What happens when a bunch of thirty-something, pleather clad, swing dancing bikers show up in a 1950's small town and refuse to leave? Chaos of course! This Marlon Brando gem is so unintentionally hilarious you simply have to forgive its idiotic plot and perfectly amiable villains.
The films opens up with a small statement on the screen: "It could never take place in most American towns, but it happened in this one..." Not much happens though. Two biker gangs rumble into a town where the most exciting thing that happens is the occasional wedding, and when one of their leaders is arrested for fighting they all set up camp despite the protests of local, inept law enforcement. While they are there they drink beer late into the night, dance with the local girls, and generally just make 50's mischief. I thought my ears started to bleed when one of the gang called a member of the town a "cornball." Seriously, you would not want to get caught in a dark alley with one of these guys--they might shoot a spitball at you or call you a square or something.
Our hero is Johnny (Brando) who is quieter than the others, but leads his group with authority. He falls in love with the town waitress, of course. She falls for his lifestyle, of course. It is impossible for them to be together, and they part without a word shared between them, of course. There is more to Johnny than meets the eye however, which keeps this film a bit more involving than it probably should have been. His manner and the choices that Johnny made in his interactions with the townsfolk did raise questions that I could not immediately answer. I think, however, that these questions only arose because it was Brando playing the lead. Had anyone else played it I am sure it would have been a performance more like the rival leader's (Lee Marvin, doing a pretty dang good job), colorful, but uninspiring.
Brando really can do anything. It has been said time and time again, but really there is Brando and there is everyone else. He had the most trite material to work with, and even though he had a stupid tough guy affectation in his voice he still mesmerizes when he is on the screen. There were scenes when Marvin was doing his thing, being loud and obnoxious and all over the place like every other biker in the film, and he was obviously supposed to be the focus of the scene, but Brando raises his eyebrows or wipes his nose and all attention falls on him. It really is startling and rather awe-inspiring. Is this a Stanley Kowalski or a Terry Malloy moment? Of course not. The role and the movie are garbage and elementary, but the actor is a man driven by instinct. His method is so raw and so fresh, many others would kill just to have the afterbirth of his talent. He is immortal.
...also I have a huge crush on him, but that is neither here, nor there.
This shows that I overthink films that ought not be thought about at all, but I was confused about the message of the film. I was really not sure whether this film was a glorification or a condemnation of the rabble-rousers. Was this an attack on lawlessness, or was it pointing a spotlight on straight laced day to day life, or both? I really don't know. If it was the latter...well it shouldn't have been. Make a statement for Pete's sake.
In summation, this is a short movie whose G-rated bad boys will give you a chuckle. It will not present you with anything new or exciting, but it really was the first biker film which inspired a legacy of others, and for any Marlon Brando lover it really is a staple.
2/4
Friday, July 29, 2011
Thursday, July 28, 2011
Black Swan (2010)
Darren Aronofsky has directed one of my favorite films of 2008, The Wrestler, and one of my least favorite films of all time, Requiem for a Dream. His work may not always be to my taste, but he goes big or he goes home. He is undeniably a visionary director who works without compromise, and I thought when I first watched Black Swan in the theaters that I was seeing something fresh and visceral. Upon a second viewing, however, I now see that I was blinded by clever camera work and a bravura performance from Natalie Portman.
His latest endeavor follows something resembling The Wrestler--it is a story about an entertainer trying to find the spotlight. While his earlier work is about an unremarkable man trying to find a sense of meaning in his life, his latest creation looks at an artist obsessed with perfection who will do what she must in order to be seen. This sounds formulaic, after all how many movies in the past fifty years have tried to copy All About Eve? A million. None of them, however, have tried to create an atmospheric thriller though about paranoia and madness, and if they have they certainly have not been this loud or memorable.
Portman plays Nina, a young ballet dancer in New York with dreams of stardom and who is compelled to achieve technical perfection. She lives with her failed dancer of a mother (Barbara Hershey) who lives vicariously through her daughter, pushing her ever harder to succeed. When the prima ballerina of the company is forced into retirement the role of the Swan Queen in Tchaikovsky's "Swan Lake" is suddenly available to be had. Nina lands the role with her technical prowess, but the character requires her to be not only the ethereal White Swan, she must also be the seductive and instinctual Black Swan. Nina's timid nature and sheltered lifestyle does not lend her to this part, but when a new, beautiful, and effortless addition to the company (Mila Kunis) threatens her place as the lead, Nina's drive for perfection leads her down a psychotic path for ultimate triumph.
We, of course, follow her down this path as she discovers the Black Swan inside of herself, and as she goes mad with the effort. It is dark, macabre, and at times rather scary, but upon a multiple viewing and with the shock factor mostly gone the problems with the film were all too obvious. The performances are great all around, to be sure. Natalie Portman really is spectacular as the troubled dancer, and Mila Kunis works very well off of her (there is a delicious scene with the two of them that will bring all of the guys in the audience to the front of their seat--even the limp-wristed ones like myself). Barbara Hershey does well as the mentally deranged, overprotective, stage mom, but her character was written very poorly. One critic mentioned her Mommie Dearest moment which I have to say was spot on, and not much of a compliment. Also there is a terrific and terribly depressing cameo from Winona Ryder as the washed up prima ballerina.
The faults here fall on Aronofsky who, I have to say, did a psychological thriller 101 film. The art direction was without thought; the black and white was so on the nose it was annoying. Every time Nina had an episode (except two...I think) there was a mirror in the room. Physical mutilation as representation for her mental breakdown. It was all just too obvious. Further, I really have no reason to accept the story that a girl who really showed no signs of mental instability (except that her mom was slightly off) would suddenly have a complete mental breakdown. I know stressed, over zealous workers who work just as hard as she did for the stage, but they have never started hallucinating. Of course this ruins the spirit of the movie, but it kept bothering me, and I couldn't tell the thoughts to leave me alone.
Aronofsky, like Nina, was in his own way from creating something exceptional. He did not take enough chances as a director and simply relied on his actors and his cinematographers to create the drama in ballet. That is not enough, says I. Strong acting and a camera tossed about the stage can only dazzle me for so long. Soon enough you can bet that I will see that with a less capable lead this film would be nothing more than the dime-a-dozen horror/thrillers that are schlocked out every year, but with a more pretentious backdrop. Ballet is not interesting, and neither is gilded film making.
3/4
His latest endeavor follows something resembling The Wrestler--it is a story about an entertainer trying to find the spotlight. While his earlier work is about an unremarkable man trying to find a sense of meaning in his life, his latest creation looks at an artist obsessed with perfection who will do what she must in order to be seen. This sounds formulaic, after all how many movies in the past fifty years have tried to copy All About Eve? A million. None of them, however, have tried to create an atmospheric thriller though about paranoia and madness, and if they have they certainly have not been this loud or memorable.
Portman plays Nina, a young ballet dancer in New York with dreams of stardom and who is compelled to achieve technical perfection. She lives with her failed dancer of a mother (Barbara Hershey) who lives vicariously through her daughter, pushing her ever harder to succeed. When the prima ballerina of the company is forced into retirement the role of the Swan Queen in Tchaikovsky's "Swan Lake" is suddenly available to be had. Nina lands the role with her technical prowess, but the character requires her to be not only the ethereal White Swan, she must also be the seductive and instinctual Black Swan. Nina's timid nature and sheltered lifestyle does not lend her to this part, but when a new, beautiful, and effortless addition to the company (Mila Kunis) threatens her place as the lead, Nina's drive for perfection leads her down a psychotic path for ultimate triumph.
We, of course, follow her down this path as she discovers the Black Swan inside of herself, and as she goes mad with the effort. It is dark, macabre, and at times rather scary, but upon a multiple viewing and with the shock factor mostly gone the problems with the film were all too obvious. The performances are great all around, to be sure. Natalie Portman really is spectacular as the troubled dancer, and Mila Kunis works very well off of her (there is a delicious scene with the two of them that will bring all of the guys in the audience to the front of their seat--even the limp-wristed ones like myself). Barbara Hershey does well as the mentally deranged, overprotective, stage mom, but her character was written very poorly. One critic mentioned her Mommie Dearest moment which I have to say was spot on, and not much of a compliment. Also there is a terrific and terribly depressing cameo from Winona Ryder as the washed up prima ballerina.
The faults here fall on Aronofsky who, I have to say, did a psychological thriller 101 film. The art direction was without thought; the black and white was so on the nose it was annoying. Every time Nina had an episode (except two...I think) there was a mirror in the room. Physical mutilation as representation for her mental breakdown. It was all just too obvious. Further, I really have no reason to accept the story that a girl who really showed no signs of mental instability (except that her mom was slightly off) would suddenly have a complete mental breakdown. I know stressed, over zealous workers who work just as hard as she did for the stage, but they have never started hallucinating. Of course this ruins the spirit of the movie, but it kept bothering me, and I couldn't tell the thoughts to leave me alone.
Aronofsky, like Nina, was in his own way from creating something exceptional. He did not take enough chances as a director and simply relied on his actors and his cinematographers to create the drama in ballet. That is not enough, says I. Strong acting and a camera tossed about the stage can only dazzle me for so long. Soon enough you can bet that I will see that with a less capable lead this film would be nothing more than the dime-a-dozen horror/thrillers that are schlocked out every year, but with a more pretentious backdrop. Ballet is not interesting, and neither is gilded film making.
3/4
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
As anyone who knows me can tell you, I am very interested in British history, particularly from the 1880's to 1940's. The era of the British hegemon on world affairs holds my fascination as there really is nothing like it with which to draw comparison. Everything that we know about England at her pinnacle comes from the written word which we must accept as fact as all else is lost. There is little to equate a strong England to--even the United States at its zenith is nothing like it. There was pride that came with strength that was not boastful, it was duty bound. The United States may be large and in charge, but that is only because we actively seek to preserve our power for the sake of having it; it is scary to imagine a world without supremacy. The English, however, fought to preserve their dominance, it seems, because they felt it was their purpose as the leaders of the civilized world to encompass as much of it as possible. That is a strange and foreign idea to me, and one that is intriguing. This was a period in time where a nation referred to "honor" as something that could be tangible, and that is what The Bridge on the River Kwai is about.
Alec Guinness plays Col. Nicholson, the commanding officer of a British squadron in the Pacific Theatre during WWII that is forced to surrender to the Japanese. Moved to a PoW camp he butts heads--to put it euphemistically--with the head of the camp, Col. Saito (Sessue Hayakawa). The power struggle escalates as Nicholson tries to maintain control of his troops and Saito attempts to undermine his authority and use their labor to construct a bridge over the Kwai River. The main issue at hand being that Saito tries to force the officers to do manual labor with the rest of the lower ranking soldiers, a demand strictly forbidden by the Geneva Convention.
An American PoW also stationed in the camp manages to do the impossible and escape. Arriving to a safe camp of the Allies, the US Navy turns him over to the British Army to penetrate the camp with a small team to destroy the bridge, in turn damaging the Japanese rail lines. The soldier, Shears (a passable William Holden), provides the voice of dissent as the anti-war cynic who at every opportunity points out the ridiculous and the futile. Nevertheless he agrees to the assignment. It is an exciting and very engaging plot without the violence for the sake of violence. It is exactly my type of war film that does not rely on excess, but simply focuses on telling a story with strong characters and a clear message.
The questions that it raises are much more complex than the plot might initially reveal and, because of a stellar performance by Hayakawa, the answers do not come easily. It is documented that wounded Japanese soldiers taken to Allied hospitals would need to be restrained because if they did not then they would rip off their bandages in order to bleed to death. The Bushido Code firmly establishes honorable and dishonorable conduct in war, and being taken alive was not listed under the "honorable" category (watch Letters from Iwo Jima). Japanese honor is very similar to British honor in the respect that it is taken seriously, and to be disgraced is a fate far worse than death. Of course the two have differences, and that is the real topic explored in this film. What does it mean to be honorable? How far does one go to preserve their honor? Is it okay to place the health and well-being of others at stake in order to preserve the good name of your nation and its leader?
The fact is that both Nicholson and Saito are very strong, very proud men who love their country. Guinness won an Oscar for his stiff upper-lipped colonel who did really push the limits of those questions I listed. At the hands of the Japanese he suffered for weeks because he stuck to his principals, and others suffered by association. But watch and really contemplate what happens to Saito once Nicholson takes control of the bridge building. Who really is Col. Saito? When we are introduced to him he is the devil incarnate. But is that truly who he is? Hayakawa and director David Lean do a magnificent job of not revealing more about his character than absolutely necessary. What is given is amazing, earning the actor an Oscar nod, and the director a win.
This movie will challenge you morally as it entertains you thoroughly. There was not a minute of this nearly three hour epic that I was not completely invested in the action as well as the characters. It is a supreme example of film making of the 50's, and of war films in general. I can find gratuitous violence anywhere, but whether or not I care about the characters is an entirely different story.
*A little side note: This film is done in CinemaScope and glorious Technicolor. The bigger the screen the better, but certainly not necessary.
4/4
Alec Guinness plays Col. Nicholson, the commanding officer of a British squadron in the Pacific Theatre during WWII that is forced to surrender to the Japanese. Moved to a PoW camp he butts heads--to put it euphemistically--with the head of the camp, Col. Saito (Sessue Hayakawa). The power struggle escalates as Nicholson tries to maintain control of his troops and Saito attempts to undermine his authority and use their labor to construct a bridge over the Kwai River. The main issue at hand being that Saito tries to force the officers to do manual labor with the rest of the lower ranking soldiers, a demand strictly forbidden by the Geneva Convention.
An American PoW also stationed in the camp manages to do the impossible and escape. Arriving to a safe camp of the Allies, the US Navy turns him over to the British Army to penetrate the camp with a small team to destroy the bridge, in turn damaging the Japanese rail lines. The soldier, Shears (a passable William Holden), provides the voice of dissent as the anti-war cynic who at every opportunity points out the ridiculous and the futile. Nevertheless he agrees to the assignment. It is an exciting and very engaging plot without the violence for the sake of violence. It is exactly my type of war film that does not rely on excess, but simply focuses on telling a story with strong characters and a clear message.
The questions that it raises are much more complex than the plot might initially reveal and, because of a stellar performance by Hayakawa, the answers do not come easily. It is documented that wounded Japanese soldiers taken to Allied hospitals would need to be restrained because if they did not then they would rip off their bandages in order to bleed to death. The Bushido Code firmly establishes honorable and dishonorable conduct in war, and being taken alive was not listed under the "honorable" category (watch Letters from Iwo Jima). Japanese honor is very similar to British honor in the respect that it is taken seriously, and to be disgraced is a fate far worse than death. Of course the two have differences, and that is the real topic explored in this film. What does it mean to be honorable? How far does one go to preserve their honor? Is it okay to place the health and well-being of others at stake in order to preserve the good name of your nation and its leader?
The fact is that both Nicholson and Saito are very strong, very proud men who love their country. Guinness won an Oscar for his stiff upper-lipped colonel who did really push the limits of those questions I listed. At the hands of the Japanese he suffered for weeks because he stuck to his principals, and others suffered by association. But watch and really contemplate what happens to Saito once Nicholson takes control of the bridge building. Who really is Col. Saito? When we are introduced to him he is the devil incarnate. But is that truly who he is? Hayakawa and director David Lean do a magnificent job of not revealing more about his character than absolutely necessary. What is given is amazing, earning the actor an Oscar nod, and the director a win.
This movie will challenge you morally as it entertains you thoroughly. There was not a minute of this nearly three hour epic that I was not completely invested in the action as well as the characters. It is a supreme example of film making of the 50's, and of war films in general. I can find gratuitous violence anywhere, but whether or not I care about the characters is an entirely different story.
*A little side note: This film is done in CinemaScope and glorious Technicolor. The bigger the screen the better, but certainly not necessary.
4/4
Sunday, July 24, 2011
Battleship Potemkin (1925)
I am sometimes grateful that I am not learned in film studies as I feel that too extensive a knowledge in the technical aspects that go into creating a film would hinder me from enjoying the artistic beauty that is the result of that background work. Such are my feelings towards Battleship Potemkin, Sergei Eisenstein's propaganda masterpiece about the origins of the Russian Revolution. Nothing about this film can be said that hasn't already been written (and probably much more eloquently) as this was considered the greatest film made for a good thirty years. Every aspect and every point of view has been tackled relentlessly from film critics and historians, and as a result they have exhausted any surprises that might be found in it, which is unfortunate because it is a really good film.
Fortunately for me my knowledge of these aspects is limited, and in the case of this film it does not go far beyond montage to which Eisenstein is affectionately known as its "Father." When I watched it I tried very much to let its story and its message take me away from what I know about its creation and the critical response that it has received. It is the mark of a great film that it was able to do that so well. I am a movie lover, yes, but I am also a history buff, so I went into this film with an historical eye. The result was pleasing. As a historian I have always looked at cinema as being a wealth of resources to explore a particular place at a particular time. Many others of this field might reject my views on it because films are meant for entertainment and are fictitious or embellished, but I believe that they speak as loudly for or about public opinion. To me they are just as important as paintings, poems or any other fine art that might hold historical value.
Battleship Potemkin is about a group of mariners who rebel against their dictatorial commanding officers after they are served worm infested meat. We hear that on the mainland the revolution has already begun, and the men are inspired to take up the guns in defiance. A mutiny begins, and in the struggle their leader dies earning him martyr status. When the sailors take control they return ashore where they are greeted most warmly and the funeral service is attended by thousands. A fight against the evil army ensues after the incredibly famous Odessa Steps scene in which soldiers march down the stairs killing women and children who attend a communist rally. The result is a call to arms with an ending not soon forgotten. The face of death is horrific. This movie is aggressive and embittered; it is a menacing look at the face of rebellion. The eyes of the proletariat are unforgiving.
Much of this film is not based in fact. The Odessa Steps scene, for instance, never actually happened, but its implications are great, and what it says about the place and time in which it was made is of incredible value to someone with my interests. A look at this film reveals public moods towards religion, the government, the army--essentially the fabric of life to the Russians were living in, and where the future was moving. The beauty of this film was how it sent my mind reeling (pun may or may not be intended) into my history books and the lessons it conjured up. Films should be able to transport you into a different world, and this one did an exemplary job of that.
Before Citizen Kane made it's 40th anniversary re-release and smashed its way into the number one film slot, Potemkin had been enjoying a thirty year streak at the top. Its content was relevant, their was loads to be learned from it, and it was a genuinely engaging film. Although it is no longer at the top and its material is a bit dated, it is still a required film for anyone who loves movies and anyone who is interested in the past. With a proper audience it can enthrall, enrage, and enliven.
3.5/4
Fortunately for me my knowledge of these aspects is limited, and in the case of this film it does not go far beyond montage to which Eisenstein is affectionately known as its "Father." When I watched it I tried very much to let its story and its message take me away from what I know about its creation and the critical response that it has received. It is the mark of a great film that it was able to do that so well. I am a movie lover, yes, but I am also a history buff, so I went into this film with an historical eye. The result was pleasing. As a historian I have always looked at cinema as being a wealth of resources to explore a particular place at a particular time. Many others of this field might reject my views on it because films are meant for entertainment and are fictitious or embellished, but I believe that they speak as loudly for or about public opinion. To me they are just as important as paintings, poems or any other fine art that might hold historical value.
Battleship Potemkin is about a group of mariners who rebel against their dictatorial commanding officers after they are served worm infested meat. We hear that on the mainland the revolution has already begun, and the men are inspired to take up the guns in defiance. A mutiny begins, and in the struggle their leader dies earning him martyr status. When the sailors take control they return ashore where they are greeted most warmly and the funeral service is attended by thousands. A fight against the evil army ensues after the incredibly famous Odessa Steps scene in which soldiers march down the stairs killing women and children who attend a communist rally. The result is a call to arms with an ending not soon forgotten. The face of death is horrific. This movie is aggressive and embittered; it is a menacing look at the face of rebellion. The eyes of the proletariat are unforgiving.
Much of this film is not based in fact. The Odessa Steps scene, for instance, never actually happened, but its implications are great, and what it says about the place and time in which it was made is of incredible value to someone with my interests. A look at this film reveals public moods towards religion, the government, the army--essentially the fabric of life to the Russians were living in, and where the future was moving. The beauty of this film was how it sent my mind reeling (pun may or may not be intended) into my history books and the lessons it conjured up. Films should be able to transport you into a different world, and this one did an exemplary job of that.
Before Citizen Kane made it's 40th anniversary re-release and smashed its way into the number one film slot, Potemkin had been enjoying a thirty year streak at the top. Its content was relevant, their was loads to be learned from it, and it was a genuinely engaging film. Although it is no longer at the top and its material is a bit dated, it is still a required film for anyone who loves movies and anyone who is interested in the past. With a proper audience it can enthrall, enrage, and enliven.
3.5/4
Saturday, July 23, 2011
Pink Floyd: The Wall (1982)
One of the greatest rock albums of all time gets a visually dazzling and disturbing film makeover by director Alan Parker. Given a the same title as its musical derivation, Pink Floyd: The Wall is a trippy mindfuck about social isolation--a brick wall--built as a bandage for the past and a barrier for the present.
Pink Floyd has never been a favorite of mine, but I have always understood and appreciated their lyrical and musical genius. My father, on the other hand, has always been a huge fan of the band as well as the movie. I talked to him about the album a bit in order to get a perspective on the film from a person who had a deep and personal connection with the message being delivered. He told me that it was probably his favorite album; there was a period of time in college when he and his roommates listened to "The Wall," in parts or in its entirety, once a day for seven months. There has never been an album that has inspired me enough to hold my attention for more than a few weeks, and this made me think very hard about the messages that were being presented in the music as well as the story.
The film follows the album faithfully. The record is an autobiographical concept album about Pink, who deals with the death of his father in WWII, the overbearing nature of his mother, his troubles in school as a child, his failed marriage, and the creative and emotional slump that this culminated in. The result of which was a metaphorical wall to separate Pink from those that might enter his life just to hurt him again. The film took this story and created a visual representation set as rock opera. It is as much literal as it is conceptual, but it never compromises. Even though I was not a fan of the film in its entirety--like the album it came from--I appreciate spontaneous and fearless art in its raw form and therefore this film spoke loudly to me.
Speaking of art, this film not only blends music and image, there is also gorgeous, graphic illustrations that make up a significant portion of the film's abstract concepts. They make up about fifteen minutes of the running time and were created by political cartoonist Gerald Scarfe. They were by far my favorite moments of this cerebral film as I think they did a better job of conveying the messages of Pink Floyd's music than did the live action portions of the film. Much of the rest had little dialogue and parallel story lines that were rather uninteresting. The illustrated portions, by contrast, were so vibrant and alive that the grotesque, sexual, and morbid statements made that much more of an impression.
The film's messages deal mostly with loneliness, and how integrity is compromised by Pink's ideas of fascism. There were many images and scenes in the film that were Teutonic in design and mood that were strong and frightening, but were rather confusing in what was being said. In his mind Pink was a Neo-Nazi with a black uniform, shaved eyebrows, and a mass of followers made of rebel youth. So much of the music was an attack on establishment and the brainwashing that goes hand in hand with education and parental discretion that I was confused to see Pink in an intentional send up of The Fuhrer. There was irony in its statements, but it might have made a stronger statement had it been someone else standing at the pulpit. Was its point that we become what he hate even if we don't want to? Do the seeds planted at a young age reveal themselves whether we want them to or not? It was not as explicit as it should have been.
Had that point been clearer I then I would say that the finale came twenty minutes too soon. There is a moment in the film that is incredibly powerful, but the strength that it might have given to the movie was diminished a bit by the structure of the story which was unfortunate. It was a scene paying homage to Leni Riefenstahl's infamous documentary of the Nazi rally in Nuremberg, Triumph of the Will. The best scenes in this movie were those that were group shots; Bob Geldof was lacking as the troubled rocker, Pink, and the scenes with just him were uninteresting.
This is a very creative and inspired movie. Not everything works, but the stuff that does makes it a necessity to watch. I wish I had been alive when it had premiered because it was something so new and weird and very controversial that I'm sure it made quite a splash. It is obvious that this influenced the work of a great many directors in the 80's.
3/4
Pink Floyd has never been a favorite of mine, but I have always understood and appreciated their lyrical and musical genius. My father, on the other hand, has always been a huge fan of the band as well as the movie. I talked to him about the album a bit in order to get a perspective on the film from a person who had a deep and personal connection with the message being delivered. He told me that it was probably his favorite album; there was a period of time in college when he and his roommates listened to "The Wall," in parts or in its entirety, once a day for seven months. There has never been an album that has inspired me enough to hold my attention for more than a few weeks, and this made me think very hard about the messages that were being presented in the music as well as the story.
The film follows the album faithfully. The record is an autobiographical concept album about Pink, who deals with the death of his father in WWII, the overbearing nature of his mother, his troubles in school as a child, his failed marriage, and the creative and emotional slump that this culminated in. The result of which was a metaphorical wall to separate Pink from those that might enter his life just to hurt him again. The film took this story and created a visual representation set as rock opera. It is as much literal as it is conceptual, but it never compromises. Even though I was not a fan of the film in its entirety--like the album it came from--I appreciate spontaneous and fearless art in its raw form and therefore this film spoke loudly to me.
Speaking of art, this film not only blends music and image, there is also gorgeous, graphic illustrations that make up a significant portion of the film's abstract concepts. They make up about fifteen minutes of the running time and were created by political cartoonist Gerald Scarfe. They were by far my favorite moments of this cerebral film as I think they did a better job of conveying the messages of Pink Floyd's music than did the live action portions of the film. Much of the rest had little dialogue and parallel story lines that were rather uninteresting. The illustrated portions, by contrast, were so vibrant and alive that the grotesque, sexual, and morbid statements made that much more of an impression.
The film's messages deal mostly with loneliness, and how integrity is compromised by Pink's ideas of fascism. There were many images and scenes in the film that were Teutonic in design and mood that were strong and frightening, but were rather confusing in what was being said. In his mind Pink was a Neo-Nazi with a black uniform, shaved eyebrows, and a mass of followers made of rebel youth. So much of the music was an attack on establishment and the brainwashing that goes hand in hand with education and parental discretion that I was confused to see Pink in an intentional send up of The Fuhrer. There was irony in its statements, but it might have made a stronger statement had it been someone else standing at the pulpit. Was its point that we become what he hate even if we don't want to? Do the seeds planted at a young age reveal themselves whether we want them to or not? It was not as explicit as it should have been.
Had that point been clearer I then I would say that the finale came twenty minutes too soon. There is a moment in the film that is incredibly powerful, but the strength that it might have given to the movie was diminished a bit by the structure of the story which was unfortunate. It was a scene paying homage to Leni Riefenstahl's infamous documentary of the Nazi rally in Nuremberg, Triumph of the Will. The best scenes in this movie were those that were group shots; Bob Geldof was lacking as the troubled rocker, Pink, and the scenes with just him were uninteresting.
This is a very creative and inspired movie. Not everything works, but the stuff that does makes it a necessity to watch. I wish I had been alive when it had premiered because it was something so new and weird and very controversial that I'm sure it made quite a splash. It is obvious that this influenced the work of a great many directors in the 80's.
3/4
Friday, July 22, 2011
The 400 Blows (1959)
What a breath of fresh air this film is. Over 50 years old and The 400 Blows is still as relevant and moving as it was when Francois Truffaut unleashed it into French cinema. It is a beautiful and sad tale of Antoine Doinel, a twelve year old boy living in poverty who, treated unfairly and without understanding throughout his entire childhood, turns to a life of petty crime on the streets of Paris. It presents a caring look at childhood that avoids any deadly sentimentality, and really tries to present the plight of Antoine in a way that is sympathetic while giving a reproachful glare to the adults that fill his world.
The audience is introduced to Antoine in his classroom where he is caught with the hot potato (a smutty picture) in his hands. Snickering children watch as he is reproached and made to stand in the corner. He teacher is a draconian "sourpuss" who seems to dislike Antoine simply because he is unintelligent and always seems to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. He is slapped, he is punished, and eventually he is suspended for telling lies far greater than what he could contend with.
His home life is no better. His mother is a vain and unpleasant woman who constantly yells and verbally abuses him. At first I hoped that there might have been a beacon of light with his father who at first glance seems to be more jovial and funny, but his welcome is soon worn out and it becomes clear that the only affection that poor little Antoine receives is from his friends, particularly Rene. It is with Rene that he drinks, smokes cigarettes, steals, plays in the arcade, and generally escapes from the constant put-downs.
It's hard not to hate the adults in this movie. So much more is known about childhood education now that Antoine today would not be labeled a troubled child; he might be diagnosed with ADD, or might even be considered a gifted child. He often complains about not being able to focus. Any decent educator today would easily take that sort of boredom as a sign for either of those or half a dozen other issues. What's heartbreaking about this is Antoine gets punished not for a lack of trying, but a lack of results. It is probably more likely that Antoine had ADD or dyslexia or something else the matter that prevented him from learning ably, but his teacher and his parents expected far more than he could produce. The pressure of high expectations and continuous failing was probably the reason that drove a child like him to lash out in the way that he did. Notice that the first time that he runs off is because he cannot meet the expectations set out for him. He is shamed, and that is infuriating.
I watched this wonderful French documentary last year called To Be and To Have which is about a little schoolhouse high up in the mountains. All of the children, preschool through probably fifth or sixth grade, are taught in one room by one teacher, Georges Lopez. He is a man of infinite patience who has gained the respect of his students not by intimidation, but by love and a genuine desire to see each of his students exceed. It was clear that some of the children had some sort of special needs, but he gave them all the same time and respect that he expected in return. I jotted the name of this movie in my notes while I watched The 400 Blows as I could only imagine the different and infinitely better life Antoine might have had if only he had someone who could work to meet him halfway.
The on-the-nose irony of this film come from the adults' constant preaching and disdain for Antoine's misbehavior, whose scrutinizing eyes never turn on themselves. This film is so much about what is not seen and not said. It is a highly sexual film if you watch for it; sins of the flesh drive so many of the characters on a number of different scales, but people like Antoine's mother discourage smutty talk. Through most of it I had the general sense that something larger was behind the relationship between Antoine and his parents that was unspoken. At the end he meets with a psychologist where he talks of his past--the scene brought me to tears (I have been kind of weepy lately though...). His honesty, the nonchalant way he said so many things that made me cringe, the life he lead was abhorred. The actor playing him is a little boy named Jean-Pierre Leaud whose raw talent is astonishing. Had it been an American film he might have garnered an Oscar nomination from that scene alone.
Thus far I have presented this as a rather bleak movie--which it is to a point. These are very unhappy circumstances, but Truffaut takes care not to make this too much of a sob story. The happy moments he puts in are all the more so because of their juxtaposition to the many unhappy ones. There is scene which made my face hurt because I was smiling so big. Antoine and Rene run off and watch a children's puppet show (Little Red Riding Hood). There is maybe a hundred children in the audience and Truffaut has the camera on the faces of the little ones for a steady two or three minutes, watching them watch the fairy tale. Such naked wonderment and joy and innocence is captivating--more than captivating, it is enchanting. Truffaut's movie is like this puppet show. It is drama wrapped in whimsy, a man-eating wolf dressed in women's clothing. The content is upsetting, but it is still a film about a little boy trying hard not to lose all of his childhood. Most is gone, but he still clings on. There is power in play, and there is power in love. He tries not to give up on both.
4/4
The audience is introduced to Antoine in his classroom where he is caught with the hot potato (a smutty picture) in his hands. Snickering children watch as he is reproached and made to stand in the corner. He teacher is a draconian "sourpuss" who seems to dislike Antoine simply because he is unintelligent and always seems to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. He is slapped, he is punished, and eventually he is suspended for telling lies far greater than what he could contend with.
His home life is no better. His mother is a vain and unpleasant woman who constantly yells and verbally abuses him. At first I hoped that there might have been a beacon of light with his father who at first glance seems to be more jovial and funny, but his welcome is soon worn out and it becomes clear that the only affection that poor little Antoine receives is from his friends, particularly Rene. It is with Rene that he drinks, smokes cigarettes, steals, plays in the arcade, and generally escapes from the constant put-downs.
It's hard not to hate the adults in this movie. So much more is known about childhood education now that Antoine today would not be labeled a troubled child; he might be diagnosed with ADD, or might even be considered a gifted child. He often complains about not being able to focus. Any decent educator today would easily take that sort of boredom as a sign for either of those or half a dozen other issues. What's heartbreaking about this is Antoine gets punished not for a lack of trying, but a lack of results. It is probably more likely that Antoine had ADD or dyslexia or something else the matter that prevented him from learning ably, but his teacher and his parents expected far more than he could produce. The pressure of high expectations and continuous failing was probably the reason that drove a child like him to lash out in the way that he did. Notice that the first time that he runs off is because he cannot meet the expectations set out for him. He is shamed, and that is infuriating.
I watched this wonderful French documentary last year called To Be and To Have which is about a little schoolhouse high up in the mountains. All of the children, preschool through probably fifth or sixth grade, are taught in one room by one teacher, Georges Lopez. He is a man of infinite patience who has gained the respect of his students not by intimidation, but by love and a genuine desire to see each of his students exceed. It was clear that some of the children had some sort of special needs, but he gave them all the same time and respect that he expected in return. I jotted the name of this movie in my notes while I watched The 400 Blows as I could only imagine the different and infinitely better life Antoine might have had if only he had someone who could work to meet him halfway.
The on-the-nose irony of this film come from the adults' constant preaching and disdain for Antoine's misbehavior, whose scrutinizing eyes never turn on themselves. This film is so much about what is not seen and not said. It is a highly sexual film if you watch for it; sins of the flesh drive so many of the characters on a number of different scales, but people like Antoine's mother discourage smutty talk. Through most of it I had the general sense that something larger was behind the relationship between Antoine and his parents that was unspoken. At the end he meets with a psychologist where he talks of his past--the scene brought me to tears (I have been kind of weepy lately though...). His honesty, the nonchalant way he said so many things that made me cringe, the life he lead was abhorred. The actor playing him is a little boy named Jean-Pierre Leaud whose raw talent is astonishing. Had it been an American film he might have garnered an Oscar nomination from that scene alone.
Thus far I have presented this as a rather bleak movie--which it is to a point. These are very unhappy circumstances, but Truffaut takes care not to make this too much of a sob story. The happy moments he puts in are all the more so because of their juxtaposition to the many unhappy ones. There is scene which made my face hurt because I was smiling so big. Antoine and Rene run off and watch a children's puppet show (Little Red Riding Hood). There is maybe a hundred children in the audience and Truffaut has the camera on the faces of the little ones for a steady two or three minutes, watching them watch the fairy tale. Such naked wonderment and joy and innocence is captivating--more than captivating, it is enchanting. Truffaut's movie is like this puppet show. It is drama wrapped in whimsy, a man-eating wolf dressed in women's clothing. The content is upsetting, but it is still a film about a little boy trying hard not to lose all of his childhood. Most is gone, but he still clings on. There is power in play, and there is power in love. He tries not to give up on both.
4/4
Wednesday, July 20, 2011
The Battle of Algiers (1966)
The Algerian War was a mostly Islamic struggle that took place from 1954-1962 in North Africa against the occupying French forces. This film only spans through the first three years of that in which an organized group of rebels lead a serious of terrorist attacks in order to spawn revolution. The end product is one of the most powerful and moving pieces of political cinema yet made.
The Oscar nominated drama was created with an almost documentary-like feel to it. Only one of the many characters was a professional actor, and it was shot on location in the Casbah of Algiers in order to create as authentic an atmosphere as possible. Opening the film is a shot of four people huddled behind a false wall in a small house with the French army about to detonate the building. It focuses in on a young man named Ali, our hero, and it is his memory that tells the story.
The film is not so much about the history of the conflict as it is about the methods used to fight for freedom, and how the French government responded to it. There are daily stories now of suicide bombers in cafes and buses in the Middle East who die fighting for a cause, and I dismiss them as sick extremists without consciences that ought to be suppressed. Perhaps that is true, but this film shows the same types of people, people fighting for freedoms to practice their religion without the involvement of the West whose only methods are small acts of violence. Whether it is blowing up a discotheque filled with Parisian teens or stabbing a lone cop in the neck, the acts, though insignificant in and of themselves, accumulate and eventually someone begins to notice.
The Battle of Algiers takes us inside of the National Liberation Front where we see Ali as he joins their ranks and commits his acts of terrorism. But the story is not really about him. He might as well be nameless--I even think that might have been a stronger choice--because he is simply a focal point, a place to rest our eyes and see the events that unfold around him. Through him we see the importance of women who carry bombs hidden in their baskets or guns under their hijabs. We see an Islamic marriage, an unconventional attack against the European invaders. We see an old member of the FLN use her lighter skinned grandson as a way to help her pass a checkpoint out of the Islamic sector and into the French-controlled Algiers.
There are so many disturbing and beautiful scenes in this film it would take all day to address them. One in particular that struck me the first time that watched this and even more so this last time is a scene in which the checkpoints become too hazardous to cross anymore for Islamic women, so three of the lightest skinned FLN members dress as French ones. The camera sits in the room with them as they don their calf-revealing skirts, bleach their hair, apply their lipstick, and wait to be judged by the higher ranking members. As I watched them I asked myself what made them terrorists. They didn't look like people capable of killing entire rooms full of civilians, they look just like everyone else--but that is the point. One asks themselves how much a person is willing to endure before they snap and loose their frustration against their suppressors.
The film does not only focus on this side of the battle, though. On the French side we are introduced to the Col. Mathieu (Jean Martin, the only actor) as he leads his paratroopers in a fight to maintain the colony. The voice of reason and level-headed judgment in the film, Col. Mathieu says what needs to be said in the way it needs to expressed. He calls the resistance a "tapeworm." You must cut off the head or it will continue to live: "To know them is to eliminate them." Take away their anonymity and they have no power. When questioned about the torture used to obtain information in his Operation Champagne he simply asks the reporters whether or not they want to remain in Algeria. When no dissent is heard he dryly states that they must then accept the consequences in their entirety.
We do see torture. We do see dead children. We see acts so deplorable that one can not help but being moved to tears. Watch the final scenes and tell me that the passion and the anger and the hurt in those peoples' eyes does not make you feel ashamed and vengeful too. A ululation goes out...
4/4
The Oscar nominated drama was created with an almost documentary-like feel to it. Only one of the many characters was a professional actor, and it was shot on location in the Casbah of Algiers in order to create as authentic an atmosphere as possible. Opening the film is a shot of four people huddled behind a false wall in a small house with the French army about to detonate the building. It focuses in on a young man named Ali, our hero, and it is his memory that tells the story.
The film is not so much about the history of the conflict as it is about the methods used to fight for freedom, and how the French government responded to it. There are daily stories now of suicide bombers in cafes and buses in the Middle East who die fighting for a cause, and I dismiss them as sick extremists without consciences that ought to be suppressed. Perhaps that is true, but this film shows the same types of people, people fighting for freedoms to practice their religion without the involvement of the West whose only methods are small acts of violence. Whether it is blowing up a discotheque filled with Parisian teens or stabbing a lone cop in the neck, the acts, though insignificant in and of themselves, accumulate and eventually someone begins to notice.
The Battle of Algiers takes us inside of the National Liberation Front where we see Ali as he joins their ranks and commits his acts of terrorism. But the story is not really about him. He might as well be nameless--I even think that might have been a stronger choice--because he is simply a focal point, a place to rest our eyes and see the events that unfold around him. Through him we see the importance of women who carry bombs hidden in their baskets or guns under their hijabs. We see an Islamic marriage, an unconventional attack against the European invaders. We see an old member of the FLN use her lighter skinned grandson as a way to help her pass a checkpoint out of the Islamic sector and into the French-controlled Algiers.
There are so many disturbing and beautiful scenes in this film it would take all day to address them. One in particular that struck me the first time that watched this and even more so this last time is a scene in which the checkpoints become too hazardous to cross anymore for Islamic women, so three of the lightest skinned FLN members dress as French ones. The camera sits in the room with them as they don their calf-revealing skirts, bleach their hair, apply their lipstick, and wait to be judged by the higher ranking members. As I watched them I asked myself what made them terrorists. They didn't look like people capable of killing entire rooms full of civilians, they look just like everyone else--but that is the point. One asks themselves how much a person is willing to endure before they snap and loose their frustration against their suppressors.
The film does not only focus on this side of the battle, though. On the French side we are introduced to the Col. Mathieu (Jean Martin, the only actor) as he leads his paratroopers in a fight to maintain the colony. The voice of reason and level-headed judgment in the film, Col. Mathieu says what needs to be said in the way it needs to expressed. He calls the resistance a "tapeworm." You must cut off the head or it will continue to live: "To know them is to eliminate them." Take away their anonymity and they have no power. When questioned about the torture used to obtain information in his Operation Champagne he simply asks the reporters whether or not they want to remain in Algeria. When no dissent is heard he dryly states that they must then accept the consequences in their entirety.
We do see torture. We do see dead children. We see acts so deplorable that one can not help but being moved to tears. Watch the final scenes and tell me that the passion and the anger and the hurt in those peoples' eyes does not make you feel ashamed and vengeful too. A ululation goes out...
4/4
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
Pandora's Box (1929)
Like Citizen Kane or Casablanca, Pandora's Box is G.W. Pabst's untouchable film from the silent era. Critics tremble at the awesome might that is Louise Brooks' "Lulu," but I nearly fell asleep. Once before have I tried to watch this movie, but I did not even make it to the halfway mark. Last night I watched it in its entirety, but only with the help of my two friends Caffeine, and Pause Button. I solicited their help liberally.
Funnily enough, the synopsis of the film is very intriguing and, watching it, I felt that had it not been silent or done by another director (Fritz Lang, perhaps) it might have been a film that I like very much. It is a tale of a young girl, Lulu, who sexual charm gets her everything she wants and more. She is "versed in the fine art of flattery," but her powers of seduction lead to her eventual demise. In a misunderstanding between her jealous husband and a man we later learn is Lulu's father a gun is pulled, and by accident her emotional and unfortunate husband is shot dead.
She stands trial for manslaughter, but due to a fire in the courtroom she manages to escape. Lulu is helped by the son of her late husband, Alwa, who has always been keen on Lulu. but never had the heart to break up his father and his father's mistress (which she was until their wedding night. That seems like an obvious statement, but it is not). The two run off, and Lulu's indiscretion gets her into more trouble than she can bargain for. At this point, however, her lack of control now envelopes those around her making the lives of her friends and loved ones just as precarious as hers. Her unrestrained self-absorption finally drives them to London where she finally meets her fate in a most unusual and grotesquely ironic fashion.
This summary is awesome--the plot was awesome, and I wanted so much to be invested. I have, in the past, found it difficult to remain invested in silent dramas. If they are short and sweet like any Chaplin or Keaton film I enjoy it immensely, but it takes a rare drama to keep me engaged. To be sure, there are those out there that rank amongst my favorite films--The Passion of Joan of Arc, Metropolis--but this was not one of them.
Brooks is stunningly beautiful with her doe eyes and her "come hither" smile, and her character was very interesting. Very rarely do we meet characters who care about almost nothing but themselves, but Lulu is almost sociopathic in the way that she views those around her. Men are nothing but walking wallets, without feelings, and whose sole purposes are to provide for her the resources she needs to get what she wants in the immediate. She is someone to be hated, to be spit upon, but at the same time the audience hates themselves for falling for her charms. Her powers of seduction are too great for mortal men and, much to the dismay of the men she encounters, Lulu knows it.
God, I wish I liked this film. I like thinking about it, but it was a chore. I long, grueling chore.
2/4
Funnily enough, the synopsis of the film is very intriguing and, watching it, I felt that had it not been silent or done by another director (Fritz Lang, perhaps) it might have been a film that I like very much. It is a tale of a young girl, Lulu, who sexual charm gets her everything she wants and more. She is "versed in the fine art of flattery," but her powers of seduction lead to her eventual demise. In a misunderstanding between her jealous husband and a man we later learn is Lulu's father a gun is pulled, and by accident her emotional and unfortunate husband is shot dead.
She stands trial for manslaughter, but due to a fire in the courtroom she manages to escape. Lulu is helped by the son of her late husband, Alwa, who has always been keen on Lulu. but never had the heart to break up his father and his father's mistress (which she was until their wedding night. That seems like an obvious statement, but it is not). The two run off, and Lulu's indiscretion gets her into more trouble than she can bargain for. At this point, however, her lack of control now envelopes those around her making the lives of her friends and loved ones just as precarious as hers. Her unrestrained self-absorption finally drives them to London where she finally meets her fate in a most unusual and grotesquely ironic fashion.
This summary is awesome--the plot was awesome, and I wanted so much to be invested. I have, in the past, found it difficult to remain invested in silent dramas. If they are short and sweet like any Chaplin or Keaton film I enjoy it immensely, but it takes a rare drama to keep me engaged. To be sure, there are those out there that rank amongst my favorite films--The Passion of Joan of Arc, Metropolis--but this was not one of them.
Brooks is stunningly beautiful with her doe eyes and her "come hither" smile, and her character was very interesting. Very rarely do we meet characters who care about almost nothing but themselves, but Lulu is almost sociopathic in the way that she views those around her. Men are nothing but walking wallets, without feelings, and whose sole purposes are to provide for her the resources she needs to get what she wants in the immediate. She is someone to be hated, to be spit upon, but at the same time the audience hates themselves for falling for her charms. Her powers of seduction are too great for mortal men and, much to the dismay of the men she encounters, Lulu knows it.
God, I wish I liked this film. I like thinking about it, but it was a chore. I long, grueling chore.
2/4
Monday, July 18, 2011
Au Hasard Balthazar (1966)
In the Bible Balthazar is one of the three wise men that bring gifts to the baby Jesus. Along with Caspar and Melchior, Balthazar followed a star to man's savior where he brought the child a gift of frankincense. Knowing this troubled me as I watched Au Hasard Balthazar as I spent much time trying to figure out how this religious allusion fit into the story. But I finally came to realize it had little to do with the story of the nativity at all...
In Robert Bresson's masterpiece Balthazar is a donkey. Befriended as a foal by the naive Marie, Balthazar is reared into a tolerant observer. Ever watchful but never judgmental, Balthazar grows old and experiences the sins of man firsthand. Marie, delicate and beautiful, falls into a life of degradation as she becomes a young woman. The two stories--through very different in content--follow oddly paralleled story arcs about the soul of a person, and how much abuse it can take while remaining unspoiled.
Marie went through her childhood in love with the romantically obedient Jacques who she later deems a fool. As she ages she finds herself attracted more and more to the depraved and sadistic Gerard. Not much of a punk by today's standards, Gerard is a violent and jealous rebel nonetheless heading a scooter gang. Once she falls for his bad-boy ways she suffers under his abusive hands. He says, "Come" and she comes as Marie puts it almost, proud in her defense of his maltreatment.
It is really Balthazar, though, that we care about. Never could I imagine that I would ever care for a donkey in a movie as much as I did this one. His willingness to love, his patience, his hard work--all of this he gave even for the most vile and abusive of masters. Once Balthazar got to a certain age he began his circulation through many different owners. He ended up a circus, he worked for a drunken murderer, a slothful and bitter lover of money, before finally ending back up with Marie who was the only person who ever really cared for him. He became used to the beatings; he brayed, but still he worked.
It was not until near to the end that I realized that Balthazar was not supposed to be the magi, he was Bresson's interpretation of Jesus. The film is a brilliant religious allegory for the life and sacrifice that Christ made in order to absolve the wrongdoings of mankind. Around him he is surrounded by people filled with vices and deadly sins: there is the proud father, the lustful wife of the baker, the wrathful Gerard, the greedy merchant, and many others. Even Marie with all of the kindness that she showed to Balthazar could not cover the fact that she was a lecherous and unfaithful young woman who pretended to be saintly even though it was Balthazar who was the saint.
The wicked in this film get their comeuppance--and some get it that ought not too. I will not give away the ending, but I will say that it is one of the most powerful scenes that I have ever had the privilege to watch in a movie. It is sure to make some cry not simply because it is sad, but because its message holds so much meaning. By the end of the film both Marie and Balthazar reach transcendence through the abuses that they suffer, but I learned from this movie that perhaps enlightenment is not as beautiful and lovely as it has been expounded before, and perhaps we are better off not knowing.
This film is short, but it encompasses so much of the faults and fears of man. Anyone with any sense at all will watch this and be deeply moved. It is a tough film that demands much from its audience, but its rewards are great.
4/4
In Robert Bresson's masterpiece Balthazar is a donkey. Befriended as a foal by the naive Marie, Balthazar is reared into a tolerant observer. Ever watchful but never judgmental, Balthazar grows old and experiences the sins of man firsthand. Marie, delicate and beautiful, falls into a life of degradation as she becomes a young woman. The two stories--through very different in content--follow oddly paralleled story arcs about the soul of a person, and how much abuse it can take while remaining unspoiled.
Marie went through her childhood in love with the romantically obedient Jacques who she later deems a fool. As she ages she finds herself attracted more and more to the depraved and sadistic Gerard. Not much of a punk by today's standards, Gerard is a violent and jealous rebel nonetheless heading a scooter gang. Once she falls for his bad-boy ways she suffers under his abusive hands. He says, "Come" and she comes as Marie puts it almost, proud in her defense of his maltreatment.
It is really Balthazar, though, that we care about. Never could I imagine that I would ever care for a donkey in a movie as much as I did this one. His willingness to love, his patience, his hard work--all of this he gave even for the most vile and abusive of masters. Once Balthazar got to a certain age he began his circulation through many different owners. He ended up a circus, he worked for a drunken murderer, a slothful and bitter lover of money, before finally ending back up with Marie who was the only person who ever really cared for him. He became used to the beatings; he brayed, but still he worked.
It was not until near to the end that I realized that Balthazar was not supposed to be the magi, he was Bresson's interpretation of Jesus. The film is a brilliant religious allegory for the life and sacrifice that Christ made in order to absolve the wrongdoings of mankind. Around him he is surrounded by people filled with vices and deadly sins: there is the proud father, the lustful wife of the baker, the wrathful Gerard, the greedy merchant, and many others. Even Marie with all of the kindness that she showed to Balthazar could not cover the fact that she was a lecherous and unfaithful young woman who pretended to be saintly even though it was Balthazar who was the saint.
The wicked in this film get their comeuppance--and some get it that ought not too. I will not give away the ending, but I will say that it is one of the most powerful scenes that I have ever had the privilege to watch in a movie. It is sure to make some cry not simply because it is sad, but because its message holds so much meaning. By the end of the film both Marie and Balthazar reach transcendence through the abuses that they suffer, but I learned from this movie that perhaps enlightenment is not as beautiful and lovely as it has been expounded before, and perhaps we are better off not knowing.
This film is short, but it encompasses so much of the faults and fears of man. Anyone with any sense at all will watch this and be deeply moved. It is a tough film that demands much from its audience, but its rewards are great.
4/4
Friday, July 15, 2011
Get Low (2009)
Felix Bush was a man made into a myth. Larger than life, and shrouded in macabre stories, the wild hermit lived in a self-made house in the middle of the woods with only a mule as company. "Gossip is the devil's radio," says one observer, and certainly gossip created a creature of the woods much larger than any man could be. This is his story, a character study of a man coming out of the woodworks, so to speak, to throw his own funeral party--while still alive.
Two questions cropped up immediately when watching this film: Why go into hiding? and then why come out of hiding forty years later to throw the biggest party anyone in the county has ever seen? This a film built on mystery and questions, as its hero (well...its antagonist) is a man of few words and unreadable eyes. It struck me that for every perfectly calculated word he said, Bush (Robert Duvall) was saying four, five, six things at once. Everything had double-meaning, and was said not only to express thoughts, but to also manipulate the thoughts of others. He had an uncanny way of getting others to do what he wanted, said the only man that might have constituted as a "friend."
The story is fairly straightforward. The hermit did come out of the mountain to a failing funeral home run by Frank Quinn (Bill Murray) to throw a funeral party. Not entirely a stretch for Murray, Quinn is a sly, smiling business man who will clap you on the back with one hand, and pick your pocket with the other. He and his assistant, Buddy (Lucas Black), take care of all of the odds and ends to the party while trying to unravel the past of this walking enigma. Also there is the relationship between Bush and Maddie (Sissy Spacek) that might have been sexual once, but whose implications reveal something dark and disturbing in the Felix Bush story.
It seems to me that this movie was grossly misrepresented in its advertising and in any tagline you will read about it. I expected a darkly funny film with more a Rooster Cogburn via Jeff Bridges character as the crazy old hermit. To be sure there were funny moments mostly coming from Murray, but there was a humor to be found in the deep wisdom of Bush's lines. This, however, was not the film I was expecting, and it took me a while to become adjusted to the fact that the film would be far more poignant and, ultimately, more sentimental than what I had bargained for.
This is not to say it was a bad movie, far from it. It was a very compelling character study of a man that perhaps not ought to have been studied. As far as an analysis piece of a strange individual goes there was definitely something to be gained here. Bush was described as a "cave" of a man, and that is a very intriguing road to search. Based on Duvall's performance I should like to give this film a positive review, but alas I cannot. The writer was very keen on centering on the lesson that gossip can destroy the lives of those that it might not actually want, and the devastating power that that can yield. The implications of what one event and the talk that it inspired are truly heartbreaking and shaming, but the way that lesson was presented was gone about all wrong.
I think that perhaps the film might have had more power if Duvall had not been the main character of the story, and that his true nature had been something of a mystery. The opening sequences were very curious indeed, and I wish that I had remained in a state of curiosity rather than suspense, which is where I was lead. The film is 100 minutes long, the first 80 building up to what should have a been a very powerful 20 minute payoff. I was disappointed. If we hadn't learned so much of the character that tall-tales were made from--no matter how good Duvall was--it might have made the ending, while anticlimactic to a point, much more moving and far more gratifying. Also, in the one scene at the end which should have presented all of the genius of Duvall (you'll know it when you see it) the editor made some incredibly serious blunders which made the third act deadly to the film.
Watch it for fine performances from seasoned actors, terrific music, and a couple of very funny scenes, but don't expect much in the way of satisfaction.
2.5/4
Two questions cropped up immediately when watching this film: Why go into hiding? and then why come out of hiding forty years later to throw the biggest party anyone in the county has ever seen? This a film built on mystery and questions, as its hero (well...its antagonist) is a man of few words and unreadable eyes. It struck me that for every perfectly calculated word he said, Bush (Robert Duvall) was saying four, five, six things at once. Everything had double-meaning, and was said not only to express thoughts, but to also manipulate the thoughts of others. He had an uncanny way of getting others to do what he wanted, said the only man that might have constituted as a "friend."
The story is fairly straightforward. The hermit did come out of the mountain to a failing funeral home run by Frank Quinn (Bill Murray) to throw a funeral party. Not entirely a stretch for Murray, Quinn is a sly, smiling business man who will clap you on the back with one hand, and pick your pocket with the other. He and his assistant, Buddy (Lucas Black), take care of all of the odds and ends to the party while trying to unravel the past of this walking enigma. Also there is the relationship between Bush and Maddie (Sissy Spacek) that might have been sexual once, but whose implications reveal something dark and disturbing in the Felix Bush story.
It seems to me that this movie was grossly misrepresented in its advertising and in any tagline you will read about it. I expected a darkly funny film with more a Rooster Cogburn via Jeff Bridges character as the crazy old hermit. To be sure there were funny moments mostly coming from Murray, but there was a humor to be found in the deep wisdom of Bush's lines. This, however, was not the film I was expecting, and it took me a while to become adjusted to the fact that the film would be far more poignant and, ultimately, more sentimental than what I had bargained for.
This is not to say it was a bad movie, far from it. It was a very compelling character study of a man that perhaps not ought to have been studied. As far as an analysis piece of a strange individual goes there was definitely something to be gained here. Bush was described as a "cave" of a man, and that is a very intriguing road to search. Based on Duvall's performance I should like to give this film a positive review, but alas I cannot. The writer was very keen on centering on the lesson that gossip can destroy the lives of those that it might not actually want, and the devastating power that that can yield. The implications of what one event and the talk that it inspired are truly heartbreaking and shaming, but the way that lesson was presented was gone about all wrong.
I think that perhaps the film might have had more power if Duvall had not been the main character of the story, and that his true nature had been something of a mystery. The opening sequences were very curious indeed, and I wish that I had remained in a state of curiosity rather than suspense, which is where I was lead. The film is 100 minutes long, the first 80 building up to what should have a been a very powerful 20 minute payoff. I was disappointed. If we hadn't learned so much of the character that tall-tales were made from--no matter how good Duvall was--it might have made the ending, while anticlimactic to a point, much more moving and far more gratifying. Also, in the one scene at the end which should have presented all of the genius of Duvall (you'll know it when you see it) the editor made some incredibly serious blunders which made the third act deadly to the film.
Watch it for fine performances from seasoned actors, terrific music, and a couple of very funny scenes, but don't expect much in the way of satisfaction.
2.5/4
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Bringing Up Baby (1938)
One of my all-time favorite comedies, Bringing Up Baby is a mad-cap, screwball comedy featuring spot on performances from Cary Grant and the untouchable Katharine Hepburn. I have seen it multiple times, with each viewing I learn something new about the art of comedy, and of the amazing gifts of both actors.
In a nutshell, there is a paleontologist, David Huxley, who has spent the last four years assembling the newly discovered brontosaurus skeleton. On the eve of his marriage to a fellow coworker, David has several chance encounters--none of them good--with a wealthy and slightly eccentric young heiress named Susan Vance. Long story short, a fox terrier runs off with the brontosaurus' clavicle bone, the two of them buy 30 pounds of steak for jazz-loving leopard named Baby, Huxley turns gay all of a sudden, everyone makes loon calls at the dinner table, and Susan busts out of jail pretending to be 'Swingin' Door Susie' of the Leopard Gang. In the end it turns out that Susan was David's pair of Ruby slippers all the time who could have gotten him what he wanted from the very beginning, but what fun would that have been? The roundabout, ridiculous way is far more interesting.
Katharine Hepburn is my favorite actress, and Cary Grant is in my top 5 favorite actors. Pitting them against one another is a match made in heaven for me; I would gladly watch them banter while never saying anything all day if I could. I usually think of Hepburn as the unmatched Queen of Drama doing that weepy-eyed thing that she does so well, but I forget sometimes what a youthful energy she brought to the screen when she was starting out. Her rapier wit was so perfectly matched to the sort of fast paced, think-on-your-feet dialogue in a film like this that you forget her work in films like The Lion in Winter and On Golden Pond. Each of those had a more intellectual comedy shade to them, but nothing like the roll 'em out jokes of this movie.
Grant, as everyone should know, is a master of comedy who is one of the few people in cinematic history that had perfect timing, all of the time. I admire and desire his skills so much. His choices in this film were so interesting, but I am sure that not many people except those who act themselves or those who have a watched a considerably large number of films (guilty to both) would see. They were not choices I, or many others I think, ever would have thought of, but they fit so perfectly it seems as if he wrote the lines himself.
Watching two greats play off one another the way that they did was dazzling and inspiring. There are moments in the film that I do not necessarily laugh out loud (though there are a fair share of those), but rarely are there moments when I watch it that I don't grin from ear to ear. Simply the shear wonderment of being inspired at your craft is enough to keep me happy. This is not a comedy for everyone, however. Many will find it dated, many will find that they have seen what is done there many times in more recent films, and many will find the acting forced in a time when realism is the name of the game. The type of acting that we look at now as being "authentic" really was not established until the early-50's with Marlon Brando's Stanley Kuwalski in A Streetcar Named Desire, so for those unaccustomed to the style pre-Brando it may seem phony. But to those who can look past that, and the fact that they have seen films who have taken inspiration directly from it, this is rewarding, hilarious, and very odd experience.
4/4
In a nutshell, there is a paleontologist, David Huxley, who has spent the last four years assembling the newly discovered brontosaurus skeleton. On the eve of his marriage to a fellow coworker, David has several chance encounters--none of them good--with a wealthy and slightly eccentric young heiress named Susan Vance. Long story short, a fox terrier runs off with the brontosaurus' clavicle bone, the two of them buy 30 pounds of steak for jazz-loving leopard named Baby, Huxley turns gay all of a sudden, everyone makes loon calls at the dinner table, and Susan busts out of jail pretending to be 'Swingin' Door Susie' of the Leopard Gang. In the end it turns out that Susan was David's pair of Ruby slippers all the time who could have gotten him what he wanted from the very beginning, but what fun would that have been? The roundabout, ridiculous way is far more interesting.
Katharine Hepburn is my favorite actress, and Cary Grant is in my top 5 favorite actors. Pitting them against one another is a match made in heaven for me; I would gladly watch them banter while never saying anything all day if I could. I usually think of Hepburn as the unmatched Queen of Drama doing that weepy-eyed thing that she does so well, but I forget sometimes what a youthful energy she brought to the screen when she was starting out. Her rapier wit was so perfectly matched to the sort of fast paced, think-on-your-feet dialogue in a film like this that you forget her work in films like The Lion in Winter and On Golden Pond. Each of those had a more intellectual comedy shade to them, but nothing like the roll 'em out jokes of this movie.
Grant, as everyone should know, is a master of comedy who is one of the few people in cinematic history that had perfect timing, all of the time. I admire and desire his skills so much. His choices in this film were so interesting, but I am sure that not many people except those who act themselves or those who have a watched a considerably large number of films (guilty to both) would see. They were not choices I, or many others I think, ever would have thought of, but they fit so perfectly it seems as if he wrote the lines himself.
Watching two greats play off one another the way that they did was dazzling and inspiring. There are moments in the film that I do not necessarily laugh out loud (though there are a fair share of those), but rarely are there moments when I watch it that I don't grin from ear to ear. Simply the shear wonderment of being inspired at your craft is enough to keep me happy. This is not a comedy for everyone, however. Many will find it dated, many will find that they have seen what is done there many times in more recent films, and many will find the acting forced in a time when realism is the name of the game. The type of acting that we look at now as being "authentic" really was not established until the early-50's with Marlon Brando's Stanley Kuwalski in A Streetcar Named Desire, so for those unaccustomed to the style pre-Brando it may seem phony. But to those who can look past that, and the fact that they have seen films who have taken inspiration directly from it, this is rewarding, hilarious, and very odd experience.
4/4
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
Lost in Translation (2003)
I was hesitant to watch this film as every hipster and their mom loves it, and I began watching it with my arms crossed daring it to impress me. I regret to say that the hipsters were right about this one. A moody comedy, or a comedic drama, Lost in Translation is an irony about a girl searching for meaning, and a man searching for fulfillment. They find these things and more when they happen upon each other in a hotel in Tokyo.
He is Bob Harris (Bill Murray), a fading American film star who is being paid $2 million to represent a Japanese whiskey. Frustrated by his job, lackluster marriage, and young children who get used to his absence he finds as much solace as a man can in the hotel bar. He is constantly told to give "more intensity." She is Charlotte (Scarlett Johansson), the wife to famous photographer accompanying him on one of his trips abroad. Recently out of school and unsure of where her life is going, she tries to take in the Japanese culture--viewing chanting monks, listening to Zen CD's--all to no avail. After some exchanged glances and passed drinks they finally talk, and a week long friendship of intense love is formed. Their days together are spent experiencing Japan in its entirety, pointing out its lunacy, and its beauty.
Sofia Coppola has created a work of great art for this new age of film-making. The comedy of her work is situational and not particularly clever, but it got genuine laughter from me as she made me realize that Japan is really a world away. It is a strange and baffling place full of stereotypes and wonderment and, like her characters, we wade through it trying to find something to cling on to. What that something turns out to be is a complete stranger, but avoiding the cliches of the two star-crossed lovers plot, it is a story told in a way that is not only endearing, it is one that made me envious. The genuine chemistry betwen the two characters was so convincing that I could imagine it happening anywhere in the world, and will make sure that I smile at everyone that I meet in elevators on the off chance it inspires a similar story.
I was never one who really understood the cult of personality that seems to have grown around Bill Murray. Some people really dislike me for this, but I have always felt that behind all of his incredible comedic timing there was a jerk lying somewhere underneath, and I have found that repugnant. His work in this, however, startled me in the best of ways. So calm and understated, he caught me off guard with his likability. To be sure he had his comedic moments--this was his film, and he harnessed it with authority--but he approached each one with restraint and only the slightest wink to the audience that he understood the ridiculousness of the situations, and that is where the best moments came from. L.C. Knight writes that "comedy is the first-born of common sense," meaning that the best comedians are people who know best how the world is supposed to function, and therefore see the things that stray from normality most clearly. But more than that, it is the comedian's job to relay that information in such a way that the audience sees how it strays from the normal without clubbing them over the head with it. Murray did this with exemplary skill. It was a joy to watch him wield comedic swords with such swiftness and precision that they are almost unseen.
I spent a while trying to figure out what "Lost in Translation" as a title meant, in more than just the literal meaning of cultural barriers. Both characters suffer from insomnia while in Tokyo which becomes something of an ongoing joke between Bob and Charlotte. In one scene Bob slips a message under her hotel room door with "Are you awake?" typed on it. In another--the film's most quiet and reflective scene--the two are on Charlotte's bed talking of their past and of their fears with such sincerity that I believe I discovered the meaning. There are several phone conversations between Bob and his wife that are so guarded that it is impossible not to notice the difference between the way he talks to her, and how he talks to Charlotte. Perhaps the only time when we are completely honest with all of our defenses lowered is when we are with people we don't know; those we have spent all of our lives around may know more about us than others simply because of the longevity of the relationship, but do we talk to them with an open heart as we should? Do we second-guess ourselves, and anticipate reactions? If we know how a person behaves would it not make sense that we shape our words to obtain a positive reaction? A complete stranger disarms our security and exposes our true feelings. Nothing, then, is lost in translation--we say precisely what we mean.
Coppola fit so much into such short amount of time that I feel I would need to watch it again to be able to give an analysis of half of it. There is a wonderful bit added for all of the film-buffs of the world. One evening the two of them watch Fellini's La Dolce Vita with Japanese subtitles--it was the scene in which Marcello joins Sylvia in the fountain. It struck me that Marcello was a man that fit the descriptions of both Bob and Charlotte, and that Sylvia was the personification of their situation. It was wonderfully paralleled. The film, however, is summed up in its final moments. What a magnificent decision not to let the audience hear what he whispers to her. Perhaps he told her he loved her, or that she shouldn't worry about her future, or that he would search for her when he returned to the United States. It doesn't matter, because it was exactly what he wanted to say, and that is beautiful.
4/4
He is Bob Harris (Bill Murray), a fading American film star who is being paid $2 million to represent a Japanese whiskey. Frustrated by his job, lackluster marriage, and young children who get used to his absence he finds as much solace as a man can in the hotel bar. He is constantly told to give "more intensity." She is Charlotte (Scarlett Johansson), the wife to famous photographer accompanying him on one of his trips abroad. Recently out of school and unsure of where her life is going, she tries to take in the Japanese culture--viewing chanting monks, listening to Zen CD's--all to no avail. After some exchanged glances and passed drinks they finally talk, and a week long friendship of intense love is formed. Their days together are spent experiencing Japan in its entirety, pointing out its lunacy, and its beauty.
Sofia Coppola has created a work of great art for this new age of film-making. The comedy of her work is situational and not particularly clever, but it got genuine laughter from me as she made me realize that Japan is really a world away. It is a strange and baffling place full of stereotypes and wonderment and, like her characters, we wade through it trying to find something to cling on to. What that something turns out to be is a complete stranger, but avoiding the cliches of the two star-crossed lovers plot, it is a story told in a way that is not only endearing, it is one that made me envious. The genuine chemistry betwen the two characters was so convincing that I could imagine it happening anywhere in the world, and will make sure that I smile at everyone that I meet in elevators on the off chance it inspires a similar story.
I was never one who really understood the cult of personality that seems to have grown around Bill Murray. Some people really dislike me for this, but I have always felt that behind all of his incredible comedic timing there was a jerk lying somewhere underneath, and I have found that repugnant. His work in this, however, startled me in the best of ways. So calm and understated, he caught me off guard with his likability. To be sure he had his comedic moments--this was his film, and he harnessed it with authority--but he approached each one with restraint and only the slightest wink to the audience that he understood the ridiculousness of the situations, and that is where the best moments came from. L.C. Knight writes that "comedy is the first-born of common sense," meaning that the best comedians are people who know best how the world is supposed to function, and therefore see the things that stray from normality most clearly. But more than that, it is the comedian's job to relay that information in such a way that the audience sees how it strays from the normal without clubbing them over the head with it. Murray did this with exemplary skill. It was a joy to watch him wield comedic swords with such swiftness and precision that they are almost unseen.
I spent a while trying to figure out what "Lost in Translation" as a title meant, in more than just the literal meaning of cultural barriers. Both characters suffer from insomnia while in Tokyo which becomes something of an ongoing joke between Bob and Charlotte. In one scene Bob slips a message under her hotel room door with "Are you awake?" typed on it. In another--the film's most quiet and reflective scene--the two are on Charlotte's bed talking of their past and of their fears with such sincerity that I believe I discovered the meaning. There are several phone conversations between Bob and his wife that are so guarded that it is impossible not to notice the difference between the way he talks to her, and how he talks to Charlotte. Perhaps the only time when we are completely honest with all of our defenses lowered is when we are with people we don't know; those we have spent all of our lives around may know more about us than others simply because of the longevity of the relationship, but do we talk to them with an open heart as we should? Do we second-guess ourselves, and anticipate reactions? If we know how a person behaves would it not make sense that we shape our words to obtain a positive reaction? A complete stranger disarms our security and exposes our true feelings. Nothing, then, is lost in translation--we say precisely what we mean.
Coppola fit so much into such short amount of time that I feel I would need to watch it again to be able to give an analysis of half of it. There is a wonderful bit added for all of the film-buffs of the world. One evening the two of them watch Fellini's La Dolce Vita with Japanese subtitles--it was the scene in which Marcello joins Sylvia in the fountain. It struck me that Marcello was a man that fit the descriptions of both Bob and Charlotte, and that Sylvia was the personification of their situation. It was wonderfully paralleled. The film, however, is summed up in its final moments. What a magnificent decision not to let the audience hear what he whispers to her. Perhaps he told her he loved her, or that she shouldn't worry about her future, or that he would search for her when he returned to the United States. It doesn't matter, because it was exactly what he wanted to say, and that is beautiful.
4/4
Sunday, July 10, 2011
99 River Street (1953)
They say the pen is mightier than the sword, but 99 River Street proves that brute strength can get you all that you need. It is a film about a man that the world has turned his back on, but a man that uses his fists to reclaim his dignity.
Film noir is my movie genre, and this film adheres to every bullet in the Film Noir Rule Book. Before the phrase was coined, what we deem "noir" was considered the melodrama of the day. It usually centered on a man who was separated from the rest of the world, and everyone was suspect. There was a damsel in distress, usually a trick ending, and was often very violent. Motivations were usually sexual in nature, and actions were inspired by cynical outlooks. Typically the main character was a cop or detective or, in this case, a boxer.
Eddie Driscoll is a down-and-out boxer living in a thankless marriage. His wife Pauline, a failed actress, dreamed of stardom, but when Eddie lost the fight of his career she began to resent him. Seeking money and excitement she begins an affair with a jewel thief named Victor Rawlins, a typical noir villain with a fedora and a slimy smile, who wants nothing more than paper bills.
Having stolen $50,000 worth of diamonds Victor meets up with the other members of the affair, Pauline in tow. Victor's boss is not pleased at seeing a women in the midst and calls the deal off. Worried that he might not receive his share of the money Victor kills Pauline and frames Eddie for the death. Eddie--being chased by the police not only for the murder, but also for assault and battery of some very dubious Broadway producers (in one of the film's best scenes)--hunts down Victor, his only proof that he didn't commit the murder, in a roller coaster evening of violence and deception.
There are plot twists, and a love affair with the aspiring actress, Linda James (a very good performance from Evelyn Keyes, an actress I was not familiar with before this movie) --hence the connection to the producers. Coincidentally, Keyes owns the other best scene in the film when, towards the end of the film, Linda uses her acting talents to try to seduce information from Victor in a fish-and-chips joint. The film is bloody, with a deliciously ridiculous message that former glory will not die completely. Eddie is always more competent with his boxer's fists than all of the pinstriped gangsters are with their revolvers.
You won't find anything particularly special from this film, but it is an involving character study of a hulking man whom everyone calls "boy," and the lengths that he goes to in order to prove that he is no longer life's punching bag. It is brisk, but sad; good, but I could probably recommend something better.
3/4
Film noir is my movie genre, and this film adheres to every bullet in the Film Noir Rule Book. Before the phrase was coined, what we deem "noir" was considered the melodrama of the day. It usually centered on a man who was separated from the rest of the world, and everyone was suspect. There was a damsel in distress, usually a trick ending, and was often very violent. Motivations were usually sexual in nature, and actions were inspired by cynical outlooks. Typically the main character was a cop or detective or, in this case, a boxer.
Eddie Driscoll is a down-and-out boxer living in a thankless marriage. His wife Pauline, a failed actress, dreamed of stardom, but when Eddie lost the fight of his career she began to resent him. Seeking money and excitement she begins an affair with a jewel thief named Victor Rawlins, a typical noir villain with a fedora and a slimy smile, who wants nothing more than paper bills.
Having stolen $50,000 worth of diamonds Victor meets up with the other members of the affair, Pauline in tow. Victor's boss is not pleased at seeing a women in the midst and calls the deal off. Worried that he might not receive his share of the money Victor kills Pauline and frames Eddie for the death. Eddie--being chased by the police not only for the murder, but also for assault and battery of some very dubious Broadway producers (in one of the film's best scenes)--hunts down Victor, his only proof that he didn't commit the murder, in a roller coaster evening of violence and deception.
There are plot twists, and a love affair with the aspiring actress, Linda James (a very good performance from Evelyn Keyes, an actress I was not familiar with before this movie) --hence the connection to the producers. Coincidentally, Keyes owns the other best scene in the film when, towards the end of the film, Linda uses her acting talents to try to seduce information from Victor in a fish-and-chips joint. The film is bloody, with a deliciously ridiculous message that former glory will not die completely. Eddie is always more competent with his boxer's fists than all of the pinstriped gangsters are with their revolvers.
You won't find anything particularly special from this film, but it is an involving character study of a hulking man whom everyone calls "boy," and the lengths that he goes to in order to prove that he is no longer life's punching bag. It is brisk, but sad; good, but I could probably recommend something better.
3/4
Saturday, July 9, 2011
The Girl in the Cafe (2005)
"It is not a good time for unselfishness." Every year the G8 summit brings together the eight most powerful nations in the world in order to discuss everything from international security to coffee tariffs. And there, over the course of a week, some of the most important decisions for the future are made, sometimes for year, and others for a generation. Most of the time, however, tough decisions are compromised as these leaders focus on pushing what they believe to be achievable rather than something historic. By trying to cover all of the topics equally they simply don't give enough strength to those that might be most impactful.
The G8 summit will be the backdrop for most of the action of this tale, but it begins in a cafe in London when a quiet little man sits across from a quiet little woman. Lawrence is about 60, works for the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and is completely devoted to his work. Straight laced, perfectly shy, and with a head for factoids and statistics it is clear that he leads a life devoted to the sovereign. Sitting opposite a girl half his age was something most unexpected for him, though perhaps not for us.
She is Gina, an equally mild mannered Scottish girl who owns about four blouses, and has absolutely nothing in the world to occupy her time. So much about her remains unsaid, but even though she is enigmatic her sweet face and cute obscenities make her endearing. Lawrence talking to her was dumbfounding to her, but she responds gently, and their relationship...well it doesn't flower, but it buds.
Individually, these characters would have made for interesting study. Putting them together, however, was painfully boring. The entire first act of the film was nothing but small talk. A relationship can not be based on small talk, but they managed to make the first thirty minutes nothing but that. It was clear that Lawrence wanted something more, but it was like watching a snail race to see where the film might take off.
It does (after a gruelingly long time) when Lawrence invites her--after very few dates--to accompany him to the G8 summit in Reykjavik. Surprisingly (for the characters, not for the audience of course) she agrees. After a tumultuous beginning they arrive in Iceland, and through a slip-up are forced to share a room together. Gina takes the couch. Throughout their time together Lawrence has been spouting off facts and figures with regards to the Millennium Development Goals--goals to end extreme poverty within a few short years--and once they are at the summit Gina takes it upon herself to learn more.
While there she embarrasses herself, Lawrence, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer (not to mention the British PM) by confronting them about these new facts that she learns about child mortality, statistics of women dying in childbirth, the number of people living on less than $2 a day. The Chancellor confronts Lawrence about it saying that the G8 summit is supposed to be without protesters. I kept trying to figure out a motive for her outbursts; the actual reason was not fulfilling, but left me even more curious about her past.
Structurally this movie was completely backwards. I was frustrated by it, because so much of the beginning of the film was taken to establish a genuine relationship built on pathos, but we come to realize that it was only a vehicle for the films actual humanitarian message. I have no problem with a film trying to make the case that it did, but it seemed almost unfair to the characters that their relationship should be nothing more than a way to get an average working-girl with shady past in the presence of some of the most important figures in the world. I felt like they were cheated.
Further, as I mentioned earlier, the two characters were far too shy to be together in the way that they were. There were so few supporting characters that the love story was built around two people who didn't know what to say to one another, who were afraid to be intimate. I think the problem falls on the shoulders of the director, David Yates (who I love and was very disappointed to see his name in the credits). Listening to his very good dialogue it seems to me that Bill Nighy's Lawrence should not have been as flummoxed and unsure of himself as he was. It became almost silly the way that he could barely speak a line to her even after they had spent so much time together. He was quiet around other people, yes, but when he spoke he at least seemed sure of himself. I think Yates created characters that could not be supported by one another, and so they failed.
The end of the film is predictable and overly sentimental. The writing is devilishly witty, but bogged down by strange performances.
1.5/4
The G8 summit will be the backdrop for most of the action of this tale, but it begins in a cafe in London when a quiet little man sits across from a quiet little woman. Lawrence is about 60, works for the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and is completely devoted to his work. Straight laced, perfectly shy, and with a head for factoids and statistics it is clear that he leads a life devoted to the sovereign. Sitting opposite a girl half his age was something most unexpected for him, though perhaps not for us.
She is Gina, an equally mild mannered Scottish girl who owns about four blouses, and has absolutely nothing in the world to occupy her time. So much about her remains unsaid, but even though she is enigmatic her sweet face and cute obscenities make her endearing. Lawrence talking to her was dumbfounding to her, but she responds gently, and their relationship...well it doesn't flower, but it buds.
Individually, these characters would have made for interesting study. Putting them together, however, was painfully boring. The entire first act of the film was nothing but small talk. A relationship can not be based on small talk, but they managed to make the first thirty minutes nothing but that. It was clear that Lawrence wanted something more, but it was like watching a snail race to see where the film might take off.
It does (after a gruelingly long time) when Lawrence invites her--after very few dates--to accompany him to the G8 summit in Reykjavik. Surprisingly (for the characters, not for the audience of course) she agrees. After a tumultuous beginning they arrive in Iceland, and through a slip-up are forced to share a room together. Gina takes the couch. Throughout their time together Lawrence has been spouting off facts and figures with regards to the Millennium Development Goals--goals to end extreme poverty within a few short years--and once they are at the summit Gina takes it upon herself to learn more.
While there she embarrasses herself, Lawrence, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer (not to mention the British PM) by confronting them about these new facts that she learns about child mortality, statistics of women dying in childbirth, the number of people living on less than $2 a day. The Chancellor confronts Lawrence about it saying that the G8 summit is supposed to be without protesters. I kept trying to figure out a motive for her outbursts; the actual reason was not fulfilling, but left me even more curious about her past.
Structurally this movie was completely backwards. I was frustrated by it, because so much of the beginning of the film was taken to establish a genuine relationship built on pathos, but we come to realize that it was only a vehicle for the films actual humanitarian message. I have no problem with a film trying to make the case that it did, but it seemed almost unfair to the characters that their relationship should be nothing more than a way to get an average working-girl with shady past in the presence of some of the most important figures in the world. I felt like they were cheated.
Further, as I mentioned earlier, the two characters were far too shy to be together in the way that they were. There were so few supporting characters that the love story was built around two people who didn't know what to say to one another, who were afraid to be intimate. I think the problem falls on the shoulders of the director, David Yates (who I love and was very disappointed to see his name in the credits). Listening to his very good dialogue it seems to me that Bill Nighy's Lawrence should not have been as flummoxed and unsure of himself as he was. It became almost silly the way that he could barely speak a line to her even after they had spent so much time together. He was quiet around other people, yes, but when he spoke he at least seemed sure of himself. I think Yates created characters that could not be supported by one another, and so they failed.
The end of the film is predictable and overly sentimental. The writing is devilishly witty, but bogged down by strange performances.
1.5/4
Friday, July 8, 2011
Amores Perros (2000) - Life's a Bitch
Dog is man's best friend, but why? We prize their companionship, their loyalty, the funny way their legs twitch when they dream. But perhaps they offer more to us. Could they not also be a meal ticket, a good listener, catharsis, sanity, an accessory? When people become unreliable, maybe we turn to dogs because we feel they need us more than we need them. Of course that isn't true at all, but it is a comforting thought nonetheless.
Amores perros gives a look at the lives of various people on the poor streets of Mexico in three intertwining plots that converge in a horrific car accident. The result is probably the most unrelentingly grim film of 2000. My problems with this movie are ample, but fantastic performances from Gael Garcia Bernal, Goya Toledo, and Emilio Echevarria, as well as genuinely compelling storytelling won me over, and left me rather unsettled. I will present it in the way it was presented to me.
Octavio and Susana:
The film begins on a strong note, following a young man's (Bernal) obsession with his sister-in-law. Octavio lives with Susana and his violent, stupid brother, Ramiro who makes his money by performing armed robberies on the grocery store where he works. Octavio is in love with Susana, and proposes that she run away with him. Susana is hesitant and points out that he has no money.
Ramiro's dog Cofi, a massive rottweiler, had recently killed the champion dog fighter Jorge's prized pit bull, inspiring Octavio's idea to place Cofi in the fights for the money. We then get to spend a third of the film looking at the lucrative world of dog-fighting. Some of the scenes in this vignette were nearly unwatchable. Apparently the dogs in the fight scenes were wearing plastic mouth guards which are clearly visible if you freeze the movie. I, however, did not do this, and the attacking dogs were frightening.
The film opens on Octavio, his friend, and the wounded Cofi fleeing in car while being chased by men with guns. They hit a car. By the middle of his story it clear that a fight with Jorge is the cause, and it was just a matter of seeing how the plot would unfold. The interesting part of Octavio's story is seeing the love triangle play out between him, his brother, and his sister-in-law.
Daniel and Valeria:
Daniel is a family man and the editor of a fashion magazine. He has been cheating on his wife for some time with a model, Valeria (Toledo), and finally leaves his wife for her. The two move into an apartment with their dog, Richie, a little shih tzu. Across the street is a giant poster with a thirty-foot Valeria seducing the neighborhood, the word "ENCHANT" scrawled across the top.
Valeria's car is hit. Wheelchair ridden, she stays in her apartment with Richie all day, staring at her looming poster across her window. One day Richie chases a ball into a hole in the floorboards. Much of the rest of the story watches Daniel and the nearly immobile Valeria as they spend days trying to get the poor Richie out of the floor, while at the same time keep their relationship in tact.Valeria spirals into depression as her career is lost (along with a little more, as you will learn), as Daniel begins missing his family, and poor Richie simply tries not to be eaten by rats.
El Chivo and Maru:
The last story follows a wino, Chivo, as he plans an assassination. All day, trailed by his pack of dogs, he scours garbage cans, and follows a young, mysterious woman who holds some secret to his past. One day he is approached to two men asking Chivo to kill the business partner and half-brother of one of the men. It turns out that Chivo was a Zapatista guerrilla fighter, and that his skills were legendary.
Accepting the job he follows the young man. Two cars crash. Chivo rescues a giant rottweiler from one of the cars and sneaks off with the rest of his canine friends. He nurses the nameless dog back to health as he prepares for something more sinister, and more godlike than simply the taking of a life. That is all I will say about him.
All of these stories are good in and of themselves. They involve complex and intriguing characters with interesting symbolism and creative story arcs. It seems though, that the use of the intertwining story lines was being employed a lot during the end of the 90's and the early 2000's. Following the immensely popular Pulp Fiction it became vogue to create the multiple stories connected in an ironic way. Some of the more popular and critically acclaimed movies of the time did just that: Crash, Magnolia, and Traffic especially, are all very much like this film. And, like Traffic, that problem I had with this film is that some vignettes are far more interesting than the others. I would much rather watch an entire film about the relationship between Octavio and Ramiro--how Ramiro became a masked robber, more about the dog-fighting business--than I would watching a condensed version of the story followed by two others. That is not to say that I would not want to know the other plots, but I do not believe that they were suitable together. The second film would have made an incredible, Oscar worthy, short film at twenty minutes; forty-five was far too long. El Chivo's story could have worked as either and would have been equally as good.
Ambition is admirable, but shoving three really good ideas together does not make a great film.
3/4
Amores perros gives a look at the lives of various people on the poor streets of Mexico in three intertwining plots that converge in a horrific car accident. The result is probably the most unrelentingly grim film of 2000. My problems with this movie are ample, but fantastic performances from Gael Garcia Bernal, Goya Toledo, and Emilio Echevarria, as well as genuinely compelling storytelling won me over, and left me rather unsettled. I will present it in the way it was presented to me.
Octavio and Susana:
The film begins on a strong note, following a young man's (Bernal) obsession with his sister-in-law. Octavio lives with Susana and his violent, stupid brother, Ramiro who makes his money by performing armed robberies on the grocery store where he works. Octavio is in love with Susana, and proposes that she run away with him. Susana is hesitant and points out that he has no money.
Ramiro's dog Cofi, a massive rottweiler, had recently killed the champion dog fighter Jorge's prized pit bull, inspiring Octavio's idea to place Cofi in the fights for the money. We then get to spend a third of the film looking at the lucrative world of dog-fighting. Some of the scenes in this vignette were nearly unwatchable. Apparently the dogs in the fight scenes were wearing plastic mouth guards which are clearly visible if you freeze the movie. I, however, did not do this, and the attacking dogs were frightening.
The film opens on Octavio, his friend, and the wounded Cofi fleeing in car while being chased by men with guns. They hit a car. By the middle of his story it clear that a fight with Jorge is the cause, and it was just a matter of seeing how the plot would unfold. The interesting part of Octavio's story is seeing the love triangle play out between him, his brother, and his sister-in-law.
Daniel and Valeria:
Daniel is a family man and the editor of a fashion magazine. He has been cheating on his wife for some time with a model, Valeria (Toledo), and finally leaves his wife for her. The two move into an apartment with their dog, Richie, a little shih tzu. Across the street is a giant poster with a thirty-foot Valeria seducing the neighborhood, the word "ENCHANT" scrawled across the top.
Valeria's car is hit. Wheelchair ridden, she stays in her apartment with Richie all day, staring at her looming poster across her window. One day Richie chases a ball into a hole in the floorboards. Much of the rest of the story watches Daniel and the nearly immobile Valeria as they spend days trying to get the poor Richie out of the floor, while at the same time keep their relationship in tact.Valeria spirals into depression as her career is lost (along with a little more, as you will learn), as Daniel begins missing his family, and poor Richie simply tries not to be eaten by rats.
El Chivo and Maru:
The last story follows a wino, Chivo, as he plans an assassination. All day, trailed by his pack of dogs, he scours garbage cans, and follows a young, mysterious woman who holds some secret to his past. One day he is approached to two men asking Chivo to kill the business partner and half-brother of one of the men. It turns out that Chivo was a Zapatista guerrilla fighter, and that his skills were legendary.
Accepting the job he follows the young man. Two cars crash. Chivo rescues a giant rottweiler from one of the cars and sneaks off with the rest of his canine friends. He nurses the nameless dog back to health as he prepares for something more sinister, and more godlike than simply the taking of a life. That is all I will say about him.
All of these stories are good in and of themselves. They involve complex and intriguing characters with interesting symbolism and creative story arcs. It seems though, that the use of the intertwining story lines was being employed a lot during the end of the 90's and the early 2000's. Following the immensely popular Pulp Fiction it became vogue to create the multiple stories connected in an ironic way. Some of the more popular and critically acclaimed movies of the time did just that: Crash, Magnolia, and Traffic especially, are all very much like this film. And, like Traffic, that problem I had with this film is that some vignettes are far more interesting than the others. I would much rather watch an entire film about the relationship between Octavio and Ramiro--how Ramiro became a masked robber, more about the dog-fighting business--than I would watching a condensed version of the story followed by two others. That is not to say that I would not want to know the other plots, but I do not believe that they were suitable together. The second film would have made an incredible, Oscar worthy, short film at twenty minutes; forty-five was far too long. El Chivo's story could have worked as either and would have been equally as good.
Ambition is admirable, but shoving three really good ideas together does not make a great film.
3/4
Thursday, July 7, 2011
Bicycle Thieves (1948)
Post-World War II Italy. A queue of able-bodied workers form in front of an office building where they struggle to compete for the couple of jobs offered for the day. Some of them have not worked for a year, but the job is given Antonio Ricci because, among his other skills, he has a bicycle. The job is hanging movie posters, and requires that he can speedily get around Rome.
Antonio wants to be the provider for his family. He has a patient and resilient wife, a new baby, and young son Bruno, maybe six, who is hard-working and full of love. Tony and Bruno go off to work together in the morning, both dressed proudly in their uniforms. Bruno works pumping gas at a gas station for twelve hours a day while Antonio begins his first day at work. At first I thought perhaps Bruno was going to school--his mother made him an omelette before he left, and it looked as if there were more children were he was dropped off at--however the squalor of the family necessitates he work.
As the title would suggest a thief steals his bicycle while Tony is up on a ladder hanging his posters. There is a heart-breaking moment in the film when Tony goes to report the robbery to the police. A second officer approaches the first inspector and asks if it is something important who responds, "Nothing. Just a bicycle." For Antonio the bicycle is everything, it is his livelihood, it is the well-being and happiness of his family. For him his bicycle means "we can live again." The rest of the film follows Antonio and Bruno as they scour the streets trying to find his precious treasure. Through their search they meet an old man that has recently come in contact with the thief, a soothsayer who only speaks doomsday, and the thief himself, a young man who shares a one-room apartment with three members of his family. He gains the help of some friends who stop their own work to help him look. The comradery is moving.
As he comes closer to finding his bike he becomes more and more desperate to achieve the goal. The methods that he takes to convince people around him for help become more and more questionable. All the while there is Bruno, so fond of his father and so susceptible. Antonio must create a balancing act as he tries to push the limits of his morals while still providing an acceptable image of himself for his son. This film reminded me in many ways of the more recent and very popular La vita e bella. In that movie too there is a boy, still pure and unaffected by the misery that his life is filled with, who looks up to his father with reverence. His adoring father does what he can to protect that innocence in a time and location where the means that are employed break the bounds of day to day life.
The end of the film is spectacular. Throughout the movie we regard the thief as a monster. How could he do this to our young Antonio and his family! Has he no heart? The strength of this film comes in the end where Antonio unhinges the limits of what he believed he was capable of and becomes the monster that the audience has spent the last hour and a half building rage against. The final images of father and son disappearing faceless into the crowd are haunting.
Bicycle Thieves is an iconic film of the Italian Neorealism genre. Italian directors of the 40' and 50's wished to create movies that depicted poverty and struggle following the Great War in Italy. Most were filmed on location with amateur actors in order to preserve the authenticity of the tone and material. Their films were not meant to shed a light of hope (as this film makes clear), but were rather meant to inspire outrage against an incompetent bureaucratic system that failed to creates jobs for those who fought for their country. This film has emotional power that is not seen often. It is frustrating to know that so much depended on two wheels and a frame for one man trying to keep his family alive after the bombs stopped falling.
4/4
Antonio wants to be the provider for his family. He has a patient and resilient wife, a new baby, and young son Bruno, maybe six, who is hard-working and full of love. Tony and Bruno go off to work together in the morning, both dressed proudly in their uniforms. Bruno works pumping gas at a gas station for twelve hours a day while Antonio begins his first day at work. At first I thought perhaps Bruno was going to school--his mother made him an omelette before he left, and it looked as if there were more children were he was dropped off at--however the squalor of the family necessitates he work.
As the title would suggest a thief steals his bicycle while Tony is up on a ladder hanging his posters. There is a heart-breaking moment in the film when Tony goes to report the robbery to the police. A second officer approaches the first inspector and asks if it is something important who responds, "Nothing. Just a bicycle." For Antonio the bicycle is everything, it is his livelihood, it is the well-being and happiness of his family. For him his bicycle means "we can live again." The rest of the film follows Antonio and Bruno as they scour the streets trying to find his precious treasure. Through their search they meet an old man that has recently come in contact with the thief, a soothsayer who only speaks doomsday, and the thief himself, a young man who shares a one-room apartment with three members of his family. He gains the help of some friends who stop their own work to help him look. The comradery is moving.
As he comes closer to finding his bike he becomes more and more desperate to achieve the goal. The methods that he takes to convince people around him for help become more and more questionable. All the while there is Bruno, so fond of his father and so susceptible. Antonio must create a balancing act as he tries to push the limits of his morals while still providing an acceptable image of himself for his son. This film reminded me in many ways of the more recent and very popular La vita e bella. In that movie too there is a boy, still pure and unaffected by the misery that his life is filled with, who looks up to his father with reverence. His adoring father does what he can to protect that innocence in a time and location where the means that are employed break the bounds of day to day life.
The end of the film is spectacular. Throughout the movie we regard the thief as a monster. How could he do this to our young Antonio and his family! Has he no heart? The strength of this film comes in the end where Antonio unhinges the limits of what he believed he was capable of and becomes the monster that the audience has spent the last hour and a half building rage against. The final images of father and son disappearing faceless into the crowd are haunting.
Bicycle Thieves is an iconic film of the Italian Neorealism genre. Italian directors of the 40' and 50's wished to create movies that depicted poverty and struggle following the Great War in Italy. Most were filmed on location with amateur actors in order to preserve the authenticity of the tone and material. Their films were not meant to shed a light of hope (as this film makes clear), but were rather meant to inspire outrage against an incompetent bureaucratic system that failed to creates jobs for those who fought for their country. This film has emotional power that is not seen often. It is frustrating to know that so much depended on two wheels and a frame for one man trying to keep his family alive after the bombs stopped falling.
4/4
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
Fantasia (1940)
The last time that I watched Fantasia I was probably eight years old, give or take. My memory of it was foggy; there were recollections of the dancing flowers, the dinosaurs dying of thirst, Mickey Mouse on his perch, Pegasus and his family on Mt. Olympus, Satan. Though the memories were few they were incredibly vivid, but watching it anew was like experiencing it for the first time.
The film is a celebration of timeless classical music combined with vivid imagery that creates a truly unique movie-going experience, and one of the best Disney films made. In it are seven vignettes set to eight pieces of music from Bach, Beethoven, Dukas, Moussorgsky, Ponchielli, Schubert, Stravinsky, and Tchaikovsky from some of their best works ranging Toccata and Fugue to The Pastoral Symphony. Describing each piece would be tedious to write and to read, but each is wondrous to behold.
The scope of the film is ambitious. There is a narrator who comes out with The Philadelphia Philharmonic and introduces us to the concept of the film. He explains that Walt Disney Productions intended to blend sight and sound in a way never before attempted in a feature length film. He subsequently tells the audience a bit about the musical numbers and the thoughts behind each of their creative designs. There are pieces ranging from the creation of life on Earth to an illustrated version of The Sorcerer's Apprentice.
Not everything in this movie works. How could it possibly? Each piece tells its own story with its own mood, and aesthetic. There are bound to be segments more interesting and better designed than others--that is simply the nature of the film. I did not agree with all of the artistic choices, just as I musically I did not agree with some of the choices that the conductor made. Those mistakes, however, were sacrifices made to try something entirely different. I would imagine that Fantasia is the most influential of all animated films after Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. It set the stage for how movie musicals--especially animated ones--would be interpreted in the future (I think specifically of Dumbo, Sleeping Beauty, and The Hunchback of Notre Dame), and I believe that it is one of the most visionary films ever made.
4/4
The film is a celebration of timeless classical music combined with vivid imagery that creates a truly unique movie-going experience, and one of the best Disney films made. In it are seven vignettes set to eight pieces of music from Bach, Beethoven, Dukas, Moussorgsky, Ponchielli, Schubert, Stravinsky, and Tchaikovsky from some of their best works ranging Toccata and Fugue to The Pastoral Symphony. Describing each piece would be tedious to write and to read, but each is wondrous to behold.
The scope of the film is ambitious. There is a narrator who comes out with The Philadelphia Philharmonic and introduces us to the concept of the film. He explains that Walt Disney Productions intended to blend sight and sound in a way never before attempted in a feature length film. He subsequently tells the audience a bit about the musical numbers and the thoughts behind each of their creative designs. There are pieces ranging from the creation of life on Earth to an illustrated version of The Sorcerer's Apprentice.
Not everything in this movie works. How could it possibly? Each piece tells its own story with its own mood, and aesthetic. There are bound to be segments more interesting and better designed than others--that is simply the nature of the film. I did not agree with all of the artistic choices, just as I musically I did not agree with some of the choices that the conductor made. Those mistakes, however, were sacrifices made to try something entirely different. I would imagine that Fantasia is the most influential of all animated films after Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. It set the stage for how movie musicals--especially animated ones--would be interpreted in the future (I think specifically of Dumbo, Sleeping Beauty, and The Hunchback of Notre Dame), and I believe that it is one of the most visionary films ever made.
4/4
Monday, July 4, 2011
Cars 2 (2011)
Before I talk about the movie, I would like to mention something funny that happened during the previews. I saw the matinee screening so the theater was filled entirely by young kids with their parents in tow. They are always vocally responsive to the films that excite them, and equally receptive to the previews. All of the films that Cars 2 previewed said that they would be shot in 3D--no response. Then Spy Kids 4: All the Time in the World showed--no response. At the end, however, it tried to be clever and said the experience would be in "4D"--uproarious response from every child under 8 in the theater. Kids literally out of their seats demanding more information: What is the 4th dimension?! Will I be fighting along side them? Is it safe? Tell us!
I love kids.
Cars 2 gives us Pixar's most complex and thought out plot since The Incredibles. It is also their most visually dazzling since WALL-E. This second installment is in some ways a large step forward, but I would like to avoid comparing the first to the second as much as possible. I have never believed that films should be compared in such ways; each should be looked at for its own merits.
Lightning McQueen is back for this latest film, but he rides shotgun to Mater, the lovable, oafish tow-truck who, for better or worse, takes the driver's seat for this adventure. As it was in the first film, racing provides the impetus for the plot. The hotshot, Italian racecar, Francesco Bernoulli (John Turturro), has challenged McQueen to a race to determine the fastest car in the world. Sponsored by a new alternative fuel Allinol-- created by the once oil billionaire, now electric-car tycoon Sir Miles Axelrod (Eddie Izzard)--the first ever World Grand Prix will take place in Japan, Italy, and finally in the United Kingdom.
This is more or less the backdrop for the main plot, and allows the animators to create some absolutely breathtaking scenes all around the globe. This film is actually an elaborate espionage film. We get to meet some new characters with high-tech, secret spy gadgetry like Finn McMissile (Michael Caine), a seasoned professional with more weapons in his hull than Dick Chaney's house. We also meet Holley Shiftwell (Emily Mortimer), the new recruit from the tech division with gadgets advanced enough that she should be more informed and efficient than she is.
Basically the story involves a threat on the world's energy supply by a legion of lemons. It's kingpin is unknown, but his right-hand man is a German with a monocle, so you know that the kingpin must really be evil if he is going to out-cliche Professor Z. Mater, through a serious mistaken identity mishap, is thought by Holley and Finn to be a undercover American agent, and the three of them set out to find the kingpin, and thwart his plans before he destroys all of the cars racing in the World Grand Prix. Professor Z has discovered that when an EMP is applied to Allinol it combusts. Allinol, being the sponsor of the races, is inside all of the racecars, and there you see the problem. By proving alternative fuels unsafe the Professor, his boss, and their band of junky cars can secure their wealth and power, as they own the largest oil reserve in the world.
I really liked this story, although I don't think that half of the kids in the audience understood it--probably much less than half. Pixar did not think this through as well as they should have. They distance themselves from their younger audience by making the plot too thick, but also turn off their adult audience by making Mater, a completely insufferable character in large doses, the star of the show. This will definitely be a blemish on the otherwise beautiful face of Pixar, as they have finally created something that cannot be universally connected to which is what they are known for.
The movie really was lovely to behold. The color pallet was exquisite, and the action sequences were superb. This, however, really could not win me over when I was frustrated by the incompetency of all of the characters... all of them. Secret agents should not be as dumb as they were in this film. Maybe their big secret is that none of them really are capable of anything--after all, guess who saves the day?
2/4
I love kids.
Cars 2 gives us Pixar's most complex and thought out plot since The Incredibles. It is also their most visually dazzling since WALL-E. This second installment is in some ways a large step forward, but I would like to avoid comparing the first to the second as much as possible. I have never believed that films should be compared in such ways; each should be looked at for its own merits.
Lightning McQueen is back for this latest film, but he rides shotgun to Mater, the lovable, oafish tow-truck who, for better or worse, takes the driver's seat for this adventure. As it was in the first film, racing provides the impetus for the plot. The hotshot, Italian racecar, Francesco Bernoulli (John Turturro), has challenged McQueen to a race to determine the fastest car in the world. Sponsored by a new alternative fuel Allinol-- created by the once oil billionaire, now electric-car tycoon Sir Miles Axelrod (Eddie Izzard)--the first ever World Grand Prix will take place in Japan, Italy, and finally in the United Kingdom.
This is more or less the backdrop for the main plot, and allows the animators to create some absolutely breathtaking scenes all around the globe. This film is actually an elaborate espionage film. We get to meet some new characters with high-tech, secret spy gadgetry like Finn McMissile (Michael Caine), a seasoned professional with more weapons in his hull than Dick Chaney's house. We also meet Holley Shiftwell (Emily Mortimer), the new recruit from the tech division with gadgets advanced enough that she should be more informed and efficient than she is.
Basically the story involves a threat on the world's energy supply by a legion of lemons. It's kingpin is unknown, but his right-hand man is a German with a monocle, so you know that the kingpin must really be evil if he is going to out-cliche Professor Z. Mater, through a serious mistaken identity mishap, is thought by Holley and Finn to be a undercover American agent, and the three of them set out to find the kingpin, and thwart his plans before he destroys all of the cars racing in the World Grand Prix. Professor Z has discovered that when an EMP is applied to Allinol it combusts. Allinol, being the sponsor of the races, is inside all of the racecars, and there you see the problem. By proving alternative fuels unsafe the Professor, his boss, and their band of junky cars can secure their wealth and power, as they own the largest oil reserve in the world.
I really liked this story, although I don't think that half of the kids in the audience understood it--probably much less than half. Pixar did not think this through as well as they should have. They distance themselves from their younger audience by making the plot too thick, but also turn off their adult audience by making Mater, a completely insufferable character in large doses, the star of the show. This will definitely be a blemish on the otherwise beautiful face of Pixar, as they have finally created something that cannot be universally connected to which is what they are known for.
The movie really was lovely to behold. The color pallet was exquisite, and the action sequences were superb. This, however, really could not win me over when I was frustrated by the incompetency of all of the characters... all of them. Secret agents should not be as dumb as they were in this film. Maybe their big secret is that none of them really are capable of anything--after all, guess who saves the day?
2/4
Sunday, July 3, 2011
Moonstruck (1987)
Giacomo Puccini's famous opera "La Boheme" looks at the instant attraction of Mimi, a seamstress, and Rodolfo, a poet, as they try to find a way to be poor and happy together. Rodolfo leaves her for an ex-girlfriend who charms him back into her life, but he later regrets his mistake--only too late. Mimi is sick, and in the final act she dies, though her friends do all they can to make her final moments peaceful.
In Moonstruck, Nicholas Cage plays the brutish yet sensitive Ronnie, a baker, who manages to convince Loretta to go to see "La Boheme" with him at the Metropolitan Opera House. She agrees hesitantly, as the catch is that Ronnie is brother to Loretta's fiance, Johnny, who is off in Palermo visiting his dying mother. The roads to death and engagement are followed at almost the same time so Johnny asks Loretta to invite his brother, to whom he has not spoken to in five years, to the wedding.
Loretta (played by an effervescent Cher) meets with Ronnie who, in a rage, tells her the story of he and his brother's estrangement. At work he became distracted by something Johnny said, and lost his hand in a bread slicer. Appalled by his disfigurement, the girl of his dreams left him. Ronnie blamed Johnny for his losses, and is infuriated when Loretta pointed out was not Johnny's fault. The audience is immediately put off by Ronnie's character, but we know that Loretta will fall for him.
Cher is naturally gifted with charisma and energy, but her Loretta is a 37 year old Italian widow who knows that her chances at finding love are slim at her age, and is now simply focused on finding someone passable. She does not love the childish and weak Johnny, but he is safe, and she believes that a marriage done correctly will bring her the luck she has never had. Ronnie with his raw emotions, however, is exciting, and in the throws of passion the tension is released and she falls for him.
Loretta lives with her family who come from the old country, so there is etiquette and rules for how relationships work. Infidelity is rampant in her household, however, and everyone is reminded that stones should not be thrown in glass houses (which you in a hilarious scene following the opera). Why are all of these rules of engagement being broken? Apparently the moon is the cause of it all. Luna disturbs the humors and ushers in spontaneity into the midst, driving all of the characters to behave in ways that they might not normally do otherwise.
Cher and Olympia Dukakis do a good job in this film, although I am not sure that either were Oscar worthy (especially when they were up against Glenn Close and Anne Archer in the mega-hit Fatal Attraction). As a gay man, though, I feel an obligation to pause and reflect on the amazing talents that Cher does possess. She really is a superstar, and her skills on screen match--if not exceed--her skills on stage. Nicholas Cage was, in my opinion, horrible casting. His lines felt forced, he was not funny, and his hair looked terrible.
The script was good. There were moments of beautiful clarity ("I see everything, and you are a wolf"), as well as really witty one-liners ("You got those bad eyes like a gypsy"). There were also moments which were almost unwatchably bad (though they were few). But that is what comes from a screenwriter taking risks, and I suppose that John Patrick Shanley's Oscar proves that those risks paid off.
I tried to make the connection between Rodolfo and Mimi to Ronnie and Cher, but I have had a very difficult time of doing it. Perhaps they were meant to compliment one another, and show that a leap of faith pays off every once in a while. Rodolfo leaves Mimi for Musetta even though he doesn't love her, because he knows that she is a safe choice. Ronnie was not the safe choice, and Loretta had to break all of the rules that she has made for herself in order to be with him, and her choice only leads to unhappiness for Johnny (who did nothing wrong, but got left with the short end of the stick). Perhaps Johnny should have made a leap as well.
2.5/4
In Moonstruck, Nicholas Cage plays the brutish yet sensitive Ronnie, a baker, who manages to convince Loretta to go to see "La Boheme" with him at the Metropolitan Opera House. She agrees hesitantly, as the catch is that Ronnie is brother to Loretta's fiance, Johnny, who is off in Palermo visiting his dying mother. The roads to death and engagement are followed at almost the same time so Johnny asks Loretta to invite his brother, to whom he has not spoken to in five years, to the wedding.
Loretta (played by an effervescent Cher) meets with Ronnie who, in a rage, tells her the story of he and his brother's estrangement. At work he became distracted by something Johnny said, and lost his hand in a bread slicer. Appalled by his disfigurement, the girl of his dreams left him. Ronnie blamed Johnny for his losses, and is infuriated when Loretta pointed out was not Johnny's fault. The audience is immediately put off by Ronnie's character, but we know that Loretta will fall for him.
Cher is naturally gifted with charisma and energy, but her Loretta is a 37 year old Italian widow who knows that her chances at finding love are slim at her age, and is now simply focused on finding someone passable. She does not love the childish and weak Johnny, but he is safe, and she believes that a marriage done correctly will bring her the luck she has never had. Ronnie with his raw emotions, however, is exciting, and in the throws of passion the tension is released and she falls for him.
Loretta lives with her family who come from the old country, so there is etiquette and rules for how relationships work. Infidelity is rampant in her household, however, and everyone is reminded that stones should not be thrown in glass houses (which you in a hilarious scene following the opera). Why are all of these rules of engagement being broken? Apparently the moon is the cause of it all. Luna disturbs the humors and ushers in spontaneity into the midst, driving all of the characters to behave in ways that they might not normally do otherwise.
Cher and Olympia Dukakis do a good job in this film, although I am not sure that either were Oscar worthy (especially when they were up against Glenn Close and Anne Archer in the mega-hit Fatal Attraction). As a gay man, though, I feel an obligation to pause and reflect on the amazing talents that Cher does possess. She really is a superstar, and her skills on screen match--if not exceed--her skills on stage. Nicholas Cage was, in my opinion, horrible casting. His lines felt forced, he was not funny, and his hair looked terrible.
The script was good. There were moments of beautiful clarity ("I see everything, and you are a wolf"), as well as really witty one-liners ("You got those bad eyes like a gypsy"). There were also moments which were almost unwatchably bad (though they were few). But that is what comes from a screenwriter taking risks, and I suppose that John Patrick Shanley's Oscar proves that those risks paid off.
I tried to make the connection between Rodolfo and Mimi to Ronnie and Cher, but I have had a very difficult time of doing it. Perhaps they were meant to compliment one another, and show that a leap of faith pays off every once in a while. Rodolfo leaves Mimi for Musetta even though he doesn't love her, because he knows that she is a safe choice. Ronnie was not the safe choice, and Loretta had to break all of the rules that she has made for herself in order to be with him, and her choice only leads to unhappiness for Johnny (who did nothing wrong, but got left with the short end of the stick). Perhaps Johnny should have made a leap as well.
2.5/4
Saturday, July 2, 2011
Gosford Park (2001)
Gosford Park has been called a murder mystery over and over again, which is about as misleading a definition as you could get. Yes there is a murder, and yes it is mysterious, but it was not at all what I expected which was in some ways disappointing. Had I not thought that it would be like Clue or Murder on the Orient Express I think I would have enjoyed more of what is a terrifically acted and incredibly sharp movie from one of the last great directors, Robert Altman.
The film is not so much about motives and murder as it is about class distinction, and the interaction between-- what the end credits call--the "upstairs" and the "downstairs." We arrive at a huge estate in the early 1930's as the preparations for Sir William McCordle's hunting party take place. Slowly the genteel sophisticates and their servants arrive. There are easily more members of the staff then there are guests, and they are all called by the name of their lord or lady (for the purposes of this review the servants will be addressed as Mr. and Ms., the guests as Sir or Lady).
Like The Remains of the Day a good deal of time is spent explaining the rules of the housekeeper. There is a hierarchy in the downstairs as immovable as there is in the upstairs. There is a wonderful moment where the help are about to have their dinner. The butler to Sir William sits at the head of the table, and everyone else falls in line by rank. A woman sits to the right of Mr. William who snaps "Since when does a baroness outrank a countess?" and hence follows a reshuffling of the chairs. The maids and valets live vicariously through their lords and ladies, gossiping not about each other, but about the private lives of those they serve. The guests know where the true ears of the house lie, and try and get the scoop from their maids as well.
Fortunately for the audience, there is maid still being broken in by Lady Trentham (played by a gloriously snobbish Maggie Smith), and an American servant with different customs than the British. They are educated on the goings-on of the household, and therefore so are we. The latter of the two, Henry (I call him by his first name because the man he serves, Morris Weissman, is a movie producer in Hollywood, and therefore also a Mr.--it would be confusing), plays a larger role than he first appears, and whose actions offer the audience much more than we originally guess. He has a pretty face, and a very healthy libido, which he makes very good use of.
The upstairs works in a remarkably similar way, though they wear fancy clothes, and are much more skilled in passive aggressiveness. There is a hilarious moment when Mr. Weissman introduces himself to some of the ladies in the house. One repeats "Weissman?" incredulously, and with her raised eyebrow hours of salacious xenophobic remarks fly through the air to the other ladies who respond with equally malicious turned-up lips. The Weissman character is wonderful in juxtaposing the new world order to the crumbling decadence of the upper-crust of England. It also turns out that he is a vegetarian (which the cooks below have never heard of), and there were hints of his homosexuality (but you kind of have to be looking for those, which I most certainly was).
We assume that the murder will come from those closest to Sir William (he's the murder victim, but that is clear). The help serve as vessels to which we can see and hear the motives unfurl in hushed whispers when accord has been shrugged off. Sex and money is all that ever seems to trouble anyone, but the elite take these two things with a little more gravity it seems than those below; the maids and valets are just happy to get a bit of either. I become concerned that delving into the problems of these people anymore would spoil the fun of watching it yourself, so I will stop.
This movie is technically a murder mystery, but it breaks the barriers of all of them that I have seen. In others the characters are established, murky motives are laid out, the action happens early on, and then a very smart and capable detective dazzles us with insight. In this film, however, the murder does not come until almost an hour and a half in, the detective is completely inept, and answer that we find more unusual than you might guess. If you want something more traditional find yourself a classic Agatha Christie film.
Reflecting on it now the movie was really very good. The script crackled with highbrow English humor ("Did you have a horrid day?" "Yes, fairly horrid"), and yielded terrific performances from the entire cast, especially from Maggie Smith, Kristen Thomas, Jeremy Northam, and Helen Mirren (is there anything she can't do?). My one problem is that for the first twenty minutes I could not understand half of what was said. The sound editor ought to have been shot. A minor quibble with the film. This is a strong film that is definitely worth taking the time to watch.
3.5/4
The film is not so much about motives and murder as it is about class distinction, and the interaction between-- what the end credits call--the "upstairs" and the "downstairs." We arrive at a huge estate in the early 1930's as the preparations for Sir William McCordle's hunting party take place. Slowly the genteel sophisticates and their servants arrive. There are easily more members of the staff then there are guests, and they are all called by the name of their lord or lady (for the purposes of this review the servants will be addressed as Mr. and Ms., the guests as Sir or Lady).
Like The Remains of the Day a good deal of time is spent explaining the rules of the housekeeper. There is a hierarchy in the downstairs as immovable as there is in the upstairs. There is a wonderful moment where the help are about to have their dinner. The butler to Sir William sits at the head of the table, and everyone else falls in line by rank. A woman sits to the right of Mr. William who snaps "Since when does a baroness outrank a countess?" and hence follows a reshuffling of the chairs. The maids and valets live vicariously through their lords and ladies, gossiping not about each other, but about the private lives of those they serve. The guests know where the true ears of the house lie, and try and get the scoop from their maids as well.
Fortunately for the audience, there is maid still being broken in by Lady Trentham (played by a gloriously snobbish Maggie Smith), and an American servant with different customs than the British. They are educated on the goings-on of the household, and therefore so are we. The latter of the two, Henry (I call him by his first name because the man he serves, Morris Weissman, is a movie producer in Hollywood, and therefore also a Mr.--it would be confusing), plays a larger role than he first appears, and whose actions offer the audience much more than we originally guess. He has a pretty face, and a very healthy libido, which he makes very good use of.
The upstairs works in a remarkably similar way, though they wear fancy clothes, and are much more skilled in passive aggressiveness. There is a hilarious moment when Mr. Weissman introduces himself to some of the ladies in the house. One repeats "Weissman?" incredulously, and with her raised eyebrow hours of salacious xenophobic remarks fly through the air to the other ladies who respond with equally malicious turned-up lips. The Weissman character is wonderful in juxtaposing the new world order to the crumbling decadence of the upper-crust of England. It also turns out that he is a vegetarian (which the cooks below have never heard of), and there were hints of his homosexuality (but you kind of have to be looking for those, which I most certainly was).
We assume that the murder will come from those closest to Sir William (he's the murder victim, but that is clear). The help serve as vessels to which we can see and hear the motives unfurl in hushed whispers when accord has been shrugged off. Sex and money is all that ever seems to trouble anyone, but the elite take these two things with a little more gravity it seems than those below; the maids and valets are just happy to get a bit of either. I become concerned that delving into the problems of these people anymore would spoil the fun of watching it yourself, so I will stop.
This movie is technically a murder mystery, but it breaks the barriers of all of them that I have seen. In others the characters are established, murky motives are laid out, the action happens early on, and then a very smart and capable detective dazzles us with insight. In this film, however, the murder does not come until almost an hour and a half in, the detective is completely inept, and answer that we find more unusual than you might guess. If you want something more traditional find yourself a classic Agatha Christie film.
Reflecting on it now the movie was really very good. The script crackled with highbrow English humor ("Did you have a horrid day?" "Yes, fairly horrid"), and yielded terrific performances from the entire cast, especially from Maggie Smith, Kristen Thomas, Jeremy Northam, and Helen Mirren (is there anything she can't do?). My one problem is that for the first twenty minutes I could not understand half of what was said. The sound editor ought to have been shot. A minor quibble with the film. This is a strong film that is definitely worth taking the time to watch.
3.5/4
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