff blows up. There is some sort of plot about government secrets that matters very little. One odd note is that inter-agency in-fighting in the American government has become so routine that it even shows up in a kid's movie about Australian crocodile wranglers. If that is not reason for intelligence reform, I don't know what is.

None of that, though, mattered much while I was watching the film. This is well worth tracking down in the near furutre so that you can truly appreciate the irony of Irwin's death. It is at one level obvious; the man who provokes animals for a living died at the hand(tail) of an animal. But in this film, the constant allusions to danger, the admonishments to the audience not to do the very dangerous things he is doing, are so common that the irony of the whole thing overwhelms. It's morbid, it's fascinating, it's creepy.

And I had a great time experiencing it. I guess if entertainment value is why we watch films in the end, then Collision Course delivers. Here is hoping that Steve Irwin is poking dangerous animals with short sticks somwhere in TV heaven. He tempted fate so that we might be moderately entertained. He seemed to enjoy doing it, which is the only way to judge a life.

MAP

The Passion of Joan of Arc

2006-10-11T20:14:00.000-04:00

1928

Dir: Carl Theodor Dreyer (Vampyr; Day of Wrath)

I was a fool to wander and astray
Straight is the gate and narrow the way
Now I have traded the wrong for the right
Praise the Lord, I saw the light.
-Hank Williams (the good one)

My long dark days of prejudice against the silent film are now over. I have seen the light. And no, I have absolutely know problem comparing this film to Biblical revelation; it is that good.

99% of the sound films that I have seen are boring and lifeless compared to this peerless work. More is told in one forlorn look into the camera, one sweep across a set of fat and fatuous judges, one hand woven crown here than in hundreds of pages of script across countless lesser works. The singularity theme is appropriate, for this film is singular in its brilliance.

Maria Falconetti is spellbinding as Joan, the pious and probably insane French girl whose faith and hartred of the occupying English drives her to martyrdom. The film is a courtroom drama of the most famous trial in the history of the Western world that did not involve Jesus, a trumped up charge of witchcraft to justify relieving the church of this bothersome claimant to divine grace. Even for a silent film, the focus on the nuance of the trial, the hypocricy of the questions, and the undetermined faith of the accused pays off in a fascinating examination of the way philsophical categories can be twisted into accusations against the unorthodox.

Dreyer wrings all of the proper lessons out of this historical moment. The conduct of the clergy is familiar and inexcusable, but we see it as only one moment in an enternity of wagon circling and self protection from those who supposedly represent truth and compassion. Politics, business, religion, the family, you name it, you can recognize what these particular priests are doing; protecting their own authority from the bold and popular challenger.

Mind you, all of the lessons are told visually. The text is minimal, after all. The film is shot almost entirely in close-up. The faces, especially the mercurial Falconetti, convey so much information. The restoration on the print (found in a Norwegian insance asylum after it was thought to be lost) is impeccable, the best looking silent film I have ever seen. Dreyer controls his camera so well, making sweeping shots and movements that seem decades ahead of his time. This is what silent film acting and directing should be; a supreme focus on conveying information with facial expression, gesture, and blocking. No one I have ever seen has understood this like Dreyer does in this film.

The Passion of Joan of Arc is a perfect storm of powerful material, deep and insightful writing, brilliant acting and visionary directing. It stands up to any film made today both technically and as entertainment. I really was thrilled by watching it. It was not silent films that I did not like, it was obsolete and dated filmmaking. Dreyer was ahead of his time, a virtuoso who has made an essential film. BME.

MAP

The Woodsman

2006-10-11T19:38:00.000-04:00

2004

Dir: Nicole Kassell (First film)

Gutsy film dancing around the edges of a sympathetic view of a child molester. Kevin Bacon, after his release from prison, gets a job and tries to assimilate back into the normal world. He takes up with Kyra Sedgwick, an outcast who herself wrestles with the effects of past abuse. Over the film, Bacon must try to resist the temptation to repeat his crimes and maneuver an outraged and impatient set of peers.

This is the sort of film I am predisposed to like, because it tells a story that I haven't seen before. In order to avoid the facile qualities of an after school special, the script finds places for us to identify with and care about the deeply flawed protagonist. Indeed, the entire cast seems to share the scars that he has inflicted, on one end or the other. The ubiquity of tragedy throughout the film makes everything feel dirty and dark. The whole world is screwed up, and people like Bacon are on one end and we are on the other. But everyone is a part of it.

Bacon's performance is very good for its understatement, the sort of thing Philip Seymour Hoffman is perfect at. Bacon's character is the ultimate introvert, hiding his shame and his demons from the rest of us. He blissfully resists the temptation to overact. The supporting cast is even stronger, though. Sedgwick is tough as nails, and Benjamin Bratt is rather good too as Bacon's sympathetic yet skeptical brother-in-law. But the supporting show is stolen by Mos Def as the philosophical detective who has his eye on Bacon. His lines are nice, but he gives them a tremendously mysterious quality, a real depth beneath his reflections on temptation and evil that were quite thrilling to watch. He has some real talent.

The film, while full of good points, fails to really pay off in the way that would make it essential. And I am not sure how it could. The subject matter is so inexplicable, so raw and real in the lives of so many, that the film cannot really offer any solution. The film's answer lies in an identification between the two ends of the crime, a recognition of the other that causes a hesitation of one's own compulsion. But I didn't need this film to tell me that. The movie does showcase the too often ignored and yet rampant phenomenon of sibling/sibling molestation, an important twist of focus from grubby uncles in dirty overcoats that should be applauded.

We will not punish a film because its story is ambitious. The writing, directing, and especially the acting are solid all around. And the theme of the project is a very important one, as society continues to elevate the protection of children above all other goals. The Woodsman makes this issue more complex, a welcome nuance to the Nancy Grace/Mark Foley approach to the problem that currently dominates out national discourse.

MAP

Days of Heaven

2006-10-09T15:06:00.000-04:00

1978

Dir: Terrence Malick (Badlands; The Thin Red Line; The New World)

There are some films that one is too young to understand. When I first saw this film, who knows how many years ago, it left no real impression. I was learning film, and Malick was a name to explore, move on to the next one. But now, with the moderate amount of life experience that I can now claim, Days of Heaven opens like a flower, brilliant and filling all the senses, a near perfect spectacle and perhaps the most beautifully shot film I have ever seen. This time, there was a mark.

The minimalism of the dialogue and plot mask fathoms of wisdom and insight in the story. Richard Gere and Brooke Adams are migrant farm workers, who show up at Sam Shepard's farm with young Linda, Gere's sister, in tow. They hatch a scheme, where Adams will marry Shepard in order that the secret couple might live off of his money. But the heart is fickle, Adams is torn between the two, and the whole plot unravels, taking the characters with them. Highly allegorical, the plot would make a fine novel, dwelling on the interior psychology of the characters.

But Malick has no lofty chapters to expose those feelings. He has his camera. And to what ends does he use it. I have never, hands down, in my life seen a film with more beautiful shots of the sky. Every scene seems to be filmed at that exact three minute window near the dusk when the colors of the sunset are most vibrant. The Texas panhandle's infintie horizon features giant panorama's of color, cloud, and light. The characters live their lives under the umbrella of the atmosphere, a bid to the insignificance of any one story and yet the universality of it at the same time. Nature abound in the film, animals and vegetation forever the backdrop for the actions of the characters, themselves not as impervious as they think from the instinctual and predetermined motivations of the beasts and the plants.

Of particular interest is Malick's narrator, the young Linda Manz who exudes complete authenticity as the world wise young girl. Her dialogue is uncannily right, both for her character and for the contemplative tone of the film. Simple yet profound, plain yet poetic, she tells us all we need to know about the characters. As their actions unfold, Malick supplements her narration with plenty of symbolism, so that the meaning of the film richly unfolds in suprising and compelling ways.

Malick's work here was quite simply awesome. It was like going to an art mueseum. Truly beautiful and moving. A tremendous experience, to be approached with appropriate sensitivity, pantience, and enough taste to meet the skills of the filmmaker.

BME

MAP

Love and Death

2006-10-09T13:15:00.000-04:00

1975

Dir: Woody Allen (Husbands and Wives; Annie Hall; Crimes and Misdemeanors; Manhattan; Deconstructing Harry; Hannah and Her Sisters)

Odd little Allen film, a comedy set in Russia during the Napoleonic wars. While the setting is period, the humor is classic Allen, transporting his brand of philosophical and psychoanalytic verbal humor and physical comedy without too much translation for the setting. While the film is funny, the redundancy of the writing puts Love and Death back among the pack of Allen's early comedies.

Allen is a waifish pacifict who is forced into fighting for Russia after Napoleon invades. He is in love with Diane Keaton, who in turn pines for his older, more brutish brother. Through the standard comedy set of plot points, Allen and Keaton make a bid to assasinate Napoleon. The signature of the film are a series of philosophical discussions about good and evil, the nature of love, ethics, and metaphysics. They are humorous, but I do think Allen goes to the well a few times too often to ensure the premise is kept fresh. There are allusions to Russian literature that lend a satisfying sense of recognition to those who have read their Dostoevsky, and the philosophical jokes are learned enough that it is safe to call the film intellectual.

However, the humor drops off quite a bit in the second half as the novelty wears off. In many ways, the film feels experimental. Allen is playing around with the genre that he did more than anyone else to resurrect, the screwball comedy. While Bananas was less intellectual, and Sleeper broader and more physical, both were also funnier than Love and Death. It is easy to see Allen's decision to leave screwball behind and write more sophisticated, character driven comedies in the 80's. He is looking for something deeper here, but does not really deliver it.

The film is fair. For Allen completists (like myself) only.

MAP

Syriana

2006-10-09T11:09:00.000-04:00

2005

Dir: Stephen Gaghan (Abandon)

Paul makes a Godfather II comparison to this film in his previous review. I cannot be sure that his suggestion did not bury itself in my mind when I read that in December, but it was nice to find that I was thinking the same thing when watching Syriana.

I probably think that Syriana does not get as close to that work of genius than either Paul or Ron do, however. The subject matter is essential, the acting (especially Clooney, Damon less so) is solid, and the script is both complicated yet understandable. But in the end, I think the thematic approach of the script is a little too easy. Corporations are corrupt is such a trite message that it wears thin on me; children's movies routinely feature the meme! Yes, it is true, and yes, there are lots of people who do not quite get it. But in terms of my personal aesthetic and persuasive experience with a political movie, I want a little more analysis than just "oil men will do whatever it takes to get money."

Much more interesting than that was the examination of the Arab side of the equation. The internal power stuggles between the reform minded, forward looking brother and the cautious, conservative, and religiously minded heir apparent did much to add nuance to what is so often seen as a monolithic culture. The public relations angles, the brief scenes of the regular citizens of the country, the tension between traditional values like the unquestioned authority of the father and the needs to adapt (economically and politically and socially) to wealth and Westernization were well thought out and engaging.

Less engaging by far were the limp attempts to bring all of these machinations home to the families of the American pawns. The crying wife and the disaffected children are mechanical, formulaic, and in this case poorly done (I never liked Amanda Peet anyway). Add to that what I found to be the gratuitous child death scene, mere shock in a bid for emotional impact, and I just was not moved. Here is a screenwriting tip: if you kill a child and I don't even know their name, let alone anything about them, that is gratuitous. It's a bid to generate sympathy for Matt Damon through the instrumentality of a kid's drowning. It is both lazy and manipulative.

And that is why Syriana has good parts but gets nowhere near Godfather II. In that piece of genius, the family struggles are just as compelling, just as lovingly crafted and intricate as the almost impossibly complicated political themes. Almost impossibly, because there is a difference between smarter-than-me and confused. There is also a difference between moving and shocking. Godfather II is the former on both counts; Syriana has too much simplicity and not enough heart to rise that far.

MAP

The Science of Sleep

2006-10-02T23:37:00.000-04:00

Director- Michel Gondry (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind)

What a great movie. Really, really fabulous. An interrogation of the subconscious, sleep, and the way that relationships create in all of us a double consciousness and anxiety about what we are doing and thinking. This movie is pushed as a sort of escapism but in ways I think it is very, very real. It lays bare the neuroses, anxieities, and fears of anyone who is figuring out that they are in love and are deeply afraid of what that may cause.

Gael Garcia Bernal plays Stephane, and Charlotte Gainsbourg plays Stephanie (note the subtle paralellism). Stephane has just moved back to Paris from Mexico to take a job laying glue and type in a boring office. The work is incredibly lame to Stephane, who spends his down time drawing colorful pictures of disasters to represent every month of the year for a calendar called "Disasterology". At night Stephane dreams colorful, blazing, and amazing dreams of telling off his boss, flying through the air, and a host of other imagery that could come only from the subsconsious.

Stephane means Stephanie when he moves into his new place in Paris. Stephanie is renting from his mother. The two have a connection- besides the names, they can come together in flashes of artisitic creativity where they both strongly enjoy each other's company. But Stephane's detatchment from reality proves a barrier to his relationship with Stephanie. He also has a dysfunctional relationship with his mother and colorful relations with his workmates (the best of whom is played by Alain Chabat in a delightfully dirty turn).

The film is very sweet, and moving in a way. I urge everyone to go see it. The paralells between Stephane and Stephanie helped to remind me of the constant dual anxiety that goes along with dating and relationships- the paranoia that your date will not meet you for coffee, the fear that they will hold a single gaffe against you so much that it wil destroy the relationship, and the emotional difficulty of opening yourself up to loss. The stunning visuals were an accoutrement, not a distraction, to this great movie.

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari

2006-09-30T13:01:00.000-04:00

1920

Dir: Robert Wiene (Raskolnikov; Panic in Chicago; A Night in Venice)

At the behest of a reader, I watched this classic of silent horror hoping for more than I had found in Nosferatu. And I did. Not enough to really enjoy the film, mind you (my irrational prejudices and poverty of taste continues to control the silent movie experience). But there was a richness of detail to the production of the film that I can say its high reputation is more deserved.

The set design is the hands down triumph of the film. The expressionist trends in art at the time get faithful adaptation here. The buildings, for example, slant at odd angles, with windows and doors in the shapes of trapezoids and right triangles. Furniture is out of proportion, such as the high stools that government clerks sit on so that they have to lean forward to reach down to their desktops, twisted in tension creating pretzels. The sets feel like they were for a Kafka play, adding an artificiality and discord to every single scene that is very effective. A lot of detail and attention went into creating the environment for this movie, and many of the frames could hang in museums. Think Munch. Really good stuff.

Everything else about the film is dated and silly. The plot has something to do with psychological hysteria, where a shrink takes a guy who sleeps all the time and manipulates his mind to make a killing machine. But the killer is also horny, so he goes after the girl. I am sure this was all too shocking back in the day, but now it is just incoherent. The acting is acceptable, I guess. Caligari is creepy, and the sleeping guy does some nice stuff with his eyes. But there are significant pockets of dead time when the two aren't on the screen.

This really isn't a horror movie. It is an excuse to utilize the fascinating sets that Wiene had built. I could have looked at those for an hour and just skipped the acting, writing, and story.

But at least now I can say that I have seen the thing.

MAP

In Memoriam: Gilda

2006-09-26T18:33:00.000-04:00

1946

Dir: Charles Vidor (Hans Christian Anderson; The Joker is Wild; Rhapsody)

Glenn Ford passed recently. One of those incredibly prolific character actors with lead talent, Ford was a favorite of mine from Blackboard Jungle. Gilda was cited often at the time of his death as another gem.

The mass media, in this case, was correct. Gilda is great, a very fun and darkly sexual noir that has quite enough banter and flirtation to thoroughly entertain. Ford is a down and out hustler who hooks on with an Argentinian casino owner. When the boss brings how a new wife, who happens to be the bitter ex-lover of Ford, the stage is set for some complicated machinations. The fact that Rita Hayworth plays the bombshell certainly does nothing to detract from the viewing experience. After all, she gave good face, and lots of other good stuff too.

The plot is the weak point of the film, involving some dumb scheme to corner the tungsten market and some ex-Nazis and other weirdness. It makes little sense. But the dialogue is full of good lines and euphemisms. The star of the show is the sexual tension between Hayworth, Ford, and George Macready. Those folks can act, and the dance between them is very fun. The dark turn that the movie takes about 2/3 through provides an interesting twist on what could have been a very trite plot, even if it does get silly at the end.

A movie like this is what American cinema does well. A high entertainment ratio, an accessible set of characters and a sense of mood that is quite satisfying. I really enjoyed Gilda, and am glad to have celebrated the life of Glenn Ford by viewing it.

MAP

Breathless

2006-09-21T19:49:00.000-04:00

1960

Dir: Jean-Luc Godard (Alphaville)

I don't think Godard and I are going to get along. Sure, he's an OK guy and all. I certainly can see where other people would really like him. But there is just something about him that, well, bores me. I am sure it is my fault, that I am not giving him a chance. Too many people like that guy for me to be correct. And yet, I can't say that I would go out of my way to have a beer with the guy.

Breathless is one of those minimalist character studies of the stoic hood that has been done real well before, but here becomes so stripped down and sparse that it failed to grip my attention. A cop killer and otherwise bad guy woos an initally innocent American newspaper girl in Paris. At first just a fling, she soon is wrapped in his dangerous and cold lifestyle, forced to choose between joining his doomed fate or abandoning adventure.

People love this movie. But I found the plodding nature of the unfolding relationship tedious (God, I sound like those people I hate that just can't get into a film unless stuff blows up or some boobs are prominent in the first twenty minutes!). Godard was much more philosophical in Alphaville, where at least aphorisms gave me something to chew on amidst the lean plot. But here, the meaning is supposed to come from thigs like 20 minute scenes of the couple smoking in bed, the theif demanding sex and the girl being coy. I just didn't buy her with him. Now, the seduction of a dangerous lifestyle is easier to buy, and certainly the movie is at its height as she wrestles with her self destructive and youthful desire to live as this cold blooded killer does. But Godard's overall approach to that worthwhile subject is so detached and implied that even a somewhat savvy filmgoer like myself felt ignored by the movie.

I really didn't like Breathless. I wonder if I am flawed, or the others are pretentious. I am sure I will give Godard another look, invite him out for another drink. But I wouldn't be surprised if I walk out in the middle.

MAP

Husbands and Wives

2006-09-11T12:01:00.000-04:00

1992

Dir: Woody Allen (Annie Hall; Crimes and Misdemeanors; Manhattan; Deconstructing Harry; Hannah and Her Sisters)

Yet another masterpiece of drama from one of cinema's true greats. The deep introspection of the man is on full display here, the final film he would make with by that his ex-wife Mia Farrow. When that couple works through its on-screen relationship (permit me the obvious and constant allusion), it is just like Bergman working through his affair with Liv Ullmann. The tragic flaws of Allen's persona in Deconstructing Harry are here in a milder form, but still showing Allen's increasing frankness with himself.

Six characters predominate. Allen and Farrow are a couple who are forced to examine their marriage after the sudden divorce of their friends, played by Judy Davis and Sydney Pollack. Now that man has some talent; he is great as the stifled and lecherous Jack. Davis as well plays her role with gusto, anrgy and vulnerable and neurotic and yet defiant and strong at the same time. Liam Neeson is OK but not particularly noteworthy, unlike Juliette Lewis in what must easily be her best work as a nymphette who stands as the ultimate temptation for the self destructive Allen.

Lewis has one scene in particular that is among the best of Allen's oeuvre. She has read Allen's manuscript, and is getting up the courage to critique his sexual politics. During a cab ride, the conversation is presented in snippets, the camera continually in close up on her face (ahem, Bergman again). The editing shows us the arc of the conversation in fits and starts, drawing our attention to the changes over time. That cab ride could have taken 5 minutes or 1 hour, we do not know, but we do know that Lewis travelled miles as a woman. The scene's courage, technique, writing and acting are exemplary, the sort of thing I would show in a class about film.

In another jarring scene, Pollack feels compelled to leave a party after his young girlfriend embarasses him among his intellectual friends. A fight ensues, and the thing is real and thrilling that it is almost painful to watch. Masters at the top of their craft across the board.

Allen uses a pseudo-documentary device, having a camera crew interview his actors in character about each other and the development of the story. He almost goes overboard with these things at times, but once again his talent is so strong that they still seem natural. Like Bergman before him (hat trick!), the man is inventive but always in the interests of developing story, not gimmicky or for the sake of cleverness alone.

Husbands and Wives often slips through the cracks of the Allen cult. It shouldn't; I loved the film and give it my highest recommendation.

MAP

Annie Hall

2006-09-10T11:54:00.000-04:00

1978 Oscar Winner Best Picture, Actress, Writing and Direction

Dir: Woody Allen (Crimes and Misdemeanors; Manhattan; Deconstructing Harry; Hannah and Her Sisters)

I have seen this film many times. It is screamingly funny, piercingly insightful, and above all groundbreaking in technique and storytelling. And yet, compared with some of the later Allen films that I have seen in the last year (see links above), this may be the first time I have seen Annie Hall and been somewhat underwhelmed. Now, this is relative; it went from best romantic comedy ever to just a really, really great film. But this viewing impressed on me the power of tradgedy (or at least more dramatic themes) to move an audience beyond that which more pure comedy can.

The star, far and away, is the script, so innovative in composition, device and storytelling. The asides, the use of irony and transperancy are all now pretty standard humor techniques. But Annie Hall pioneered them. Bergman's deconstruction of the medium is on diplay here, as Allen speaks directly to the audience and features the role of dramatic representation in the story line itself. Allen's acting is great, and Diane Keaton is certainly iconic (if overwrought) as Annie. But when Allen starts to narrate his feelings to passers-by on the street, asking them for advice about his relationship, it is easy to forget just how transgressive that is for a film. Allen is kitchen sinking the script with every device he can think of, and the product is a near perfect feat of writing.

This film was a springboard for Allen to more fully realize his vision in Manhattan, and throughout the 80's his films acheived some startling successes of observation of human relationships. Annie Hall is a transition film between the early screwball comedies and the more adult works to follow. It is the work of a genius, mind you, but a young one.

MAP

Crimes and Misdemeanors

2006-09-09T14:30:00.000-04:00

1990

Dir: Woddy Allen (Manhattan; Deconstructing Harry; Hannah and Her Sisters)

Allen interprets Crime and Punishment in this dark, funny, and brilliant film. Martin Landau has a dilemma when his mistress (Angelica Huston) becomes increasingly unstable. Meanwhile, Allen plays a jealous documentary maker who resents his brother-in-law's success as a producer of television drivel. Both story lines explore the underbelly of human behavior more directly that Allen had in the past, and the result is in many ways his most mature and profound work.

While Landau underwhelms in his performance, Huston more than makes up for it as the jilted and honest Dolores. We cannot help but simultaneously sympathize with and fear her, just as Landau's character feels guilt and yet yearns for her to just go away. His solution is obvious for those who know their literature. But it is Allen's attitude toward Landau's actions in the last third of the movie that makes Crimes and Misdemeanors so profound. At the end of the film, we are not sure whether Landau has committed the former or the latter.

That story line is contrasted with a heartbreaking little love story between Allen and Mia Farrow, with Alan Alda as the pompous nemesis to our awkward hero. Allen's Cliff Stern is shy and boyish in a way that many of his other characters were not, a quality that allows us to care about him more than the more cynical people he has played in the past. This plot takes its own, more ordinary dark turn. When Allen and Landau finally come together at the end of the film, the spectrum of bad deeds, and the connections between them, is brought to our attention in a very insightful way. It is an exhilirating moment.

This is clearly one of Allen's most learned scripts, with religious, philosophical and literary allusions and themes permeating the dialogue. While also very entertaining, Allen has several deep points to make here. The film is an important document, near the top of the man's catalogue. My highest recommendation.

MAP

The Adventures of Pluto Nash

2006-09-06T15:36:00.000-04:00

2002

Dir: Ron Underwood (City Slickers)

Dare I say it? Not as bad as I was lead to believe Eddie Murphy science fiction vehicle. Now, I'm not saying Pluto Nash is a good film, far from it. But I was expecting something to rival Battlefield: Earth in the badness category. The film's reputation comes from its box office (100 million to produce, 4.4 million US box office) and its infamous stint sitting on the studio shelf. But there are worse movies made very year in Hollywood, with just as many big time actors.

The faults do shine through, however. The script is obvious and leaden. The plot is pointless (I know, lets do a futuristic movie, but the plot will be the most formulaic mob story line we can think of). You could have done the same story in Tokyo or New York or Des Moines or Mars. And the twist at the end, incorporating cloning, is so laughably wrong on the science and behind the times on our understanding of that procedure that many people should have been fired for it. Pluto Nash actually goes to the old "which one is the good Eddie Murphy, I can't tell. Shoot him . . . No, shoot him!" well but without a trace of the irony that has made that device continually popular. This thing is hopeless as a story that it should by all rights have never been made.

And yet, Pluto Nash has redemptive elements. The set design reflects the budget, and it at least provides some interesting details and very slightly creative elements. I have always been a sucker for Murphy as an actor, and his screen presence is not objectionable. Rosario Dawson is actually not too bad (and beautiful). But Randy Quaid has a bad character and makes it worse, playing a robot like I did when I was six. And someone please stop giving Jay Mohr acting roles, please.

Actually, Pluto Nash fails on all accounts. It is a bad movie, but it is also not so bad that it is a fun movie. Its place in the honor roll of terrible films is underserved; that list should be for bad movies that are worth watching. This is just a regular bad movie, deserving a place with your average Cube Gooding Jr or Sharon Stone film.

MAP

In Memoriam: City Slickers

2006-08-28T15:30:00.000-04:00

1991

Dir: Ron Underwood (Tremors; Mighty Joe Young; The Adventures of Pluto Nash; In the Mix)

Bruno Kirby has passed on. While a verteran character actor, it is undeniable he is best known for two roles in mass appeal comedies, When Harry Met Sally and this film. I was reminded that, while everyone saw City Slickers when it came out, I had not revisted the film for many years. What greeted me was an exceptional "feel good" film, intelligent and heart warming that showcases the abilities of actors like Kirby when given the room to act.

City Slickers was a lot more thoughtful that I remembered, and probably more than I could appreciate on first viewing. The emasculation of the Baby Boomers was a big deal back then, often directed in the "Angry White Man" syndrome portrayed in Falling Down. Nowadays, the pendulum has swung the other way toward the feminization of men in the "Metrosexual" movement. City Slickers bears the mark of a generation, raised in the safe envrions of the 50's, reaching mid-life and finding themselves trapped in family and middle management.

That backdrop provides the motivation for a good old-fashioned underdog story, pretty much a sports film forumla transferred to a Western setting. The script is by Babaloo Mandel and Lowell Ganz, a favorite team of mine responsible as well for A League of Their Own, Gung Ho, Night Shift, and the supremely funny Spies Like Us. City Slickers is their most accessible script, with an emotional range that brings in all kinds of various audiences. The catch phrase humor and one-liners is backed with emotional dialogue that may lack subtlty but undeniably accomplishes its goal. Underwood's incessant orchestral score, swelling on cue when men reveal their feelings to one another, tells us exactly what to fell and on what lines to feel it.

For a Western, the movie does feel strangely claustrophobic, failing to make full use of the vistas of Southern Colorado. The secondary characters accompanying our protagonists on the trail, the dentists, the ice cream moguls, and the lonely woman, are all completely superfluous, especially the young black dentist who teases that race will be an issue and then safely gets ignored for the rest of the film. A cutting room casuality for that story line, I wager.

The film rests entirely on four actors. Jack Palance took home a "lifetime acheivement" Oscar as Curly, a performance I admit didn't strike me as particularaly special after further review. He plays old and grizzled, which he is so it's no big deal. The writing carries the day there, a satisfyingly complex archetype of traditional masculinty. But a bunch of veteran actors could have done it just as well, believe it or not. Billy Crystal, never one of my favorite actors, has perfect comedic timing but little acting chops in my mind. He gets laughs and keeps scenes moving, but never delivers emotional impact.

The stand outs, both in writing and acting, are Daniel Stern and Kirby as Crystal's friends. Each is called on to fully develop a troubled character and work through real personal crises in the course of the film. Each embodies a particular aspect of the male persona, and the actors understand their roles. Stern has real talent, and Kirby plays out of type, supremely confident but with lots of pent up anger.

The script is very good at getting us to empathize with these characters, and then puts a real challenge in front of them. That sort of rooting interest is the bread and butter of the feel good movie, and I must admit that watching City Slickers made me feel good. It is genuinely funny, heartwarming if manipulative, but also intelligent and well thought out. This is the sort of film you watch with the folks on Thanksgiving, a movie that stands near the top of its genre.

MAP

Little Miss Sunshine

2006-08-27T13:30:00.000-04:00

Director- Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris

The "Road Movie" is a rather archetypical sort of movie. Motley assorted crew travels on a quest for some Sword or Ring or whatever and eventually through the process come to know that what really matters is not that object, but themselves and the differences and bonds they have shared through their journey and various and sundry misfortunes that befall them on the voyage.

It would be a stretch to say that many of the characters in this movie end up being closer as a result of their shared journey. Many of them still possess the same reflections and angers they possess at the beginning of the movie (many of them are, after all, quite deserved). But they do know themselves better and I think for this movie thats what is important, because the message it delivers interpersonally is so clearly about how to behave better as an individual, not how to force others to behave differently or to criticize them for doing so.

The conceit of the film is simple: Little Olive has managed to get into the finals of the regional Little Miss Sunshine contest, a beauty pageant for young girls. Because of a host of circumstances, the entire family must pile into an old VW touring van and head from New Mexico up to California. The cast of characters are Abigail Breslin as Olive, Greg Kinnear as Richard (a failing self-help guru), Toni Collete as Sheryl, the matriarch holding it all together, Steve Carell as Frank, a suicidal Proust scholar, Paul Dano as Dwayne, the son so smitten with German nihilism he does not speak, and Alan Arkin as Richard's father.

The acting in this film is pitch perfect. Really hilarious and well done stuff. Carell in particular is an absolute revelation. He takes the "aw shucks" sarcasm he used to great effect in The 40 Year Old Virgin and amplifies it with a sharper edge. Alan Arkin is pretty much the most hilarious grandpa of all time, with a totally dirty mind. But he also is the only character who really makes time to care for a develop a relationship with Olive.

Kinnear's self-help quack is not very likeable. He is always telling everyone right and wrong, but not in a fascist way. A good scene is where Richard tries to moralize about Olive ordering ice cream. He implies that eating ice cream will make you fat not by stating it outright but with a condescending syllogistic call and answer with Olive, who pushes her ice cream away afterwards. He is just a jerk and the worst kind, one who claims to have all the answers.

Sheryl and Dwayne are in some sense the more controlled character, resigned to the utter insanity that is the family. Sheryl is near a breaking point because she's worked the hardest to keep everything together and it still might not work. Dwayne hates his family like any good cinematic teenager. His refusal to speak because of a certain anti-semitic German philosopher is one of the film's most hilarious aspects.

I want to hold off (mostly) on being a pretentious grad student about this movie. I want to champion it for its simple pleasures. It was hilarious. It made me laugh a lot. The acting was superb. Every single Alan Arkin rant in this movie is worth the price of admission. The movie was also dealing with some seriously heavy material. Suicide, drug addiction and pedophilia are just three of the main topics of this film's conversation. Yet each one of them in some way will be made to be absolutely hilarious.

The only "academic" thought I have right now on the movie is this- like The Catcher in the Rye this is a text which attacks phonies. Like Nietzche it has no tolerance for people whose systems of morality or worldviews have unerringly corrupted their souls. The most intolerable characters in the movie are the ones who attempt to fit everything that occurs into their own little boxes of understanding, whether its Richard's self-help crap fest or an overly uptight registration attendant at the beauty pageant. I hesitate to say any more, because I really do not know my Nietzche, but the fact that dancing plays a strong role in combating the sinister social forces the drive uptight behavior seems to me to be clearly speaking to particular passages I had read once upon a time.

Do go see this movie. It will do you right.

Shame

2006-08-23T15:06:00.000-04:00

1968

Dir: Ingmar Bergman (The Passion of Anna; Autumn Sonata; The Magic Flute; Hour of the Wolf; Persona; Scenes From a Marriage; The Virgin Spring; Cries and Whispers; Fanny and Alexander; Wild Strawberries)

Bergman does a film about war, and Ron wallows in his own shame. How sad it must be for him that the director can make such relevant and interesting films and yet Ron's puny intellect cannot fathom them? I won't repeat the phrase that he recently used in an email to me in reference to Bergman, but take my word that it speaks to Ron's poverty of the soul.

How can Shame be simultaneouly one of the best studies of war I have ever seen and yet not quite up to par with the rest of the man's catalogue? Well, being an unparalelled genius has something to do with it. Max von Sydow stands in for all of us as a civil war at first strips him of his identity and then recasts him in cruelty and hatred. Without a doubt this is the most angry and violent Bergman film I have seen. It is also the most political. But since the subject is the universal experience of war on the human psyche, it is not an anti-Vietnam or anti-fascist film per se. He deftly keeps the political persuasions of the two sides in the conflict in the dark. The common people have no ideological stake in the outcome; they are simply caught between two cruel and indiscriminate armies who both use terror and death to acheive their aims. The ending scenes are indelible, cold and harsh and real and poetic and tragic, using imagery alone to showcase the effect of war on humanity.

As if often the case with him, Bergman uses an interpersonal relationship to highlight larger points. The disintegrating marriage of von Sydow and Liv Ullmann is the result of loss of masculinity. von Sydow cowers and cries at the slightest criticism, is unable to use his hands to fix things or kill animals for food. He breaks down under the weight of the looming conflict. Once the war comes to his house, he finds that parties have taken sexual possession of his wife. At that point, the man is remade, a cold and selfish killer. This is a cycle of violence narrative at its most artistic and compelling, a psychological study like only this genius can articulate.

And yet, for all of these high points, I was not as moved by Shame as many of the man's other works. I think it is a product of the subject matter. I have seen this theme explored many times before; never in this way, mind you, and never with this skill, but the emasculating effects of violence are familiar ground. Bergman's other great works have a novelty to them that combines with his skill (and those of the actors) to create genuinely unique and exciting films. In Shame, Bergman stands with other giants in solidarity around a common Orwellian theme.

This is not a reason to avoid the film, of course. Shame, like all other Bergman films, is essential viewing and an expression of human truth. No self resepcting student of cinema can avoid it. The fact that some on this blog express so much ignorant malice toward the man is a hallmark of how often so-called intellectuals fail to profess anything of importance.

MAP

Equinox

2006-08-23T12:38:00.000-04:00

1970

Dir: Jack Woods (only film)

When Criterion talks, I listen.

This release is testament to that company's dedication to cinema. Equinox is essentially a backyard monster movie from a bunch of teenagers. Now, one of the those teenagers was Dennis Muren, who would goi on to be the greatest special effects man of all time. Star Wars, ET, Return of the Jedi, Young Sherlock Holmes, The Abyss, T2, Jurassic Park, Twister, AI, Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, War of the Worlds, even Willow!

Let's get everything but the effects out of the way. This film looks like it was filmed by a bunch of teenagers in their back yard (coincidence?). The acting, sets, direction, editing, and writing are all tragic. We are talking Village of the Giants bad, Teenagers from Outer Space Bad. And the plot has something to do with Satan, but Satan is a park ranger who seems hopelessly bad at killing people.

This movie has acheived cult status, and Criterion's homage, because of the monsters. Severalkmonster scenes look as good as anything in a Hercules or Sinbad movie. Now, I'm not saying it looks great, but you do have to marvel at what was possible from amatuers with commercially available technology. The spirit of homemade moviemaking is here, and even amidst the painful aspects of the film there is a sense of wonder at the medium.
Juxtaposed to their other cinematic talents, the special effects here seem mercurial. It is difficult not to be attracted to that kind of model making (who didn't like Clash of the Titans?). In a time of cinematic experimentation, when technology was finally available to let the masses create their own movies (pre-internet youtube), this aspect of film deserves recognition as an examplar of folk art.

The movie is only of interest to devoted monster movie buffs, Criterion completists, or those interested in the history of special effects. It is not worth your time, expect to say that you have seen it, and maybe to reconnect with the mass appeal of the medium.

MAP

Metallica: Some Kind of Monster

2006-08-22T12:11:00.000-04:00

2004

Dirs: Joe Berlinger (Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2) & Bruce Sinofksy

It is absolutely impossible for me to be objective about this rockumentary. Metallica stands in for so much bad taste and misplaced teen anger in my mind. It is complete prejudice and subjective attitude, I grant. No doubt this band is/was very good at capturing the type of adolescent experience that millions of disaffected white lower and middle class folks thought was very authentic at the time. 'Man, the world is so phony" Holden Caulfield angst translated into dark imagery and songs about being pissed off played very loud through unison guitar/bass/drum riffs just never did it for me. My depressing music is rural, acoustic, agrarian, full of resignation not rage. No doubt they say the same things about my "'profound" music.

Getting that off of my chest allows me to approach this film on its own terms. And it turns out that we get the world's biggest episode of reality television, a VH1 show that features unrivaled access, pop psychology, and a pretty interesting story of the dissintegration of multi-millionare prima donnas who find their power slipping away. Metallica is facing the prospect of a "comeback," the transition from most popular band to an MTV Icon where the industry fetes what once was. But the band is still working, even if it is fraying apart in terms of membership and psyche. The best parts of the film are the extended examinations of the creative process, the nuts and bolts of writing songs while still protecting your own turf and ego within a group of overpraised and undertalented pop musicians.

Unable to get along with each other, the record label hires a "performance coach," essentially a babysitter who makes the band members avoid killing each other. I traced the root of the problem to the fact that the band never had any real talent, and now trying to reproduce their marketability is proving increasingly difficult as taste passes them by. When the lead singer checks himself into rehab, the film becomes about the struggle to maintain themselves personally in the face of both fame and failure while cutting their new album.

Like the B celebrity shows that litter the airwaves today, Some Kind of Monster succeedes from its ability to access the irony of the viewer. I guess there are die-hard Metallica fans out there that will consider this a groundbreaking examination of some musical geniuses, but I found myself smiling throughout at the seriousness of the band, the emotional stakes involved in creating angry but still slight pop music, and the machinations that were required to get this album made.

Sure, I enjoyed myself. It was worth watching, and certainly moved me to consider things that I would not have otherwise. That those things were not the filmmakers intent is inconsequential; the author is dead and I will take read films however I wish.

MAP

Transamerica

2006-08-18T09:50:00.000-04:00

2005

Dir: Duncan Tucker (first feature film)

There is so, so much right with this movie. Sometimes, people with money also have talent and vision. So when William Macy executive produces an off beat, heartfelt and clearly inspired script for his wife to take on one dynamite role, you get artistic filmmaking as it is supposed to work. The machine did not spit this one out. A gem.

Transamerica reminds one of Alexander Payne, an About Schmidt take on gender identity. Felicity Huffman is a preoperative transsexual, a man who learns on the eve of her surgery that she had fathered a son years ago. The pronoun dissonance in that last sentence may stand in as the theme of the whole film. It is carefully thought out, nuanced and insightful. So nuanced, in fact, that what could easily have been a slam dunk and boring rejection of intolerance becomes a very complicated exploration of the panoply of difficult issues surrounding sexual identity and practice. Our lead is a bad person, really, stifled by years of self denial and societal contempt. Her son is himself a product of a confused and destructive sexual milieu. The various people encountered on the road themselves hold believable attitudes that challenge the audience's own understanding of tolerance and liberation. Each character is full portrait, an exciting amalgamation of intent and action.

Kevin Zegers pays the wayward son as it should be, with juvenile pain and teenage resistance. Never properly weaned, this man-child can both be worldly and hopelessly childish, a fascinating performance in a brilliant characterization. But of course the story is Huffman. Her performance shifts from the feminine pantomime of a man struggling to become something else to occasional relapses into heady masculinity when stress overwhelms her ability to concentrate on passing. The performance is spot on throughout, a revelation of what talent and freedom can accomplish together.

The story is surprisingly humorous and offbeat. The subject could easily have become maudlin or soapy, but the dry humor and cynicism about the world relax the tensions of the audience and invites them in. Even the confrontations with the unfeeling or bigoted or selfish are wry, eliciting shoulder shrugs and shaken heads more than anger. It is a perfect creative move, exploding the pallete of feelings that the film conveys.

Like the last movie I viewed, there is a sense of contrivance to the narrative. I would have liked some more attention to character motivation for their actions. But character motivation for their feelings is a home run, so this is only the smallest piece of criticism.

Even the soundtrack is great. Some grass, some gospel, even Old Crow Medicine Show. Tucker is listening to the same CDs I am. And finally a film has the correct take on hippies.

Transamerica surpasses the hype. You should see it for Huffman, but I think you will find that the entire film is inspired, a complete package that I am so thankful was able to find the light and blossom. Outstanding film.

MAP

P.S. Oh, and the Academy should be disbanded. Reese Witherspoon takes a southern drawl and magazine covers with babies and fancy gowns on the red carpet and robs a true work of art from recognition. Shame.

The Descent

2006-08-17T10:54:00.000-04:00

2005

Dir: Neil Marshall (Dog Soldiers)

I actually dragged myself to a theater.

Nothing wrong with some horror movie action. Lionsgate has been pretty good about their releases in recent years, with the very watchable Saw and the truly brilliant Hostel. This is a low budget British film that is earning lots of well deserved praise. Horror is about concept and editing, and The Descent delivers on both.

Six women go spelunking. Inside, there are some nasty things. That's your plot.

Most noteworthy about the film is the inspired decision to cast all women, none of whom is sexualized. This is the anti-Hostel (that was sarcasm above), where the women are completely capable, independent, and kick ass. In these films, one expects women to either be naked and in distress or naked and evil, but always sexualized. But not even a veneer of that exists in The Descent. It is so refreshing, might I suggest even revolutionary to see such casting and writing? The marketing folks must have had some issues with it, and lots of 14 year old boys are going to be mad. Therefore, the film should be supported for its casting alone.

The suspense is there too. The nasty things take their time showing up, and the most tense moments involve completely plausible dangers of caving in the film's second act. Like Jaws, the events seem real in the early going. Horror films rarely overtly play upon universal fears, opting for phantasm. But claustrophobia and fear of the dark will hit anybody. The Descent's best moments are when it explores those themes.

The menace below ground is effective too. Like 28 Days Later, make-up is minimal, but mood, camera, lighting and editing do the trick. The effect is lost over time, as the movie moves into a Aliens-like killing spree. But even if that bit is less terrorizing, it is still pretty fun to watch, almost like the movie is letting us off the hook from the really suspensful moments earlier and settling into familar territory.

The script can certainly be critiqued for contrivances and lack of attention to character motivation. It is much better than 28 Days Later, where such issues overwhelmed the dramatic effect of the horror and made the film laughably bad, but such things are not the strength of the filmmakers. So I won't give The Descent an Oscar. But as a fan of the low budget horror genre, here is a smart and sound entry that captures the essence of what scares us. For those with an interest, there are lots and lots of worse films playing right now.

MAP

V for Vendetta

2006-08-16T15:07:00.000-04:00

2005

Dir: James McTeigue (first film)

Paul loved V for Vendetta, emerging with a revolutionary fervor that I have yet to see translated into any newsworthy subversive acts (but I will remain patient). I did not like it near that much, placing it within the pantheon of technically competent but intellectually shallow action movies of recent years. Think The Matrix Revolutions here.

Certainly the film is trying to make the right points. I don't know if the presentist touches were in the source material, such as references to the Koran and a focus on sexual preference. But even if they were, if you get your story from a comic book, am I wrong to say that your argument is comical? Despite its attempts to speak to today, the regime in Britain is way more oppressive than Stalinist Soviet Union ever was. This is Orwell with the volume turned up. By making the dictatorship so odious (roving gangs of raping policemen, complete oppression of the entire panoply of private behavior) the defense of violence against the state becomes a no-brainer. Of course blowing up the justice building is OK! And V isn't even targeting civilians, but political targets such as the statist media. We find ourselves supporting the terrorist because he isn't a terrorist, he is a freedom fighter by any objective definition.

I suppose there is some future world where a freedom loving people surrender completley to a central government in the face of foreign threats and domestic epidemics. But the calculus of appropriate responses to such a regime would be entirely different at that point from the present day. I think the filmmakers were attempting to challenge our unreflexive rejection of any terrorism, but they constructed the narrative so sympathetically as to be unreflexive the other way.

For a much more interesting take on this subject matter, I would direct you to the essential Paradise Now (see also here) or even the acceptable Munich (see also here).

As for the non-political elements of the film, V for Vendetta is behind the 8-Ball already by casting the unfortunate starlet Natalie Portman, the least talented big time actress since Daryl Hannah. There were no Brits who could pull this off, or even any foreigners with passable British accents? If we have to cast a pretty young woman with a bad accent, could it at least have been one with some basic acting skills? She lucked into a big role at 18 in The Phantom Menace, and now we are stuck with her.

The supporting cast is generally very good, including John Hurt and the always welcome comedic genius Stephen Fry. Stephen Rea essentially reprises his role from Citizen X (literally, its the same damn role) but he is good in it both times. The art direction, set design, costuming etc. are all excellent, invoking an engaging mood and an attention to detail that will reward multiple viewings.

The movie is almost worth watching for one scene, the back story of V's turn to struggle through the persecution of a lesbian couple. That was a powerful and moving indict of intolerance. And why could not Natasha Wightman have done the Portman role? The former uses two minutes to outshine the entire performance of the latter.

I won't recommend the film for its message; it is just too facile to be interesting. As an action movie, there are some nice touches, some decent performances, and I can't say I had a bad time watching it. But I was hoping for more.

MAP

Donkey Skin

2006-08-11T13:26:00.000-04:00

1970

Dir: Jacques Demy (The Umbrellas of Cherbourg)

Looking for a movie with a light hearted take on incest? How about one with a donkey who craps money? Then this one is for you!

The team that brought the blissful Umbrellas of Cherbourg offers a campy fairy tale, full of enough surrealism and kitch to keep one interested. Catherine Deneuve is a Princess whom her lusty father yearns to marry. Her Fairy Godmother hurries her away to live in hiding as a peasant donning, I am not kidding, the skin of a donkey. The skin is a like a cape with a giant donkey head for a hood. Oh, and her boss spits frogs. More than occasionally crossing over into Sid and Marty Croft trippyness, the film is certainly a product of the 70's.

The point here is to capture to wonder of a children's story and take it seriously. I think the film is pretty good at doing that. The Cinderella elements to the narrative are always welcome, and the movie clearly has so much fun with the subject matter that you are willing to go along with it. I can't say any of the acting is particularly good, or that the film is well written. Its musical numbers pale in comparison to the sensitive Cherbourg.

The standout elements of the film are set design and costuming. All of the clothing is over the top, especially a series of dresses that are commissioned to resemble celestial bodies. The sets look a lot like Barbarella, with purposefully tacky and fake elements taking center stage. The King has what looks like an amateurly stuffed giant white house cat, there is a plastic stag, Christmas lights are everywhere. This isn't the product of a low budget, but a deliberate allempt to add artificiality to the scenes, since of course the fairy tale is a fantastical genre. One intrusion of modern technology is unexpected, and reinforces the theme.

Not really my cup of tea, but an interesting evening for those with a particular interest in fairy tales, Catherine Deneuve, or the the experimental side of the New Wave.

MAP

The Passion of Anna

2006-08-11T10:01:00.000-04:00

1969

Dir: Ingmar Bergman (Autumn Sonata; The Magic Flute; Hour of the Wolf; Persona; Scenes from a Marriage; The Virgin Spring; Cries and Whispers; Fanny and Alexander; Wild Strawberries)

Once again, as always, genius. Bergman continues his exploration of human misery and the deconstruction of the medium in this intense, distrubing, blindingly good character study. The usual stable of actors is here, Ullmann, Andersson and Josephson all brilliant. And Max von Sydow again is completely mesmorizing.

He plays a middle aged hermit who encouters three others living on the same island. He strikes up a friendship with the man, has an affair with his wife, and a long-term relationship with their friend. Each contact, in its own way, breaks down von Sydow, stripping him of the wall of isolation that had kept his animal nature hidden away. He becomes increasingly emotional, violent, and eventually he completely disintegrates.

The thematic nature of the story is, as per usual, intensely honest and brutal. Bibi Andersson shines here as the insomniac wife, a creature unable to function without male affection and desperate for release from her lonlieness. Josephson is cynical and clinical, a collector of photographs that catalogue human emotions and placed in idiosyncratically numbered boxes in a fascinating metaphor from Bergman. Ullmann here is less interesting that normal, perhaps a by-product of the fact that her real life love affair with Bergman was ending at this time. Her character is a wicked hyprocrite, calling for honesty and yet literally evil in her deception.

These basic Bergman themes are reinforced by a quite distrubing focus on animal cruelty in the script. It is a difficult metaphor to explore as the audience, myself included, is so revulsed by the idea that it is hard to analyze. But Bergman holds nothing back, never showing the actual act but being entirely frank about the aftermath of indiscriminate torture and mutilation of God's creatures.

As in the films Persona and Hour of the Wolf, the medium itself is subject to experimentation and critique. His most radical move yet is in this film, where at four points in the narrative Bergman cuts to the actors being interviewed about their characters, exposing their own reflections about how to play the roles. I think it is a bold move, but this time fails because I am not sure the actors give any insight that an attentive viewer did not already know. The device, with more attention given to what is said during these cuts (they were improvised, apparently) could be very interesting. But as they stand now they seem more redundant non-sequitors than statements about acting.

But the closing scene makes up for all that. I can't help but reveal the ending in order to discuss it. von Sydow has finally reached the end of his rope. In a long shot, we seem him pacing back and forth. The camera begins to slowly zoom, to the point where the images becomes so blurred as to make man and scenery indistinguishable. Zooming further, the scene itself dissolves as the camera technology prevents seeing the man anymore; the frame is just pixels of color, which of course is all it was to begin with. It is a truly brilliant use of Bergman's experimental mindset to make a point in the story. To know the last line, itself another masterpiece, watch the film.

The 60's for Bergman, and I have now scene most of the films, must rank as the most sustained period of genius from any artist of the century. I am giddy every time another of his films comes from the BCE, and am likely to watch them all again once I have exhausted the DVD catalogue.

MAP

Talladega Nights

2006-08-10T15:01:00.000-04:00

Director- Adam McKay (Anchorman)

Let me begin by saying I am not a huge Will Ferrell fan. While some of this SNL stuff was good, a lot of it grated on me, and I could not help but think that sometimes people laughed just because he was being very loud and aggressively obnoxious. This criticism I felt very strongly about Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy, a film of which most of my peers sat in guffawing awe. That movie ad its moments, but overall I thought was rather dispensable and extremely forgettable.

On the other hand, I am a pretty big fan of Sacha Baron Cohen. Da Ali G Show is one of my favorites, and the guy has a good sensibility about his humor, especially some of his more politically charged stuff. That's why this movie was so surprising to me- I really liked Will Ferrell in it and mostly thought Cohen's character was less entertaining.

This movie was pretty funny. I reccommend it. Ferrell's antics really add to the movie, and I think the film has a lot more fun poking fun at its characters while allowing them to be at least slighlty dynamic. Even though Cohen's gay racer is less a winner, he still has some inspired moments. And the film works as a satire of both backwardness and corporate sponorship. Unlike a trailer, I do not want to give away some of the movie's funnier moments. But the story is simple: Ferrell plays racer Ricky Bobby, who was born to drive and quickly ascends to dominance in NASCAR. His life is perfect with his best friend Cal and his family, until Cohen's race car driver comes to wreck his life by racing out of his mind.

Most of these "dumb comedies" for me are like elections- they are an expectations game. You can not go to an Adam Sandler classic like Happy Gilmore expecting to see a great film. But if you come in with the right frame of mind, you may find yourself entertained. This film did not just entertain me- it was actually pretty doggone good.

Viridiana

2006-08-10T09:48:00.000-04:00

1961

Dir: Luis Bunuel (The Discrete Charm of the Bourgeoisie; That Obscure Object of Desire)

Satire about the complicated nature of charity and devotion, Bunuel's movie is frank about our outward desire to be good but our inner natures that drive us to sin.

A young woman on the verge of her solemn vows leaves the monestary to visit her uncle. The lonely and lecherous man, in his lonliness, propositions and attempts to rape her. After the uncle's suicide, she devotes herself to helping the poor, inviting them to live with her. Meanwhile, the Uncle's son takes possession of the house and pursues our heroine. Along the way, the devotion of young Viridiana is tempted by the presence of the charming man and the unruliness of her chosen flock.

None of these characters are purely good or evil. Viridiana is well intentioned but hopelessly naive. The Uncle is a predator but motivated from a deep and sympathetic melancholy. The son is a lothario but is wise. The beggars that are brought into the house are appreciative but unable to resist their inner shiftlessness and hedonism. They all mean well (in their own way) but all cause problems through their actions.

The movie is generally obtuse and metaphorical, inviting multiple meanings. Scenes dominate as opposed to lines of narrative. The best scene is near the end, when the beggars are left alone in the oppulent house and host their own dinner party. Free from imposed morality or authority, they comport themselves as they wish and have a party that I would have loved to attend. The enigmatic ending as well is tought provoking, almost shocking even by contemporary standards as to how Bunuel resolves the moral morass that Viridiana finds herself in.

The film is subversive in a way that most are afraid to be, a work of art that carries a potent political message. I wasn't blown away, but then these sorts of films tend not to do that for me. Characters here make points, they don't tell stories. It is an important film, a great film, but not a moving film.

MAP

Tsotsi

2006-08-09T15:22:00.000-04:00

2005 Oscar Winner Best Foreign Language Film

Dir: Gavin Hood (A Reasonable Man)

South African adaptation of Athol Fugard's novel about the redemption of a street thug in the Johannesburg slums. My expectations were very high for this film, and I think that contributed to a small sense of let down. The film has a lot going for it, but still left me unclear as to the extraordinary motivations of the characters. This story is the journey of one young man, his social awakening and development of dignity and compassion. While the sequence of events are compelling, the internal narration that no doubt drove the source material is here left absent, leaving the audience to fill in the gaps. The cast is not quite up to the task of communicating that information.

A young man jacks a car and shoots the owner, only to find out later that there is an infant in the back seat. His uncertainty over what to do, and the transformation that comes with the realization of the consequences of his actions, provide the substance of the film. At first, Tsotsi came off like a lot of films influenced by exported American gansta' culture mixed with Tarantino-cool, a celebration of thug life and the reality of violence on the streets and in the underworld. But instead of glamorizing such actions, the film takes a hopeful turn, one fitting a nation dealing with the crushing legacy of racism and epidemics of crime and disease. AIDS gets several subtle references, as any film from the world's most infected nation no doubt must.

Hood gives several beautiful shots, almost gratuitously using sunsets and long shots to add beuaty to the slum. His interior work is also noteworthy, especially several scenes where light streams into the protagonist's shack and illuminate the people inside angelically. The score too is really strong, African hip-hop mixing with orchestral pieces to complement to context in which these thugs live.

My critique of Tsotsi is that it never quite crossed the finish line, never really opened a window into the soul of its lead. But the rest of the film is solid. See especially the special feature of alternate endings that demonstrates both the care the filmmakers gave to the narrative and their ability to make the correct decision. Worth your time, especially to support cinema from this part of the world.

MAP

Citizen Kane

2006-08-04T15:16:00.000-04:00

1941

Dir: Orson Welles

Boring story about a newspaper man. In fact, so much of this film is amateurish that I can't understand how it has topped all those lists. My friends and I thought we should watch one of those films people are always talking about, and since Aeon Flux was out at the video store, we got this thing.

First off, the thing is shot weird. I mean, half the time you can't even see the actor's faces! There's all these odd angles; in one scene, Kane and this other guy are talking to each other and they are literally standing on top of the camera. It's like we are supposed to be these tiny little mice at the feet of giants. But we're not mice!

I talked about those faces. Really, Orson doesn't know much about lighting. Shadows were all over the place. He should move that stuff away from the lights. People walked in and out of shadow with no warning. It was really confusing.

The acting is pretty bad too. They did this thing were they kept shifting the time the story takes place, so they had to do all these make-up changes. Lots of the time I couldn't tell who was what! And none of them were stars. I mean, I know some of the big stars from back then: Cary Grant, Doris Day, Mickey Rooney. How come they couldn't get some star power. At least I knew Orson Welles from the Muppet Movie.

And the story. Ugh! Bo-ringgggg. Nothing happens. Welles is so trying to be like Tarantino with that flashback/forward thing. But the whole movie is just people talking. And they all kept looking for the Rosebud thing, I was like "Who cares! Let's get to some action!" It was just all this preachy exploration of this guy's life. Boo-hoo! With all that money, you think he would have some sweet cars at least. Man, this was no Tokyo Drift.

I kind of dug the guy's creepy house. I would so have some raging keggers there, man! And he should have had a hotter wife. She was always whining and spoiled, with that squeaky voice. It made no sense to me at all why this rich guy would hang out with her. You think they would have explained that. It's like the movie made no sense at all. At least I didn't get it.

Look, avoid Citizen Kane. It is by no means the greatest technical marvel in cinema history. No way is it still visionary after all these years. And no way is it a lasting document of what can happen when you give a genius creative control. Nuh-uh. I'm totally renting Fantastic Four tonight.

MAP

On the Waterfront

2006-08-03T16:09:00.000-04:00

Director- Elia Kazan (A Streetcar Named Desire)

What a tour de force. Even if this film served as Elia Kazan's ego function for his naming names in the Communism witch hunts of the 1950's, this is proof that art from the self can make a powerful statement to society at large. Plenty of film projects have been starkly personal in nature and yet moving and powerful- Schindler's List held special meaning for Steven Spielberg as a Jew, The Passion of the Christ had special meaning for Mel Gibson (who, as it turns out, may not get along with Mr. Spielberg), and for John Travolta Battlefield Earth was a powerful representation of his committment to Scientology that turned society towards the teaching of L. Ron Hubbard. Well, ok, sometimes these personal movies don't always have the power to move mountains. Marcus' old review is here.

The story is classic right versus corruption. Marlon Brando plays a former prizefighter named Terry Malloy who is working and living down at the docks with his brother, Charley, who's the right hand man for the local mobster controlling the unions. The film opens with a murder, a fellow named Joey "fell off a building", but the neighborhood knows its because he was willing to talk about the mob's control of the docks. The local priest, played ably by Karl Malden, is convinced to begin to involve himself in the fight against corruption by Joey's sister, played by Eva Marie Saint.

Terry initially gets involved with the investigation as a stoolie, but his involvement with Joey's sister and the rising body count becomes more complex and creates a crisis of conscience in Terry. There is a wonderful scene at the bar between Brando and Saint that perfectly encapsulates Terry's struggle and transformation with the idea of conscience in the face of corruption, however near his heart and bloodline that corruption may be.

The writing in this movie is near perfect. Great lines include "He doesn't need an ambulance, he needs a priest" and other various one liners poorly imitated by Law and Order. While my familiarity with corruption on the docks in old New York was limited, I was able to understand very clearly the story more than 50 years after the movie was made.

But it is the acting which separates this movie from almost any other I have ever seen. Malden, solid as always. Lee J. Cobb and Rod Steiger fantastic as mafia heavies. Eva Marie Saint makes you believe that she could change Tommy's mind and create his conscience. But it is Brando's performance that is pure bravura, so brilliant. The famous speech in the backseat of the car is a moment I watched a second time immediately after the movie, so powerful. And in that speech it is not the writing which elevates it, but the pure and total immersion of Brando in the role that makes you believe and feel for his failed career as a boxer, that helps you to know that Terry has discovered who his friends are and who his enemies are. Whatever Stanislavskian memory that Marlon Brando channeled to create his eyes in that speech must have been mighty powerful. This is still not BME, but perhaps here Brando is BAE.

Anatomy of a Murder

2006-08-03T09:48:00.000-04:00

1959

Dir: Otto Preminger (The Man With the Golden Arm; Exodus; Porgy and Bess)

I rewatched what is probably my favorite court room drama after a recent vacation to Michigan's Upper Peninsula, the setting for this fantastic film. A soldier is accused of murder after he shoots a man who allegedly raped his wife. Country lawyer Jimmy Stewart is enlisted in defense, and George C. Scott is brought up from the big city to prosecute.

What we get is a fascinatingly detailed trial, still frank in its treatment of sexualized aggression even after all these years. Put in the context of the late 50's, the film is positively scandalous. It challenges the viewer to reconsider the ethical responses to that sort of violation, but puts the events in a grey zone that rewards careful attention to the nuance of the performances. The court room scene is well over an hour, but never drags or gets redundant. It is brilliantly writtent.

But the acting is even better. Stewart and Scott taker their time before clashing, like two rams stalking each other before butting heads. Their contrasting styles play well off of each other, and fit the unique talents of each man. When Scott is finally unleashed, it is something to behold; chilling, almost evil, but amazing lawyering. Lee Remick is also great as the victim, a femme fatale to rank among the best.

The secondary stories running through, Stewart's stewed partner, the mysterious manager of the deceased, are all welcome complements to the intensity of the court case. Lord, even Duke Ellington writes the score. So many good elements to this movie.

On this viewing, I could appreciate the remarks of the judge about the different, laid back ways of the UP. It was a great, great trip, by the way, beautiful and relaxed at the same time. That is transferred into Stewart's character, and goes a long way to cementing the unique feel of this film.

I never get tired of this movie. Anatomy of a Murder is the cream of the crop for legal films, a riveting experience.

MAP

In Memoriam: Sayonara

2006-08-02T09:53:00.000-04:00

1957

Dir: Joshua Logan (Mister Roberts; South Pacific; Camelot; Paint Your Wagon)

Red Buttons is dead. I know his comedy from television. But this film netted him a Best Supporting Actor Oscar. Buttons proves that having comedic talents often translates into dramatic ones. His performance is really strong, very natural and confident. His role calls for both joviality and deep commitment to principle, and Buttons surprises in both. An excellent performance from a great talent.

Sayonara is a race tale, the sort of once controversial story of interracial love that would have been the stuff of newspaper headlines back in the day. Now, it still works but as a tale of international mistrust in the aftermath of a war. It is 1951, and American servicemen stationed in Japan are falling in love with local women. The Army and the homefront, still burning with the fire of racism and resentment, put bureaucratic and social sanctions on these marriages.

Marlon Brando plays an ace fighter pilot and General's son, expected to marry into another military family. But he too succumbs to the native charms of the exotic women. Brando's acting ability is on full display, but I do admit that his Southern rubeness is over done in my mind. He plays the character the way it was written, that "Aw, shucks, I don't nothin' 'bout dat. Us country boys . . ." ignorance explaining the character's early opposition to Buttons' marriage, but overdone when applied to everything else. Still, Brando offers so many little things to delight; the way he sits down in front of his potential mother-in-law, the embodiment of cockiness when he pursues women, the angle of his eyes when coming to some realization. His job in the dramatic climax is testament to his talents.

An Oscar also went to Miyoshi Umeki as Buttons' wife, in what must have been a politically motivated vote. She is fine, but has few lines and does little but stand next to Red. But by giving the couple Oscars, the Academy signaled their approval of the subject matter. The award should have gone to Miiko Taka, as Brando's love interest, if to anyone in this film.

The film suffers from a momumental performative contradiciton, though, by casting Ricardo Montalban as the Japanese Kabuki star. It is offensive and inexcusable, then as now, for reasons that should speak for themselves in the context of Sayonara's message of racial tolerance. Studio interference at its worst, I wager.

My favorite parts of the film were the extended scenes of Japanese theater. Lots of cultural detail infuses the story. Logan's work with musicals serves him well in the production numbers.

The film is fine, dated, but no doubt important in its time. See it because one should always see Brando in his prime and because actors like Buttons can find spaces to shine even in the shadow of an actor like Brando.

MAP

Nosferatu

2006-08-01T12:51:00.000-04:00

1922

Dir: F.W. Murnau (Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde; The Haunter Castle; Faust)

Celebrated silent adaption of the Dracula story, Nosferatu suffers in my mind from my own inability to really get behind silent movies. I fell bad about it, I know it is a product of my limits as a moviewatcher, but I don't find them enjoyable. Nosferatu is right up there with the best I have seen, though. It has enough interesting imagery to strike the viewer, and my familiarity with the story allows me to slog through the silly non-Vampire moments. But as a whole, this and all other silent films is just too distant, too ancient for me to connect with. It is like seeing some ancient relic in a museum; you appreciate the craft, you recognize how novel it was, but it is clearly a product of another, by-gone era.

Those visuals do indeed hit the spot. Max Schreck, or his make-up at least, is so creepy that one wonders why nine years later they made Bela Lugosi bat like. The rat motif is more effective, and I think more resonant with the disgusting qualities of the Count. Monsters tap into our base fears, and I think that plague carrying vermin may be a deeper mine to excavate. His minion, Knock, is also fun, sort of a demonic Tweedle-Dum.

Everything not involved with the supernatural, though, maybe is good but beyond my ability to critique fairly. Nosferatu is not a brilliant movie, but does contain brilliant images, shots, moods, and impressions.

The score, redone by some weird new-age virbraphone orchestra, is unlistenable. We turned it off and put the Requiem by Brahms on instead. That is one of the good things about silent films; you can talk over them, or put on Duran Duran or whatever, and not mar the aesthetic experience. Talking through it might actually help you finish it.

This isn't an irrational prejudice. It is a flaw of taste. I know it is my own fault. But I don't think I can recommend Nosferatu.

MAP

Jaws

2006-08-01T08:57:00.000-04:00

1975

Dir: Him (Munich; Schindler's List; Jurassic Park; The Color Purple; War of the Worlds)

The iconic thriller that absolutely deserves its reputation. The Senor has famously defined a genre. But what makes Jaws a brilliant film is not just its action, its careful attention to camera and editing and music to create tension, but its character development that provides interest in between the thrilling parts. The movie entertains in several ways, a triumph for a young genius of popular film making.

If Jaws threatens to tear apart anywhere, it is in its plot and the somewhat absurd notion that an entire town wouldn't care about a potential shark massacre on their own families in the interests of the local economy. Too many overwrought speeches would have made this an after school special, but the script gives just enough of that so we get the point but it does not detract. A well acted movie will help along those lines as well. Robert Shaw is a caricature as the salty sea campaign, but Dreyfuss and Scheider are both remarkable as the anti-shark crusaders. Their talents make the down scenes worth watching on their own. My favorite moment is when the three swap drunken stories, but Scheider keeps secret his own gunshot wound in the face of the rising misery count between the two sea lovers. Even in a populist movie, Speilberg will make his audience think along.

But of course the true star is the shark. Convincing puppetry and brilliant direction to gradually show more of the beast over the course of the film makes this the most realistic movie monster of all time. A giant rubber shark in the opening scene would have drawn laughs, but we are primed to believe in it over the film, so that when it does show we go along with it. The script takes great care to give enough science that we can believe this actually could happen (even if it couldn't).

I am sure everyone in the country has seen this. It is part of our collective culture and one of the great films of the last century.

MAP

Se7en

2006-07-31T12:54:00.000-04:00

This film was already ably reviewed and disccused once.

I sat down and watched this movie again with an eye towards reading this movie as an attempt to demystify the "buddy cop" movie, because as I watched I was struck at how unlike so many cooperative detective films it is.

In the same way that Unforgiven effectively destroys the ideal Westerns of the past, Se7en (although an inferior film to Eastwood's classic) may be a nail in the coffin of the Lethal Weapons of the world. Let me be clear: David Fincher did not sit down and aim his film at a genre that his movie could not even be coded as. The intent of Se7en and Lethal Weapon or 48 Hrs. could not be more different, but this movie makes those other "buddy cop" movies seems piddling and trifling.

Brad Pitt's David Mills comes off to me as something of a meathead. The term is rather pejorative but it conveys exactly what I mean. He wants justice. He transfers into the Queens district homicide unit because he wants to catch bad people doing bad things. His character's focus on work and rightness can be encapsulated by his decision to move to a tougher more raw district- the move worsened his home life and wife's disposition substantially.

Morgan Freeman's Somerset is the streetwise, seen-it-all, world weary cop. He's a week from retirement. When they discover the first body he recognizes the work of a serial killer and wants no part of it. He is almost done with his tour of duty in the black depths of civilization, and would just as soon get out.

In investigating the first murder the dynamic between the two partners is clear: Somerset knows what is up, and Mills is a young hothead. Mills makes all sorts of typical Law and Order style wisecracks when they discover the obese corpse of John Doe's first victim. Somerset's glares of derision say it all- wiseacre dark humor doesn't have any part of this business.

That Mills is out of his element is made clear very quickly in the movie. He does not know how to proceed when a second body turns up and Somerset is off the case. He requires the help of Somerset to move to great works of literature to help to understand the relationship of the seven deadly sins to the killer and the crime.

The movie is slow for long stretches. This is because witing is integral to detectivework, according to Somerset. Mills hates the waiting. He wants to go do something. The brash, hotheaded youngster wants to go "kick some ass". When he finally gets a chance to hotdog it, his life is spared through only the (well its not mercy) choice of the killer. Not only is he not a great detective, he's not the most accomplished in a physically demanding footchase. If only the young hothead was played by Mel Gibson, THEN he would've gotten the killer.

The narrative of the film gives almost all the skill and talent to the experienced Somerset. The only exception is when Somerset refuses to go into Doe's house without a warrant- Mills resolves that problem quickly (but in a corrupt way, and police corruption comes full circle in the end of the film). The upshot, though, is that the young Mills gets more than his comeuppance for his wisecracks and hot headed behavior.

What a great film. Watch often.

Superman Returns

2006-07-30T23:06:00.000-04:00

2006

Dir: Bryan Singer (X-Men 1 & 2, The Usual Suspects)

Really? I never knew he left. Then again, Superman III and IV were so forgettable, he might as well have left. Expectantly, most efforts to remake films or rekindle franchises result in failure, collapsing under the weight of (un?)reasonable expectations and (un?)fair comparisons. At worst, it is an exercise of directorial hubris hellbent on making loads of cash. At best, it is pointless. However, Bryan Singer, who jumped the X-Men ship to direct this film, realizes that if something is only partially broke, only fix that part. Superman Returns starts where Superman II ends, ignoring the wastes of silver nitrate that were Superman III and IV. Singer's reverence for the first two is evident from the opening credits to John Williams' original score to the casting of Brandon Routh (a Christopher Reeve clone). In fact, Singer's direction of Routh as both Kent and Superman generates some eerie, yet oddly welcome, parallels to Reeve's Superman.

The film starts with Supe returning from a five-year absence. He originally left his salvation occupation to return home on word that astronomers believed they found Krypton (I was hoping for greater exploration of the reasons Superman left for Krypton, but we have to leave stuff for the sequels). The general narrative follows an expected pattern for such a film: Superman returns in dramatic fashion and Lex Luthor has designs to make billions on artificially created land, all the while the man in tights pines for Lois Lane. But, Kent's effort to pursue Lane are frustrated by her commitment to her son and his father.

I always found Superman as a character the most plastic of all the major comic superheroes: he's perfect and indestructible, save kryptonite (never really understood why his home planet would be poison to him on Earth, but that is another issue). So many other comic book characters (Spiderman, Batman, etc.) are humans with serious emotional and fragilities. But, Singer's choice to focus on Superman's devotion to Lane, complicated by the other two men in her life, really opens up a space for emotional exploration of the man of steel. While Routh demonstrates a certain acumen for such complexity, Kate Bosworth as the distant Lois Lane falls flat. In my opinion, Lane must be a difficult part to play; she is the object of desire for the most powerful man in world. Millions of women, and men, would throw themselves at the charming Superman. So, the actress must communicate an intangible quality that makes it at least remotely believable that Superman would fall for her. And while Bosworth eclipses Kidder in the looks department, she does not embody the quirkiness and edginess of Kidder's Lane.

With the exception of Bosworth, I had little problem with the film (although Luthor's scheme seems a bit nonsensical, even for a Superman film). Routh and Spacey are enjoyable as the major characters. While Routh respectfully channels Reeves, Spacey adds even more cunning to Hackman's Luthor. It may have gone a bit long (over 2 1/2 hours), but these types of films are designed to be entertaining while setting up for sequel; and the extra twenty minutes allowed for deeper character development that presumably will benefit the next film(s).

In the past few years, we have enjoyed a slew of exceptional superhero films, and Superman Returns clearly belongs in such company. Although Superman Returns does not usurp the Spiderman films or Batman Begins at top superhero cinema totem pole, it is definitely no League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. It is certainly worth a viewing, especially in the theater where one can relish the outstanding special effects.

The Turn of the Screw

2006-07-29T17:52:00.000-04:00

1999

Dir: Ben Bolt (The Big Town)

Masterpiece Theater adaptation of the Henry James novel. This is a very effective and thought provoking work. Clearly a case of the whole being greater than the sum of the parts, there is little about the acting, set design or direction that stands out. The piece is in line with many other very capable, well worth watching television productions. But here the writing and editing has taken the work of a notoriously difficult author and packaged the main themes very well.

Jodhi May (who has made a career of Victorian period pieces) is hired as a nanny for some rich orphans. The kids, it turns out, were previously in the charge some caretakers who were ambiguously bad. When those dead caretakers return as ghosts, fraternizing again with the children, May must defend the young ones. Not from the supernatural per se, mind you, but from the corrupting influence of bad examples which will certainly make the kids rotten and send them to hell.

It might sound a little absurd, but the story works very effectively as a parable for the overprotection of children and the attempt by proper society to sequester itself from evil, fornication, and bad influence. With contemporary eyes, I think James was alluding to molestation, but that is never unpacked. In any event, it is the nanny's desperation to shield the children from corruption, and the toll it takes on herself and the especially the children, that makes this an interesting pyschological narrative. The main point, that you can screw up someone just as much cordoning them off them letting them run free, is well taken.

The two child actors are fine, especially young Jow Sowerbutts (yikes, sorry about the name kid) as Miles. The uber maturity that authors write children with here actually works, as he exploits the nanny's puritanical nature in his bid for freedom and self expression.

This is one of those films that makes me want to read the original book. The writing in this film is very taught, and I wonder what was left behind. James was famous for exposing the psychological motivations of his characters (in such an impenetrable and long winded way that I find his books quite the struggle), but it is in those motivations that I found the greatest entertainment.

Get great source material, and then get out of the way. That's the recipe for a pretty good picture.

MAP

Footloose

2006-07-27T15:20:00.000-04:00

1984

Dir: Herbert Ross (Funny Lady; The Sunshine Boys; The Sever-Per-Cent Solution; The Goodbye Girl; Steel Magnolias; Boys on the Side)

Can it be I got this far in my life having never seen this film? I guess I had good instincts. But now at least I know the context for that song.

Look, Footloose has its heart in the right place, I suppose. A bunch of kids rise up against their oppressive parents, assert the timeless freedom of youth and claim their own identities. We learn that overprotectiveness can be just as harmful as neglect, that part of growing up is making mistakes, and that the human spirit cannot be contained. It is a fine theme, and has been done well.

But Footloose wants to have it both ways. It wants to embody a transgressive subject matter, but still play in Peoria. So instead of sex, drugs, and rock 'n roll, we get petting, dancing, and Kenny Loggins. I mean, all the kids want to do is dance. That's their big bid against the system? And not even Dirty Dancing, but like doing the hand jive in a line, dancing tame enough to be in Grease! No doubt this is the reason for the film's lasting appeal; a generation of youngsters were able to digest it in a way a really great movie like Rebel Without A Cause eludes. Footloose makes you feel good and want to dance; Rebel challenges you and makes you want to cry. But you can't embody youthful rebellion and make an uplifiting film at the same time!

On its own terms, Footloose is OK. A surprise is a young Sarah Jessica Parker, genuine in this role in way I don't remeber seeing her elsewhere. Bacon is hunky, but the unfortunate Lori Singer is a real eyesore. When even the script is calling you out for being too thin, its time for the casters to develop a little social conscience. John Lithgow really should pick better roles; he is a better actor than most of the scripts he takes on.

The choreography is actually really solid technically, but completely out of character. These are high school kids, they want to dance to pop music, but Lynne Taylor-Corbett has them doing balletic arm swining and expressive full body twists (oh yeah, and doing Tarzan swings on a chain in an abandoned factory). This isn't West Side Story; just have the kids jump around a little, OK?

What happens when you want a safe story line that preaches generational rebellion? You get Footloose, clean and safe and wildly popular.

I've seen worse.

MAP

Hiroshima Mon Amour

2006-07-19T18:24:00.000-04:00

1959

Dir: Alain Resnais (Night and Fog)

Wow. Wow. I am prone to hyperbole here on the BBE, but this movie is really something special. It cuts to the core of the human experience. Consistently it delivers universal insights that blossom from the indiosyncratic stories of extraordinary people in extraordinary situations. It is a poem on love, on death and mutilation, on loss and the flimsy stuff of memory, a tragic and beautiful testament to the power of what humans can do when they put their minds to it. It is a film about unspeakable evil and destruction, told thourgh a powerful love story. It is a moving experience, one of the very best movies I have ever seen.

Emmanuelle Rive plays a French actress who has an affair in Japan. She is filming an anti-war movie with Hiroshima as the backdrop. The film's opening montage is a brief moment of genius, juxtaposing the intertwined interracial lovers with reflections on the representation of the atomic bomb in post-war Japenese public memory. We will soon learn that these people from different worlds hold similar scars, the way that war and destruction rips apart your very identity. Death and deformity abound, and while we may try to preserve our happiness in interpersonal relationships, they too are fleeting and subject to the barriers of time, culture, and our separate bodies.

These are heavy themes, but the film is never leaden. The pace is brisk in terms of plot, but contemplative when telling the small stories that stand in for all of humanity. Really just a few conversations interspersed among shots of Hiroshima voiced over in poetry, the film is enigmatic and yet so focused.

If my descriptions have a strong "one the one hand, on the other" feel, it is a reflection of this nearly perfect movie. It does everything it attempts to well, and it attempts wildly different things. All of the parts are exemplary, making a whole that is even better. Its lines will haunt you, its imagery will stay with you, its story will move you, its acting will grip you, and its effect will change you.

BME. Loved it, loved it, loved it.

MAP

The Little Foxes

2006-07-19T17:44:00.000-04:00

1941

Dir: William Wyler (Ben-Hur; Roman Holiday; The Best Years of Our Lives; Wuthering Heights)

Very entertaining Bette Davis vehicle, at the height of her enormous powers as the most electrifying actress in American cinema. Almost no one has filled a screen like her, her body a bomb that obliterates anyone with a look, pose, head movement, or just her presence. She plays one of three siblings who seek money for a business scheme in turn of the century Alabama. To get it, they must convince her dying husband to give up the money. He knows the plan will exploit the townspeople, and that the money is what his cold and vindicative wife wants, so he refuses.

Caught in the middle is Davis' daughter, coming of age and searching for her way in the adult world. As my viewing partner stressed on me, all of the political machinations between the siblings are a side story to the mother/daughter relationship, implied throughout the film but brought to a central place in the film's closing scenes. The last shot is so powerful that it is creepy, a perfect combination of Bette Davis' raw talent and a smart script saving its best for last.

The acting is very stong throughout. The plot is intriguing, and the backstabbing between the partners unpredicatble yet within character. The love story is a little flat, but serves an important narrative purpose. Wyler's mis en scene is very nice, making the entire town come alive with plenty of exterior shots on the streets and among people.

But let's face it; you watch a Bette Davis movie for Bette Davis. I fear she is being lost among the Hepburns as the great actress of the Golden Age. She is always bracing, and a dynamo unlike any other actor.

See this and many more of her films.

MAP

Cousin Bette

2006-07-19T12:41:00.000-04:00

1998

Dir: Des McAnuff (The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle)

Poor adaptation of a novel by Balzac (steady now!). Jessica Lange is the spinster younger sister of a dead socialite. The family, it turns out, is less well off than they seem. There is some sort of entanglement among a variety of mistresses, attempts to marry people off, and sexual indiscretions that I am sure made lots of sense in the novel. But it is clear from the get go that this film team is not up to the challenge of making a period parlor comedy, with the labrynthine relationships between characters, come off in two hours. A really sloppy job of editing and writing throughout, with great leaps in the story that have no explanation whatsoever.

Hugh Laurie is one of my favorite comedic actors (haven't seen House yet though). He is lovestruck with Elisabeth Shue, another of my favorites but for reasons that have nothing to do with her acting, which has and always will be dreadful (Palmetto, shudder). Bob Hoskins is here too, so with Lange this was not the fault of second rate talent in front of the camera. Throughout the film, I found myself questioning who was scheming and who sincere love, a tragic flaw for a story that relies on our witty understanding that the characters are being manipulated farcically. Aden Young is a starving artist with no work ethic that everyone seems to fall in love with for no reason. But he also is supposed to be seducing everyone to destroy them, or maybe he is double crossing the women who control him? I don't know, and I suspect neither do the writer or director.

The costumes are pretty. The music is really lovely, I mean that. A fantastic score. But as a droll tale of sexual manners, this is pretty confusing stuff. Stick with Balzac (stop that snickering).

MAP

The Lower Depths (Donzoko)

2006-07-19T10:43:00.000-04:00

1957

Dir: Akira Kurosawa (Harakiri; The Bad Sleep Well; Kagemusha; Ikiru)

A oft flimed play from Maxim Gorky, the Lower Depths examines the dregs of society: bums, gamblers, drunks, thieves, the loveless, the wandering, the sick. Their lives are cyclical dramas of fatalistic recognition of their lot, then dreams, then solace in hedonism. The pressing cruelty of poverty hangs over them all, and any attempts at escape are inevitably tragic.

Kurosawa retains the dramatic feel of the play, essentially using one room for the entire film, with characters coming in and out in different states of sobriety. The pace is almost maddeningly slow, with speech after speech developing the themes. The film requires quite an investment of intellectual energy, since plot is thin and one of the main points of the film is the relentless monotony of the lives of those who have abandoned ambition or self improvement.

Toshiro Mifune is a thief who has fallen in love with the sister-in-law of the oppressive landlord of this boarding house. The mistress of the house is jealous, and devises a Double Indemnity like plot to off her husband. This is all rather secondary, just one personal narrative in a film dominated by the supporting actors and an ensemble story.

This is certainly a love it or hate it movie, with the pace even getting to this viewer at times. This is Russian literature at its bleakest, with no escape from the inevitability of pain and suffering. If one can stomach the subject matter, Kurosawa has certainly given room for his stable of actors to embody the play.

This film stands alone on the source material. I'm not sure there is a ton of value added here from AK. But not messing up an already good thing is often harded that it sounds. Jean Renoir also made a version of this play; I will be interested to see how the two compare.

MAP

Alphaville

2006-07-17T19:10:00.000-04:00

1965

Dir: Jean-Luc Godard (Breathless; A Woman is a Woman; Masculine-Feminine; Week-End)

I believe this was my first Godard film, but I Just Saw's own Ron has praised him before me. He finds Godard difficult, clearly brilliant but opaque. Alphaville may be exhibit A in that reading, a movie with a lot going on but stubbornly unwilling to open itself up to interpretation.

Alphaville is a futuristic technocracy, increasingly ruled by a genocidal computer that turns the city's population into unfeeling robots themselves. A secret agent from abroad arrives to retrieve that computer's programmer. Half noir, half science fiction, the film is at one level right out of the series of minimalist French detective films that I have been watching lately. On the other hand, it often feels like a script of the original Star Trek. Think of the scene is South Park when the home schooled girl is asked out to the dance.

The movie is at its best when it is highly poetic. Alpha 60 is certainly the most learned maniacal computer ever filmed, philosophically self aware and dedicated to a peculiar noramtive vision of existence. Godard does not really address the AI question, but this computer is something more than machine. The hard boiled detective stuff is always welcome, and the dark sexuality of it is well done here.

There were some things that rubbed me the wrong way, though. I know it's petty, but the voice of Alpha 60 continually reminded me of someone who was burping their way through the alphabet (Alpha 60 beers maybe?). More seriously, I never understood exactly why people followed the oppressive rules either. Peple seemed aware of the outside, even people who immigrated into Alphaville towed the line. Small violations seemed to go unpunished. What is the appeal of the emotionless way of life?

But the movie works as a series of aphorisms and puzzles. Our hero, Lemmy Caution, in another Star Trek move, gives the computer a philosophical puzzle that it cannot solve in order to defeat it. Often times, characters speak lines that drip with poetry and insight. Alphaville is in that class of reflective science fiction like 2001 or Solaris, using the future to make very lofty proclamations about the human condition. I can dig that sort of stuff, absolutely.

Very hard movie to blog. I didn't hate it, but I didn't really enjoy myself either. It's like reading high theory; good for you, but a real workout. No wonder Ron says the academic film scholars love Godard!

MAP

The Grapes of Wrath

2006-07-12T13:15:00.000-04:00

1940

Dir: John Ford (Wagon Master)

I know I am supposed to critique a movie within the technological and cultural possibilities of the times. It makes no sense to look at the original King Kong and say it was a bad film because it wasn't as visually stunning as the remake. You work with what is available at the time.

And I also realize that filming this novel was itself a risky political move, with its fierce defense of unionization and the rights of workers. For that, Ford is to be commended. But I had forgotten about the cardinal sin of this film, the glaring omission of the novel's stroke of genius at the end. Seeing it for the second time, I remembered my anger at leaving out the final scene, so intense that I run the risk of hating the film.

This is entirely a product of my reverance for Steinbeck's book, without a doubt one of the most moving and technically perfect works of fiction ever created. It is definitely on my short list of favorite novels, and I am protective of it. And I know that I am commiting a Kong fallacy by expecting them to put that final scene into a film from 1940. But I can't help myself.

Other than that, The Grapes of Wrath is tremendous. Fonda is the perfect Tom Joad, cold and distant but intense and powerful. The entire family is cast of chracter actors who convincingly pull off the desperate poverty of the family. The politics remain strong yet seductive, just like in the book. And Ford has really pulled off a triumph with his camera. If you have never experienced the candlelight scene near the beginning of the film, you don't understand what lighting can do for a picture. Numerous examples of great camera work are rife in this film.

My gut reaction, though, is anger; not at Ford but at the times. That such common sense subject matter would be controversial is one thing; but censoring such a moving image of human compassion and desperation as Steinbeck's ending is a real crime.

MAP

Crash

2006-07-11T13:59:00.001-04:00

Dir: Paul Haggis

See my previous review.

Whereas Brokeback Mountain improved under a second viewing, I found that Crash diminshed somewhat. Not that it is less than awe inspiring, not that it still isn't one of the best race pictures I have ever seen. But the visceral reaction to the intertwining plot lines, the shock at the characters and the unexpected twists that occur in seemingly every scene loses some of its punch when we know what is going to happen.

I panned the acting in the first review, but that was too judgmental. I was letting Fraser and Bullock stand in for the the rest of the cast. Ludacris continues to stand out for his performance. Cheadle and Dillon are really great. And the rest of the supporting cast seemed much more compelling than it did last time. The plot and writing are so good that the first time through you can't really pay attention to anything else.

Boy, tough call between this and Brokeback. Two very, very good films.

MAP

Hud

2006-07-11T12:37:00.000-04:00

1963

Dir: Martin Ritt (The Spy Who Came In From the Cold; Hombre; Norma Rae; Stanley and Iris)

Paul Newman is the greatest ever screen actor. I have been known to say that about James Stewart, but a recent run on Newman's films has me reconsidering that question. Hud is yet another film that showcases his power, intensity, sexuality and undeniable likeableness even while being a heel.

Philosophical Western that tells the story of three generations of ranchers. Hud is the son of a traditional man of the land, steadfast in his virtue and unwavering in his belief in doing the right thing. Hud's impressionable newphew Lonnie admires his womanizing and hard living, and the youngster stands on the precipice of making decisions that will shape his character as a man. When the family ranch faces a crisis, each man must come to grips with his ethics and his mettle.

Patricia Neal, so good in A Face in the Crowd, is again remarkable as the men's sexually frustrated housekeeper. She flirts with Hud, is desired by Lonnie, but is eventually hurt by the family's destruction. She is beautiful through her acting, and never seems to disappoint.

When Hud's faults as a man cause him to fail as things go south, Newman's acting gets a real chance to shine. He becomes frighteningly self destructive, angry, unethical, and hopeless. Hud does not shy from this tradgedy. The movie is shot with reverence and emotion, with long sunset vistas and grand sweeping looks at the wide prarie. Many memorable scenes are to be found, especially surrounding the cattle who represent love of land to the great Melvyn Douglas.

Larry McMurtry provided the source material, and also wrote the beautiful Brokeback Mountain. I have not read any of his novels, but his films certainly are powerful. I highly recommend Hud, Paul Newman with yet another expression of his genius.

MAP

The Big Lebowski

2006-07-07T10:27:00.000-04:00

1998

Dir: Joel Coen

A bit of a lost Coen Brothers movie for me, I saw it in the theater and that was about it. But it has gained a cult following despite me, so it was high time to reintroduce myself to it.

The strength of Lebowski is in its collection of anti-heroes, Jeff Bridges and John Goodman. This may be the big man's comedic masterpiece, a well written character that is taken to the next level but his empassioned performance. The combination of paranoia, fool's confidence, intelligence and total ignorace is very fun to watch, and gives Goodman a great platform to show off his talents. Bridges is far more constrained, reduced to befuddlement at his predicament. He is stoic and selfish while the crazyness surrounds him. But "The Dude" does get the best catch phrases, a dynamic that contributes to the film's popularity more so than the story itself.

The weakness of Lebowski is in that story, an attempted deconstrcution of the kindapping mystery that I think trips over its own cleverness at times. In Raising Arizona, the humor was character based and the silly plot never got in the way. Here, the Coens put a lot of stock in twists and turns in the story, and that can be tricky if you don't pull it off prefectly. The Usual Suspects gets it; Hitchcock got it; Lebowski misses the mark.

The film has some very interesting characters who unfortunately get all mixed up in a passable but hardly transcendent storyline. This is like a high class SNL skit, some resonant phrases and crazy characters but not much else. That's entertaining, sure, and "The Marcus abides" may even make it into my lexicon. But this is not among the Coen Brothers' best.

MAP

Autumn Sonata

2006-07-06T21:09:00.000-04:00

1978

Dir: Ingmar Bergman (The Magic Flute; Hour of the Wolf; Persona; Scenes From a Marriage; The Virgin Spring; Cries and Whispers; Fanny and Alexander; Wild Strawberries)

One day I will see a Bergman film that isn't amazing. The day I watched Autumn Sonata was not one of those days. The hands down greatest moviemaker ever to live astounds once again with this examination of a mother-daughter relationship. Tried and true subject matter, the perfectionist and distant mother and her reserved and resentful daughter, eleveated into high art by the true genius of Bergman's writing. I am now ready to call him the greatest contemporary dramatist as well; each movie could be staged in a theater. His dialgoue is brilliant, and his ability to capture emotion and expose it completely is among the greatest writers I have ever encoutered.

At some point, I will have to get away from my Bergman hyperbole. But every film I encounter from him just reinforces my awe. In this one, we also get the talents of Ingrid Bergman (no relation), no less compelling in her older years. She plays a concert pianist, fovever on the road and neglectful of her family. Liv Ullmann (as always, wonderful Liv) is the mousy daughter. The first half of the film captures the awkwardness of their relationship when Ingrid makes an unexpected visit after years away. The unknown presence of her other daughter, crippled by a musular disease, immediately sets the visit off on the wrong foot. After ably trying to make things work, and cover up their mutual dislike, the mother and daughter have it out in the film's second half.

Those scenes are so powerful, so honest, so well acted and written that I was dumbstruck. Bergman is the best writer of female characters I have ever seen, in any genre. Father/son movies are common, but I found this to perfectly and uniqulley capture the other familial binary without the customary sap or maudliness, at least as far as I can understand that relationship. The trademark Bergman closeups are here, long takes that do indeed feel like scenes in a play with intense focus on facial expressions and the nuance of reaction that great actors can convey.
The movie, by the way, is worth seeing just to experience Ingrid Bergman working in her native language. That husky voice she used so well in her sheepish role in Murder on the Orient Express is here confident, demonstrating her amazing range as an actress, truly one of the best ever.

This is definitely among the best of the best catalogoue of film. Yet another entry into the essentials. I cannot be more effusive in my praise for this man and his art.

MAP

The Caine Mutiny

2006-07-03T11:26:00.000-04:00

1954

Dir: Edward Dmytryk (Murder, My Sweet; Back to Bataan; The End of the Affair; The Carpetbaggers)

One of favorite movies from my youth, The Caine Mutiny is a real sleeper of a character study. It chronicles the slow deterioration from sanity of Navy Capt. Queeg (Humphrey Bogart) and the eventual displacement of him from command at war by a disparate group of officers aboard the U.S.S. Caine. While the first half seems to plod a bit, obsessing about small details to build the case for mutiny, it is the second half of the films that is truly brilliant. This is one of those films that, whenever it is on TV, I find myself watching, making that court martial sequence of my most familair in cinema.

The film has flaws, for sure. Robert Francis does nothing for me as the green Lt. Keith, and his love story with May Wynn is pretty silly. But other than that, the acting is exemplary. When you have Lee Marvin and Claude Aikens in bit supporting parts, you are doing OK. Van Johnson is very compelling as the number two in command, who makes up for his lack of intelligence with courage and strength of convinction. Fred MacMurray, easily one of my favorite actors, is great as the oily and cynical novelist whose theories of psychology drive the bid for mutiny.

Bogart gives one of his best performances as the paranoid Queeg. The iconic rolling steel balls in his hand is just one great touch. The "strawberries" scene has made its made into popular culture as an example of paranoia. Bogart shows a real range here, very subtly moving from crusading captain to broken old man. Casablanca is, obviously, his masterpiece. But I think The Caine Mutiny belongs on the list of his most compelling triumphs.

Jose Ferrer steals the show, though. As the shrewd defense lawyer, he is the driving force behind the fascinating defense as it unfolds. What I love about the second half so much is that it gets you to sympathize with the mutineers, and then turn all of that on its head, forcing us to reconsider who was really at fault. Ferrer's closing speech of the film is one of the best acted, written, and narratively satisfying climaxes to a film that I have ever seen. I invariably repeat it if I have Caine on DVD (which I did this time), and never grow tired of it. A real perfect storm of the elements that can make films so interesting.

The Caine Mutiny is a very thoughtful exploration of duty and the psychological impact of war. There is a whole lot of acting talent on the screen, and the film is able to overcome its more trite elements. I very highly recommend it for those interested in either war or courtroom movies.

MAP

Steel

2006-07-02T10:47:00.000-04:00

1997

Dir: Kenneth Johnson (V [writing and directing]; Lots of other TV work, first feature film)

Let me quote Ron; "The value of superhero films (comic books, etc.), at least the good ones, is that they operate from a spectacular premise that provides the intellectual and narrative space to ruminate over more complex ethical and social issues." Then I guess Steel is not "one of the better ones," unless space age sonic pulse military weapons manufactured by a video game company and placed in the hands of Los Angeles gangs so that they can defeat a seven foot tall motorcylcle vigilante dressed in a home-smelted steel suit is a "complex ethical and social issue."

In somewhat belated honor of his NBA championship, and in the interests of bad movie night, I watched Shaquille O'Neal's third film. He is D.C. comic "legend" Steel, a former weapons designer for the military (work with me here) who resigns after his sort-of love interest is paralyzed by the negligence of a rival designer. The bad guy gets a job with an arms dealer, who has a front business making aracade games, but at night hires gang members to rob banks for him. Shaq figures out what is up when the weapons make the news, and with the help of his friends becomes the armor wearing vigilante. His character name is John Steel, and his mighty hammer (which he never hits with anything, I am incensed to inform you) that becomes a laser gun blows up lots of stuff good.

Obviously, the story is dumb. My favorite part is how no one in the government really seems to care that their top secret weapons are now being used by 18 year olds to rob the Federal Reserve. It's up to Shaq to save the day, because the NSA can't be troubled to track down the only three people in the world who can build these things. But we don't watch bad movies for good plot!

The film becomes Robocop in the second half, as the metal encased Shaq starts dispensing one liners while kicking ass. Is it bad when you are getting out acted by a cyborg? How could Peter Weller be more human playing a robot than Shaq is playing a human? Everyone else in the film is acting up a storm, though. Judd Nelson (yes!) is our villian, just sinister enough to make you think twice about having a beer with him. Annabeth Gish is the friend interest, and does everything her role calls for without cracking up at playing opposite Shaq.

The best part of the film was definitely watching Shaq's image managment. The bad guys get to kill people, but Shaq does not. I keep alluding to the weird status of his relationship with Gish. They are very close, he has deep feelings for her (at least the script implies that, of course Shaw can't quite communicate an emotion, any emotion, through his acting) but nothing remotely sexual is allowed to take place. Where every other movie would have them kiss, here they hug. Is Shaq not allowed to fall in love with a wee white woman in a wheelchair? Clearly the PG-13 rating does not preculde a little deeper intimacy between these two. Or are they really only supposed to be good friends? Is the spectre of hulking O'Neal swallowing up the white woman just too much for Peoria?

Shame on this movie for balking at such a plot point. Shame on Judd Nelson for acting like he does. Shame on the movie for thinking that Steel and half of the L.A. underworld can find the bad guy's hideout by looking on the internet, but the entire US military can't figure that out (they literally advertise an auction for the weapons on a webpage; I guess the Special Forces don't have Google). And shame on this movie for not being quite bad enough to really be a great bad movie night experience.

For those really interested in the cultural constuction of race only. Wait a minute, maybe Steel is a place to work out social and ethical issues; it is a great movie!

MAP

Beat the Devil

2006-07-02T10:16:00.000-04:00

1953

Dir: John Huston (The Treasure of the Sierra Madre)

Remember in Capote (see also here), when Truman is sitting around the kitchen table relating stories of the movie he wrote for Bogart that was filmed in Italy? He said no one understood that movie. And he was right; it is very odd.

Beat the Devil is a satire, but it refuses to let you in on the joke. Bogart is with a group of uranium speculators who are trying to make a land deal in Africa. Then end up on a boat with a British couple, he a pseudo-gentleman and she a beauty with a penchant for embellishment. All of these characters are over the top; the paranoid speculators, the flighty femme fatale, the super-British Brit. The increasingly bizzare set of circumstances they find themselves in, and their steadfast refusal to meet those circumstances with anything but more scheming and backstabbing, is where the humor lies. The movie is like Huston's Maltese Falcon, but so much so that we laugh at it.

None of this is clear on its face. The first half is just the prelude to the obviously satirical elements of the second half. Actually, the first half is a bit of a jumbled mess, which you would see as part of the humor if you knew it was humor in the first place. But once the boat ride begins, then the movie settles into a good comedic groove, giving me several out loud laughs.

The cast certainly helps things along. Bogart, Peter Lorre, Jennifer Jones, and especially Robert Morley (one of my favorite character actors) all do their roles without a hint of being in on the joke. Capote and Huston have written a comedy that constrains their actors within dramatic acting conventions. That is supposed to be the humor, but it is very difficult to pull off.

Beat the Devil is an interesting movie experience. I wager subsequent viewings would unlock more of the script. But it is hardly necessary to track down, unless like me you had a curiosity about Capote's work after the biopic.

MAP

The Wild Bunch

2006-06-26T20:25:00.000-04:00

1969

Dir: Sam Peckinpah (Straw Dogs; Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid; Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia; Convoy)

There are only three candidates for the best ever Western. I will hear a debate about The Searchers, How the West Was Won, or Rio Bravo; but I will not be swayed after that debate. Only Unforgiven, The Good The Bad and The Ugly, and The Wild Bunch are allowed serious consideration.

I think The Wild Bunch may be the winner.

I forgot how great this film was. Some of the best characters in any Western. The old "one more job and then I retire" theme is augmented here by a crew of bounty hunters stalking our intrepid bandits. The leader of the bounty hunters (Robert Ryan) is being blackmailed to get his former partner, the leader of the bandits (an unbelievable William Holden). Ernest Borgnine is also very good as one of the bandits. The story involves a chase through Mexico and Federales who terrorize a small village. As with most Westerns, the themes of honor and duty are in the forefront. But here, the anti-heroes are rather ruthless, and the law itself is even more corrupt. This is definitely a neo-Western.

Peckinpah made his reputation as a maven of screen violence here, with truly amazing opening and closing gun battles. The opening scene is legendary, with a Temperance Union caught in the crossfire. I can recall no other Western focusing on collateral damage like this, a gripping reminder that the violence depicted is at once thrilling and disgusting. But other than that, the film is continually brilliant. Shot of gorgeous bluffs and canyon land, the harshness of the desert is ever present. While the action scenes are wonderful, the more laid back and playful elements of village life and the joyful rowdyness of these rough men are something special as well. Many great lines, breathtaking direction, everything that makes the genre special.

A particular high point for me is a minor role by Alfonso Arau. I remember my first time seeing The Wild Bunch, on its rerelease at the Mayan Theater in Denver. There, out of no where, was El Guapo from The Three Amigos. Same damn character, same cadence in this speech, same undeniably joy in every word he says. John Landis found that guy and just had him reprise his stuff. Great inisde movie joke, and a great performance in both instances.

Unforgiven is more philosophical. The Good, Bad, Ugly is cooler. But The Wild Bunch is probably the best combination of all elements of the Western. And I do think it is that genre's best representative.

MAP

Brokeback Mountain

2006-06-24T14:05:00.000-04:00

2005

Dir: Ang Lee (The Ice Storm)

Second time through, see my previous review.

The first time with this film, I was caught up in the public theater of it. I watched it politically, to see how it positioned itself and made its argument. I thought of its broader message and how audiences might respond. Brokeback had become a polarizing text, and I over analyzed it as a result.

This time, I just watched it. And I liked it even more. Like all brilliant films, subsequent viewings reveal an economy of script, a depth of symbolism, and a richness of character that continues to reward. I liked the movie even more the sceond time.

I underestimated the strength of the love story initially. Not that I panned it, far from it if you read my earlier review. But I had the impression that Brokeback was one among many great love stories. I think now that it is one of the best, a retelling of a classic theme but with a significant twist (pun intended). The first act, on the mountain, is a masterpiece of dense narrative told with minimalist material. I thought initially that the reasons why these men were in love were given short shrift, that I hadn't really gotten involved enough in them to really care about their later lives. But Lee and McMurtry were too smart for me, and I was too distracted. Their love is silent, and so too is their courtship. I found it very moving.

I was too worried the first time about deciding if this film should win an Oscar. But it should be taken on its own terms. I think Brokeback deserves multiple viewings and a place among the best love stories of the decade.

MAP

Body Double

2006-06-24T00:58:00.000-04:00

Director- Brian DePalma (Blow Out)

I sure did think Blow Out was a decent movie alright. Why not give DePalma another shot? After all, Ron says Sisters is great and I do like Carrie, even though that may owe more to Stephen King than the good director.

This film operates as homage to two Hitchcock movies- Rear Window and Vertigo. The protagonist, Jake, is played by Craig Wasson (who is a dead ringer for Bill Maher). He's an out of work actor struggling to make it as a vampire in B movies because scenes in coffins give him claustrophobia. Jake makes a fast friend, Sam (played byGregg Henry) while cruising around LA for a job, and Jake is desperately in need of some friendship because he catches his girlfriend in bed with another man.

Sam has to rush off to a show, but offers to let Jake housesit in his totally swinging bachelor pad. This apartment has quite a perk- a view via telescope of a hot neighbor next door who changes in an open window every night, like clockwork. Jake is spellbound by this woman, observes her evening ritual of undress, and one day follows her across town, saving her from a pursenatching Native American.

When he next looks into her apartment, she is the subject of a grisly murder attempt. Jake watches in horror from far away through the telescope, observing her creep closer and closer to danger. The Native American, armed with an elaborate and ungainly electrical drill, eventually succeeds in his task. When Jake decides to investigate, he is led to a porn queen played by Melanie Griffith. The rest of the plot I should leave to the film to tell you.

DePalma's movies' content is often irrelevant. This movie is in many sense a gesture that is a wink at the audience. Setting it in Hollywood, making the major players actors, characters in outlandish and unbelievable settings, and an over the top story and cinematography combine to indicate that DePalma is just playing around. For example the scene where the Native American murders the young woman with the power drill is effective in how it leaves the violence to our imagination- much as he does with his shot of the chainsaw in Scarface- we see only the blood splatter, but not the actual chainsaw on sinews and bone one might expect in say, a slasher flick.

I also detect a real voyeuristic and perhaps misogynistic streak in this period of DePalma's work. The evidence? In Carrie the scene of sexual awakening in the shower is unnecessary- we know from countless other developments in the film that Carrie is becoming and woman and becoming interested in the opposite sex. In Blow Out we can see it in the way the Nancy Allen character is a dumb hooker with the heart of gold. And in this movie there is so much nudity without point. Yes, Melanie Griffith is very hot as a porn star, as are the women who undress in the window. But is just egregious and over the top. I suppose it could be satire of the B movie tradition- one that DePalma is obviously engrossed with given the jobs his characters have in this film and Blow Out.

Do I recommend this movie? No. Its just not very good. It seems dated, is really cheesy, and while sometimes DePalma's homage works, in this case it does not fly. Do not see, unless very bored.

Rocky

2006-06-23T12:50:00.000-04:00

1977 Oscar Winner Best Picture, Best Director

Dir: John G. Avildsen (Save the Tiger; The Karate Kid I-III; Lean on Me; Rocky V)

While a staple of my childhood on cable, it had been many years since I revisited this landmark film. Rocky beat a host of other great films, including Network, All the President's Men, Marathon Man, and Taxi Driver. I can't say that it is better than all those films, but Rocky is certainly very good at what it does, a clean and pure story of an underdog that is refreshingly written. Stallone's nominated screenplay is the best part of the film, and its economy and voice remain unique.

We may forget how little boxing is actually in this movie. Stallone's courtship of Talia Shire is its foundation. His stupidity is contrasted against her temerity with great charm and compassion, and their dialogue is very believable for the characters. Ruminations about life and love avoid any lofty prose whatsoever, and everything seems so real that it is impossible not to pull for this couple. Shire's brother, a drunken loser, is another one of those characters that seems so real that it becomes complex even while the emotions portrayed and the dialogoue used are completely ordinary. By omitting any pretense, and going for a realistic script, Stallone has written characters that resonate with everyone, a key component to the film's broad appeal.

The boxing itself is, famously, the opposite of realistic. That fight would have been stopped in the first round. But real boxing, especially heavyweight, is often boring; it takes a lot of energy to hit that hard, and doctors step in long before the kinds of horrific wounds that both Creed and Balboa sustain pop up. This may be the most violent boxing scene ever done in a good film (B movies notwithstanding), and yet it still appeals to a broad demographic. But since Rocky has invested so much time in the love story, we forgive his pummeling because we care about him. That is the difference between gratiuitous violence and violence that drives narrative; he must both sustain and inflict that sort of punishment to purge his sins.

Rocky also rightly keeps the focus during the boxing scene on the themes of personal redemption and spiritual triumph. The high point of the movie is the last scene, where the fights official decision becomes inconsequential in the face of Balboa's development as a person. Stallone has captured better than any other sports movie I have seen the essence of competition, especially in a blood sport as punishing as boxing. It redeems the activity and elevates the audience.

No, it's not as good as Network. But Rocky really is worthy of its iconic reputation. The Philadelphian in me also recognizes its local color; I often see people running up those steps as I eat a steak sitting by the fountain at the end of the Ben Franklin parkway before the Art Museum. Everyone knows those steps, as the film has permeated our popular culture. That the film is also an artistic triumph makes it worthy of high praise.

Almost forgot: Rocky had a montage.

MAP

Baby Doll

2006-06-21T13:52:00.000-04:00

1956

Dir: Elia Kazan (East of Eden; A Face in the Crowd; A Streetcar Named Desire; On the Waterfront)

Denounced by the Legion of Decency, pulled by Warner Bros. two weeks after its release, Baby Doll was a scandal in the 50's. As you can imagine, it is pretty tame by contemporary standards. But any film that a Cardinal says it is a sin to watch is OK in my book, so I gave it a view.

Tennessee Williams wrote his first screenplay, and Kazan brings in Karl Malden, Eli Wallach, and Carroll Baker to act. Baker is Baby Doll (more TW names), a 19 year old virgin wife who is so infantalized that she sleeps in a crib. Her long suffering and drunken husband Archie is broke after Wallach's cotton gin showed up in town and took all of the business away. The Italian entrepeneur has been wronged by Archie, and intends to get his revenge through his nymphette yet untouched wife.

It was that seduction that raised the ire (and I wager other things) of the Legion, as the banter is quite charged and the quarters close. Baker is absolutley gorgeous and sexual, and Wallach's lothario stylings forceful. The famous swing scene featuers closeups of the pair's faces, and one can't help but wonder what their hands are doing below frame. Williams' famous sexuality is on full display here. Yet the consummation of this courtship is left ambiguous.

The rest of the story is somewhat surreal, comedic in its oddness and yet never played up for laughs. I did not find it as much funny as absurd, but I can see where some would find Wallach uproarious.

This is all well and good, but the star of the show is Malden, a performance that is somewhat lost amongst the sexual fireworks. His frustration has transformed into brutality, and it is hard not to simultaneously sympathize with and loathe the man. A very complex character, and Malden is brilliant in being both dejected and violent. His predicament is half circumstance, half his own fault, and I kept going back and forth on my feelings about him. I am sure subsequent viewings would illuminate more aspects of his character.

Kazan has also pulled off a master stroke in his use of extras. Filmed on location in rural Mississippi, Kazan uses amatuer locals to play the townspeople. The signs of segregation are real, and the rednecks and black folk have an authenticity that infuses the whole production. Not a story about the racist South, the film nonetheless uses that tension (Emmit Till had been lynched in the area just a month befre filming) to enhance the marital tensions played out in the script.

Well worth tracking down, if only as a document of what was once so deplorable. Baby Doll is a really fine example of acting, writing and direction, an intriguing film that was very entertaining.

MAP

Aguirre, The Wrath of God

2006-06-20T15:05:00.000-04:00

1972

Dir: Werner Herzog (Heart of Glass; Fitzcarraldo; Where the Green Ants Dream; Grizzly Man)

My first Herzog film, and the first time I have seen Klaus Kinski in a starring role, this tale of greed and madness is wholly disconcerting. The film is creepy, disjointed, uncomfortable and dissonant. And this mood matches the story perfectly; few films that I have seen have created an atmosphere so effectively to reinforce its themes.

A group of Spaniards travel through the jungle looking for El Dorado, beset by natives and plagued by internal strife. A mutiny along the way brings the insane Aguirre (Kinski) to power, and he leads them on a suicidal river trip. The movie is filmed on location in an unforgiving jungle, and most of the movie takes place on a raft in the heat of the sun. A puppet rebel government is set up by the rafters, with a Lord of the Flies set of challenges confronting the conquerors. But more damning than leadership struggles is the jungle, cannibals, the lack of food, and of course the futility of their fictional destination. The maniacal greed and bloodlust of the conquistadors slips into insanity, and the film records this decent with lingering and uncomfortable shots of the soldier's despair.

The film is quite a technical acheivement, with some remote shots that required a huge dedication from the crew. The opening scene, with hundreds of men scaling a steep mountain shrouded in fog, was spellbinding when you consider what work had to go into it and is worth the price of admission itself.

Kinski is freaky as Aguirre, one of those actors who really seems to be insane. Physically he is menacing, and there is abolsutely no sign of artifice in his cruelty. Herzog often gets out of the way and just lets Kinsky go, no background score or camera edits. At other times the camera frantically moves as we circle conspirators or bob along with the ill fated raft, leaving the viewer dizzy.

This is very difficult movie to describe, as so much of it is about mood and atmosphere. It's kind of like having a headache, hard to focus on and causing your brow to furrow. It is quite unlike any movie I have ever seen, and I strongly recommend it just as an experience.

MAP

Rififi

2006-06-20T13:51:00.000-04:00

1955

Dir: Jules Dassin (Topkapi; The Canterville Ghost)

A crowning acheivement of French noir, Rififi blends a wonderful heist story with a very engaging and troubling character study to produce a wonderful picture. Unafraid to make its characters unappealing, and yet finding room for development within their dark world, Rififi reminds us that codes and honor apply in any context, even among theives.

In what may be the only movie where developing the story through a lounge act actually works, we learn that rififi means "rough stuff," the way of interacting with the world that involves guns, smacking people around, and taking risks. The rewards are great, but in the end it always catches up with you. The cast of theives in the film all represent various takes on this basic theme; the jovial life of the party, the family man with a double life, the safe cracker with a weakness for the ladies, and the brutal Stephanois, the silent but violent leader.

They come together to rob a jewelry store (once again, the best kind of heist). The robbery itself is great, all done without sound and in painstaking detail, forcing us to concentrate on the silence and duration of the whole thing. It is intersting to watch them overcome 1950's theft prevention technology, where muzzling a bell alarm is their biggest challenge. You don't need gizmos in order to generate excitement.

After the heist, complications arise that force the characters to make difficult decisions. Each chooses differently, with their personal flaws either sealing their fate or facilitating their own redemption. It is great stuff, and still comes with the traditional coolness of a heist film to provide crowd pleasing entertainment.

Rififi succeeds in being both populist and intelligent, action oriented and character driven. It is the best of the French noirs I have seen recently, really a tremendous film.

MAP

Blow Out

2006-06-20T01:21:00.000-04:00

Director- Brian DePalma (Snake Eyes)

Oh Brian DePalma. I think you're really overrated. This last few days has been an active attempt on my part to overcome that prejudice. I watched this film and Body Double. A quick review of my opinion of Mr. DePalma's record is required before I delve into this film.

Good DePalma Movies: Mission Impossible was good. It didn't make sense, but he didn't write it so i don't blame him. Carlito's Way is a fine film. Carrie is fabulous and tense.

Mediocre DePalma movies: The Untouchables. People think this movie is good? I think its really really mediocre. Just like Scarface, which has some incredibly neat shots, but overall can't seem to sustain most of its characters or running time.

Bad DePalma movies: Snake Eyes is really atrocious. Mission to Mars is really decent- until the incredibly crappy ending. Finally, The Bonfire of the Vanities is complete and utter junk.

This movie, Blow Out, is interesting. It is obviously referencing two films- Blow Up and The Conversation. John Travolta plays Jack, an ex-cop turned into a sound engineer for a B movie studio. While attempting to gather sounds for a movie, he observes and records a car accident that kills a presidential candidate. He dives into the water to fish out a woman from the car named Sally, played by Nancy Allen.

In the aftermath of the accident, a cover up is apparent. The woman's presence in the car is kept quiet and Jack is told to keep his mouth shut. Jack cannot help but endeavor to replay the accident and his recordings of it in his mind, and during this process believe that the accidental tire explosion was no accident. He endeavors to investigate this more and encounters and increasing array of obstacles telling him to stop looking.

As he finds out more, he encounters a sleazy photographer played by Dennis Franz, a plot to extort the candidate, and a creepy psychotic played by John Lithgow. The tension escalates as Jack and Sally decide to go public with their information. The ending of the movie is its weakest part.

A few things stand out about this movie. Some of the visuals and shots that DePalma uses are fascinating. I think the movie's opening is very, very well done. Moreover, Jack's character is well done and his backstory and behaviors are involving. The scenes in Jack's sound laboratory are particularly well shot.

A few bad things. Nancy's performance as Sally is pretty terrible- I had trouble believing Travolta would fall for her. The Lithgow character is flat and as is often the case with DePalma, I think he depicts a few too many violent acts when a simple one would easily communicate to us that Lithgow's character is a nut. The ending is bad. Contrived and formulaic. Brings to a mediocre end an otherwise fine film. I solidly recommend it, but don't bend over backwards to see it.

Glengarry Glen Ross

2006-06-19T10:26:00.000-04:00

1992

Dir: James Foley (Who's That Girl?; Confidence)

Not much to add over my previous review. This time I payed particular attention to Pacino's monologue in the first act about middle class morality, a master piece of nihilism and its seductiveness to the weak.

BME.

MAP

The Magic Flute

2006-06-17T17:38:00.000-04:00

1975

Dir: Ron's Least Favorite Director (Hour of the Wolf; Persona; Scenes From a Marriage; The Virgin Spring; Cries and Whispers; Fanny and Alexander; Wild Strawberries)

Bergman's straight-up television staging of Mozart's comedic opera, I see this film like a great musician who does an album of her favorite covers. Bergman is urging us to reconnect with narratives of old, and is using his fame to present the classic essentially unadulterated. He can put whatever he wants on Swedish TV and millions will watch, so he chooses an opera. It would be a mistake to put this film in the same conversation with Ingmar's own works, this is Mozart first and foremost. And since the work is, of course, one of genius, The Magic Flute should be sought out by those with a curiosity about opera.

This is not to say that Bergman brings no value added. His fascination with the medium of film, so self refexlive about the artificiality of his own films, is echoed here in his foregrounding of the theatrical elements of the opera. The entire overture is played behind reaction shots from an assembled audience. Every possible type of human is represented (old and young, rich and poor, etc.) but most especially a little girl that Bergman returns to throughout the performance. Her subtle smile at the fantastical story, full of comedy and magic, asks us to see the opera through her eyes.

The work is translated into Swedish, once again reinforcing the idea that Bergman wants to bring opera to the masses. The language fits the music quite well, and adds a note of novelty that is very welcome.

The opera itself is very intimate on the small screen, allowing for closeups and whispered sentences that would be impossible in an opera house. I must admit that Mozart's plot is a bit of a mess, but the music makes up for it. Operas are never known for their subtle character development and paint with very broad brushes.

Certainly at the bottom of your Bergman must-see list. But the film does serve as a user-friendly introduction to the opera itself, which was Bergman's point. Watch for that reason.

MAP

'Breaker' Morant

2006-06-16T15:39:00.000-04:00

1980

Dir: Bruce Beresford (Tender Mercies; Crimes of the Heart; Driving Miss Daisy)

Australian military drama that explores the ethics of war under changing circumstances. Set during the Boer War at the turn of the last century, an Australian patrol is under court marital from British authorities for executing some Dutch prisoners of war and a German missionary. Their case is caught up in global and colonial politics, and throughout the course of the movie we recognize their predetermined fate and yet are forced to judge ourselves whether their actions were censurable.

The story is by and large interesting, certainly complex enough to make the audience do some work. Tidbits of information come out during the course of the trial that make us reconsider the characters several times. Much of the acting requires that stiff upper lip British aloofness, giving only the Australians much of an emotional range in which to work. I have no complaints there.

The sound, though, is particularly muddy. The film did not have much of a budget, and it takes place largely in one cement courtroom, leading to echos on top of already quickly spoken and accented English. I had to back it up and relisten to dialogoue several times.

The issue raised by the film is what conventions of war apply when the enemy themselves does not follow them. The Boer's are irregular soldiers, not in uniform, raiding on farms and civilian property, early commondo fighters. The British "gentlemen's" system cannot fight that, so tactics turn more brutal. Should we blame them? And should we blame the soldiers who carry out those orders?

American torture policy was foremost in my mind during the film. I think that we are supposed to sympathize with the defendants here who were put in an intolerable position by orders from above and now are being made scapegoats. I take a more judgmental view, that following an unjust order is itself an unjust act. But to the extent that the film wants to put ultimate fault in a flawed war policy, I could not agree more. No matter how heinous the enemy, the moral high ground can only be maintained by strict adherence to reasonable rules of war. Shooting prisoners, or torturing them, is blameworthy on the ground and inscribed in policy.

Sometimes movies can be presentist in ways the filmmakers could not have anticipated. But continually telling stories is a way to reconsider old themes, and hopefully relearn their lessons.

MAP

Le Cercle Rouge

2006-06-16T14:21:00.000-04:00

1970

Dir: Jean-Pierre Melville (Le Samourai; Bob le Flambeur)

The third minimilast noir from Melville that I have seen recently, and this caper film is the best of the lot. The action is a tad less cerebral than Samourai, and a tad more familiar than Flambeur. All three are outstanding pictures, but I found this one to be the most entertaining and satifsying of them.

Two theives recently out of prison (one by release, one by escape) team up with a crooked ex-cop to rob a jewelry store. Of all the possible heists, I like jewelry store pictures the best. Banks are usually done with lots of gun play and blowing up safes and the like. But the jewelry store, or art gallery, is about patiently overcoming technological defenses in the dead of night and over a period of time. The demands for silence, stealth, and steely control create a lot more tension and excitement than most other crimes.

Le Cercle Rouge does retain many of the thematic elements of Melville's other films. The East/West connection through the silent warrior is preserved. In fact the movie's title and main symbol comes from the words of the Buddha. The sparseness of dialogue, the way the characters communicate through sublte gestures and never betray their inner motivations is also here. Maybe no moviemaker I have seen has told better stories with fewer words than Melville.

A special performace is given by Yves Montand as the thristy ex-cop who happens to be a heck of a shot. By then a suave veteran screen star, Montand's supporting role is suprising in its grit, and the clever way that Melville represents his inner demons. Very familiar, actually trite, story line, but it is handled very well here.

Much of the first half of the movie is spent as both our protagonists are chased by the cops and the mob. The film is actually non-stop action, if in the muted and leisurley pace that Melville likes to set. I found it engaging throughout.

Good place to start for Melville, I think. This movie holds many hallmarks of crime stories we are familiar with, and was very entertaining.

MAP

Bottle Rocket

2006-06-14T15:17:00.000-04:00

1996

Dir: Wes Anderson (Rushmore; The Royal Tenenbaum's; The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou)

The first film from Anderson and writing partner Owen Wilson, a cute character study that shows flashes of the brilliance of Rushmore and Tenenbaum's. A story of a group of misfits yearning for glory as criminals, Bottle Rocket is above all compassionate to its characters despite their flaws, an ethos that allows us to both laugh at and sympathize with them.

Obviously, the whole movie lies with Owen Wilson. I know a guy just like Dignan (no one reading this, don't worry), so awkward and simultaneously well intentioned that you can't help but like him even as you cringe at his mannerisms. The loveable loser thing is here taken to real heights by the spot-on performance. I found the rest of the movie to be less intersesting, with too much time devoted to Luke Wilson's whirlwind romance with the motel maid. I get the point, but the strength of the script lies in the other half of the plot, and found myself marking time until the Owen returned to the fore.

This movie showcased for me why I didn't really like Napoleon Dynamite. They both share an attention to the quirks of outcasts and their attempts to fit in. But in ND, we were held at a distance from the main characters as they were humilitated or acted rudely (I think Ebert made this point?). Bottle Rocket begins themes explored more fully in Anderson's later movies, where the outcasts are really the sweet ones, people with a lot to offer and their own stories to tell. ND is caricature (sometime funny), Bottle Rocket is character, less funny but much more rewarding.

This film is clearly inferior to Anderson's next two, but wathcing Owen Wilson was enjoyable and seeing the early development of this unique appraoch to filmmaking was worthwhile. Recommended, but really for Anderson fans only.

MAP

Sweet Bird of Youth

2006-06-14T13:58:00.000-04:00

1962

Dir: Richard Brooks (In Cold Blood; Cat on a Hot Tin Roof; $)

After Hot Tin Roof and Streetcar, my knowledge of Tennessee Williams drops off dramatically (get it). So I queued up Sweet Bird of Youth knowing little about it. This movie belongs in conversation with the two famous TW adaptations, a splendidly dark tale of lost love and broken dreams.

Paul Newman is Chance Wayne, a local hero who goes to New York to find fame but ends up using his good looks to get no farther than a boy-toy. He has left behind Heavenly Finley (I love those TW names), the daughter of the local political Boss (Oscar winning performance for Ed Begley). Chance has drifted in and out of town over the years, always on the verge of making it so that he can prove his worth to Heavenly. This time, he has in tow a drunken actress (Geraldine Page) trying to forget the loss of her beauty and power.

While Newman is really dynamite, he almost loses the show to Page's Alexadra Del Lago, who dominates the second half of the film after sleeping through most of the first act. Her story is stupendous, a great mixture of foreshadowing and resistance to the inevitable so that we understand Chance's probable future through her own failings. At different times in the film she is the helpless victim of circumstance and the all-powerful dominator of would-be successes like Wayne.

Paul has never been more attractive, and that is saying a lot. His impotence of Hot Tin Roof here becomes the seeting sexuality of Brando in Streetcar. His struggle with Boss Finley is less engaging than that with Del Lago (see All the King's Men for that story line told better), but Newman's determination carries through scenes.

A special suprise is Madeleine Sherwood, who played the shrewish Mae Flynn in Hot Tin Roof, but here takes a sultry turn as Finley's neglected mistress. It is rare to see actresses get that kind of range from the same director; usually they are either sex symnbols OR unattractive foils. Sherwood pulls of both very nicely over the two movies.

Sweet Bird of Youth is a very tough examination of power and beauty, the way that either can be manipulated for selfish gain. It is a very compelling film, and deserves your attention.

MAP

The Passenger

2006-06-10T17:50:00.000-04:00

Director- Michael Antonioni (Blow Up)

This movie was the opposite of almost every modern mainstream film. It has the trappings of a typical international thriller, but chooses to run with that plot in a completely and indescribably unique and challenging way. I have not seen any other Antonioni, but if anyone has recommendations I am all ears.

The movie boasted what in the mid 70's was a surefire cast. Jack Nicholson (in the same year he did Cuckoo's Nest- good year Jack!) and Maria Schneider of Last Tango in Paris fame showed up in the film during career highs. Although Nicholson's career has been so sweet, the whole damn thing has pretty much been a high. Except Wolf.

This movie takes its cast, which would surely be a bankable leading tandem for box office success, and starts out simply enough. Nicholson is an investigative journalist somehwere in the Third World reporting on a civil war. He befriends a fellow on on this trip, and returns one day from his assignment to his motel room to find his new friend dead of a heart attack. Nonplussed, his character, Locke, responds to this death in a unique way. Noticing the man has a similar face to his, he takes his identification papers and destroys his old ones, assuming the man's identity, that of Robertson.

Various investigations by Locke turn up some interesting facts- namely that Robertson was an international arms dealer. Locke/Robertson decides to continue to attend the meetings scheduled in Robertson's planner. While travelling through Europe, he bumps into Schneider's character (unnamed in both the credits and press materials, she is known simple as The Girl). Their conversations are empty. Their relationship is sexual, but I feel like I should not describe it as romantic. Nor even, sexual. I mean, they fornicate. But its completely immaterial to what is occurring.

Meanwhile Locke's estranged wife, saddened by reports of his death from the international periphery, decides to hunt down Robertson, the last man known to have encountered Locke. The wife and Locke's old boss are found in various European cities tailing Robertson/Locke, even as he has numerous meetings with actors interested in purchasing various and sundry international arms.

The film's final shot is famous, and for good reason. It is amazingly powerful. I simply cannot do it justice except to here say that it rates in my top 5 all of time. (The others, in no particular order, are the shot of Lt. Elias as he is gunned down in Platoon while helicopters circle above, the shot in Spiderman 2 where Peter erupts out of the rubble in the coffeeshop where Ock has abducted Mary Jane, the closing shot of The Godfather in which Kay gazes into Michael's office, and the incredible climactic battle scene in AVP. Actually, I just barely prefer the blood in the drain shot in Psycho. But its close!)

There is much to discuss in this movie. Firstly the names. Locke, a name tied to political philosophy of governance and property. The name seems to say held and made fixed. After all, Locke helped to develop theories of sovereignty of ownership. Locke as an identity could represent fixedness, or at least the existence of a natural order that made things the way they were- a static existence. Robertson, on the other hand, is a totally ubiquitous British name. Quite average. Perhaps it blends in. At least, we can think that at first. But since the movie reveals that "stealing an identity" is not a truly liberating move in its narrative scope, it seems the name Robertson may not in and of itself liberate. Morevoer, these individuals are defined not by their name but rather their acts. An act literally named after a name carries the baggage of those actions. Benedict Arnold anyone? Robertson has actions he must answer for, just as Locke has actions he is required by societal position to carry out.

Another read to bring to bear is existentialism. Many critics have commented on the film's literal performance of existential anxiety- Locke is a character literally running and being pursued by his old identity. His attempt to manufacture a new one just causes him to take on the baggage of Robertson in addition. Perhaps this is because his existence after the identity theft is so empty- he just cavorts about Europe with Maria Schneider. A refusal to enact a new set of behaviors to represent an identity means the old ones will just fill in the vacuum perhaps.

Excellent film. I highly recommend.

Paradise Now

2006-06-09T09:48:00.000-04:00

2005

Dir: Hany Abu-Assad (Another Day in Jerusalem)

Omri has already posted a very careful and insightful critique of this film, so I will refer you to him for plot summary.

Paradise Now is everything Munich could/should have been but was not (also see Ron's review). It is gripping, it is fair, it is politically challenging, it is above all a fantastic story and a work that manages to both entertain and make a point. I really loved it and believe that anyone interested in politics or human rights should see it.

Do not be fooled by the flat first twenty minutes or so, when the would-be suicide bombers have one last night to be with their families. I think much was lost on me in cultural translation, but I was not invested in the characters at that point. It is after the mission begins that the movie gets really good. On its own, the plot generated a lot of tension in me, with many possible lines of resolution and the script letting out key motivations for the characters at unexpected moments. The story got more complex, we came to see how all of the viewpoints articulated by the various characters make sense for them, and this depth makes the film great viewing just on its own.

But Paradise Now is even better as a political document. While Omri notes its omission of the Israeli perspective, he also notes the nuance from within the Palestinian perspective about the various approaches to their cause. The important thing, in my mind, is not representation of the entire controversy, but a faithful and illuminating representation of the issue as seen from the subject position of the characters. This is a film about Palestinians, and rightly tells the story from their side. But it also critiques the actions of everyone, the suicide bombers and the peace activists, the cowards and the crazy, the zealots and the level headed. This is what stories give us, the chance to step inside another person's world and in so doing learn more about the human condition. The contrasting views on the efficacy and morality of terrorism present a full panoply of the issue, and let the audience appreciate the society's struggle as well.

Paradise Now, read with my eyes, is an interventionist plea for peace while at the same time condeming the material conditions that make terrorism possible in the first place. And it is, of course, correct. Killing and poverty, occupation and jihad, all are things the world would be better off without. The film very skillfully implies the existence of another route to resistance, even at the same time understanding those who take more aggressive tactics; understand, never condone in my mind.

I thoroughly enjoyed the film. I am confident I will continue to think about and cite this movie as an important document in the history of political filmmaking. I strongly urge everyone to see it.

MAP

The Omen

2006-06-09T09:13:00.000-04:00

Director- John Moore (Behind Enemy Lines)

Is it just me or is this summer movie season kinda beat so far? One interesting movie a week comes out and then there are some ancillary features of varying quality. Despite being in Nashville, An Inconvenient Truth was not playing anywhere, so this was the next best option. I have never seen the original, so anyone familiar with it could chime in on its merits.

This film is a summer oddity. I suppose the idea of a gimmicky 6/6/6 release appealed to studio executives. It is entirely possible that this is why it was remade in the first place, purely for the marketing opportunity. That would be rather sad, but predictable. I could not shake the feeling during this movie that we would have been better served to see it as a release in the Fall, closer to Halloween. Because the movie itself endeavors to be scary and creepy, but not a horror film closer to high art, ala The Sixth Sense.

Liev Schreiber and Julia Stiles star as parents whose child dies while being born. A priest offers them another motherless child born on the same day- at 6 am on June 6th!!!! As the child grows up more and more creepy and disconcerting things begin to happen to the people around him. The movie does not go to great lengths to hide that the child is the anti-christ.

There were a couple good things about the movie. Mia Farrow's presence as the child's wicked nanny is inspired casting, adding a powerful wink and nudge given her involvement in Rosemary's Baby. There are some seriously frightening and creepy moments. But overall the movie is just not that good- I feel like there is a great idea for a movie in here waiting to get out, but the acting isn't great and it just doesn't work. I cannot recommend this film, but it wasn't really bad. Just not good.

Bound For Glory

2006-06-08T09:51:00.000-04:00

1976

Dir: Hal Ashby (Harold and Maude; Shampoo; Coming Home; Being There)

In the annals of American folk music, few names resonate more strongly than Tom Joad and Woody Guthrie (Jesus is higher up there, at least). These icons stand for the common man's political awakening in the face of oppression. As chronicles of the Dust Bowl and its effects in California, no documents are more powerful than The Grapes of Wrath and Dust Bowl Ballads.

Bound For Glory is a biopic of folk singer Woody Guthrie, hero of Dylan and a whole generation of American musicians. But rather than focus on the rise of Guthrie's career, reminding the audience of how he got famous, Bound For Glory examines the rise of Guthrie's political conscience. Himself an "Okie" (from Texas, though) who sought the Eden of California's fruit groves, Guthrie turned his anger and sense of injustice into some of the most imporant folk songs of the century. It was his local fame as an activist that later made him famous throughout the country. So Ashby focuses more on the conditions of Guthrie's creativity than the spread of that work.

A cynic could see Bound For Glory as a rehash of The Grapes of Wrath. And I am a pretty big cynic. There is no way that this film is better than Steinbeck's book or the brilliant film adaptation of it. But this is certainly a resonable reconsideration, especially given its Oscar winning cinematography. Many shots are quite extraordinary, long shots of men riding on the top of a train and who move in front of a sunset at just the right time in the script. Much of camera work was very carefully planned, and that is the film's most rewarding aspect.

The soundtrack is of course great. It sounded to me like David Carradine did his own singing, not too hard a task since Guthrie was from the "voice of the people" school. Just about every important Guthrie song is here, as well as some other staples of folk music.

Guthrie is giant of culture and music. Anyone who is not familiar with him should get a hold of Dust Bowl Ballads. Seeing Bound For Glory wouldn't be a bad idea either.

MAP

Hour of the Wolf

2006-06-07T19:46:00.000-04:00

1968

Dir: The Great One (Persona; Scenes From a Marriage; The Virgin Spring; Cries and Whispers; Fanny and Alexander; Wild Strawberries)

Since Ron seems to hate Ingmar Bergman, I feel it is up to me to stand up for the greatest director of movies ever. After every film of his that I see, my belief in that sentiment continues to grow.

This is Bergman's lone horror movie, a fantastical exploration of Max von Sydow's decent into madness. Liv Ullmann, oh sweet Liv, is von Sydow's wife who is pulled down with him. The film explores the ways that our inner demons can take over our lives and how the lines between reality and nightmare can become blurred in the diseased mind. It can be classified a horror movie (for certainly Bergman has played with the reality of mental symbols before) by its constant references to classics of that genre, especially a steady stream of vampire allusions. Most of his films disturb, but this is designed especially to terrify. As you might expect from this material, Bergman is rather inscrutible, forcing the audience to reckon with what is real and false along with the main characters.

Each of the mental demons that plague von Sydow are personified and are archetypal in the emotion that they represent (jealousy, lust, fear, etc.). The complicated script has these people float in and out of corporeal reality; sometimes we know they are figments, sometimes both partners in the marriage experience the same delusion. von Sydow keeps a diary that is ambiguous as well. Trying to get a sense of where the film comes down on these "monsters" is half of the terror; there is a lot of cognitive dissonance between the realism and the magical nature of the story, just as our own understanding that vampires are figments does not stop them from physically disturbing us.

Like Persona before it, Bergman is also very self reflexive about the movie making process here. The allusions to Bela Lugosi for example are plain as day (physical appearance, camera angle, acting), reminding the audience that this is a film like many they have seen before. The opening credits are shown over a black screen, but in the background are sounds of the crew building sets and Bergman's voice giving direction. The themes of artificiality and reality are at play in many ways, all fascinating.

This is a hard movie to write about. Did I say it was brilliant? It was. The acting is impeccable, the imagery is genuinely frightening and memorable, and the film is plenty smart to have meaningful messages about psychology and art.

Yet another brilliant, wonderful, jaw dropping film from Bergman. Maybe one day Ron will drop the hate and learn to appreciate good films.

MAP

V for Vendetta

2006-06-07T09:29:00.000-04:00

Director- James McTeigue (This is the only thing he has ever directed)

Ahhh the two dollar theater. What a marvelous invention. God knows I was mad that I missed She's the Man in the theaters. I will not even mention the all time winner for two dollar theater movies, Cabin Boy. But hey, two bucks for a couple hours worth of entertainment? Pretty good deal ya know?

Especially when the source of that entertainment is V For Vendetta. Damien and Carly opined a good line about the film which was "loved the movie, hated the discussions that followed it". I do think avowedly political films can spark some of the worst conversations. Witness for example The New York Post's comically bad review of An Inconvenient Truth, which had no issue with running the worst set of arguments I had ever seen against Al Gore at both a political and personal level.

But this film is marvelous. Really excellent. I did not go in expecting more than a pretty solid movie, and came out blown away. The story is set in futuristic London, ruled by a fascist (played with much vigor by John Hurt). The city has curfews, and a news organization that is played like a puppet by the government (complete with a character meant to obviously imitate the worst of Fox News's talking heads). At the center of the story is Evey, played by Natalie Portman. At the beginning of the movie she is saved from some governmental agents by V, who wears a Guy Fawkes mask (and acted quite well behind this mask for the entire film by Hugo Weaving, of 'Mr. Andeeeeeeeeeeeerson' fame).

The movie opens with a dramatization of Guy Fawkes failed plot to blow up Parliament several hundred years ago. This fades out into Evey's salvation at the hands of V. V then takes Evey to where she can observe the destruction of the Old Bailey by a series of explosions. After releasing Evey, V engineers another disruptive act at the state news service where Evey works, during the course of which he proclaims that in a year he will blow up Parliament. He also absconds with Evie, taking him to his lair (The VCave). Here they have a number of discussions, and Evey is horrified at V's willingness to take life in the name of freedom.

From here on the movie becomes focused on the police's pursuit of V, the backstory of V and Evey, and the increasing viciousness of the regime. I will say no more about the plot except that the movie has chosen a very proper setting for making us very sympathetic with V's behavior.

Technically, this is excellent filmmaking. With the involvement of the Wachowski brothers, we knew that the action sequences and explosions would be very well executed. These do not disappoint. All the actors and actresses involved are quite competent, especially Stephen Rea as the chief governmental investigator who is unravelling both the mystery of V and the nefarious behavior of his own government. Portman is also given a real chance to shine in the second half of the film, and does not dissappoint. (Her performance is not like sand, which is rough. It is like the water, which is smooth and cool to the touch.)

Politically, the film sparks some discussion no doubt. V deals in absolute truths. His experiences throughout the movie and his political conversations with Evey do not wean him off of this perspective. He is willing to do pretty much anything to fight what he perceives as governmental injustice. Well, dealing in absolutes is exactly what the government does. Yet V is sympathetic, the movie is effective at rallying our support for his terroristic acts, and I found myself cheering for his success in blowing up Parliament (I know, I hate freedom). The message can be any number of things. That politics is a dirty business and so we must get dirty too. Or that sometimes there is right and wrong and you damn well better be fighting for right.

Inspired filmmaking. It made me want to go free some people from Guantanamo who are faceless and nameless, and speak their story. Not because I think it speaks so appropriately to our current political circumstances, but because I find its claim thats "ideas have power, ideas do not die" to be such an important sentiment and one that is timless because ideas do not only exist in a moment in time, but become summoned effectively by mental markers. Guy Fawkes=American Revolution=Warsaw Resistance=Choose your own political adventure may seem like a great jump, but "People should not be afraid of their governments; governments should be afraid of their people" is as telling and crucial an idea not just in this era of neoconservative imperial governance, but one which was crucial to throwing off the shackles of colonialism in India or mainstreaming civil rights in America.

An excellent film, even though critics who say it glorifies terrorism have a point.

A Boy and His Dog

2006-06-06T09:08:00.000-04:00

1975

Dir: L.Q. Jones (The Devil's Bedroom)

Harlan Ellison supplies the award winning source material for this low budget post-apocalyptic satire. The film fails to do justice to the novella (I wager) but does hint at some potential in more capable hands.

Don Johnson gives one of his first performances as a very horny young man, whose psychic connection with his trusting dog facilitates a symbiotic relationship; Johnson gets the dog fed (Blood has lost his hunting ability) and Blood gets the boy laid (he sniffs out the few females left on the desert landscape so they can be raped). Why the dog can talk/think, or cannot hunt, or even why so few females are left the movie leaves to conjecture. But that's OK, I am ready to suspend disbelief.

For once in a film a talking animal is somewhat interesting. Blood (voiced by singer/actor Tim McIntire) is intelligent, cynical, witty, and realizes the odious nature of his life. But after World War IV, survival comes first. Over time, the Boy and His Dog develop a close relationship.

Then, an attractive woman shows up who is willing to submit to Johnson. He follows her into "The Down Below," an underground dystopian society. Now here the movie gets good, no doubt capturing all of the bizarre social commentary that made the book famous. But Jones saves the good stuff for essentially the last half hour, after an hour of wandering the desert looking for fun.

The dystopia has modeled itself after home spun country values. Everyone dresses like farmers, the oppressive "Town Council" punishes any transgression with a "trip to the farm" and certain death. Bake sales and marching bands and one room schools all strictly regiment the lives of the denizens of "Topeka." But apparently the women cannot get pregnant. So Johnson has been lured down to supply sperm to the women, and not in a pleasant way. It is a satisfying turn of the tables on the roving rapist of the top world. I am sure there was much more to explore in terms of the gender relationships and politics of the whole thing, but we don't get it here.

There is some sort of rebellion, and a chase, and some robots. The end of the film (which I might as well reveal) involves the Boy reuniting with his abandoned Blood, and turning the tables on the duplicitious young lady once more, in about the most permanent and taboo way possible. But after the Apocalypse, you have to get food where you can get it.

The underworld scenes are bizarre enough that you won't hate this movie. But it strikes me as such a missed opportunity, ripe for a remake by a filmmaker who has a clue for what is interesting in a script. And it has talking animals!

Not recommended.

MAP

The River

2006-06-04T22:43:00.000-04:00

1951

Dir: Jean Renoir (Rules of the Game; The Golden Coach; Grand Illusion)

I have said this before, but the Renoir family has perhaps the most artistically talented gene pool in history: the father a genius painter, the son widely considered one of the greatest film directors ever, the nephew a gifted cinematographer. All this despite being French. I know Marcus is high on Bergman as best ever, but I believe Renoir's complete cinematic opus might be comparable in quality and artistry. The River is a late Renoir film, and his first shot in color (and perhaps the first shot in English) and filmed entirely on location in India.

Harriet is the eldest daughter of five children, four girls and one boy, from a British family living in India. She is our narrator reflecting on her experiences as a teenager smitten with an injured American serviceman who stays with the neighbors, a British widower and his mixed race daughter who returns from boarding school. Unfortunately for Harriet, all the local ladies are quite fond of the American. The American, who lost his leg in an unnamed war (presumably WW II), is rather despondent but caring, uncertain of his place in world. Ostensibly, the narrative is a coming of age story for a young lady. However, the story speaks to the social complexity of waning British colonialism and the ascension of a new global superpower. Each character reflects the fascinations and dangers that often accompany the confluence of two cultures: one dominant but curious, the other submissive but seductive. Normally, I am not a fan of voiceovers, but it is a curious decision for a French director attempting to negotiate the relationship between the British and the Indians. Harriet is the most thoughtful and poetic of all the characters, certainly a byproduct of her being our narrative anchor, but it is from that perspective we avoid the condescension and myopia often present in imperialist narratives.

The acting is poignant yet subtle and the dialogue lyrical. However, my favorite character is India. The rich Technicolor film stock creates luminous hues that jump of the screen. Renoir did not have a dolly, so the mise en scene had to create the motion, and his nephew's keen framing and exquisite set designs demonstrated how simple camera motions can not substitute for gorgeous settings. The river, I believe it is the Bengal and not the Ganges, as one would guess, is the film's lietmotif: it is both everpresent and reliable, but in constant motion washing away time and change.

This is one of Martin Scorsese's favorite films, and easily his favorite Renoir (he likes Rules of the Game, but it does not resonate with him in the same way; so Marcus, you and Marty are on the same page). It may not be my favorite Renoir, but that is like saying I prefer the Ninth to the Fifth.

Time Bandits

2006-06-04T19:06:00.000-04:00

1981

Dir: Terry Gilliam (Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas; 12 Monkeys; Brazil)

I really do not know what to think of Terry Gilliam. I like most of his movies, his visual style is always engaging and his projects are often ambitious. However, there is always an undertone of pretense and condescension that informs his films. Similar to the conceit of Marx, Gilliam is burdened by his ability to see beyond the false promises of economics and technology. But he claims that his playful stories and silly visuals do not try to make grand statements; for he is just a humble film maker that just wants to direct interesting little films (just as long as he is not making them in the United States...it is just too constricting). To me, Gilliam and Altman are directors of similar disposition.

Time Bandits has all the Gilliam staples: A cheeky plot with some clever dialogue that uses an absurd fantasy theme to critique technology (or bureaucracy or religion). The time bandits are five little folks who pilfer the temporal map of the universe from the Supreme Being, their former employer. They use the map to steal from various historical subjects: Napoleon, Agamemnon. But along the way, they pick up a young child, a boy who is neglected by technology-obsessed parents, that serves as the moral conscious for the band of cherubic thieves. Although the Supreme Being is attempting to reacquire the map by chasing the bandits through time, the ultimate enemy is the Evil Genius who lives in the Castle of Ultimate Darkness. EG lures the bandits to his domain by preying on their greed, promising the most valuable object in history. Mr. E. Genius wants the map so he can alter time by reconstructing the world in his images, which is dominated by technology. The adventure is pleasurable and the visual styles and thematics are clearly influential (I imagine Tim Burton is a big Gilliam fan...I also remember a TV series, I believe it was called the Voyagers, that followed a 18th Century inventor and a sidekick 80s child that journeyed though time solving historical problems).

I remembering seeing this film as a child, and so many images can back to me during this viewing. I enjoyed it then, but perhaps a little bit less so now. It is still pretty good, and maybe my malaise regarding the film's broader message/ambition is unwarranted (I'll entertain arguments that prove the film's genius). It's Criterion, so I am probably wrong. Next stop, directors commentary...but then again my gut feelings about Gilliam may influence my read.

Eye of God

2006-06-04T13:19:00.000-04:00

1997

Dir: Tim Blake Nelson (The Grey Zone)

The second Nelson film that I have seen, this his directorial debut. Like The Grey Zone, Eye of God is brutally honest about its subject matter, unrelenting in its dedication to the story without artifice or sugar coating. Nelson clearly has a gift for writing, his work more theatrical than anything else. His is a genuine talent, and this film is well worth your time.

In rural Oklahoma, we learn in disjointed time the circumstances of a murder. Tommy Spencer (Nick Stahl) finds the body, and we learn this young man's story at the same time as we follow the marriage of Ainsley (Martha Plimpton) to Jack (Kevin Anderson) a born again ex-con. The two narratives develop along their own course until they come together in the film's climactic moments. Nothing about Eye of God is very suprising, the essentials of the plot can be guessed in the first 20 miunutes. It is in the eye for detail that Nelson brings to the script that the film becomes intriguing. These stories are well worn, the themes as old as stories themselves; but there is a vision in this film that makes it gripping. The idea that beneath a sleepy conservative town lurks evil and despair is nothing new, but this film is fresh.

The film is a bit too cute at times, with the poetic voice over thing and the broken chonology sometimes becoming a distraction. But I am rather a purist with such things. For the most part, the technique of the thing enhances the tension as we try to piece together the plot from fragments, only occasionaly overwhelming the story. And when you have a story this compelling, I find the less artifice the better. A much better directorial decision is the omission of any resolution or explanation to key details of the killing, spurring some interesting conjecture after the film from my viewing companion as to exactly what happened. Nelson has chosen to focus on the motivations for the characters, not the ins-and-outs of how those were manifested. Our minds fill in details that are more shocking than what could have been shown.

A solid effort across the board, an opening salvo from a writer/director with a real vision. I recommend the film strongly.

MAP

The Treasure of the Sierra Madre

2006-06-04T10:19:00.000-04:00

1948

Dir: John Huston (The Maltese Falcon; Key Largo; The African Queen; The List of Adrian Messenger; Annie; Prizzi's Honor)

It goes without saying that this film is an essential for anyone who is cinema or pop culture savvy. It is also a tremendous movie, with directing and writing Oscar's going to Huston. A classic (I mean, ancient) tale of hubris and greed updated for a modern age, Sierra Madre combines archetypal character study with the lawlessness of a Western.

While Walter Huston (John's father) took home the Oscar for his supporting role as the grizzled and wise prospector, even more impressive is Bogart as the paranoid but confident fortune seeker who feels the strongest effects from the party's quest for gold. His transformation is extremely compelling, not wide eyed running around the room insanity but more an assertion of his latent psychopathic qualities that are alluded to in the film's first half-hour. It would be easy to put some people in the mountains and let them go crazy, but the character development before the obstacles arise is what separates this film from lesser ones.

An intelligent, very well acted and written Western/thriller. Certainly in the array of the greatest films ever made, and I would not laugh at someone who tried to make that claim.

MAP

Blue Velvet

2006-06-02T02:18:00.000-04:00

Director- David Lynch (Dune)

My ventures into David Lynch territory have been limited. As an old boy, I saw Mulholland Drive and was more attracted to its prurient content than its mystery wrapped in an engima wrapped in a riddle story. And yet I can not help but feel that if I had paid full attention to the movie it would not have made complete sense to me, aside from providing the engine for some very inspired rambling.

The story of this movie is, in some senses, quite simple. It walks and talks in some ways like a film noir. Drawn back home to Lumberton, USA, by the collapse of his father, young Jeffrey (played by Kyle Maclachlan) stumbles upon an ear lying on the ground during a walk at night. Intrigued, he heads over to talk to his friend Sandy's father, a local cop. He reconnects with Sandy, and they decide to use information she has obtained from her father to investigate the missing ear themselves. Their interactions smack of good old fashioned youth and vigor, summoning up the sexless, chaste, and eager tales of The Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew.

It is here that the movie develops its split personality. One track of the narrative follows the tale of Sandy and Jeffrey's investigation, the other follows Jeffrey's descent into Lumberton's netherworld. One connection drawn from Sandy's father is that the ear is somehow connected to a jazz singer at a local club in town. Further investigation involves a complicated plot to sneak into her apartment and further investigate. While checking it out, Jeffrey is discovered upon her return and is made to hide at the appearance of Frank, played by Dennis Hopper. Frank has a taste for doing nitrous hits and engaging in rough sadomasochistic sex with the jazz singer. It becomes somewhat apparent that Frank has kidnapped the singer's relatives, and is using them as leverage to extract sexual favors from the woman.

Jeffrey becomes sexually involved with the singer, and discovers that the rough treatment of Frank, far from harming her, does quite a bit for her. Jeffrey is internally conflicted about this when she makes demands upon him to perform during their encounters. As Jeffrey is drawn deeper and deeper into this world, Sandy becomes more and more concerned about him. Jeffrey is eventually confronted by Frank, and they have an absolutely ludicrous night out (which includes one of the all time great Marcus repeated quotes). The rest of the film I will not even try to describe, but suffice to say that its ending is less linear and more deep than that of say, Return of the Jedi.

Having culled various interviews, criticisms and readings I find myself most drawn to Lynch's own descriptions of what he meant in the movie- that in many ways he does not even know what he means until he sits down and watches the movie. What does it even mean, does it even mean anything? I'm tempted by one reading promulgated by the author David Foster Wallace and illuminated for me by my friend Grant. This reading claims that Frank and Jeffrey are the same person, just two sides of the same coin. This reading dovetails nicely with the frame of the movie. The town is essentially a civic Janus- two faces on the same body. There is Lumberton, meant to be Anytown, USA, where shiny fire trucks and happy citizens like Sandy walk about with nary a care in the world. Then there is dark Lumberton, the shadowy, violent, corrupt, and masochistic town of Frank.

Ron's parallel drawn in his initial review of A History of Violence is I think quite correct, and very telling. Cronenburg and Lynch are two of the primary promulgators of the "weird but good" movies, and I think this movie and Violence are making similar points about the libidinal economies of normal communities. The machinations of the good and wholesome can only run on the kinetic energy of dark violence and sex. I don't think that Blue Velvet is even condemning this violence either. After all how much of what occurs between Frank and Jeffrey is even real? And if Isabella Rossellini's character finds the sado-masochistic sex satisfying and has it consensually, it is difficult to read the movie as a condemnation of it. Even our all American boy Jeffrey enjoys it a bit.

There are literally a thousand threads to be found in this movie. Let us explore some, because I really do not know where else to start.

Harakiri

2006-05-31T17:02:00.000-04:00

1962

Dir: Masaki Kobayashi (Kaidan; Human Condition I-III)

A Samurai film that deconstructs the genre, Harakiri is a truly great film. On par with the great Kurosawa movies, it is compelling through and through. The fact that the film sneaks in a pretty devastating political message to boot makes it both important and entertaining.

In the 1600's, peace reigns and warriors starve in the streets. At the beginning of the film, Hanshiro Tsugumo (Tatsuya Nakadai) arrives at the house of a powerful family asking to commit ritual suicide (seppuku or harakiri) on their grounds. During the preparations, we learn that a similar request was made a week ago by another samurai, one whose ignobility was exposed. This earlier man was forced to kill himself in a most gruesome way. The film unravels the relationship between the two would-be suicides and the samurai code that controls their actions.

The story itself is expertly put together, unpredictable and engaging and filled with tension. It is simultaneously uplifting and maudlin, political but universal, tense but contemptlative, but always enthralling. Nakadai and Akira Ishihama are brilliant as the two protagonists, altering their performance as more of the story is unveiled. The lone action sequence at the end of the film is unique and balletic, a sophisticated bit of sword play that drives character as well as resolves the narrative.

Kobayashi strongly indicts a culture that claims codes of honor yet allows abject poverty, that invests power in the hands of a duplicitous few who hide behind tradition to cover their own cowardice, and elevates faith to family and love above political allegiance. He takes acts of depseration and turns them into triumphs. Throughout, his camera finds symbols of Samurai legend and juxtaposes them with the true actions of those who claim to live by the code. Like the latter-day western, Harakiri deconstructs the genre and finds truths applicable to the modern day. I really loved it.

This film won the Jury Prize at Cannes. It deserved more. Even with To Kill A Mockingbird in the mix. It is a splendid, brilliant film, one of the best I have seen from Japan.

BME.

MAP

The Apostle

2006-05-31T15:35:00.000-04:00

1997

Dir: Robert Duvall (Assasination Tango)

Another Southern themed film that I had not seen in many years. The Apostle, written and directed by and starring Robert Duvall, is an absolute triumph, a testament to the power of the medium and what talent can do when given the chance. Duvall had to put up the money for the film himself after trying unsuccessfully for over a decade to get a studio to make it. And the reasons why it was shunned are apparent. The Apostle takes religion seriously, is undeterred in its development of character, takes its time to really explore the themes of the film, and combines a simple narrative with a deep and complex symbolism that rewards multiple viewings. In a sense, it is everything good about movies that challenges an audience.

Duvall plays a complicated man of God, whose personal demons lead him to stray from the same flock that he is so good at brining others into. His horrible deeds cause him to flee and undertake a spiritual journey of redemption, to reconnect with the fundamental goodness of religion before it is polluted by human hypocricy and sin. With the threat of worldy justice forever hanging over his minsterial work, he represents the promise of faith as well as the seemingly universal ability of humans to betray the faith of others. The message is beautiful, moving, gripping, and expertly crafted.

Duvall's performance is absolutely mercurial, holding his own among the real life revivalists that he hired to play preachers, and surpassing them in the film's climactic final sermon. June Carter Cash and Miranda Richardson also shine, the latter effecting a magnificent Southern accent to hide her own British roots. An oddly flat note is played by Billy Bob Thornton as a bigot, who unlike his role in The Man Who Wasn't There, needs to bring a bit more energy to this role.

Another slight flaw is the fact that Duvall wrote this movie for himself years before making it, and his age now makes some of the "lady's man" themes a bit of a stretch. But all approach the scenes with gusto, so we may turn a blind eye due to the idiocy of the studios for blocking the script for so long.

But none of this in any way detracts from the power of The Apostle. When you have a story this well written, this insightful, this well acted and shot, and this important to our understanding of ourselves, I can do nothing but praise it.

Truly exceptional film. My absolute highest recommendation, BME.

MAP

Harlan County, U.S.A.

2006-05-31T10:56:00.000-04:00

1977 Oscar Winner Best Documentary Feature, 1990 Placed on National Film Registry

Dir: Barbara Kopple (American Dream; Wild Man Blues; Woodstock '94)

Some time ago, ten years or more it must have been, this documentary changed my life. I only saw it once, on TCM during 31 Days of Oscar. But it has now been released by Criterion. Upon further review, all of the dynamics that shaped my entire worldview, how I saw art, culture, politics, the human condition, all are still there. It is still one of the best movie experiences I have ever had, still hands down the greatest documentary I have ever seen, still a window into a different universe right in my own backyard.

Harlan County, U.S.A. chronicles a coal mining stike in Eastern Kentucky and the patriots who put their lives on the line for their neighbors and their families. Duke Power Company (still around) and the corrupt United Mine Workers had colluded to keep working conditions, pay, and labor practices 50 years behind most other industries in the country. Kopple was originally making a film about the UMW elections, and she was going to spend only a day at an under the radar strike in Harlan. Instead, she stayed for year among the some truly remarkable people.

The movie strikes me for many reasons. Most of my contemporary experiences with unions were ridiculous ones; baseball players, umpires, airline pilots, etc. While each may have had theoretical issues, they were hardly striking for bread or for sufficient health care when their job gives them lung disease. Even workers like the air traffic controllers, UPS drivers, mass transit workers in Philly and NYC, are striking over things that these folks in Harlan could not even drem existed. Folks in Harlan wanted running water. This movie made me realize what it was all over the place before organized labor. It reoriented my politics on this important issue.

The film also reversed my thinking on mountain folk. And trust me, these people fit to tee every stereotype you have of Kentucky coal miners. Thick accents, living in shacks, no teeth, toting guns, washing babies in iron tubs, the fodder of constant jokes and snickers from suburban people like myself. But unlike almost any other film I have seen, Kopple exposes the qualities in these people that makes them beautiful. Their strength in the face of challenges that I would wilt under, their conviction in family and history of self reliance, their recognition that no one cares for them and they have to look out for themselves. The women in particular dominate the film. The miners are under a court injunction not to picket, but the wives were not. Throughout the film, it is they who are the catalysts for change, they who escalate the tactics in the face of the gun thugs, they who make it possible for the men to risk their lives. Kopple uses almost no narration; these women tell the story for us.

This film was also my first serious exposure to bluegrass and coal mining music. Kopple captures authentic songs from the oral culture of the miners, toothless men and women who chant out the stories of years ago in raspy wails. Think Ralph Stanley's "O Death" here. That song is sung in this film by Hazel Dickinson, then a largely unknown traditional music singer with a voice that will send a chill through you. This movie propelled her to as much stardom as a woman who sings about labor movements a capella could get, I guess. It was Hazel that lead me to explore country roots music, a journey that I continue decades later.

95% of a good documentary is being in the right place at the right time. Kopple has provided a number of unforgettable images, as for some reason both sides in this dispute forget or ignore the presence of her camea. When the thugs show up with guns and clubs, we are there. When the sherriff refuses to do his duty, we get the whole conversation. When miners die in the struggle, we see their brains on the ground. It is moving, powerful, unbelievable, and transcendent.

BME.

MAP

X-Men: The Last Stand

2006-05-30T12:26:00.000-04:00

2006

Dir: Brett Ratner (for some reason, Hollywood's new IT director who is willing to do the third film in any trilogy)

Paul, I had not read your post until after I Just Saw the film (nice plug). But we see eye to eye on this one. I wonder which is the worse artistic crime, poor execution of noble intent or competent filmmaking with missed potential? I would usually default to the latter, and for me this film only seems to justify those leanings. The value of superhero films (comic books, etc.), at least the good ones, is that they operate from a spectacular premise that provides the intellectual and narrative space to ruminate over more complex ethical and social issues: the Batman films explore the limits of justice and revenge, the Spiderman films examine the nexus of power and responsibility, while the Superman films import Christian narratives to uncover the nature of sacrifice and temptation. The X-Men upholds such a tradition by positing rich social questions about difference and discrimination. In theory, by the time you get into the second and third film of any superhero franchise (having already gone through the requisite conversion story), you can most pointedly engage in broader commentary.

I thoroughly enjoyed the first two X-Men films (still, the best superhero franchise are the two Spiderman films), but the premise to the third is unquestionably the best. The X3 story strongly echoes the thought experiment Derrick Bell presents in "The Space Traders," albeit from different perspectives. Bell's story posits a world where aliens offer an unlimited energy supply to (white) Earth (or was it just the US?) in exchange for all of its black citizens. The aliens ensure that they will be treated as equals with a prosperous future, never again facing any form discrimination. X3 presents a similar storyline: a "cure" for mutancy is discovered that allows the mutants to shed their "affliction" and rejoin society without chance of discrimination. The mutant community is divided over proper reaction to this new discovery, and the responses seem to parallel many of the civil rights activists who debate over how to best fight this discrimination: do we take the MLK response of negotiation and peaceful protest or adopt the militant anger of Malcolm X?

Rich storylines that have the potential for novel insight and quality character development, but Ratner elects to dedicate time to fighting and special effects instead. Yes, the story advances in the wake of eye candy (and he directs the film quite ably, hence the apt execution versus missed potential question). But, I cannot but help wanting more, and not in the sense of 2001: A Space Odyssey left me wanting more. The narrative moved quickly, requiring the audience to fill in any motivation. Sure, they made enthymematic sense, but a film that wishes to explore issues more deeply should not dependent on such plot devices. The film clocked in at 1:44, leaving more that enough time to add on atleast 20 minutes of character/narrative development without having the film drag. The American public, I think, can handle longer films; provided they are good, people will still come to see them (all the Matrix films, the recent Star Wars films, obviously LOTRs were well over 2 hours and extremely lucrative).

Bryan Singer let X-Men to do Superman Returns--it better be worth it.

X-Men: The Last Stand

2006-05-26T02:37:00.000-04:00

Director- Brett Ratner (Rush Hour, Red Dragon)

Oh Bryan Singer, how do I love you? Let me count the ways. The Usual Suspects. X2. Apt Pupil . Just kidding. Not even Bryan Singer's wife likes Apt Pupil. But his work with the franchise was nothing short of remarkable. When you play with Comic Book Fire, you risk being burned by an annoying overly critical fanbase. You could for example use the first era Cyclops costume instead of the third era costume, angering fans who prefer the X-men's "cartoonish" phase. Or whatever. The point is that the first two X-men movies were pretty doggone decent. I was not much of a fan of the first one, but the second is in my top 5 comic book movies of all time (the rest of the list, in no order, is Batman Begins, Batman (Tim Burton, not Burt Ward), a spot reserved for Dick Tracy, and Spiderman 2. and I lied. Spiderman 2 is the best of the bunch IMHO).
Mr. Singer departed the X-men franchise so that he could revive the Superman one. Kudos for that. From the trailers, it looks fantastic. But in the place of Singer for the third installment of our favorite mutant heroes in walks Brett Ratner. I was not as down on this choice as some on various messageboards for a couple reasons. Firstly, I kind of thought Rush Hour was pretty decent for what it was- a serviceable buddy movie. Secondly, Red Dragon was good- certainly a better Lecter installment than Ridley Scott's overwrought Hannibal.
The series' third installment has a pretty decent premise. A "mutant cure" is being developed, with implications for mutants and humans alike. For some, like Magneto's Brotherhood, the cure threatens the specter of a mutant genocide. For others, like the X-Men, the cure is seen as one of many options that exist in the world for mutants- neither good nor bad, but a choice that can be made. For humans, this cure offers the promise to cure their fear of the "mutant other" for good.
We are introduced to a few new mutants- the Beast (played by Kelsey Grammar) who is blessed with a refined and tactful manner, along with a furry blue animalistic skin. Magneto has new henchmen as well, including a woman who can sense mutant powers and move like The Flash. Jean Grey, who is thought to have died in the last episode, returns in this film. I'm not spoiling anything, it happens really fast into the movie.
The movie builds towards a climactic conflict between humans and the two mutant factions who will fight for control over the young boy who harbors the secret of the mutant cure. In the process Jean Grey is revealed to have gone crazy and evil, and some characters who featured prominently in the last two movies have their roles reduced or eliminated.
There are some pluses. There are a couple spectacular visuals, including one involving a prison convoy and another involving the Golden Gate bridge. But there is nothing as iconic and amazing as the scene in X2 where Magneto escaped from his plastic prison. Still, Ratner can direct an action sequence and you will not find that the story moves slowly. This in part could be because the movie is rather short, a quick 90 minutes or so. Ian McKellen's performance is also excellent. At this point, I would watch a movie called "Ian McKellen acts like a refined badass and talks shit while playing chess with old people in the park". He hams it up with admirable flair.
The minuses are several. Firstly, Mr. Ratner must have sold his character development soul to the devil for a delicious sandwich and an ear for predictable lame dialogue. The worst line is definitely an exchange early on between Wolverine and Cyclops that I'll let you "discover" for yourself. The only saving grace is that when young Bobby (Iceman) is finally able to make love to his girlfriend Rogue (Anna Paquin, who is talented and terminally underused) we are spared a truly horrific Eugene O'Neill reference. The movie also more prominently than past films features Halle Berry's storm character. The Oscar she won for Monsters Ball should probably be taken away for her plain and uninspired performance in this movie. She is really mailing it in.
Overall, if you were ever hardcore into X-Men, this movie will probably anger and dissapoint you. If you are interested in a summer popcorn flick, than this is serviceable. I am probably less hard on this movie than I should be because it was my first summer flick this year, the theater was packed, I had a big thing of popcorn and a giant soda, and the action sequences were well constructed enough that I found myself rooting for the heroes. So much so that I would certainly reccomend this film heartily if they managed to kill the film's writers, who are responsible for the parts of this movie that just don't work.

Munich

2006-05-24T10:24:00.000-04:00

2005

Dir: Him (Schindler's List; Jurassic Park; The Color Purple; War of the Worlds)

Let me give my own thoughts on the film, and then address the debate that occured here on I Just Saw.

I found the movie difficult to form a judgment on. Some parts I found very compelling, and others left me flat. It is by no stretch a bad film, but I do think the good parts workmanlike. On first reflection, this is a capable and entertaining film, but not much more.

The excellent parts are the actual cloak-and-dagger assasinations and plotting. As a spy/secret agent film, Munich delivers a sense of realism and successfully conveys the politics of field work, not just the actual killing itself. Many times it reminded me of a mob movie, with various hits going on and different alliances with different families, everyone recognizing the futility and the inevitabiliy of it all. I rather liked the relationship between Avner and his informer Louis, a complicated one that grows over time. The problems on contacts, pesky governments counting receipts, the unpredictability of explosives, the jitters of new operatives, are all welcome remedies from the polished perfection of a James Bond.

Some directorial bits were also rewarding. I was rather impressed with the opening montage about the hostage crisis at the Olympics, and the shifting back and forth between the two sides. Would that the rest of the film had that sort of depth and complexity in its exploration of this issue! More on that below.

But what falls flat in the film are the familial elements that are supposed to create Avner's tension about his job. Am I right, or was the entire development of the love for his family that is supposed to dominate his entire worldview the fact that he had sex with his pregnant wife? One scene, and then its "I can't live without you." Half way through the movie, Avner cries when his toddler says "Dada." Everything else is just inferred. But I expect some reason to be invested in his relationship myself if I am going to care about its disposition. The movie is far more concerned with justice, not with family. I found that whole thread tacked on, unconvincing, and distracting.

What is left is some things that blow up good, an interesting spy film that chooses a different conflict than most others, and not much else. Just like a Bond film, I think the little dart guns are cool, watch in the bushes with our hero until the guards have a cigarette break, and wait for the next action scene.

The debate between Ron and Omri linked above addresses an entriely other level to the film, its overt and ambiguous politics. You should read it before moving on to my reactions below.

While Omri's post is well thought out and makes sense from a certain perspective, its is not applicable to this film. Omri starts with a contradiction in the first two sentences, one that cuts to the heart of his critique. He says that a movie claiming to represent the facts that then gets those facts wrong is propanganda. He then says that Speilberg wanted to (1) spark discussion about violence and (2) contribute to peace with Munich. Where is the fidelity in truth in those two goals?

Omri's post goes on to simultaneously make two arguments. One, that Munich is inaccurate (his first claim above). Two, that Munich equivocates between Israeli and PLO violence. All of the stuff relating to one goes out the window once we recognize this is a narrative and does not claim to accuratley represent the events of the Munich and its aftermath. You can make that charge against Michael Moore (or even Mel Gibson, who was more interested in the facts of the matter than many film makers), but not Speilberg. This is polemic, not documentary.

So we have equivalence. Ron says that Speilberg is deft there, humanizing both sides while resisting the assignation of blame, expect to "the media and, to a lesser degree, American aparthy." Speilberg is ambivalent to violence, recognizing the motives but bemoaning its lack of solvency. I agree; too many scenes feature characters proclaiming that Israel has no other response to terrorism, that anyone would do the same thing in their shoes. No characters question counter terrorism itself, but only pragmatically; it doesn't work, leaders emerge and they have revenge on their minds, but you still have to do it.

Omri thinks this move equivocates. But it is also undeniable. Any neutral observer would have to recognize the escalating revenge factor over time, and the tragic human toll in repsonding through strength on both sides. The dead care not about equivocation; everyone dies the same.

The flaw with Munich's politics is not that it sees both sides the same, but that is has not the will to really tell the Palestinian side. Only in one scene do we get their take, and it is the most superficial one possible. "Everyone wants a home." Even the most casual oberver of the conflict already knows that. Speilberg tells the story from one side, and in so doing provides a warrant for one kind of violence and only implying one for the other. Omri is wrong; this film is pro-Israel, not just neutral. By only humanizing one side, there is no equivocation here, but advocacy.

Now, I don't have a problem with advocacy. I want films on both sides; it is through these stories that we empathize with the parties in the conflict (Paradise Now is very high in my Netflix queue). Of course, I had my problems with how that humanization went down here, but that is a different issue. I am all for a pro-Israel film. But saying that this pro-Israel film is not pro-Israel enough lacks self reflexivity. And I think Ron turns a blind eye to the advocacy here, that he wants Speilberg to have been fair, or found blame in parties outside the two primary antagonists.

The film is pro-Israel. Complicating counter terrorism is not equivocating between it and terrorism.

And it is still only a fair film.

MAP

Citizen X

2006-05-24T09:48:00.000-04:00

1995

Dir: Chris Gerolmo (The Witness; Mississippi Burning [writer])

Early HBO TV movie about the most notorious serial killer in global history, Andrei Chikalito who mutilated over 50 victims during a six year period in the Soviet Union. The film has the right idea, and a unique slant on this tired genre, but has too many writing flaws to get my recommendation.

The detective work in the film is totally controlled by the stifling Russian bureaucracy and the desire of party leaders to cover up the presence of a murderer in the country. Serial killing is supposedly a "decadent, Western phenomenon," and the allow the killer to continue in the interests of PR. Stephen Rea (The Crying Game; V for Vendetta) is a forensic scientist who leads the investigation. His superior is a woefully miscast (yet still Emmy award winning) Donald Sutherland. His Russian accent, which wasn't good to begin with, comes and goes, and both Michelle and I looked at each other about 5 minutes in and wondered "Is he supposed to be gay?" It actually may be in the backstory of the character (homosexuality is a sidelight in the plot), but if it was then Donald is way overdoing it here, to the point of distraction.

Sutherland is an experienced navigator of the bureaucracy, and most of the film is spent with the subtlty of a trainwreck. When the party boss storms into a room and demands that a suspect (the real killer) be released because "he is a party member in good standing. Do you know how this will look!" we roll our eyes at the bluntness of the confrontation. Even in Red Russia, I have a feeling that winks and nods and private conversations and silent understandings were much more the order of business than matter-of-fact shouting matches and irrational edicts in a room full of people. These things must be done delicately, or at least they should be to make a good film. The audience is forced to do no work whatsoever here, all of the slight moves in the bureaucracy game are spelled out. That makes it silly.

The film is resolved after Perestroika, where overnight the party loses power and Sutherland is freed up to get the bad buy. This, as well, is blunt and unimaginative. The only good thing is that the investigators can now bring in a psychiatrist, played by the perfect-in-everything-he-does Max von Sydow (who can hold an accent) in a very intersting scene exploring the psyche of the killer, a bid to sympathize him and make him another cog in this failing system. This really a scathing indict of the Soviet system.

Good idea. This movie is certainly praised and won several awards. But I think the script insults the intelligence of the audience, and earns low marks in my mind.

MAP

VIdeodrome

2006-05-24T04:06:00.000-04:00

Director- David Cronenburg (Scanners )

I loved A History of Violence. I did not like Crash. I did like this Cronenburg entry, part of "bizarre media and respected director week" here at Casa de PJ. About thirty minutes in, I could not shake the idea that this movie in some ways was meant to perform Marshall McLuhan's famous critique that "the media is the message". And about fourty minutes in, I wanted to kick my own ass for invoking the name of the media theorist whose pretentious rants are the subject of the funniest movie scene of all time. As it turns out, the McLuhan link is not the construction of a beer addled, sleep deprived graduate student, but what Mr. Cronenburg intended all along. Since I got the ghetto DVD from netflix instead of the sweet special edition, I was limited only to the production notes. However, even these sparse aides indicated that the director was attempting to make a point just like McLuhan's.

But first the story- James Woods plays Max Renn, director of a struggling tv station called "Civic", which shows violence and nudity in copious amounts to attract viewers. Max is awakened every morning by a tv video wake up call made specially for him by his assistant, and his everyday behaviors are saturated with media- he appears on talk shows, watches samples of shows for programming, and watches videos with his dates. One day Max has the opportunity to check out some real "promising" video tape- it turns out to be essentially snuff material that he initially thinks is broadcasting out of Southeast Asia. Later, they discover that the footage is broadcasting out of Pittsburgh! (WOOOOO GO BURGH! I'd like to take this opportunity to share a story about how people just scream out the name of a city whenever its mentioned by someone famous. There was a Ben Folds concert at Wake a month or so ago and during the performance of the heartrending song "Brick", about how Mr. Folds and his first girlfriend had to go get an abortion, Mr. Folds sings "went down to Charlotte" and the crowd goes absolutely apeshit nuts. He went there to get AN ABORTION PEOPLE! ITS SAD!. Idiots. Anyway...). Max then takes up with a young woman (played by Deborah Harry, of Blondie fame) with a fetish for rough sex and even rougher visuals, and then goes off to Pittsburgh to find her way to this station which she thinks "is perfect for her".

It is here that the movie takes a turn for the bizarre and creepy. Which is good, because it could it could have turned crappy. Max begins to have hallucinations that involve making love to the television, bizarre encounters with cloaked agents, and whips. There are characters, but their names do not really matter. They simply embody the idea that "we are what we eat" from a media standpoint. I will not rant a bunch about "The Media is the Message" because I frankly don't fully understand it. But as Max's behavior becomes more and more tangled in terms of a failureto understand the difference between reality and hallucination AND as the viewer becomes less able to discern what is really happening, the movie does make a clear point about how a powerful and immersive medium can easily control or dominate the minds and visions of those individuals who watch it. And that those individuals may not just be watching, but being in that medium all at once. The close of the movie is fascinating and shocking, and the entire narrative is filled with shocking sexual images and incredibly grotesque violence. But I believe in this movie they are not catering to prurient interests, but are called for. In order to effectively perform the point that immersion in media dulls our sense this extreme violence must continuously manifest itself so that when we are presented with absurd violence at the end of the movie we too have become desensitized to it. But the fact that the movie plays with what reality is also dulls our sense- if we don't think the violence is real, and we view it only as fantasy, we do not react to it.

This is why the beginning of the movie, when Renn seizes on the violent images on the satellite (the show itself is called Videodrome, which literally means video arena or video space) Max looks at them as entertainment opportunities, but ignores the violent content and relationships depicted. This makes it close to not just McLuhan but also Horkheimer and Adorno- the violent sexual images themselves are made to be the same as other programming because they can brings ratings and advertising dollars. The judgments that Max makes about the shows come not from an ethical perspective that can condemn or even speak to particular behaviors, but operate only in a relative frame with a baseline of ratings. Cronenburg is consistently fascinated in his work about the viewer's relationship to violence, and this movie is not the sly wink of A History of Violence but instead the brutal blow of a sledghammer, whose clang signals the complicity of the viewer in the consumption of not just violent ideas and images, but a medium who makes those ideas real where they may not have been.

I really liked this movie. It creeped me out, despite the fact that it was special effects reliant and as a result somewhat dated. Additionally, 80's movies generally have the absolute worst soundtracks of all time, since whoever invented the synthesizer was constantly blowing everyone in charge of mixing sound for any movie in the 80's. The movie slogs through that, and James Woods' performance is absolutely first rate. He plays scumbags well, and this is a scumbag who we can't help but identify with- and should (oh irony of ironies).

The Devil and Daniel Webster

2006-05-24T00:22:00.000-04:00

1941

Dir: William Dieterle (The Hunchback of Notre Dame; The Life of Emile Zola, and born July 15, a splendid day indeed)

Another film I would have probably passed over if it were not under the Criterion Banner. And again the good folks at CC fail to disappoint. Jabez Stone is a down on his luck New Hampshire farmer. Mounting debts, inclement weather, and bad harvests keep Jabez and the family Stone poor. As his spills his last bag of seed, he foolishly utters that he would give his soul for two cents and then some. Wishing to oblige, Mr. Scratch appears with gold and offers Mr. Stone the expected Faustian bargain. Intoxicated by the wealth that lays before him, Stone gladly accepts the terms of the agreement (first you get the sugar, then you get the power, then you get the women). Mr. Scratch promises seven years of good fortune in exchange for his "worthless soul." This fortune is parlayed into plentiful harvests, excessive wealth and a newborn son. However, the temptations mount, both material and corporeal, and Stone is caught up in the glamour of worldly possessions and slowly turns his back on his faith.

Seven years pass, and Stone has alienated his family and friends, and Mr. Scratch comes to collect. But Stone realizes the error of his ways and enlists the help of his son's godfather, Daniel Webster (I'll spare you the backstory, but back then I guess politicians were extremely accessible). What ensues is the often mimicked courtroom battle with the Devil over the ownership of the soul. Daniel Webster's heroic speech to a jury of deceased American traitors (Benedict Arnold is the foreman), appeals to an American ideal where true citizens have already given their soul to the cause of freedom (I was hoping for a less pathos driven argument--even Marge Simpson had a contractually-based legal appeal, but the orator is the good guy, so I'll take that).

The film is an adaptation of a 1937 Stephen Vincent Benet short story, which is one of three stories that mythologize Webster as a Bunyanesque figure who is an ardent defender of the American ideal. And with the film being released in 1941, there are clear rallying cries for American support to stop the spread of tyranny (although, the closing shot troubles a sincere read, as Mr. Scratch, perusing his black book looking for another "victim," points at the camera, imitating the pose of Uncle Sam from the army recruitment posters). The film does not boast any incredible depth beyond an allegorical interpretation. There is a sincere reverence for Webster as the virtuous guard of the Union, destined to promote the community (he does enable the grange to reunite). However, Mr. Scratch does make some pointed attacks on the American ideal, noting that he was there when the Americans killed their first Indian and the first slave ship that sailed from the Congo. This provides the only real indict of Websterian ideals. However, it was the historic Webster, an abolitionist, who pushed the Missouri Compromise, his own Faustian bargain to keep the Union together. And yet, the warnings of materialism shine though; the subsequent arguments Webster makes suggest that the violence levied against others during the founding of America was the product of a polluted ideal, brought down by unfettered greed.

William Huston's Mr. Scratch provides the only real standout performance. Everyone else is passable. But the real winners are the Oscar winning score, by the incomparable Bernard Herrmann (Hitchcock's longtime musical author), and the cinematography (a young Robert Wise as editor, btw). Clever lighting, special effects, and spooky instrumentals capture the demonic power of Mr. Scratch, cultivating a disquieting mood for a film that spends most of its time being cheeky.

If you have the chance, see it. But if the queue long, it can wait behind the clearly recognizable classics.

Fists in the Pocket

2006-05-22T10:05:00.000-04:00

1965

Dir: Marco Bellocchio (China is Near)

Itailan pychological horror movie just released on Criterion. A sequestered provincial family is all screwed up, full of hate and malice and incest. It's all too much for Alessandro, who turns to killing just for the thrill, to break-up the oppression of his surroundings.

What does one do when all the smart people are on one side of the critical debate and you find yourself alone? I assumed I would love the film. I eagerly anticipated a breakthrough for Italian cinema and the horror genre writ large. I even watched Bertolucci's fawning (and self aggrandizing) remembrance of the film afterwards to try and learn what made the movie great.
But I was bored. I watched the film in half hour chunks because my mind kept wandering to things like doing the dishes. Was I in a bad mood? Did I pick the wrong film to watch sober? Did I pick the wrong week to quit sniffing glue?

I think what others are going for here is that Fists in the Pocket explores the depravity with which the traditional subjects of a horror film live their everyday lives, how their debilitations function when they aren't wearing a leather smock covered in blood. It brings to us the everydayness of the conditions that might lead to the actions of a psychopath.

But it just never connected with me. I need to care about the characters or their victims, even if I am rooting for their ultimate failure. A bad horror movie substitutes character development for gore; but this movie forgoes both! Part of the problem may be the loose editing and stylized storytelling that featured minimal dialogue and lots of gaps in the narrative. The episodic nature of the writing left me wondering why I was supposed to care about anything this family did. Here, backstory or some descent into this condition would have been welcome.

I am more than willing to admit that I must be wrong. Too many smart people like this movie for me to be the only voice of reason. I often call out others for refusing to admit the shortcomings in their own taste, that proudly proclaiming "I hate classical music" or "I was bored with Lawrence of Arabia" is not a spirited stance against pretention but is instead flaunting ignorance. Not that such beliefs make you a bad person; it just means your have a blindspot. I try to be relfexive in my own prejudices and points of undercultivation.

It must have been the fact that I was sober. Six months from now, me and bottle of Maker's have a date with Fists in the Pocket.

MAP