July 11, 2007
Movies Love Bald Guys
I used this picture on the other site yesterday. The more I look at it, the funnier I think it is, so I had to post it over here as well. Jen and Jake hosted a party at a lower east side bar for friends of the site Monday and I got to meet some regular readers, including people whose photos I use frequently for Extra, Extra. It was not a disappointing experience. Most were as pleasant in person as they are talented and interesting online. I didn't get to meet the person who took this photo on a subway platform, but I wish I had.
(Untitled photo of adjacent movie posters, by dogseat at flickr)
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March 20, 2007
CAN HE SHOW US THE WAY?
The LA Times ran an interesting Opinion piece yesterday. While I'm generally a fan of Spike Lee's work and find a good deal of validity to the concept, I don't think I was familiar with his theory of the "Magic Negro" stock character in films. In his opinion piece, David Ehrenstein writes that Barack Obama is filling the role of the Magic(al) Negro in the drama that is an election cycle in American poltics:
The Magic Negro is a figure of postmodern folk culture, coined by snarky 20th century sociologists, to explain a cultural figure who emerged in the wake of Brown vs. Board of Education. "He has no past, he simply appears one day to help the white protagonist," reads the description on Wikipedia.
He's there to assuage white "guilt" (i.e., the minimal discomfort they feel) over the role of slavery and racial segregation in American history, while replacing stereotypes of a dangerous, highly sexualized black man with a benign figure for whom interracial sexual congress holds no interest.
Wikipedia's definition gets more specific:
The magical negro is simply a plot device to help the protagonist get out of trouble, typically through helping the white character recognize his own faults and overcome them.[3] In this way, the magical negro is similar to the Deus ex machina; a simple way for the protagonist to overcome an obstacle almost entirely through outside help. Although he has magical powers, his "magic is ostensibly directed toward helping and enlightening a white male character."[5] It is this feature of the magical negro that is most troubling. Although the character seems to be showing African-Americans in a positive light, he is still ultimately subordinate to whites. He is also regarded as an exception, allowing white America to "like individual black people but not black culture."
I have to admit that I think Ehrenstein may be onto something here. Even Barack Obama's past lends to his characterization as a Magic Negro. Obama grew up in Hawaii, a place that is viewed as being veritably Edenic and unspoiled by any of the ugly problems that face the rest of the world and the U.S. in particular. One can hear these concerns echoed in regards to questions of Obama's "authenticity" as a black person. His persona seems to have sprung sui generis from an American dream archetype, unsullied by any intimations of America's less racially inclusive past. White Americans can take comfort that at no point is Obama going to assume the role of racial buzzkiller, a la Al Sharpton, by finding out his great-great-great grandfather was a slave owned by Jimmy Carter's great aunt's cousin's next door neighbor in Georgia.
There is only one problem––for Obama––when it comes to playing the role of the Magic Negro, if the stock character is being correctly applied. The same way that the character comes out of nowhere, as Obama has an extremely short history as a national political figure, it's also required that he or she exits stage left in short order, either by dying or, as in the case of Bagger Vance (pictured above), literally disappearing. If the pattern holds true, then Obama will make some significant contribution to redeeming the Democratic Party in the eyes of the public, then will politely fade away at the appropriate time––magnanimous and benificient. I'll presume that that is not the goal Obama and his supporters are hoping to achieve.
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March 16, 2007
ST. PADDY'S DAY MOVIE RECOMMENDATION
("Do we go if Frankie calls, or if he doesn't call?")
When it was released in 1990, State of Grace disappointed at the box office. Some have speculated that it was simply overshadowed by another film about gangsters that year: Goodfellas. The former is still lacking in recognition to this day though. Primarily because it rarely if ever appears on television. The word "fuck" and its variations appear in the film approximately 210 times during the running time, or about 1.5 times every minute.
Despite its lack of recognition, I highly recommend State of Grace for any New York metrophile or fan of taut crime dramas. The movie was shot on location all over NYC and it's fun to play spot-the-location. The cast is superb. Sean Penn, Robin Wright Penn, Ed Harris, John C. Reilly, and a host of others animate the screen. The real show-stealer, however, is a then-little-known Gary Oldman, whose frenetic drug and alcohol fueled behavior threatens to jump right off the screen.
So why is this a St. Patty's Day recommendation? Without giving too much away, State of Grace is about the Westies, the Irish mob in NYC in the 1980s. The film's climax takes place on St. Patrick's Day as the parade marches down 5th Avenue, when few are aware of the simmering underworld of Irish-American violence that is about to boil over. If this sounds like your kind of genre, search it out. You won't be sorry.
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March 10, 2007
THERMOPYLAE IN THEATERS
I found this surprising, although maybe I shouldn't have. The Greek battle pic 300 is set for a huge opening weekend.
Imax, the giant-screen movie chain, reported that all 57 of its 12:01 a.m. Friday screenings of the Warner Bros. film had sold out as its advance ticket sales for the weekend hit a new record for the month of March.
"We had the most amazing night," said Greg Foster, chairman and president of Imax Filmed Entertainment, adding that many Imax theaters arranged 2:30 a.m. shows at the last minute to accommodate fans who failed to get into the midnight showings.
Many of the rest of the nation's 600 theaters with early morning shows also played to capacity crowds, said Dan Fellman, domestic distribution president for the Time Warner Inc.-owned studio.
"They were flocking everywhere, not just to Imax," he told Reuters.
300 is based on graphic novelist Frank Miller's (Batman) take on the Battle of Thermopylae, where 300 Spartan warriors stood at a wall on a narrow pass between a mountain and the sea in 480 B.C. With the rest of Greece's city states unwilling or unable to offer timely or effective assistance, it fell to the Spartans under King Leonidas to stand against an advancing Persian army of one million under the command of King Xerxes. Leonidas recognized that the most defensible position was the narrow pass at Thermopylae, where his highly trained citizen warriors could match up equally gainst overwhelming numbers.
Neither Leonidas nor his men were under the illusion that they would survive the battle victorious. They knew they were fighting a rearguard action whose purpose was to both deplete Xerxes' forces while giving the other Greek states time to evacuate so they could fight another day. For their role in the battle that eventually served to stem the tide of the advancing Persian Empire westward and into Europe, the Spartans at Thermopylae are generally credited with sacrificing themselves in order to preserve the birthplace of democracy in the Western world.
Hardly humanitarians, Sparta was the epitome of a warrior culture in the ancient world. Mothers would give up their sons at the age of seven so that they could begin their training to eventually become part of Sparta's highly disciplined and effective army, admonishing them to either come home carrying their shields or borne upon them. While other Greeks were writing plays, figuring mathematical principles, and dabbling with political democracy, the Spartans were the tip of the Hellenist spear.
Like Sky Captain And The World of Tomorrow, 300's live actors were filmed entirely in front of green screens and their mise en scene is completly computer generated. I'd like to see it on an IMAX screen.
I can highly recommend Steven Pressfield's novelization of the Battle of Thermopylae, Gates of Fire. Not only is it an exciting story, but Pressfield does an excellent job describing the training of Spartan warriors and the city state's ethos of honor in war before all else.
Tagged: 300, film, greeks, persians, spartans, thermopylae, warriorsPosted by Lexiphane at 1:14 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 4, 2007
FUN WITH FONTS
While the typography here at Lexiphane.com is somewhat limited and not at all original, we do appreciate those that use not just words, but the shape of their words to get a point across. We recently came across a fantastic short film that employs not only varying fonts, but kinetic motion to convey a familiar movie scene's drama and emotion. Warning in advance of audible profanity and violence as Jules wants an answer to the question "What does Marcellus Wallace look like?" [via the John Nack at Adobe blog]
Tagged: adobe, animation, blog, film, fonts, pulp fuctionPosted by Lexiphane at 10:25 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
February 25, 2007
CELLULOID TOWER: ACADEMY AWARDS
Didn't get to see a lot of movies this year, so predictions coming out of Lexiphane.com HQ are going to be a little light regarding tonight's awards ceremony. Here's a smattering of notes, observations, and opinions about statuette distribution.
Actor In A Supporting Role
People love foul-mouthed old people who do inappropriate things like take drugs. They're funny! I'm inclined to tilt towards Alan Arkin in this category. On the other hand, Dreamgirls fell well short of its expected crop of nominations so I expect voters will go out of their way to favor Eddie Murphy in this category. The Academy seems besotted with black comedic actors who can manage any transition to a serious role (think Jamie Foxx.) It's rather condescending, but I expect that if Martin Lawrence could pull off a serious role in a period costume drama, he'd be on his way to at least a nomination. I enjoyed Mark Wahlberg in The Departed, but it was a rather one-note performance and I'm not sure if it's enough for a win.
Actress In A Supporting Role
This is a tough one. Jennifer Hudson has got that whole winning-"American Idol"-thing going for her and her performance in Dreamgirls was apparently enough to shove Beyonce Knowles out of the movie's limelight, a difficult thing to do given the latter's musical talent and drop dead good looks. There is the very young Abigail Breslin from Little Miss Sunshine. While her dancing skills may not rival Hudson's vocal abilities, she did play a strangely self-possessed little girl surrounded by manic adults very well. I would leave this one up to a coin toss, but am going to root for Breslin in the hopes that she accepts her awards with the shortest acceptance speech of all time: "In your face Dakota Fanning!" Still, I gotta give it to Hudson.
Actress In A Leading Role
Did not see any of these movies. Assume it will be Helen Mirren, who seems to have had a banner year that also includes an acclaimed performance in a BBC series where she plays an aged, but slutty and drunken police inspector.
Actor In A Leading Role
This is a brutally competitive category for a number of different reasons. Let's begin by discarding Ryan Gosling in Half Nelson, though, for the reason that no one saw it. Hollywood can't let an Oscar near a film that grossed only $2.7 million; they just can't do it. Unfortunately, that would also torpedo Peter O'Toole's chances, as Venus only grossed $1.2 million. That is only 20% of what the widely panned Gigli grossed in 2003. O'Toole is a beloved actor and nearly dead, while having never won an Academy Award. Sentimentality is his only saving chance, but I don't think it'll be enough. The conventional wisdom is that Forest Whitaker will win for The Last King of Scotland. I haven't seen it, but am inclined to agree in theory. Whitaker is a superb actor. Still, to stick with my prior theory, his film only did $9.6 million in box office. If most Americans haven't seen it, there's little reason for me to think Academy Members have given it significantly more attention (I hold them in very low esteem). That leaves us with two heavyweights: Leonardo DiCaprio and Will Smith, whose films did $54 million and $157 million, respectively. Smith has that whole black-comedian-turned-serious-actor thing going for him that I mentioned earlier. He's also been nominated before, so his winning would not be unprecedented. Plus he played a homeless single parent--that's triple bonus points. On the minus side, he overcame adversity to find financial success as a . . . stockbroker. Oooh, that's what takes him out of the running. Everyone knows that people in the financial industry are only capable of stealing money from widows and orphans, callously laying people off, or murdering people. That leaves us with Leonardo DiCaprio. I didn't see Blood Diamond, but I'm betting that voters give him the final nod for several reasons. They feel bad about passing him over for a Best Actor Oscar two years ago in The Aviator. He also played a lead role in the Best Picture-nominated The Departed. And Blood Diamond is about a socially conscious subject: conflict diamonds, but still is filled with beautiful actors and actresses and a shitload of violence. It's the trifecta that Hollywood can't say no to.
Best Director
This is where gamesmanship starts to come into play. Babel is going to win Best Picture and no one's heard of its director, so we can eliminate it. I think it's almost a dead heat between Martin Scorcese for The Departed and Clint Eastwood for Letters From Iwo Jima and I'm giving the nod to Eastwood for the win. Scorcese is certainly the sentimental favorite, but he will be declined. No one believes that Scorcese is going to stop making fantastic movies so there's always another day for him. Plus, his movie is a taut psychological thriller about cops and robbers? Not even the proximity of Jack Nicholson can convey the gravitas that Academy voters feel the need to convey, which is that they're doing important things. I haven't seen Eastwood's film, but I gather the film is about how war is a tragedy and even the enemy--no matter how genocidal or homicidal--is actually just like us on the inside. Awwww! Plus, an anti-war movie presents a perfect opportunity to give the metaphorical finger to the Bush administration, something Hollywood feels difficult passing up. And Eastwood is a crotchety but beloved Hollywood icon. No one will fault voters for handing him this accolade, or at least that's what they'll tell themselves as they avoid eye contact with Scorcese at the after parties.
Best Picture
Whoops, already gave this one away. It's going to be Babel for the reasons listed above regarding Blood Diamond (violence, beautiful actors and actresses, socially conscious). Also, Hollywood seems infatuated with the intertwining story line model that made the thoroughly mediocre Crash Best Picture last year. It allows Academy voters to mistake story structures that range from clever to absurd as profound, which makes them feel good about themselves for getting it. Little Miss Sunshine is a huge favorite in this category, but the writer/directors are Hollywood newbies. They'll be given the consolation prize of Best Original Screenplay. This is ironic, because there's little original about Little Miss Sunshine. I certainly enjoyed it; it was a cute picture with a talented cast. The story, however was hackneyed, shopworn, and executed better in my opinion in the very recent past. Come on, a roadtrip movie of funny quirky dysfunctional characters that becomes a journey of discovery and personal redemption? Didn't anybody see Pieces of April, The Daytrippers, or even National Lampoon's Family Vacation?
To recap in short:
Best Supporting Actor: Eddie Murphy
Best Supporting Actress: Jennifer Hudson
Best Actress: Helen Mirren
Best Actor: Leonardo DiCaprio
Best Director: Clint Eastwood
Best Picture: Babel
Bear in mind that these are not my personal picks, but a purely cynical analysis handicap of expected results.
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January 14, 2007
CAN'T LOSE WITH AN ACE IN THE HOLE
This early scene from Billy Wilder's Ace In The Hole has Kirk Douglas marooned in a southwestern dust-trap town's newspaper office, waxing poetic about NYC: the stink, the noise, the availability of 80th floors to jump from when you need one. Douglas' character Tatum is an exiled NYC reporter, waiting for a big break to vault him back into the metro paper scene. What follows is one of the most cynical, entertaining, and illuminating films about our modern obsession with media frenzies.
Ace In The Hole was a gigantic flop at the box office; so much so that when Wilder's next film Stalag 17 was a success, Paramount deducted the cost of the first from Wilder's profits in the second. All the same, it remains one of my favorite Billy Wilder films and I can't recommend it highly enough. Fortunately a newly restored 35mm print is being shown at Film Form on West Houston for the next week. Five screenings a day through January 18th gives one few excuses to miss it.
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November 1, 2006
SCRIPT AT LARGE
While this may be contrary to the auteur theory of film direction that posits that a director's actions directly imprint their vision on a script, it might be possible that Stanley Kubrick might have a direct influence on a film yet to be made. Although he passed away in 1999, a script was recently found that he commissioned early in his career from pulp icon Jim Thompson.
Despite its title, “Lunatic at Large” is not a horror story. It’s a dark and surprising mystery of sorts, in which the greatest puzzle is who, among several plausible candidates, is the true escapee from a nearby mental hospital. Mr. Clarke, the screenwriter, said that the recovered treatment (a prose narrative dramatizing an idea by Mr. Kubrick) was a “gem” but also “pretty basic,” and that he expanded it a bit, adding a new subplot, among other things, to make the solution less obvious. Mr. Clarke’s experience consists mostly of writing for British television, so he prepared for his new task by rereading Mr. Thompson and studying old Bogart films.
His finished screenplay has the feel of authentic Thompsonian pulpiness. Set in New York in 1956, it tells the story of Johnnie Sheppard, an ex-carnival worker with serious anger-management issues, and Joyce, a nervous, attractive barfly he picks up in a Hopperesque tavern scene. There’s a newsboy who flashes a portentous headline, a car chase over a railroad crossing with a train bearing down, and a romantic interlude in a spooky, deserted mountain lodge.
The Hopper that the Times refers to above is Edward Hopper, an early- and mid-20th Century painter who is probably most famous for his work "Nighthawks", which pictures a trio of people sitting at a flourescent-lit NYC diner counter in the middle of the night. Hopper's work is generally taken as portraits of urban isolation and disconnectedness. As an aside, I frankly think the Times is a being a little pretentious dropping the term "Hopperesque" into an article with no characterization. Sorry! Not everyone who reads your paper was an art history major. There's pedanticism and then there's just being obscurely supercilious. The preceding sentence is a perfect example.
Digressing, the script for Lunatic at Large sounds like a parallel of Samuel Fuller's Shock Corridor. The former is about identifying an insane man on the outside of an asylum when society itself presents many candidates. The latter is set inside an asylum and presents the obviously insane inmates as emblematic of the outside society they're restricted from. If Lunatic at Large is ever produced, I think the two films would make interesting bookends to life in mid-20th Century America in a country riven with so many internal contradictions that it eventually cracked during the 60s. I don't know if Sam Fuller and Jim Thompson ever were acquainted with each other, but they were certainly kindred artistic spirits.
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October 26, 2006
MIXED-UP COMPANY
I'm not a big fan of political correctness. Hypersensitivity to ethnic and sociological differences can be more divisive than helpful. Still, it's interesting to wander upon a cinematic time capsule to reveal some insight into how how far we've come in matters of racial sensitivity or rather, lack of blockheaded-ness in that respect, over the last 30 years.
Today I stumbled upon a movie called Mixed Company starring Barbara Harris and Joe Bologna. The latter's character plays the coach of the Phoenix Suns--an actual NBA team--and the former is his wife. In the movie, the wife cajoles her reluctant husband into adopting an African-American, Vietnamese, and Native American boy girl and then boy into their family when they already have three children of their own. The tagline of the movie is "SURE YOU'LL LAUGH--IT AIN'T HAPPENING TO YOU!"
I think it would be instructive to screen this movie before college audiences around the country. There were few instances where I even contemplated thinking about laughter. It was more of a cringe-inducer. The strange thing is, I think this was supposed to an appeal to liberal toleration of minorities and the saving power of family over racial intolerance. Nonetheless, I was transfixed for an hour and a half by scene after scene of a through-the-looking glass peak at what American life must have been for minorities.
When the coach's wife drags him to a foster home picnic trying to convince him to adopt more children, the sympathetic and well-meaning social worker explains that one of the girls is the offspring of an American GI and a Vietnamese woman. "She's a mongrel. They found her abandoned in a 'hooch'" using a verbal pause in place of those little parentheses fingers people put up in the air. This was delivered completely straight without a hint of irony. It sounds like she's shopping puppies out of a storefront.
That is just the tip of the iceberg as far as this movie goes and the only quote I could grab my pen and notebook in time for. There are far far worse. The thing is this was supposed to be a progressively liberal picture of the times. I'm still against political correctness and over-sensitivity to racial affiliation--I think it's self-destructive to a healthy society--but I now have a much better appreciation of why the progress we've recently made was necessary.
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COMEDY FROM UNEXPECTED CHARACTERS
The history of film is filled with actors one wouldn't expect to see in a comedy, yet Marlon Brando was hilarious in The Freshman and Robert DeNiro has re-invented himself as a comedic actor--only Robert Redford maintains a strict lack of humor in his roles. There is one other actor one would expect to remain hardboiled to the end: Humphrey Bogart. "What's funny about Bogie?" one would think. His entire career is centered around being a humorless tough guy.
I highly recommend seeing the movie We're No Angels. Starring Bogart, Aldo Ray, and Peter Ustinov as a trio of scamsters and murderers it is one of the most understatedly comedic and droll movies I've ever seen. The three men are convicts at Devil's Island who are intent on escaping after robbing and murdering the proprietor of an island store and his family after being farmed out to repair the store's roof. As movies go, however, they all turn out to be somewhat soft-hearted without letting go of their murderous intentions.
We're No Angels is funny for two reasons: one is the deft physical comedy of Bogart, Ray, and Ustinov. There are no pratfalls or Chaplinesque scenes. It's just little things worked into scenes, like the three of them washing dishes, where wash, rinse, and dry are accomplished by casually tossing plates and saucers blindly; I wonder how many takes that took. The second reason must be given to the credit of the writers, Albert Husson and Ranald MacDougall. The dialogue is full of double entendres and sly wit. As the three convicts being to realize they actually like the family they're about to rob and murder, Bogart's character insists "I hope none of you are losing your nerve!"
We came here to rob them and that's what we're gonna do - beat their heads in, gouge their eyes out, slash their throats. Soon as we wash the dishes.
That pretty much sums up the whole movie. A threesome of unavowed murderous and thieving men who are nonetheless seamlessly integrated into a happy domestic environment. It's set on Christmas Eve and Day, so this year, do yourselves a favor and skip It's a Wonderful Life and rent a much funnier film celebrating the spirit of redemption.
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October 24, 2006
CINEMATIC PHILOSOPHY AND ANTI-PHILOSOPHY
God, that really is the worst title for an entry I've ever written. No one's clicking on this link. They should, however, because it's about a movie I saw this weekend that I can't resist watching every time I catch it on cable and called The Tao of Steve. The indie film is about navigating the personal difference between perceived satisfaction and actual happiness in love.
The Tao of Steve that the title refers to explains the difference between Steve personalities and Stu personalities. As explained by the protoganist Dex (Donal Logue), Steves are ultimate cool, who always get women without even having to try, e.g. Steve Austin, and Steven McQueen. Stu characters are Gomer Pyles, Jugheads and Barney Fifes; likeable to be sure, but not getting the girls.
Despite his total lack of ambition, pathetic physical condition (he describes himself to the woman he's wooing as "Alright, now I'm a fat disgusting pig"), and willingness to do a few bong hits first thing in the morning before heading off to teach first-graders--very successfully--Dex has an incredible way with seducing women that he credits to practice of the Tao of Steve, i.e. women always want what is retreating from them.
Dex, despite his slacker lifestyle, is a farely erudite philosophy student even ten years out of college. He believes his life of total inambition and acculturated non-desire affords him happiness as defined by philosphers such as Buddha and Lao Tzu. Sleeping with one of his friend's wife allows him to be completely unentrappable in romantic entanglements.
Then Syd (Greer Goodman) shows up for a few weeks to live with Dex's friends. Their relationship remains antagonistic throughout, but eventually Dex realizes that a life without longing and desire might not be what he's looking for, while he finds it difficult to shed his Taoist gameplan.
There are a few things I love about this movie. One is the setting, which is in New Mexico, apparently a beautiful section of the country I can't wait to visit. Second is the cast. Unlike most movies--especially romantic comedies--filled with impossibly good looking characters, The Tao of Steve seems like it could be cast with people you might know. Greer Goodman in particular is an unconventional beauty one could see almost anyone becoming infatuated with. Third is the soundtrack. You'll just have to watch the movie to appreciate the excellent selection the music director picked out. Fourth--and this is probably just exclusive to a minority of people, including myself--is the desire not to dumb down the script. Dex and Syd debate the meaning of the opera Don Giovanni over the hood over a pick-up truck, Dex can be found casually reading an examination of the Gnostic Gospels while sitting on his beat-up couch in his driveway next to his dog, and the film's title obviously clues one into the fact that it involves the use of eastern philosophies as a way to get girls.
It's an entertaining movie. I recommend it.
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October 17, 2006
MODERN PARABLES
There are as many theories about the true meaning of the film Donnie Darko that it's easy to dismiss the whole movie as a MacGuffin for conversation or a meditative koan. I recently watched the movie again, however, and found some interesting parallels. I think Donnie Darko's character is a highly reluctant Christ-figure, sent into the world to save it from darkness.
For those who haven't seen the movie, Donnie Darko is about a troubled teenager who appears to be mentally ill--and possibly could be--but who is visited by a dream figure who saves his life, directs his actions, and eventually introduces him to a world of time travel and the salvation of others.
In a discussion with his science teacher, Donnie talks about the seemingly contradictory nature of fixed destinies and the ability to see into the future. The teacher explains that the ability to see the future disposes of destiny, because one has choices. Donnie responds that one could control the future without disrupting destiny if one were travelling in "God's channel."
In one of the later scenes, Donnie's psychiatrist discusses the possible end of the world that he's foreseen:
If this world were to end, there would only be you... and him... and no one else.
The "him" they're talking about is unclear, but most likely about Frank, the omnipotent character dressed as a rabbit that keeps visiting Donnie in his dreams and directing his actions.
Donnie: How can you do that?Frank: I can do anything I want. And so can you.
Donnie is a reluctant savior because he feels completely detached from humanity and doesn't understand why. Discussing with his English teacher:
Karen Pommeroy: This could be the death of an entire way of life, the end of an era...
Donnie: Why should we care?
Karen Pommeroy: Because the rabbits are us, Donnie.
Donnie: Why should I mourn for a rabbit like he was human?
Karen Pommeroy: Are you saying that the death of one species is less tragic than another?
Donnie: Of course. The rabbit's not like us. It has no... keen look at something in the mirror, it has no history books, no photographs, no knowledge of sorrow or regret... I mean, I'm sorry, Miss Pommeroy, don't get me wrong; y'know, I like rabbits and all. They're cute and they're horny. And if you're cute and you're horny, then you're probably happy, in that you don't know who you are and why you're even alive. And you just wanna' have sex, as many times as possible, before you die... I mean, I just don't see the point in crying over a dead rabbit! Y'know, who... who never even feared death to begin with.
In the movie, Donnie has a history of social destruction and commits destructive acts against evil people that mirrors Jesus' overturning of the moneychangers' tables in Jerusalem's temple. Eventually, he comes to realize his role in life and death:
Donnie: Why do you wear that stupid bunny suit?
Frank: Why are you wearing that stupid man suit?
Donnie's purpose is to save mankind as personified by his girlfriend, who has the sins of humanity weighing on her shoulders.
Dr. Lilian Thurman: What did Roberta Sparrow say to you?
Donnie: She said "Every living creature on earth dies alone".
Eventually, Donnie Darko sacrifices his own life to save his girlfriend. At the moment of her death, Donnie whispers "Deus ex machina. . . Our Savior" That's a literary device to effect a plot seemingly from nowhere. Literally translated in latin, it means a device of God. It is the time when he realizes to save her life he must sacrifice his own.
In the end, Donnie Darko gives his life up willingly and laughing and his corporeal body remains on earth, yet also has been transported through a "hole in the sky." And his girlfriend has been saved, unaware that she's never even met him.
There are several allusions in the film that substantiate this interpretation. One is the marquee of the movie theater panned to when Donnie and Gerladine go on a date. It's a double feature showing Evil Dead and The Last Temptation of Christ. The first title is a metaphor for the spiritual state of the world before Donnie chooses his sacrifice. The latter title refers to a movie about Jesus' struggle to choose sacrifice and mankind's salvation over the promise of his own life.
This is a fairly extemporaneous interpretation of Donnie Darko, one that I came up with just while watching the film for the 10th time or so. I could be totally off, but it seems logical. Blame the Jesuits.
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August 16, 2006
A JOURNEYMAN PASSES
Sad day all around. Actor Bruno Kirby succumbed to complications from leukemia yesterday. Most will probably remember him for his role as Billy Crystal's character's best friend in When Harry Met Sally. The one that wanted to keep the wagon wheel table to Carrie Fisher's character's horror after they got married.
Kirby was a journeyman actor, a character actor, and was superb. He teamed again with Crystal in the City Slickers movies, but he was much more. He worked in several tv shows spanning several decades, including "Homicide", "Mad About You", "Hill Street Blues", "Emergency!" and was even in the pilot of "M*A*S*H."
I'll always remember Bruno Kirby, however, as the man who stole Matthew Broderick's luggage in The Freshman, and plunged him into a ridiculous mafia story with Marlon Brando reprising his Don Corleone character but with an avuncular twist. That itself is an inside joke. Kirby played Carmine Sabatini's (Brando) nephew in The Freshmen. In The Godfather II, Kirby played the man who got a young Corleone involved in the mob in the 1910s. He was the young Clemenza! The scene where Kirby and Broderick wrestle a giant lizard from a mall to the Jersey countryside is reminiscent of Kirby and Robert Deniro wrestling a stolen rug into the latter's LES tenement.
Bruno Kirby was a talented actor that most people may have never noticed outright, but will surely recognize and definitely miss in the future. Thanks Bruno. You worked with the best. You were the best.
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August 10, 2006
COMING SOON TO A FRATHOUSE NEAR YOU
Possibly one of the funniest movies of the 21st Century is Super Troopers, which portrays a Vermont highway patrol unit of cops trying to bust an Afghani drug ring--nominally--while acting out scenes that contain lines like "Hey! You There! Bear . . . Fucker!" It was produced by the comedy troupe Broken Lizard. Their sophmore effort, Club Dread, was a little weak, lampooning a slasher genre already thoroughly played out.
Broken Lizard returns to the well and its core audience this month by releasing a film called Beerfest about compmetitive beer drinking. I expect weak-to-fair box office receipts and stellar DVD sales. The trailer's here. If pee and boob jokes don't appeal to you, don't bother.
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July 27, 2006
"THAT'S YOU ALL OVER TOM; A LIE AND NO HEART"
(Greatest Movie Ever)
While we're reminiscing, let's discuss Miller's Crossing. I've met a lot of people over the past five years who read this site, yet who I've failed to sing the praises of this movie to. And it must be praised regularly; it is my FAVORITE movie.
Not many people have seen Miller's Crossing. That is astounding, as it features an Oscar-winning cast, was written, directed, and produced by Oscar winners, and is possibly the greatest-written movie ever.
Miller's Crossing is a mob movie starring Gabriel Byrne. His co-stars are Marcia Gay Harden, Steve Buscemi, John Turturro, Albert Finney, Jon Polito and Frances McDormand (with a small uncredited role). Set in the 1920s, Miller's Crossing is one of those definitive movies that intertwine friendship, loyalty, betrayal, romance, treachery, violence, virtue, and personal weakness into a perfect storm of conflict and dispute.
If you don't get everything the first time you watch it, go ahead and watch it again. I've seen the movie about a hundred times, have the script committed to memory, and still pick up small plot items now and again. The story is labrynthine, but the depths are worth it. The movie's rich like chocolate cake.
If you want me to keep my mouth shut, it's gonna cost you some dough. I figure a thousand bucks is reasonable, so I want two.
The shit is hardboiled and possibly the most undervalued piece of film ever. The best present I ever received was a membership to the Lincoln Center Film Society, that was featuring a large screening of Miller's Crossing, with a reception afterwards where Gabriel Byrne ate appetizers and sipped wine. I don't think I've ever been happier.
After slapping his girlfriend when she taunts him "You think you've raised hell, haven't you?":
"Sister, when I've raised hell, you'll know it!"
She strolls out of the ladies room, trailing her stoll.
God, I could watch that movie a million times.
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July 26, 2006
IN A WORLD WHERE DOMINION IS KING, AT A TIME OF UPHEAVAL AND CHANGE
Yesterday marked the release of the concert film Awesome; I Fuckin' Shot That on DVD. If you're a Beastie Boys fan, run--don't walk--to your nearest video store. "Awesome . . ." was shot in October '04 at the Beastie Boys' final show at Madison Square Garden, in NYC. I'll go ahead and understate the situation: IT. WAS. FUCKING. AWESOME!. The ultimate NYC boys wrapped up their NYC-tribute tour in the heart of the city, and they freaking KILLED! When they busted out "An Open Letter to NYC", I don't think I've ever seen a crowd go so absolutely insane.
I saw the concert movie in a theater and the reaction was barely less restrained. Goddamn, my heart was thrumming for about 2 days after the actual concert. I think my friend John is still feeling thready, two years later.
Here's a link to the trailer, which includes the most ironically overwrought voiceover ever. It is hilarious.
Voiceover:
In a WORLD where DOMINION is king
At a TIME of upheaval and change
And truth and justice are JUST A DREAM
Only the STRONGEST rise to the challenge
Only the pure-of-heart- can SIEZE THE MOMENT
And FORGE DREAMS into reality
It really is one of the funniest trailers ever.
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July 16, 2006
RETURN OF THE NYC MATINEE
(A good reason to get up before noon)
I don't know what the rest of the country is charged for movie theater tickets, but some of you may be appalled to know that Gotham residents have to pay $10.75 for a first run theater ticket. In a surprise move, however, the AMC chain is instituting a new pricing policy, in which tickets to movies starting before 12 p.m. are now only $6. With kids on summer vacation, this is the greatest thing a theater corporation has done for famililes in a decade.
I can't say personally because I haven't seen it yet, but I've talked to a half-dozen people who've seen Pirates of the Caribbean II and their praise has been uniform. Myself, I would go see a three hour badly lit movie of Keira Knightley knitting a brown sweater, so I may have to check Pirates out.
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July 1, 2006
YAKUYOWZA!
I recently watched a film called Kiroshiya 1 (English title "Ichi, The Killer). Actually, I'm most of the way through it and am taking a break. Adapted from a manga novel, it is possibly the most horrifying movie I have ever watched.
When a yakuza boss diappears with a large sum of money, his sado-masochistic #2 man scours the Shinjuku district of Tokyo for him, leaving a wake of the deformed, tortured, and dead. While he suspects a rival gang, what he doesn't know is that his boss has been killed by a psychopathic young man being used as a pawn by a retired police officer.
Frankly, I can't believe I'm still watching this movie. The level of sadism, torture, mutilation, sexual depravity, and general violence makes Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill series look like a Disney cartoon. Apparently, when Koroshiya 1 made its Western premiere at the Toronto Film Festival, barf bags were distributed as a promotional device. That was not uncalled for. I haven't had to close my eyes so many times during a movie since I was about five years old.
I hate to make sweeping cultural generalizations about a society based on singular works of art, but the fact that manga is a mainstream cultural phenomena originating and flourishing in Japan kind of freaks me out. It is some sick fucking shit, no two ways about it. I'm generally not a squeamish person, but the fact that such a graphic level of grotesquerie could find a widespread audience is really disturbing.
UPDATE: I actually went to bed last night contemplating what was the artistic purpose of the film discussed above. I had some thoughts. Godzilla films are purportedly an expression of Japanese national response and anxiety about living in a nuclear age following the horrors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I have a similar theory about hyper-violent-sexualized-manga-and manga-inspired films.
The first has to do with the archetype of the Japanese schoolgirl in knee socks and standardized primary school uniform. I'm guessing that this represents a subconscious representation of Japan as a nation. When the country entered WWII, it was a newly modernizing country, in its prime, so to speak. Also, the Japanese have a fetishistic impulse towards the pure. There are vending machines that launder people's bills. The frequent rape, torture, and sexual exploitation of the schoolgirl archetype is a reflection of a nation's image to view itself as something pure that has somehow been violated.
Then there is the hyper-accentuated violence. Japan is a nation that endured and committed the most horrific of war violence. After the war, there was little avenue for catharsis. The country was occupied by the U.S. and had its future dictated to it. For a people focused on pride and face, this must have been deeply humiliating. Without an external avenue of revenge available and a growing sense of internal guilt about what Japan had done, I can see how a nation's fascination for violent rage could turn inward. But it wasn't turned inward on itself, but on a fascination with the demi-monde of yakuza, who seemed shockingly potent to an emasculated nation.
American (and "Spaghetti") westerns are recognized as a cultural artifact, after the fact, rationalizing the brutality of westward expansion of the continental U.S. It's not unreasonable to see hyper-violent manga entertainment as a reasonable response to a national defeat and shame, mirroring its own self image and perceived violation and guilt over a horrific war. Hopefully this is more of a national catharsis than a national indulgence and indication of denial.
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June 17, 2006
"IT WAS LIKE SOMETHING OUT OF A WERNER HERZOG FILM"
In a meta-postmodern documentary about a documentary, famed filmmaker Werner Herzog spoofs his own experiences as a director of his own incredibly dramatically/traumatically produced films in 2004's Incident at Loch Ness. The premise of the film is that two documentarians are following Herzog to Scotland to film the legendary icon making another documentary about a separate legendary icon--the Loch Ness Monster--and the obsessive characters that pursue evidence of its existence. That's what I mean when I write "meta-postmodern." The premise is reasonable, as Herzog's specialty is making films about manic people and characters that metaphorically tilt at windmills in defiance of all logic. Herzog is brilliant at this type of work because he identifies with his subjects; his body of work most regularly identified with its Sisysphean difficulties.
This is where Incident at Loch Ness becomes, if not brilliant, fabulously clever and very entertaining in my opinion. And I love Herzog all the more for agreeing to be a part of what, in a sense, is a spoof of his own career. Production of Herzog's ostensible documentary begins to bog down and tensions rise when it becomes clear that the gladhanding producer Zak Penn is literally producing the documentary: manufacturing incidents and installing actors as the supposed obsessives Herzog is supposed to be profiling. The two documentarians following Herzog and his crew document the meltdown in perfect fashion as tempers flare, people quit, and there's quite a bit of yelling.
Against his better instincts, Herzog agrees to continue working on the film, if anything because he is fascinated with the producer's complete lack of ethical fiber and overabundance of duplicity. Plus, Herzog's got points on the profits. At this point, the film descends into hilarious parody when things start happening that makes Herzog begin to believe in Nessie itself. In a blending of The Blair Witch Project meets Jaws, Scotland style, everything goes completely to hell and only the bedraggled surivors are left to recount their tale.
My estimation of Herzog rose a great deal watching the film, because it's fun to watch estimable people making fun of themselves. At one point, Herzog is dressing down the producer of his own film, saying it was one of the most chaotic productions he had ever been a part of.
Zak Penn: At least we're not dragging the boat over a hill...
Werner Herzog: What was that?
Zak Penn: Uh... nothing.
That's in reference to Herzog's film Fitzcarraldo. There is really no serious value to Incident at Loch Ness; no serious themes or interesting insights into the value of documentary filmmaking. It is Herzog and his crew having a blast toying with the medium. I found it incredibly fun to watch. I think most fans of Werner Herzog would find it similarly entertaining.
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June 13, 2006
HELP ME JESUS! HELP ME JEWISH GUY! HELP ME TOM CRUISE!
OK, Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby will not be winning any Oscars. In fact, the NASCAR comedy featuring Will Farrell as a race car prodigy will probably be terrible. Nonetheless, the final scene of the movie's trailer, which had a naked Farrell running up the embankment of a racetrack trying to swat out imaginary flames wearing just his underpants and a racing helmet screaming "Help me Jesus! Help me Jewish Guy! Help me Tom Cruise!" did make me laugh out loud. In addition, while saying grace at the dinner table, Ricky Bobby thanks "Lord Baby Jesus" for his two beautiful sons Walker and Texas Ranger. Come on, that's kind of funny. Well look, at least the theater will be airconditioned.
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May 19, 2006
MUNNSVILLE: CSI
I recently re-watched a film that I saw at Upstate Films in Rhinebeck, NY, my senior year of high school that I think enamored me to the art of documentary filmmaking. It was called Brother's Keeper and by Joe Berlinger and Joe Sinofsky.
In 1990, Adelbert Ward woke to find his brother beside him in bed deceased. They were two of a fraternal quartet of upstate bachelor dairy farmers that all resided in a decrepit house, living a life that would not have been out of place 100 years ago. In the hours after the discovery of the body, Delbert signed a confession that he murdered his older brother in a mercy killing.
Brother's Keeper is a documentary about a town circling the proverbial wagons to watch over what they see is the persecution of their own. According to the film, the four brothers were seen as backwood outcasts even by the standards of a rural town in central New York State. But when one of its residents went on trial for a questionable murder, the community gathered together to support a man that did no wrong--even if he did.
Preening lawyers and posturing doctors are just a sideshow to the real attraction of the film, which is a slow deliberate look at a rural community that still existed in New York State in 1990. It is absolutely fascinating and even having seen the movie in upstate NY in 1992, I was stunned at the remoteness of the location and culture. The Ward brothers lived in an unheated shack with no running water, but a tv. A few were illiterate and one had to be helped off the witness stand, apparently in shock at being transported to the milieu of a modern courtroom and in front of "big city" tv cameras.
I won't ruin the movie by saying whether Delbert was convicted of murdering his brother Bill, but I will say that the movie did stand the test of time, 14 years later. It is a cinematic treasure that stood as an example of everything promising about moviemaking in the late 20th Century, when indie films were coming into their own.
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May 13, 2006
DON'T LOOK AWAY
The New York Times has a piece today about the Army's concern over a documentary on an Advance Combat Support Hospital in Baghdad due to fears that it may demoralize soldiers and their families.
The documentary, titled "Baghdad ER," chronicles two months at the 86th Combat Support Hospital, where filmmakers were given broad access to follow doctors, nurses, medics and others as they treated soldiers wounded by roadside bombs and in combat. As one nurse, Specialist Saidet Lanier, says in the film: "This is hard-core, raw, uncut trauma. Day after day, every day."The Army officials said that concerns about the documentary — which includes footage of an amputation, wounded soldiers undergoing surgery , and, in some cases, dying — were also raised by the wives of top Army officers who had seen the documentary.
I have no doubt that such footage would be disturbing to the families of service members, but I do think it's a bit patronizing to think that it would be overly demoralizing to troops. The men and women serving around the world are fully aware--in fact, too aware--of the mortal cost of being in the armed forces these days. They're neither blind nor stupid. They don't need to watch a tv show on HBO to tell them that their comrades in arms are being maimed and killed in battle. One doesn't convince a democratic populace that war is necessary by downplaying the negative--war is obviously shit--but by conveying its necessity despite its horrible costs.
Examples: The Best Years of Our Lives was an Oscar-awarded film about three friends, including a double-amputee, who find it difficult to return to their families, wives, and lives after WWII. It is about making sure that the war didn't turn out to be the most important period of their lives. The subject matter is difficult and heart-rending. The film was awarded seven Oscars.
Despite an hour of searching, I've been unable to find the exact name of a movie I saw once called "The Town That Didn't Stare", about an English village housing horribly burned RAF pilots that aided their recovery.
The point is there are plenty of pro-military programs out there. There's even a Discovery Military Channel broadcasting 24 hours a day. Showing the negative side of war may not only be balancing, but redemptive to some families and servicemen. It illustrates that they are not alone in their hardships.
A list of combat and anti-war films is available here. My personal favorite is Stanley Kubrick's 1957 anti-war film Paths of Glory. It's lesser known than his later film Full Metal Jacket, but much more powerful in my opinion. Let's compare two essential and pivotal pieces of dialogue:
From Paths of Glory:
General Broulard: Colonel Dax! You will apologize at once or I shall have you placed under arrest!
Colonel Dax: I apologize... for not being entirely honest with you. I apologize for not revealing my true feelings. I apologize, sir, for not telling you sooner that you're a degenerate, sadistic old man. And you can go to hell before I apologize to you now or ever again!
From Full Metal Jacket:
Gunnery Sergeant Hartman: What is this Mickey Mouse shit? What are you two animals doing in my beloved head? Why is Private Pyle out of his bunk after lights out? Why is Private Pyle holding that weapon? Why are you not stomping Private Pyle's guts out?
Private Joker: Sir, it is the private's duty to inform the senior drill instructor that Private Pyle has a full magazine that is locked and loaded, Sir!
And then there's the passingly clever:
From Paths of Glory:
General Mireau: I can't understand these armchair officers, fellas trying to fight a war from behind a desk, waving papers at the enemy, worrying about whether a mouse is gonna run up their pants leg.
Colonel Dax: I don't know, General. If I had the choice between mice and Mausers, I think I'd take the mice every time.
From Full Metal Jacket:
Private Eightball: Personally, I think, uh... they don't really want to be involved in this war. You know, I mean... they sort of took away our freedom and gave it to the, to the gookers, you know. But they don't want it. They'd rather be alive than free, I guess. Poor dumb bastards.
It's interesting to see in the exact 30 years between the two films, Kubrick's descent from a morally based righteous indignation at the horrors of war to an abdication of moralism and fall into nihlism of "who the fuck cares?" No more hifalutin grandstanding, just the superimposition of the Mickey Mouse Club theme being sung by soldiers marching over a blighted landscape.
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April 22, 2006
THERE ARE MOVIE SHOWS -- DOWNTOWN
The New York Times ran a good article on The Tribeca Film Festival yesterday, even including a decent interactive guide.
IMAGINE you are at the multiplex. There are 17 movies — indies, comedies, dark dramas, foreign films and documentaries. Most have something to recommend, and each one would meet at least someone's fancy, maybe yours. Surveying all the options, you wonder where to head first.
Now multiply by 10, and you have some idea of the scope of the Tribeca Film Festival, the downtown orgy of cinema that begins Tuesday with the premiere of "United 93" and winds down on May 7 with a lovingly restored version of the 1955 noir, "The Big Combo." The Tribeca Film Festival was conceived as a civic gesture to help the neighborhood get back on its feet after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and has mushroomed into the film fest that ate downtown. Last year, its fourth, it sold 135,000 tickets to over 700 screenings. This year there will be at least 764 screenings — 174 features and 100 shorts — bursting out of TriBeCa and heading even north of Columbus Circle.
The Times advises against getting overwhelmed by the number of offerings, although that could be difficult. I was handed a program guide on the Lower East Side last week and it looks to be jammed with good stuff. One I'm looking forward to: Colour Me Kubrick
John Malkovich gives a hilarious tour-de-force as Alan Conway, a conman who successfully passed himself off as the famed and notoriously reclusive director for the last decade or so of the filmmnaker's life. Combining breathtaking chutzpah undeterred by a barely fleeting knowledge of Kubrick's work, Malkovich's Conway switches accents, costumes and mannerisms with sly delight.
That sounds like fun cultural criticism, pitting celeb-obsessed society against blinding ignorance; the punchline being that John Malkovich in any amount of makeup looks absolutely nothing like Stanley Kubrick. Absolutely nothing.
Here is the offical site of The Tribeca Film Festival. A PDF file of the program guide is available here.
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April 17, 2006
DAY AFTER EASTER EXPOSE
This short film attempts to explain what the Easter Bunny does the other 364 days of the year that aren't Easter. The answer? He's kicking ass all over NYC.
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April 14, 2006
UNITED 93
The Tribeca Film Festival debuts the film United 93 this month and the movie opens nationwide April 28th. It tells the story of the fourth hijacked airline on 9/11/01 that was allegedly going to be crashed into the White House or Capitol, but instead met its end in a field in Pennsylvania. I've seen the trailer online and have to agree that it's disturbing. I disagree, however, with the decision to pull it from NYC theaters.
The story of United flight 93 is one of the most dramatic from that day. After communicating with people on the ground via cellphone, the passengers on that flight knew that they were facing certain death and could very well be involved in a plot to kill hundreds if not thousands more. What happened next is still unclear, but the actions of the passengers in the ensuing minutes resulted in the only unsuccessful link in a heinous terrorist plot.
The site of the planned Flight 93 National Memorial is here.
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April 3, 2006
VERHOEVEN: IT'S BUSH'S FAULT EROTIC FILMS ARE LIMPLY RECEIVED
Director Paul Verhoeven is more famous for his debacle than his successes. While there are certain admirable things in his sci-fi classics Starship Troopers and RoboCop, he will long be best remembered as the director of the camp classic Showgirls, which aspired to eroticism, but succeeded only as farce. As the director of the 1992 film Basic Instinct, however, he is blaming the decline of "erotic" thrillers on the ascendance of some conservative movement in the U.S.
Paul Verhoeven, director of the first "Basic Instinct" (which scored $353 million worldwide) as well as the widely ridiculed "Showgirls" (now regarded as something of a camp classic), attributes the genre's demise to the current American political climate.
"Anything that is erotic has been banned in the United States," said the Dutch native. "Look at the people at the top (of the government). We are living under a government that is constantly hammering out Christian values. And Christianity and sex have never been good friends."
Scribe Nicholas Meyer, who was an uncredited writer on 1987's seminal sex-fueled cautionary tale "Fatal Attraction," agrees, noting that the genre's downfall coincides with the ascent of the conservative political movement.
"We're in a big puritanical mode," he said. "Now, it's like the McCarthy era, except it's not 'Are you a communist?' but 'Have you ever put sex in a movie?'"
Talk about a self-serving lack of perspective! From what I've seen, there is more sexual content on television these days than was contained in any of the movies in the supposedly free-spirited 1960s and 1970s. Paul Verhoeven must consider 1992 the height of sexual expressiveness on film because he managed to squeeze a one second glamor-lit shot of Sharon Stone's cooch into a scene opposite a sweating, fidgeting Wayne Knight (Newman the postman from "Seinfeld") into Basic Instinct. That was hot!
If anything is responsible for the decline of erotic thrillers it's the absolute profusion of overt sexuality in all other forms of media. Cable television, on-demand video, DVDs, and the mother of all porn outlets--the Internet--make the prospect of shelling out $11 for a few minutes of sex sandwiched between hours of laughable dialogue and bad plotting make erotic thrillers a losing proposition. And considering that the primary filmgoing market is comprised of a younger demographic, what 20-year-old wants to go see a 40-year-old Sharon Stone pant heavily onscreen when he can sit at home and watch a half-hour long Girls Gone Wild infomercial on tv for free?
The genre's problem is that it's lost its ace in the hole, so to speak. No one's going to go see a clunker of a movie just because it's got some T&A (in my opinion, the only reason anyone ever watched Basic Instinct.) Let's see what the experts have to say about Basic Instinct 2, which debuted in 10th place at the box office this weekend and probably would have been better served had it gone straight to video. Rottentomatoes.com, an aggregator of professional film reviews gives the movie a rating of 3 out of 10 (that's bad!) with six positive reviews and 99 negative reviews. Obviously all of those film critics are just pawns of the insidious conservative ascendancy; like that Savonarola Roger Ebert, who gave it 1 1/2 stars out of five. Or maybe the American public just isn't willing to accept crap for crap's sake just because a filmmaker happened to throw some titties in there.
ADDENDUM: If anything good can come from the abysmal box office performance of Basic Instinct 2, I hope that it will be the dissuasion of Madonna entertaining any ideas of making a sequel to 1993's Body of Evidence.
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March 24, 2006
AWESOME
Last night I went to a preview screening of the new Beastie Boys concert film Awesome: I Fuckin' Shot That. The movie is the result of the distribution of handheld cameras to 50 audience members of a October 2004 performance at Madison Square Garden. My review of the movie is somewhat mixed.
On the whole, Awesome: IFST is a must-see for Beastie Boys fans. Seeing the movie in a theater is like getting walloped upside the head with a rosin bag full of powdered adrenalin. Although I imagine the first-night fans were the most hardcore BBs fanatics, there was a good deal of cheering between songs and singing along. And a cameo by rap pioneer Doug E. Fresh is a singular highlight.
There were two major downsides however. One is the cinematography. Watching an hour and a half of jostled handheld camerawork is fairly nauseating. I was sitting in the third row of the theater, but I highly suggest others sit as far from the screen as possible to minimize this effect. The other negative is the inclusion of about 15 minutes of instrumental pieces that were part of the concert. Dressed in cheesy 70s-era tuxes, the Boys look like members of a bad wedding band. I know these songs are included to reinforce the band members' bona fides as legit musicians, but they suck almost every bit of energy and momentum from the film. A smaller downside is that the volume was not nearly loud enough. Earsplitting wasn't necessary, but it seemed strange watching a concert film at such a relatively subdued level.
Awesome: I Fucking Shot That opens nationwide March 31st.
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March 3, 2006
TIME FOR A NEW BLACKLIST?
Actor Billy Zane's most memorable role recently was guesting on the second-rate WB show "Charmed" last year, so he's desperate for work. And since Gary Busey was in a near-fatal head-injuring motorcycle accident about a decade ago, it's widely acknowleded that he's basically insane. Still, what the hell are the two of them doing in the Turkish-produced film Valley of the Wolves--Iraq [Kurtlar Vadisi - iRaq]?
I haven't seen the film, but the trailer presents U.S. soldiers as murderers and bloodthirsty executioners. Other reviews bring up the fact that Busey's character raises the old and hoary stereotype of a Jewish doctor harvesting the organs of Iraqis for sale and profit to Israeli and Western recipients. Zane's character is played as a sanguine mastermind who patrols the streets of northern Iraq chauffered in a black limosuine and wearing a crisp white suit.
The movie, which is playing in sold-out theaters in Germany to packed audiences of Turkish immigrants who cheer the deaths of U.S. soldiers, is something I'd like to see as well. Remember when movie stars like Jimmy Stewart put their careers on hold to serve in the military during WWII (Stewart was a bomber pilot in Europe, hardly safe duty)? Apparently now some actors can't even restrain themselves from making propaganda films posing U.S. servicemen as butchers.
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February 27, 2006
AND I CAN STILL SEE BLUE VELVET THROUGH MY TEARS
Film Forum marks the 20th anniversary of the release of David Lynch's Blue Velvet with a two-week run of the film that starts this Friday. The movie is an examination of the dark underworld that lurks below the surface of a seemingly serene candy-colored town. Jeffrey Beaumont, played by Kyle McLachlan, returns home from college after his father is hospitalized to run the family's hardware store. When he finds a severed ear in a vacant lot, he reports it to the police and is drawn into a frightening alternate reality filled with psychotic and desperate characters. Jeffrey is a young man on the verge of adulthood forced to confront the depravity that exists in society that he was heretofore unware of. Dennis Hopper inhabits the role of the psychotic Frank Booth in one of his most memorable roles ever.
Film Forum is located at 209 West Houston St. in Manhattan.
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February 15, 2006
CINEMATIC CONTRASTS
Quick on the heels of the heralded Million Dollar Baby, I saw an advance screening of the Irish film Rory O'Shea Was Here--titled Inside I'm Dancing in the European release. I remember walking out of Million Dollar Baby disgusted, not at the movie so much, but because the day before I'd seen James Woods on "The Tonight Show" saying that it had gotten a standing ovation at the screening he'd seen. When I saw the movie, this turned my stomach, because it was about a woman who, when faced with a handicap, decided she'd rather be dead than lead a less than complete life. Her character, portrayed as heroic in the film, was more pathetic. She was someone pre-occupied with an all-consuming goal, and her existence outside that goal was completely nonexistent. Million Dollar Baby is more a tragedy of moral and existential vacuousness than any type of triumphal tale of a right to die.
Rory O'Shea Was Here is about as hammy (in truth, Million Dollar Baby could've passed for a Lifetime movie of the week), although touching at times. Michael is a speech disabled and physically MD-hampered man, who meets Rory, a completely paraplegic but communicative and rebellious friend. The latter teaches the former that a fulfilling life is still possible despite their disabilities. And a complete life involves sucking up disappointment and getting over it--there is very little sense of entitlement in the film. While somewhat romanticized, the film does not shy away from the difficulties of such a life--neither from the handicapped themselves or those who have to care for them.
I still remember the bad taste that Million Dollar Baby left in my mouth as I walked out of the theater. With memories of James Woods' recollections of standing ovations in my head I thought we must live in a society bereft of humanity. And I shuddered to think what a handicapped person would have thought walking out of the same screening, i.e. people applauding my death rather than my life. Guh!
Watch Rory O'Shea Was Here. It's a helpful tonic to the bathetic nihlism Clint Eastwood displayed in late 2004.
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February 10, 2006
HEART OF GOLD
I hate aged rockers. I thought the Super Bowl halftime show was not only pathetic, but grotesque. Senior citizens should not be prancing about singing anthems of youth. It's undignified and embarrassing for the viewer as well as the performer. I'll give a pass to one and only one musician on this count: Neil Young. The man's music transcends age and period. He manages to avoid looking foolish because his body of work is as aesthetically varied as it is anachronistic and forward-looking at the same time.
Ted Demme [CORRECTION: Jonathan Demme directed, Ted Demme died a few years ago] directed Neil Young: Heart of Gold that is opening on the coasts this week.
Mr. Demme shot the film over the course of two concerts recorded on Aug. 18 and 19 in Nashville's storied Ryman Auditorium, original home of the Grand Ole Opry. The first half of the film includes 9 of the 10 songs from Mr. Young's most recent album, "Prairie Wind" (Mr. Demme saved one song for the DVD); the second features 10 titles from his songbook, a number of which were first recorded in Nashville. Although this part of the film — this set, really — begins with "I Am a Child," which he recorded with his former band Buffalo Springfield, many of the other titles in this section — "Old Man," "Old King" and "The Old Laughing Lady" — suggest that Mr. Young, who turned 60 in November, is in a ruminative state of mind.
Jim Jarmusch directed Young's last film, Year of the Horse, and it's highly entertaining, although Young and Crazy Horse's tendencies towards unending song versions filled with feedback, refrains, and codas can be tiresome when you're not actually at the venue. Trailers are available he