Most of the great directors we know are considered auteurs – an ‘author’ of a film who also has a consistency of style, subject, and/or theme. Every once in a while a director will throw us for a loop and make a film that is inconsistent with his or her other work. Here’s a compilation that has been brewing in my head for a long time – a list of the most famous cinematic anomalies from great directors. These anomalies aren’t necessarily flops, or failures, but deviations in either style, theme or genre from their traditionally known films. For example, Steven Spielberg’s “1941” is considered a major flop, but the themes, comedy and style of the film all carry his signature stamp – in this case all taken to the extreme. As well I've excluded most 'first features' from directors. For example, James Cameron's "Pirahna II" or Oliver Stone's "Seizure" or even "The Hand", both of which were made before their acclaimed work began. The first entry, Robert Altman’s “Popeye’ looks and sounds like an Altman picture, but the subject matter – a popular comic book series meant to be a tentpole franchise film for its studio? That’s anything but Altman territory.
Robert Altman – Popeye
The 70’s were Robert Altman’s decade. He produced quantity - directing at least one film every year in the decade – and quality (“MASH”, “McCabe” and “Mrs. Miller”, “Nashville”). The anomaly that jumps out us is "Popeye" – a musical based on the famous comic books, starring Robin Williams. I saw the film in the theatre as a kid, and though I was 5 when I saw it, I do remember it sucking really badly. Of course, there are hordes of cult fans for the film. It's considered a bomb in its day, and put Altman in the Hollywood doldrums for much of the 80’s. Interestingly though, the film took in almost $50million in the box office, almost double its budget. And despite the reputation of the film it received some great praise from the nation’s most noted critics – two thumbs up from Siskel and Ebert. The latter of the two wrote about Altman, “He takes one of the most artificial and limiting of art forms -- the comic strip -- and raises it to the level of high comedy and high spirits.” Vincent Camby of the New York Times wrote, “''Popeye'' has other unexpected joys, including the fact that, unlike most movies, it gets better and better as it goes along." Judge for yourself.
Francis Coppola – Jack
Another Robin Williams film. Hmmm, a trend? I don’t know anyone who has actually seen “Jack”. So, if it’s a great film please correct me. Jack tells the story of a man whose body ages four times as fast as his brain. Therefore when Jack is 10, he has the body of a 40 year old. Most of the humour derives from the concept of Robin Williams in an elementary school classroom. Todd McCarthy summed up everyone’s question in his 1996 review, “The message of ‘Jack,’ as spelled out for all to hear in the climactic scene, is, 'None of us have very long on this Earth. Life is fleeting.' What, then, is Francis Ford Coppola doing spending a year on this tedious, uneventful fantasy…”
Roman Polanski – Pirates
Since the early 60’s Roman Polanski had established himself as one of the great psychological horror directors – “Knife in the Water”, “Repulsion”, “Rosemary’s Baby”, “Pirates”… what? Starring Walter Mathau? It turns out “Pirates” was a labour of love for Polanski who first conceived the idea after “Chinatown” (1974) with Jack Nicholson as the lead. That nasty statutory rape case put a halt to those plans in the 70’s, but he revived the project in the 80’s. Critically and commercially it was a bomb. Roger Ebert trashed the film back in the day saying, “This movie represents some kind of low point for the genre that gave us ‘Captain Blood’.”
Stanley Kubrick - Spartacus
Every time I cruise the Kubrick filmmography and marvel at his great body of work, I stop and pause at “Spartacus”. Since “Paths of Glory” (1957) (and arguably “The Killing the year before) Kubrick’s films look, sound and feel like ‘Kubrick films - his beautiful tracking shots, zooms, wideangle lenses, classical music. But "Spartacus" is so generic, so Hollywood, so not his film, it warrants a mention. Only one shot in the film screams Kubrick – the hint of the ‘Kubrick stare’ on Kirk Douglas early on in the film. Other than that, it’s a hack job. It’s a wonderfully competent film, with terrific action scenes – especially the dramatic battle scene at the end – but it was his first and only ‘director for hire’ job and a bold anomaly of his career.
Walter Hill – Brewster’s Millions
Walter Hill is an action legend. A protégé of bloody Sam Peckinpah, Hill took the editing style of Peckinpah and adapted it to his own personal style of filmmaking. Hill made fun adventures with highly stylized violence – “The Driver”, “The Warriors”, “48 Hours”, “Streets of Fire”. His characters were alpha male macho and dirty. But in 1986 he made a Richard Pryor-John Candy comedy, “Brewster’s Millions” about a down and out baseball player who inherits $300 million but has to spend it in 30 days. The novel it was based on was actually originally written in 1902, and made into a film six times before. So perhaps it was Hill remaking a film or book he loved in his youth. Who knows.
Brian De Palma – Wise Guys
Like Walter Hill above, in 1986 the popular director of violent horror films decided to go comedy. “Wise Guys” is a Danny De Vito-Joe Piscopo vehicle about two lowly mob errand runners who are set up to kill each other. It’s a mob-comedy romp, unlike any of De Palma’s popular and best known films. It’s interesting to note that De Palma did start out in comedy before turning to Hitchcockian horror films – "Hi Mom!" and “Phantom of the Paradise” are both wildly comic films. But when sandwiched between “Body Double” (1984) and "The Untouchables" (1987), the film is a head scratcher.
Robert Wise – Star Trek: The Motion Picture
Robert Wise is a man of all genres – horror, musical, sci-fi - and when cinephiles talk about the great career of Mr. Wise, it’s “The Sound of Music, “The Haunting”, The Day the Earth Stood Still” and “West Side Story” – not to mention his editing resume which includes “Citizen Kane” and “The Magnificent Ambersons.” But the first Star Trek film? Between the cancellation of the 60’s TV Series and this first feature film there were several attempts to revive the series in the 70’s, the closest being a TV pilot entitled “Phase II” to be directed by Bob Collins. After Star Wars was released, the pilot was reworked into the feature film, “Star Trek: The Motion Picture”. Paramount replaced the unknown Bob Collins with sure hand of Oscar-winner “Robert Wise”. Until the recent addition of JJ Abrams, the franchise hasn’t had a higher profile director since Mr. Wise. Wise was lambasted by critics and fans for overusing the 'awkstruck-ness' of the special effects and not concentrating on the heart of the "Star Trek" stories.
John Huston – Victory!
“Victory!” is a guilty pleasure from my youth – a story about Allied WWII prisoners who, in captivity, play a game of Soccer against the German national team, as a rouse for their elaborate escape plan. The film starred Sly Stallone as the lone American (who played the goalkeeper), Michael Caine, and Max von Sydow. Many real-life soccer/football stars were also featured, including the Brazilian great, Pele, and Premiership stars, Bobby Moore and Mike Summerbee. How or why the great 75 year old director of “The Maltese Falcon” and “The African Queen” got involved, I don’t know . The film has a cult following, especially in Britain (where the film was named “Escape to Victory).
David Lynch – The Straight Story
Though “The Straight Story” is a new film and still in our memories, many years from now when Lynch is dead and gone, this film will most certainly be his anomaly. There's no sex, no horror, no surrealness. The appropriately titled film, tells the true story of Alvin Straight, a humble farmer who travels hundreds of miles on a John Deere tractor to be with his dying brother. It features the Oscar-nominated last role for Richard Farnsworth – who sadly died shortly after the Oscar ceremony. “The Straight Story” is a great film, and is much different in style and tone to his other films. There are some wonderful moments of introspective poignancy which fits in well with Lynch's style. Watch the dissolves and sound design of the scene below. As well, there's a wonderful moment with Sissy Spacek and Farnsworth at night pondering life while looking up at the stars.
Sam Raimi – For Love of the Game
Sam Raimi is a big baseball fan – a Michigan-born Tigers fan. As a hired hand, “For Love of the Game” fell into Raimi’s lap with Kevin Costner already cast. The result was a maligned production involving some high-profile disputes between director and star. Upon release the film fell out of theatres quickly and quietly. Of course, this was the pre-“Spider-Man” Sam Raimi. Don’t be surprised if Raimi gets back into the chair behind another baseball film that can he can coddle from the development stages to make it a true passion project.
Gus Van Zant - Finding Forrester
From 1997 – 2000 we can consider to be Gus Van Sant’s mainstream period – his “Rose Period”. “Good Will Hunting” was a major success, and he decided to follow it up with his remake of “Psycho”. Although some considered it blasphemous to reshoot such a classic, I wasn’t too perturbed by it. And if anyone could get away with it, it’s Gus Van Zant. But I won’t forgive him for his wholesome feel-goodness of “Finding Forrester.” We were all happy Van Zant went back to his experimental roots to gain back his indie cred. His next three films comprised his “death trilogy” (“Gerry”, “Elephant” and “Last Days”). “Finding Forrester” will always stand out as Van Zant’s sore thumb. I doubt he will ever make a movie like that again.
Tim Burton – Planet of the Apes
Think about it, “Planet of the Apes” is the least 'Burton-esque' film Tim Burton ever made. In fact, like Kubrick’s “Spartacus”, there’s isn’t anything in terms of production design or camerawork or humour that resembles his signature works. And other than his then wife Lisa Marie, none of the familiar Tim Burton players are present either. He may as well have called it an Alan Smithee film - it's that generic. The production was also a difficult endeavour for Burton. Perhaps his heart wasn't in it. Though the film is only 6 years old and fresh in our memory, 20 or 30 years from now, “Planet of the Apes” will likely remain Tim Burton’s anomaly.
Woody Allen – Match Point
When I saw “Match Point” in early 2006, it was one of the most refreshing films I had seen in a while. Knowing the film was a “Woody Allen film” I had certain expectations, even though I knew it wasn’t a comedy. But I was not expecting the magnificent Hitchcockian homage that it was. In fact, it’s one of best-ever “Hitchcockian” films. There is a lot of black humour in the film, but none of it smelled like Allen’s other films. As of now, “Match Point” is his anomaly, but who knows, he may be starting a new period in his career. His next film “Cassandra’s Dream” with Ewan MacGregor and Colin Farrell sounds like more morbid “Match Point” stuff. Can’t wait.
Wes Craven - Music of the Heart
Wes Craven made a comeback with the "Scream" franchise in 1996. He parlayed that success into his only mainsteam dramatic film "Music of the Heart" with Meryl Streep. The film wasn't bad, but wasn't great either, and I can't blame him for trying to change genres. The horror genre, especially pop-horror, is a tough hole to dig oneself out of career-wise. I doubt he's getting any decent dramatic scripts sent his way these days. It's too bad he didn't jump onto something with more substance than the uninspired retread material the film turned out to be.
HE DIRECTED THAT?
THE RED AND THE WHITE
The Red and the White (1968) dir. Miklós Jancsó
Starring: József Madaras, Tibor Molnár
****
Thanks to my readers who commented on my "Long Take" article, I have discovered the cinema of Miklós Jancsó. My entry is "The Red and the White". Trying to describe Jancsó’s ode to Russian Revolution is difficult. There is no traditional plot, no tradition characters – it drops the audience into the front line of the war between the Reds and the Whites in the violent years just after the Russian Revolution. Jancsó matter-of-factly shows us both sides of the conflict with complete dispassion. It’s not documentary-like either, as in “Bloody Sunday” – it’s a cinematic experience unto itself and a dazzling anti-war film.
The film starts on the front line of the Russian Civil War of 1919 (aka Red and White War). The Reds are the Bolshevik Army who have just overthrown the Czarist monarchy. They were comprised not just of Russians, but workers from Romania, Hungary and Poland and other European countries. The Whites were a coalition made up of Czarist loyalists who wanted to overthrow the new Communist government. They were backed by and in many cases fought by other European soldiers and armies.
The film opens in the Russian countryside with a wonderful dolly and crane shot as a platoon of Whites pursue a group of Hungarian Reds across a hillside. Some are captured and some escape. The escapees wander into a Hospital barracks, where they receive care. Soon after the Whites catch up to them and pillage the premises looking for more Red soldiers. The film fluidly moves back and forth across both sides of the war. In the hospital the point of view inconspicuously moves to the White side of the battle. At times the soldiers don’t know who is on whose side and neither do we. After all it was a civil war fought by multinationals on both sides. Jancsó doesn’t care about confusing the audience though - the brutality of war is his main concern.
The film was meant to be propaganda, but often times great films come from these political restrains, the films of Mikael Kalatozov (“I am Cuba”), Sergei Eisenstein (“October”) and Leni Reifenstahal (“Triumph of the Will”) come to mind. In fact, “The Red and the White” was born from a commission by the Soviet government to make a film commemorating the 50th Anniversary of the Russian Revolution.
There is more than just a thematic kinship with Kalatozov’s fantastic “I am Cuba”. Both films use breathtaking long takes and wide-angle black and white cinematography. The scene when the Red captain makes the White captives take off their shirts and run throughout the barracks like released animals at a fox hunt is brutal and humiliating, but expertly shot and choreographed. The use of wideangle landscape shots in the finale battle is a tremendous piece of cinema and reminiscent of the epic battle in “Spartacus”.
Ironically, "The Red and the White" is an anti-war film masquerading as propaganda. Despite being a commission of the Soviet Government, the Soviets were not pleased with the Jancsó’s cut, and had the film re-edited to make the Reds more heroic. The film eventually was banned in the Soviet Union, but not before it was released in the U.S. and Hungary and became one of Jancsó’s most beloved films.
Kino has a barebones DVD available. The transfer is from the print, which means the cigarette burns and handling scratches are visible, but it’s still beautiful to watch and a must see for all cinephiles. I can't wait to discover Jancsó's other films. Any suggestions? Enjoy.
Buy it here: The Red and The White
Note: This is a compilation of shots set to different music:
NIAGARA
Niagara (1953) dir. Henry Hathaway
Starring: Marilyn Monroe, Joseph Cotton, Jean Peters
***
"A raging torrent of emotion that even nature can’t control!"
“Niagara” is a Hitchcock film that Hitchcock never made. Veteran studio director Henry Hathaway directs this suspense thriller about a woman who conspires to kill her husband and run away with her male companion. It features one of Marilyn Monroe’s most alluring performances, but it’s Niagara Falls that’s the star of the film – skillful use of on-location shooting to make the natural wonder a foreboding omnipresent shadow over the action.
A young newlywed couple, Ray and Polly Cutler (Max Showalter and Jean Peters) arrive in Niagara Falls for their honeymoon. Occupying one of the rooms is the sultry and sexy figure of Rose Loomis (Marilyn Monroe). She is the trophy wife to an elder man, George Loomis (Joseph Cotton). Right away there’s something teasing, naughty and shifty-eyed about Rose. When Polly catches Rose locking lips with another man near the Falls, she knows something is awry.
It turns out Rose is quietly plotting to leave George and run away with her handsome boy toy – Patrick (Richard Allen). George is targeted to be bumped off by Patrick in an elaborate murder scheme, but when the plan fails Patrick ends up the one murdered. George goes on the hunt for revenge against Rose. But when Polly gets in the way, suddenly she’s caught in the web of suspense and thrills, which culminates thrillingly at the edge of the Falls.
As effectively as Hitchcock used San Francisco in “Vertigo” or Mount Rushmore in “North By Northwest” Henry Hathaway does the same with Niagara Falls. In fact, Joseph Cotton, not so subtly tells us the metaphor of the Falls when Loomis warns Polly about love, “…it's calm and easy, and you throw in a log, it just floats around. Let it move a little further down and it gets going faster, hits some rocks, and... in a minute it's in the lower rapids, and... nothing in the world -- including God himself can keep it from going over the edge.” This is Loomis’ marriage in a nutshell.
Hathaway shoots the Falls with stunning visual beauty. His frames highlight its powerful force as well as its graceful natural elegance. The murder at the bell tower provides a wonderful cinematic shot showing a murder from high in the ceiling looking down at the shadowy action overhead with the bells perfectly framed in the foreground. The final moments down the river approaching the edge is a terrific action sequence – especially for 1953. Hathaway uses complex gimble effects to rock the boat and he dumps more than enough water in Cotton and Peters’ faces to make it believable.
Marilyn Monroe is a perfect Hitchcockian blonde cocktease. She is ravishing, especially in her opening shot, naked underneath the covers in bed. We see her coming in and out of the shower on a number of occasions, and her famous pink dress rivals any sexually enticing costume I’ve seen on film. It’s too bad Ms. Monroe never made a real Hitchcock film. She stayed mostly in her comedic comfort zone, but in “Niagara” she commands the screen like best-ever femme fatales.
Max Showalter as Ray Cutler is a weakpoint in the film. His gawky naivety is too childish and rudimentary to have even survived scrutiny in 1953. His one-note and ‘clown like’ facial expressions are fit for television, not the big screen.
Henry Hathway wasn’t a studio hack, and though he never did get the recognition of an Alfred Hitchcock, he did create some indelible noir classics including, “The Dark Corner”, “Kiss of Death”, “Call Northside 777” and, of course, “Niagara”. Enjoy.
Buy it here: Niagara
LIGHTS! CAMERA! ELVIS!
Blue Hawaii - Easy Come Easy Go - GI Blues - Girls Girls Girls - King Creole - Fun in Acapulco – Roustabout - Paradise Hawaiian Style
Starring: Elvis Presley
Guest review by Greg Klymkiw
Paramount Home Video’s contribution to the recent glut of Presley celluloid is a nicely packaged box set entitled: “Lights! Camera! Elvis! Collection”. It is precisely the packaging – a fancy blue suede box that holds the eight movies – which counts as one of two reasons to recommend picking up this title that exploits (I mean, commemorates) the 30th anniversary of the King’s deadly slide off the porcelain throne onto the cool slab of Memphis marble adorning the second floor of Graceland.
The second reason to pick up the box is the inclusion of Mr. Presley’s best movie – the just-short-of-great "King Creole". Based upon Harold Robbins’s best-selling pot-boiling trash-lit and serving, not surprisingly, as a fine structural coat-hanger to the fashionably stylish dark fabric of late-noir, this Michael Curtiz-helmed studio picture tells the tale of poor-boy Danny Fisher and his rise from the gutter and ultimate acceptance of his loving Dad while battling a sleazy gangster and having to choose between a life of crime and a life of song.
Featuring a terrific supporting cast, "King Creole" features the delectably sleazy Walter Matthau as the gangster-club-owner who makes Danny’s and pretty much everyone else’s life miserable, a sad and sexy Carolyn Jones as Matthau’s Madonna-whore moll with a heart of gold, a suitably pathetic Dean Jagger as Danny’s loser Dad and the radiant and utterly magical Dolores Hart as Presley’s main love interest. Better yet is Presley’s fine performance. His smouldering screen presence is palpable and he displays a wide range of emotion. If Col. Tom Parker had not so horribly bungled Elvis’s motion picture career, the King might well have joined the ranks of James Dean, Paul Newman and Marlon Brando as one of the truly great angry young men of 50s and 60s celluloid rather than the popular, but ultimately cartoon-like joke he became in later pictures.
The rest of the package is a woeful collection of some of Presley’s worst screen offences – some more risible than others, but risible nonetheless. From the standpoint of picture quality, this collection offers transfers ranging from adequate to first-rate. The lack of extra features (save for original theatrical trailers) is a bit annoying, but only "King Creole" really suffers from having no additional tidbits to add some informational cherries to the ample and tasty treat of the picture itself. It’d be great to try and score a commentary track (or even extensive interview) from Dolores Hart who, at the age of 25, left the fame and glamour of the movie business to become a nun in the Catholic Church. Even now, she apparently holds the distinction of being the only nun who is a voting member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. I also think a scholarly commentary would be great with this picture especially since Curtiz’s direction is so first-rate and the late-noir style would also deserve some in-depth analysis.
The other movies in this box include one of Elvis’s biggest hits, the utterly ludicrous travelogue "Blue Hawaii" which has the dubious distinction of virtually no plot and an annoyingly over-the-top Angela Lansbury offering support. "G.I. Blues" is a plodding attempt to present Presley’s service experience in an entertaining fashion. Stella Stevens is mouth-wateringly gorgeous in "Girls! Girls! Girls!" but her character is such a sourball that one is not surprised that Elvis’s eyes may occasionally roam around at the constant bevy of beauties around him. "Fun in Acapulco" and "Paradise Hawaiian Style" are both dull and silly travelogues, while "Easy Come Easy Go" tries to mix it up with some deep-sea diving action to liven up the stale proceedings.
These titles are pretty woeful, but for some they might offer enough nostalgia appeal to warrant sitting through more than once. I, for one, was kind of hoping for at least some melancholic magic that’d bring me back to those halcyon days when I first saw many of these movies as a kid attending the Saturday matinees at a little neighbourhood cinema in my old hometown. Through the gentle haze of childhood recollection, I thought many of these pictures were really wonderful. Alas, they do not hold up to adult scrutiny. Elvis is always cool in the pictures, but it’s alternately depressing seeing this brilliant young actor in material that is so below his talents that all feelings of bygone warm and fuzzies dissipate pretty quickly.
Other than the terrific "King Creole", the only other picture in this collection that might warrant more than one viewing is the solid, though unexceptional "Roustabout" that tells a tale of Elvis amidst some old-time carnies played with classic verve by Barbara Stanwyck and Leif Erickson. This is one movie that might have benefited from having someone or something resembling a director behind the lens as opposed to the dull-as-dishwater competence of John Rich who is, not surprisingly, a veteran television director. He’s a decent enough camera jockey, but it might have been nice to imagine this picture in the hands of someone like Don Siegel or Sam Peckinpah.
Now, I am sure that some might argue that the whole point of the Elvis pictures is to showcase the songs and the King performing them in a variety of locations. This might have been fine in the day, but it’s awfully hard to watch most of what’s in this box set after watching "King Creole". It’s not only a good movie with a genuinely good Elvis performance, but the music is presented in a context that does not detract from the noir-ish world Curtiz creates, but actually works within it, not unlike the musical sequences in something like the classic Rita Hayworth picture "Gilda". Among a whole mess o’ tuneful crawfish ditties crooned by everyone’s fave lipster, my personal delights were his renditions of the title track, “Trouble” and the get-up-and-boogie “Hard Headed Woman”.
And while this may be hard to believe, many of the other movies don’t actually feature Elvis’s best numbers. They’re always beautifully performed – his voice is smoother than smooth, but tinged with those occasional wild-man highs and lows that can send us to truly orgasmic places – however, many of the songs themselves just plain suck. There’s no polite way of saying it, so allow me to reiterate – they just plain suck! For example, the "Blue Hawaii" soundtrack features one – count ‘em – one truly legendary song (“Can’t Help Falling In Love”), but I am sure my life will be full if I never again have to hear “Rock-a-Hula Baby”. And yes, I know the album from this picture was probably one of the biggest albums of all-time, but that doesn’t mean most of the songs on it were any good. In G.I. Blues we get to see Elvis sing “Blue Suede Shoes”, but we also have to suffer through numerous musical mediocrities. This is pretty much the case for the rest of the pictures in this box set.
In summation, the “Lights! Camera! Elvis! Collection” presents an interesting look at how a brilliant young actor was used, abused and wasted – especially in light of the great work he displayed in "King Creole". If you must own the blue suede box that houses the abovementioned titles, then feel free to pick this collection up. Otherwise, you might do better by just renting "Roustabout" and purchasing "King Creole" on its own or waiting until someone issues a special edition of this fine picture. Art thou listening Paramount Home Video? Do Elvis and his fans proud and get cracking on a tasty DVD gumbo of this fabulous movie.
Buy it here: Lights! Camera! Elvis! Collection (Blue Hawaii/Easy Come, Easy Go/Fun in Acapulco/G.I. Blues/Girls! Girls! Girls!/King Creole/Roustabout/Paradise Hawaiian Style)
THE LIVES OF OTHERS
The Lives of Others (2006) dir. Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck
Starring: Ulrich Mühe, Sebastian Koch, Ulrich Tukur
****
There was silent shock at last year’s Oscars when the Best Foreign Language film was read out as “The Lives of Others” instead of the favourite, “Pan’s Labyrinth.” I was surprised but not disappointed because the Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck’s first feature film is absolutely terrific. I’ve seen it twice now, and it stands up well after two viewings. It’s terrific as a thriller, a character study and cold war spy film. It’s highly recommended viewing.
In East Germany, 1984, the Berlin Wall is up and citizens are still under oppressive Communist rule. Artists and their works are watched with scrutiny for subversiveness. Many great artists are blacklisted and not allowed to perform or create. In Orwellian fashion (hence 1984), the secret police, Stasi, keeps strict control on all activities of suspected conspirators. They are so determined and meticulous they collect samples of body odour from the seats of interrogated victims to have on file for future reference.
The best of the best of Stasi agents is Captain Gerd Weisler, a robot-of-a-man, who conducts his interrogation and surveillance with unwavering determination. When he is assigned the case of bugging the apartment of a talented playwright Georg Dreyman and his actress/wife Christa, Weisler’s outlook on life and patriotism slowly changes. By listening in on the most intimate and personal aspects of their life he begins to envy their creativity, freedom and ‘joie de vivre’. When Dreyman conspires to write anonymous essays for a Western newspaper, unknown to Dreyman, Weisler silently becomes his guardian, covering up information and silently subverting his own surveillance effort.
Ulrich Mühe is phenomenal as Weisler and gives an Oscar-worthy performance. At the beginning he is a monster who prides himself for interrogating his countrymen with intense psychological cruelty. He accepts his role as an instrument of the government to do their dirty work with complete dispassion. Yet, on several occasions we see him walk home and enter his sterile domicile apartment. Here we get to see the feared man as an ordinary person – lonely and weak. He has nothing outside his job and his sex life consists of weekly visits from prostitutes.
The final moments of the film are heartbreaking for Weisler. After the fall of the Wall, we see the broken man delivering mail with deflated pride. At this point we are given full perspective of the effect of the Iron Curtain. Weisler was a talented man and though he was the best at his job the only way he could succeed was by compromising his convictions and cheating himself and his country. Weisler chose not to and thus became a broken man. But in the last scene, a few small words on a page redeem all that he has lost. It’s a remarkably poignant moment. Some may be put off by the ‘Frank Capra-ness’ of the scene, but it’s emotional and cinematic and takes the film to another level.
A sad footnote to the film was the sudden death Ulrich Mühe, who succumbed to stomach cancer only a few weeks ago. Mühe’s life remarkably mirrored the character of Dreyman – he was a theatre actor in East Germany during the Cold War years, who, like Dreyman, was forbidden from speaking out against the repressive regime. Mühe claims his wife was compromised and secretly had him under Stasi surveillance for the last 10 years of their marriage.
“The Lives of Others” is a fascinating and thoroughly entertaining film. Writer/director Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck is a talented filmmaker with a bright future. Watch for him to be making the move to Hollywood very soon. Enjoy.
Buy it here: The Lives of Others
ARMY OF SHADOWS
Army of Shadows (1969) dir. Jean-Pierre Melville
Starring: Lino Ventura, Jean-Pierre Cassel, Simone Signoret
****
Kyle Smith of the New York Post was quoted as saying Robert De Niro’s film “The Good Shepherd” was “the ‘Godfather’ of spy films”. That’s a horrible comparison, but saying “Army of Shadows” is the “Godfather” of Résistance films – or even ‘spy’ films as a whole – is not an overstatement. Jean-Pierre Melville’s classic was rediscovered and reissued last year and has arrived on a beautiful Criterion Collection DVD special edition. It’s an epic story of a group of ordinary French citizens and their courageous but dangerous and difficult efforts to front the Résistance efforts against Nazi occupation in WWII.
The opening shot is a magnificent long static take. The Arc de Triumphe framed perfectly at the end of the Champs Elysee. When a group of Nazi soldiers goosestep their way into frame from the background to the foreground we are mediately put in the time and place. It’s 1942 – Nazi occupied France. One of the leaders of the French Résistance, Philip Gerbier (Lino Ventura) has been captured and taken into interrogation. His escape is expertly engineered and executed like a trained killer would. He’s not a fighter though, but a civil engineer, forced into participating in the dangerous game of hiding and subverting the Nazis from within. Immediately we get the sense the 3 years of occupation has hardened Philippe. He’s not the same man before the war. But now, he’s a tough-minded, steely-eyed idealistic soldier.
The film focuses on a group of six Résistance leaders who are equally as determined to make the sacrifices needed to free France. But with the Nazi’s hot on their tail, this tests the resolve of each of members of the group.
Jean-Pierre Melville’s confidence with the story and the medium is apparent. Made in 1969, it’s one of Melville’s later films and a labour of love. Melville was known for his American-style French crime films – “Le Samourai”, “Le Circle Rouge”, and “Bob Le Flambeur”. Those films were genre-based and always had a cinematic panache to them. Melville takes “Army of Shadows” very seriously. The mood and tone is cold and isolated. There’s a blanket of despair consistent throughout, visualized by the desolate streets, the clean compositions, grey and colourless visual design and the cold and detached performances of the actors.
But when the film shifts briefly to London we immediately feel a different mood. The group makes a daring trip via submarine to London to get support from the British government. Philippe gazes around at the lively activity of the city. He walks into a bar and looks forlornly on the playful interaction of males and females. He’s reminded of the life he used to have as a pre-war citizen. The hustle and bustle of the city is palpable and contrasts the quiet subdued air of occupied France.
Eventually the group returns to France when one of their leaders is captured by the Nazis. Here on in a series of events tests the soldiers’ allegiance to their cause. No one is immune the pressure of torture and persecution. Everyone has their weak spot – including Mathilde.
The Criterion transfer of the film is magnificent. That combined with the classical cinematography and expert direction makes "Army of Shadows" one of the great films of the era. The themes of honour, guilt, and betrayal hold true to today as well. The film is closest in comparison to Bertolucci’s “The Conformist” (1971), both are great films about characters whose loyalties to their friends and countrymen are tested amid tumultuous times of war and subjugation.
Buy it here: Army of Shadows - Criterion Collection
THE 11TH HOUR
The 11th Hour (2007) dir. Nadia Connors, Leila Conners Peterson
A Documentary presented by Leonardo Di Caprio
**
“The 11th Hour” is a high profile documentary which arrives with much hype and publicity, mainly due to the vigorous efforts of its producer and presenter Leonardo Di Caprio – a fervent celebrity environmentalist. I agree 100% with the information and 100% with the arguments in the film. It’s hard to fault a film for so passionately trying to convince people to change their collective ways and save the environment. But since the medium is film and art, I must review it as such. As a persuasive argument for environmentalism it succeeds. As a ‘film’ it fails.
“The 11th Hour” gathers dozens of the finest scientists, activists, and politicians in traditional talking head interview style to summarize the state of the world. Leonardo Di Caprio opens the film like David Attenborough or James Burke in a PBS documentary, walking and talking telling us what we’re about to see and be told. Perhaps it’s a warning for those who already know we’re teetering on the edge of our own destruction to leave the theatre and watch something more entertaining, like “The Simpsons” or “Hairspray. What follows is an assault of doom and gloom information from a line-up of scientists telling us how everything we do in life is wasteful, redundant and harmful. Everyone from Stephen Hawking to Mikael Gorbachev to Aboriginal chiefs – everyone is given their shot at us.
I invariably must compare the film to “An Inconvenient Truth” which has the same agenda, but while Al Gore’s film is succinct and to the point, “The 11th Hour” is sloppy and meandering. The film not only discusses our environmental irresponsibilities but scolds us for eating junk food, watching celebrity gossip television, playing video games etc etc. It’s like being caught in a pseudo-intellectual rant from a stoner/drunkard at a party. Just rambling and rambling to the point of not having a point. There’s a reason why Al Gore is a politician, he knows how to speak and knows how to present an argument. “An Inconvenient Truth” was concise and streamlined – “The 11th Hour” is not.
I was surprised how under-visualized the film was. Other than the interviews virtually the entire film is a series of montages made up of old archival stock footage we’ve seen time and time again. I can only guess how much was original footage but I would wager about 10% or less. Midway through the film the editing of the stock footage reminded me of Oliver Stone’s “JFK” – and low and behold the editor of the film was Pietro Scalia – the multi Oscar-winning editor of “JFK”. He does his best with what he has, but the film badly needed some purposely shot film to provide us some relief from the barrage of stock images. We are browbeaten for nearly 2 hours by shocking image after shocking image – decaying cows in fields, seal clubbing, Katrina flooding footage, glacier melting, toxic chemical dumping and on and on. It just doesn’t stop. Cudos though to the filmmakers for choosing some magnificently grand music tracks from the likes of Sigur Ros, Mogwai and Brian Eno.
The films of Michael Moore, which are unabashedly activist, succeed because entertainment is put above information. “An Inconvenient Truth” was heavy on information and persuasive arguments but the heart of the film is the story of Al Gore, which is an emotional and entertaining journey. “The 11th Hour” is all information, no heart, no emotion.
As I said I can’t argue against the message, but for the medium of choice (cinema), the argument needs to be made by using art to inform. Interestingly enough this film has essentially been made before – 20 years ago – as “Koyaanisqasti.” Except “Koyaanisqatsi” didn’t have a single interview or line of voiceover - only music and images. It’s a perfect example of presenting a powerful argument as art and entertainment, rather then preaching. So, make your next car a hybrid, convert your household lights to energy saver bulbs, and recycle your plastic bottles. And if you want to see how our shallow and superfluous lifestyle needs are collectively contributing to the downfall of the planet, watch “Koyaanisqatsi” – you will definitely be entertained and informed.
Click here for a review and clip of “Koyaanisqatsi”
Here’s the trailer for “The 11th Hour”
THE MATADOR
The Matador (2005) dir. Richard Shepard
Starring: Pierce Brosnan, Greg Kinnear
**1/2
“The Matador” is an Elmore Leonard wannabe film about a depressed hitman whose chance meeting with a lowly salesman in a hotel turns his career around to make a better and more respectable life for himself. The writer/director creates some interesting characters but doesn’t take them to the places they need to go make the film dramatic or suspenseful. The film works well as a poignant black comedy, but I wish it was more blacker than comedic.
Julian Noble (Pierce Brosnan) is a suave hitman. He’s also a burned out drunk and a despicable womanizer. While casing his next hit, he meets a suburban middle class salesman, Danny Wright (Greg Kinnear) in a Mexico City hotel bar. They strike up an unusual friendship, which takes them to a bullfight. There Julian reveals to Danny the truth about his job. Danny doesn’t believe him, and Julian proceeds to demonstrate by stalking and attempting to do a random hit on a bystander. He doesn’t go through with it, but Danny is convinced he’s the real deal.
With 20 years behind him, Julian’s on his last days as a hitman. Danny's description of his blissful domestic life sticks with Julian. Suddenly he has a conscience, which makes his job difficult. But Danny’s life isn’t as blissful as it looks. Their unlikely friendship continues beyond Mexico City when Julian shows up unannounced at his Denver home in the middle of night. He’s come to ask Julian for a favour of extreme consequence that will affect both their lives forever.
The film is a black comedy with all the violence left off screen or dramatized with humour. The film concentrates on character instead of situation. As a result much of drama of the danger is lost. We never get to see Danny's reactions to these life-changing events. The flip side of this is the way director Richard Shepard hides this information from us. It’s a bit of forced narrative manipulation (think of the unnecessary narrative shifting “21 Grams”), but it does provide some surprising reveals, especially at the end.
I can’t help but think of how the film could have been different (and better) if we saw the violent moments on screen. Pierce Brosnan was one of the producers. He’s a good looking dude, but has never stretched himself as an actor. Brosnan could have taken the film in a darker direction and really made a name for himself outside of James Bond. Instead he chose to stay with light and whimsical. This is a reason why no one younger than 60 ever went to a film because Pierce Brosnan was in it.
The film looks terrific. Shepard and DOP David Tattersall bathe the Mexico scenes in beautiful colours and bright sunlight. Each scene is staged and directed well. Shepard chooses his music well also. His final music choice, which takes us into the credits is perfect for the tone of the film.
The title of the film refers to the bullfighting scene which is the key scene in solidifying Julian and Danny’s friendship. To me, it’s a metaphor for the cathartic enjoyment of violence and the bloodlust we all have deep within ourselves. In this scene Danny ignites Julian’s benevolent side, but Julian also ignites Danny’s malevolent side. The film never shows the bull being killed, nor do we see Julian’s victims be killed. It’s a consistent cinematic choice, but is it the right one? It’s for you to decide. Enjoy.
Buy it here: The Matador (Widescreen Edition)
3:10 TO YUMA (Original)
3:10 to Yuma (1957) dir. Delmar Daves
Starring: Glenn Ford, Van Heflin
***
With the release of the well-casted “3:10 to Yuma” with Christian Bale and Russell Crowe, it’s timely to review the original film from 1957. Elmore Leonard has been around for a long time, and before he perfected his own brand of crime stories, he wrote dozens of classic Westerns, including “3:10 to Yuma”. The film was highly popular at the time and attracted audiences with the against-type casting of Glenn Ford as the bad guy. Fifty years later, the film survives remarkably well. It looks great and provides ample entertainment with all the essential elements of the genre.
The film opens with Ben Wade (Glenn Ford) robbing a stagecoach. Wade is the charismatic leader of the black clad group of thieves. He’s not sadistic though, and is forced to kill one of the drivers in self defense. The group of soon-to-be-wanted men ride into town where they plan their escape across the border. Wade splits up with his men so as not to attract attention to themselves as suspects. But in doing so he opens himself up for capture.
Enter Dan Evans (Van Heflin), a decent, hardworking rancher with a wife and two children. Dan is caught in the middle of the activities when he strolls into the same town looking for a loan to help him through the lengthy drought that’s plagued the land. With no means to secure the loan, he accepts an offer of $200 to help transport Wade to prison. Knowing Wade’s gang will be out to rescue him Evans and the authorities plot a rouse to get Wade on the 3:10 train to Yuma prison (hence the title) under the noses of the gang. Evans has to keep a steady watch on the manipulative and dangerous offender in order collect the money which will save his family from financial ruin. But with the clock ticking down to 3:10pm Wade’s gang eventually catches onto their plan. Evans is faced with two options – let go Wade go and flee to safety or go through with the plan and send Wade to prison at the risk of his own death.
The film’s main strength is its brilliant direction and cinematography. The 1950’s was the golden age of black & white cinematography. Director Delmar Daves and DOP Charles Lawton Jr. craft one of the most beautifully shot films of the era. It flawless composed, lit and choreographed creating an absolute perfect example of classical filmmaking. The film stands up to any of today’s films. It’s very modern. Gone are the dated rear projection process shots of the 40’s. Everything is on location and real. The camera movements and creative composition make every shot a visual treat. The exteriors look like Ansel Adams photographs and rivals anything John Ford has ever done.
Story wise, Elmore Leonard and screenwriter Halstead Welles create a well-told narrative. The opening act is suspenseful. We’re not quite sure what is going on, nor can we predict the course of the action in the film. When the gang leaves Wade alone in the bar, there’s a lengthy courtship scene between Wade and the barmaid. It’s short, but they actually fall in love and the scene ends with a passionate kiss. This isn’t the typical Western bad guy. Jack Palance would never get romantic with a dame. But this is Glenn Ford. He was known as the everyman hero in his films, and Wade was an against-type character. Ford makes Wade an honest antagonist with personal ethics. He is highly effective as such. But where the film fails, is in the second act when Evans and Wade are companions at the station waiting for the 3:10 train. By playing Wade as likeable and honest, there is no suspense or tension between the two. Even with Evans' shotgun pointed at Wade we should continually feel the threat from Wade. But we never get that. Ford is too much of a hero to ever threaten Van Heflin. Watch Henry Fonda’s performance in Leone’s “Once Upon a Time in the West” for the best example of sinister anti-casting. Therefore, with much of the tension zapped from the story the film drags until the finale.
The finale redeems the film in the end, with an expertly choreographed ambush on the town. Evans is forced to fight off the gangsters and get Wade into the train. The only false moment happens at the very very end when it finally rains on the land. The water/rain effects are quite amateurish considering the technical polish on everything else in the film.
Overall, “3:10 to Yuma” is a great Western. Though without the lasting impact of John Ford or George Stevens film, it ranks somewhere around the “High Noon”, “Bad Day at Black Rock” level of Westerns. Check it out. Enjoy.
Buy it here: 3:10 to Yuma (Special Edition)
KISS ME DEADLY
Kiss Me Deadly (1955) dir. Robert Aldrich
Starring: Ralph Meeker
**1/2
Film noir is well established genre - dark crime tales usually involving ordinary guys caught in tangled webs of intrigue or crime, visualized with dark shadowy cinematography. Often low budget, with tier B actors, the sexuality and violence became the attraction rather than star power. “Kiss Me Deadly” is considered one of the greats. It’s familiar territory as described above, dramatizing another hard boiled crime story from writer Mikey Spillane. The film is also famous for influencing Quentin Tarantino’s glowing briefcase in “Pulp Fiction”, Alex Cox’s glowing trunk in “Repo Man” and Steven Spielberg’s mysterious Ark of the Covenant in “Raiders of the Lost Ark.” It certainly has the noir mood and tone, but unfortunately, other than for its historical significance, it doesn’t age well.
Ralph Meeker plays Mike Hammer, a L.A. private eye who one night picks up a mysterious hitchhiker named Christina (a young Cloris Leachman). He gets into an accident by the forced hand of an unknown assailant. When he wakes he finds the Christina has died. With the help of his local P.I. colleagues Hammer embarks on a dangerous investigation into the accident and discovers a dark and dangerous magical maguffin that’s the root of all this criminal activity.
For two thirds the film moves with the pace and excitement of a “Law & Order” episode. Hammer interviews several friends and colleagues trying to track down the source of Christina’s disappearance. Along the journey Hammer evades the usual shadowy but unimpressive henchmen. Hammer is no wimp though, he fights off a knife-wielding hitman at night and violently throws him down a long flight of stairs; he disarms a bomb planted in his car with ease; and he fights off a half a dozen group of thugs at the home of local heavy Sugar Smallhouse.
The finale is a classic and the reason to watch the film. The legendary ‘whatsit’ box, which everyone is after, is never really explained though it has been speculated to be one of several metaphors (a caution against atomic testing is the most popular). It’s interesting to see its influences on two important films from two different generations – “Raiders of the Lost Ark” and “Pulp Fiction.”
Though the ending packs a wallop, a great noir has to tease us with details, red herrings or false leads. Since the audience is with the point of view of the investigator, we must also constantly feel the threat of Hammer moving forward to discover the mystery. For example, in “DOA” Edmund O’Brien’s character is poisoned and must find his killer in 48 hours in order to live, or in “The Postman Rings Twice”, Frank and Cora conspire to murder Cora’s husband because it’s the only way she can escape her drab and boring life. Two acts of investigation in “Kiss Me Deadly” provide little drama or intrigue. Nothing is learned about Christina or cause of her trouble until the very end in a rushed though fantastic finale.
Ralph Meeker is a tough gumshoe but he’s missing the wit and charisma of a Humphrey Bogart, or the confidence of a Fred MacMurray. As a character actor (ie. “Paths of Glory”) he’s effective but doesn’t have the chops to fully carry a film (though I have to give him credit for the best-ever cinematic 'bitch-slapping'). Missing also is a credible antagonist. Where’s the Sidney Greenstreet or Peter Lorre or Orson Welles or Edward G. Robinson? A young and skinny Jack Elam makes an appearance, but his commanding presence just isn’t there yet.
Rudimentary plotting, which moves from scene to scene without impassioned danger or action, stalls the film. The ending certainly takes the film to another level, but the jump is too large, too quick and too much for me to recommend it over other classics of the genre. Watch “Double Indemnity”, “Touch of Evil”, “Mildred Pierce”, “The Big Sleep” or “The Maltese Falcon” first.
Buy it here: Kiss Me Deadly
SUPERBAD
Superbad (2007) dir. Greg Mattola
Starring: Jonah Hill, Michael Cera, Seth Rogan, Bill Hader
***1/2
“Superbad” is one of the most entertaining films of the year. I was worried the best parts were in the trailer, which I saw at least a dozen times over the past 4 months of hype. But the film is R-rated enough to show us only the PG parts and save us the raunchy and funnier bits for the theatre. “Superbad” isn’t original, in fact, it’s another of the ‘one-night-in-the-life-of-high-schoolers-trying-to-get-laid’ genre. It treads on “American Pie” material, but without the sappy fromage which plagued that franchise. “Superbad” is indeed bonafide badass.
Seth (Jonah Hill) and Evan (Michael Cera) are prototypical teenagers, and even though they’re about to graduate, they’re still negotiating their way through the social challenges of high schooldom. Their plans are Machiavellian. They know they’re going to get laid in University, therefore they need girlfriends for the summer so they can actually be good at it by that time. This opportunity presents itself in the form of a big party held by Jules - a Tier 1 social strata babe. Their plan is to use the new fake ID of their nerdy friend Fogell (Christopher Mintz-Plasse) to buy liquor for the party. This would ingratiate them with the cool kids and hopefully get them girlfriends for the summer.
Things don’t as planned when Fogell comes back with a Hawaiian driver’s license named “McLovin”. After much arguing Fogell grows a pair, buys the booze, and is just about the leave when a perp knocks him out while robbing the store. He wakes up in the care of the police, who then take him on a wild debaucherous diversion. Meanwhile, Seth and Evan’s plan B has them crashing another house party and stealing their booze. The story moves at a quick pace as the night takes the trio of losers from one outrageous situation to another.
The film has a lot going for it - strong and genuinely funny comedic writing to start. The situations aren’t necessarily original, in fact, it’s a combination of “American Graffiti”, “Animal House”, “Porky’s” “Dazed and Confused” and “American Pie”, but writers Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg inject a healthy dose of “I’ve been there” reality.
Casting is top notch. Hill and Cera are completely opposite in personality but compliment each other like a classic comedic duo – think of the personality dynamic of Abbot and Costello or the Smothers Brothers or Martin and Lewis. Seth does most of the talking, shouting and complaining, Evan is content to go with the flow. The film really gets moving when Fogell meets the childishly irresponsible cop duo, Slater and Michaels (played Seth Rogan and Bill Hader, who, I’m convinced are minor comic geniuses). They take idiocy to another level.
The discovery is Christopher Mintz-Plasse, who is transformed from the wirey Fogell into the party legend McLovin’. His best scene is when he’s roped into his inspiring booty shaking dance with a party hottie. The best moment for Seth is the confession of his childhood habit for drawing highly detailed sketches of cocks. This has added humour for me because of a good friend of mine who had a penchant to tagging public places with similar sketches.
For several reasons, “Superbad” trumps all other similar films of its genre– specifically “American Pie”, which this will ultimately be compared to. The “American Pie” series was always plagued with sappy cheeseball character arcs that undermined all of the film’s raunchiness. “Superbad” does have characters that change and grow but they remain badass losers to the very end. As well, “Superbad” is cast with likeable and lovable leads. “American Pie” was cast with good looking but ultimate cardboard actors with no personality. And thirdly, I doubt we will ever see “Superbad 4 – Band Camp”.
“Superbad” is one of those movies that condenses everything that is fun about high school and distills out all the crap. It works best because, like “Knocked Up”, the filmmakers keep it real and honest and relatable. Especially for the guys, I think we all, in some form or another, were Seth, Evan or McLovin’. Enjoy.
THE U.S. VS. JOHN LENNON
The U.S. vs. John Lennon (2006) dir. David Leaf & John Scheinfeld
Documentary
**1/2
“The U.S. vs. John Lennon” tells the story of John Lennon’s controversial activism for peace during the tumultuous late 60’s and early 70’s. Though the subject is the former Beatle, the film uses John Lennon as the entry point to tell the larger story of anti-war activism during the Vietnam War. Though the film is polished and comprehensive it doesn’t reveal anything we didn’t already know about the anti-war movement or the Lennon the man.
As he mentions in a press scrum outside one of his Immigration hearings, “he had a face that people didn’t like”. In fact, John Lennon has stirred up controversy his entire life. In Lennon’s own words we hear him talk about his working class background in Liverpool which begat his hatred of oppression and contempt for authority. When he was a Beatle he was much beloved for his music, but his infamous statement about being bigger than Jesus revealed his anti-establishment personality for which he would later become more famous.
The film tracks John’s rise from Beatle to political activist and his lengthy battle against deportation by the Department of Immigration. From the government’s point of view, it makes sense, why should John Lennon, who isn’t American and only recently moved to America, be allowed to criticize a government that’s not his. Lennon used the media and his pop star celebrity to his advantage? He befriended them and allowed them into his home, which mutually benefited both parties.
The film gets all the right people to appear on camera, Yoko is there, so are activists Tariq Ali, Noam Chomsky, Bobby Seale, journalists, Carl Bernstein and Walter Chronkite and Nixon-era politicians G. Gordon Liddy, John Dean and George McGovern. These are all great people which give the film its credibility, but no Paul McCartney? no Ringo Starr? Unfortunately the film becomes just a factual rundown of 1966-1980. There’s no deep analysis or discoveries into Lennon the man, just a surface summary which could have been provided by an A&E Biography. The film’s narrative, other than building up to his assassination in 1980, climaxes with Lennon getting his green card. It’s not very exciting and in fact, is an anti-climax.
The filmmakers use the glossiest and slickest visualization techniques available today. HD cameras shoot the interviewees against creative backgrounds and 3-D still photography enhancement (a la “The Kid Stays in the Picture”) allow standard photographs to dynamically pop out of the screen. It’s beautiful to look at, but in the end it’s style over substance.
For such an important man who left a valued creative and political legacy, the film is too shallow to challenge our minds. It's a ‘puff-piece’. I’m waiting for the filmmaker who can get Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, or Julian Lennon to talk about the side of John Lennon we’ve never seen. But at the very least there some great music to enjoy.
Buy it here: The U.S. vs. John Lennon
THE PROPOSITION
The Proposition (2005) dir. John Hillcoat
Starring: Guy Pearce, Ray Winstone, Danny Huston, Emily Watson
***1/2
“The Proposition” is an Aussie Western written by new wave punk rocker Nick Cave. It’s a beautifully crafted film telling a familiar western tale from the Australian point of view of their sordid history and association with British imperialism. It’s a story of a British officer who puts his job before his family in the idealistic hope of civilizing the lawless Australian outback. The story is simple, but it’s theme of betrayal and revenge is classical giving the film a resonating mythical quality.
The opening reminds me of “Days of Heaven” – still photographs of the era with a quiet melancholy soundtrack over the main credits. It sets the time, place and mood of the film perfectly. The inciting incident happens before the film starts. A well-respected family is brutally murdered by a particularly brutal gang led by the sadistic maniac Arthur Burns (Danny Huston). After a Peckinpah-worthy shootout Lawman Captain Stanley (Ray Winstone) captures Burns’ two brothers Charlie (Guy Pearce) and Mikey (Richard Wilson). Stanley makes a proposition to Charlie – to find and kill his older brother Arthur in the nine days before Christmas, or he will kill his younger brother Mikey. Charlie accepts the proposition and sets out to find his long lost brother.
Though Guy Pearce’s character is structured as the main protagonist, the complexities of the film lay with Captain Stanley. His dedication to the law and the land compromises his family as husband to his beautiful and refined wife, Martha (Emma Watson). But Stanley has convictions about his role in Australia. His commitment to his job is fed by his desire to provide a peaceful home for Martha - thus his need to “civilize” the land. We discover the ramifications of his ‘proposition’ when his superior Eden Fletcher (David Wenham) arrives in town. When he finds Mikey Burns in custody, he orders a 40 lash flogging as punishment for the Hopkins massacre. With his word broken Stanley knows Arthur and Charlie will soon go after he and Martha – therefore his proposition effectively becomes his own death sentence.
Cave and Hillcoat effectively build up the Arthur Burns character to be a Kaiser Sose/Col Kurtz-type larger-than-life antagonist. We don’t meet him until the second act, but the stories told about him and the legends portray him as a spirit or a legend. The aborigines describe him as part man, part dog, with long ears and a tale. When we finally meet him, he doesn’t disappoint. He’s aloof but sadistic. He speaks with calm eloquence, but his actions are maniacal and vicious. Likely inspired by Brando’s Col. Kurtz in “Apocalypse Now”, Danny Huston plays him to perfection.
Nick Cave’s ethereal buzzing music soundscapes add to the Australianness of the film. There’s strong sense of aborigine spirituality throughout the film that give it A “Walkabout” or “Picnic at Hanging Rock”-type feel.
The film builds and builds to a violent cathartic ending. The Charlie and Arthur ride off to rescue brother Mikey and avenge his beating, meanwhile Captain Stanley and his wife try to have a peaceful Christmas - a soon-to-be tragically ironic occasion.
Have some patience with the film and pay attention to the quiet dialogue, which is sometimes difficult to understand. It’s all fuel for this violent but beautiful layered genre gem. Enjoy
Buy it here: The Proposition
THE DARK BACKWARD
The Dark Backward (1991) dir. Adam Rifkin
Starring: Judd Nelson, Bill Paxton, Wayne Newton
*
I had never heard of “The Dark Backward” before, but apparently it’s a ‘cult film’. Well, it’s “finally” arrived on DVD Special Edition. After watching it for the first time I realize why it’s been unavailable all these years, it’s a terrible film hiding underneath so-called ‘cult status’. It’s a pseudo-fantasy freak-show story about a lowly garbage man who becomes a stand up comic, fails, then succeeds when he discovers a third arm growing out of his back. Nope, there are no typos in that last sentence.
Judd Nelson plays Marty Malt a nerdy garbage man, who dreams of something bigger than his mundane life. His best buddy (Bill Paxton) is an accordion-playing celebrity wannabe named Gus. He’s the entrepreneur of the duo, who’s always cooking up schemes to get rich and famous. For no apparent reason, Gus encourages Marty to try stand-up comedy. Marty’s act is beyond terrible, but for no apparent reason Gus keeps trying to sell him as entertainment.
For no apparent reason Marty starts growing an arm from his back. When the arm is fully grown Gus exploits it and turns Marty’s comedy act into a freak show. He interests a famous talent agent, Jackie Chrome (Wayne Newton), and together they make the impossible possible - Marty Malt is a successful stand up comic. Then, for no apparent reason, overnight, his third arm disappears, Marty goes back to his run of the mill mundane life. The film follows a traditional path of rise to fame, then collapse. Nothing makes sense and there’s absolutely no wit or humour in the script.
From the outset Marty Malt is a beaten down character. We’re supposed to feel sorry for him because he’s a garbage man, which is the most childish device in the book. And he’s given a nerdy hairstyle, black rimmed glasses and a pocket protector to hit the nail on the head. A nerd throwing away trash for a living - that just doesn’t make sense. It’s convenient storytelling where the humour is derived from the concept and idea instead of story, character and situation.
Bill Paxton is at his most annoying. He’s Private Hudson from “Aliens” taken to the extreme. His whining and shouting and constant chattering was like daggers in my ears. For no apparent reason his character, Gus, lives and gravitates to the most vile, disgusting “Fear Factor” trials you could imagine. Here’s a role call of a few of these disgusting scenes and how they probably read in the script:
EXT. Garbage Dump – Day
Gus sees half-eaten ham sandwich in a bag of rotting garbage. He eats the sandwich.
INT. Gus’ apartment – Night
While partying with a group of grossly obese strippers, Gus asks Obsese Stripper #1 for a bucket of faeces, which he then proceeds to smear over his nipples and massages into his skin.
EXT. Garbage Dump – Day
Gus happens upon the decaying body of a dead woman. Gus licks the woman’s breasts for pleasure.
Rifkin apparently wrote the film when he was 19. It shows. My own 1994 action film starring my high school friends using toy guns as props, shot on Hi-8 video and edited with two VCRs is a better film. I can lend you a copy if you want.
Enough said.
Buy it here: The Dark Backward (Special Edition)
TAXI DRIVER
Taxi Driver (1976) dir. Martin Scorsese
Starring: Robert De Niro, Albert Brooks, Cybil Shepherd, Jodie Foster
****
"I got some bad ideas in my head."
What is there to be said about “Taxi Driver” that hasn’t been said already? Not much. So pretend you’ve never heard of the film before. “Taxi Driver” is one of a half dozen pure masterpieces in Scorsese’s collection. It’s unlike any other film, it doesn’t fit into a genre, it’s difficult to summarize, and moves with an awkward pace. It’s part social commentary, part character study, part violent thriller, part comedy, partly personal filmmaking, part noir and on, and on, and on.
The film opens with shots of New York from various points of view from a taxi cab. Its a hallucinagenic sequence intercut with a closeup of a pair of wandering eyes. The taxi is a character, the street is a character, and so is it’s driver – Travis Bickle, one of the most unique and analyzed characters in film. As Bickle describes to his employer in his job interview, he can’t sleep nights. He’s a glutton for punishment though and will work ‘any time, anywhere’. He’s also a Vietnam vet – but more on that later. Bickle gets the job and drives the streets of New York encountering all sorts of people – high class, low class, politicians, prostitutes, pimps, maniacs etc.
He’s a lonely person with no direction, just looking to fit in with society. Finding a girlfriend or some sort of companion seems the right thing to do. His attempt to ask out the concession stand girl in a porno theatre fails. Then he tries to court one of the most beautiful people on the planet – Betsy (Cybil Shepherd), a political campaign representative for a Presidential candidate. Needless to say, she’s way out of his league, but he actually has enough charm to get a date with her. He dresses the part, says all the right words, but makes one ghastly mistake. He takes her to a porno theatre. Oh Travis, no! As the audience we’re rooting for Bickle to succeed, but the moment the camera reveals the X-rated marquee, our hearts collectively sink. It’s only the second act, but it’s downhill all the way from here.
Bickle tries to compensate by taking in a twelve-and-a-half-year-old street prostitute, Iris (Jodie Foster). They develop a unique friendship, but Bickle is still hurting from Betsy’s rejection of him. He abandons all hope of traditional social interaction and plots a violent course of action which will make him a martyr for society.
As mentioned, the film is many things. It shows the chaotic world through Bickle’s eyes. Like Mark Lewis, in my previous entry, “Peeping Tom” , Bickle is a voyeur and Scorsese is careful to show Bickle’s reactions to the most mundane and irrelevant people, places and things. Watch the scene in the coffee shop when he asks the Wizard (Peter Boyle) for advice. Bickle fixates on the foaming tablet in his water, Charlie T as he exits the store, and the limping street hustler walking past him on the street. It’s as if he’s a computer, or an alien, taking in information and calculating an answer.
Bickle is a stunted human being, and likely mentally ill. We don’t know if it was Vietnam that caused his malfunction, but the fact that it’s hinted at only at the beginning, but never referenced again, is an interesting decision for writer Paul Schrader. Since it was made in 1975 (and released in 76) Vietnam films had yet to be made, and the war had only finished a year before. I suspect Schrader and Scorsese didn’t want to provide a clear answer to Bickle’s actions because it would become an entirely different film.
By staying ambiguous and vague, the film remains personal for both filmmakers. Schrader put his heart and soul and some of his own experiences as a lonely writer into the screenplay, and Scorsese shows the ‘warts and all’ of his beloved city like only he can. Without Vietnam, “Taxi Driver” remains a personal view of New York.
There’s a new 2-Disc Special Edition of “Taxi Driver” out on DVD this week. At the very least it improves the cover art, which now is artistic enough to represent the great film that it is. But Sony gets everything right on this one – the packaging, presentation, extras et al. There’s two audio commentaries and a host of other essays, interviews and interactive features. Don’t be fooled by the submenu, “Featurettes” where the documentaries and interviews are placed, these aren’t lame EPKs, they’re informative and individually-worthy mini-films. It’s interesting listening to DOP Michael Chapman and Scorsese discuss their influences on “Taxi Driver”. I never thought of Godard when watching the film, but in hindsight I completely agree with Chapman when he says, “there’s Godard all over this film.”
My favourite moment in “Taxi Driver” is a quintessential Scorsese scene. After shooting the corner store thief, the owner says he’ll take care of it. He grabs Bickle’s gun, then proceeds to beat the man with an iron bar even though he’s 100% dead. Then the film cuts to a brilliantly ironic song, “Late For the Sky” by Jackson Browne. Bickle is sitting with a gun in hand watching American Bandstand. It’s another voyeur moment. Bickle watching on the TV the life he so desperately wants to have, and which he will soon abandon and reject. Enjoy.
Buy it here: Taxi Driver (Two-Disc Collector's Edition)
YOJIMBO
Yojimbo (1961) dir. Akira Kurosawa
Starring: Toshiro Mifune
***
“Yojimbo” is a landmark film for Akira Kurosawa. He was already on the map with “Rashomon” (1951) and a master filmmaker by “Seven Samurai” (1954), but he became a living legend with “Yojimbo”. The film famously influenced Sergio Leone to create the Spaghetti Western “Dollars Trilogy” and George Lucas to create “Star Wars”. “Yojimbo” is a supreme example of the adaptability of Kurosawa’s storytelling, but unfortunately beyond historical significance it doesn’t quite stand up to Kurosawa’s other more revered works – “Ikiru”, or “High and Low” or “Seven Samurai”.
Toshiro Mifune plays Kuwabatake Sanjuro, a feudal Japanese Ronin who is first seen wandering rural Japan. He has nowhere to go and no timeline, and so he puts his fate to chance by throwing a stick on the ground to determine his direction. The stick directs him to the small township, similar to those one-horse towns from the American Western. Sanjuro is an opportunist and immediately he sees an opportunity to make some money and exploit the gang war that plagues the innocent bystanders. Sanjuro offers himself to the highest bidder and schemes from both sides of the conflict to incite the gangs to destroy themselves thereby freeing the citizens their tyrannous rule.
Kurosawa’s frames are brilliant. Widescreen black and white always looks good and “Yojimbo” is one of his best looking films. Kurosawa mixes long lens portraits, which influenced George Lucas and the classic wideangle establishing shots of the town, which influenced Leone.
Plot wise, the film doesn’t hold as well today as it did in 1961. The second act drags. Sanjuro’s manipulation of the gangs is never clearly thought out and the moment he is beaten up, there’s a long stretch where the film almost comes to a complete halt. Interestingly, “Fistful of Dollars” suffers from the same flaws as well.
It’s fun to watch the opening fight scene in “Yojimbo” to see where it influenced both George Lucas and Sergio Leone in separate ways. Leone takes Kurosawa’s humour, specifically mimicking Mifune’s last line to the coffin maker – “Two coffins... No, maybe three”. Lucas borrows the fighting style of the Samurai. Compare it the scene in “Star Wars: The Phantom Menace”, when Liam Neeson and Ewan Macgregor rescue the Natalie Portman from the droids in the first act. Watch how Neeson kills the droids with his lightsaber with speed and sheaths his saber exactly like Sanjuro.
The Western archetype is the prevailing theme – a wandering fighter, a loner who balances personal ethics with crafty selfishness. Wind and dust are important to the look and feel of the film. It fills the frame with chaotic movement while the characters move with slow deliberate steps. Like those who were influenced by him, Kurosawa’s work is an amalgam of several other sources - the great American Western filmmakers, John Ford, Howard Hawks, George Stevens, Japanese myths and classic Shakespeare.
The 1962 film “Sanjuro” is a sequel featuring the same character on a different adventure. Though it has some flaws as well, it features a fantastically bloody ending which “Yojimbo” lacks. But all quibbles aside there’s nothing to take away from Kurosawa. He is and always will be one of the top five filmmakers of all time. Enjoy.
Buy it here: Yojimbo - Criterion Collection
This is the final confrontation – spoilers obviously:
PEEPING TOM
Peeping Tom (1960) dir. Michael Powell
Starring: Carl Boehm, Moira Shearer, Anna Massey
****
“Peeping Tom” is a British cinema classic from the 60’s - a psychological horror film ironically made by one of Britain’s more mainstream filmmakers - Michael Powell. It’s a naughty but brilliant film about many things - sex, voyeurism, murder, psycho-analytical torture, pornography and the movies itself. Though not as well-known as Hitchcock’s “Psycho” from the same year, the film had a significant an impression on filmmakers such as Martin Scorsese, John Carpenter and Brian De Palma, and maybe even Hitchcock himself.
The film opens in the streets of London at night with a man picking up a prostitute. In the hotel we watch the woman undress from the point of view of an 8mm camera. Then a look of intense fear comes upon her face. As the camera moves closer she screams. She is dead. The murderer is Mark Lewis, a shy introverted film technician. By day, he pulls focus for feature films at a London film studio, in his spare time he likes to shoot the world with his 8mm camera. Lewis is addicted to his camera and has a lifelong obsession with capturing the emotion of fear on women’s faces.
One day Mark meets one of his neighbours Helen Stephens, who is fascinated by his obsessive shyness. A cautious courtship takes place between them in Mark’s apartment and eventually the two fall in love. But Mark’s deep psychological obsessions aren’t healed and he still feels the need to kill with his camera. Mark reveals to Helen a dysfunctional childhood which saw his child psychologist father manipulate and study his son with a series of filmed emotional experiments. Mark’s love for Helen fights against his brainwashed compulsion to complete his lifelong documentary of death.
“Peeping Tom” is a fascinating film. The opening moments are eerily similar to John Carpenter’s famous point-of-view opening murder in “Halloween”. Admitedly, in the first few scenes, I had trouble getting past the datedness of the film. It’s very 60’s both in look, tone and acting style. But Carl Boehm’s performance draws you in so cleverly. He’s stands up to the best-ever psychopaths – Robert De Niro’s Travis Bickle, Anthony Perkins’ Norman Bates or Peter Lorre’s Hans Beckett. The commonality of these characters is the sympathy and understanding the actors bring to their characters. But Carl Boehme deepens Mark perhaps just a bit more. For example, Norman Bates is a murderer with a dual personality but sufficient and credible explanation is never given to us (other than the rushed denouement). Mark’s history with his father’s deepens him further than Bates ever was.
The film contains some terrific individual scenes. The death of the stand-in, Vivian, is a masterpiece of counterpoint and hypnotic pacing, as she dances for Mark around the vacated set with happy-go-lucky glee not knowing she’s being lit to die. The reveal of his weapon of choice would make Hitchcock jealous – a phallic leg of his camera tripod, with a knife on the end. Mrs. Stephens’ suspenseful confrontation with Mark in his screening room is also great because, despite her blindness, she’s able to protect her daughter by striking at Mark’s vulnerability.
Martin Scorsese’s love of the film is well known, but its influence in Brian De Palma should also be noted. Going back to his 1970 underground film, “Hi Mom!”, the voyeuristic themes are ones De Palma would return to time and again. “Blow Out” owes a lot to the psychology complexities of “Peeping Tom” and the exploration of these elements through the world of filmmaking. And the film’s Freudian themes were lifted and inserted directly into De Palma’s “Raising Cain”.
“Peeping Tom” was way ahead of it’s time. In fact, audiences couldn’t understand or relate to the film in 1960. Michael Powell, one of the Britain’s greatest filmmakers, was essentially ruined because of the negative reaction to the film. It’s now universally recognized as a great film by a great filmmaker. And he couldn’t have made a more impassioned work of art to be the exclamation point of his career. Enjoy.
Buy it here: Peeping Tom - Criterion Collection
It’s a dated trailer, and doesn’t do the film justice:
HARRY POTTER & THE ORDER OF THE PHOENIX
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007) dir. David Yates
Starring: Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Rupert Grint
** ½
No introduction needed. It’s part 5, everyone knows what to expect now. The series is sailing at a competent speed, it’s not slowing down but not going faster either.
Continuing from the 4th film, Harry Potter is still shaken from his encounter with Voldimort – an encounter which saw the death of Cedric Diggory. The film opens, as always, in London in Harry’s regular home. Harry is approached by a couple of evil dementors (remember those cool ghost-creatures from Azkaban?). Harry uses a spell to ward them off, which is illegal in the Wizard world. Potter is put on trial by the Ministry of Magic, but is acquitted thanks to the testimony of Dumbledore. As a result Dumbledore and Potter are blacklisted by the Ministry for spreading accusations about Voldimort’s return. Something’s rotten in the State of Hogwarts…
I’m not a huge Potter fan, I haven’t read the books but have seen each film in the theatres. The series has flatlined for me. The introductory scenes with Potter’s family are quickly becoming sillier and sillier and are not in keeping with the more mature chapters of the series. And I’m still having trouble understanding the rules of the magic in the films. All genre stories establish their own rules. What can the characters do in terms of magic, what are their limits and what are their boundaries? My beef is the ending, when Dumbledore, Voldimort and Sirius Black seem to randomly ‘appear’ in the action when it’s convenient. Where were they, where did they come from? Were they watching the action somewhere and just decided to appear at that right moment? If the characters have the ability to ‘beam’ into any situation, where were they to help Potter in parts II, or II, or IV? And maybe I’m wrong, but the wizards always seem to be inventing spells to fit whatever threats comes at them.
I am continually disappointed with the lack of character development with anyone else but Potter. We haven’t learned anything new about Hermione or Ronald or Malfoy since Part II (which, for me, is the best of the series). There’s supposed to be a burgeoning relationship between Hermione and Ronald, but not an ounce of emotion is brought from either character. And this film even has less action to compensate.
The special effects were great in parts but dull and cartoonish in others. I was disappointed by the centaurs and that giant man-creature in the forest, which looked more Shrek-like than Potter-like. But, as mentioned, the battle of the wands finale was extraordinary, especially in IMAX 3-D. For once the technology enhanced the viewing experience. The last IMAX 3-D film I saw was “Superman Returns” whose 3-D scenes distracted me from the film. Now I can finally see the potential of the medium. Let’s just hope James Cameron can fix that annoying double-image problem with the glasses.
I was pleased to see Slawomir Idziak lensing this film. Idziak was one of Kieslowski’s frequent DOPs. His yellow and green style shows up in places, but it’s his ominous dark greys that dominate the film. It looks great.
I don’t think I was alone in my relative boredom with this film. Midway through, the audience was collectively distracted by some incredibly loud snoring in the theatre. Either the man needed a nap really badly or the series was waning for him too. Consider it an alarm bell for the producers to step it up. Enjoy.
FLAMINGO ROAD
Flamingo Road (1949) dir. Michael Curtiz
Starring: Joan Crawford, Sidney Greenstreet, Zachary Scott
***1/2
"She can handle her job, make a whiskey sour and cook bacon, crisp. A man's gotta know more about a girl like that."
“Flamingo Road” is terrific Hollywood melodrama. The studio system at its best - a top notch director (Curtiz) with one of the best-ever leading ladies (Crawford) reuniting after 1945's "Mildred Pierce". The film is about female empowerment in a sexist age of specifically-defined domestic and gender roles. It’s an engrossing story of a girl from the wrong side of the tracks who fights prejudice and sexism as she moves up into high society and the corrupt world of American State politics.
Joan Crawford plays Lane Bellamy, a wearied and weathered girl who dances in a two-bit traveling carnival. When the carnival can’t pay its debts, like usual, it packs up and quickly moves out of town. But this is one too many times for Lane. She’s been on the road her whole life, and wants to stay in the quaint Southern town. She meets local deputy Fielding Carlyle and falls in love. The big boss in town is the larger than life Sheriff Titus Semple (Sidney Greenstreet). He resents Lane’s presence in the town and her stubbornness to stay fuels his impassionated hatred of her. Through backdoor deals, Titus has plans to get Fielding into the state Senate. He engineers Fielding’s breakup with Lane and gets her unlawfully imprisoned for prostitution.
Lane is strong and survives her prison sentence. When she’s out and returns to town, with an even greater determination to make an honest living. While waitressing for a local high society social club she meets and courts local influential business owner, Dan Reynolds – a man of equal if not greater stature than Titus. Lane’s finally makes it onto “Flamingo Road”, the local street symbolic of respectable society, only to face off against Titus once again. Lane, Reynolds, Titus and Carlyle rekindle their battles in the political ring where the consequences will be deadly.
Joan Crawford carries the film like few can. When we first see her as an exotic bellydancer, she looks out of place in age and culture. She’s a survivor, a tough broad who lives paycheck to paycheck and has never been able to plant roots anywhere. It all shows on her face. Crawford was 44 when the film was made, and though the role was likely written for a 25 year old, it needed someone with both innocence and toughness to pull it off. All of that is etched in Crawford’s course face. Her big saucer eyes are the innocence and her crows feet are the toughness.
Titus Semple is an equally meaty role and the great character actor Sidney Greenstreet (“Casablanca” and “The Maltese Falcon”) fills the shoes well. Titus is one cinema’s great bad guys. He’s like Iago in “Othello” – behind the scenes politicking his way through the world to get what he wants. His shear size commands a room but he also has the subtle skills and confidence to intimidate and control people to do his bidding.
Michael Curtiz directs with his usual panache. His great choreography, editing and efficiency with his narrative make this plot-heavy film a fast-paced breeze. Max Steiner’s music, as always, emphatically hits the melodramatic beats with the right mood. Viewers unaccustomed to the style of filmmaking at the time may be distracted by the overdramatization and on-the-nose dialogue, but despite this there’s a lot of significant and important subtext going on.
The film has a lot to say about class and sexism. As a drifter and a woman without any discernable talent or skills, Lane has very little chance of achieving any kind of success. But she’s a woman of the world, with a decent heart, who genuinely falls in love with Reynolds. She doesn’t manipulate him or deceive him into marrying her. And when she finally makes it to “Flamingo Road” she never exploits it. She always knows where she came from and is grateful for everything she has.
I do think the ending cops out though. With her husband in Titus’ political grasp and about to be sent to prison, Lane takes the matters into her own hands to save him. We want the street-smart Lane to use Titus’ own weapons or vulnerabilities against him, instead she resorts to the “gun” to solve the problem. By resorting to this easy device, the film demeans everything Lane has earned from us. In the end though she does sacrifice herself, and goes to prison for her husband which, considering the time and place the film was made, is a shocking anti-type role reversal.
“Flamingo Road” not only empowers women at a time when domestic roles were classically defined, it’s an example of a great studio picture that entertains and send us a positive message. Unfortunately it’s not available on DVD, but hopefully soon Warner Bros will take it out of its library for us to rediscover. Enjoy.
THE BOURNE SUPREMACY
The Bourne Supremacy (2005) dir. Paul Greengrass
Starring: Matt Damon, Joan Allen, Brian Cox
***1/2
"The Bourne Ultimatum" rocks. Let's look back at “The Bourne Supremacy” which is also one of the best-ever sequels. “The Bourne Identity” which came before it, docks right into the second part perfectly. It continues the saga of super assassin Jason Bourne as he slowly uncovers the memories of his sordid past. With a new director the film is kicked up a notch and provides one of the most intense action films ever.
The plot is quite complicated and it takes acute attention to keep track of the names, dates, locations and timeline of the events. When we last left Bourne he escaped the clutches of the CIA and met up with his new girlfriend Marie. Part II opens in Goa India where the couple has fled to start a new humble life of exile. But a mysterious Russian agent shows up looking for Bourne. With his cover blown Bourne is forced back into the mix.
In Berlin Pamela Landy (Joan Allen) is heading up a CIA sting operation to uncover a mole, when things go awry and an unknown assassin kills her team, Bourne and the defunct Treadstone operation from the first film is to blame. The only way Bourne can get to the bottom of the mystery is to put himself in harms way and confront the original Treadstone operators face-to-face. But with Conklin dead, it’s Ward Abbott (Brian Cox) who silently holds the strings and is the one accountable.
In fact, all three films feel like one film. Chris Cooper’s character, Conklin, who died in the first film, is like a ghost character and is still very much important to the story. He is continually referenced and seen partially in Bourne’s flashbacks. It’s a testament to the material that would bring Cooper back for what is a thankless and unglamorous role. As well Greengrass is sure to cast Gabriel Mann as Danny Zorn, and Julia Stiles as Nicky, characters with little effect to the film, but is still important to the big picture of the Bourne world.
One of the character throughlines for Bourne is his need for redemption. With his memory gone, as a new man, he looks upon his time as a killer with contempt. He has the skills to do the job, but he’s reluctant and he now performs out of necessity. At the very end we receive a nice surprise in Moscow which relates to the first flashback we saw at the beginning of the film. He has attempted to correct one mistake from the past, even if it puts himself in harms way.
The Bourne Trilogy essentially makes the traditional Bond and “Die Hard” franchises obsolete. Where those films rely on artificial storytelling to fill in the gaps between action scenes, in Bourne the action, dialogue, montages and set ups all meld together naturally. Everything happens organically as opposed to the staged set pieces of those other films. In a Bourne film you don’t release you’re in an action scene until midway through the action. The tension, suspense and pace are kept up through the whole film which removes that disconnect between action and story.
This is due to the direction of Doug Liman in Part I and Paul Greengrass in Parts II and III. Greengrass gets down and dirty with the camera in real locations, real people, real cars. No green screen or digital cars or rear projections. The camera and the audience are part of the action. Like a rollercoaster ride. Of course, that’s a style Greengrass developed in previous films like “Bloody Sunday” and the British TV movie “The Murder of Stephen Lawrence”. It’s always described as a documentary-like approach, which is true, but his style goes beyond that. Greengrass knows his pacing and shoots enough film for him and his brilliant editors to control the pace with supreme manipulative skill. Credit also goes to the unsung music of John Powell, he uses a drum and base style rhythm that’s fresh and modern. Listen to the music in the final car chase. It changes gears like Bourne changes gears in his car. The music in the scene gets faster and faster and climaxes at the final crash in the tunnel. Then there’s silence. Meanwhile I’m out of breath.
It was a bold but smart choice by the producers to bring in Greengrass. With no action film experience, when it was announced who was directing the second part, I was shocked. But being a fan of “Bloody Sunday”, I knew there was potential for it to be something special. We’re all grateful for that. Thank you, Frank Marshall. Enjoy.
Buy it here: The Bourne Supremacy (Widescreen Edition)
THIS FILM IS NOT YET RATED
This Film Is Not Yet Rating (2006) dir. Kirby Dick
Documentary
**1/2
In the tradition of Michael Moore filmmaker Kirby Dick seeks to uncover the veil of secrecy behind the enigmatic MPAA Ratings Board. The film is funny and tongue in cheek, telling the big picture of conservative censorship in the United States. The film is highly watchable, but based on the evidence “uncovered” the film actually makes a very weak case against the MPAA.
According to the IMDB Kirby Dick is a documentary filmmaker who’s made several documentary films. I haven’t heard of any of them, but considering the titles, “Sick: The Life & Death of Bob Flanagan, Supermasochist” or “Showgirls: Glitz & Angst” I assume he’s had some problems in the past with the MPAA. If you don’t know, the Motion Picture Association of America administers the ratings board that assigns G, PG, PG13, R or the dreaded NC17 on all films that are released in the marketplace. Each notch up the scale means, on average, less potential revenue for the film. Therefore no one wants an R or an NC17 rating.
But as the film explains the MPAA, formerly headed by political lobbyist Jack Valenti, is a private organization that claims to be beholden to no one except the average American film viewer. As a result, they are notoriously secretive. Their ratings officers, or appeals board members are not known and have never been divulged to the public. “Who are these people who are judging our films and assigning what sometimes seems like arbitrary and inconsistent ratings?” Dick cites sex and drugs to be the main target, but gratuitous violence is given a larger buffer room. After going through the history and background of the organization and the process, Dick hires private investigator Becky Altringer to uncover the names of the ratings board members. This becomes the throughline for the film which Dick cuts back to time and again. Becky’s personality and odd relationship with her teenage protégé are some of the most interesting parts of the film. Though her sexual orientation (she’s a lesbian) has nothing to do with the MPAA or anything about the film, her description of how she came out of the closet is poignant and also curiously funny.
Dick uses clips from all the major films that were forced to make cuts to avoid the NC17 rating – “Basic Instinct”, “Boys Don’t Cry”, “Where the Truth Lies” etc. Part of Dick’s argument is that the MPAA is judging what is decent and should be viewed by the American public. Here is Dick’s fundamental mistake. This is my skeptical mind talking… the MPAA isn’t meant to judge what people can and can’t see. Anyone can see an NC17 film – even kids. The rating says, “kids under 17 must be accompanied by an adult”. The director of “Gunner Palace”, was upset his film received an R rating. He gripes that since his film is about real life violence and that everybody should be able to see it. Does he not realize that everyone can see it? What the director is mad at, is that his film will make less money because it’s rated R. Besides does he really think that a 14 year old kid should watch a film that shows brutal war violence by himself? Or would? Surely he would want his parents in the room, to help explain the context and significance of the images he’s watching.
Dick completely misdirects his anger and frustration. He and all the other filmmakers are mad because movie theatres in Middle America won’t screen NC17 films. Or Blockbuster, or Walmart won’t sell NC17 DVDs. This is the crux of the film – money, politics and American values – not the MPAA.
The big reveal of the ratings board and the appeals board member doesn’t reveal anything significant at all. Dick focuses on the ‘shocking fact’ that the two clergy members are part of the appeals board, but glosses over the fact that the other 13 members of the board are all VPs or executive of major distributors – whose best interest is to have their films screened as widely as possible.
Then I thought about Becky’s speech in the car, where she describes so dispassionately how she came out of the closet. At first it struck me as odd, because it didn’t have anything to do with the MPAA, but then I realized that it has everything to do with heart of the problem. Becky says she was at first scared to accept her homosexuality, but the feelings she had for her partner made her feel so good, then says, ‘what can be wrong with something that makes me feel so good’? This is what the American conservative majority doesn’t want to accept.
Saying all of that, the film is actually quite enjoyable and I recommend it, but keep an open mind and judge for yourself. Enjoy.
Buy it here: This Film Is Not Yet Rated
John Waters hits the nail on the head here:
THE 10TH ANNIVERSARY OF 1997 - PART II
For Part I, Click HERE
For me, the Fall season of 1997 was kicked off by David Fincher’s intense follow up to “Seven”, “The Game” – a dizzying point of view of a cold and depressed businessman’s rebirth through a devious and dangerous interactive game. It’s one of Fincher's coldest and detached films. It didn’t quite connect with as large an audience as “Seven”, but it still was an engrossing cinematic experience that had me guessing all the way to the end.
The Oscar race got kicked off by the epic crime film – “L.A. Confidential”. The buzz started at Cannes earlier in the year and when it opened wide, it did not disappoint. "L.A. Confidential" launched the Hollywood careers of Russell Crowe and Guy Pearce and was the breakout film for director Curtis Hanson – a late bloomer who only mildly impressed people with grade-B thrillers like “The River Wild” and “The Hand That Rocks the Cradle.” He’s been an A-List director ever since. I'll always remember the exhilaration of my first viewing. Kevin Spacey’s death was shocking, but it was his chilling final words, “Rolo Tomasi” which gave him his revenge in death that sealed the deal for me. For the longest while “L.A. Confidential” was the clear frontrunner for the Oscars. But that movie with the boat hadn’t been released yet. More on that later.
The highlight of the year came the weekend of Oct 24th when P.T. Anderson’s “Boogie Nights” was released wide. The trailer looked good, and I remembered the buzz around the director when “Hard Eight” was released. When the lights went down and Michael Penn’s somber opening chords played over the New Line logo and an extended black frame, I knew this was going to be something special. The grandest scene of the film is the Rahad Jackson/firecracker scene set to Night Ranger’s “Sister Christian”. There wasn’t a finer moment in cinema that year.
Back to Matt and Ben...on November 21, Francis Coppola’s adaptation of John Grisham’s “The Rainmaker” premiered. Heads turned when we found out the legendary director was turning to paperback material. But was “The Godfather” novel any more credible? It will forever be significant as Matt Damon’s first starring role though – a major coup for him, considering the a-list supporting cast he had around him. In fact, the film was one of the better Grisham adaptations thanks to Matt.
A few weeks later that feel good Gus Van Sant film with the bad title premiered – “Good Will Hunting”. You may remember the film started off very quiet. The reviews were average at best, and I heard some people saying it was a chick flick for dudes. Huh? I delayed seeing it until way into the New Year, when I just about had to. It surpassed my expectations. The film still stands up as powerful and personal film about male friendship. With an Oscar win for Best Screenplay, Matt and Ben were officially stars.
And then “Titanic” came out. You may remember the film was supposed to come out in the summer – multiplexes were already postered when the release was delayed. Cost overruns, LSD tainted catering, and Cameron’s freakishly mad directing was all we heard about the film. All of this spelled disaster. Remember “Waterworld”? Needless to say, it defied all expectations and became the highest grossing film of all time - by a large margin. “Titanic” has since gone into the doldrums from overexposure. Ironically, a testament to its popularity is the fact that it’s been monumentally uncool to like the film for almost 10 years now.
The biggest surprise late in the year was the Barry Levinson-directed, David Mamet-scripted “Wag the Dog” – one of the best-ever satires of politics or Hollywood. Levinson shot the film in just 29 days, with a budget of $15 million – considering the star power attached (Robert De Niro and Dustin Hoffman), not to mention the filmmaking team behind the camera, it was a miracle achievement by today’s standards. It came out of nowhere, but what a brilliant film. It’s one of Mamet’s best scripts – fast, clever dialogue as usual but with a razor sharp satirical wit we hadn’t heard before from Mamet. My favourite character - Dennis Leary’s spin doctor character, Fad King – who brilliantly dissected the crisis and spitballed the manufactured War on Albania.
So that was the 1997, in a nutshell – for me, one of the best years of the 1990’s. There are a few other good films that I haven't mentioned, including Quentin Taratino's "Jackie Brown", a low-key sombre follow up to "Pulp Fiction", Andrew Niccol brilliant neo-Sci-Fi brain-film, "Gattaca", James L. Brooks' slightly overrated "As Good As It Gets" and Martin Scorsese's Dalai Lama flick, "Kundun."
Here’s a list of the films I mentioned to check out, rediscover, or program your own 1997 Annus Mirabilis Film Festival:
In the Company of Men
Hard Eight
Star Wars (Sp Ed)
Empire Strikes Back (Sp Ed)
Return of the Jedi (Sp Ed)
Chasing Amy
The Sweet Hereafter
The Eel
A Taste of Cherry
Happy Together
Funny Games
The Ice Storm
L.A Confidential
The Game
Boogie Nights
The Rainmaker
Good Will Hunting
Titanic
Wag the Dog
Jackie Brown
Kundun
As Good As It Gets
Gattaca
THE 10TH ANNIVERSARY OF 1997 - PART I
The 10th Anniversary of 1997
There have been many great years in film. Peter Bogdanovich regards 1927 as American cinema’s greatest year when silent film achieved near perfection, and the same year, the first talkie the “The Jazz Singer” was released.
1939 is considered by many to be cinema’s greatest year, which brought us “The Wizard of Oz”, “Gone With the Wind”, “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington”, “Stagecoach”, “Ninotchka” and more. Sure, sure. That’s fine.
1974 brought us “Chinatown” and “The Godfather Part II”, 1975 brought us “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest”, “Nashville” and “Jaws”, 1982 brought us “E.T.”, “Blade Runner”, “The Thing” and “Gandhi”. I don’t want to start another list, but these examples help chart the course of cinema on a macro level and help us understand certain transition points in film history.
For me, 1997 was a seminal year for film. Throughout the year, on a personal level, there were several experiences and discoveries that have forever been etched in my memory.
The 1990’s decade is one of the greatest decades in film and 1997 was one of the best. 1994 and 1995 were great, so was 1999. The year 1997 was significant because it represented the introduction of bold new auteur filmmakers, the re-introduction of great foreign filmmakers in North America, and the rebirth of the mega-blockbuster.
The year started off with the Oscar race of 1996. Late and wider releases into the smaller markets of the country meant great indie films like “Sling Blade” and “Secrets and Lies” and “Breaking the Waves” were in the theatres. Most cinephiles were ecstatic that many of the truly deserving films were recognized - “Fargo” was finally given mainstream recognition, Lars Von Trier was nominated and so was Mike Leigh. The big sweeping romance epic “The English Patient” took the big prizes, but the recognition these auteur filmmakers received for their small films was sufficient to make the ceremony worthy.
The Sundance Film Festival traditionally kicks off the year in cinema. For me, the notable Sundance entry was Neil La Bute’s scathing indictment of the male ego and corporate culture – “In the Company of Men”. Made on a shoestring for $25,000, the film substituted production value for sharp witty dialogue, and a unique visual design of creatively framed long takes. It was a loud introduction to playwright turned director Neil La Bute and his number one bad guy, actor Aaron Eckhart.
I’ll always remember, in February of that year, “Siskel and Ebert’s” review of a small film directed by first-time feature director, Paul Thomas Anderson. The film was “Hard Eight”. I recently rewatched the review on At the Movies.com, and though there isn’t a mention of Anderson’s name, there was something about the clips they choose and the passion they had for the film that struck me as special. Further written reviews and background to the film kept mentioning a 70’s film the director was shooting which was causing a fervor in Hollywood. My interest was piqued, but more on that later.
Just around the time of “Hard Eight” a certain movie made in 1977 was re-released in theatres. “Star Wars” was the first film I ever saw in the cinema and so getting the chance to see it again on the big screen was a chance to reclaim those distant memories. Of course there were the added effects, scenes, Guido shooting first etc etc. But at the time people didn’t care about that. No one was knocking Lucas for doing that. It was all about the joy of Star Wars and announcing to the world that 3 more films will soon be arriving to us. And with “Empire Strikes Back” and “Return of the Jedi” released 3 and 6 weeks after, for almost two months it was as if I was 5 years old again. It’s hard to bottle that feeling, but “Star Wars” did.
1997 was also the year of Matt Damon and Ben Affleck. At the beginning of the year nobody had heard of these two guys, but by the end, they were household names and soon to be Oscar winners… for writing! Ben Affleck came first with Kevin Smith’s third film, “Chasing Amy”. The budget was a fraction of his sophomore bomb “Mallrats”, but Smith had his mojo back and brought to our attention its lead Ben Affleck. There are two other instances of Matt and Ben in 1997, but more on that later.
Cannes was a special year for Canadians. It unveiled one of Canada’s greatest films – Atom Egoyan’s “The Sweet Hereafter” – a fascinating mosaic of characters centred around a tragic bus accident in Alberta. It won the Grand Jury Prize, which is considered ‘second place’, and critics were hailing the film a masterpiece. It would be on hundreds of Critic’s Top Ten lists and eventually give Egoyan and Canada it’s first Oscar nominations for Best Director and Best Screenplay. It wouldn’t be until the fall before I and most others would be able to see it. And I did, and it certainly lived up to the hype. I watch it now and again, and it still packs an emotional wallop.
As I said, it was a special year at Cannes – but not just for Canadians either. Shoei Imamura’s “The Eel” and “Abbas Kiarostami’s “A Taste of Cherry” shared the Palm D’Or and Wong Kar Wai’s lyrical love poem, “Happy Together” took Best Director. All are masterpieces. Oh yeah, Michael Haneke’s “Funny Games”, Ang Lee’s “The Ice Storm” and “L.A. Confidential” also premiered then. Pretty good year so far.
The summer blockbusters of 1997 unfortunately were some of the worst in recent memory. We also saw the birth one of the worst trend revivals in film history – the disaster film. We had the privilege of seeing two Volcano films grace our screens. The other summer blockbusters included the sequels, “The Lost World” and “Speed 2: Cruise Control”, “The Fifth Element”, and “Con Air.” But the piece de résistance of crap was “Batman and Robin”, which I still cite to this day as “the worst film I’ve ever seen.”
The summer is also significant because the first of the stadium seating super-plex cinemas were built - The Famous Players Coliseum in Mississauga was the first in Canada. Some say it turned the theatre-going experience into more of a Las Vegas style circus atmosphere - distracting lights, noises, grotesque colours assaulting our eyes - but gone were the shoebox cinemas of the 80's. We were now watching our films in giant lounge chairs with unobstructed views and gigantic larger than ever screens. I was not complaining.
The late summer had some under-the-radar minor but largely forgettable hits, "Men in Black", "Air Force One" and "The Full Monty", but the Fall and Winter would make up for a relatively dull Summer.
Click HERE for Part II
THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM
The Bourne Ultimatum (2007) dir. Paul Greengrass
Starring: Matt Damon, David Strathairn. Joan Allen, Julia Stiles
****
“The Bourne Ultimatum” is bad-ass. It’s a red hot, non-stop thrill ride from beginning to end. It jumps into the story where the second one left off and tracks a downhill course that gains speed all the way to the end. It’s a rare series where the films get better and better with each chapter.
PLEASE NOTE, SOME MINOR SPOILERS AHEAD.
Few sequels start minutes after the previous film ended. (“Halloween II” is like that, any others?). Jason Bourne is in Moscow moments after stumbling out of Irene Neski’s apartment. He’s being tracked by the local police who corner him in a public washroom. Despite the injury he fights them off, and just before killing one of them he stops and lets him go. This is the new Jason Bourne – the post amnesia Bourne – the one with a conscience. As we all know he’s still in search of the old Bourne, the one who would have killed that officer in the blink of an eye.
While on a train ride to Paris he reads an article about himself in the paper, written by a London journalist Simon Ross (Paddy Considine). The unnamed source of information in the article piques his interest as the man who can answer all his questions. But with the CIA tracking Ross as well, Bourne once again is tempting fate by throwing himself into the fire. Cause and effect events spillover from there as Bourne finally tracks down the source of all his fractured memories and reconciles his past.
Pamela Landy (Joan Allen) is hot on his trail again, but this time under the command of Senior Official Noah Vosen (David Strathairn) – another steely-eyed acerbic pencil-pusher. Over the course of the series, after Chris Cooper and Brian Cox, the producers have cast three of the best character actors around for that role.
The film, and the series as a whole, feels like “The French Connection” – basically one long chase film with very little breathing time – like a 24 episode on speed. Sometimes it’s the CIA chasing Bourne, sometimes it’s reversed. The details of the surveillance techniques are well thought out and highly plausible, as compared with, say, the hackers in “Live Free or Die Hard”. The control room scenes with Landy and Vosen’s crack team of tech-spies is impressive. One of the key ingredients to the believability of the series is the intelligence of its minor characters. It’s like a chess match, or psychological case of game theory. Who can predict whose moves the fastest and strike first. It’s a spy vs. spy, battle of the brains.
Bourne has the brawn too. The hand-to-hand fight scene is brutally violent and had me cutting off the blood circulation to my wife’s hand. There’s a wicked-awesome chase through streets of Tangier, which starts off as a motorcycle chase, then turns into a running chase over the roofs of the buildings. The car chase scene doesn’t quite top the climatic scene in “The Bourne Supremacy” but it comes very close. My favourite scene though is Bourne guiding Ross through a busy London station while evading the CIA surveillance operatives. Greengrass apparently filmed it in public with real bystanders. And I believe it, it’s a masterful piece of choreography. Greengrass again employs his handheld camera, but it’s important to note that the effect is indeed dizzying but it’s never confusing. The sense of geography of the area is always there. He’s a supremely talented director, who deserves another Oscar nod – why not? They gave one to William Friedkin.
I advise watching Bourne II before watching Bourne III, there is a clever overlap between the two films, which you may not catch if it’s not fresh in your memory. It’s just one minor point which most people probably missed, but it adds more intelligence to already the smartest spy series ever made. After watching these three films, I don’t have a desire to see anymore Bond films. The high bar for the genre has been set, and I don’t think Martin Campbell or Marc Forster, or whoever they choose to reboot the credibility of the series will top these films. Enjoy.
KUNG FU HUSTLE
Kung Fu Hustle (2004) dir. Stephen Chow
Starring: Stephen Chow, Wah Yuen, Yuen Qiu, Chan Kwok Kuen, Bruce Leung
***
New to DVD is a cool “Axe-Kicking” edition of Stephen Chow’s mind-blowing kung-fu extravaganza. It’s hard to describe “Kung Fu Hustle”, but as it says on the DVD cover, Entertainment Weekly sums it up best, “Kill Bill meets the Looney Toons”. It’s an appropriate description as the film combines traditional Chinese Kung Fu with the extreme cartoonish violence of a Road Runner episode. It’s highly entertaining stuff, and something that could only have been made outside of North America.
In 1930’s Shanghai the city is run by a particularly brutal gang called the Axe Gang – named after their preferred brand of weaponry. The opening scene shows the gang leader, while dancing to some swing music, brutally hacking to death a rival gang. Our protagonist, Sing and his tagalong, Bone, desperately wants to be part of the gang. He decides to impress the gang leaders by terrorizing a group of lowly rural tenement residents outside of town. The tenement landlords prove to be worthy opponents though, and the fracas sets off a brutal war between the two groups – the tenement landlords vs. the Axe Gang.
Sing’s desire to be part of the gang stems from an incident in childhood when he attempted to save a young deaf girl from being mugged. He realizes that the good guys never win and decides to become part of the gang to gain acceptance. But when he reencounters the girl from his past his outlook changes and he strives to fight the evils of the Axe Gang.
Like traditional Kung Fu films of the 60’s and 70’s each fighter has a distinct and particular style of fighting (ie. crane, dragon and snake styles). Chow takes these elements to the extreme with over-the-top manoeuvres like the Lion’s Roar – a bellowing howl that can blow the shirt off a man’s back, or Sing’s Buddhist Palm, which produces enough force to form a crater imprint of his hand in the ground. It’s all in good fun, and much of the humour comes from the creative ways to kill a person. The maimings produced from the magical knives of the harpists is particularly gruesome and enjoyable.
The character element of the story is also over-the-top. Sing’s redemption from the humiliation suffered as a child is classical storytelling, yet Chow exaggerates the dramatic beats as much as his violence. When Sing meets the deaf girl again for the first time, the girl dramatically reveals the lollipop she kept all those years as a symbol of his heroism. Sing shatters this moment, literally, when he disregards her and smashes her lollipop to pieces against a wall.
The legendary Yuen Woo Ping is the fight choreographer on this one and his work, as always, is exceptional. He uses CG effects, wire work and good old fashioned fighting skills to craft some masterful sequences. Sing’s dramatic fight at the end when he takes on a hundred gang members is the highlight for me as well the landlords' fight against the unassuming yet powerful, flip-flop-wearing ‘Beast.’
You don’t have to be a kung-fu fan to enjoy the film, in fact the self parody humour adds to the accessibility. Often Chinese martial arts films take themselves too seriously resulting in painfully overacted melodrama in between the fights. You don’t have to fast forward through this film; it’s funny and enjoyable all the way through. Even my wife liked it, which is the truest test of its accessibility. Enjoy.
Buy it here: Kung Fu Hustle (Axe-Kickin' Edition)
LIVE FREE OR DIE HARD
Live Free or Die Hard (2007) dir. Len Wiseman
Starring: Bruce Willis, Justin Long, Timothy Olyphant
**
I miss John McTiernan, I miss Reginald Veljohnson, I miss Alan Rickman, I miss Jeremy Irons, I miss Michael Kamen, I miss Steven E. DeSouza. These are just six reasons why “Live Free or Die Hard” bored me. It’s the equivalent to “Terminator 3” – long over the hill, with an attempted injection of youth in the form of a new director and young co-stars. And the results are the same - a kick at the can one too many times.
Computer hackers led by ultra-hacker Thomas Gabriel (Timothy Olyphant), who spends more of his time barking orders and shooting guns than at a computer screen, has infiltrated all the traffic and communication networks in order to shut down the infrastructure of the United States. One of the hackers whom Gabriel employed to do his dirty work is Matt Ferrall (Justin Long, piggybacking on his Mac character). When Gabriel sends his euro-trash henchmen to Ferrall’s house to kill him, he’s met by our hero John McClane, who’s been assigned to bring Ferrall in to the authorities. With Ferrall still alive, he’s the only one who can prevent Gabriel’s team from e-terrorizing the entire country. And the only one who can protect Ferrall is John McClane.
Somewhere along the line Gabriel finds out about McClane’s daughter, attending Rutgers and kidnaps her to blackmail McClane into giving up Ferrall. As if. This only makes McClane angrier and the punishment more severe. Ferrall and McClane hop around the D.C. area taking down bad guys, blowing shit up and cracking one-liners. In the end the good guys win.
The film feels old and antiquated. It feels like a mid 90’s Bond movie or a knock off “Die Hard” film. Some of the essential elements of the “Die Hard” franchise are missing. First, there’s the confined setting. In the first film, it was L.A’s Nakatomi Plaza, the high rise that became the jungle ground for the close-quarters action. In the second film, it was Dulles Airport on a snowy day, in the third it was Manhattan. With McClane driving, running and flying all over the East Coast, lost is the “poisoned pill” aspect of McClane’s character – the wrong place at the wrong time.
The film is also missing the wonderful Michael Kamen score, which was the signature sound of the series. Sadly Kamen died a few years ago, and Marco Beltrami fills in, with a sampling of his themes, but the feel just isn’t there. Imagine if Marco Beltrami scored the new Indiana Jones film? It’s just not the same.
The third missing link is a charismatic bad guy. Timothy Olyphant was cast for his looks, but the part needs charm to make it a “Die Hard” film. Also, Wiseman holes up Olyphant and his crew in a truck for most of the film and they never have to lift a finger to do the work. I know we live in a digital age, but hackers stealing money by typing on a keyboard just isn’t exciting. And remember the introduction of the McTiernan bad guys – Alan Rickman and Jeremy Irons? We first see Olyphant turning his head toward camera in a close-up. There's no visual panache.
Wiseman casts the always wonderful Cyril Raffaelli, the parquor master from France, as his Alexander Gudonov. He is great and shows off his tremendous skills. And it is a shame when he eventually gets killed by an overmatched McClane. Maggie Q, as a hacker/kung fu master, is ridiculous and ripped out of a lame Bond film.
Len Wiseman looks comfortable with the action and stages some good scenes, but at times it looks as if he’s biting off more than he can chew. The addition of a fighter jet firing missiles at McClane’s truck went way over the top, not to mention the digital car that flips about 10 times and flies over McClane and Ferrall’s heads in the highway tunnel.
The original “Die Hard” seemed to be rooted in some kind of logic. But here, physics and geography are thrown out the window. John McClane is no longer the everyman, working class cop in the ‘wrong place at the wrong time’ he’s now the equivalent of a Marvel superhero and a self-parody like “The Terminator”. John McTiernan wouldn’t have let this happen.
THE FORGOTTEN
The Forgotten (2004) dir. Joseph Ruben
Starring Julianne Moore, Dominic West, Gary Sinise
***
After watching “Premonition” earlier this week, I was pleased to come across “The Forgotten” on television last night. They make a good comparison. Both are high concept thrillers, with a dash of the supernatural. Both are star vehicles for actresses of similar star power (Sandra Bullock and Julianne Moore). Both films are flawed but “The Forgotten” trumps “Premonition” because of a series of fantastic reveals in the second half of the film that take it to another level.
Julianne Moore plays Telly Paretta, married to Jim Paretta (Anthony Edwards). Fourteen months ago their son Sam was killed in a plane accident and the grief has never left Telly. But now mysterious and unexplainable things start happening to her memories of Sam, items that Sam owned disappear, Sam’s image vanishes from photos, home videos are erased. Telly thinks it’s Jim punishing her for her lengthy grieving, but when she confronts him about it, suddenly Jim, himself, has no memory of Sam. She seeks the comfort of another parent, Ash (Dominic West) and together they go a search for their lost children.
The set up is similar to “Premonition”. Sandra Bullock thinks her husband has died in a car accident until he appears before her alive and well the next day, with no memory of an accident. She too appears to be experiencing some sort of divine intervention that no one else around her is subject to. Both characters go on their own journey to unravel the mystery.
BEWARE SPOILERS AHEAD...
Where “The Forgotten” moves away from “Premonition” is in the unveiling of the grand story at play. As Julianne peels back the layers of the onion, she discovers a conspiracy involving the NSA and ... SPOILERS ALERT... aliens. Director Joseph Ruben uses clever direction and camera angles to plant this seed in our brains before making its big reveal. Many of the establishing exterior shots are shot from high above in the sky, we see low angle shots of the clouds in the sky, characters have subconscious desires to look up in the air and an ever-present wind seems to have a character of its own.
The characters in the film are indeed being watched from above, but by whom? And why? By the very nature of the film and its point of the view, we can only know the answers to these questions by exposition. Since the film gives us only the information the protagonists have, there will inevitably be a scene where the characters have to tell us what exactly is going on. Both LOST and Harry Potter do it. I call it the “Hardy Boys” scene, or the “Scooby Doo” scene. These scenes always disappoint.
I saw the film in a theatre back in 2004, and I will always remember the scene in the cabin, just as the handcuffed NSA agent is about to tell us the big secret, with a gigantic bang he gets blasted, through the roof, into the air and presumably into a wormhole in space. This comes so out of left field it left the audience completely silent. It was awesome. The scene when Alfre Woodard gets blasted into the air is even better. These scenes are so cool, they make up for all the film's faults.
We never get to know what this other alien world is like, or what these aliens look like. And I don’t need to know. You’re watching the film for the concept alone. Telly and Ash are cardboard characters at best. We don’t get to know them or what makes them tick at all. It’s all about the cool scenes, the misdirections and the big reveals.
Where “Premonition” turned the engine off and coasted into its third act, “The Forgotten” took a sharp left turn and kicked it into another gear. I do wish the plot cohesively stuck together at the end, but I was still appreciative of the ride. Enjoy.
Buy it here: The Forgotten
THE LAST MIMZY
The Last Mimzy (2007) dir. Robert Shaye
Starring: Chris O’Neill, Rhiannon Lynn Wryn, Rainn Wilson, Joely Richardson, Timothy Hutton
**1/2
What is the Last Mimzy you ask? What the hell kind of title is that you ask? It’s a surprisingly good kids flick released by New Line earlier this year that harkens back to the ET-era of empowered kids films from the 80’s. The marketing of the film attempts to piggyback on the Narnia, LOTR, Potter neo-fantasy genre, but it's not as big as those and part of the joy of the film comes from its small scale intimacy.
The Wilders are your average WASPy middle class family. Jo (Joely Richardson) is the hardworking homemaker who cares for her kids deeply, David (Timothy Hutton) is your typical overworked Benz-driving businessman who rarely has enough time for his kids, and Noah (Chris O’Neill) and Emma are your average 6 and 8 year olds. But when a mysterious black box floats onto the shore near their Seattle weekend cottage their lives get turned upside down. Noah and Emma discover a series of objects in the box each with magical properties – spinning rocks, crystals, sea shells, and a doll rabbit. As we learn in the pre-credit sequence, the rabbit is the most important which was sent to Earth from sometime in the future to help save the planet.
It starts out as a ‘kids vs. adults’ adventure, as Noah and Emma hide their new gifts from the parents. But we are saved the frustrating narrative device of the adults not believing the kids, with the introduction of Larry (Rainn Wilson - aka Dwight from “The Office”), Noah’s science teacher who has a connection to the mystical events. With the help of his flakey astrologist girlfriend, Larry uncovers the historical significance of the objects. Rainn Wilson brings his own brand of quirky fresh humour and actually made me laugh on several occasions.
We learn these objects were sent back to many different time periods, in addition to Noah and Emma’s. Larry finds evidence of these objects in ancient texts, history books and other examples of mysticism. This broadens the scope of the film for those high-concept-sci-fi-loving viewers (like me). But as thought-provoking as it is, it also conveniently plugs a few plot holes as well.
The film is essentially a clone of E.T. The kids discover secret powers of the objects, which alert the black-suited authorities. Like E.T, the doll’s powers are dying and so the kids have to find the secret to puzzle to ‘phone home’, which in this case means opening up the worm hole which will send the doll back to its world.
The purpose of the Rabbit and why it needs to go back (or forward) in time is kept vague throughout the whole film. Why send it back in time only to send it forward again? What gives? There is an expository explanation which is hastily told to us in voiceover at the end. It’s a little lazy and convenient in storytelling purposes. But it does make sense, if not wildly implausible and over ambitious. Kids don’t really need the explanation, it’s just for the adults.
One of the interesting aspects of the film is the director Robert Shaye – a mega-player in Hollywood, who founded New Line. It’s only his second feature film and first since 1990’s “Book of Love”. The move from the office to the director’s chair is successful, as he keeps the story moving forward, the pace up, and the running time down. The kids are competent and he doesn’t make them stretch too far beyond their abilities as actors. The visual design of the film is original and uses special effects sparingly. He’s smart enough to know he’s not competing with Potter or Narnia and doesn’t overindulge himself.
If you have kids and are sick of watching Harry Potter for the 20th time, “The Last Mimzy” will certainly be enjoyed by your kids and will freshen up your eyes and ears again as well. Enjoy.
Buy it here: The Last Mimzy (Widescreen Infinifilm Edition)
BECOMING JANE
Becoming Jane (2007) dir. Julian Jarrold
Starring: Anne Hathaway, James McAvoy, Maggie Smith, Ian Richardson, Julie Walters
**1/2
“Becoming Jane” is a harlequin-style 17th Century corset drama chronicling the formative creative years of the Queen of corsets herself, Jane Austin. I generally hate Jane Austin stuff but this isn’t half bad.
The film starts out as a happy-go-lucky pompous romp in the English country. Jane Austin (Anne Hathaway) is a poor country girl whose mother and father are desperately trying to marry her off to a wealthy gentleman. But Jane doesn’t want a loveless marriage like her mother and rejects the affections with traditional cinematic youthful rebelliousness. Jane’s sister asks her, “If money won’t satisfy you what kind of man will?” Enter Tom LeFroy, and rambunctious Irish lawyer who at the behest of his crusty old benefactor Uncle (Ian Richardson) is ordered to spend the summer in the country with his brother. In addition to his handsomeness Jane likes his rough Irish edges. Sparks fly between the two, though in traditional cinematic romance fashion she plays hard to get. The two eventually fall in love and appear to be destined to be together.
The courtship is perfunctory - scene after scene of recycled romantic material. The film doesn’t get interesting until the second half when Jane meets Tom’s family in London. Tom is faced with the same choice Jane had to make in choosing true love over wealth and family acceptance. And so when Tom pauses to consider the potential consequences it causes a major rift in their blissfulness.
I have to admit I can’t really tell the difference between “Sense and Sensibility”, “Pride and Prejudice”, or this film. In fact, I probably like this better, I’ll substitute Anne Hathaway for Keira Knightly and James McAvoy for Hugh Grant any day. Hathaway has natural beauty - her doughy eyes, porcelain white skin and competent accent make for a great English heroin. Taking a break from Hogwarts are Julie Walters and Maggie Smith, who play opposing mothers on opposite sides of the class system. Smith is certainly in familiar territory, as, other than say, Emma Thompson, nobody does British stuck-up better than Maggie Smith.
Putting Jane in the title and making the film the story of the actual Jane Austin doesn’t add value to film. I’d argue the film would have been better without the Jane Austin hook. In fact, her career as a writer is treated as a third tier subplot and doesn’t affect the core relationship at all. If Tom doubted Jane’s ability to make a career from writing, his choice in the end would be more complex, but instead it’s the usual story in these films – wealth, class and property. Yawn.
“Becoming Jane” is a terrible title, and after “Finding Neverland” and “Mrs. Potter”, can we put to rest dramatic films about British authors’ lives please? Hey, what about the porno version – “Banging Bronte”? Sorry, just a bubble thought.
The film actually looks pretty good. I noticed the top notch cinematography in the final act, where Tom and Jane's relationship struggles to stay afloat. Eigil Bryld desaturates the frame and opens the aperture full for a shallow depth of field, creating an isolating and cold feel.
If there were any doubts the women in the audience were into the movie they were erased when, in the final moments the audience drew a highly audible collective gasp at a last minute revelation. I giggled with joy, which confirmed my assertion that Jane Austin was the first Harlequin novelist. Enjoy.
ANGELS WITH DIRTY FACES
Angels With Dirty Faces (1938) dir. Michael Curtiz
Starring: James Cagney, Pat O’Brien, Humphrey Bogart, Ann Sheridan
****
Michael Curtiz is one of my favourite directors, and arguably the consummate studio director – a filmmaker who made lean, polished and fast paced films with little fat or excess. And “Angels With Dirty Faces” is one of those. It’s a classic Warner Bros. gangster film, with Jimmy Cagney at his maniacal best.
Cagney and O’Brien play Rocky Sullivan and Jerry Connolly, childhood friends who we first see in their youth as petty criminals. When Rocky is caught stealing by the police and Jerry gets away their lives divide in two separate paths. Rocky goes to juvie prison and then becomes a hardened gangster, Jerry joins the church and becomes a Catholic priest. When Rocky gets out of prison they rekindle their friendship for the first time in 14 years. Rocky befriends a group of n’er-do-well orphaned street kids (played by a group of young actors billed as “The Dead End Kids”). He has a knack for discipline with the rambunctious punks and so Jerry is accepting of Rocky’s presence.
But Rocky is still knee-deep in organized crime. He takes up with his former partner, James Frazier (Humphrey Bogart) and the new boss in town, Max Keefer (George Bancroft). Rocky’s presence threatens Frazier and Keefer’s new business and they conspire to cut him out of his share of the money he’s owed.
Meanwhile, when the kids start idolizing Rocky as their hero, Jerry decides to personally fight against the mob influence in his neighbourhood, effectively pitting himself against his best friend. Their bond of loyalty and friendship is challenged up until the very end when Rocky is on death row. With only his pride and his reputation left, Jimmy asks Rocky to relinquish that to prevent the kids of the street from martyring Rocky and ruining their future lives as descent citizens. The ending packs an emotional wallop and stands up to any film ever made.
“Angels With Dirty Faces” was made before “Casablanca” but by 1938 he had already proven himself with “Captain Blood”, The Adventures of Robin Hood” and “Charge of the Light Brigade”. He was a master with his camera and could choreograph and shoot action sequences better than anyone. But his skill with character is on display here. Cagney is magnetic as Rocky. He reads his dialogue with razor-sharp intensity. He’s charismatic and confident, and for the kids, someone to look up to as a former street kid. O’Brien plays his character not so much as a scripture-quoting Priest, but a pragmatic counselor who knows his way around the streets. Even when Rocky and Jerry are on opposite sides of the law the mutual respect for one another is always present. This makes Rocky’s final moments so powerful. And watch how Curtiz carefully shoots Rocky in this moment – in shadow only – an effective and brilliant directorial choice.
Curtiz gives the film some grand scope as well. Look at the opening shot which pans across the New York tenement showing hundreds of people on the street going about their usual day (reminiscent of the establishment of ‘Casablanca’). The action is taut and exciting, especially the final gunfight. As always Curtz knows how to move his camera at the right time to maximize pace, drama and emotion. Watch how he enters scenes as well, often framing a close-up and pulling to find actors and start the scene. It’s a modern technique we don’t notice now, but at the time was actually innovative. And his montage scenes are impressive and technically complex as well - overlapping and superimposing dozens of images to condense time.
The film is also dated in many respects. Rocky is tough, very tough, on the kids in the neighbourhood. The basketball game is almost laughable how Rocky literally slaps the kids into submission. Rocky’s courtship of his girlfriend Laury (girl-next-door alluring, Ann Sheridan) is just misogynistic, cruel and well, definitely not politically correct.
But despite some datedness, “Angels With Dirty Faces” is still a remarkably dramatic character study, with some terrific action in as well. After all it is a gangster film. The scenes with Cagney and Bogart (before he was a star) are worth the price of admission as well – two of the best actors of their day shouting tough gangster dialogue at each other – what else do you need? You can see how much this film was an influence on Martin Scorsese’s “The Departed”. Enjoy.
Buy it here: Angels With Dirty Faces
Unfortunately no youtube clips exist.
PREMONITION
Premonition (2007) dir. Mennan Yapo
Starring: Sandra Bullock, Julian McMahon, Kate Nelligan
**
“Premonition” is a high concept film about a woman who foresees her life one week in advance during a time after her husband has been killed in a car accident. The events are confusing and she questions her own sanity and the reasons for her perplexing premonitions. The film messes about in the Shymlyan genre, and establishes a neat concept, but in the end it’s too clever for its own good and fails to deliver the goods.
Linda and Jim Hanson live a humble family life in the country. Linda cares for their two daughters at home while Jim sells cars at a local dealership. One day, a cop shows up at her door and tells her Jim has died in a car accident. The news is obviously shocking to Linda and she spends the rest of day in a haze. The next morning she wakes to find Jim alive and everyone around her is going about their day as if nothing is wrong. The day after that Jim is dead again. Just as Linda is on the brink of going crazy she notices the pattern, that every other day moves her forward by a week. Therefore she can predict what will happen to Jim before it actually happens in real time. Linda is forced to make life-altering decisions about her old life and her potential new life without Jim.
The film is two thirds good and one third failure. It establishes the concept which is intriguing and thought-provoking but then fails to live up to the buildup. In the final act it slowly deflates like a lifeless balloon falling to the ground and landing with a faint whimper.
The film wants to be scary and moody like “The Sixth Sense”, but it also wants to be intelligent and time-shifting like “Memento”. The result is a much lesser film than either. Director Yabo and writer Bill Kelly use the first half of the film to set up the premise. Yabo uses slow creepy movements, stock and trade autumn leaves and naked branches of the country to establish the isolated environment. Yabo drops several scary stings on us to keep us on the ‘edge of our seats’. There’s a dead bloody crow lying on the ground near her clothesline, there’s a series of unexplained horrific scars on her daughter’s face, there’s a creepy doctor who shows up with a devious agenda. The problem is in the third act these mysteries prove to be red herrings which have nothing to do with the story. It’s a major let down.
As well the film never really explains why Linda is experiencing these premonitions. Divine intervention is thrown in at the end as an easy explanation, but it doesn’t satisfy the ‘existential’ questions of why her and not someone else. The film wants us to ask the question, what would you do differently in life if you could see the future? Well, Linda doesn’t do much, or at least not enough to make an interesting film. “Premonition” needed to push the consequences of her choice further and raising her stakes. As well Yabo and Kelly needed to connect the scary elements in the film to her ultimate decision at the end. A lost opportunity is the doctor character played by Peter Stormare. Stormare is at his creepiest in a scene where he takes Linda away to his clinic, but the disconnect with the throughline of the film is too wide.
Sandra Bullock is surprisingly good as Linda though. The scene where she has to tell her kids that their father has died is a great performance. It’s totally believable. In fact, Bullock’s reactions to the events in the film are, for the most part, plausible and truthful.
Despite these criticisms it’s an interesting American introduction to director Mennan Yabo, whose first film was an award-winning German thriller, “Lautlos”, which I haven’t seen, but makes me wonder what in that film gave Bullock and the producers confidence to make “Premonition”. In any case, “Premonition” is competent but won’t set any fires and is ultimately not a good coming out party for Yabo.
Buy it here: Premonition (Widescreen Edition)
