Seen at: AMC Promenade in Westminster, Colo., at 1:50 p.m. on Dec. 26.
For Christmas this year, I drove down to my sister's place in Westminster, where the whole family got together, including my parents and my sister Anne and her family as well. It was magnificently fun time, to have the family all together.
The last time I'd been down, I promised my sister's daughters that I would see The Princess and the Frog with them. The Christmas visit seemed like the perfect opportunity, so I stayed over an extra night, and the next afternoon we drove to the AMC Promenade, the beautiful giant multiplex in the lifestyle center a couple miles from their house. The place was swarming with post-Christmas movie goers. You really can't doubt that moviegoing is alive and well in America.
I was really looking forward to this movie, because I wanted to see what Disney could still do with hand-drawn animation. I wasn't disappointed at all. This really was a nice piece of old school film making.
The story was well crafted. One could criticize it for following the same Disney type of storyline, in terms of Disney ripping off it's own work. For example, there is a musical number that seems to be nearly the same as Jungle Book's "I Want to Be a Man Cub," and another that one could sing "Hakuna Matata" as alternate lyrics.
If you're looking for something ground-breaking and "completely new" this is not the movie for you. But if you want to see Disney doing the old Disney thing, and having a fresh take on the organic feel of hand-drawn animation, then this is very non-disappointing.
And the four-year-old girls on both sides of me really liked it too. Does it need any more endorsement than that?
Verdict: not mindblowing, but warm and yummy in an old-school kind of way.
Thursday, December 31, 2009
Brothers
Seen at: Cinemark 16 in Fort Collins, at 9:50 p.m on Dec. 24.
Like I said, Christmas is brutal on movie watching because some releases which might otherwise play a long time in the theaters get flushed out very quickly. There simply isn't enough auditorium space.
One of the losers of the multiplex sweepstakes was Brothers, by a Danish filmmaker remaking his own movie about the Afghanistan War. I scurried over to the Cinemark to see it on the very last showing on Christmas Eve, before it left.
For much of the film, I couldn't help thinking what a shame it was, that this movie was not playing longer. Although much of the story is based on the absurd and distorted premise of Afghan "terrorists" torturing a U.S. GI (something that has never happened in 8 years of the war, and which seems like a stereotype taken from the Rambo movies), it nevertheless mostly works on a human level. Just a reminder: torturing is generally our thing, not theirs.
Actually most of story---and the core essential drama---takes place on the "home front" in the form of a burgeoning love story between the soldier's brother and his wife. Both Jake Gyllenhall and Natalie Portman were superb here, and I was captivating by the subtlety and complexity of their interaction. At the two-thirds mark, I was thinking, "what a shame that this movie is not getting the screen time it deserves."
Well, as I often do, I spoke way too soon. Recall how I said this is a remake of a Danish film, by the original auteur. Like so many European films, it eschews any narrative tension that might actually force to us to feel sharp emotions over the characters. Although it builds up a very good premise for dramatic tension, in the end, it chooses to wind down the story in one of the least satisfying ways possible, giving us no resolution to the essential drama of the love story between the soldier's brother and his wife. That's right, no resolution at all.
I nearly booed and hissed at the screen at the end. It was a huge cop-out way to end the movie. It was a great big let-down, and made me understand why people haven't been going to see this movie. If you want a war drama about the home front, try The Hurt Locker. I think it's going to win Best Picture.
Too bad about this movie. The acting was indeed very good. Natalie Portman was impressive. She's really maturing into a decent actress, leaving her teenage years behind. One day I could see her having the gravitas to play something as complex as, say, a galactic senator. Just sayin'.
Verdict: a waste of a good premise and good actors, and confirmation of the deficiencies of much of Euro-cinema.
Like I said, Christmas is brutal on movie watching because some releases which might otherwise play a long time in the theaters get flushed out very quickly. There simply isn't enough auditorium space.
One of the losers of the multiplex sweepstakes was Brothers, by a Danish filmmaker remaking his own movie about the Afghanistan War. I scurried over to the Cinemark to see it on the very last showing on Christmas Eve, before it left.
For much of the film, I couldn't help thinking what a shame it was, that this movie was not playing longer. Although much of the story is based on the absurd and distorted premise of Afghan "terrorists" torturing a U.S. GI (something that has never happened in 8 years of the war, and which seems like a stereotype taken from the Rambo movies), it nevertheless mostly works on a human level. Just a reminder: torturing is generally our thing, not theirs.
Actually most of story---and the core essential drama---takes place on the "home front" in the form of a burgeoning love story between the soldier's brother and his wife. Both Jake Gyllenhall and Natalie Portman were superb here, and I was captivating by the subtlety and complexity of their interaction. At the two-thirds mark, I was thinking, "what a shame that this movie is not getting the screen time it deserves."
Well, as I often do, I spoke way too soon. Recall how I said this is a remake of a Danish film, by the original auteur. Like so many European films, it eschews any narrative tension that might actually force to us to feel sharp emotions over the characters. Although it builds up a very good premise for dramatic tension, in the end, it chooses to wind down the story in one of the least satisfying ways possible, giving us no resolution to the essential drama of the love story between the soldier's brother and his wife. That's right, no resolution at all.
I nearly booed and hissed at the screen at the end. It was a huge cop-out way to end the movie. It was a great big let-down, and made me understand why people haven't been going to see this movie. If you want a war drama about the home front, try The Hurt Locker. I think it's going to win Best Picture.
Too bad about this movie. The acting was indeed very good. Natalie Portman was impressive. She's really maturing into a decent actress, leaving her teenage years behind. One day I could see her having the gravitas to play something as complex as, say, a galactic senator. Just sayin'.
Verdict: a waste of a good premise and good actors, and confirmation of the deficiencies of much of Euro-cinema.
Armored
Seen at: Cinemark Greeley Mall 16, at 2:45 p.m. on Dec. 23.
You can usually tell a movie is going to be bad when its release gets delayed. Armored was supposed to come out in October, but got bumped to the early December pre-Christmas slot, which is where movies go to die. Thus it got swiftly bumped out of the theaters by the Christmas onslaught, and after two weeks of it being out, I was forced to drive over to Greeley to see it. As it happened, the only day I could make it was right after a big snowstorm that shellacked the highways with ice. I've never made such an effort to see a movie. As I sat in the theater waiting for it to start, I couldn't help dreading the impeding experience.
Turns out I was completely wrong in my expectations, as I often am. Although I thought I was gong to see a dreadful, formulaic heist-gone-wrong movie (about the inside-job robbery of an armored car), the story felt fresh and enlivened by interesting characters. I knew from the opening scenes, that set up the two main characters, that I was going to like, Matt Dillon, in particular, was superb as the bad guy, whose entire character is established in the opening shot of him looking in the mirror, and not liking what he is seeing.
The story---which was reminiscent of some of the work of Sidney Lumet---just flew by. There was just the right amount of action and violence to make it work, without going overboard. The casting was also particularly good.
There was, however, one thing that really bothered me about this movie. It was released by Sony Screen Gems. As in the case of Untraceable (2008) and this fall's Stepfather, both of them released through Sony Screen Gems as well, one of the main themes of the story is how evil people in our society can exploit holes in the electronic control grid. Armored has the lightest version of this particular theme, but it is still nevertheless present (basically it is that universal GPS tracking would solve everything).
The common but subtle message of these Sony movies seems to be: "Big Brother is good, but it needs to get even bigger in order to make us safe." With the release of Armored, the pattern is clear. Sony Screen Gems seems to like making these kinds of scripts, for whatever reason. I'm definitely keeping my eyes out for this in the future.
Verdict: a superb underated thriller-drama marred by an injection of totalitarian propaganda.
You can usually tell a movie is going to be bad when its release gets delayed. Armored was supposed to come out in October, but got bumped to the early December pre-Christmas slot, which is where movies go to die. Thus it got swiftly bumped out of the theaters by the Christmas onslaught, and after two weeks of it being out, I was forced to drive over to Greeley to see it. As it happened, the only day I could make it was right after a big snowstorm that shellacked the highways with ice. I've never made such an effort to see a movie. As I sat in the theater waiting for it to start, I couldn't help dreading the impeding experience.
Turns out I was completely wrong in my expectations, as I often am. Although I thought I was gong to see a dreadful, formulaic heist-gone-wrong movie (about the inside-job robbery of an armored car), the story felt fresh and enlivened by interesting characters. I knew from the opening scenes, that set up the two main characters, that I was going to like, Matt Dillon, in particular, was superb as the bad guy, whose entire character is established in the opening shot of him looking in the mirror, and not liking what he is seeing.
The story---which was reminiscent of some of the work of Sidney Lumet---just flew by. There was just the right amount of action and violence to make it work, without going overboard. The casting was also particularly good.
There was, however, one thing that really bothered me about this movie. It was released by Sony Screen Gems. As in the case of Untraceable (2008) and this fall's Stepfather, both of them released through Sony Screen Gems as well, one of the main themes of the story is how evil people in our society can exploit holes in the electronic control grid. Armored has the lightest version of this particular theme, but it is still nevertheless present (basically it is that universal GPS tracking would solve everything).
The common but subtle message of these Sony movies seems to be: "Big Brother is good, but it needs to get even bigger in order to make us safe." With the release of Armored, the pattern is clear. Sony Screen Gems seems to like making these kinds of scripts, for whatever reason. I'm definitely keeping my eyes out for this in the future.
Verdict: a superb underated thriller-drama marred by an injection of totalitarian propaganda.
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Planet 51
Seen at: Cinema Save 6, at 6:00 p.m on Dec. 21.
When I saw the trailer to this, it solved the mystery that had plagued me when I saw the dreadful Battle for Terra last spring in Massachussets. I thought that movie was Planet 51, for which I'd seen the trailer about a year ago. The theme of unwelcome human invaders in an alien world is so common now among animated features that I am getting them mixed up.
How many times must I saw it? If it's animated and it ain't Disney/Pixar, it's going to have goofy alien characters in it. Sometimes I get bored of being proven right so any times like this.
I like Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, but he was a terrible choice for the human invader astronaut here. He's simply not a voice actor. Why was he chosen? The kids just don't care about the name actors.
Halfway through I realized this was really a time travel movie in disguise, about a hapless Postmodern emasculated boy-astronaut who gets thrust back into the 1950s. There was even a direct ripoff of, uh I mean homage to Back to the Future.
But what was the point? Not sure. To show how powerless we have now become? I guess I'm too much of a grumpus to enjoy lowbrow animation lately.
Bring in Avatar! Let's see Cameron's take on the human invader thing.
Verdict: I literally fell asleep in the middle of the movie for a few moments, but I didn't miss anything.
When I saw the trailer to this, it solved the mystery that had plagued me when I saw the dreadful Battle for Terra last spring in Massachussets. I thought that movie was Planet 51, for which I'd seen the trailer about a year ago. The theme of unwelcome human invaders in an alien world is so common now among animated features that I am getting them mixed up.
How many times must I saw it? If it's animated and it ain't Disney/Pixar, it's going to have goofy alien characters in it. Sometimes I get bored of being proven right so any times like this.
I like Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, but he was a terrible choice for the human invader astronaut here. He's simply not a voice actor. Why was he chosen? The kids just don't care about the name actors.
Halfway through I realized this was really a time travel movie in disguise, about a hapless Postmodern emasculated boy-astronaut who gets thrust back into the 1950s. There was even a direct ripoff of, uh I mean homage to Back to the Future.
But what was the point? Not sure. To show how powerless we have now become? I guess I'm too much of a grumpus to enjoy lowbrow animation lately.
Bring in Avatar! Let's see Cameron's take on the human invader thing.
Verdict: I literally fell asleep in the middle of the movie for a few moments, but I didn't miss anything.
Ninja Assassin
Seen at: Cinema Saver 6 at 6:15 p.m on Dec. 19.
A blender full of blood and body parts would have been easier to watch than this. The story was mostly a metaphor for the worst kind of sadistic child abuse.
Verdict: Et tu, Wachowski Brothers?
A blender full of blood and body parts would have been easier to watch than this. The story was mostly a metaphor for the worst kind of sadistic child abuse.
Verdict: Et tu, Wachowski Brothers?
The Damned United
Seen at: Lyric Cinema Cafe, at 5:30 p.m. on Dec. 17.
I'm not much of a soccer fan, and I know nothing of how the English professional leagues work. I was completely unfamiliar with the historical characters in this 1970s period piece.
The wonderful thing about movies is that even with these kinds of handicaps, if the story is well-told, you can wind up caring about the characters and what happens to them.
This was very much the case. Mostly when I go to movies, I wind up watching the clock. In most cases, by the end, I am waiting for the movie to be over so I can leave.
The Damned United was one of those cases where I never looked at my cellphone clock. At the end of the movie, I actually wanted it to go on with more of the story. This is pretty much the highest compliment I can pay to a film maker.
Verdict: suprisingly one of my favorites of the year. Another triumph for the versatile Michael Sheen.
I'm not much of a soccer fan, and I know nothing of how the English professional leagues work. I was completely unfamiliar with the historical characters in this 1970s period piece.
The wonderful thing about movies is that even with these kinds of handicaps, if the story is well-told, you can wind up caring about the characters and what happens to them.
This was very much the case. Mostly when I go to movies, I wind up watching the clock. In most cases, by the end, I am waiting for the movie to be over so I can leave.
The Damned United was one of those cases where I never looked at my cellphone clock. At the end of the movie, I actually wanted it to go on with more of the story. This is pretty much the highest compliment I can pay to a film maker.
Verdict: suprisingly one of my favorites of the year. Another triumph for the versatile Michael Sheen.
Dave Matthews: Larger than Life in 3D
Seen at: Carmike 10 in Ft. Collins at 10:00 p.m on Dec. 16.
One of the reasons I was looking forward to this was that before I walked in, I knew absolutely nothing about the Dave Matthews Band, except for one song.
I enjoyed the set-up to the movie, which gives one the feeling of actually going to a concert (in 3-D) complete down to the multiple repeated announcements about having your bags ready to be searched (I get it---we live in a police state with no rights. All right, already! This is why I don't go to concert events, so I can avoid this totalitarian crap).
The opening acts were interesting and fun. I was surprised, however, that the main act was not shot in the same locations as the first two acts, which sort of destroyed the feeling of going to a 3-D concert event.
At the end, I can't say I'm a fan of Dave Matthews, but I certainly became a fan of a 3-D concert movies.
Verdict: for a fifteen-buck special event, I guess it was worth it.
One of the reasons I was looking forward to this was that before I walked in, I knew absolutely nothing about the Dave Matthews Band, except for one song.
I enjoyed the set-up to the movie, which gives one the feeling of actually going to a concert (in 3-D) complete down to the multiple repeated announcements about having your bags ready to be searched (I get it---we live in a police state with no rights. All right, already! This is why I don't go to concert events, so I can avoid this totalitarian crap).
The opening acts were interesting and fun. I was surprised, however, that the main act was not shot in the same locations as the first two acts, which sort of destroyed the feeling of going to a 3-D concert event.
At the end, I can't say I'm a fan of Dave Matthews, but I certainly became a fan of a 3-D concert movies.
Verdict: for a fifteen-buck special event, I guess it was worth it.
Pirate Radio
Seen at: Cinema Saver 6 at 3:30 p.m. on Dec. 16.
This wasn't quite the movie I thought it was going to be. It was much more listless and free-flowing than I expected. The conflict of the bad government guys trying to shut down the radio pirates was more of a level of farce than it would have been in a more "serious" production.
That being said, it was a fun movie to watch, with fun characters. As a period piece of the 1960s, it mostly succeeded. I couldn't help thinking that I'd never seen a movie with more shots of people sitting on toilets, however.
Verdict: not unpleasant way to fill a couple hours.
This wasn't quite the movie I thought it was going to be. It was much more listless and free-flowing than I expected. The conflict of the bad government guys trying to shut down the radio pirates was more of a level of farce than it would have been in a more "serious" production.
That being said, it was a fun movie to watch, with fun characters. As a period piece of the 1960s, it mostly succeeded. I couldn't help thinking that I'd never seen a movie with more shots of people sitting on toilets, however.
Verdict: not unpleasant way to fill a couple hours.
Transylmania
Seen at: Carmike 10 at 7:45 p.m on Dec. 10.
You can tell a vampire spoof is a going to be a bomb when it doesn't even get released during Halloween, but during the lull of pre-Christmas. Actually this is a really a "stupid college" movie masquerading as horror satire.
Whatever. I saw in the listing that it was leaving the Carmike after only a week, and thus I scrambled to see the early evening showing on it's last day there. As I announced the name of the movie to the ticket booth attendant, I added "because someone has to see it."
It lived up completely to my expectations. Perhaps it wouldn't have been so bad, but the first ten minutes were chock full of disgusting references to bodily fluids. It never really recovers from that.
There were a few moments when I laughed, mostly because it was sto stupid. But I was by myself in the theater, and I wound up doing my usual routine of counting the seats and even banging my head against the padding of the auditorium wall. Not the first time I've done that in Auditorium 9 in the corner of the Carmike, but I really hate when it gets that far.
Verdict: disgusting college comedy that no one could possibly love
You can tell a vampire spoof is a going to be a bomb when it doesn't even get released during Halloween, but during the lull of pre-Christmas. Actually this is a really a "stupid college" movie masquerading as horror satire.
Whatever. I saw in the listing that it was leaving the Carmike after only a week, and thus I scrambled to see the early evening showing on it's last day there. As I announced the name of the movie to the ticket booth attendant, I added "because someone has to see it."
It lived up completely to my expectations. Perhaps it wouldn't have been so bad, but the first ten minutes were chock full of disgusting references to bodily fluids. It never really recovers from that.
There were a few moments when I laughed, mostly because it was sto stupid. But I was by myself in the theater, and I wound up doing my usual routine of counting the seats and even banging my head against the padding of the auditorium wall. Not the first time I've done that in Auditorium 9 in the corner of the Carmike, but I really hate when it gets that far.
Verdict: disgusting college comedy that no one could possibly love
Good Hair
Seen at: Lyric Cinema Cafe, at 2:25 p.m on Dec 11.
When I walked into see this, I had reached a point where I had lost a lot of interesting in seeing movies. I was beginning to wonder if I might have to stop going to theaters for a while.
This movie cured everything. It is the kind of fun documentary (about what makes "good hair" among African Americans) that makes going to movies worthwhile. I loved every minute watching this, and never got bored for a second. Chris Rock was perfect.
Verdict: fun and very uplifting.
When I walked into see this, I had reached a point where I had lost a lot of interesting in seeing movies. I was beginning to wonder if I might have to stop going to theaters for a while.
This movie cured everything. It is the kind of fun documentary (about what makes "good hair" among African Americans) that makes going to movies worthwhile. I loved every minute watching this, and never got bored for a second. Chris Rock was perfect.
Verdict: fun and very uplifting.
Everybody's Fine
Seen at: Carmike 10 in Fort Collins, at 7:05 p.m. on Sat. Dec 5.
Towards the end of the movie starring De Niro as a man in a cross-country search for his adult children, it occurred to me that the story reminded me of European cinema. That is, the story felt "soft," in that it was character-driven and avoided conflict. This wasn't meant as a compliment. The story felt sort of well, drawn out and boring and had completely the wrong ending (a real downer). But at least, I thought, watching De Niro in any role is a pleasure.
At the end of the credits, I noticed that the movie was based on a Italian movie Stanno Tutti Bene. Ha! Can't fool me. I can spot soft Euro-cinema from a mile away.
Verdict: yawn
Towards the end of the movie starring De Niro as a man in a cross-country search for his adult children, it occurred to me that the story reminded me of European cinema. That is, the story felt "soft," in that it was character-driven and avoided conflict. This wasn't meant as a compliment. The story felt sort of well, drawn out and boring and had completely the wrong ending (a real downer). But at least, I thought, watching De Niro in any role is a pleasure.
At the end of the credits, I noticed that the movie was based on a Italian movie Stanno Tutti Bene. Ha! Can't fool me. I can spot soft Euro-cinema from a mile away.
Verdict: yawn
An Education
Seen at: Lyric Cinema Cafe, at 4:15 p.m on Dec. 4.
Verdict: a well-told coming-of-age story with interesting characters.
Verdict: a well-told coming-of-age story with interesting characters.
Paris
Seen at: Lyric Cinema Cafe, at 3:45 p.m on Dec. 2, 2009
The title made me skeptical that a movie could be worthy of the name of such a complex city, but in the end I felt it deserved it. The cinematography of these interweaving of sub-stories captures the many facets of Paris in a romantic-yet-nonromantic fashion, like a glimpse of the Eiffel Tower on a beautiful morning while standing by an alley that smells of last night's garbage. Many contradictions of the old and new inside one movie.
Verdict: je l'aimais beacuoup.
The title made me skeptical that a movie could be worthy of the name of such a complex city, but in the end I felt it deserved it. The cinematography of these interweaving of sub-stories captures the many facets of Paris in a romantic-yet-nonromantic fashion, like a glimpse of the Eiffel Tower on a beautiful morning while standing by an alley that smells of last night's garbage. Many contradictions of the old and new inside one movie.
Verdict: je l'aimais beacuoup.
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
No Impact Man
Seen at: Lyric Cinema Cafe, at 4:45 p.m. on Nov. 25
About ten minutes into this documentary about a guy in New York who tries to lower his carbon footprint to zero, one begins to have all sorts of cynical thoughts about his project. Is he just a poseur.
The documentary is skillful in this regard, because it is actually wanting you to feel this, so that it can address it, and use the tension of the genuineness of his project to form the narrative structure underneath. In this regard, it was well done. My interest was sustained throughout.
Much of the narrative tension centers around the protagonist's relationship with his wife, and her involvement and enthusiasm for what they have been doing. The validity of the protagonist's crazy scheme then get mixed up in the wife's desire to have a baby. In that end, the documentary itself becomes a framing story for the issue of whether or not the husband is willing to accede to the wife's desire for a child. This part of the story becomes an interesting take on the standard Postmodern boy-man theme. Nice touch.
Verdict: worth watching, even if you think as I do that the "carbon footprint" thing is a globalist scam.
About ten minutes into this documentary about a guy in New York who tries to lower his carbon footprint to zero, one begins to have all sorts of cynical thoughts about his project. Is he just a poseur.
The documentary is skillful in this regard, because it is actually wanting you to feel this, so that it can address it, and use the tension of the genuineness of his project to form the narrative structure underneath. In this regard, it was well done. My interest was sustained throughout.
Much of the narrative tension centers around the protagonist's relationship with his wife, and her involvement and enthusiasm for what they have been doing. The validity of the protagonist's crazy scheme then get mixed up in the wife's desire to have a baby. In that end, the documentary itself becomes a framing story for the issue of whether or not the husband is willing to accede to the wife's desire for a child. This part of the story becomes an interesting take on the standard Postmodern boy-man theme. Nice touch.
Verdict: worth watching, even if you think as I do that the "carbon footprint" thing is a globalist scam.
The Blind Side
Seen at: Carmike 10, Ft. Collins, at 4:20 p.m. on Nov. 23.
Boy howdy, I was not looking forward to this movie. I'd seen the trailer about two dozen times by the time it premiered a couple weeks back, and I was eager to cross it off my list.
Shame on me. This was an awesome movie. It really broke my cynicism. It's full of interesting characters trying to be honorable and do the right thing in the face of difficulties and challenges. It rivals Tyler Perry's I Can Do Bad All By Myself as the most classical Hollywood movie of the year.
The most startling thing was that it broke what amounts to a three-decade long drought of positive Christian characters in movies. The purported Christians on screen actually strive to embody the Gospel and the teachings of Christ in regard to universal love, instead of playing to Christianoid stereotypes.
It really won me over. So did Sandra Bullock. Given her roles in The Proposal and All About Steve, it's obvious that Bullock, in her mid Forties, is really trying to challenge herself as an actress while she is in the age range to playing leading women in these kinds of roles (she's almost my same age, so I'm on her side in this regard). The trailers made me think she was biting off more than she could chew in this one, but those impressions were wrong. She strikes exactly the right note all the way through, and I concur with those putting her among the favorites for the Best Actress Oscar.
This movie isn't for everyone. If you're in a cynical mood, it might not work for you, but if it is approached with an open mind, I think it shines forth as superb cinematic storytelling with a breakthrough neo-Classical slant.
About the only disappointment I had about this movie was that although it was set in Memphis---a city I came to discover and love this year---it was filmed in Atlanta. Oh, well. You can't have it all.
Verdict: outstanding
Boy howdy, I was not looking forward to this movie. I'd seen the trailer about two dozen times by the time it premiered a couple weeks back, and I was eager to cross it off my list.
Shame on me. This was an awesome movie. It really broke my cynicism. It's full of interesting characters trying to be honorable and do the right thing in the face of difficulties and challenges. It rivals Tyler Perry's I Can Do Bad All By Myself as the most classical Hollywood movie of the year.
The most startling thing was that it broke what amounts to a three-decade long drought of positive Christian characters in movies. The purported Christians on screen actually strive to embody the Gospel and the teachings of Christ in regard to universal love, instead of playing to Christianoid stereotypes.
It really won me over. So did Sandra Bullock. Given her roles in The Proposal and All About Steve, it's obvious that Bullock, in her mid Forties, is really trying to challenge herself as an actress while she is in the age range to playing leading women in these kinds of roles (she's almost my same age, so I'm on her side in this regard). The trailers made me think she was biting off more than she could chew in this one, but those impressions were wrong. She strikes exactly the right note all the way through, and I concur with those putting her among the favorites for the Best Actress Oscar.
This movie isn't for everyone. If you're in a cynical mood, it might not work for you, but if it is approached with an open mind, I think it shines forth as superb cinematic storytelling with a breakthrough neo-Classical slant.
About the only disappointment I had about this movie was that although it was set in Memphis---a city I came to discover and love this year---it was filmed in Atlanta. Oh, well. You can't have it all.
Verdict: outstanding
Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs
Seen at: Cinema Save 6, Ft. Collins, 9:00 p.m on Nov. 21
It took me forever to get around to seeing this, but I was rewarded when it wound up playing at the discount theater. I love it when that happens.
Well, you might know how I feel about non-Disney/Pixar animation. It almost always lets me down, on the story level if nothing else. In this case, the story wasn't so bad, but the animation really got to me. It was way too frenetic, with arms and legs flying everywhere in every scene. Every motion of the protagonist screamed of too much urgency of emotion. I got tired of it, and actually had to turn away from the screen a couple times to give my eyes a break.
Plus it just too stupidly messy. Maybe I would have liked it if I were a ten-year-old, but I don't think so. Let me check with my inner ten-year-old....nope, wouldn't have liked it in 1974 either.
Very fitting last time of the movie. The villain-mayor is sinking on a boat made of toast. The very last thing we hear is him saying, "This was a very bad idea."
Verdict: Headache-inducing animation to tell a passable narrative.
It took me forever to get around to seeing this, but I was rewarded when it wound up playing at the discount theater. I love it when that happens.
Well, you might know how I feel about non-Disney/Pixar animation. It almost always lets me down, on the story level if nothing else. In this case, the story wasn't so bad, but the animation really got to me. It was way too frenetic, with arms and legs flying everywhere in every scene. Every motion of the protagonist screamed of too much urgency of emotion. I got tired of it, and actually had to turn away from the screen a couple times to give my eyes a break.
Plus it just too stupidly messy. Maybe I would have liked it if I were a ten-year-old, but I don't think so. Let me check with my inner ten-year-old....nope, wouldn't have liked it in 1974 either.
Very fitting last time of the movie. The villain-mayor is sinking on a boat made of toast. The very last thing we hear is him saying, "This was a very bad idea."
Verdict: Headache-inducing animation to tell a passable narrative.
Sunday, December 6, 2009
Aside: Climategate and Postmodernism
I agree with a lot of this op-ed in the Wall Street Journal.
Actually I think it crossed over a long time ago, around 1970. During that time, while physics disappeared into the pointless arcana navel-gazing of String Theory (itself a manifestation of the degeneracy of Postmodernism), physical sciences were stolen and hijacked by globalist UN bureaucrats in service to the bankers and eugenicists. The last few weeks have been the most exciting I have felt as a scientist (or ex-scientist)in two decades ever, and the most exciting I have felt for civilization since the fall of Communism.
(And yes I am fully aware that WSJ is owned by News Corp. Keep in mind that Fox put out a video in 2006 bragging about how it has put messages about global warming into all its shows, such as The Simpsons. They are part of the same globalist cabal. Fox News simply exists to provide controlled opposition for domestic conservative idiots. All of Murdoch's other news services around the world are vehemently in the globalist "warmist" camp. It all works very well, since most liberal folk I know will automatically oppose anything that a Fox News pundit advocates. Easy as pie---I know, because it used to work on me, until I woke up. All they have to do is play the fake global warming skeptic, have GE shill Keith Olbermann denounce them, and it works like a magic spell. That's how well they know how to control us).
What is happening at East Anglia is an epochal event. As the hard sciences—physics, biology, chemistry, electrical engineering—came to dominate intellectual life in the last century, some academics in the humanities devised the theory of postmodernism, which liberated them from their colleagues in the sciences. Postmodernism, a self-consciously "unprovable" theory, replaced formal structures with subjectivity. With the revelations of East Anglia, this slippery and variable intellectual world has crossed into the hard sciences.
Actually I think it crossed over a long time ago, around 1970. During that time, while physics disappeared into the pointless arcana navel-gazing of String Theory (itself a manifestation of the degeneracy of Postmodernism), physical sciences were stolen and hijacked by globalist UN bureaucrats in service to the bankers and eugenicists. The last few weeks have been the most exciting I have felt as a scientist (or ex-scientist)
(And yes I am fully aware that WSJ is owned by News Corp. Keep in mind that Fox put out a video in 2006 bragging about how it has put messages about global warming into all its shows, such as The Simpsons. They are part of the same globalist cabal. Fox News simply exists to provide controlled opposition for domestic conservative idiots. All of Murdoch's other news services around the world are vehemently in the globalist "warmist" camp. It all works very well, since most liberal folk I know will automatically oppose anything that a Fox News pundit advocates. Easy as pie---I know, because it used to work on me, until I woke up. All they have to do is play the fake global warming skeptic, have GE shill Keith Olbermann denounce them, and it works like a magic spell. That's how well they know how to control us).
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
The Twilight Saga: New Moon
Seen at: Carmike 10 in Ft. Collins at 4:00 p.m. on Nov. 20
Well, I suppose you're expecting me to say how much this movie sucks, and what a travesty it is that it made a gazillion dollars during its opening weekend.
Yes, I could write about that, but there are about a hundred thousand other bloggers writing about that right now, and I just hate to be part of the herd.
So instead I'll just stick to discussing the story, and whether or not it works within the context of the fictional world created by the movie, specifically as an extension of last year's first installment, Twilight.
As it happens I had the pleasure of seeing this on the afternoon of the first day of release. The auditorium at the Carmike was filled with preteen girls and middle-aged women---and me. I always appreciate seeing a film within ints intended audience.
Does the story work? I suppose it does, mostly. Overall it's mostly boring and sort of slow-moving, but there is enough of a narrative to make it watchable.
Most of the story is about the love triangle. As you may know, it is a lvoe triangle in which a teenage girl must choose between a vampire or a werewolf. Well, that's just the surface level of the allegory. Really it's about a a teenage girl who must choose between her love for a 109-year-old man and her physical attraction to a beefcakey but immature sixteen-year-old boy. Guess who wins?
Yes, it's the latter part I found most interesting, since, if you've read any of my writings over the past year, I've become fascinated by Hollywood's continual twisted metaphorical sublimation of the taboo subject of intergenerational love. It keeps cropping up over and over in various weird guises, including one of last year's Academy Award Best Picture nominees.
And if you think the Twilight series doesn't have this subtext, just consider how it would work if Edward were a seventeen year old vampire. Or worse, what if it were a 109-year-odl female vampire having a romance with a a seventeen-year-old male mortal? What if the mortal boy had to choose between the centenarrian vampiress and a sixteen-year-old busty lycanthropic cheerleader. My point is not that there is a double standard, but that age matters here.
So imagine my surprise when one of my female Facebook acquaintences, nearly my age, complains about the men her age who are complaining about New Moon. They are just jealous they aren't young and hunky like Edward, she complained. That really made me chuckle, but just imagine the layers of metaphorical twisting that is involved here, that has "Twilight Moms" waiting outside theaters at midnight to see the first showing. Are they in love with a seventeen year old boy, or a 109-year-old man? What it were "Twilight dads"? Would we find that similarly endearing?
I don't have a lot of answers to these questions right now, but I have to admit that the fact that I'm thinking about them is a plus for the movie franchise as a whole.
Now, back to the story. Like I said, it was slow moving. The Third Act came on too abruptly. I really wanted to spend more time in that Italian hill town (not the first time I've said that in my life, by the way). I thought the Volturri were interesting, and expected to see more of them, given the trailer. Instead they played a fairly small role.
Also I was bit disappointed to see the smash-up of the marble Volturri throne room. Not again, I moaned. It was way too much like the similar smash up the Classic(al!) theater in the fight scene at the end of Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant. Such a boring cliche.
But it makes sense, really. Vampires, as a metaphor, speak to Classicism stripped of moral character but retaining the Classical structure. Werewolves, on the other hand, are often about Classical morality stripped of its structure. I'll have to write about that sometime. I'm sure I'll get a chance soon. The Vampire movies just keep coming and coming.
By the way, the preteen girls has a mixed reaction to the story. They really didn't like the ending. One of them screamed out as much as the final credits hit. Tough crowd!
Verdict: If you liked the first one, might as well...
Well, I suppose you're expecting me to say how much this movie sucks, and what a travesty it is that it made a gazillion dollars during its opening weekend.
Yes, I could write about that, but there are about a hundred thousand other bloggers writing about that right now, and I just hate to be part of the herd.
So instead I'll just stick to discussing the story, and whether or not it works within the context of the fictional world created by the movie, specifically as an extension of last year's first installment, Twilight.
As it happens I had the pleasure of seeing this on the afternoon of the first day of release. The auditorium at the Carmike was filled with preteen girls and middle-aged women---and me. I always appreciate seeing a film within ints intended audience.
Does the story work? I suppose it does, mostly. Overall it's mostly boring and sort of slow-moving, but there is enough of a narrative to make it watchable.
Most of the story is about the love triangle. As you may know, it is a lvoe triangle in which a teenage girl must choose between a vampire or a werewolf. Well, that's just the surface level of the allegory. Really it's about a a teenage girl who must choose between her love for a 109-year-old man and her physical attraction to a beefcakey but immature sixteen-year-old boy. Guess who wins?
Yes, it's the latter part I found most interesting, since, if you've read any of my writings over the past year, I've become fascinated by Hollywood's continual twisted metaphorical sublimation of the taboo subject of intergenerational love. It keeps cropping up over and over in various weird guises, including one of last year's Academy Award Best Picture nominees.
And if you think the Twilight series doesn't have this subtext, just consider how it would work if Edward were a seventeen year old vampire. Or worse, what if it were a 109-year-odl female vampire having a romance with a a seventeen-year-old male mortal? What if the mortal boy had to choose between the centenarrian vampiress and a sixteen-year-old busty lycanthropic cheerleader. My point is not that there is a double standard, but that age matters here.
So imagine my surprise when one of my female Facebook acquaintences, nearly my age, complains about the men her age who are complaining about New Moon. They are just jealous they aren't young and hunky like Edward, she complained. That really made me chuckle, but just imagine the layers of metaphorical twisting that is involved here, that has "Twilight Moms" waiting outside theaters at midnight to see the first showing. Are they in love with a seventeen year old boy, or a 109-year-old man? What it were "Twilight dads"? Would we find that similarly endearing?
I don't have a lot of answers to these questions right now, but I have to admit that the fact that I'm thinking about them is a plus for the movie franchise as a whole.
Now, back to the story. Like I said, it was slow moving. The Third Act came on too abruptly. I really wanted to spend more time in that Italian hill town (not the first time I've said that in my life, by the way). I thought the Volturri were interesting, and expected to see more of them, given the trailer. Instead they played a fairly small role.
Also I was bit disappointed to see the smash-up of the marble Volturri throne room. Not again, I moaned. It was way too much like the similar smash up the Classic(al!) theater in the fight scene at the end of Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant. Such a boring cliche.
But it makes sense, really. Vampires, as a metaphor, speak to Classicism stripped of moral character but retaining the Classical structure. Werewolves, on the other hand, are often about Classical morality stripped of its structure. I'll have to write about that sometime. I'm sure I'll get a chance soon. The Vampire movies just keep coming and coming.
By the way, the preteen girls has a mixed reaction to the story. They really didn't like the ending. One of them screamed out as much as the final credits hit. Tough crowd!
Verdict: If you liked the first one, might as well...
Monday, November 30, 2009
Astro Boy
Seen at: Metrolux 14 in Loveland, Colorado at 2:00 p.m on Nov. 18.
Except for Disney/Pixar releases, I've come to dread going to any animated feature. I know from experience that it's most likely going to be uncreative and derivative, and, as I've mentioned, probably feature goofy aliens in a gratuitous manner.
Well, there were no goofy aliens in Astro Boy, but it did indeed feel quite derivative.
First off, the good points. The three-dimensional animation was superb, as it often is. It is not technical skill which is lacking in this genre. Rather it is storytelling (the most important thing).
The derivative aspect is apparent right off. We're in a "trash-heap" Earth, where technology has allowed humans to escape the surface. "Oh, it's the Wall-E world again," I thought to myself in the Metrolux. Ho hum.
That's probably a bit harsh. The story was interesting enough (side note is that I used to watch the Astro Boy cartoons on television when I was very, very young). There was just enough freshness to keep it going.
What really bummed me out was the casting of the voice actors. Nicholas Cage was just plain wrong for the part of Astro Boy's dad. It just didn't work for me. I was distracted by the Cage-ness of the character throughout the entire movie. Likewise Donald Sutherland felt wrong as the villain here. But Nathan Lane was pretty good, as the second villain.
Yes, a second villain. The adult character you think is sympathetic turns out to be a bad guy too. This is an odd movie---it's very much a kids vs. adults theme. There are almost no good adult characters in this movie, none with any real honor or courage. Even the dad character is deeply flawed only comes around at the end. The only adults who don't betray the children are spineless cowards. The kids are really on their own, to fend for themselves, with the help of benevolent robots. If nothing else, the whole premise gave me food for thought, especially considering it was made in Hong Kong.
Like I said, if you're an animation fan, you might appreciate the technical aspects of this movie. Otherwise, it's sort of, well, boring and bleak. For me the most interesting part were the closing credits, which were actually in English and in Chinese characters.
Verdict: It'll do if you need an animation fix.
Except for Disney/Pixar releases, I've come to dread going to any animated feature. I know from experience that it's most likely going to be uncreative and derivative, and, as I've mentioned, probably feature goofy aliens in a gratuitous manner.
Well, there were no goofy aliens in Astro Boy, but it did indeed feel quite derivative.
First off, the good points. The three-dimensional animation was superb, as it often is. It is not technical skill which is lacking in this genre. Rather it is storytelling (the most important thing).
The derivative aspect is apparent right off. We're in a "trash-heap" Earth, where technology has allowed humans to escape the surface. "Oh, it's the Wall-E world again," I thought to myself in the Metrolux. Ho hum.
That's probably a bit harsh. The story was interesting enough (side note is that I used to watch the Astro Boy cartoons on television when I was very, very young). There was just enough freshness to keep it going.
What really bummed me out was the casting of the voice actors. Nicholas Cage was just plain wrong for the part of Astro Boy's dad. It just didn't work for me. I was distracted by the Cage-ness of the character throughout the entire movie. Likewise Donald Sutherland felt wrong as the villain here. But Nathan Lane was pretty good, as the second villain.
Yes, a second villain. The adult character you think is sympathetic turns out to be a bad guy too. This is an odd movie---it's very much a kids vs. adults theme. There are almost no good adult characters in this movie, none with any real honor or courage. Even the dad character is deeply flawed only comes around at the end. The only adults who don't betray the children are spineless cowards. The kids are really on their own, to fend for themselves, with the help of benevolent robots. If nothing else, the whole premise gave me food for thought, especially considering it was made in Hong Kong.
Like I said, if you're an animation fan, you might appreciate the technical aspects of this movie. Otherwise, it's sort of, well, boring and bleak. For me the most interesting part were the closing credits, which were actually in English and in Chinese characters.
Verdict: It'll do if you need an animation fix.
Play the Game
Seen at: Carmike 10 in Fort Collins, at 4:10 pm on Nov. 17
I'd watched helplessly as this small-budget movie came and went from the theaters a few months back without my getting a chance to see it. Then two weeks ago, it crops up out of nowhere in the listings for the Carmike theaters in Fort Collins and Cheyenne. I knew the habits of the Carmike---they book movies like this for a one-week run, so I made a priority to see it right away. My intuition was confirmed when I found myself heading to tiny little auditorium #9 at the neighborhood Carmike, the one in the corner of the building with only 88 seats.
All I knew about this movie going in was that it had a scene with Andy Griffith receiving oral sex. Now I'm an old Andy fan to be sure---I've seen nearly every Matlock---but this foreknowledge didn't really have me running to the theater.
So let me just say right the back that the scene in question actually worked within the context of the story. And you only see him from the neck up.
I just plain liked this movie, overall. It's really the story of a young man (Paul Campbell), stuck in a job as a sleazy car salesman working for his father, who is really looking for love. He meets a young woman (Marla Sokoloff), and, following the dictates of the Postmodern pick-up artist (not to be confused with the Post-Postmodern version) he attempts to woo her through deception and stalking.
That is, he does everything to meet her and gain her interest except telling her about his interest in her directly. Being up front is the last thing he would ever do.
All this plays out in the context of a relationship between the young man and his grandfather (Griffith), who is in a retirement home, and is still mourning the loss of his wife. The story between the two of them is based on reciprocal teaching---the old man tries to tell his grandson about being direct with a woman, and the pleasures of long-term companionship (the old Classical way), while the grandson helps the grandfather overcome his grief and learn to be spontaneous without worrying too much about replacing his wife as a companion.
The stories work very well together. As such, the grandfather learns to loosen up (hence the scene in question) while the young man wins the young women, while only partially following his grandfather's advice. Indeed, through much effort he finally does meet her, gains her interest, and gets her to fall in love with him---all the while playing his deceptive game. But of course, at the critical moment she revolts against his insincerity and leaves him broken hearted.
Such are the wages of the efforts of the Postmodern Boy-man trying to use femininte wiles to win the woman. It only works up to a point.
Did I say feminine wiles? Yes, this movie has a wonderful Classical twist at the end, one that endorses the old double standard that whereas men must be direct and up front about their desire, women can (and perhaps should) be indirect and even downright deceptive in the courtship game.
The Postmodern Boy-man complains about this supposed double standard. The Classical man accepts and embraces it as part of the order of the universe. As you might guess, I really had a smile on my face as I left the Carmike.
Verdict: Charming and fun
I'd watched helplessly as this small-budget movie came and went from the theaters a few months back without my getting a chance to see it. Then two weeks ago, it crops up out of nowhere in the listings for the Carmike theaters in Fort Collins and Cheyenne. I knew the habits of the Carmike---they book movies like this for a one-week run, so I made a priority to see it right away. My intuition was confirmed when I found myself heading to tiny little auditorium #9 at the neighborhood Carmike, the one in the corner of the building with only 88 seats.
All I knew about this movie going in was that it had a scene with Andy Griffith receiving oral sex. Now I'm an old Andy fan to be sure---I've seen nearly every Matlock---but this foreknowledge didn't really have me running to the theater.
So let me just say right the back that the scene in question actually worked within the context of the story. And you only see him from the neck up.
I just plain liked this movie, overall. It's really the story of a young man (Paul Campbell), stuck in a job as a sleazy car salesman working for his father, who is really looking for love. He meets a young woman (Marla Sokoloff), and, following the dictates of the Postmodern pick-up artist (not to be confused with the Post-Postmodern version) he attempts to woo her through deception and stalking.
That is, he does everything to meet her and gain her interest except telling her about his interest in her directly. Being up front is the last thing he would ever do.
All this plays out in the context of a relationship between the young man and his grandfather (Griffith), who is in a retirement home, and is still mourning the loss of his wife. The story between the two of them is based on reciprocal teaching---the old man tries to tell his grandson about being direct with a woman, and the pleasures of long-term companionship (the old Classical way), while the grandson helps the grandfather overcome his grief and learn to be spontaneous without worrying too much about replacing his wife as a companion.
The stories work very well together. As such, the grandfather learns to loosen up (hence the scene in question) while the young man wins the young women, while only partially following his grandfather's advice. Indeed, through much effort he finally does meet her, gains her interest, and gets her to fall in love with him---all the while playing his deceptive game. But of course, at the critical moment she revolts against his insincerity and leaves him broken hearted.
Such are the wages of the efforts of the Postmodern Boy-man trying to use femininte wiles to win the woman. It only works up to a point.
Did I say feminine wiles? Yes, this movie has a wonderful Classical twist at the end, one that endorses the old double standard that whereas men must be direct and up front about their desire, women can (and perhaps should) be indirect and even downright deceptive in the courtship game.
The Postmodern Boy-man complains about this supposed double standard. The Classical man accepts and embraces it as part of the order of the universe. As you might guess, I really had a smile on my face as I left the Carmike.
Verdict: Charming and fun
Friday, November 27, 2009
Black Dynamite
Seen at: Lyric Cinema Cafe at 4:30 p.m. on Nov. 16.
I thought I was going to enjoy this movie, an over-the-top spoof of 1970's blaxploitation movies. It was fun for the first twenty minutes, until a scene in which the protagonist is distracted by a microphone from an overhead boom. At that point I realized that the film makers were not going to take this movie seriously. Instead, they were going to use to make a Saturday Night Live skit that lasted for two hours.
What a stupid way to ruin an otherwise good movie. Yeah, yeah, we get it. Productions in that era were slap-dash. But why ruin your own movie that way. Still I suffered through it until the story itself went haywire. Somehow they decided that they could cease telling a coherent narrative towards the end, introducing new plotlines and new characters almost at random, as if to slamdunk their point about the quality of movies from that era. Big BIG mistake. NEVER FSCK WITH THE STORY MUTHAFSCKA! Do I need to repeat that? I hope not.
Whatever you do---you can have crummy direction, lousy acting, half-ass lighting, but always always always tell a coherent story.
Verdict: almost could have been an entertaining spoof, but decided to drink its own kool-aid.
I thought I was going to enjoy this movie, an over-the-top spoof of 1970's blaxploitation movies. It was fun for the first twenty minutes, until a scene in which the protagonist is distracted by a microphone from an overhead boom. At that point I realized that the film makers were not going to take this movie seriously. Instead, they were going to use to make a Saturday Night Live skit that lasted for two hours.
What a stupid way to ruin an otherwise good movie. Yeah, yeah, we get it. Productions in that era were slap-dash. But why ruin your own movie that way. Still I suffered through it until the story itself went haywire. Somehow they decided that they could cease telling a coherent narrative towards the end, introducing new plotlines and new characters almost at random, as if to slamdunk their point about the quality of movies from that era. Big BIG mistake. NEVER FSCK WITH THE STORY MUTHAFSCKA! Do I need to repeat that? I hope not.
Whatever you do---you can have crummy direction, lousy acting, half-ass lighting, but always always always tell a coherent story.
Verdict: almost could have been an entertaining spoof, but decided to drink its own kool-aid.
Thursday, November 26, 2009
The Men Who Stare at Goats
Seen at: Carmike 10 in Ft. Collins at 1:15 p.m. on Nov. 15
Did I like this movie? I guess so. It wasn't very deep. Mostly it made me wish Hollywood made movies about the real CIA programs, such as MK-ULTRA. Someday they might---after the revolution comes, after we are ready to learn what really happened. Until then, we get stuff like this. Pass the popcorn.
Verdict: not unpleasant way to kill two hours, albeit superficial and deceptive in historical terms.
Did I like this movie? I guess so. It wasn't very deep. Mostly it made me wish Hollywood made movies about the real CIA programs, such as MK-ULTRA. Someday they might---after the revolution comes, after we are ready to learn what really happened. Until then, we get stuff like this. Pass the popcorn.
Verdict: not unpleasant way to kill two hours, albeit superficial and deceptive in historical terms.
A Serious Man
Seet at: Lyric Cinema Cafe, at 2:00 p.m on Sat. Nov. 14.
I often get tired of seeing period movies from the Sixties that dont' really feel like the 1960s. This movie was set in suburban Minneapolis in May 1967 and it felt awesomely like the Midwest in that time. I could write a lot about this movie. It blew me away. It may be the best movie of the year, and it is my favorite Cohen Brothers movie since The Big Lebowski (which I saw only three years ago). It may be their best.
How could I not like a movie that chronicles the breakdown of Classical civilization, right up the point of an aged rabbi quoting Jefferson Airplane? When the Truth is found to be lies...
It's about the Sixties, but it's really about now. It's a movie about Judaism, yet it is completely universal as well. This is how you do it. This is how you make great art.
Verdict: Superb. Perhaps the best movie of the year.
I often get tired of seeing period movies from the Sixties that dont' really feel like the 1960s. This movie was set in suburban Minneapolis in May 1967 and it felt awesomely like the Midwest in that time. I could write a lot about this movie. It blew me away. It may be the best movie of the year, and it is my favorite Cohen Brothers movie since The Big Lebowski (which I saw only three years ago). It may be their best.
How could I not like a movie that chronicles the breakdown of Classical civilization, right up the point of an aged rabbi quoting Jefferson Airplane? When the Truth is found to be lies...
It's about the Sixties, but it's really about now. It's a movie about Judaism, yet it is completely universal as well. This is how you do it. This is how you make great art.
Verdict: Superb. Perhaps the best movie of the year.
Coco Before Channel
Seen at: Lyric Cinema Cafe at 2:25 p.m. at Thu. Nov. 12
You'd think I would have seen this last summer in France, when it was showing at the multiplex in Claira. Instead I decided to wait and see it with subtitles. I'm glad I did. It wasn't mind-blowing, but it was an interesting story about an interesting character/person. At the end, I felt like I understood Chanel more. It was the kind of movie that made me wish that there were many, many more historical biopics. We could have a hundred more a year, as far as I'm concerned. Whenever you are tempted to think that there are no more good stories for movies, just remember the inexhaustible supply of interesting historical personages, about whom the public knows very little.
Verdict: nice historical biopic worth seeing.
You'd think I would have seen this last summer in France, when it was showing at the multiplex in Claira. Instead I decided to wait and see it with subtitles. I'm glad I did. It wasn't mind-blowing, but it was an interesting story about an interesting character/person. At the end, I felt like I understood Chanel more. It was the kind of movie that made me wish that there were many, many more historical biopics. We could have a hundred more a year, as far as I'm concerned. Whenever you are tempted to think that there are no more good stories for movies, just remember the inexhaustible supply of interesting historical personages, about whom the public knows very little.
Verdict: nice historical biopic worth seeing.
Where the Wild Things Are
Seen at: UA Twin Peaks in Longmont, CO at 1:00 p.m on Nov. 11
This was the first time I'd ever visited this multiplex, in the mall on the south edge of Longmont, which dates from the 1960s. It's probably the oldest multiplex in northern Colorado. The movie was a bit underwhelming.
Verdict: Un-enchanting. Somehow didn't work.
This was the first time I'd ever visited this multiplex, in the mall on the south edge of Longmont, which dates from the 1960s. It's probably the oldest multiplex in northern Colorado. The movie was a bit underwhelming.
Verdict: Un-enchanting. Somehow didn't work.
Sunday, November 22, 2009
The Box
Seen at: Carmike 10 in Fort Collins, 4:20 p.m. on Nov. 10
Ugh---more aliens. That makes three alien movies in a row. Sorry to spoil it for you, by the way.
This didn't look like a movie about aliens. I thought it was going to be a government-conspiracy thriller, a Twilight Zone genre story about a young couple who receive a mysterious box, with the offer that if they press the button, they will receive a million dollars, but someone they don't know will die. It was an intriguing set-up, and for the first act, it completely worked.
I especially liked that it was a period piece, set in 1976 in suburban Virginia. I didn't expect that. I was hooked. I wanted to see where it was going.
But this movie isn't a thriller---it's science fiction. You learn this at the mid point of the movie, and then the movie just disappears down the rat hole of weird alien phenomena with CGI magic. That could have been ok, if somehow the story had wrapped it all up at the end, but it doesn't. It just gets weirder and weirder all the way to the end. We never really learn why most of it is happening. We don't get explanations. We're just supposed to be in awe of all the strange stuff, and accept it as somehow interesting. It isn't. That's not the way movies are supposed to work.
Also it has completely the wrong resolution. The gun should have had blanks in it. That's all I'm gonna say. That would have been a much better twist. The writers totally failed here.
By the end, I had totally rejected the story. What a shame. Such a fun set-up.
Verdict: a waste of a good premise.
Ugh---more aliens. That makes three alien movies in a row. Sorry to spoil it for you, by the way.
This didn't look like a movie about aliens. I thought it was going to be a government-conspiracy thriller, a Twilight Zone genre story about a young couple who receive a mysterious box, with the offer that if they press the button, they will receive a million dollars, but someone they don't know will die. It was an intriguing set-up, and for the first act, it completely worked.
I especially liked that it was a period piece, set in 1976 in suburban Virginia. I didn't expect that. I was hooked. I wanted to see where it was going.
But this movie isn't a thriller---it's science fiction. You learn this at the mid point of the movie, and then the movie just disappears down the rat hole of weird alien phenomena with CGI magic. That could have been ok, if somehow the story had wrapped it all up at the end, but it doesn't. It just gets weirder and weirder all the way to the end. We never really learn why most of it is happening. We don't get explanations. We're just supposed to be in awe of all the strange stuff, and accept it as somehow interesting. It isn't. That's not the way movies are supposed to work.
Also it has completely the wrong resolution. The gun should have had blanks in it. That's all I'm gonna say. That would have been a much better twist. The writers totally failed here.
By the end, I had totally rejected the story. What a shame. Such a fun set-up.
Verdict: a waste of a good premise.
The Fourth Kind
Seen at: Carmike 10 in Fort Collins, at 4:35 p.m. on Nov. 9
I have to admit I was intrigued by the premise of this---Blair Witch realism meets Close Encounters alien stuff. It seemed like fun original concept.
Along those lines, the movie supposedly mixes "actual footage" of interviews with people who have experienced alien abductions with fictional depictions of the same events portrayed by Hollywood actors. Again, it seems like it could be interesting.
But it isn't. It's boring. I got sick of the side-by-side real-fictional footage conceit after five minutes and wished it would go away. I just wanted to see the fictional stuff.
But above all it's boring because nothing much really happens, aside from people sitting around talking about their experiences. I picked up on the plot twist way in advance, one that brings into question the whole motivations for the psychologist who is conducting the investigation of the supposed abductions.
There should have been more fiction, less reality. There should have been more drama and action. and fewer interview footage. The "reality" conceit just made this barely watchable.
Also this may be nitpicking, but supposedly the movie was set in Nome, Alaska, where all these "real" abductions and encounters were taking place. Nome is a barren, flat place along the coast of the Bering Sea. But the movie was shot in a temperature mountainous place with lots of trees, probably the coast of British Columbia. Ordinarily this wouldn't bother me (it's Movieland, after all), but if you're going to play the "reality" card, and you want me to buy into it all, this kind of gross switcheroo doesn't just fly with me. It's all or nothing. Like I said, I would have preferred just the fiction, in any case. A good story trumps everything, and this movie didn't have one.
Verdict: yawn.
I have to admit I was intrigued by the premise of this---Blair Witch realism meets Close Encounters alien stuff. It seemed like fun original concept.
Along those lines, the movie supposedly mixes "actual footage" of interviews with people who have experienced alien abductions with fictional depictions of the same events portrayed by Hollywood actors. Again, it seems like it could be interesting.
But it isn't. It's boring. I got sick of the side-by-side real-fictional footage conceit after five minutes and wished it would go away. I just wanted to see the fictional stuff.
But above all it's boring because nothing much really happens, aside from people sitting around talking about their experiences. I picked up on the plot twist way in advance, one that brings into question the whole motivations for the psychologist who is conducting the investigation of the supposed abductions.
There should have been more fiction, less reality. There should have been more drama and action. and fewer interview footage. The "reality" conceit just made this barely watchable.
Also this may be nitpicking, but supposedly the movie was set in Nome, Alaska, where all these "real" abductions and encounters were taking place. Nome is a barren, flat place along the coast of the Bering Sea. But the movie was shot in a temperature mountainous place with lots of trees, probably the coast of British Columbia. Ordinarily this wouldn't bother me (it's Movieland, after all), but if you're going to play the "reality" card, and you want me to buy into it all, this kind of gross switcheroo doesn't just fly with me. It's all or nothing. Like I said, I would have preferred just the fiction, in any case. A good story trumps everything, and this movie didn't have one.
Verdict: yawn.
Shorts
Seen at: Lincoln Popcorn Palace in Cheyenne, Wyoming, at 7:15 pm on Nov. 4
When I first arrived back in Fort Collins last month, I spent the first week scrambling to see any movies that were about to leave theaters for good. Shorts was at the top of my list, but I just couldn't muster up the energy to chase it down on its last day playing out in Fort Morgan, which is about eighty miles distant on the Plains. Thus I resigned myself to seeing it on DVD, which I didn't figure was too big a loss, since the trailers made this kid movie seem rather chaotic and unappealing.
Imagine my delight, however, when I saw that it had reappeared a couple weeks ago, back from the dead, to play in the area. Moreover it was showing at my favorite theater in these parts---the awesome grand old Lincoln Popcorn Palace in downtown Cheyenne. What a great excuse for trip up there.
As I mentioned, I used the trip to visit the Carmike Frontier in the mall north of town to see Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant. Afterwards, I drove into downtown Cheyenne and explored the streaks a little before ducking into the LPP. It's a privilege to see a flick in an old theater like this.
As I sat in the auditorium before the start of the trailers, I thought about how the owners had obviously named it "Lincoln Popcorn Palace" in order to sell more popcorn, which along with soft drinks forms the lifeblood of revenue for theaters like this. The more I thought about it, the more I wanted some popcorn, not only because I was hungry, but because I thought it would good to support the theater that way. After all, I'd only paid three bucks for the ticket.
When I got to the counter, I discovered to my further delight that at the LPP, they take the amount of your ticket off your first popcorn purchase. Since I'd chosen a medium (four bucks), it only cost me a dollar. As if I needed a further reason to like this place!
I got another shock when the movie started. During the opening credits, I learned that it was written and directed by Robert Rodriguez. He also co-produced it, when suggested right off the bat that no one else was willing to move the ball and finance this project. Not always a good sign, for a Hollywood movie.
What to say about Rodriguez. Well, on the one hand, I have to root for the guy. He was a student of my roommate in Austin when he used a deck of VCRs to make his first version of El Mariachi as a class project.
On the other hand, an Austinite can't fool an Austinite, and Shorts seemed to me to fall into the category of Austinesque material that wasn't meant to see the light of day to the outside world, as if it were made under the influence of too many psychedelic drugs without the steadying hand of a hard-assed outside producer to keep it in line.
The title, by the way, refers to the fact that the movie is narrated by one of the boy charactes as a series of "shorts" he has made with his digital video camera about the strange goings-on in his town (actually a Hill Country subdivision outside Austin).
As a kid's movie, this is just all over the map---fragmented, chaotic, and weird-in-a-not-always good sense. Also it's very disgusting, in a "giant booger come to life" sort of way.
The story falls smack into the genre of Dysfunctional American Family stories. Like Aliens in the Attic, which came out an the same time, the family dysfunction is used as an opening for the appearance of miniature extraterrestrials. That can't be a coincidence. There is something to this cultural meme that I have to keep my eye on.
Along the lines of American dysfunction, the climax of the movie features an evil corporate boss who has turned himself into a giant Transformers-type bot. He is menacing the townspeople who are also his employees. His daughter, who has turned herself into a giant wasp, is buzzing around him, trying to sting him and stop his rampage, all the while underscored by a soundtrack of a choir chanting the name of a popular Macintosh typeface.
What a bizarre picture of America in 2009. I couldn't help wondering what the hell Gary Cooper and Cecil B. De Mille who think of this. Would they even understand it? But that's Rodriguez, I guess.
I suppose I'm glad this movie was made. It's bizarre enough to be interesting. But it's not a kid's movie. I wouldn't recommend it to my nieces and nephews---maybe to my Austin friends, but they're weird, you know.
Verdict: well...uh...it's certainly different.
When I first arrived back in Fort Collins last month, I spent the first week scrambling to see any movies that were about to leave theaters for good. Shorts was at the top of my list, but I just couldn't muster up the energy to chase it down on its last day playing out in Fort Morgan, which is about eighty miles distant on the Plains. Thus I resigned myself to seeing it on DVD, which I didn't figure was too big a loss, since the trailers made this kid movie seem rather chaotic and unappealing.
Imagine my delight, however, when I saw that it had reappeared a couple weeks ago, back from the dead, to play in the area. Moreover it was showing at my favorite theater in these parts---the awesome grand old Lincoln Popcorn Palace in downtown Cheyenne. What a great excuse for trip up there.
As I mentioned, I used the trip to visit the Carmike Frontier in the mall north of town to see Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant. Afterwards, I drove into downtown Cheyenne and explored the streaks a little before ducking into the LPP. It's a privilege to see a flick in an old theater like this.
As I sat in the auditorium before the start of the trailers, I thought about how the owners had obviously named it "Lincoln Popcorn Palace" in order to sell more popcorn, which along with soft drinks forms the lifeblood of revenue for theaters like this. The more I thought about it, the more I wanted some popcorn, not only because I was hungry, but because I thought it would good to support the theater that way. After all, I'd only paid three bucks for the ticket.
When I got to the counter, I discovered to my further delight that at the LPP, they take the amount of your ticket off your first popcorn purchase. Since I'd chosen a medium (four bucks), it only cost me a dollar. As if I needed a further reason to like this place!
I got another shock when the movie started. During the opening credits, I learned that it was written and directed by Robert Rodriguez. He also co-produced it, when suggested right off the bat that no one else was willing to move the ball and finance this project. Not always a good sign, for a Hollywood movie.
What to say about Rodriguez. Well, on the one hand, I have to root for the guy. He was a student of my roommate in Austin when he used a deck of VCRs to make his first version of El Mariachi as a class project.
On the other hand, an Austinite can't fool an Austinite, and Shorts seemed to me to fall into the category of Austinesque material that wasn't meant to see the light of day to the outside world, as if it were made under the influence of too many psychedelic drugs without the steadying hand of a hard-assed outside producer to keep it in line.
The title, by the way, refers to the fact that the movie is narrated by one of the boy charactes as a series of "shorts" he has made with his digital video camera about the strange goings-on in his town (actually a Hill Country subdivision outside Austin).
As a kid's movie, this is just all over the map---fragmented, chaotic, and weird-in-a-not-always good sense. Also it's very disgusting, in a "giant booger come to life" sort of way.
The story falls smack into the genre of Dysfunctional American Family stories. Like Aliens in the Attic, which came out an the same time, the family dysfunction is used as an opening for the appearance of miniature extraterrestrials. That can't be a coincidence. There is something to this cultural meme that I have to keep my eye on.
Along the lines of American dysfunction, the climax of the movie features an evil corporate boss who has turned himself into a giant Transformers-type bot. He is menacing the townspeople who are also his employees. His daughter, who has turned herself into a giant wasp, is buzzing around him, trying to sting him and stop his rampage, all the while underscored by a soundtrack of a choir chanting the name of a popular Macintosh typeface.
What a bizarre picture of America in 2009. I couldn't help wondering what the hell Gary Cooper and Cecil B. De Mille who think of this. Would they even understand it? But that's Rodriguez, I guess.
I suppose I'm glad this movie was made. It's bizarre enough to be interesting. But it's not a kid's movie. I wouldn't recommend it to my nieces and nephews---maybe to my Austin friends, but they're weird, you know.
Verdict: well...uh...it's certainly different.
Saturday, November 21, 2009
Cirque du Freak: the Vampire's Assistant
Seen at: Carmike Frontier 9 in Cheyenne, Wyoming, 4:15 p.m. on Nov. 4
I was already up in Cheyenne for another movie, so I decided to check out the Carmike multiplex in the Frontier Mall on the north edge of town. I like multiplexes that have entrances right inside the mall itself. I'd forgotten that Cheyenne is full of military personnel from the bases there.
It wasn't a bad little multiplex, all in all, although the walls seemed to be thin. I could hear the booming soundtrack from the movie in the auditorium next door. On the plus side, the stadium seating was much better than the traditional seating of its corporate sibling in Fort Collins.
As for the movie, it's based on a children's book that comes out of the now-familiar Harry Potter tradition of a young person being saved from their boring life and dysfunctional family by outside supernatural influences. Bah.
The story started out ok, but somehow I just got bored watching John C. Reilly as a vampire. I got bored with the teenage kid protagonist. I didn't really care what happened to them. This tends to happen to me in any story in which the plot is driven by supernatural stuff.
Moreover, it's clear that this was, of course, setting up a longer series of stories. I don't really care about it, and unless the book is tremendously popular, it doesn't work (as it didn't in the Golden Compass movie). I wouldn't be surprised if there aren't any more movies made in this series.
Update: I was also particularly offended by the needless destruction of classic old theater during the climax of this movie---perhaps a variation on my Laws of Destruction?
Verdict: enough already with the vampires, and the whole supernatural rescue of a kid stuff.
I was already up in Cheyenne for another movie, so I decided to check out the Carmike multiplex in the Frontier Mall on the north edge of town. I like multiplexes that have entrances right inside the mall itself. I'd forgotten that Cheyenne is full of military personnel from the bases there.
It wasn't a bad little multiplex, all in all, although the walls seemed to be thin. I could hear the booming soundtrack from the movie in the auditorium next door. On the plus side, the stadium seating was much better than the traditional seating of its corporate sibling in Fort Collins.
As for the movie, it's based on a children's book that comes out of the now-familiar Harry Potter tradition of a young person being saved from their boring life and dysfunctional family by outside supernatural influences. Bah.
The story started out ok, but somehow I just got bored watching John C. Reilly as a vampire. I got bored with the teenage kid protagonist. I didn't really care what happened to them. This tends to happen to me in any story in which the plot is driven by supernatural stuff.
Moreover, it's clear that this was, of course, setting up a longer series of stories. I don't really care about it, and unless the book is tremendously popular, it doesn't work (as it didn't in the Golden Compass movie). I wouldn't be surprised if there aren't any more movies made in this series.
Update: I was also particularly offended by the needless destruction of classic old theater during the climax of this movie---perhaps a variation on my Laws of Destruction?
Verdict: enough already with the vampires, and the whole supernatural rescue of a kid stuff.
Couples Retreat
Seen at: Carmike 10 in Fort Collins, 4:00 p.m. on Nov. 3
Mildly interesting story of multiple couples in a retreat in Tahiti, and how they rediscover the importance of committed relationships. Like many comedies lately, it wasn't as raunchy as I thought it was going to be from the trailers. Story gets a bit choppy towards the middle, as I couldn't really follow the thread of the overlapping bickering among the couples, and where my sympathies were supposed to lie. Yet it manages to stay coherent enough to be watchable.
Verdict: not overly offensive
Mildly interesting story of multiple couples in a retreat in Tahiti, and how they rediscover the importance of committed relationships. Like many comedies lately, it wasn't as raunchy as I thought it was going to be from the trailers. Story gets a bit choppy towards the middle, as I couldn't really follow the thread of the overlapping bickering among the couples, and where my sympathies were supposed to lie. Yet it manages to stay coherent enough to be watchable.
Verdict: not overly offensive
Capitalism: a Love Story
Seen at: the Lyric Cinema Cafe, a couple weeks ago at an afternoon matinee (Lyric doesn't give tickets)
When I walked out the Lyric after seeing this movie, my reaction was "brilliant...and braindead." The brilliant part was Moore's examination of the corruption of Wall Street. There was also some good on-the-spot documentation of people getting their homes confiscated during foreclosure.
The braindead part was when Moore actually tried to draw conclusions. According to Moore, capitalism is "evil" (actually wording). He flat out pushes Communism at us as the solution, showing us footage of Stalin while implying how foolish we were to think that this is what Communism is about.
At one point he goes to Washington, D.C. and looks at the original document of the Constitution, notices that it says "We" and "People" and concludes that it is not a capitalist document but sounds a lot "like that other ism." That pretty much sums up the depth of his thinking on this issue.
A lot of hilarious idiocy is woven through, most of it in trying to do gymnastics to defend his personal savior Obama (He-Who-Must-Be-Adored). For example, Moore goes through the list of revolving-door Wall Street cronies that filled the Bush Administration. He includes Timothy Geithner in that list, implying Geithner was a Bush appointee. But it was good old Obama who appointed Geithner. Like I said, braindead.
At one point, he implies that the entire prosperity of post World War II America was because we had bombed our competition into the ground. Then later he implies it was because of strong unions, and we need to get back to that. Which is it, Michael?
We are told profit is evil, and shown the solution: a bread factory in California where the workers are the owners. We are told that profit motive is now banished in decision making. I nearly fell out of my chair. That's capitalism, Michael, staring you right in the face!
Moore is not about logical arugmentation, but about feeling. All solutions are about how they sound and feel. And this leads us right to the end, where he asserts that everything would have been perfect if we had just adopted FDR's Second Bill of Rights which basically makes poverty Unconstitutional. The solution was easy all along! I was surrounded by middle-aged and elderly liberals in the audience who were weeping and clapping as FDR appeared on screen at the end. Then the credits roll while we hear a Vegas nightclub version of the Communist Internationale hymn.
I know Moore doesn't give a damn if his arguments make logical sense. He's going to make lots of evil profit off this movie that will give him a chance to make more movies. The problem is that I do indeed care that arguments make logical sense. To anyone who does, Moore's movie will be utterly infuriating, mostly because people are actually listening to him.
As the emoting liberals left the theater, leaving me alone in the auditorium, I sat with my bad containing the copy of The Gulag Archipelago I was reading. If you want to read about people getting their homes confiscated, as well as tortured, and killed by the system by the millions, it's a good read.
Verdict: hypocritical and illogical.
When I walked out the Lyric after seeing this movie, my reaction was "brilliant...and braindead." The brilliant part was Moore's examination of the corruption of Wall Street. There was also some good on-the-spot documentation of people getting their homes confiscated during foreclosure.
The braindead part was when Moore actually tried to draw conclusions. According to Moore, capitalism is "evil" (actually wording). He flat out pushes Communism at us as the solution, showing us footage of Stalin while implying how foolish we were to think that this is what Communism is about.
At one point he goes to Washington, D.C. and looks at the original document of the Constitution, notices that it says "We" and "People" and concludes that it is not a capitalist document but sounds a lot "like that other ism." That pretty much sums up the depth of his thinking on this issue.
A lot of hilarious idiocy is woven through, most of it in trying to do gymnastics to defend his personal savior Obama (He-Who-Must-Be-Adored). For example, Moore goes through the list of revolving-door Wall Street cronies that filled the Bush Administration. He includes Timothy Geithner in that list, implying Geithner was a Bush appointee. But it was good old Obama who appointed Geithner. Like I said, braindead.
At one point, he implies that the entire prosperity of post World War II America was because we had bombed our competition into the ground. Then later he implies it was because of strong unions, and we need to get back to that. Which is it, Michael?
We are told profit is evil, and shown the solution: a bread factory in California where the workers are the owners. We are told that profit motive is now banished in decision making. I nearly fell out of my chair. That's capitalism, Michael, staring you right in the face!
Moore is not about logical arugmentation, but about feeling. All solutions are about how they sound and feel. And this leads us right to the end, where he asserts that everything would have been perfect if we had just adopted FDR's Second Bill of Rights which basically makes poverty Unconstitutional. The solution was easy all along! I was surrounded by middle-aged and elderly liberals in the audience who were weeping and clapping as FDR appeared on screen at the end. Then the credits roll while we hear a Vegas nightclub version of the Communist Internationale hymn.
I know Moore doesn't give a damn if his arguments make logical sense. He's going to make lots of evil profit off this movie that will give him a chance to make more movies. The problem is that I do indeed care that arguments make logical sense. To anyone who does, Moore's movie will be utterly infuriating, mostly because people are actually listening to him.
As the emoting liberals left the theater, leaving me alone in the auditorium, I sat with my bad containing the copy of The Gulag Archipelago I was reading. If you want to read about people getting their homes confiscated, as well as tortured, and killed by the system by the millions, it's a good read.
Verdict: hypocritical and illogical.
The Informant!
Seen at: Cinema Saver 6 in Ft. Collins, 8:45 p.m. on Nov. 2
This movie is really two movies. The first half is about a guy who works as an executive at Archer Daniels Midland and who after discovering high-level corporate corruption, and decides to expose it. The second half is about...uh...well, something else.
In any case, I'm not sure what this movie was really supposed to be saying in the end. It felt very confusing, and not in a good way. Perhaps it was just too clever for me.
Also, I couldn't help noticing that although the movie was set in the early 1990s, the art direction and costumes seemed to recall the 1970s. It felt anachronistic. Perhaps that was part of the cleverness of the movie that went over my head.
Verdict: entertaining at times, but a bit...off.
This movie is really two movies. The first half is about a guy who works as an executive at Archer Daniels Midland and who after discovering high-level corporate corruption, and decides to expose it. The second half is about...uh...well, something else.
In any case, I'm not sure what this movie was really supposed to be saying in the end. It felt very confusing, and not in a good way. Perhaps it was just too clever for me.
Also, I couldn't help noticing that although the movie was set in the early 1990s, the art direction and costumes seemed to recall the 1970s. It felt anachronistic. Perhaps that was part of the cleverness of the movie that went over my head.
Verdict: entertaining at times, but a bit...off.
Law-Abiding Citizen
Seen at: Cinemark 16 in Ft. Collins 11:55 a.m. on Nov. 2
At times this felt like a decent movie with a few clever plot twists, but at other times it felt like an amped-up ripoff of Silence of the Lambs (including a scene where I guy in prison orders a full meal and then kills someone in the cell with him!).
My main impression, however, is that it is utter straightforward propaganda for the Police State. The moral seems to be that the law is for suckers, and if the police are going to get anything done, they need to do what needs to be done, and screw the law.
The most vivid scene in this regard is one in which the Mayor of Philadelphia is swearing in the protagonist (Jamie Foxx) as the new District Attorney. He has his hand on the Bible and is affirming that he will uphold the Constitution. In the very next scenes the Mayor declares martial law and a complete "lockdown" of the city, and the DA protagonist is busting into private property while saying "Screw his civil rights." That's Postmodernity in a nutshell to me, at least at is applies to the law.
Verdict: barf.
At times this felt like a decent movie with a few clever plot twists, but at other times it felt like an amped-up ripoff of Silence of the Lambs (including a scene where I guy in prison orders a full meal and then kills someone in the cell with him!).
My main impression, however, is that it is utter straightforward propaganda for the Police State. The moral seems to be that the law is for suckers, and if the police are going to get anything done, they need to do what needs to be done, and screw the law.
The most vivid scene in this regard is one in which the Mayor of Philadelphia is swearing in the protagonist (Jamie Foxx) as the new District Attorney. He has his hand on the Bible and is affirming that he will uphold the Constitution. In the very next scenes the Mayor declares martial law and a complete "lockdown" of the city, and the DA protagonist is busting into private property while saying "Screw his civil rights." That's Postmodernity in a nutshell to me, at least at is applies to the law.
Verdict: barf.
Friday, November 20, 2009
Surrogates
Seen at: Cinema Saver 6 in Fort Collins, at 9:30 p.m. on Nov. 1
One can't help noticing that often Hollywood movies come out in pairs---i.e. two or more films released near to each other with nearly the same premises. Such was the case this fall with Gamer and Surrogates, both of which involve the use of human beings controlling avatars. In fact, Avatar in December will make it a triple.
I saw Gamer in Memphis and loved it---one of those quiet movies that will fly under the radar and remain in the public memory for a long time. I was not surprised that it stuck around in theaters for a while. Surrogates, on the other hand, got tepid reviews. It came and went quickly from the first run multiplexes, and wound up in the cheapo second run theater in Ft. Collins after only a few weeks.
Imagine my surprise when I wound up liking it---a lot. First off, it has a slightly different premise than Gamer, where people control other humans as avatars. In Surrogates, the humans control android avatars. The movie is set in a dystopian future in which everyone stays indoors almost permanently, and does all outside activity thorugh their robot avatars.
O.K., this isn't a masterpiece, but it had fun original concept and a story that kept me interested all the way through. There are some goofy scenes here and there, but I cared about the characters. There's even an anti-eugenics message in it, as the bad guy basically hates human beings and want to sterilize the Earth. What's not to like here?
Verdict: Unexpectedly fun as sci-fi. One of those "bad" movies that is actually quite watchable.
One can't help noticing that often Hollywood movies come out in pairs---i.e. two or more films released near to each other with nearly the same premises. Such was the case this fall with Gamer and Surrogates, both of which involve the use of human beings controlling avatars. In fact, Avatar in December will make it a triple.
I saw Gamer in Memphis and loved it---one of those quiet movies that will fly under the radar and remain in the public memory for a long time. I was not surprised that it stuck around in theaters for a while. Surrogates, on the other hand, got tepid reviews. It came and went quickly from the first run multiplexes, and wound up in the cheapo second run theater in Ft. Collins after only a few weeks.
Imagine my surprise when I wound up liking it---a lot. First off, it has a slightly different premise than Gamer, where people control other humans as avatars. In Surrogates, the humans control android avatars. The movie is set in a dystopian future in which everyone stays indoors almost permanently, and does all outside activity thorugh their robot avatars.
O.K., this isn't a masterpiece, but it had fun original concept and a story that kept me interested all the way through. There are some goofy scenes here and there, but I cared about the characters. There's even an anti-eugenics message in it, as the bad guy basically hates human beings and want to sterilize the Earth. What's not to like here?
Verdict: Unexpectedly fun as sci-fi. One of those "bad" movies that is actually quite watchable.
The Stepfather
Seen at: Carmike 10 in Fort Collins, 1:15 pm on Nov. 1.
It was interesting contemporary premise---a psychopathic serial killer who continually remarries women with children, and then murders the family, moving on to the next one.
Began badly, with an assault on Christmas in the first scene. Hollywood hates Christmas, of course, as I've mentioned, and takes every opportunity to show how dysfunctional it all is. Peace on Earth is for suckas.
Story held up fairly well, but I grew enraged at the overt predictive programming telling us that anyone who uses cash instead of electronic transactions is to be feared. This was released by Sony Screen Gems, which I've noticed in the past is very much on board with pushing the idea in its movies that we should surrender to the electronic control grid for our own safety and security (specifically in last year's Untraceable, which curiously enough was also set largely in a basement in Portland ,Oregon). The moral of this movie: if only we'd let the police track our every move, none of these dreadful things would happen to us!
Also the story gets a little wild the end and lacks the appropriate Hitchcockian emotional release. I could overlook that, if it weren't for the overtly totalitarian messages being thrown at me.
Verdict: Could have been half-way decent, but ruined by embedded Fascism.
It was interesting contemporary premise---a psychopathic serial killer who continually remarries women with children, and then murders the family, moving on to the next one.
Began badly, with an assault on Christmas in the first scene. Hollywood hates Christmas, of course, as I've mentioned, and takes every opportunity to show how dysfunctional it all is. Peace on Earth is for suckas.
Story held up fairly well, but I grew enraged at the overt predictive programming telling us that anyone who uses cash instead of electronic transactions is to be feared. This was released by Sony Screen Gems, which I've noticed in the past is very much on board with pushing the idea in its movies that we should surrender to the electronic control grid for our own safety and security (specifically in last year's Untraceable, which curiously enough was also set largely in a basement in Portland ,Oregon). The moral of this movie: if only we'd let the police track our every move, none of these dreadful things would happen to us!
Also the story gets a little wild the end and lacks the appropriate Hitchcockian emotional release. I could overlook that, if it weren't for the overtly totalitarian messages being thrown at me.
Verdict: Could have been half-way decent, but ruined by embedded Fascism.
Paranormal Activity
Seen at: Carmike 10 in Fort Collins, 10 pm on Oct. 28.
(Note: I've fallen so far behind in write-ups, I've just decided to shot-fun them all with short comments)
What a disappointment. From the hype, you'd think this was something interesting and novel in the horror genre---sort of Blair Witch Project type "reality" ghost story set in a condo. It starts out that way, and then it just degenerates, mostly because the film makers violate the "don't show too much" rule of horror. When the Ouija Board caught on fire, I just burst out laughing. By showing too much actual "activity" of the supernatural (caught on tape!), it just looks silly.
It's too bad, because the psychological basis of the horror was interesting. It's about a young unmarried couple. The "ghost" is basically a manifestation of the rage that the young feels towards her goofy forever-adolescent Postmodern boyfriend who wants to play with his toys instead of facing up to his adult responsibilities (by marrying her). He makes the situation worse at every turn, and the "ghost" gets angrier along with the woman.
If only they had played it a little more close to the vest, it would have worked. Last shot of the movie dreadfully stupid use of CGI. Too bad.
Verdict: Good premise for horror, and almost worked, but ruined with too much goofy supernatural.
(Note: I've fallen so far behind in write-ups, I've just decided to shot-fun them all with short comments)
What a disappointment. From the hype, you'd think this was something interesting and novel in the horror genre---sort of Blair Witch Project type "reality" ghost story set in a condo. It starts out that way, and then it just degenerates, mostly because the film makers violate the "don't show too much" rule of horror. When the Ouija Board caught on fire, I just burst out laughing. By showing too much actual "activity" of the supernatural (caught on tape!), it just looks silly.
It's too bad, because the psychological basis of the horror was interesting. It's about a young unmarried couple. The "ghost" is basically a manifestation of the rage that the young feels towards her goofy forever-adolescent Postmodern boyfriend who wants to play with his toys instead of facing up to his adult responsibilities (by marrying her). He makes the situation worse at every turn, and the "ghost" gets angrier along with the woman.
If only they had played it a little more close to the vest, it would have worked. Last shot of the movie dreadfully stupid use of CGI. Too bad.
Verdict: Good premise for horror, and almost worked, but ruined with too much goofy supernatural.
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Jennifer's Body
Seen at: Elvis Arvada 8, evening of Oct. 27.
It was interesting to see this movie later in the day after Tyler Perry's latest movie, because both had a lot to do with contemporary spirituality. Whereas I Can Do Bad All By Myself was partly about the struggle to incorporate Christianity into modern life, in particular among the urban black community, Jennifer's Body focused on the prevalence of Satanism in small town and suburban white America, at least as Hollywood sees it.
Satanism, you say? Really? Well, yes, Satanism has indeed become the dominant religion of America as depicted in the mirror that Hollywood wants to hold up to us (whether it's true or not is a different story). Many people think our national "movie world" religion is bland agnosticism coated with Christian tradition (like Christmas trees, etc.), but this is false and I can prove it.
In the eyes of Hollywood (outside of a few film makers like Perry), Christianity is utterly dead. No one except religious freaks believes in Jesus anymore, and they are given no quarter in mainstream Hollywood. But what we should believe in, according to Hollywood, is every story about demons rising from hell and taking possession of people. We must believe in every occult legend about paranormal evil spiritual power wreaking havoc in our lives. A quick survey of the recent horror movies will prove my point.
This, my friends, is exactly what Satanism is about---the belief in the dominance of evil spirtual forces in the material world and the impotence of any prevailing idea of good.
Jennifer's Body tackles this head on in the first scene. The heroine, a high school girl, is locked inside a mental institution. We will soon go back in time to find out how she got there, but before we do, in her opening lines, she explicitly denies the power of Jesus to help her. Above all, this is a movie about hopelessness.
I really expected to hate this movie walking into, but I was suprised at how much I enjoyed most it. The story was different that I expected,not your run-of-the-mill horror cliches. I didn't realize unitl the end that is was written by Diablo Cody, the ex-stripper who won and Academy Award for her original screenplay of Juno.
But Juno is light-hearted and life-affirming. Jennifer's Body is very dark, and it just keeps getting darker all the way through. On the surface, there is nothing wrong with such darkness on screen, but the story just takes us to places that really made me wonder about the sanity and intentions of those who made this.
Basically in the final minutes, and over the closing credits, the story puts the viewer in sympathy with a psychotic killer who commits a ritual mass satantic killing in a hotel room. We are supposed to be on her side, because it is righteous revenge.
This is exactly the natural and logical culmination of the Satanist instinct---the moral justification of mass murder out of sense that the victims deserved it in some unforgivable way.
On bright side---and I can't believe I'm saying this---I actually enjoyed the performance of Megan Fox. She and Cody should work together more often. For once, I thought Fox was well cast and turned in a decent performance. Her character turns out to be much more sympathetic than you'd expect from the trailer---as much a victim as anyone else. This facet of the story is probably what kept it interesting, and from being swallowed completely by the darkness.
Speaking of darkness, I almost got swallowed up by it myself on the way home from Arvada, in the weirdest freakiest early season snowfall ever in Colorado. The only thing that kept me from running off the road were the tail lights of the cars in front of me. Thank you, Jesus!
Verdict: more interesting than I thought it would be, but extremely dark.
It was interesting to see this movie later in the day after Tyler Perry's latest movie, because both had a lot to do with contemporary spirituality. Whereas I Can Do Bad All By Myself was partly about the struggle to incorporate Christianity into modern life, in particular among the urban black community, Jennifer's Body focused on the prevalence of Satanism in small town and suburban white America, at least as Hollywood sees it.
Satanism, you say? Really? Well, yes, Satanism has indeed become the dominant religion of America as depicted in the mirror that Hollywood wants to hold up to us (whether it's true or not is a different story). Many people think our national "movie world" religion is bland agnosticism coated with Christian tradition (like Christmas trees, etc.), but this is false and I can prove it.
In the eyes of Hollywood (outside of a few film makers like Perry), Christianity is utterly dead. No one except religious freaks believes in Jesus anymore, and they are given no quarter in mainstream Hollywood. But what we should believe in, according to Hollywood, is every story about demons rising from hell and taking possession of people. We must believe in every occult legend about paranormal evil spiritual power wreaking havoc in our lives. A quick survey of the recent horror movies will prove my point.
This, my friends, is exactly what Satanism is about---the belief in the dominance of evil spirtual forces in the material world and the impotence of any prevailing idea of good.
Jennifer's Body tackles this head on in the first scene. The heroine, a high school girl, is locked inside a mental institution. We will soon go back in time to find out how she got there, but before we do, in her opening lines, she explicitly denies the power of Jesus to help her. Above all, this is a movie about hopelessness.
I really expected to hate this movie walking into, but I was suprised at how much I enjoyed most it. The story was different that I expected,not your run-of-the-mill horror cliches. I didn't realize unitl the end that is was written by Diablo Cody, the ex-stripper who won and Academy Award for her original screenplay of Juno.
But Juno is light-hearted and life-affirming. Jennifer's Body is very dark, and it just keeps getting darker all the way through. On the surface, there is nothing wrong with such darkness on screen, but the story just takes us to places that really made me wonder about the sanity and intentions of those who made this.
Basically in the final minutes, and over the closing credits, the story puts the viewer in sympathy with a psychotic killer who commits a ritual mass satantic killing in a hotel room. We are supposed to be on her side, because it is righteous revenge.
This is exactly the natural and logical culmination of the Satanist instinct---the moral justification of mass murder out of sense that the victims deserved it in some unforgivable way.
On bright side---and I can't believe I'm saying this---I actually enjoyed the performance of Megan Fox. She and Cody should work together more often. For once, I thought Fox was well cast and turned in a decent performance. Her character turns out to be much more sympathetic than you'd expect from the trailer---as much a victim as anyone else. This facet of the story is probably what kept it interesting, and from being swallowed completely by the darkness.
Speaking of darkness, I almost got swallowed up by it myself on the way home from Arvada, in the weirdest freakiest early season snowfall ever in Colorado. The only thing that kept me from running off the road were the tail lights of the cars in front of me. Thank you, Jesus!
Verdict: more interesting than I thought it would be, but extremely dark.
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Tyler Perry's I Can Do Bad All By Myself
Seen at: Century 12, in Aurora, late morning on Oct. 27
Tyler Perry is a national treasure. I didn't used to think that, because I didn't really get his movies. It seemed annoying that he came out with a movie every six months and put his name on the front of every title.
But he deserves to put his name there. He creates lucid and compelling stories on screen with lucid camera work . He shares well-drawn and interesting characters with us. He addresses issues of personality morality in an innovative fashion.
Perry is probably the most Classical director in Hollywood right now. From a Hollywood standpoint, perhaps the most exceptional part of his stories is that he can address the theme of spirituality in contemporary life, and draw upon the good parts of Christianity, without covering it all in the sauce of too much base-level irony.
That he can do this is in large part because of the character Madea, the sexagenarian woman whom he plays in drag. It's an absurd concept, but I've decided it works, at least for me. I take back what I said about it not working, because it does.
I got the pleasure of seeing it with a primarily Africa-American audience in Aurora, near the mall off the interstate, on a late morning, mostly among couples and older folk. There were about fifty people in the audience, a good crowd for that time of day. Most of them seem to like it a lot, and I learned some things about black culture from the jokes they laughed it.
Perry is excellent at evoking true Aristotlean pathos. Seeing his movies puts me in a good state, in a heightened appreciation of the world, and of other people. I like life better, after I see his movies. That's the power of art, in a nutshell.
Maybe I'll even like the next Woody Allen movie. Who knows? I'm game to try.
Verdict: one of my favorite movies of the year, without a doubt.
Tyler Perry is a national treasure. I didn't used to think that, because I didn't really get his movies. It seemed annoying that he came out with a movie every six months and put his name on the front of every title.
But he deserves to put his name there. He creates lucid and compelling stories on screen with lucid camera work . He shares well-drawn and interesting characters with us. He addresses issues of personality morality in an innovative fashion.
Perry is probably the most Classical director in Hollywood right now. From a Hollywood standpoint, perhaps the most exceptional part of his stories is that he can address the theme of spirituality in contemporary life, and draw upon the good parts of Christianity, without covering it all in the sauce of too much base-level irony.
That he can do this is in large part because of the character Madea, the sexagenarian woman whom he plays in drag. It's an absurd concept, but I've decided it works, at least for me. I take back what I said about it not working, because it does.
I got the pleasure of seeing it with a primarily Africa-American audience in Aurora, near the mall off the interstate, on a late morning, mostly among couples and older folk. There were about fifty people in the audience, a good crowd for that time of day. Most of them seem to like it a lot, and I learned some things about black culture from the jokes they laughed it.
Perry is excellent at evoking true Aristotlean pathos. Seeing his movies puts me in a good state, in a heightened appreciation of the world, and of other people. I like life better, after I see his movies. That's the power of art, in a nutshell.
Maybe I'll even like the next Woody Allen movie. Who knows? I'm game to try.
Verdict: one of my favorite movies of the year, without a doubt.
Whatever Works
seen at: Chez Sanyo, via Redbox, two weeks ago.
One of the movies I missed while I was in Europe was Woody Allen's latest, Whatever Works, which he made from a script he wrote in the late 1960's, but which the studios passed on. I can barely describe how much this movie disgusted me.
There are some good things about this movie, specifically the casting and the acting by Larry David and Evan Rachel Wood, one of my favorite young actresses. But that's about it. Everything else about his movie repulsed me.
It's the story of a miserable and nihilistic physicist in Manhattan who makes it his purpose in life to bring as many other people into his misery as possible, and thereby "save" them. Simply put, this is a hate letter to America. Everyone would be better off if they came to New York and embraced their sexual deviancy and homosexuality, and coverted to Judaism. It's as if Allen saw the success of Sasha Baron Cohen's movies and said, "Hey, I can do that. In fact, I did. Let me dust off that old script."
It combines the absurd naivte of the 1960s cutlure with the toilet-bowl mentality of today's Hollywood. There is no irony. Nihilism is better. America outside of Manhattan sucks--a virulently anti-Semitic wasteland that deserves no sympathy.
Verdict: a pefect insight into the Postmodern mentality. An all-time low for Allen, and a perfect x-ray of his dysfunction. I felt sorry for David and Wood for being in this.
One of the movies I missed while I was in Europe was Woody Allen's latest, Whatever Works, which he made from a script he wrote in the late 1960's, but which the studios passed on. I can barely describe how much this movie disgusted me.
There are some good things about this movie, specifically the casting and the acting by Larry David and Evan Rachel Wood, one of my favorite young actresses. But that's about it. Everything else about his movie repulsed me.
It's the story of a miserable and nihilistic physicist in Manhattan who makes it his purpose in life to bring as many other people into his misery as possible, and thereby "save" them. Simply put, this is a hate letter to America. Everyone would be better off if they came to New York and embraced their sexual deviancy and homosexuality, and coverted to Judaism. It's as if Allen saw the success of Sasha Baron Cohen's movies and said, "Hey, I can do that. In fact, I did. Let me dust off that old script."
It combines the absurd naivte of the 1960s cutlure with the toilet-bowl mentality of today's Hollywood. There is no irony. Nihilism is better. America outside of Manhattan sucks--a virulently anti-Semitic wasteland that deserves no sympathy.
Verdict: a pefect insight into the Postmodern mentality. An all-time low for Allen, and a perfect x-ray of his dysfunction. I felt sorry for David and Wood for being in this.
Monday, November 2, 2009
Closer (2004)
Seen at: Chez Sanyo, last week
Now that I have Netflix again for the first time since starting this blog, I'm wondering if I'll wind up writing up an entry on every DVD movie I see. Probably not, I suppose, since it would bog me down further than I already am. So I'll play it by ear for the time being.
That being said, I felt like I needed to write up something about Closer, which I saw last week at home. Like Dial M for Murder, it was suggested to me strongly by my friend Tiffany as one of her favorite movies. But whereas the Hitchcock movie is a masterpiece, I found Closer to be one of the least appealing movies I've seen recently.
Closer was directed by Mike Nichols, one of the finest auteurs of our era, and one I admire greatly. Among his early films is The Graduate (1967), which of course everyone loves, as well as Working Girl (1988), which is one of personal all-time favorites. But Closer was just a piece of dung, in my opinion.
The story is set in London and surrounds the painful and everchanging romantic interweaving of four people---two American women and two British men. The characters were unappealing and flopped around in emotional self-indulgence and self-pity without any redemption. The men, of course, are particularly dishonorable and unable to control their impulses and emotions in any way.
Among other things, the movie makes the familiar equation of "not lying" with "being obsessively candid," especially in regard to sexuality (see my write-up of The Invention of Lying).
Moreover, the men in the movie are obsessed with the sexual histories of the women. One of the received pieces of wisdom in Classical cinema was that women should be in control of their sexual past. It was part of the concept of female honor, as it was defined then. In the Classical view, no good is ever accomplished by forcing a woman to reveal her sexual history. A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) is one of the best examples of this from the Classical era: Stanley destroys Blanche by forcing her to confront the "truth" about herself.
But whereas Tennessee Williams was conscious of the principle that a man should accept the polite fiction that a woman is allowed to present herself as a "blank slate," Postmodernity demands that we all be obsessively candid, and that requiring a thorough confession of one's sexual partner is always a righteous thing to do.
Or at least that's the impression I got from Closer, that "this is how things are," without offering any insight beyond this cultural illness. Another way of saying this is that whereas A Streetcar Named Desire is a true tragedy, Closer just wallows in a bestial semi-enlightened muck.
Perhaps what really turned me off to this film is how much it was transparently a stage play in a very clumsy way. If you read my write-up for Dial M for Murder, you might find this ironic, but in every scene of this movie I could see the dialog typed up on the page. I could see the actors "acting" their hearts out. And this from Mike Nichols?
I can't believe this was nominated for Oscars, especially in 2004, which was a decent year.
Well, Tiffany, on my count, you're one for two.
Verdict: Yecch.
Now that I have Netflix again for the first time since starting this blog, I'm wondering if I'll wind up writing up an entry on every DVD movie I see. Probably not, I suppose, since it would bog me down further than I already am. So I'll play it by ear for the time being.
That being said, I felt like I needed to write up something about Closer, which I saw last week at home. Like Dial M for Murder, it was suggested to me strongly by my friend Tiffany as one of her favorite movies. But whereas the Hitchcock movie is a masterpiece, I found Closer to be one of the least appealing movies I've seen recently.
Closer was directed by Mike Nichols, one of the finest auteurs of our era, and one I admire greatly. Among his early films is The Graduate (1967), which of course everyone loves, as well as Working Girl (1988), which is one of personal all-time favorites. But Closer was just a piece of dung, in my opinion.
The story is set in London and surrounds the painful and everchanging romantic interweaving of four people---two American women and two British men. The characters were unappealing and flopped around in emotional self-indulgence and self-pity without any redemption. The men, of course, are particularly dishonorable and unable to control their impulses and emotions in any way.
Among other things, the movie makes the familiar equation of "not lying" with "being obsessively candid," especially in regard to sexuality (see my write-up of The Invention of Lying).
Moreover, the men in the movie are obsessed with the sexual histories of the women. One of the received pieces of wisdom in Classical cinema was that women should be in control of their sexual past. It was part of the concept of female honor, as it was defined then. In the Classical view, no good is ever accomplished by forcing a woman to reveal her sexual history. A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) is one of the best examples of this from the Classical era: Stanley destroys Blanche by forcing her to confront the "truth" about herself.
But whereas Tennessee Williams was conscious of the principle that a man should accept the polite fiction that a woman is allowed to present herself as a "blank slate," Postmodernity demands that we all be obsessively candid, and that requiring a thorough confession of one's sexual partner is always a righteous thing to do.
Or at least that's the impression I got from Closer, that "this is how things are," without offering any insight beyond this cultural illness. Another way of saying this is that whereas A Streetcar Named Desire is a true tragedy, Closer just wallows in a bestial semi-enlightened muck.
Perhaps what really turned me off to this film is how much it was transparently a stage play in a very clumsy way. If you read my write-up for Dial M for Murder, you might find this ironic, but in every scene of this movie I could see the dialog typed up on the page. I could see the actors "acting" their hearts out. And this from Mike Nichols?
I can't believe this was nominated for Oscars, especially in 2004, which was a decent year.
Well, Tiffany, on my count, you're one for two.
Verdict: Yecch.
Sunday, November 1, 2009
Dial M for Murder (1954)
Seen at: Chez Sanyo, last week
A couple weeks ago, sitting around in a bar with some high school classmates, the subject of movies came up, and we began to compare opinions about contemporary and classic films.
One of my classmates, John R., who worked with me way-back-when on the high school newspaper, said he found contemporary films more enjoyable partly because of the acting. He said that acting in old films looked less natural, probably because actors back then were more influenced by stage acting.
It's an opinion I've heard several times before about classic films. I explained why I disagreed with it.
"Modern 'naturalistic' was invented very early in movie history," I said, "By 1915 Lillian Gish had fairly well mastered the modern cinematic style, as fluidly as, say, Robert De Niro today. What you're seeing in old films is not stage acting, but the fact that fifty years ago, people were actually different. They talked differently. They stood, walked, and held their bodies differently. They had a different vocabulary of gestures and facial expressions."
Last week I thought again about this very subject while watching Dial M for Murder at home. "Chez Sanyo" is what I call my home DVD setup, since Sanyo is the brand of both my DVD player and my television.
I had reactivated Netflix two weeks ago, after the long hiatus of my road trip. Dial M for Murder was the very first movie I put in my queue, for several reasons, one being that my friend Tiffany had insisted I see it. It was one of her favorite movies, and she had repeatedly pestered me about it, making this movie buff feel somewhat embarrassed that he had not yet seen it.
Moreover, the iconic scissors scene with Grace Kelly is one of the clips featured in Turner Classic Movie's 100 Years at the Movies montage (at about the 5:40 mark). I've tried to make a point of identifying and seeing all the movies in it, including the Edison silent shorts at the beginning. There are only a few movies featured in that are left for me to see.
One of the things that struck me while watching the film was how much one could tell that this was an actual film from the 1950s, instead of a film made today and set in the 1950s. First off, the way the clothes fit on the bodies of the actors is just plain different. Somehow the costume makers of today can make clothes that look like clothes back then, but they can't tailor them the same way, for some reason.
Moreover, there is that now-foreign syntax of facial expressions, a vernacular that is no longer current but is part of the past. Actors today use the syntax of today to convey emotions and thoughts that are readily identifiable to today's audiences. But it is not the same syntax as fifty years ago.
But maybe my friend John was correct. After all, it was more common in the Classical era to adapt hit Broadway plays as motion pictures. Perhaps there was something to this argument that acting back then was closer to stage acting.
So I asked myself: were the actors in this movie acting as if on stage? I pondered this while I got absorbed into the narrative. Cripes, Ray Milland is fantastic. I'd already known that. But this movie finally convinced me beyond a doubt that Grace Kelly is a great actress as well.
By the end of the movie, I could see no dominance of stage acting, anymore than one would see in a movie today. It thus wound up confirming my previously held opinion.
But the joke was on me. After watching the film itself, I started going through the DVD extras. There was a short feature on the history and making of the film, from which I learned a few surprising things.
For example, I learned that when this movie was made (1954), 3-D movies were all the rage (as they are today), and Hitchcock actually had to shoot this in 3-D (there are a couple give-away shots, such as when Ray Milland holds up a key to the camera). The movie is rarely screened in 3-D today, but I would love love love to see it in a theater that way.
But the most surprising thing to learn about this movie was that not only was it based on a stage play, but Hitchcock essentially shot it as a stage play with hardly any modification. This blew me away. In most cases, you can tell when a classic movie is based on a stage play, but this just went right by me, mostly because of the way Hitchcock uses the camera. In fact almost all the action is confined to a single room, just as it was originally on stage.
Yet for all that, I had not thought I was witnessing "stage acting." Gosh, I love Classic cinema.
Verdict: A masterpiece, of course---even in 2-D.
A couple weeks ago, sitting around in a bar with some high school classmates, the subject of movies came up, and we began to compare opinions about contemporary and classic films.
One of my classmates, John R., who worked with me way-back-when on the high school newspaper, said he found contemporary films more enjoyable partly because of the acting. He said that acting in old films looked less natural, probably because actors back then were more influenced by stage acting.
It's an opinion I've heard several times before about classic films. I explained why I disagreed with it.
"Modern 'naturalistic' was invented very early in movie history," I said, "By 1915 Lillian Gish had fairly well mastered the modern cinematic style, as fluidly as, say, Robert De Niro today. What you're seeing in old films is not stage acting, but the fact that fifty years ago, people were actually different. They talked differently. They stood, walked, and held their bodies differently. They had a different vocabulary of gestures and facial expressions."
Last week I thought again about this very subject while watching Dial M for Murder at home. "Chez Sanyo" is what I call my home DVD setup, since Sanyo is the brand of both my DVD player and my television.
I had reactivated Netflix two weeks ago, after the long hiatus of my road trip. Dial M for Murder was the very first movie I put in my queue, for several reasons, one being that my friend Tiffany had insisted I see it. It was one of her favorite movies, and she had repeatedly pestered me about it, making this movie buff feel somewhat embarrassed that he had not yet seen it.
Moreover, the iconic scissors scene with Grace Kelly is one of the clips featured in Turner Classic Movie's 100 Years at the Movies montage (at about the 5:40 mark). I've tried to make a point of identifying and seeing all the movies in it, including the Edison silent shorts at the beginning. There are only a few movies featured in that are left for me to see.
One of the things that struck me while watching the film was how much one could tell that this was an actual film from the 1950s, instead of a film made today and set in the 1950s. First off, the way the clothes fit on the bodies of the actors is just plain different. Somehow the costume makers of today can make clothes that look like clothes back then, but they can't tailor them the same way, for some reason.
Moreover, there is that now-foreign syntax of facial expressions, a vernacular that is no longer current but is part of the past. Actors today use the syntax of today to convey emotions and thoughts that are readily identifiable to today's audiences. But it is not the same syntax as fifty years ago.
But maybe my friend John was correct. After all, it was more common in the Classical era to adapt hit Broadway plays as motion pictures. Perhaps there was something to this argument that acting back then was closer to stage acting.
So I asked myself: were the actors in this movie acting as if on stage? I pondered this while I got absorbed into the narrative. Cripes, Ray Milland is fantastic. I'd already known that. But this movie finally convinced me beyond a doubt that Grace Kelly is a great actress as well.
By the end of the movie, I could see no dominance of stage acting, anymore than one would see in a movie today. It thus wound up confirming my previously held opinion.
But the joke was on me. After watching the film itself, I started going through the DVD extras. There was a short feature on the history and making of the film, from which I learned a few surprising things.
For example, I learned that when this movie was made (1954), 3-D movies were all the rage (as they are today), and Hitchcock actually had to shoot this in 3-D (there are a couple give-away shots, such as when Ray Milland holds up a key to the camera). The movie is rarely screened in 3-D today, but I would love love love to see it in a theater that way.
But the most surprising thing to learn about this movie was that not only was it based on a stage play, but Hitchcock essentially shot it as a stage play with hardly any modification. This blew me away. In most cases, you can tell when a classic movie is based on a stage play, but this just went right by me, mostly because of the way Hitchcock uses the camera. In fact almost all the action is confined to a single room, just as it was originally on stage.
Yet for all that, I had not thought I was witnessing "stage acting." Gosh, I love Classic cinema.
Verdict: A masterpiece, of course---even in 2-D.
The Invention of Lying
Seen at: Cinemark 16, Fort Collins, CO on Mon. Oct. 26
From the trailers, I knew that The Invention of Lying was one of the those movies that I was definitely not going to pay full price for, so I schlepped out of the house on Monday morning to catch the very first pre-noon show at the Cinemark 16, which is about three miles from where I type this.
Ten minutes into this movie, I knew it was going to be a disaster, so much so that my jaw was hanging open from what I was seeing.
First, a little background, in case you didn't see the trailer. This movie is supposedly set in a fictional world in which lying has never been invented. There isn't even a word for lying, and people have no concept of it. The story follows a hapless man named Mark (Ricky Gervais) who one day discovers how to tell lies. This changes his whole life, and eventually the world. Much of the narrative is driven by a romance, namely Mark's pursuit of the beautiful but dunderheaded Anna (Jennifer Garner). There's a whole raft of supporting roles and cameos from other well-known actors who somehow got roped into making this.
But this is a Gervais project, thorugh and thorugh, as he not only starred in it, but wrote and directed it. It therefore gives a pretty good glimpse at his vision of the world, and it is an ugly and confused vision.
What's so screwed up about this movie? It's that it indulges in what I consider to be one of the greatest errors of Postmodernity: the conflation of being honest with being obsessively and proactively candid. I see this conflation over and over, and I think it is a sickness of our time, that we no longer understand the concept of honesty, and by extension truth. This movie does not really explore this, but instead wallows in the error---well at least for most of the time. It had it's moments, ones that almost redeemed it.
For most of the movie, the charcters in this "honest" world go around spontaneously saying every thought and emotion that crosses their mind. To be honest, according to Gervais, is to be constantly cruel and vulgar. Insults are flung with ease. Men openly proclaim there sexual desires, and women, of course, spend most of their time recoiling from them. Come to think of it, this is a lot like the world now. Maybe this movie is brilliant after all.
Let's compare this to the world of Classical cinema, which indeed is a world in which decent and honorable characters are indeed obsessively honest. Classical cinema understood the difference between honesty and obsessive candor, and the high value of discretion. Heroes and heroines of Classical stories could go out of their way to tell the truth even while using the truth to deceive a villain, or protect a loved one or an innocent person. The only time Classical heroes were permitted to outright lie was when it was necessary to protect the honor of someone else, and this lying usually took the form of taking the blame or responsibility for something the hero didn't actually do (i.e., self-sacrifice).
Yet this honesty was not considered a weakness but a strength. Such honesty made characters who were impeccable, whose word was unbreakable, and who were built out of steel (Superman is actually a great example---he lived an entire double life without having to openly tell lies).
That someone like Gervais can make a movie like this shows you how far away from this notion we have come. Honesty is now considered a weakness of character, one that must be overcome. The world needs lies at every turn, we are told, if it is to turn at all. How low we have sunk, when we no longer even recognize what honesty and truth are.
The movie was saved from being a complete disaster by a story that did not painfully follow the trajectory I anticipated. I mentioned recently how deception is the basic spice of Hollywood stories, one that can create proper Hollywood narrative where it would not otherwise exist. I figured this movie would follow the standard outline of a "deception" story, given the subject matter, but instead it wandered off in directions I did not quite anticipate. This actually made it more watchable, thankfully. Act Three zigged when I thought it would zag, and so I wasn't completely disgusted and bored by the end, but curious to see how it would turn out.
At one point the story suprised me by delving into the realm of spirituality in a rather nuanced way. Probably the most interesting point of the movie is when Mark unwittingly "invents" a story of the afterlife to calm the fears of his dying mother. When others hear of this idea, it spirals out of control, such that Mark becomes a prophet of the first "religion."
There were some beautiful moments in here. One could have read the first "lie" Mark told as in fact divine revelation, and thus his "falsehood" about the immortality of the soul was, unbeknownst to him, truth.
But this story is not enlightened enough to linger in that state. Instead it devolves into the silliness of showing that all religions are outrageous "lies" about a "man in the sky," while simultaneously shoving outrageous product placement for a pizza franchise in our face (I'm not kidding here). That mythologies are "falsehoods" is a subject worthy of exploring, but this was just juvenile, pointless, and nihilistic.
Perhaps the stupidest part of thi supposed romantic comedy is the romance itself. Mark (Gervais) keeps telling Anna (Garner) what a wonderful person she is. Uh, no she's not. She's stupid, superficial, vain, and self-centered. The only reason he is pursuing her is because of her pretty face. But instead of admitting this fact, it is projected onto the rival and villain (Rob Lowe). Thus Mark is actually lying to himself about why he likes Anna. But the movie does not explore this irony at all. It is unconscious of its own overt falsehoods, while thinking it is being clever in revealing the falsehoods of others. Come to think of it, that's a great description of Postmodernity as a whole.
Verdict: a Postmodern train wreck that was interesting only because the story was not completely predictable.
From the trailers, I knew that The Invention of Lying was one of the those movies that I was definitely not going to pay full price for, so I schlepped out of the house on Monday morning to catch the very first pre-noon show at the Cinemark 16, which is about three miles from where I type this.
Ten minutes into this movie, I knew it was going to be a disaster, so much so that my jaw was hanging open from what I was seeing.
First, a little background, in case you didn't see the trailer. This movie is supposedly set in a fictional world in which lying has never been invented. There isn't even a word for lying, and people have no concept of it. The story follows a hapless man named Mark (Ricky Gervais) who one day discovers how to tell lies. This changes his whole life, and eventually the world. Much of the narrative is driven by a romance, namely Mark's pursuit of the beautiful but dunderheaded Anna (Jennifer Garner). There's a whole raft of supporting roles and cameos from other well-known actors who somehow got roped into making this.
But this is a Gervais project, thorugh and thorugh, as he not only starred in it, but wrote and directed it. It therefore gives a pretty good glimpse at his vision of the world, and it is an ugly and confused vision.
What's so screwed up about this movie? It's that it indulges in what I consider to be one of the greatest errors of Postmodernity: the conflation of being honest with being obsessively and proactively candid. I see this conflation over and over, and I think it is a sickness of our time, that we no longer understand the concept of honesty, and by extension truth. This movie does not really explore this, but instead wallows in the error---well at least for most of the time. It had it's moments, ones that almost redeemed it.
For most of the movie, the charcters in this "honest" world go around spontaneously saying every thought and emotion that crosses their mind. To be honest, according to Gervais, is to be constantly cruel and vulgar. Insults are flung with ease. Men openly proclaim there sexual desires, and women, of course, spend most of their time recoiling from them. Come to think of it, this is a lot like the world now. Maybe this movie is brilliant after all.
Let's compare this to the world of Classical cinema, which indeed is a world in which decent and honorable characters are indeed obsessively honest. Classical cinema understood the difference between honesty and obsessive candor, and the high value of discretion. Heroes and heroines of Classical stories could go out of their way to tell the truth even while using the truth to deceive a villain, or protect a loved one or an innocent person. The only time Classical heroes were permitted to outright lie was when it was necessary to protect the honor of someone else, and this lying usually took the form of taking the blame or responsibility for something the hero didn't actually do (i.e., self-sacrifice).
Yet this honesty was not considered a weakness but a strength. Such honesty made characters who were impeccable, whose word was unbreakable, and who were built out of steel (Superman is actually a great example---he lived an entire double life without having to openly tell lies).
That someone like Gervais can make a movie like this shows you how far away from this notion we have come. Honesty is now considered a weakness of character, one that must be overcome. The world needs lies at every turn, we are told, if it is to turn at all. How low we have sunk, when we no longer even recognize what honesty and truth are.
The movie was saved from being a complete disaster by a story that did not painfully follow the trajectory I anticipated. I mentioned recently how deception is the basic spice of Hollywood stories, one that can create proper Hollywood narrative where it would not otherwise exist. I figured this movie would follow the standard outline of a "deception" story, given the subject matter, but instead it wandered off in directions I did not quite anticipate. This actually made it more watchable, thankfully. Act Three zigged when I thought it would zag, and so I wasn't completely disgusted and bored by the end, but curious to see how it would turn out.
At one point the story suprised me by delving into the realm of spirituality in a rather nuanced way. Probably the most interesting point of the movie is when Mark unwittingly "invents" a story of the afterlife to calm the fears of his dying mother. When others hear of this idea, it spirals out of control, such that Mark becomes a prophet of the first "religion."
There were some beautiful moments in here. One could have read the first "lie" Mark told as in fact divine revelation, and thus his "falsehood" about the immortality of the soul was, unbeknownst to him, truth.
But this story is not enlightened enough to linger in that state. Instead it devolves into the silliness of showing that all religions are outrageous "lies" about a "man in the sky," while simultaneously shoving outrageous product placement for a pizza franchise in our face (I'm not kidding here). That mythologies are "falsehoods" is a subject worthy of exploring, but this was just juvenile, pointless, and nihilistic.
Perhaps the stupidest part of thi supposed romantic comedy is the romance itself. Mark (Gervais) keeps telling Anna (Garner) what a wonderful person she is. Uh, no she's not. She's stupid, superficial, vain, and self-centered. The only reason he is pursuing her is because of her pretty face. But instead of admitting this fact, it is projected onto the rival and villain (Rob Lowe). Thus Mark is actually lying to himself about why he likes Anna. But the movie does not explore this irony at all. It is unconscious of its own overt falsehoods, while thinking it is being clever in revealing the falsehoods of others. Come to think of it, that's a great description of Postmodernity as a whole.
Verdict: a Postmodern train wreck that was interesting only because the story was not completely predictable.
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Whip It
Seen at: Metrolux 14, Loveland, CO on Sun. Oct. 25
On the way back from Cheyenne after seeing Inglourious Basterds, as I drove south on I-25, the last shards of light from the setting sun were sprinkled across the mountains to the west. After such a fun visit to Wyoming, I wasn't quite in the mood to head home yet, and it seemed like a nice evening to make it a double feature. So when I got to the Harmony Road exit in Fort Collins, I kept going on the highway.
I pulled off the highway nine miles further south at the junction of US 34 east of Loveland. Being hungry, I searched out one of my favorite Waffle House franchises, only to discover that it had been shuttered during my year-long absence from Colorado. I had to make due with a Taco John's instead.
Going to the Waffle House always reminds me of the South and Texas. It gives me good feelings. As such, it would have been a perfect set-up for Whip It, which I wound up seeing later at the Metrolux 14, the big sparkling multiplex visible from the Interstate at the cloverleaf. It anchors the giant Centerra lifestyle center that was built about a decade ago, and which became the bane of so many locals who detested this kind of development. I always feel a little icky going to the Centerra, but sometimes it just can't be avoided.
Most of the movies at the Metrolux play simultaneously at the Cinemark in Fort Collins, so it's usually not necessary to go there. But Whip It was an exception, so I took this opportunity to cross the Metrolux off my list in my Radius Project. Now I don't have to go back there, unless I feel like it.
The Waffle House would have been a good set-up for Whip It because the movie, written by Shauna Cross and the first to be directed by Drew Barrymore, is not only set in Austin, Texas, but embraces certain aspects of Austin culture in a way that made me more than a little homesick for the city where I once lived.
The story is about a high school girl named Bliss, played by Ellen Page of Juno, who lives in a small town in Texas, works at a diner, and is bored out of her mind while being pressed by her traditional-minded mother into participating in pageants. By chance, during a trip to nearby Austin, she discovers the local roller derby scene, filled with the kind of free-spirited women she wants to become, and falls in love it.
The obvious conflict will be between Bliss' desire to immerse herself in Austin roller derby and her mother's desire to cultivate Bliss as a traditional pageant star in her own image.
But if you read my write-up of Love Happens, you know about my latest insight about film---to create narrative tension, use deception. Whip It is a perfect example of this. By itself, the conflict I described would make a good indie film. But it is not enough for Hollywood. To make it worthy of a wider release, we need to add the spice of deception.
Thus the conflict will be driven by Bliss' deception in pursuing her roller derby career. As such it follows a fairly standard trajectory:
1. At first the deception works, in that the protagonist reaps immediate rewards and happiness.
2. Eventually the deception starts to cause problems that make it increasingly difficult to maintain the deception.
3. The character has several chances to "come clean" but declines to do so, because of the pain involved and because the deception is still seen as leading to happiness.
4. At a moment of truth, usually on the threshold of some major achievement as part of the deception, the deception is revealed (not by the protagonist but by another agent, or by accident), resulting in public disgrace and bringing down the entire house of cards.
5. The protagonist, in the short run, is worse off than at the beginning, often because of the loss of friendship of others invovled in the deception.
6. The process of coming clean actually clears up the conflict and the character not only resumes the trajectory, now openly, but with increased happiness.
This isn't a perfect outline of the deception paradigm, so I will probably be refining it over time. Nevertheless I think it captures many aspects of it. If you go to Hollywood movies, you will see it over and over and over.
The paradigm will work so long as the story is fresh enough, and the characters are compelling. Whip It is a pretty good example about how to do it. The concept (Austin roller derby) is original enough to make the movie interesting even though the trajectory of the paradigm pretty much could have written itself.
Thematically, the movie is one of the strongest statements I've seen that follows the Postmodern thesis about "strong women, weak men." The females in this movie---from the traditional mother, to the tatooed roller derby members---are all built out of steel. They are independent and driven by strong wills. Barrymore seemed to be making a love letter to the power of the fairer sex.
On the other hand, the men in the movie are universally weak. The pattern is unrelenting: Bliss' boyfriend does not cheat on her, but in his weakness, he doesn't protect a special item of clothing. This enough is to earn our scorn of him, and to show him as unworthy of the heroine.
The weak man is also the sexually frustrated man. Jimmy Fallon of Saturday Night Live makes a fun appearance as the emcee of the roller derby league, and hosts the after-game parties. But instead of being a sex symbol he should be, he is reduced to making hapless and pathetic passes at the (lesbian) players, and to pleading for sex openly in front of the crowd. Let's get ready to bumble!
Even the good men don't have any backbone and can't exercise power. The strongest male character, Bliss' father is still quite flawed and hides from the world rather than engaging it (how awesome it was to see Daniel Stern again!). Likewise, the male roller derby coach is unable to convince his power female players to execute the plays he draws up.
Bliss' boss, a young Hispanic man who is honorable and honext, but who can't even control the nicknames given to him, is in love with Bliss' best friend. At a moment of truth, they are alone and face to face in the back room of the diner. It is an obvious moment of connection, when a kiss is appropriate. I wanted to yell out: kiss her, damn it. But that's not what happens. Instead, it is the girl who grabs the guy and kisses him! I nearly burst out laughing in the theater, it was so much the opposite of what I thought would happen. That's just the way things are done these days. It was characteristic of everything in the whole movie.
By contrast, the only truly unlikable female character is one of Bliss' teenage pageant rivals, a point that is lessened by the fact that Bliss doesn't even want to compete in such pageants. Moreover, this mean girl rival attacks Bliss through control over the rival's weak-willed but thuggish high school boyfriend. Part of the "coming of age" aspect of this story is that this meaningless "immature" rival is replaced by a meaningful "mature" rival on the roller derby stage, a "mean girl" who skates on one of the other teams (Juliette Lewis, doing a very good derby villianness). But it turns out that this mature rival is actually honorable, and furthermore we get to understand her point of view, and her antagonism towards Bliss, in a critical scene towards the end of Act Two.
Postmodern sexual politics aside, this was a fun story, and a well-crafted (if fairly standard) narrative. As a movie, it showed some hallmarks of a first-time director, to be sure, but I thought Barrymore made a pretty good start in this regard.
And yes it made me miss Austin, even if the part of Austin culture it showed was not my particular cup of tea most of the time. Ironically, most of the movie, outside of some location shots of Ellen Page on South Congress Avenue, was not shot in Austin itself but in Ypsilanti, Michigan. Nice job, Miss Barrymore. This former Austinite bought it all.
Verdict on movie: an entertaining Austinesque story with fun original concept, slightly raunch in tone and based around a standard deception-driven plot.
On the way back from Cheyenne after seeing Inglourious Basterds, as I drove south on I-25, the last shards of light from the setting sun were sprinkled across the mountains to the west. After such a fun visit to Wyoming, I wasn't quite in the mood to head home yet, and it seemed like a nice evening to make it a double feature. So when I got to the Harmony Road exit in Fort Collins, I kept going on the highway.
I pulled off the highway nine miles further south at the junction of US 34 east of Loveland. Being hungry, I searched out one of my favorite Waffle House franchises, only to discover that it had been shuttered during my year-long absence from Colorado. I had to make due with a Taco John's instead.
Going to the Waffle House always reminds me of the South and Texas. It gives me good feelings. As such, it would have been a perfect set-up for Whip It, which I wound up seeing later at the Metrolux 14, the big sparkling multiplex visible from the Interstate at the cloverleaf. It anchors the giant Centerra lifestyle center that was built about a decade ago, and which became the bane of so many locals who detested this kind of development. I always feel a little icky going to the Centerra, but sometimes it just can't be avoided.
Most of the movies at the Metrolux play simultaneously at the Cinemark in Fort Collins, so it's usually not necessary to go there. But Whip It was an exception, so I took this opportunity to cross the Metrolux off my list in my Radius Project. Now I don't have to go back there, unless I feel like it.
The Waffle House would have been a good set-up for Whip It because the movie, written by Shauna Cross and the first to be directed by Drew Barrymore, is not only set in Austin, Texas, but embraces certain aspects of Austin culture in a way that made me more than a little homesick for the city where I once lived.
The story is about a high school girl named Bliss, played by Ellen Page of Juno, who lives in a small town in Texas, works at a diner, and is bored out of her mind while being pressed by her traditional-minded mother into participating in pageants. By chance, during a trip to nearby Austin, she discovers the local roller derby scene, filled with the kind of free-spirited women she wants to become, and falls in love it.
The obvious conflict will be between Bliss' desire to immerse herself in Austin roller derby and her mother's desire to cultivate Bliss as a traditional pageant star in her own image.
But if you read my write-up of Love Happens, you know about my latest insight about film---to create narrative tension, use deception. Whip It is a perfect example of this. By itself, the conflict I described would make a good indie film. But it is not enough for Hollywood. To make it worthy of a wider release, we need to add the spice of deception.
Thus the conflict will be driven by Bliss' deception in pursuing her roller derby career. As such it follows a fairly standard trajectory:
1. At first the deception works, in that the protagonist reaps immediate rewards and happiness.
2. Eventually the deception starts to cause problems that make it increasingly difficult to maintain the deception.
3. The character has several chances to "come clean" but declines to do so, because of the pain involved and because the deception is still seen as leading to happiness.
4. At a moment of truth, usually on the threshold of some major achievement as part of the deception, the deception is revealed (not by the protagonist but by another agent, or by accident), resulting in public disgrace and bringing down the entire house of cards.
5. The protagonist, in the short run, is worse off than at the beginning, often because of the loss of friendship of others invovled in the deception.
6. The process of coming clean actually clears up the conflict and the character not only resumes the trajectory, now openly, but with increased happiness.
This isn't a perfect outline of the deception paradigm, so I will probably be refining it over time. Nevertheless I think it captures many aspects of it. If you go to Hollywood movies, you will see it over and over and over.
The paradigm will work so long as the story is fresh enough, and the characters are compelling. Whip It is a pretty good example about how to do it. The concept (Austin roller derby) is original enough to make the movie interesting even though the trajectory of the paradigm pretty much could have written itself.
Thematically, the movie is one of the strongest statements I've seen that follows the Postmodern thesis about "strong women, weak men." The females in this movie---from the traditional mother, to the tatooed roller derby members---are all built out of steel. They are independent and driven by strong wills. Barrymore seemed to be making a love letter to the power of the fairer sex.
On the other hand, the men in the movie are universally weak. The pattern is unrelenting: Bliss' boyfriend does not cheat on her, but in his weakness, he doesn't protect a special item of clothing. This enough is to earn our scorn of him, and to show him as unworthy of the heroine.
The weak man is also the sexually frustrated man. Jimmy Fallon of Saturday Night Live makes a fun appearance as the emcee of the roller derby league, and hosts the after-game parties. But instead of being a sex symbol he should be, he is reduced to making hapless and pathetic passes at the (lesbian) players, and to pleading for sex openly in front of the crowd. Let's get ready to bumble!
Even the good men don't have any backbone and can't exercise power. The strongest male character, Bliss' father is still quite flawed and hides from the world rather than engaging it (how awesome it was to see Daniel Stern again!). Likewise, the male roller derby coach is unable to convince his power female players to execute the plays he draws up.
Bliss' boss, a young Hispanic man who is honorable and honext, but who can't even control the nicknames given to him, is in love with Bliss' best friend. At a moment of truth, they are alone and face to face in the back room of the diner. It is an obvious moment of connection, when a kiss is appropriate. I wanted to yell out: kiss her, damn it. But that's not what happens. Instead, it is the girl who grabs the guy and kisses him! I nearly burst out laughing in the theater, it was so much the opposite of what I thought would happen. That's just the way things are done these days. It was characteristic of everything in the whole movie.
By contrast, the only truly unlikable female character is one of Bliss' teenage pageant rivals, a point that is lessened by the fact that Bliss doesn't even want to compete in such pageants. Moreover, this mean girl rival attacks Bliss through control over the rival's weak-willed but thuggish high school boyfriend. Part of the "coming of age" aspect of this story is that this meaningless "immature" rival is replaced by a meaningful "mature" rival on the roller derby stage, a "mean girl" who skates on one of the other teams (Juliette Lewis, doing a very good derby villianness). But it turns out that this mature rival is actually honorable, and furthermore we get to understand her point of view, and her antagonism towards Bliss, in a critical scene towards the end of Act Two.
Postmodern sexual politics aside, this was a fun story, and a well-crafted (if fairly standard) narrative. As a movie, it showed some hallmarks of a first-time director, to be sure, but I thought Barrymore made a pretty good start in this regard.
And yes it made me miss Austin, even if the part of Austin culture it showed was not my particular cup of tea most of the time. Ironically, most of the movie, outside of some location shots of Ellen Page on South Congress Avenue, was not shot in Austin itself but in Ypsilanti, Michigan. Nice job, Miss Barrymore. This former Austinite bought it all.
Verdict on movie: an entertaining Austinesque story with fun original concept, slightly raunch in tone and based around a standard deception-driven plot.
Inglourious Basterds
Seen at: Lincoln Popcorn Palace, Cheyenne, WY on Sun. Oct. 25
This must set some kind of record for me, for delaying and delaying while a movie is in theaters until the last possible chance to see it. How long has Inglourious Basterds been out? At least ten weeks, I'd say. It actually came and went from the second-run theater in Fort Collins, making me chase it down outside of town while it was still showing.
I'll admit that I hadn't exactly been looking forward to seeing this. Scratch that. By the time I actually sat down to see it in the theater, I was very much looking forward to it. It might be more accurate to state that I had been waiting for the right moment, when I knew I'd want to see it.
Don't get me wrong---Tarantino is a great film maker. I won't argue that. But for various reasons, his work just doesn't connect with my soul as it did fifteen years ago when Pulp Fiction came out. During that time, he has grown as an artist and expanded his talents, but meanwhile I migrated away from an appreciation of seeing the world and human nature through his particular lens. Ironically it was watching lots of classical movies that made me stray from the Tarantino faithful. I say 'ironically' because Tarantino's films often come across as a non-stop homage to films of the past.
Tarantino pays homage, to be sure, but Tarantino's past is a revisionist one in many ways, as if he wants to tell us that film makers and actors back then didn't really understand human nature the way that he does, in his enlightened contemporary state. When it comes to people, I think he wants to tell us, Classicism was a lie , so he is going to show it all to us the way it really was.
This attitude is actually what I consider the greatest delusion of the Postmodern Era, namely the assumption that the Postmodern paradigm is the one that really existed all along, but it was just covered up by the self-delusions of earlier times. Specifically it is the notion that humans are without honor, beast-like in their motivations, and that any other viewpoint from the past is wrong, and needs correcting. I think much of Tarantino's work, along with much of contemporary period cinema, reflects this unspoken notion.
I'll admit that over the summer I was particularly put off by the advance marketing campaign for this movie, which seemed to scream out the notion I just mentioned---"You haven't seen World War II until you've seen it through Tarantino's eyes." Gee whiz. And all this time, I thought that I'd gotten a decent impression of the war from Audie Murphy starring as himself in To Hell and Back, made in 1954 using surplus equipment from the war and by a crew that probably fought over the same ground ten years earlier. But what the hell did those guys know? It took a guy who cut his teeth fighting in the trenches of a Southern California video store in the 1980's to really put the right spin on it all.
And then there was the trailer for this movie, featuring Brad Pitt doing a cheesy southern drawl while exhorting a bunch of Jewish-American would-be psycopaths to be as cruel as possible to the enemy. Here's Tarantino at his most Postmodern, conveying that honor and decency are handicaps, that the way to defeat the Nazis is to become as much like them as possible. No war is really about ideals, we are told, but about survival of the fittest. Kill or be killed. That's all there is to it. Any other higher motivation is for losers. What a beautiful reflection of an America in which we now shrug off the use of Nazi "enhanced interrogation" techniques in a phony war to justify our empire. I guess Tarantino may be right about us---at least as we are now. But like I said, it burns me when he puts forth the notion that we were always this way. That's the Postmodern Delusion.
Also I gleaned from the trailer that this was going to be a Jewish revenge fantasy about the war. That's OK on some level, I suppose, but it just seems to be the capstone on the trend over the last few years in Hollywood cinema to assert that the meaning of World War II began and ended with the Holocaust. Leave it to Tarantino to take that idea to a whole new level, to its logical fulfillment.
Waiting all these weeks to see the movie probably helped me burn off some of these expectations, so that when I finally sat down to see it, I was indeed looking forward to it. This ought to be fun, I thought to myself. Tarantino is nothing if not pure fun.
But I have to say a little about where I saw this, which turned out to be the perfect locale. It was last Sunday afternoon, and I had set out for Cheyenne, about forty miles north of here, to see a completely different movie at a multiplex up there, because that other movie (which I'll write about later) was no longer showing in Fort Collins. But I never got around to seeing that movie on Sunday.
With about an hour to kill, I pulled into downtown Cheyenne and parked. Since I hadn't spent much time in the capital of Wyoming lately, I figured I'd give myself a little walking tour of the downtown, but just around the very first corner I ran smack into the huge marquee of the Lincoln Popcorn Palace, a looming classic era theater which I hadn't heard of, because it wasn't in the Google Movie listings for Cheyenne. What a find! What an afternoon!
The large neon script spelled out "Lincoln" and the marquee below listed the movies showing with those big fat red marquee letters. And there it was, starting in only a half hour, Inglourious Basterds. My plan had been to drive down to the north Denver suburbs to see it later that week, but I knew instantly that I had to alter my plans for that afternoon and go see Inglorious Basterds right then and there. It was just the perfect circumstances.
Two wrinkled one dollar bills at the glass booth bought me a matinee ticket. The inside didn't disappoint at all. It was one of those old-time theaters that hasn't really been renovated but retains much of its faded charm and original decor, right down to the typography on the exit signs in the soaring auditorium. Sure it's a little worse for wear after so many years of use, and its subsequent conversion into a second-run house, but just imagine what the multiplexes of today would look like after fifty years without significant renovation. Yikes. They don't build 'em like they used to.
Now as for the movie itself---well it was indeed very fun. No complaints there. Within the first few minutes, during the opening "Spaghetti Western" scene on the French dairy farm, I knew it was going to be a very good movie. On a narrative level, it is nothing if not superior. Tarantino knows how to tell a good story, and his ability has grown better over the years.
Normally one of the things about movies that really drags me down is when I see a plot point coming from a half hour away, and sit there waiting for it to inevitably unfold. Tarantino avoids all this by making the story jump ahead past all these inevitabilities. It's a highly refined version of the style he has cultivated over the years, and by now it seems seamless. This kind of storytelling thwarts the petty tension on a low-level, but allows the building of tension on a higher level with a narrative that never got mired into the convention domino-upon-dominos of what "has to happen next." This feature by itself is one of the strengths of Postmodernity, by the way, and Tarantino is the master of it.
Given that the movie tells a darn good story in an entertaining way, I can forgive a lot about it, but the film is also simply downright well made. Seeing so many movies lately, I have begun to really appreciate when a movie is good as a production. You can really tell when the producers, directors, crew, actors, etc., really went all out to make a quality product. This stuck out to me last year when I saw The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, a movie that I had mixed reactions to overall. It was simply a well made movie, and I can see why it got nominated for Best Picture. The same is definitely true of Inglourious Basterds.
Moreover the sadism I feared would dominate the movie, especially in the context of Jewish revenge fantasy, was much less overpowering than it could have been, partly because of Tarantino's aforementioned style of narrative. The movie, I thought, had just about the right amount of revenge fantasy present to make the narrative work as it did. In the end, I couldn't fault the movie on that level.
Yet also in the end there were things about this movie that kept me from completely embracing it. I ruminated this as I drove home in the dark across the Wyoming-Colorado state line on the High Plains.
First off is the Postmodern Conceit I previously mentioned, that honor is for suckers. At the end of the movie I couldn't help feel that the Nazis came off as looking more honorable than the Americans. We Americans, we are to believe, are better and wiser because we don't fool ourselves that life is anything more than survival. Thankfully that wasn't the dominating theme of the movie, but there was enough of it there to stick out to my Classical eyes to put a deep dent in my appreciation for what I'd just seen.
Or maybe this was the dominating theme. I can't tell yet. Maybe Tarantino is truly equating Classicism with Nazism on some level.
But as you might expect, if you've seen Inglourious Basterds, the biggest barrier to my embracing the film was the alternative history ending. This twist ending concept is so weird and novel---the rewriting World War II to give it a "happier" ending than it had, without any overt consciousness that it is taking such grand liberties with the past. I'm not quite sure what I think of it, and I debated with myself in the car over whether I was just being a stick-in-the-mud for not accepting this an artistically valid way to make a World War II movie.
After all, aren't all movies fiction? Aren't they all a warped version of known events in order to tell a good story? All movies severely bend history, because the artistic medium demands it, so why not bend it to this degree, if it tells a good story? I could see both sides of the argument, to be sure, but my sentiments nevertheless fall on the side of striving to be accurate to the "large" features of the historical record, the inescapable ones that seem to define the very meaning of the event? But on the other hand, have we entered a new era and thus should I just "get over it," as the Postmodern cry would urge me?
I couldn't help think that Tarantino effectively created a new genre with this movie, breaking the ground by monkeying with certain facts of history on level that previously was considered out of bounds. But like I said, I'm not sure what I think about this. It turns me off, yet it forces me to question my own artistic assumptions. After a year, I might know the answer. For now I'm a little too shocked by the ending to be able to think about it rationally.
Even as I reluctantly try to figure out a way to digest and embrace this movie, I more and more believe that next March Tarantino may well be standing on a stage in Hollywood accepting the Best Picture Oscar. Seriously, looking ahead at what remains to be released this year, what else is going to beat it? If it does indeed win the big prize, it will undoubtedly open the door to a new type of historical narrative. Are we really ready to go through that door? Is this a new level of artistic expression and freedom, or a sign that we've reached the logical vacuous end of the Postmodern Era?
If nothing else, the movie got me asking a lot of questions, not only about history, but about movies as an art form, and about my own appreciation of it. What more could you really ask for, for two bucks on an afternoon in Cheyenne, Wyoming?
And as for the Lincoln Popcorn Palace---it's my new favorite theater in the region. What fun indeed.
Verdict on movie: A superior production, and great fun for an afternoon, but what has Tarantino wrought with this?
This must set some kind of record for me, for delaying and delaying while a movie is in theaters until the last possible chance to see it. How long has Inglourious Basterds been out? At least ten weeks, I'd say. It actually came and went from the second-run theater in Fort Collins, making me chase it down outside of town while it was still showing.
I'll admit that I hadn't exactly been looking forward to seeing this. Scratch that. By the time I actually sat down to see it in the theater, I was very much looking forward to it. It might be more accurate to state that I had been waiting for the right moment, when I knew I'd want to see it.
Don't get me wrong---Tarantino is a great film maker. I won't argue that. But for various reasons, his work just doesn't connect with my soul as it did fifteen years ago when Pulp Fiction came out. During that time, he has grown as an artist and expanded his talents, but meanwhile I migrated away from an appreciation of seeing the world and human nature through his particular lens. Ironically it was watching lots of classical movies that made me stray from the Tarantino faithful. I say 'ironically' because Tarantino's films often come across as a non-stop homage to films of the past.
Tarantino pays homage, to be sure, but Tarantino's past is a revisionist one in many ways, as if he wants to tell us that film makers and actors back then didn't really understand human nature the way that he does, in his enlightened contemporary state. When it comes to people, I think he wants to tell us, Classicism was a lie , so he is going to show it all to us the way it really was.
This attitude is actually what I consider the greatest delusion of the Postmodern Era, namely the assumption that the Postmodern paradigm is the one that really existed all along, but it was just covered up by the self-delusions of earlier times. Specifically it is the notion that humans are without honor, beast-like in their motivations, and that any other viewpoint from the past is wrong, and needs correcting. I think much of Tarantino's work, along with much of contemporary period cinema, reflects this unspoken notion.
I'll admit that over the summer I was particularly put off by the advance marketing campaign for this movie, which seemed to scream out the notion I just mentioned---"You haven't seen World War II until you've seen it through Tarantino's eyes." Gee whiz. And all this time, I thought that I'd gotten a decent impression of the war from Audie Murphy starring as himself in To Hell and Back, made in 1954 using surplus equipment from the war and by a crew that probably fought over the same ground ten years earlier. But what the hell did those guys know? It took a guy who cut his teeth fighting in the trenches of a Southern California video store in the 1980's to really put the right spin on it all.
And then there was the trailer for this movie, featuring Brad Pitt doing a cheesy southern drawl while exhorting a bunch of Jewish-American would-be psycopaths to be as cruel as possible to the enemy. Here's Tarantino at his most Postmodern, conveying that honor and decency are handicaps, that the way to defeat the Nazis is to become as much like them as possible. No war is really about ideals, we are told, but about survival of the fittest. Kill or be killed. That's all there is to it. Any other higher motivation is for losers. What a beautiful reflection of an America in which we now shrug off the use of Nazi "enhanced interrogation" techniques in a phony war to justify our empire. I guess Tarantino may be right about us---at least as we are now. But like I said, it burns me when he puts forth the notion that we were always this way. That's the Postmodern Delusion.
Also I gleaned from the trailer that this was going to be a Jewish revenge fantasy about the war. That's OK on some level, I suppose, but it just seems to be the capstone on the trend over the last few years in Hollywood cinema to assert that the meaning of World War II began and ended with the Holocaust. Leave it to Tarantino to take that idea to a whole new level, to its logical fulfillment.
Waiting all these weeks to see the movie probably helped me burn off some of these expectations, so that when I finally sat down to see it, I was indeed looking forward to it. This ought to be fun, I thought to myself. Tarantino is nothing if not pure fun.
But I have to say a little about where I saw this, which turned out to be the perfect locale. It was last Sunday afternoon, and I had set out for Cheyenne, about forty miles north of here, to see a completely different movie at a multiplex up there, because that other movie (which I'll write about later) was no longer showing in Fort Collins. But I never got around to seeing that movie on Sunday.
With about an hour to kill, I pulled into downtown Cheyenne and parked. Since I hadn't spent much time in the capital of Wyoming lately, I figured I'd give myself a little walking tour of the downtown, but just around the very first corner I ran smack into the huge marquee of the Lincoln Popcorn Palace, a looming classic era theater which I hadn't heard of, because it wasn't in the Google Movie listings for Cheyenne. What a find! What an afternoon!
The large neon script spelled out "Lincoln" and the marquee below listed the movies showing with those big fat red marquee letters. And there it was, starting in only a half hour, Inglourious Basterds. My plan had been to drive down to the north Denver suburbs to see it later that week, but I knew instantly that I had to alter my plans for that afternoon and go see Inglorious Basterds right then and there. It was just the perfect circumstances.
Two wrinkled one dollar bills at the glass booth bought me a matinee ticket. The inside didn't disappoint at all. It was one of those old-time theaters that hasn't really been renovated but retains much of its faded charm and original decor, right down to the typography on the exit signs in the soaring auditorium. Sure it's a little worse for wear after so many years of use, and its subsequent conversion into a second-run house, but just imagine what the multiplexes of today would look like after fifty years without significant renovation. Yikes. They don't build 'em like they used to.
Now as for the movie itself---well it was indeed very fun. No complaints there. Within the first few minutes, during the opening "Spaghetti Western" scene on the French dairy farm, I knew it was going to be a very good movie. On a narrative level, it is nothing if not superior. Tarantino knows how to tell a good story, and his ability has grown better over the years.
Normally one of the things about movies that really drags me down is when I see a plot point coming from a half hour away, and sit there waiting for it to inevitably unfold. Tarantino avoids all this by making the story jump ahead past all these inevitabilities. It's a highly refined version of the style he has cultivated over the years, and by now it seems seamless. This kind of storytelling thwarts the petty tension on a low-level, but allows the building of tension on a higher level with a narrative that never got mired into the convention domino-upon-dominos of what "has to happen next." This feature by itself is one of the strengths of Postmodernity, by the way, and Tarantino is the master of it.
Given that the movie tells a darn good story in an entertaining way, I can forgive a lot about it, but the film is also simply downright well made. Seeing so many movies lately, I have begun to really appreciate when a movie is good as a production. You can really tell when the producers, directors, crew, actors, etc., really went all out to make a quality product. This stuck out to me last year when I saw The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, a movie that I had mixed reactions to overall. It was simply a well made movie, and I can see why it got nominated for Best Picture. The same is definitely true of Inglourious Basterds.
Moreover the sadism I feared would dominate the movie, especially in the context of Jewish revenge fantasy, was much less overpowering than it could have been, partly because of Tarantino's aforementioned style of narrative. The movie, I thought, had just about the right amount of revenge fantasy present to make the narrative work as it did. In the end, I couldn't fault the movie on that level.
Yet also in the end there were things about this movie that kept me from completely embracing it. I ruminated this as I drove home in the dark across the Wyoming-Colorado state line on the High Plains.
First off is the Postmodern Conceit I previously mentioned, that honor is for suckers. At the end of the movie I couldn't help feel that the Nazis came off as looking more honorable than the Americans. We Americans, we are to believe, are better and wiser because we don't fool ourselves that life is anything more than survival. Thankfully that wasn't the dominating theme of the movie, but there was enough of it there to stick out to my Classical eyes to put a deep dent in my appreciation for what I'd just seen.
Or maybe this was the dominating theme. I can't tell yet. Maybe Tarantino is truly equating Classicism with Nazism on some level.
But as you might expect, if you've seen Inglourious Basterds, the biggest barrier to my embracing the film was the alternative history ending. This twist ending concept is so weird and novel---the rewriting World War II to give it a "happier" ending than it had, without any overt consciousness that it is taking such grand liberties with the past. I'm not quite sure what I think of it, and I debated with myself in the car over whether I was just being a stick-in-the-mud for not accepting this an artistically valid way to make a World War II movie.
After all, aren't all movies fiction? Aren't they all a warped version of known events in order to tell a good story? All movies severely bend history, because the artistic medium demands it, so why not bend it to this degree, if it tells a good story? I could see both sides of the argument, to be sure, but my sentiments nevertheless fall on the side of striving to be accurate to the "large" features of the historical record, the inescapable ones that seem to define the very meaning of the event? But on the other hand, have we entered a new era and thus should I just "get over it," as the Postmodern cry would urge me?
I couldn't help think that Tarantino effectively created a new genre with this movie, breaking the ground by monkeying with certain facts of history on level that previously was considered out of bounds. But like I said, I'm not sure what I think about this. It turns me off, yet it forces me to question my own artistic assumptions. After a year, I might know the answer. For now I'm a little too shocked by the ending to be able to think about it rationally.
Even as I reluctantly try to figure out a way to digest and embrace this movie, I more and more believe that next March Tarantino may well be standing on a stage in Hollywood accepting the Best Picture Oscar. Seriously, looking ahead at what remains to be released this year, what else is going to beat it? If it does indeed win the big prize, it will undoubtedly open the door to a new type of historical narrative. Are we really ready to go through that door? Is this a new level of artistic expression and freedom, or a sign that we've reached the logical vacuous end of the Postmodern Era?
If nothing else, the movie got me asking a lot of questions, not only about history, but about movies as an art form, and about my own appreciation of it. What more could you really ask for, for two bucks on an afternoon in Cheyenne, Wyoming?
And as for the Lincoln Popcorn Palace---it's my new favorite theater in the region. What fun indeed.
Verdict on movie: A superior production, and great fun for an afternoon, but what has Tarantino wrought with this?
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