Pedro Almodovar has to be one of my all time favorite directors. If I was ever to have the privilege of directing movies, I think he would be at the top of my lists of inspirations. There are similar themes that run throughout all of his films--sex, mistaken identity, women, death--and he employs the same distinctive style--camp, melodrama, bright colors. This said, his films rarely become tedious, or repetitive. Like all great directors he ha had his share of pictures with opportunities for improvement, but his masterpieces Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, Talk to Her, and All About About My Mother transcend style and theme, and create a new artistry that is solely his own (my favorite of his is Volver, but that is personal taste, and I know intellectually that it does not compare with the former three).
Live Flesh is not one of those masterpieces, however there are scenes in this film that brim with creativity, spontaneity, and life; he does work that ranks among my most favorite scenes of his. It is a story of how carnal desires lead people down the wrong path even though they might have good intentions, and how--on occasion--those with duplicitous intent end up getting all that they want and more.
The movie opens on a prostitute (Penelope Cruz) and her madame trying to get to a hospital as she goes into labor. The baby comes to quickly and they have to birth the boy on an out-of-service bus. He is born on Christmas. The boy is Victor, and the plot begins 20 years later with him tracking down a girl that he had met a week previous. She is a young junkie (possibly also a hooker, but they never say so explicitly), and he shows up at her apartment much to her displeasure. After a bout of frustration a gunshot goes off signaling the arrival of two cops: Sancho, an alcoholic wife-beater, and David (played by Javier Bardem). After a another tussle between Sancho and Victor, a second gunshot goes out hitting David in the spine.
Years later Victor is released from prison with vendetta on his mind, and a plan in hand. Sex becomes his weapon of choice, although he is a 26 year virgin, and he starts on a quest to break the hearts of those that put him away. He finds the junkie, now rehabilitated and married to the wheelchair-ridden David, and forces his way back into her life. He also meets another woman, Clara, from whom he receives instructions in the art of sex. She offers more to the plot than first meets the eye, however, and will prove central to the rest of the story.That is all that I want to say about the plot. As I mentioned before, Almodovar's films are all about melodrama, and this story unfolds like a telenovela with twists around every corner, and characters fueled by impulse.
My main issue with this film is that many of the relationships happen with very little precedence. I did not understand why some people reformed their ways, or why they would choose to fall for the people that they did. The cahracters in this film try things on the spur of the moment, but the longer lasting and more meaningful relationships seemed slightly like they were created simply for the purpose of the plot. But perhaps my imagination is simply not good enough to fill in the holes.
That point addressed, I thought this movie was wonderful. That acting was terrific from most of the cast--Bardem was a bit shaky, but Liberto Rabal (playing Victor) is a beautiful man with beautiful talents who held his own as the lead. The first 15 minutes of the film are amazing, are glorious, are everything I love about the movies. I only wish that it continued on for more of the film. There were terrific moments throughout, but I wish that it had been maintained consistently. If that were the case I might rank it among his best work--the potential was there.
3.5/4
Thursday, June 30, 2011
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
The Terminator (1984)
Who is Sarah Connor and why do we care about her? It takes about 40 minutes to find out that she apparently she breeds good children. A lightning storm sends two beings from forty years in the future, one for her protection, and one for her destruction.
The story is pretty basic. We learn of a post-apocalyptic future in which a defense system constructed with a Cold War backdrop becomes too smart, interprets humans as a threat, and retaliates with a full nuclear attack. I'm not sure why the computers survived a nuclear holocaust, but apparently they did in force, and have spent the decades following hunting down the survivors who have formed guerrilla-warfare resistance. There are Terminator cyborgs who have titanium, robotic innards, but look like humans on the outside in order to confuse their enemies and make them hard to spot (except by dogs who know what cyborgs smell like as they should).
One of these Terminators (played by the elephantine Arnold Schwarzenegger) travels back to the 1984 present in order to hunt down Sarah Connor who will play a major role for the distant future. In her defense comes Sgt. Kyle Reese (Michael Biehn), who volunteered to come back to save her for the sake of his cause. What follows is an action-packed thrill-ride to save Sarah, and at the same time destroy the Austrian juggernaut.
The special are awesome. There was some really, really good action sequences in this film, and Arnold is really terrifying as a villain. Anyone that outweighs me by 100 lbs. and has biceps larger than my head will always be a good bad-guy. Also, surrounding the gravity of the main characters and the central plot is an entire cast of goofy characters with hilarious one-liners. When Sarah, Reese, and the Terminator weren't on screen I was laughing my ass off--it was really well written.
For what it was The Terminator is a good movie. I know it was an action movie with car chases, gun slinging, and Arnold's chest, and that I should not take it too seriously, but this film raised more questions than it answered. Many more. I do not pretend to know anything about time travel, but I do know that logically the timeline of the movie did not work. Sarah even addresses this, but it is never explained, and that makes me more upset than if it was not acknowledged at all. The writers knew it didn't make sense, but didn't bother to solve the problem. Also, I'm not sure why, if people in the future have the ability to bend space and time, would they use this amazing technology to go back in time in order to save a woman who does not directly do anything to help their cause, and did not instead use it to make preventative measures so that the defense system was not created in the first place. Spoiler: Further, throughout the movie we see the Terminator take beating after beating without being seriously hurt. This should raise this question at the end of the film: If a nuclear bomb is not strong enough to destroy the machines in the future, then why should home-made plastique do the trick?
Like I said, though, you shouldn't over-think this movie. Enjoy the action, and enjoy the knowledge that you see as much of Mr. Schwarzenegger as Arnold's mistress.
2.5/4
The story is pretty basic. We learn of a post-apocalyptic future in which a defense system constructed with a Cold War backdrop becomes too smart, interprets humans as a threat, and retaliates with a full nuclear attack. I'm not sure why the computers survived a nuclear holocaust, but apparently they did in force, and have spent the decades following hunting down the survivors who have formed guerrilla-warfare resistance. There are Terminator cyborgs who have titanium, robotic innards, but look like humans on the outside in order to confuse their enemies and make them hard to spot (except by dogs who know what cyborgs smell like as they should).
One of these Terminators (played by the elephantine Arnold Schwarzenegger) travels back to the 1984 present in order to hunt down Sarah Connor who will play a major role for the distant future. In her defense comes Sgt. Kyle Reese (Michael Biehn), who volunteered to come back to save her for the sake of his cause. What follows is an action-packed thrill-ride to save Sarah, and at the same time destroy the Austrian juggernaut.
The special are awesome. There was some really, really good action sequences in this film, and Arnold is really terrifying as a villain. Anyone that outweighs me by 100 lbs. and has biceps larger than my head will always be a good bad-guy. Also, surrounding the gravity of the main characters and the central plot is an entire cast of goofy characters with hilarious one-liners. When Sarah, Reese, and the Terminator weren't on screen I was laughing my ass off--it was really well written.
For what it was The Terminator is a good movie. I know it was an action movie with car chases, gun slinging, and Arnold's chest, and that I should not take it too seriously, but this film raised more questions than it answered. Many more. I do not pretend to know anything about time travel, but I do know that logically the timeline of the movie did not work. Sarah even addresses this, but it is never explained, and that makes me more upset than if it was not acknowledged at all. The writers knew it didn't make sense, but didn't bother to solve the problem. Also, I'm not sure why, if people in the future have the ability to bend space and time, would they use this amazing technology to go back in time in order to save a woman who does not directly do anything to help their cause, and did not instead use it to make preventative measures so that the defense system was not created in the first place. Spoiler: Further, throughout the movie we see the Terminator take beating after beating without being seriously hurt. This should raise this question at the end of the film: If a nuclear bomb is not strong enough to destroy the machines in the future, then why should home-made plastique do the trick?
Like I said, though, you shouldn't over-think this movie. Enjoy the action, and enjoy the knowledge that you see as much of Mr. Schwarzenegger as Arnold's mistress.
2.5/4
Sunday, June 26, 2011
The Apartment (1960)
C.C.Baxter works for an insurance firm of thirty-something thousand employees, in a city of eight million some-odd people, and works at desk eight hundred and whatever. I couldn't tell you, but Baxter sure could. He is a good natured, affable fellow who works hard and has ambitions. Unfortunately he is a complete pushover with an aptitude for getting himself into situations which he can't soon get out of. Therefore he remains nothing but a one of the numbers that he has memorized rattles off at will. But he has a plan...
We soon learn that his apartment has become available for use by his four bosses should they like an evening alone with a female companion other than their wives. This has been going on for some time. Baxter is roused from his bed at all hours of the night and left out in the cold at the whim of his superiors. He is expected to keep a steady supply of liquor and cheese crackers available for use, and he has developed an elaborate key trading system, and calendar of events. It seems that he works just as hard managing his apartment as he does at this actual job. His neighbors and landlady know nothing about his business, and assume that he likes to party extra hardy. He is, in essence, a pimp. But instead of whoring his girls, he whores his bedroom.
Why does he do this? Two reasons: to keep his job, and to advance his job. I'm not sure why only his bosses played that blackmail card--perhaps it is just in Baxter's nature not to out his bosses to their wives. It does not matter though. He doesn't seem to have many other options for standing out in a company where everybody is remarkably the same.
Even though their are thirty thousand same-faced workers in the building, the pretty fireball elevator attendant (Shirley MacLaine) remembers them all by name, and has stolen Baxter's heart. Unfortunately for him, he is unaware that she is the girlfriend of one of his bosses--that is until he stumbles across her in his apartment in the most unusual of situations. The results lead to a weekend of gin-rummy and spaghetti strained using a tennis racket (the poor man is hopelessly bacheloresque). The consequences are for you to see.
This seems like the simplest of love-triangle situations, but it is set in the most unusual and ridiculously funny of settings. We get a half-formed answer of how this situation even began involving men's tuxedos that spiraled out of control, but mostly we are left to our imagination with only the personality of helpless man as our clue. Jack Lemmon as Baxter is terrific. Billy Wilder plus Lemmon is terrific, but we already know that. It was Shirley MacLaine that took me by surprise. Most of the characters in Wilder films seem a bit larger than life; it's just the nature of his work. MacLaine, however, brought a sensibility and ease to his Wilder's words that I was not expecting. When she spoke it didn't sound like a script, it sounded like dialogue. It was unmistakably Wilder's words ("When you're in love with a married man you shouldn't wear mascara."), but they sounded so natural. I caught myself muttering "Wow, that is a terrific bit of acting" multiple times, and that is a mark of someone who is damn good at her craft.
There are scenes in this movie that were comedic genius. One of the Baxter's bosses brings over a girl he says looks like Marilyn Monroe. When I heard her voice I had to pause and look really hard to determine whether or not it was the genuine article. I chuckled when I thought of Billy Wilder auditioning girls and asking them to do their best Marilyn Monroe impressions. I'll bet half of all of the girls in L.A. showed up with an eyeliner mole on their faces doing throaty voices and wiggling their eyebrows. That would be one hell of an afternoon.
This is a hilarious and rather moving film. You love who you are supposed to love, hate who you are supposed to hate, and relish in all of the details that a great film-maker like Wilder likes to surprise you with.
4/4
We soon learn that his apartment has become available for use by his four bosses should they like an evening alone with a female companion other than their wives. This has been going on for some time. Baxter is roused from his bed at all hours of the night and left out in the cold at the whim of his superiors. He is expected to keep a steady supply of liquor and cheese crackers available for use, and he has developed an elaborate key trading system, and calendar of events. It seems that he works just as hard managing his apartment as he does at this actual job. His neighbors and landlady know nothing about his business, and assume that he likes to party extra hardy. He is, in essence, a pimp. But instead of whoring his girls, he whores his bedroom.
Why does he do this? Two reasons: to keep his job, and to advance his job. I'm not sure why only his bosses played that blackmail card--perhaps it is just in Baxter's nature not to out his bosses to their wives. It does not matter though. He doesn't seem to have many other options for standing out in a company where everybody is remarkably the same.
Even though their are thirty thousand same-faced workers in the building, the pretty fireball elevator attendant (Shirley MacLaine) remembers them all by name, and has stolen Baxter's heart. Unfortunately for him, he is unaware that she is the girlfriend of one of his bosses--that is until he stumbles across her in his apartment in the most unusual of situations. The results lead to a weekend of gin-rummy and spaghetti strained using a tennis racket (the poor man is hopelessly bacheloresque). The consequences are for you to see.
This seems like the simplest of love-triangle situations, but it is set in the most unusual and ridiculously funny of settings. We get a half-formed answer of how this situation even began involving men's tuxedos that spiraled out of control, but mostly we are left to our imagination with only the personality of helpless man as our clue. Jack Lemmon as Baxter is terrific. Billy Wilder plus Lemmon is terrific, but we already know that. It was Shirley MacLaine that took me by surprise. Most of the characters in Wilder films seem a bit larger than life; it's just the nature of his work. MacLaine, however, brought a sensibility and ease to his Wilder's words that I was not expecting. When she spoke it didn't sound like a script, it sounded like dialogue. It was unmistakably Wilder's words ("When you're in love with a married man you shouldn't wear mascara."), but they sounded so natural. I caught myself muttering "Wow, that is a terrific bit of acting" multiple times, and that is a mark of someone who is damn good at her craft.
There are scenes in this movie that were comedic genius. One of the Baxter's bosses brings over a girl he says looks like Marilyn Monroe. When I heard her voice I had to pause and look really hard to determine whether or not it was the genuine article. I chuckled when I thought of Billy Wilder auditioning girls and asking them to do their best Marilyn Monroe impressions. I'll bet half of all of the girls in L.A. showed up with an eyeliner mole on their faces doing throaty voices and wiggling their eyebrows. That would be one hell of an afternoon.
This is a hilarious and rather moving film. You love who you are supposed to love, hate who you are supposed to hate, and relish in all of the details that a great film-maker like Wilder likes to surprise you with.
4/4
Saturday, June 25, 2011
Breathless (1960)
Michel (Jean-Paul Belmondo) tells Patricia (Jean Seberg) a story of a bus driver who fell in love with a young woman. In order to catch her attention he stole $5 million and took her away on holiday where they spent the cash in three days. After the money was gone he told her what he had done. Instead of being angry or frightened, she fell in love with him and joined him and his new lifestyle as con-men and thieves. Michel tells her this to gauge her reaction as he hopes for a similar reaction from her.
Jean-Luc Godard's Breathless is a story of love and not much else, as it tries to fill a mold of a thief and cop-killer as he tries to make a break for Italy, with as much talk about sex as could be squeezed in. Mostly, however, I saw this criminal personality as more of a way to make sure that our poor central characters were able to make ends meet, provide fragmented bits of drama, and create a character-type to contrast the utterly charming Patricia. Without this added element the entire story would essentially have revolved around Michel trying to sleep with her, and if that were the case I think I would have stopped watching. It tires me endlessly to watch or listen to people make sex an important topic of conversation or an act that in its very nature creates conflict. I find sex as natural as running, but you don't watch many films with arguments stemming from one person not wanting to take a jog with another.
There are some instances in which sex has been used as an effective tool to cope with external issues or as a power ploy. I am thinking in particular of Last Tango in Paris, in which Marlon Brando's character has raw, animal sex with a complete stranger in order to distract him from the pain he feels having recently lost his wife to suicide. This catharsis creates a dependency on the girl which keeps him coming back for more and lewder sexual acts. I could justify sex becoming the central object in that story as its purpose held some greater intent then carnal gratification. This is not the case of Breathless I am sorry to say. Sex was both the ends and the means of the relationship.
Enough of that. Michel, a womanizer who lives spontaneously and somewhat recklessly, has unintentionally fallen in love with Patricia who he has known for about a month, slept with once, and has gotten pregnant (we hear this last information once, and then it is never mentioned again. It made the end of the movie unfulfilling for me). On his way into Paris he is startled by a police-officer which hijacking a car and shoots him dead. The rest of the skeletal plot involves him trying to track down a certain Antoine who owes him $5000 so that he, and hopefully Patricia with him, could escape for the border. Two hindrances to his plan include his inability for several days to locate the man, and Patricia's complete ignorance to Michel's lifestyle.
I don't feel nervous saying that she eventually does find out and that it is this knowledge that challenges their relationship--we know right from the onset that this was an inevitability. The second act of the film then, is the development of the relation that will be challenged, and it is this act that stretched my patience to the limit. It involves the French being as stereotypically interested in sex as any negative stereotype was ever reinforced. All of the characters blatantly ask each other for sex as casually as they would ask for a baguette and Chesterfield cigarette. At one point Michel says to Patricia that he wants to sleep with her again, "It means I love you." People don't talk this way, people don't act this way; it was very frustrating.
There were some clever cinematic shots and unusual editing, as is typical in French New Wave, and the players made choices that I actor found very inspiring. All of these things, however, could not redeem its incredibly tedious plot and insufferable male lead. I don't care if it is an "important" film, it is French art-house at its most dangerously boring, and for that reason I think I will leave it--and its director--to the hipsters.
1.5/4
Jean-Luc Godard's Breathless is a story of love and not much else, as it tries to fill a mold of a thief and cop-killer as he tries to make a break for Italy, with as much talk about sex as could be squeezed in. Mostly, however, I saw this criminal personality as more of a way to make sure that our poor central characters were able to make ends meet, provide fragmented bits of drama, and create a character-type to contrast the utterly charming Patricia. Without this added element the entire story would essentially have revolved around Michel trying to sleep with her, and if that were the case I think I would have stopped watching. It tires me endlessly to watch or listen to people make sex an important topic of conversation or an act that in its very nature creates conflict. I find sex as natural as running, but you don't watch many films with arguments stemming from one person not wanting to take a jog with another.
There are some instances in which sex has been used as an effective tool to cope with external issues or as a power ploy. I am thinking in particular of Last Tango in Paris, in which Marlon Brando's character has raw, animal sex with a complete stranger in order to distract him from the pain he feels having recently lost his wife to suicide. This catharsis creates a dependency on the girl which keeps him coming back for more and lewder sexual acts. I could justify sex becoming the central object in that story as its purpose held some greater intent then carnal gratification. This is not the case of Breathless I am sorry to say. Sex was both the ends and the means of the relationship.
Enough of that. Michel, a womanizer who lives spontaneously and somewhat recklessly, has unintentionally fallen in love with Patricia who he has known for about a month, slept with once, and has gotten pregnant (we hear this last information once, and then it is never mentioned again. It made the end of the movie unfulfilling for me). On his way into Paris he is startled by a police-officer which hijacking a car and shoots him dead. The rest of the skeletal plot involves him trying to track down a certain Antoine who owes him $5000 so that he, and hopefully Patricia with him, could escape for the border. Two hindrances to his plan include his inability for several days to locate the man, and Patricia's complete ignorance to Michel's lifestyle.
I don't feel nervous saying that she eventually does find out and that it is this knowledge that challenges their relationship--we know right from the onset that this was an inevitability. The second act of the film then, is the development of the relation that will be challenged, and it is this act that stretched my patience to the limit. It involves the French being as stereotypically interested in sex as any negative stereotype was ever reinforced. All of the characters blatantly ask each other for sex as casually as they would ask for a baguette and Chesterfield cigarette. At one point Michel says to Patricia that he wants to sleep with her again, "It means I love you." People don't talk this way, people don't act this way; it was very frustrating.
There were some clever cinematic shots and unusual editing, as is typical in French New Wave, and the players made choices that I actor found very inspiring. All of these things, however, could not redeem its incredibly tedious plot and insufferable male lead. I don't care if it is an "important" film, it is French art-house at its most dangerously boring, and for that reason I think I will leave it--and its director--to the hipsters.
1.5/4
Friday, June 24, 2011
Alien (1979)
The crew of the mining cargo-ship Nostromo are awakened early from their hibernation to investigate what they first interpret to be an interstellar SOS signal, but what is later determined to be a warning. The crew of seven descend on a rocky moon where they encounter an alien craft which is not as vacant as it first appears. One of their crew takes on a parasite that looks very similar Nosferatu's hand with an umbilical cord attacked to it. The creature turns out to be the smallest problem facing the Nostromo crew, as its offspring turns out to be an eight foot tall behemoth with two mouths and acid for blood. The events that transpire when the crew becomes trapped aboard with their new guest makes for one of the scariest and most suspenseful movies I have seen.
Created just two years after Star Wars: A New Hope the film industry's technical prowess was growing by leaps and bounds, and Alien's Oscar winning effects proved that science fiction film-making was a reputable genre that could not only captivate and horrify, but could make its audience completely surrender to the imagination and prowess of the director and technical crew. The movie is now over thirty years old, and looks as fresh and realistic as I'm sure it did when it was first made. I have seen the film three or four times now, and I still jump as though I don't know what is going to happen next. That is the mark of a truly great horror film.
The power of the movie comes not from a visceral punch, but from an atmospheric tension that crescendos as the crew is picked off. It features the first lead role for Sigourney Weaver as Ripley, who would reprise her role in the next two sequels, solidifying a career for her and garnering her an Oscar nomination for Aliens....I suppose that's a spoiler. Ripley survives. Surprise. Oh well, you know the plot. It's the rehashed premise of monster on board so do your best survive. That being said, there are things in this film that will disgust you, terrify you, and unsettle you in ways that are unmatched in monster movies.
I love this movie. It will survive for the same reason that films like Star Wars IV, V, The Exorcist and 2001: A Space Odyssey will survive: their special effects are created with robots, models, and makeup. I praise Allah that this film avoids CGI, as films that do become so dated so quickly. Computer graphics have a tremendous talent for bringing in box office bucks, and then killing off films five years later. They very easily could have turned the stark beauty and quiet terror of Alien into gimmicky schlock faster than you could say "Don't stick your head over that egg!" It does not. It has actors playing opposite an insanely scary creature who I would say is an entirely believable being--if the space travel that they perform was possible and if a foot long creature could grow to eight without eating any food, but I'll overlook the science in this science fiction.
4/4
Created just two years after Star Wars: A New Hope the film industry's technical prowess was growing by leaps and bounds, and Alien's Oscar winning effects proved that science fiction film-making was a reputable genre that could not only captivate and horrify, but could make its audience completely surrender to the imagination and prowess of the director and technical crew. The movie is now over thirty years old, and looks as fresh and realistic as I'm sure it did when it was first made. I have seen the film three or four times now, and I still jump as though I don't know what is going to happen next. That is the mark of a truly great horror film.
The power of the movie comes not from a visceral punch, but from an atmospheric tension that crescendos as the crew is picked off. It features the first lead role for Sigourney Weaver as Ripley, who would reprise her role in the next two sequels, solidifying a career for her and garnering her an Oscar nomination for Aliens....I suppose that's a spoiler. Ripley survives. Surprise. Oh well, you know the plot. It's the rehashed premise of monster on board so do your best survive. That being said, there are things in this film that will disgust you, terrify you, and unsettle you in ways that are unmatched in monster movies.
I love this movie. It will survive for the same reason that films like Star Wars IV, V, The Exorcist and 2001: A Space Odyssey will survive: their special effects are created with robots, models, and makeup. I praise Allah that this film avoids CGI, as films that do become so dated so quickly. Computer graphics have a tremendous talent for bringing in box office bucks, and then killing off films five years later. They very easily could have turned the stark beauty and quiet terror of Alien into gimmicky schlock faster than you could say "Don't stick your head over that egg!" It does not. It has actors playing opposite an insanely scary creature who I would say is an entirely believable being--if the space travel that they perform was possible and if a foot long creature could grow to eight without eating any food, but I'll overlook the science in this science fiction.
4/4
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
The Lower Depths (1936)
The Lower Depths is a French film from director Jean Renoir, son of the impressionist painter Pierre Auguste. It follows two friends, a thief and a baron, as they struggle with money and love in very romanticized ways. This is not my favorite of Renoir's work, but it showcases the immense talents of Jean Gabin and Louis Jouvet who are always a pleasure to watch.
The story begins with the thief Pepel, living in a flophouse who sets out to burgle the large mansion of a man whom we come to know only as The Baron. By chance or fate it happens that The Baron is down on his luck--he is a gambler who wins big, but loses much bigger. On the eve of the robbery The Baron loses the last of his money and returns home with the knowledge that all of his possessions will be repossessed in the morning. He meets Pepel in his house and the two strike an immediate friendship, playing cards until dawn.
Without money or a home The Baron eventually comes to live in the poorhouse with Pepel, and it is there, surrounded by intellectualism, spiritualism, and love that The Baron comes to find contentment with the world. There is a colorful cast of supporting characters in the flophouse who detest the bourgeois: the sick actor, the old prophet, the drunk musician, who all find solace in vices and mediums other than money.
At the same time, Pepel is struggling to balance the love he shares for two sisters....well, he stops loving one for the other which does not sit well for the first. His new love wishes to be with him to receive his affection, the old one because she believes that Pepel can steal enough to allow her to escape her horrid wretch of a husband who, incidentally, is the owner of the flophouse. In the end comes the struggle between Pepel, the two sisters and the abusive husband which is as much symbolic as it is literal.
I liked this movie for its acting, its theatricality, the relationship between Pepel and the Baron, and its beautiful dialogue. I found its message to be annoying, however, simply because I dislike granola, Bohemian dribble. This film makes the argument that love and money are mutually exclusive entities. The "bad" figures in the movie have money or try to achieve it. The exception is the Baron who lost his money and found happiness without it. I dislike people who preach that those that seek money are heartless and care for nothing else. You never hear those with money saying that wealth is a bad thing; it is only the underprivileged who I feel are simply making the best of a bad situation. They demonize something that they can't achieve which is what people do, but it doesn't make for very interesting movie watching.
3/4
The story begins with the thief Pepel, living in a flophouse who sets out to burgle the large mansion of a man whom we come to know only as The Baron. By chance or fate it happens that The Baron is down on his luck--he is a gambler who wins big, but loses much bigger. On the eve of the robbery The Baron loses the last of his money and returns home with the knowledge that all of his possessions will be repossessed in the morning. He meets Pepel in his house and the two strike an immediate friendship, playing cards until dawn.
Without money or a home The Baron eventually comes to live in the poorhouse with Pepel, and it is there, surrounded by intellectualism, spiritualism, and love that The Baron comes to find contentment with the world. There is a colorful cast of supporting characters in the flophouse who detest the bourgeois: the sick actor, the old prophet, the drunk musician, who all find solace in vices and mediums other than money.
At the same time, Pepel is struggling to balance the love he shares for two sisters....well, he stops loving one for the other which does not sit well for the first. His new love wishes to be with him to receive his affection, the old one because she believes that Pepel can steal enough to allow her to escape her horrid wretch of a husband who, incidentally, is the owner of the flophouse. In the end comes the struggle between Pepel, the two sisters and the abusive husband which is as much symbolic as it is literal.
I liked this movie for its acting, its theatricality, the relationship between Pepel and the Baron, and its beautiful dialogue. I found its message to be annoying, however, simply because I dislike granola, Bohemian dribble. This film makes the argument that love and money are mutually exclusive entities. The "bad" figures in the movie have money or try to achieve it. The exception is the Baron who lost his money and found happiness without it. I dislike people who preach that those that seek money are heartless and care for nothing else. You never hear those with money saying that wealth is a bad thing; it is only the underprivileged who I feel are simply making the best of a bad situation. They demonize something that they can't achieve which is what people do, but it doesn't make for very interesting movie watching.
3/4
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
The Tree of Life (2011)
The micro and macro-cosmic worlds shape our existence, but I am sure that we regard them as mutually exclusive when not thinking about them. With the scope of 2001: A Space Odyssey, Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life contemplates both and challenges the audience to think beyond the realm of their own backyard. We witness the universe from the Big Bang, to the creation of life, through the evolution and eventual destruction of the dinosaurs.The "narrative" of the story, if you can really call it that, centers on a 1950's suburban home, and watches a family through the eyes of an unhappy son. It explores the themes of goodness, bravery, love, God, weakness, and the family, and all the while we are reminded that the house which gained so many memories exploring these ideas was under an ocean two hundred million years ago.
The story opens on the family receiving news of the death of one of the sons in the family, and the rest of the story is a series of memories of the eldest son, some thirty years later (played by Sean Penn) looking back on his childhood and his loss of innocence. A narrative voice tells the audience that man must follow one of two paths: the path of nature--selfish, unhappy, striving to better its position in the world--or the path of grace--gentle, kind, with the ability to take abuse and forgive. Each are represented with the boy's parents, the former his father, and the latter his mother. The two wage an internal war in the boy, Jack (a very good Hunter McCracken), and shape his choices as he grows.
As I said the plot is extremely loosely constructed. Its skeleton is that of showing what might have led to a child's death, but even that is shaky, as stating that that is its plot would destroy its message. I think I counted roughly ten scripted scenes through the entirety of the film. Most everything was candid and improvised with stretches of time simply watching children play kick the can, help their father in the yard, or poking a frog. It's enchanting. It is a deeply powerful and well-loved examination of birth, play, marriage, death and all of the wonderful moments that simply happen and are taken for granted.
A glorious example of this is a shot in which Jack's eternally patient and warm free-spirit of a mother is dancing in the street with the kids, when a yellow butterfly lands on her hand. It was purely happenstance and spoke so loudly of the message of the film that it nearly brought me to tears. The father represents the path of nature, shrewd and planning, and his hard work all goes for naught in the end. It's Malick's intent that we see the beauty in every leaf, in every bubble blown, in every breath from a baby, because the best laid plans of mice and men hold no bearing in a 14.7 billion year old cosmos.
This is a gross oversimplification of the film--I'm not even sure that it is fair to try and articulate what this film means, as I would say that each person gets out of it what he puts into it. Some people have said it was one of the worst films they have seen, and I would say that that is the case because they have not taken the time to reflect on their own life or develop their own ideas about the major questions that philosophers have pondered for thousands of years. I saw this movie in the theater, and that was both a good and a bad decision. The special effects are breathtaking, so for sheer visual appeal the bigger the screen the better. The Tree of Life is, however, an extremely personal and spiritual film; no two people will have an exact same interpretation of it, as everyone should find something to relate to in a unique way. For this reason I disliked the theater-going experience, as having other people watching it in the same room as me seemed like an invasion of my privacy. I felt like they were looking in on my memories and my understanding of the universe.
Watch this and keep an open mind. Only see it if you know yourself, because that is the only way to get something truly special out of it.
4/4
The story opens on the family receiving news of the death of one of the sons in the family, and the rest of the story is a series of memories of the eldest son, some thirty years later (played by Sean Penn) looking back on his childhood and his loss of innocence. A narrative voice tells the audience that man must follow one of two paths: the path of nature--selfish, unhappy, striving to better its position in the world--or the path of grace--gentle, kind, with the ability to take abuse and forgive. Each are represented with the boy's parents, the former his father, and the latter his mother. The two wage an internal war in the boy, Jack (a very good Hunter McCracken), and shape his choices as he grows.
As I said the plot is extremely loosely constructed. Its skeleton is that of showing what might have led to a child's death, but even that is shaky, as stating that that is its plot would destroy its message. I think I counted roughly ten scripted scenes through the entirety of the film. Most everything was candid and improvised with stretches of time simply watching children play kick the can, help their father in the yard, or poking a frog. It's enchanting. It is a deeply powerful and well-loved examination of birth, play, marriage, death and all of the wonderful moments that simply happen and are taken for granted.
A glorious example of this is a shot in which Jack's eternally patient and warm free-spirit of a mother is dancing in the street with the kids, when a yellow butterfly lands on her hand. It was purely happenstance and spoke so loudly of the message of the film that it nearly brought me to tears. The father represents the path of nature, shrewd and planning, and his hard work all goes for naught in the end. It's Malick's intent that we see the beauty in every leaf, in every bubble blown, in every breath from a baby, because the best laid plans of mice and men hold no bearing in a 14.7 billion year old cosmos.
This is a gross oversimplification of the film--I'm not even sure that it is fair to try and articulate what this film means, as I would say that each person gets out of it what he puts into it. Some people have said it was one of the worst films they have seen, and I would say that that is the case because they have not taken the time to reflect on their own life or develop their own ideas about the major questions that philosophers have pondered for thousands of years. I saw this movie in the theater, and that was both a good and a bad decision. The special effects are breathtaking, so for sheer visual appeal the bigger the screen the better. The Tree of Life is, however, an extremely personal and spiritual film; no two people will have an exact same interpretation of it, as everyone should find something to relate to in a unique way. For this reason I disliked the theater-going experience, as having other people watching it in the same room as me seemed like an invasion of my privacy. I felt like they were looking in on my memories and my understanding of the universe.
Watch this and keep an open mind. Only see it if you know yourself, because that is the only way to get something truly special out of it.
4/4
Monday, June 20, 2011
Rashomon (1950)
Rashomon is generally considered to be one of master Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa's best films, and for good reason. Movies are not made like this anymore, and it is really disheartening that even in the independent and art house loops there is a general lack of films with a solid story and a strong acting. It won't be gimmicks and glitter that will make filmmakers legends; it is their ability to tell a story in which a normal person is put into an abnormal situation or an abnormal person is put into a normal setting, and is told with honesty and realism. Kurosawa knew that, and that is why his stories are as accessible now as a Shakespearean play.
The movie follows a basic premise of court hearing on the rape of a woman and the killing of her samurai husband. The plot quickly becomes tangled when we hear four different accounts of the events leading to three confessions and a fourth accusation. The first comes from the bandit himself, played by one of Kurosawa's muses, Toshiro Mifune (Seven Samurai, Yojimbo), who claimed it was an honorable fight to the death. The second, from the raped woman who said she killed her husband from the shame caused by her having slept with two men. The third came from the dead man himself who, through the mouth of a medium, said he killed himself after being disgraced by his hateful wife. The fourth accusation came from the man who had stumbled across the dead body and reported it to the police, and said it was a cowardly struggle for survival by the two men.
All of the stories follow wildly varying accounts and leave it open to the audience member to decide for himself who the real culprit was. Each story has its merits, and each story teller has a reason to be distrusted. Even if you don't choose to decide who did what it is still an incredible movie to watch filled with tremendous acting from the ensemble, and a really good script. I mentioned Shakespeare earlier, and I think that that was a very fair comparison. Kurosawa knew the human condition like Shakespeare did, and he gave us a story in which challenges to the characters' honor compromised their testimonies as it skewed their judgement. Kurosawa liked dissecting in his movies what it meant to be honorable, and this is as good a portrait of that as I have seen.
I recommend this movie very highly. Awesome entertainment.
4/4
The movie follows a basic premise of court hearing on the rape of a woman and the killing of her samurai husband. The plot quickly becomes tangled when we hear four different accounts of the events leading to three confessions and a fourth accusation. The first comes from the bandit himself, played by one of Kurosawa's muses, Toshiro Mifune (Seven Samurai, Yojimbo), who claimed it was an honorable fight to the death. The second, from the raped woman who said she killed her husband from the shame caused by her having slept with two men. The third came from the dead man himself who, through the mouth of a medium, said he killed himself after being disgraced by his hateful wife. The fourth accusation came from the man who had stumbled across the dead body and reported it to the police, and said it was a cowardly struggle for survival by the two men.
All of the stories follow wildly varying accounts and leave it open to the audience member to decide for himself who the real culprit was. Each story has its merits, and each story teller has a reason to be distrusted. Even if you don't choose to decide who did what it is still an incredible movie to watch filled with tremendous acting from the ensemble, and a really good script. I mentioned Shakespeare earlier, and I think that that was a very fair comparison. Kurosawa knew the human condition like Shakespeare did, and he gave us a story in which challenges to the characters' honor compromised their testimonies as it skewed their judgement. Kurosawa liked dissecting in his movies what it meant to be honorable, and this is as good a portrait of that as I have seen.
I recommend this movie very highly. Awesome entertainment.
4/4
Sunday, June 19, 2011
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Pt 1 (2010)
I want to talk about the most recent installment of Harry Potter because I constantly get into arguments with people who dislike the perspective of director David Yates on the Harry Potter franchise. Time and again people annoy me saying the fifth or sixth or seventh movie was "bad" because it offered less action than the first films and cut large sections from the book. While I may agree with the latter statement to a certain extent (like why most of action of the Order of the Phoenix was cut from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix), I dislike comparisons between films of different directors and think that Yates' films ought to be looked at individually.
Yates has a deep poetry to the way that he has looked at Harry Potter. It is somber and contemplative, and he recognizes that his fx should be used to inspire and awe in their judicious use, as opposed to those who use them to dazzle simply because they can.
This last film shows the wizarding world at the bleakest it has ever been, which I think is correct. I don't think it would be right to offer much hope as it is a part 1, but Yates keeps the film from becoming completely dismal by offering characters with genuine pathos, coming from the best work of Daniel Radcliffe and Emma Watson that I have had the privilege of viewing. Throughout the 10 years of Harry Potter films we have seen the wonderful progression of the young actors into people well learned in their craft. Their fine work made me overlook the fact that the running time was close to two and half hours simply because I was enjoying choices that the actors were making.
The movie offers some very clever bits amidst the long stretches of dazed wanderings. I won't delve into the plot because you should have read the book--if you hadn't then I'm not sure how you spent your childhood--but I will say that there were some moments that particularly impressed me. The opening sequence was especially disturbing; take a moment to reflect on the implications of what Hermione does to her family. The story of the three brothers was unexpected and refreshing, and among the long stretch of traveling in the second act of the film there were some especially tender moments between the actors that made it clear that the Harry Potter series is much more than magic and monsters.
My main problem with the movie is actually a fault with J.K.Rowling's narrative. The plot line with the horcruxes is incredibly superfluous and really taxing on my patience. There was nothing cleverer that she could have come up with than making the seventh book a quest story? I could think of three right away. But this is not a reflection of the film, as they were simply following orders from one of the world's most powerful women.
The movie definitely feels anticlimactic, but that is because there shouldn't be a climax. It ends with a funeral and a desecration of a grave, and somehow that is intriguing enough to have me very excited for the final chapter next month.
3.5/4
Yates has a deep poetry to the way that he has looked at Harry Potter. It is somber and contemplative, and he recognizes that his fx should be used to inspire and awe in their judicious use, as opposed to those who use them to dazzle simply because they can.
This last film shows the wizarding world at the bleakest it has ever been, which I think is correct. I don't think it would be right to offer much hope as it is a part 1, but Yates keeps the film from becoming completely dismal by offering characters with genuine pathos, coming from the best work of Daniel Radcliffe and Emma Watson that I have had the privilege of viewing. Throughout the 10 years of Harry Potter films we have seen the wonderful progression of the young actors into people well learned in their craft. Their fine work made me overlook the fact that the running time was close to two and half hours simply because I was enjoying choices that the actors were making.
The movie offers some very clever bits amidst the long stretches of dazed wanderings. I won't delve into the plot because you should have read the book--if you hadn't then I'm not sure how you spent your childhood--but I will say that there were some moments that particularly impressed me. The opening sequence was especially disturbing; take a moment to reflect on the implications of what Hermione does to her family. The story of the three brothers was unexpected and refreshing, and among the long stretch of traveling in the second act of the film there were some especially tender moments between the actors that made it clear that the Harry Potter series is much more than magic and monsters.
My main problem with the movie is actually a fault with J.K.Rowling's narrative. The plot line with the horcruxes is incredibly superfluous and really taxing on my patience. There was nothing cleverer that she could have come up with than making the seventh book a quest story? I could think of three right away. But this is not a reflection of the film, as they were simply following orders from one of the world's most powerful women.
The movie definitely feels anticlimactic, but that is because there shouldn't be a climax. It ends with a funeral and a desecration of a grave, and somehow that is intriguing enough to have me very excited for the final chapter next month.
3.5/4
Saturday, June 18, 2011
Wild Strawberries (1960)
Wild Strawberries is a film from the renowned Swedish filmmaker Ingmar Bergman. It centers on a physician in his late 70's during a day-long travel to the city to receive his jubilee achievement award. This becomes an intimate and moving reflection of one man's life, and the events that brought him to the state of loneliness and lack of fulfillment that the doctor feels about his life.
Victor Sjostrom plays Dr. Isak Borg with such convincing sincerity that one can't help but pity the man who came to his present state of isolation from friends and family by his callous nature and egotism of his youth. Throughout his journey which he takes with his daughter-in-law he encounters a trio of young lovers who smoke, kiss, and discuss God, a quarreling married couple, and his estranged family. All of these people symbolize the different stages of his life, some of them his desires, others his regrets. Dr. Borg has a series of bizarre dreams and fantasies that bring him back to his youth and force him to think on his one true love that married his brother, the dissatisfaction that he feels in his work, and his ruminations about his death. All of these work as something of cleansing process that help him come to turns with his future and with his family.
It is a simple and delicate story that plays on our basic fear that we will grow old with nothing to look back on but sadness and opportunities not taken, and tells it in a way that is both poignant and hopeful, as is characteristic of the director. Bergman is a humanist, and knows how people think and interact with one another which really makes his characters come alive. That being said, I really have trouble becoming absorbed in his work, because his style is so clunky. Although the stories he chooses to tell are lovely there is no grace to his film making, and I find watching his films oddly jarring. I sometimes feel that his work might be best suited for the stage as he could then make his productions a work of actor and director which I think was what ultimately all he cared about.
3/4
Victor Sjostrom plays Dr. Isak Borg with such convincing sincerity that one can't help but pity the man who came to his present state of isolation from friends and family by his callous nature and egotism of his youth. Throughout his journey which he takes with his daughter-in-law he encounters a trio of young lovers who smoke, kiss, and discuss God, a quarreling married couple, and his estranged family. All of these people symbolize the different stages of his life, some of them his desires, others his regrets. Dr. Borg has a series of bizarre dreams and fantasies that bring him back to his youth and force him to think on his one true love that married his brother, the dissatisfaction that he feels in his work, and his ruminations about his death. All of these work as something of cleansing process that help him come to turns with his future and with his family.
It is a simple and delicate story that plays on our basic fear that we will grow old with nothing to look back on but sadness and opportunities not taken, and tells it in a way that is both poignant and hopeful, as is characteristic of the director. Bergman is a humanist, and knows how people think and interact with one another which really makes his characters come alive. That being said, I really have trouble becoming absorbed in his work, because his style is so clunky. Although the stories he chooses to tell are lovely there is no grace to his film making, and I find watching his films oddly jarring. I sometimes feel that his work might be best suited for the stage as he could then make his productions a work of actor and director which I think was what ultimately all he cared about.
3/4
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