tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11794275646468857052024-03-19T03:55:42.963-07:00Vote Hal Phillip Walker!Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.comBlogger34125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-21723855062132092982009-10-23T18:22:00.000-07:002009-10-26T04:34:41.672-07:00Film Review: A Serious Man [A-]<span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Film / Review</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">A Serious Man</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> [</span><a style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);" href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_CURRENT/Entries/2009/10/23_A_Serious_Man_%282009%29_Directed_by_Joel_and_Ethan_Coen.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">InRO</span></a><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">]</span><br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Director: Joel & Ethan Coen</span><br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Year: 2009</span><div style="text-align: justify; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(147, 149, 140);font-family:verdana,fantasy;" ><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="white-space: pre-wrap;font-size:8;" ><object height="337" width="520"><param name="movie" value="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/14781"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"><embed src="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/14781" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" wmode="transparent" allowfullscreen="true" height="337" width="520"></embed></object></span></div></span><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>In comparison to just about every other film Joel and Ethan Coen have directed in the last fifteen years or so, "A Serious Man" seems at first glance to be small and maybe even minor. It follows on the heels of the two biggest films the Minnesotan brothers have helmed thus far—which happen to be two of the most different films the same two people could possibly make. First, 2007's austere Texan serial killer saga "No Country for Old Men" became their biggest critical hit since 1996's "Fargo," even surpassing that film in the eyes of many by clinching the Best Picture win at the Academy Awards. It topped so many critics' lists and dominated the Oscars so thoroughly (in addition to Best Picture it also took Best Director, Adapted Screenplay and a Supporting Actor trophy for Javier Bardem and his terrifying haircut), that for some the parade of praise became a little boring, and though 'No Country' has endured my repeated viewings and intensive scrutiny, its slavish perfection can also be a bit distancing, and its frigid efficiency is easier to admire than to love. While the brothers' "Fargo" has the jovial Frances McDormand to provide some relief from the nihilism, the morally-steadfast but far more stoical Tommy Lee Jones can't quite do the same for 'No Country.' And in a banner year for American films, more messy, ambitious works like Paul Thomas Anderson's "There Will Be Blood," and even David Fincher's "Zodiac," remain, to me at least, slightly preferable.<br /><br />Then the Coens turned the expressiveness dial far in the opposite direction for their looney, cartoon follow-up, last year's "Burn After Reading," a farcical FBI romp that stacks the deck with characters just as removed from our own emotional plane as those in 'No Country,' but ones who are also frequently unpleasant and only sporadically funny. The star-studded ensemble cast—which includes two of the three "Ocean's 11" remake headliners—ensured the film a hefty box office intake, but I think most were surprised and even disheartened to see it become the brothers' highest grossing film to date. (Not to mention disappointed by the fact that because of this, and for a long time to come, 'Burn's' title will sit alongside 'No Country's' and the words "from the makers of" on all promotional material for upcoming Coen films.) Few will deny that the brothers' comedies are more divisive than their dramas. Their special brand of hyperactive humor can jive with the project they apply it to ("O Brother, Where Art Thou?"), or the resulting film could be reasonably compared to a Spencer Tracy/Katherine Hepburn romp on crack cocaine ("Intolerable Cruelty"). 'Burn' unfortunately registers as closer to the latter extreme than the former, and on repeated viewings it only seems more bombastic and tiresome.<br /><br />Now, "A Serious Man," a film I've already seen twice and one my opinion of hasn't changed. It's not an adaptation of a major literary work by a respected American novelist and it's not a flashy, over-the-top star showcase. Its actors are largely unknown to big screen audiences, with lead Michael Stuhlbarg more recognizable for his work in the theater, and many of the supporting players either making their professional acting debut or primarily known for bit parts on various television shows—and yet all are uniformly excellent. The Coens are working from one of their original screenplays, and though that didn't serve them very well with "Burn After Reading," the material they've written here is decidedly more personal. The story is set in 1967 and involves a Jewish family living in a Minnesota suburb—around the same time of the Coens own Jewish, Minneapolis upbringing. It centers on Larry Gopnick (Stuhlbarg), a devoted family man and professor of physics at a local university, who seems contended enough until he suddenly finds himself beset with "tsuris," a litany of troubles that test his faith and his general resolve as a serious man.<br /><br />This particular series of unfortunate events begins when Larry fails to notice a slyly placed envelope of bribe money from his frazzled Korean student (David King) after refusing to alter his pupil's failing grade. The inadvertent transaction serves as the catalyst of Larry's misfortunes—whether that be coincidence or fate is entirely up to you to decide—and when he returns home that evening, he's confronted by his wife, Judith (Sari Lennick), who suggests they get a divorce. Soon, more bad news: Larry learns someone's been sending dissuasive letters to the school board, urging them not to grant his tenure; Judith informs him of her intention to remarry family friend and widower Sy Ableman (Fred Melamed); Larry gets angry phone calls requesting payment for a monthly record club he didn't join; his young son (Aaron Wolf) almost botches his Bar Mitzvah by smoking pot beforehand; and his brother (Richard Kind) finds himself in trouble with the police for unlawful gambling. Angry and increasingly inquisitive over the meaning of his existence, Larry seeks council from a hierarchy of three rabbis (young, old, and the heavily guarded, ancient Rabbi Marshak), in the process becoming mired in legalities and overwhelmed by guileless lawyers.<br /><br />The Coens have faced almost as many accusations of misanthropy as Lars von Trier for putting their characters through the ringer, but detractors should put away the knives this time around—"A Serious Man" is different in a crucial way. There's something of a realization that at least I had watching the film, when your sympathies for earnest, answer-seeking Larry shift, and you begin to understand the perspective of the rabbis, who urge him, basically, not to ask so many questions. "Receive everything with simplicity that happens to you," the film's seemingly aloof opening mantra reads, but if your experience watching "A Serious Man" is anything like mine, that advice takes on a quietly powerful resonance, as it's put into action in at least two crucial scenes.<br /><br />The first is the film's bizarre, entirely in Yiddish, opening anecdote, a prologue set in a European shtetl as geographically removed from the film's main action as it is temporally. Thematically, however, there's correlation: A Bear of a man arrives home to his frumpy wife and regales her with a story about meeting their elderly neighbor on the road and inviting him for supper. When he tells his thus-far-disinterested wife the man's name, she turns sheet-white and explains that the man her husband speaks of has been dead for three years. Soon, a knock on the door announces the arrival of their guest, who the wife promptly deems a "dybbuk"—which Wikipedia defines as "a malicious possessing spirit, believed to be the dislocated soul of a dead person." The segment ends with one of the Coens' characteristically abrupt acts of violence, as the wife plunges an ice pick into her guest's chest, to which he responds by chuckling warmly and wandering off into the thick of a snowstorm. ("A man knows when he's not welcome," he concludes.) The Coens neither confirm that this visitor was indeed a dybbuk, as the wife seemed so certain he was, nor do they suggest that the woman has committed a grave error and killed an innocent man. The unspoken punch line: Who cares? And it's that exact line that we hear later from the Rabbi Nachtner (George Wyner), in response to Larry's inquiry about the outcome of his equally bizarre story—involving hebrew text found inscribed on the back of a goy's teeth.<br /><br />What works extraordinarily well in this deftly plotted and impeccably paced film is the Coens' fusion of their considerable comedic and dramatic powers, maybe the most satisfying blend of the two they've yet concocted. The dialogue takes on an almost rhythmic poetry—no other filmmakers could use the line, "He's a fucker," to establish the tempo of a scene—as suggested in the brilliant trailer's comical repetitions. For maybe the first time, the Coens manage to duck both the oppressive seriousness of 'No Country' and their noir "The Man Who Wasn't There," while also avoiding the dreaded Coen-screwball impulse, which has manifested itself in films as disparate and equally unsuccessful as the aforementioned "Burn After Reading," the misfire rom-rom "Intolerable Cruelty," and the somewhat appropriately screwball, but no less disastrous, "The Hudsucker Proxy." On the contrary, "A Serious Man" is understated without being drab, and it's smart-funny without being intellectually distancing—as I often find, say, Charlie Kaufman screenplays. It's a relatively simple, straightforward parable, but the philosophical implications are as rich as those some read into 'No Country.' Personally, I read "A Serious Man" as the Coens' attempt to navigate the tricky contradictions of a Jewish man's devout spirituality and need to comprehend things on a logical, tangible level.<br /><br />But the Coens are storytellers, not philosophers, and though their films grapple with some big ideas, they'll probably be the first to tell you, 'Don't look to us for the answers.' The ending of "Burning After Reading" anti-climaxes with the line, "What did we learn?" The ending of 'No Country' finds its thoughtful sherif resigned if not defeated by the horrors he's seen. And the end of "A Serious Man," well, it's even more open ended than any of their previous conclusions (and, side note, its impending maelstrom establishes a weird similarity with Robert Altman’s underrated “Dr. T. & the Women”). But even if one of my favorite endings this year doesn’t work for you, there’s so much else in “A Serious Man” that should, from Stuhlbarg’s kite-in-the-wind performance to the canny use of Jefferson Airplane songs, and the big pay-off they provide. If you find your head filled with even more questions by the end of the film than you had at the start, that’s kind of the point. Just remember what the dormouse said.<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><br /></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-81609243797565553922009-10-23T18:11:00.000-07:002009-10-23T18:21:27.378-07:00Film Review: Antichrist [B-]<div style="text-align: justify;">Film / Review<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Antichrist</span> [<a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_CURRENT/Entries/2009/10/18_Antichrist_%282009%29_Directed_by_Lars_von_Trier.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">InRO</span></a>]<br />Director: Lars von Trier<br />Year: 2009<br /><br /><object height="249" width="450"><param name="movie" value="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/13938"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"><embed src="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/13938" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" height="249" width="450"></embed></object><br /><br />"Antichrist" is an exorcism of the foulness and unmitigated hatred stewing inside notorious provocateur Lars von Trier. Its production follows a crippling depression which stifled the Danish master's output for two years, following completion of what could be described as his only conventional film, 2006's office comedy "The Boss of it All." This new work finds von Trier coming out the other side of the woods and leading us in: "Antichrist" is set in the heart of a spooky forest ironically referred to as "Eden." The film's proverbial Adam and Eve (the cast lists them as "He" and "She") are played by the willowy Charlotte Gainsbourg and previous von Trier collaborator (in 2005's "Manderlay") Willem Dafoe. The couple recently lost their only son (a tragedy depicted while they have uninhibited sex in the film's heavily-stylized black and white prologue), and the wife has been stricken with inconsolable grief. Her husband (also her therapist, who arrogantly decides to treat her) attempts to console and rehabilitate his spouse, repelling her sexual advances and embracing her firmly each time she awakes from vivid nightmares. But after the doc's usual tricks prove largely ineffective (he instructs, "make a list of what scares you," and, "exhale on the count of five," but the woman's violent episodes persist), it's decided that the couple must pursue a more severe approach and face these terrors head-on. He leads his wilting wife to a cabin in the woods—into the forest of Eden, the place She claims she fears more than any other. Unsurprisingly, what the couple find in their foliage-ensconced retreat is nothing less than hell on Earth; a fiercely primal series of brutal acts which She inflicts upon Him in some kind of possessed fury and misguided vengeance. Lars isn't fooling around: within the first five minutes, brief penetration is shown on screen (goodbye R-rating), and later on, one character is forced to ejaculate blood and another takes a pair of shears to their genitals (hello NC-17). All this ultra-violence is given some context through Gainsbourg's pained whisper of a warning: "Nature is Satan's church." Sentiments like these are more than appropriate considering that von Trier has dedicated "Antichrist" to Russian master Andrei Tarkovsky, whose films were often heavily influenced by their natural environments. Acts of carnality and physical abuse are suggested to be provoked by the influence of Eden's foreboding landscape, which complements the film's primal urgency (especially in regard to the un-sexy and desperate sexual encounters, of which there are many). It's frustrating than that von Trier introduces a more academic motive for the wife's horrific behaviors: we learn that She was working on her Masters Thesis, regarding the mistreatment of 18th century woman, which suggests that all this mayhem may be the result of some kind of demonic possession (and/or just some good ol' misogynistic statement on Lars’ part).<br /><br />And then there's the Three Beggars, a trio of recurring woodland creatures (a deer, a fox and a crow) who pop up in horrific succession during the film. Their implication here is riotous: a fox actually talks at one point (the only point; "Chaos reigns!" he groans, covered in blood from eating himself alive), which understandably has been met with ample parodying. This is a consistent failing of "Antichrist": the more serious and provocative moments are too ridiculous to be taken as such, and thus often come off as comical, and we have to assume that's not what von Trier was aiming for (though who knows with this guy). Yet however dubious the usually on-point von Trier's symbolic implications may be in this equally dubious return to the horror genre (isn't he past this phase of his career?), his craft is still undeniably accomplished. Both the opening and closing sequences of "Antichrist" have an elevating quality to them that could easily excuse whatever comes between, but von Trier further stuns with his impressionistic therapy sessions, which find the husband instructing the wife to visit the forest in her mind and let it absorb her body—a sort of catharsis before the storm. And when a tempest of brutal, unrelenting violence does hit (like a brick to the dick, literally) its depiction is just as arresting as the more tame sequences. It's a nasty bit of business for sure, frankly depicted without an ounce of irony, and sure to be the cause of many a sleepless night and heated debates between cinephiles and casual moviegoers alike. But the fact is, this is moving cinema; whether you're moved to love it, moved to hate it, or it just churns your stomach with wretched bile, "Antichrist" will undoubtedly inspire a passionate reaction. So even if Lars von Trier isn't the "best film director in the world," as he so boldly and, I would assume, tongue-in-cheekily proclaimed at his Cannes press conference, he's still unquestionably the boss of it all—a unique artistic force who plays by his own rules and answers to no one.<br /></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-24052670016697083122009-10-06T23:39:00.000-07:002009-10-06T23:43:26.446-07:00Film Review: 35 Shots of Rum [A]<div style="text-align: justify;">Film / Review<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">35 Shots of Rum</span> [<a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_CURRENT/Entries/2009/10/4_35_Shots_of_Rum_%282009%29_Directed_by_Claire_Denis.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">InRO</span></a>]<br />Director: Claire Denis<br />Year: 2009<br /><br /><object width="450" height="336"><param name="movie" value="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/12143"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/12143" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" width="450" height="336"></embed></object><br /><br />The work of Parisian auteur Claire Denis has been cause célébre for many film critics over the last two decades. Her adoring supporters do backflips with the arrival of each one of her films, while detractors bemoan her frequent tendency to favor oblique narratives and veiled expressions (read: emotional and thematic complexity). Now, Denis is 61 years old, and with each new film she gravitates away from the "provocateur" tag slung at her years ago, a label which never really fit her in the first place. Of her nine films thus far, only one (the bloody, vampire-erotica cautionary tale "Trouble Every Day") could really offend anyone, and it's also her worst film: a mixed attempt at moody euro-horror, though one that deserves more than the angry decries of exploitation its been charged with. It explores some certifiably provocative ideas (the thin line between sex and violence) and features an orchestral-jazz score by Tindersticks' Stuart Staples, as well as the sumptuous, rosy lensing of Denis' trusted cinematographer, Agnes Godard. The auteur calls on both names again to add mood and texture to her new film, the delicate family drama "35 Shots of Rum." And to hopefully no one's surprise, one of modern cinema's great trifectas doesn't disappoint, augmenting what might be Denis' most mature and measured work with their own brand of movie-magic.<br /><br />It's obvious from the opening scene that this is the work of a uniquely great filmmaker: trains rush past each other, down deserted tracks and through tunnels. A man (Alex Descas, visibly older than he was in "Trouble Every Day") looks on in earnest, finishing a cigarette and then sticking around as Staples' harmonic score hums about him. Evening turns to night in this quaint locale somewhere on the outskirts of Paris, and still the man – and Denis with him – lingers. It would be a credit sequence, if there were actually credits during it. It would be an establishing shot, if it did serve to establish a specific location (no Eiffel Tower in sight, so we could really be anywhere). Instead, a sequence like this is meant as a mood-setter, indicating the tone of "35 Shots of Rum" as being calm and a little melancholy. In Denis' 2005 epic "The Intruder," a similar, wordless passage at the beginning served to create a sense of confusion, unrest and mystique; in 2003's liberating sexual reverie "Friday Night," the first shots of a city-wide traffic jam echo the protagonist's sense of claustrophobia. Each Denis film is a very different animal, but it’s sequences of Pure Cinema like these that get at why none could be made by any other filmmaker.<br /><br />The term "pure cinema" has always been a bit hard to pin down, but applying it to Denis' films I think complements her incredible sense of emotional clarity through complete aesthetic control. "The Intruder," for instance, is all heady existentialism and abstract collage, but Denis grounds the film with identifiable images and associations that give a distinct sense as to where her head's at. In this way, "35 Shots of Rum" may be her purest film yet. Most of Denis' work tends to straddle the line between narrative obligation and artistic indulgence – certainly the case with "Trouble Every Day," its impeccable rhythms frayed by a sometimes clunky plot – and though she rarely fails to find that compromise, not since her career-defining masterwork "Beau Travail" has she gotten it all so right: she lingers on a face or figure only as long as she has to; she cuts just when it feels necessary for her to do so; and, excluding the handheld takes, she moves her camera ever so slightly, and always with purpose. Denis is truly at the height of her powers, and '35 Shots,' coming nine years after "Beau Travail," completes a decade in her career that I can only assume will be looked at in retrospect as her absolute artistic peak. And as the films which mark the beginning and end of that period, these two could hardly be anymore different.<br /><br />"Beau Travail" finds Denis liberally adapting Herman Melville's "Billy Budd." She relocates the story of jealousy and mistrust to a French Legionnaire camp in Djibouti, and in the film's long, imposing takes of the soldiers synchronized exercise routines – their bodies caked in the dry dirt of a parched African landscape – Denis unearths the homoerotic undertones of her source text. Simultaneously, she renders the muscular male form with austere authority, a kind not seen since Michelangelo put chisel to stone. In contrast, "35 Shots of Rum" is a film of a much quieter strength, as Denis chooses understatement over broad gestures, and winds up with the most affecting film she's ever made. Yet it's the spectrum covered by the two that's most impressive, blanketing everything Denis has done in the interim: fetishization of skin ("Trouble Every Day"); dreamlike mirages ("The Intruder"); intoxicating sexual and romantic longing ("Friday Night"). Her cinema has always been about the senses, so it's not surprising that "35 Shots of Rum," the auteur's culminating work of the decade, is a masterpiece of sensory cinema.<br /><br />Descas plays Lionel, a train operator living in a modest Parisian apartment with his shy, virginal daughter, Jo (Mati Diop). Lionel begins to worry he may have sheltered his daughter too much as she, already in college, seems unwilling to strike out on her own. But when he urges her to "just feel free," he later has difficulty accepting that freedom as she tries to exercise it. It's a relationship as real and unsentimental as any depicted on the screen, and recalls the father-daughter bond of Yasujiro Ozu's classic "Late Spring," if only because "35 Shots of Rum" is in fact meant as an homage to the Japanese master. Which is fitting since Denis, like Ozu, is intent on taking her time, letting the scenes between Lionel and Jo play out with graceful precision; she pays extra attention to the way one's hand strokes the other's, and gives a charge of empathy to a father's long gaze at his daughter. And if you're wired right, in Denis' unhurried rhythms you'll find a reflection of life effortlessly captured, a mastery exemplified in the extended centerpiece at the heart of "35 Shots of Rum."<br /><br />The occasion of a concert brings together Lionel, Jo, Tall French and Oily neighbor Noé (Grégoire Colin, the hypnotic center of "Beau Travail"), and their landlord Gabby (Nicole Dogue). Noé's advances toward Jo have been received with trepidation thus far, and Gabby's heart-on-her-sleeve affections for Lionel, whose also her old fame, have faired just as poorly, but their night together will bring all these emotions to a boil. It starts when the car breaks down on the way to the concert in the middle of a torrential rain. Through the window they spy the vibrant red curtain of a small café, almost magically suggesting a warm paradise away from the misfortunes of their night. Inside, a radiant hostess offers them towels to dry their bodies, which glisten in the café's hot yellow light. "Siboney" creeps through the jukebox as Lionel dances playfully with Gabby, and then affectionately with his daughter. Lionel eyes the beautiful hostess and she notices him back. Then, just as The Commodores' soulful and seductive "Night Shift" wafts in, the whole mood of the room changes. Noé cuts in on Lionel to dance with Jo and the two kiss. Lionel looks on disapprovingly, then takes the hand of the hostess and they dance together slowly. Gabby, from her seat at the bar, looks crushed. But if it sounds like a melancholy scene, it isn't; there's too much love in this room for bad vibes to drag it down, and as a lyric from the indelible "Night Shift confirms, "It's gonna be alright."<br /><br />A stretch toward the end of "35 Shots of Rum" is almost as good. Jo drives to Germany with her father to visit her mother's grave, and a flow of naturally beautiful images passes across the screen: Jo and Lionel adorn the grave with flowers; they camp out under the stars in a patch of tall grass, as Jo suggests, "We could live like this forever"; and finally, a parade of children with glowing red lanterns march over a hill set against a sunset-orange sky. The film heads back to Paris for its equally stunning coda, and it all ends on a note of uncertainty about the future, as any film which hopes to capture real life probably should. Where Denis chooses to take her career from here feels just as uncertain; '35 Shots' seems like the end of an era for the auteur. Her prior films found characters unable to directly express how they feel, hindered by race or class distinction, stubbornness, jealousy, or an unfortunate disorder (the sexual-desire-cum-violent-impulse of "Trouble Every Day"). "35 Shots of Rum" then feels like the point at which her characters stop groping around for the right gesture – at least comparatively – and find a way to express how they feel. And since Denis has spent more than two decades studying and parsing that obscure object of desire, a little openness is something she’s thoroughly earned.</div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-72839400333410977542009-10-06T23:26:00.000-07:002009-10-06T23:37:07.891-07:00Film Review: Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind [B+]Film / Review<br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind</span> [<a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_OLD_HAT/Entries/2009/9/10_Nausicaa_of_the_Valley_of_the_Wind_%281984%29_Directed_by_Hayao_Miyazaki.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">InRO</span></a>]<br />Director: Hayao Miyazaki<br />Year: 1984<br />Part of: <a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/HOME/Entries/2009/8/30_Directrospective_6_-_Hayao_Miyazaki__The_Art_of_Optimism.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">Hayao Miyazaki: The Art of Optimism</span></a><br /><br /><object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/7wSba9hwCaU&hl=en&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/7wSba9hwCaU&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object><br /><br />On some level, it's personally satisfying for me to review one of Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki's films. I rarely discuss it anymore, but there was a time when I was something of an "anime" enthusiast, drawn to the challenging visual and thematic territory the medium often explores. This led to my appreciation of cinema on an aesthetic level, and years spent watching anime the way it was intended to be watched – in Japanese, with english subtitles – made crossing over and exploring the depths of foreign language cinema that much more of a natural extension. Before all that, however, I consumed more than I would like to admit. Some of it in retrospect is particularly embarrassing, while a few series I still remember fondly (taking in all 26-or-so episodes of "Cowboy Bebop" and "Neon Genesis Evangelion" had to be more stimulating than half of what played in local theaters). Of course, that time in my life is behind me at this point, and aside from sporadic viewings with friends who still harbor love for the stuff, I usually find it hard to appreciate the medium as I once did. Still, there are some names whose work hasn't lost any of its cache with me. Satoshi Kon is one, his "Millennium Actress" being arguably the pinnacle of animation this decade, along with Studio Ghibli auteurs Isao Takahata (director of the 1988 masterpiece "Grave of the Flies") and Hayao Miyazaki. Of that group, Miyazaki is king; he's pumped out far more films than the notoriously slow Takahata, and has amassed a good deal more work than Kon as well. He's given us at least one incontestable classic (2002's career-summing "Spirited Away") and only a single misfire (2005's "Howl's Moving Castle," which he did not write). Even Pixar, that other standard-setting studio of animation excellence, acknowledges Miyazaki's supremacy, as even their impressive canon (specifically 2007's screwball Marx Brothers riff "Ratatouille" and the twin 'Toy Story' films of the 90s) can't match that of the master.<br /><br />So it's with some disappointment that revisiting Miyazaki's second feature, 1984's "Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind," seemed to yield diminishing returns. This was the first (unofficial) production of Studio Ghibli, the first film to unite Miyazaki with Takahata (here serving as producer) and the first to time the director worked with his indispensable music collaborator Joe Hisaishi. Still, watching the film for the first time in many years, there's little doubt that 'Nausicaä' represents Miyazaki's aesthetic in chrysalis. The filmmaker embeds the same environmentally-concious themes which have earned him legions of ardent fans, and exercises his already impeccable animation chops and impressive attention to detail. But it's hard not to recognize the conflict between the ever-expanding forest (here dubbed "The Sea of Decay") and the people living at its fringes and not think of the far more robust treatment a similar plot received in Miyazaki's 1998 feudal epic "Princess Mononoke." Just as it's hard to not see the titular Nausicaä, a strong-willed girl with a powerful hold over nature, as similar to a half dozen other Miyazaki protagonists, each progressively more complex and memorable, leading up to his perfecting of the character with Chihiro in "Spirited Away." The same could be said in regard to Miyazaki's always meticulous craft, here applied to every roughly drawn line characterizing his legion of insect creatures, but later animating his human characters and lending them seemingly insignificant but cumulatively meaningful behavioral traits, which in part make Chihiro such a fully realized character.<br /><br />At the start of his film, Miyazaki quickly establishes narrative context through on-screen writing, which explains the setting as being "100 years after the collapse of industrial civilization." To me, this has always been a novel idea – envisioning a future that's actually less advanced technologically than our own present – and it can be seen as one of many sign posts throughout Miyazaki's body of work pointing to his fear of modernization. He follows this move with an even more potent storytelling technique, presenting a collage of cave drawings for the camera to pan over slowly, accompanied by Hisaishi's symphonic and resonant score, which loses none of its grandeur despite twinges of dated 80s cheese. This could be considered a form of that age-old cinematic device known as "doubling." Miyazaki presents us with information in one way, and then another, using a different medium. The effect is not one of redundancy, but of immersion; during the opening credit sequence we already feel like a part of this world Miyazaki has created, and understand it to be a variation on our own. All this confirms the man's faith in the capacity for pictures – drawings – to tell a story without words, and his faith in his younger viewers' ability to comprehend that story. Miyazaki has never talked down to children in his films, and that's always been one of his greatest strengths, as well as an attribute few if any filmmakers share.<br /><br />The film proper begins with a peaceful image of clouds drifting through a clear blue sky. Nausicaä comes sailing through on her jet-powered, one-person glider, and Miyazaki tracks her until she lands gracefully on the ground, confronting a dense, Dr. Seuss-esque jungle of purple plumed palms. Nausicaä unsheathes a rifle from the wing of her glider and presses on. It's clear immediately that this is not a Disney princess or any damsel in distress – Nausicaä, like Miyazaki himself, is an adventurer, and the filmmaker wants you to be aware of this from the first frame. He furthers this female empowerment by setting up a situation in which Nausicaä rescues a drifter from a giant bug/crustacean crossbreed. She swoops in and stuns the attacker, using a special whistle to lull it out of its rage – noticeable by glowing red eyes that fade to blue – and driving it into the jungle from whence it came. The creature is later revealed to be one of the planet's most feared: an "Ohmu," guardians of the Sea of Decay, said to stampede the cities of those who attempt to destroy their territory. This becomes central to the film's plot, as the man Nausicaä saved turns out to be the girl's old friend and teacher Lord Yupa, who brings news to Nausicaä's village, the titular Valley of the Wind, that the pervasiveness of the Sea of Decay has led to the destruction of whole kingdoms at an increasingly rapid rate.<br /><br />The Valley of the Wind is one of few bastions of peace and prosperity left in a world plagued by war and pollution. The deadly spores which populate the Sea of Decay emit a toxicity that makes the land inhospitable, and as it spreads, the human race's extinction becomes all the more imminent. In the Valley, the people live modest, earthy lives. They're ruled by a bed-ridden king, Nausicaä's father, and their robes and castles instantly recall medieval-era Europe, but as is so often the case with these too-good-to-be-true utopias, tranquility is fleeting. When a neighboring empire's advanced airship crashes into the rocks outside the village, it brings with it burdens previously unfamiliar to Nausicaä and her countrymen. Yupa, however, being a nomad on a never ending quest to discover the secret truths of our world, is all too aware what this accident means, and is able to identify the disturbing cargo the crashed ship carries – as well as its apocalyptic implications. He knows that Nausicaä, who possesses both a mysterious gift which allows her to communicate with nature and, as a princess, the power to unite a people, is humanity's last hope for survival, and likely "the one" he's been looking for to fulfill a certain prophecy.<br /><br />Admittedly, 'Nausicaä's' plot is its least interesting aspect; largely because the friction between various human tribes is more complex, and the encroaching presence of nature more richly employed both thematically and visually in "Princess Mononoke," which also features a warrior princess as the determining factor in humanity's future. But 'Nausicaä' is more interesting when considered in the context of that later work, and it should not be looked upon as a first draft but as a more idealistic film from a younger filmmaker. In "Princess Mononoke," all the characters look older and more battle-worn. The violence is unsparing, more pronounced than in any other Miyazaki film. The tone is darker, and compared to the pastel shades of 'Nausicaä,' so are the colors. The warrior princess is fierce and animalistic in 'Mononoke,' possessing none of the personable qualities of Nausicaä and certainly not the latter's altruism. It's not altogether unfounded to assume that Miyazaki was, at the time of 'Mononoke's' production, less optimistic about the future of our planet than he was when he made 'Nausicaä.' And comparing the two films yields much of interest: Whereas 'Nausicaä's conclusion is largely one of peaceful compromise brought about by an individual's martyrdom, 'Mononoke' ends on a note of uncertainty, with the push-pull dynamic of nature and humanity's coexistence sure to be tested again. Likewise Miyazaki is less idealistic about the romance in 'Mononoke,' a different-sides-of-the-tracks relationship met with resistance on both sides. In 'Nausicaä,' the bond the protagonist shares with a gunship pilot from another country seems almost an afterthought, and their union comes with no sacrifice.<br /><br />But somehow all this is OK; there's enough of Miyazaki's unmatched and boundless imagination on display in both the rendering of colorful creatures and expansive landscapes, as well as the carefully designed airships and vehicles which bear the filmmaker's distinctive mark. Miyazaki emerged out of the gate a great animator, and as early as in this film and even in his debut, 1979's 'Lupin III' installment "The Castle of Cagliostro," he's displayed a gift for visual invention matched only in the live action medium by perhaps Guillermo Del Toro. There may be no scene here quite as jaw-dropping and memorable as the sight of the Forest God's celestial patterned body decaying all over the land in "Princess Mononoke," or that of "Spirited Away's" gluttonous No Face digesting all manner of food and frogs, but 'Nausicaä's' most striking moment, in which a "Giant Warrior" fights to obey his human master's command as he decomposes on a hillside (due to the folly of said human's impatience), is nearly as meticulously drawn (by, of all people, 'Evangelion' creator Hideaki Ano) as anything Miyazaki's overseen, and coneys the same quintessential Miyazaki ideal. Neither nature nor humanity is infallible. Each relies on the other and hopes for a state of symbiosis not easily achieved. More than anything though, you have to appreciate Miyazaki's unwavering commitment to this specific project; it's based on a manga book series which he wrote and drew, serialized over the course of 13 years; and only the first quarter was finished by the time of the film's production. Every Miyazaki film feels like a labor of love, but perhaps none more than 'Nausicaä,' which in effect breathed life into Studio Ghibli and brought significant awareness to the career of one of today's most valued cinematic artists.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/HOME/Entries/2009/8/30_Directrospective_6_-_Hayao_Miyazaki__The_Art_of_Optimism.html"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 399px; height: 256px;" src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_3-2.png" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-64200903192940758332009-10-06T23:12:00.000-07:002009-10-06T23:24:54.358-07:00Festival Coverage: Toronto '09<div style="text-align: justify;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/HOME/Entries/2009/9/30_Festival_Coverage_-_Toronto_09.html"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 397px; height: 256px;" src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_2.png" alt="" border="0" /></a>This is my third year (Luke’s second) attending the Toronto International Film Festival, and though the other majors have various things going for them (the overwhelming prestige of Cannes, Tribeca’s...well, I’m sure it’s got something), to me Toronto is the big one, and the one I always look forward to the most. Once you get your tickets (and make it past the “lottery” stage which thoroughly screwed over Luke this year, as any gambling proposition can) and make all the necessary reservations (flight expenses were way down this year, so cheers to that), navigating the festival is relatively easy, and its organization certainly impresses me more than *sigh* that of Tribeca.<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />More importantly, Toronto almost always has a great lineup: Cannes may trot out enough high-profile names each year to make the paparazzi say grazie, but Toronto grabs only the best from that group, and adds to their schedule a host of films not completed at the time Cannes entries are due. To me, the most exciting name on that list this year is Claire Denis, whose latest film has had Venice-bound journalists like Guy Lodge calling it a “masterpiece.” Not necessarily a surprise since Denis already has one of those and two that are close enough. This will be the French auteur’s second film at the festival in as many years, a distinction she shares with (among others) Japanese director Hirokazu Kore-eda, whose odd-sounding Cannes carryover “Air Doll” premiered on the Croisette less than 12 months after his “Still Walking” had its premiere in Toronto.<br /><br />Then there’s the bigger, awards-baiting stuff which will certainly get the lion's share of blog coverage; this year that includes Jason Reitman's latest, slick-talking seriocomic George Clooney vehicle "Up in the Air" (already getting raves out of Telluride, so probably not one to sneeze at), more Clooney action in "The Men Who Stare At Goats," and that poor, unfortunate and much delayed Harvey Weinstein acquisition "The Road," which hasn't faired as well with critics in Venice as Weinstein probably hoped it would. Speaking of Cormac McCarthy adaptations, the Coen Brothers have a new film in Toronto too, which is perhaps a bit more anticipated than “Burn After Reading” was this time last year. However, both Luke and I are missing that one because a.) it opens not too long after we get back, and we like to see things that don't; and b.) Toronto denied us a ticket (damn lottery), as they did to the latest Pedro Almodóvar as well, which I'm destined to miss just as I did in Cannes.<br /><br />Obviously there are more Oscar hopefuls, some less hopeful than others I would assume, and some so far under-the-radar (comparatively) that it will take an audience award and we-are-the-world schmaltz to propel them to a Best Picture victory. Y'know, like that Bollywood movie that wasn't a Bollywood movie. In any case, there's no denying the bearing Toronto has on the awards race, so if you happen to be interested in that kind of thing, prick up your ears and read along. [<a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/HOME/Entries/2009/9/30_Festival_Coverage_-_Toronto_09.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">InRO</span></a>]<br /></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-78118808145190304972009-10-06T23:03:00.000-07:002009-10-06T23:11:33.471-07:00FIlm Review: District 9 [D+]<div style="text-align: justify;"> Film / Review<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">District 9</span> [<a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_CURRENT/Entries/2009/9/5_District_9_%282009%29_Directed_by_Neill_Blomkamp.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">InRO</span></a>]<br />Director: Neil Blomkamp<br />Year: 2009<br /><br /><object width="450" height="244"><param name="movie" value="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/12352"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/12352" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" width="450" height="244"></embed></object><br /><br />The summer movie blockbuster with half a brain, or the one that suggests its audience actually has one, is often revered like the one-eyed man in the valley of the blind. Especially by critics. The latest "Star Trek" reboot is a good example of this, as a film that doesn't do much of anything new – in fact it cops a good portion of its plot from the first two original "Star Wars" movies – but one that supplies audiences with the standard summer-movie thrills minus the typical deadening thud of stupidity we critics would look bad championing. I'm never explicitly on the lookout for "that film" – the one blockbuster to laud for its comparative superiority – I just look at summer as my least favorite time at the movies, as I'm part of an increasingly small minority who don't get overly excited about the meal-sized serving of superhero pictures trotted out by the studios week after week for a three month period. Generally speaking, the special-effects-heavy popcorn sequels (and prequels and reboots) don't give me the charge they do so many other people. There are, of course, exceptions. Some films, like those of "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy, muster a genuine grandiosity that's hard to ignore, while others manage to straddle the line separating escapist and intelligent filmmaking in surprisingly successful ways.<br /><br />But for every surprise, like Tony Scott's "Vertigo" riff "Deja Vu" and the Watchowski brothers' spirited "Speed Racer" adaptation, there are countless productions that serve as mere fuel for the action junkie, bereft of both style and substance, and when those two things are lacking, it's hard for me to care. You can call me pretentious, but I think in order for me to fit that description I would have to be more dismissive towards others' enjoyment of this fare. "Star Trek" and "G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra" may not be tailor-made to my specific interests, but I don't necessarily consider either to be a bad film. Just as I certainly wouldn't suggest I'm some how superior to the numerous action fans out there who do get a rush from these movies. That would be pretentious. There has to be something far worse than a lack of imagination in a film for me to really get out the red pen. And this is where "District 9" comes into the conversation.<br /><br />Neill Blomkamp's high-concept sci-fi is a film I'm not as apathetic towards. It aims to be the summer's one-eyed man; a film of supposed intelligence to the weary film critics, who've been bruised and beaten by the 'Transformers' and 'Terminators' of the cineplex all summer long. However, "District 9" amounts to little more than a messy hodgepodge of contradictory ideologies, genre cliches and inconsistent style. The director obviously has ambition, as evidenced in his film's initial premise, and this premise does, admittedly, intrigue: Blomkamp and producer Peter Jackson (a long way away from the elves and hobbits of his 'Lord of the Rings' series) imagine an alternate history defined by an event that took place in 1981 involving an alien mothership that broke down above the city of Johannesburg. For reasons left comically unexplained, the ship just floats there in mid air, even after the alien race that resided inside (bug-like humanoids we dub "Prawns") are extracted. Enter the titular District 9, the zone the aliens are confined to which, several years into their stay, begins to look like a colorful slum akin to the Rio de Janeiro of Fernando Meirelles' "City of God." An apartheid soon follows, as the human citizens of Johannesburg call for the removal of these "foreigners."<br /><br />All this information is presented to us in a film-within-a-film conceit, as a pseudo-documentary begins to take shape in the first 30 minutes, intercut with fake newsreel footage and incredibly unsubtle talking heads interviewed about the alien crisis. One of these subjects explains, "Now to everyone's surprise the ship didn't come to a stop over Manhattan or Washington or Chicago, but instead coasted to a halt directly over the city of Johannesburg," and with this statement Blomkamp heavy handedly announces the correlation between "District 9" and vaguely similar events that took place in Cape Town during the 1970s, when an apartheid regime forced 60,000 residents to relocate to "District Six." Likewise, in Blomkamp's film the Prawns are ordered by the government to pick up and move to a new area, later revealed to be little more than a glorified concentration camp, and at least at first we're led to believe the film might center around this politically-charged event.<br /><br />During this time, we're introduced to pencil pusher Wilkus Van De Merwe (Sharlto Copley), our unwitting "hero," who's assigned by his company, Multi-National United (MNU), to single-handedly take on the task of serving the Prawns their "eviction" notices. Seriously. And if any Prawn refuses to sign the paperwork? Wilkus is backed by a battalion of soldiers with heavy artillery to help be persuasive. It's around this point that Blomkamp abandons the documentary film-within-a-film approach of his first act in favor of shaky handheld camerawork, and employs a more narrative driven approach revolving around Wilkus. Blomkamp's new visual aesthetic suggests a first-person perspective realism, but this contradicts the film's soon established scope – there are plenty of scenes that could not possibly be witnessed by a documenter, most notably those involving the aliens, alone in their homes – and nothing here resembles reality.<br /><br />Wilkus, while performing his task as delivery boy, investigates one Prawn's home, and makes a discovery that changes both the trajectory of "District 9's" plot and the stability of our protagonist's otherwise average life. For those poor souls that still want to go see this thing, I won't spoil what happens; instead, I'll just make it clear that this particular development shifts the film thematically, steering it away from its vague promise as a social commentary toward a more traditional and largely derivative action movie framework. Its director does, however, stay committed to sci-fi tropes, referencing a half dozen of the genre's true classics ("The Fly," primarily, and there's a nod to "E.T." as well), but never managing to carve out a unique identity of his own. Those claiming "District 9" to be a classic itself are either just desperate for a work of quality from this genre or they're missing the insulting and conflicting nature of the values presented here. Blomkamp feeds us a finger-wagging do-un-to-others lecture and then hopes we eat up his on-screen violence just thirty minutes later. In trying to present both a critique of the injustice with which we treat those different from us (the proverbial "other"), and at the same time trying to satisfy the frothing bloodlust of American audiences with nihilistic brutality meant as entertainment, Blomkamp discredits his film under the banners of both intelligent cinema and escapist popcorn fluff.<br /><br />"District 9" is more manipulative in its construction than almost any film this year, aiming for liberal sympathy with force in its opening, then catering to the gore hounds for the majority of its runtime with sickening gratuity, and finally working hard to pull the heart-strings with a ludicrous development of inter-species camaraderie in the third act, a relationship that feels not only entirely unearned, but explicit in its bid to overshadow the aforementioned nihilism of the picture. By measure of critical and audience approval, this tact worked. But let's say I give Blomkamp the benefit of the doubt and just assume his vision is muddled, not calculated; he still crafts scenes that display flagrant indecency without purposeful commentary, and whether this was intended or not means little. It's particularly telling that in a movie all about racial acceptance this director stoops to creating ethnic caricatures. There's something of a subplot in "District 9" involving Nigerians bartering with the Prawns, trading cans of cat food (again, seriously) for advanced alien weaponry. And like so many depictions of Africa's people, the Nigerians here are rendered to be the equivalent of comic-book villains, grinning and evil practitioners of voodoo and other ooga-booga barbary, complete with eyes abulge. Like the recurring central villain of the film – a tough-talking military general who kills for fun – the natives are cartoonishly one-dimensional, another sign of Blomkamp's inept perception of social commentary.<br /><br />Most distressing is the cruelty with which Blomkamp treats his protagonist, subjecting him to a series of sadistic psychological tortures. Wilkus is experimented on by government scientists who don't even bother to give him a sedative as they talk casually about selling his body parts to different countries; and to further the shock and exploitation, the sequence is shot largely with close-ups of Wilkus' terrified face, in effort to absorb every moment of horror in much the same way Eli Roth and James Wa choose to shoot their torture victims in the equally vile installments of the "Hostel" and "Saw" franchises, (ir)respectively.<br /><br />The employment of the close-up here should be seen as an aesthetic crutch, excusing Blomkamp from the hassle of composing a scene in any sort of artful way. This approach isn't new; the 'shaky-cam' style saw application in mainstream cinema as early as 1999, in Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez's landmark pseudo-found-footage film “The Blair Witch Project,” and was used to great effect in last year's similar and very underrated J.J. Abrams produced monster movie “Cloverfield,” directed by Matt Reeves. The difference is that many filmmakers, including Abrams and Reeves and also John Erick Dowdle with his horror remake "Quarantine," commit to their style, limiting the scope of their films in effort to experience the story from the perspective of an individual. It's a gimmick, sure, but its application can create a visceral and unique experience that validates the relative disregard for traditional cinematic form. Every woozy sway and skewed angle in "Cloverfield" serves to create tension, the filmmakers' jerky movement acting as a form of choreography and in effect substituting for traditional composition. In contrast, Blomkamp neither commits to his stylistic device nor uses it for any particular reason. His narrative is otherwise totally conventional, and the pacing of the film doesn't differ from the typical Hollywood formula.<br /><br />"Cloverfield" is a good film to compare "District 9" to because it's just as analogous – though many people, bafflingly, don't seem to catch the meaning of Abrams and Reeves' film. It should be impossible for any American to watch "Cloverfield" (shot at the eye-level perspective of a man on the ground, through his digital video camera) and see people running terrified through the streets of New York City from an enveloping cloud of debris, without thinking of 9/11. We've all seen that footage, and the filmmakers (refreshingly) trusted their audience to detect the link between the chaos created in their film and that during the Twin Towers' collapse. Abrams and Reeves largely succeeded at capturing a sense of overwhelming panic. and more specifically, at constructing a disaster in which the overriding feeling is very familiar: NYC is being attacked by something it doesn't understand. The connection between "Cloverfield" and 9/11 is never explicitly announced within the film, but it's there for anyone with enough imagination to connect the dots between a monster attacking the city and people we've come to dub as "monsters" who attacked the same city. And it's both the perspective and chosen cinematic form in "Cloverfield" that make the film's connection between its fantasy and its historical context all the more prevalent. Blomkamp, on the other-hand, says nothing in "District 9" through the use of his hand-held camera, and instead chooses to communicate his ideology through that extended opening sequence; a collage of synthetic news footage which begins to seem like less the film's innovative strength and more its cross to bear: leaden exposition establishing a level of political and social relevance the film seems fully incapable of living up to, and eventually contradicts. And that's really "District 9's" big problem: it passes a hint of righteous ambition off as intelligent execution, and most of you seem to have bought it.</div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-62503249854516475372009-08-19T14:51:00.000-07:002009-08-19T14:56:53.233-07:00Music Feature: Martha Wainwright @ The Cape CinemaMusic / Feature<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Martha Wainwright @ The Cape Cinema</span> [<a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/HOME/Entries/2009/8/19_Live_in_Review_-_Martha_Wainright_%40_The_Cape_Cinema.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">InRO</span></a>]<br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_1-6.png"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 248px;" src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_1-6.png" alt="" border="0" /></a>The Cape Cinema, as the name implies, is primarily a movie theater; however, its owners have for several years now roped in some impressive live music for the summer season. Last year I caught Bon Iver at the peak of their buzz, who played to a packed house and shook the very foundation of the place, testing the strength of its speakers in a way the low-key arthouse fare the theater usually runs likely never has. This year, the management has chosen a very different artist in Martha Wainwright, though probably one much more appropriate for the crowd they cater to.<br /><br />The venue is nestled in the heart of the very rural Dennis, Massachusetts (just minutes away from my home town), where the average aged citizen probably keeps company with Betty White and where louder musicians are often directed toward one of the area's many bars or the more eclectic Melody Tent a few towns over. This place, for better or worse, is for the art snobs; the people who fancy themselves a cut above the "Spider-Man" ogling set because the movies they like play film festivals, are often in foreign languages and feature actors your average fanboy has never even heard of. Which is no knock on these people; to a certain extent, I count myself among them, cherishing the venue as the only real bastion of intelligent cinema left in my area. I'm just giving you a sense of the scene at these shows, as further evidenced in a conversation outside, during which one man says to the other, "You'll love it in there, it's historical," and then proceeds to ask those around him, "Who is Martha Wainwright anyway?"<br /><br />Of course, however uninformed this patron is about the entertainment, he's right about the history: The Cape Cinema has been around since 1930, when Cape Playhouse manager Raymond Moore opened its doors, describing it as, "a new miniature talking picture theater deluxe" (whatever that means). The real history here, and the reason our man above cited its historical value, is the arching Rockwell Kent mural overhead, which spans 6400 square feet and is always a welcome sight for this regular patron – almost making up for the venue's endurance-testing seats, which could be compared to deflated beanbag chairs draped over a wooden frame. The mural is indeed the "crowning glory" of the cinema, as the venue's website calls it, and at the time of its installation trumped even "Tintoretto's Paradise," in Venice's Doges Palace, as the largest single mural in the world.<br /><br />Fun facts for sure, but what of Martha Wainwright? To give a brief primer to the readers of this review, Martha Wainwright comes from a very regal music family; she's daughter to American blues musician Loudon Wainwright III and Canadian folk icon Kate McGarrigle, and her brother – probably the most recognizable name of the bunch these days – is the flamboyant crooner Rufus Wainwright. Martha, while perhaps the least known in the family, has one of the most distinctive voices in all of contemporary music and a vivacious, playful stage presence to complement it. As I already knew from countless YouTube videos and from seeing her absolutely stellar performance of "Tower of Song" in the 2006 documentary "Leonard Cohen: I'm Your Man," this was to be a memorable show, if for no other reason than to see this generally reserved crowd's reaction to her sexually charged gestures and to her most controversially titled song ("Bloody Mother Fucking Asshole"), should she play it. No dice there, but instead we get a surprise announcement.<br /><br />At about 20 minutes past eight, the theater manager takes the stage to introduce Wainwright. First though, he rattles off one pretty banal story – involving his struggles contacting Wainwright's booking agent and his success after tracking her down at the Toronto Film Festival – and then informs us of something far more exciting: "Last night, I got a call from Martha," he says, "and she asked me if she could bring her mother along." As my mental reflexes are not particularly speedy, it takes me a few moments – and a smattering of enthusiastic applause – to realize that this means the Kate McGarrigle is in the house.<br /><br />However, just Martha comes out at first, looking pretty harried with messy blond hair and black and white striped leggings, as she announces her "mom" will be joining her for some songs later on in the set. Without much pause or any further comment to the audience, she picks up one of her two acoustic guitars and launches into a highlight from her self-titled 2005 debut, "This Life." Her voice immediately fills the room with a piercing emotiveness and she displays an impeccable skill that few can match. "This light is boring," she half-whispers, and the soft glow of a single, saturated spotlight reflects off the body of her guitar as she rocks with the instrument like a dance partner. "There's a song, and it's in my head," she sings, and that same song is now in all of ours heads as well, the meaning of her every word conveyed through her delivery and in other subtle ways that only the most gifted and affecting singers can.<br /><br />Afterwards, Wainwright breaks for a moment, tuning her second guitar and engaging more with the audience, asking us about the town of Dennis and declaring that she and her mom had only been there for a few hours, just enough time for a dip in the lake (setting up a great punch-line later). The story is less important than the delivery; whereas some performers can't communicate with an audience without seeming like they're on a different plane, Wainwright is endearingly casual. Were the audience a little more lively (only a few were brave enough to answer her inquiries), there could be a great repartee going on here.<br /><br />Instead, we get some more songs, including the closest thing to a hit the singer has had so far ("Bleeding All Over You"), from her somewhat middling 2008 album, the hilariously titled I Know You're Married But I've Got Feelings Too. The song is also one of Wainwright's greatest achievements lyrically, a rather stunning plea for a married man's love which climaxes in the bitingly poignant line that doubles as the above album title. It sounds perhaps even better live, void of the somewhat distracting choral backing and fluttering string arrangements on the record. As a straightforward vocal and acoustic piece the sentiments lacerate even more, with focus placed firmly on the artist's deft lyrical ability. The song also sets up, rather perfectly, Wainwright's dialogue about how many of her songs feel dishonest to sing ("In one song I say, 'I am 21,' and I wonder how much longer I can sing that"), which then segues into her ill-fated announcement that, "I have something new; it's not very good, but I'm going to play it anyway."<br /><br />The song, unnamed, isn't bad at all; the lyrics are a little slight, and Wainwright suggests "maybe it can be translated. I hear it in Spanish." But, more importantly, she clearly doesn't know it very well yet, botching chord after chord and forgetting the words regularly, leaning over to check her lyric sheet between just about every line. You half expect this kind of thing from any artist playing new material, but still this portion of the show is something of a train wreck, saved only slightly by Wainwright's admission of the mishap, her very funny interjection ("shit-balls") and then by the excitement we all feel as she summons mom from backstage.<br /><br />Looking even more bohemian than her daughter, in bag-lady sweater and puffy scarf, McGarrigle enters stage right and plops herself down at an electric keyboard. She immediately comes on strong with the comedy: "Grand piano," she quips, and then, brushing back her frizzy mop she proclaims, "I have pond hair" (punch-line!), and the whole audience erupts with laughter. The duo launch into a trio of songs, kicking off with "Jesus & Mary" which sounds much better than the way-over-produced version on I Know You're Married, even as McGarrigle struggles a bit to get her somewhat awkward piano playing in sync with her daughter's supple lyrical runs and tempo-changing bridge. "We never practice," Wainwright admits, and then launches into, for my money, her best song to date.<br /><br />"Factory," off her debut album, has one of my favorite opening lines ever ("these are not my people I should never have come here / chick with the dick and the gift for the gab"), in part because it so perfectly encapsulates the awkward place Wainwright inhabits in the modern rock landscape; a bit too left of center for the Starbucks set (again, she has a song called "Bloody Mother Fucking Asshole"), but not at all experimental or adventurous enough to please indie-leaning fans of singer-songwriters in the Joanna Newsom vein. "Factory" is also probably Wainwright's most affecting song and, like most of her compositions, sounds exponentially more engaging in the live setting, where her limitless voice is given ample room to stretch out and get indulgent – but never compromising the flow of the song. Wainwright can be criticized for some things – she's a less than stellar songwriter and her production choices on record can be very poor (I'm thinking the shambling accordion polka and haunted house sonics of "Tower Song" and the sprightly marching band pop of "See Emily Says") – but few can deny the strength of that nimble, intense voice of staggering range and consistency.<br /><br />And that's really the attraction here: despite some off moments musically and a very short duration (I was in and out of there in just over an hour, for which my rump – increasingly uncomfortable thanks to those wretched seats – thanks Wainwright), that voice is just so captivating and this setting such a perfect showcase for it that the set overcomes its faults. And the show couldn't really be longer than it is, as Wainwright doesn't yet have an arsenal of great songs; she's bested even by fellow Canadian Leslie Feist in that department, who's also only released two albums but of a far more consistent quality. For Wainwright, after she's exhausted the highlights there's really nowhere left to go – though I would have loved to hear those Leonard Cohen covers she performs so flawlessly.<br /><br />After the obligatory "goodnight," Wainwright returns to the stage for the requisite encore, mom in tow. This time, however, McGarrigle is on her game, accompanying Wainwright on an impassioned French song and then, finally, on a truly lovely rendition of Wainwright's "Don't Forget." Which, despite being a pretty minor slow-ballad, is given ample pathos thanks to McGarrigle's candid admission that, "this is my favorite Martha song." She sways and smiles throughout, completely in tune with the song both musically and emotionally. It's a beautiful moment shared between mother and daughter, of a kind of rare and altogether transcendent variety you just don't see very often, and it turns out to be, by some distance, the undeniable highlight of the entire show.<br /></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-87538145918349322752009-08-19T14:19:00.000-07:002009-08-19T14:41:45.282-07:00Film Review: Tony Manero [B+]Film / Review<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Tony Manero</span> [<a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_CURRENT/Entries/2009/8/17_Tony_Manero_%282009%29_Directed_by_Pablo_Larrain.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">InRO</span></a>]<br />Director: Tony Scott<br />Year: 2009<br /><br /><object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/UvCpNw609V8&hl=en&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/UvCpNw609V8&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">Chilean filmmaker Pablo Larrain's darkly compelling second film, "Tony Manero," is a sadistic character study set in 1978 Santiago. It's unrelenting and often unpleasant to sit through; in a sense the more solemn cousin of another film from this year, Jodi Hill's "Observe and Report." Both bear the unmistakable echoes of 1976's "Taxi Driver," by examining the behaviors of mentally disturbed and compulsively violent individuals. The central characters in both films are prone to erupt in bouts of rage, but, while the violence in Hill's film is usually caused by his character's short temper, these outbursts in "Tony Manero" are both dispassionate and mechanical, triggered less by emotion than by necessity. Hill chose the template of a comedy in which to conduct his stinging social critique; Larrain’s is a stark realistic drama, closer tonally to Martin Scorses's classic and pervaded by a gloominess befitting its time and location. This establishes "Tony Manero" as a political commentary, capturing a totalitarian Chile strangled by the dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet, while its people yearn for escape and act with the innate desperation of a cat clawing its way out of a paper bag.<br /><br />The protagonist in "Tony Manero" is this idea taken to its extreme ends. We cringe at the sight of him beating the life out of his unsuspecting victims, often with his bare hands, but through this depravity Larrain clearly says something: he comments on the influence of an environment fraught with poverty, corruption and moral decay. The man is Raul, weathered, middle-aged and of average build. He's played by Alfredo Castro, who delivers one of the year's best and most haunted performances, communicating a cavernous emptiness through gaping blue eyes and muted expression. His lover diagnoses him as "dead inside," and this is mostly true, excepting when he sits in front of the silver screen, basking in the mirrorballs and bellbottoms of John Badham's 1977 disco-era classic, "Saturday Night Fever"; he lights up even more when he takes to the dance floor, emulating the choreography of John Travolta's Tony Manero with obsessive precision. "Saturday Night Fever," and specifically the glamorous life of its star (the very embodiment of masculine energy and authority), offers escapist entertainment for some, but for a man of Raul's obvious mental instability and discontentedness, the fantasy is too desirable to accept its unreality.<br /><br />Raul's life is filled with filth; he shares a tiny one-bedroom apartment above a seedy bar with his girlfriend, her temptingly coy daughter, and the daughter's political activist boyfriend, thus forming something of a pseudo family. Together, they all dance on the bar's rotting stage, and Raul scolds anyone who deviates from his idol's specific routines. He adopts every element of Tony Manero's persona as his own, practicing not only his dancing but mimicking his posture, mood and the exact dialogue from the film. Seeing "Saturday Night Fever" on the big screen (or, as he calls it, "Le Fever") becomes almost a religious experience – a concept Larrain alludes to by showing us one sequence from Badham's film in which John Travolta, bare chested and from a low angle, ritualistically slips on his golden crucifix. Raul weeps. This is all done in preparation for a television competition; we see Raul auditioning – on the wrong day – in the film's opening sequence. The competition seeks to find the "Chilean Tony Manero," and because of it Raul becomes obsessed with his impersonation. To those who stand in the way of this determined and irrational man: watch out.<br /><br />Larrain pulls no punches in depicting his lurid character throughout "Tony Manero." Raul kills an elderly woman in her home in order to steal a color TV, bashes a man's head in who offers him less than the TV is worth and defecates on a competitor's white suit. Larrain launches a political critique via this provocative character study and suggests an animalistic compulsion awakened within Raul as nearly every obstacle he faces is overcome with remorseless brutal violence. The film is meant to be volatile and void of redemption, but Larrain does perhaps take things too far at times; the scene in which Raul smears feces all over his rival's clothing is less psychologically revealing and more shocking for the sake of it – not to mention plain nauseating. Other scenes are equally repellent, the more so because the film is so devoid of feeling.<br /><br />In this sense, "Tony Manero" can be compared to Carlos Reygades' divisive 2006 Cannes entry "Battle in Heaven," which similarly targets its country's – in this case Mexico – political institutions, deteriorating moral values, religious complacency, and class tensions, alluding to these hot button issues through an overweight man's sexual and, in-turn, social inadequacy. The difference is that Reygades employs a rigorous formalist aesthetic and deliberate narrative structure – the film begins and ends with audacious sequences of oral sex. Larrain, in contrast, crafts a film less stylized and more realistic, with gritty hand-held camera work. Larrain does, however, allow for one aesthetic manipulation; his camera's focus fades in and out almost erratically, but conveying Raul's hazy state of consciousness and his blurred moral judgment. The filmmaker also employs one surrealistic flourish: the film's real-time pace is briefly interrupted by a visualization of Raul's internal emptiness, as he stares vacantly at the screen. This technique's singular application makes it all the more devastating.<br /><br />By an incremental difference, Reygades' approach seems more successful than Larrain's, if only because the emotional distance Reygades instigates in 'Battle' is more excusable, since focus is always on the craft, and since his hand is deliberately noticeable throughout. In contrast, Larrain's decision to hew closely to realism is slightly undermined by his disallowing any measurable emotional response from his character – especially during Raul's more violent episodes. It's perhaps too extreme to suggest that a man can commit such heinous acts without any visible remorse, and Larrain toes that line a bit too often. Raul may be numb to his world, but he's not comfortably numb, and yet there's never any discernible sign of his unrest. This could have stifled Castro's performance, but the actor is so good that he often transcends the stoical nature of his character and communicates far more than what's on the page. In any case, Larrain should be praised for conducting a political critique in so bold and provocative a way. "Tony Manero" is challenging, if not exactly redeeming, and it illuminates through provocation, functioning on a variety of levels: as a character study; as an examination of a society's relationship with celebrity; and as confident, assured cinema.<br /></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-57781985118680353102009-08-08T04:10:00.000-07:002009-08-08T04:49:22.848-07:00Film Feature: Best Films of the Year (So Far)Film / Feature<br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Best Films of the Year (So Far)</span> [<a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/HOME/Entries/2009/7/29_The_Best_Films_of_the_Year_%28So_Far%29_-_2009.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">InRO</span></a>]<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_1-5.png"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 415px; height: 77px;" src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_1-5.png" alt="" border="0" /></a>More than anything it’s just a pain to write these intros. And while this time last year I had the relatively mediocre quality of films released to rail about (seriously, “Kung Fu Panda” made my list), 2009 has been a solid if not overly impressive year thus far. That’s boring. So instead I’ll just observe that this year, for me, has been all about auteur filmmakers; be they established directors like Olivier Assayas or the welcome return-to-relevance of Francis Ford Coppola, or be they promising new talents Armando Iannucci, with his uproarious governmental institutions satire “In the Loop,” muscular and formally accomplished dramas by Austrian Gotz Spielmenn (“Revanche”) and German Christian Petzold (“Jerichow”), and the equally haunting debuts of Chilean director Pablo Larrain (“Tony Manero”) and Korean-American Lee Isaac Chung (“Munyurangabo”). It’s a melting pot of international talents on this list. Add to the group Mainland Chinese filmmaker Jia Zhang-ke’s stunning docu-fiction hybrid “24 City,” the aforementioned British satire “In the Loop,” Kathryn Bigelow’s brutal Iraq War pic “The Hurt Locker,” and- why not “Up,” too? The latest Pixar, a reliably excellent film from a studio that just doesn’t miss any more. Any one of those could fight their way on to this list by the end of the year. Also of note are the ones I still need to see (“Moon,” “The Beaches of Agnes,” “Tulpan,” “The Girlfriend Experience” – the latter I have really no excuse for since it was on On Demand for ages and I slept on it) and the ones I’ve seen but it’s been too long since I have to judge them with any certainty (“Lorna’s Silence”). And let’s hear it for the only doc that matters in ’09: Louie Psihoyos’ genre mash-up “The Cove,” which seemingly aims for the greatness of last year’s similar “Man on Wire,” falling a little short but creating no less enthralling and informative cinema. That’s all I got. That and see Erick Zonca’s “Julia,” despite its absence from this list and my accompanying pseudo honorable mentions rattled off above, if only for Tilda Swinton who gives the performance to beat this year.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Top 10 (Alphabetical):<br /><br /></span><span><br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_CURRENT/Entries/2009/4/25_Goodbye_Solo_%282009%29_Directed_by_Ramin_Bahrani.html"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 104px; height: 160px;" src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_4-2.png" alt="" border="0" /></a><span>Ramin Bahrani</span>'s first two films, 2006's "Man Push Cart" and 2008's "Chop Shop," wear the Iranian-American director's neorealist influences proudly, and their release marked the arrival of a significant talent. However, those films' tendency to shy away from any real form of tension or narrative momentum can seem forced, and the filmmaking skill on display isn't quite enough to elevate either above the designation of a modest achievement. Thankfully, "<a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_CURRENT/Entries/2009/4/25_Goodbye_Solo_%282009%29_Directed_by_Ramin_Bahrani.html"><span>Goodbye Solo</span></a>" steps up his craft, his storytelling ability and his characterizations, without compromising his dedication to realistic cinema, so rare to American independent filmmaking. Its basic plot is lifted from native Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami's "Taste of Cherry," but 'Solo' is considerably more engaging, favoring depiction of a strong and inspiring human connection between two unlikely friends, as opposed to the lonely wanderer at the heart of Kiarostami's film. Both are essentially about a man who seeks to end his life, but where Kiarostami found the grim subject matter to be a jumping off point for stoic meditation, Bahrani sees it as a catalyst for hope and renewal. It's that quality which makes 'Solo' both Bahrani's most compelling work, and his most optimistic. Bahrani may have always wanted to make films with a commitment to capturing real life, but "Goodbye Solo" feels like the first film of the director's career that, by its minimalist aesthetic, is emboldened rather than stifled.<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_5.png"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 104px; height: 160px;" src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_5.png" alt="" border="0" /></a>The beach serves as a powerful setting in German filmmaker <span>Christian Petzold</span>'s sophomore feature "<span>Jerichow</span>," a modern reimagining of "The Postman Always Rings Twice." In scenes rife with physical intensity, Petzold's characters glide across the screen with a dynamism similar to the greek sculptures rotating against blue skies in Jean-Luc Godard's classic "Contempt." Benno Fürmann as Thomas in particular is a striking Adonis of a man, hulking and authoritative, completely opaque and an emotional blank slate. He was dishonorably discharged by the military and soon finds a job working for Turkish immigrant Ali (Hilmi Sözer), and later having an affair with his wife Laura, played by the great young actress Nina Hoss – quickly gaining cache as one of world cinema's most skilled actresses. Both native Germans, Thomas and Laura find themselves shamed by their relationship to the wealthy outsider Ali, a kind of resent which spurns a cultural and class based conflict that informs many of the wordless stretches in "Jerichow." Dialogue may be minimal throughout and plot as simple as they come, but just the way Petzold positions his subjects within a frame says more about them and is more piercing than any other gestures could be. <span><br /><br /></span><span><br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_10-2.png"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 104px; height: 160px;" src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_10-2.png" alt="" border="0" /></a><span>Lots of fuss has been made (deservedly) over Kathryn Bigelow's "The Hurt Locker," the first successful film to take on the complex conflict that is the Iraq War and produce a work that captures our troops' experience without over dramatization. Meanwhile, quietly, Korean-American filmmaker <span>Lee Isaac Chung</span> debuted his first feature film, "<span>Munyurangabo</span>," slipped it into NYC theaters almost exclusively and wowed the few who saw it. The comparison is only apt in that Chung's film takes on another major conflict: the Rwandan genocide. And depending on your opinion of Terry George's "Hotel Rwanda," "Munyurangabo" may be the first narrative film to capture the lingering spirit of the conflict in a realistic and honest way. It's about young Tutsi boy Ngabo, an orphan of the genocide, who vows to avenge his parents with the help of Hutu friend Sangwa. The duo are immediately sidetracked by Sangwa's decision to stop and visit his family, who he hasn't seen since running away as a child. It's here where the film unexpectedly stalls, and an examination of the lasting prejudices between Hutus and Tutsis becomes central, as does the complex dynamic between the members of an impoverished Rwandan family – specifically the difficult relationship between a traditional father and his forward-thinking son. Stylistically, the film is even more impressive: the political implication of many scenes recalls the cinema of Africa's premiere filmmaker, Ousmane Sembene, but Chung's deft compositional sense, deliberate pace and sympathetic rendering of youthful characters stifled by a harsh culture and familial expectation is reminiscent of Iranian Abbas Kiarostami's films (specifically "Where is the Friend's House"). However, the real masterstroke here is a long-form, single-take poem – a moment in the film where fiction and non-fiction blur. And as much as Chung culls from many influences, this sequence is very much his own.</span><span><br /><br /><br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_CURRENT/Entries/2009/4/21_Observe_and_Report_%282009%29_Directed_by_Jody_Hill.html"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 104px; height: 160px;" src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_11.png" alt="" border="0" /></a><span>Though I perhaps sung its praises a bit too highly in my initial review, <span>Jody Hill</span>'s achingly funny and fiercely provocative "<a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_CURRENT/Entries/2009/4/21_Observe_and_Report_%282009%29_Directed_by_Jody_Hill.html"><span>Observe and Report</span></a>" is still one of the most underrated films of this year; a stylishly executed and boldly controversial character study that snuck into mainstream theaters and among much less ambitious fare, never finding an audience and, sadly, making way, way less dough than that other mall cop movie. Too bad, theatergoers, because that's your loss: Hill's film manages that rare feat of being as funny as just about anything, without compromising its depth and integrity. And "integrity" may seem an odd descriptor to apply to a film that features date-rape and the copious beatings of tweenagers, but that's exactly what Hill is going for: provocation, showing us a recognizably volatile man who's a product of middle-class America and popular culture's influence (hence the Tarantino-esque slo-mo montages and classic rock music, often mistakenly taken for mere stylistic affect). But Hill doesn't condemn his sociopath and in fact, more controversial still, shows him sympathy, without ever suggesting his brutal actions should be met with exoneration. It's a deft balance of dark humor and emotional gravity, and Hill nails it. To paraphrase a lyric from The Band's cover of a Bob Dylan classic that opens "Observe and Report," Hill, unlike many other comedic filmmakers, seems like he's genuinely trying to "paint his masterpiece."</span><span><br /><br /><br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_CURRENT/Entries/2009/4/30_Revanche_%282009%29_Directed_by_Gotz_Spielmann.html"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 104px; height: 160px;" src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_16.png" alt="" border="0" /></a><span>Austrian <span>Gotz Spielmann</span>'s "<a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_CURRENT/Entries/2009/4/30_Revanche_%282009%29_Directed_by_Gotz_Spielmann.html"><span>Revanche</span></a>" is a slow burning revenge saga that avoids the rhythms of, say, a Coen Brothers thriller and favors a more meditative pace (especially in its last act), patiently observing its protagonist in the throes of moral crisis. It's an elemental film inspired by that most elemental of all filmmakers: Russian master Andrei Tarkovsky. And just as Tarkovsky suggested metaphorical implication in his "Solaris" through contrasting landscapes – the warm embrace of natural surroundings giving way to the isolation of space – Spielmann too uses his central character's retreat from the confining sprawl of Vienna to calming woods in the countryside as symbolic of spiritual rejuvenation. But not everything in "Revanche" is so heady: it's also a film of nerve-racking suspense, and one that uses a voyeuristic device similar to that in Florian Henckel von Donnersmark's "The Lives of Others" to both give insight into these characters and to build an overwhelming tension that earns a satisfying climax. "Revanche" can be a little too staid and its dependance on an intersecting plot device feels forced, but the striking composition of nearly every frame, communicating a palpable loneliness and isolation through wide-angle shots during which the camera doesn't move, assures that this is one of the most accomplished films of the year from a very promising (and relatively new) international talent.</span><span><br /><br /></span><span><br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_17.png"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 104px; height: 160px;" src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_17.png" alt="" border="0" /></a><span>"<span>Summer Hours</span>" is the second of four planned films produced by and featuring artifacts from the Musee d’Orsay (Hou Hsiao-Hsien’s “Flight Of The Red Balloon” is the first, and in my view one of the defining films of the last decade). Its director, <span>Olivier Assayas</span>, is a guy I’ve developed a bit of a thing for (his “Boarding Gate” remains, controversially, one of my favorite films of last year, and his Fassbinder-esque "Irma Vep" is even more stunning and hypnotic). And the film stars three masterful French actors: Juliette Binoche, Jeremie Renier and Charles Berling – all of whom have worked with world cinema's leading auteurs, from Hou to Kieslowski to the Dardennes and Patrice Chereau. So the film feels like something of a culmination; a meeting of artistic minds that registers as an event movie for arthouse patrons as much as the iMAX sect got their rocks off with the 'Transformers' sequel last month. And, luckily, it doesn't disappoint; if it's not the masterpiece I designated "Flight of the Red Balloon" to be this time last year, it's still the closest thing I've seen to great in '09 thus far, and a fair bit more mature, thoughtful and especially graceful than the rest.<br /><br />It's also the premiere highlight of a burgeoning sub-genre on the international circuit: a crop of films that deal with generational transference, a term I apply to the many mirthful works concerning familial discourse and the tension between old and new generations, often stirred by financial insecurity. This includes Kiyoshi Kurosawa's nuclear family drama "Tokyo Sonata," as well as Claire Denis’ “35 Shots of Rum” and Hirokazu Kore-eda’s “Still Walking” (both homages to another purveyor of the family dynamic, Yasujiro Ozu). "Summer Hours" is the most affecting; it at first appears an elegiac film, beginning with the death of Helene, the family matriarch (the regal Edith Scob, who makes a major impression during her limited screen time), and involving deliberations between siblings (Binoche, Renier and Berling) over the outcome of the family estate. But “Summer Hours” overflows with warmth and compassion, and Assayas displays his accumulated wisdom as a filmmaker in the way he develops the relationships between his three siblings, carefully balancing their disagreements and sympathies. Still, the transcendence of "Summer Hours" arrives in its final moments: a vibrant house party filled with young people, during which Helene’s granddaughter arrives at a sudden and meaningful reflection. Assayas suggests that as our possessions and property inevitably change hands, a new season of life brings with it the cleansing prospect of a new generation.</span><span><br /><br /></span><span><br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_22.png"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 104px; height: 160px;" src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_22.png" alt="" border="0" /></a><span>It’s hard to call “<span>Tetro</span>” a return-to-form for <span>Francis Ford Coppola</span> since the form this movie takes is so vastly different from the director’s most recognized works. Often pigeonholed as, that guy who did the ‘Godfather’ movies and “Apocalypse Now,” Coppola’s talents in fact extend far beyond those exercised in his two or three monster classics. “Tetro,” if you’re looking for context, is more like the filmmaker’s greatly underrated “Rumble Fish” than anything else; both utilize lush, black and white photography that intentionally recalls a certain era of cinema, and both choose to flirt with color the same way their old fashion narratives flirt with their present day setting. It’s incredibly intimidating just to describe “Tetro” since there are so many things going on in the picture and references that fly way over my head (several scenes play snippets from Emeric Pressburger and Michael Powell’s 1951 “The Tales of Hoffman” and 1948 “The Red Shoes,” then reinterpret their absurdist-operatic tone within the film later on). It’s a messy work made by a mad filmmaker with an apparent refusal to compromise on anything – making his pairing with nasally skeleton Vincent Gallo that much more appropriate, considering that actor’s generally critic-repellent choice of projects. But it’s also a genius film, clearly labored over intensely and composed obsessively – though not in a way that makes “Tetro” feel stuffy, as it it is in fact quite humorous and its willingness to not take itself too seriously is one of its greatest strengths. Its story, about a younger brother’s search for answers and for the older brother who abandoned him (Gallo), is apparently based in some sort of abstract way on Coppola’s own life (the tyrannical father in the film is, after all, like Coppola’s own father, a famous composer). Considering this, it makes sense that “Tetro” feels like the most personal and passionate thing the director’s helmed in decades, a far cry from 2007’s wildly uneven and way too heady “Youth Without Youth” – though, thankfully, no less bonkers and thrillingly ambitious.</span><span><br /><br /></span><span><br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_23.png"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 104px; height: 160px;" src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_23.png" alt="" border="0" /></a><span>"When's the earthquake coming," one character wonders aloud in <span>Kiyoshi Kurosawa</span>'s "<span>Tokyo Sonata</span>." He's of the younger generation, wandering the streets aimlessly, coming home early in the morning with the feeling that he has no purpose in life. His comment foreshadows the arrival of a "Shortcuts"-esque tremor in the last act of "Tokyo Sonata" with a kind of knowing acknowledgment of the mess he's in – something's gotta give. And so it eventually does, but before that happens Japanese master Kiyoshi Kurosawa (no relation to that other Japanese master, though he's steadily carving out a legacy of equal importance) spends two nearly flawless hours building suspense through the mundane work-a-day activities of his suburban upper-middle class family. Suspense has always been prevalent in Kurosawa's filmography, but here he gravitates away from the horror genre and tries his hand at something more understated. If the resulting film is not his best (that would be 2005's languid epic "Pulse"), it's definitely up there; Kurosawa acutely observes Japanese social strata, and what first appears to be an on-the-nose study of economic downsizing as it effects the familial unit (a theme already explored comprehensively in Laurent Cantet's 2002 film "Time Out") soon reveals itself to be something much more penetrating, with a screenplay that rarely missteps. The scope of the film earns comparison to Edward Yang's early-decade masterpiece "Yi Yi: A One and a Two," and also to Ang Lee's own dysfunctional family drama "The Ice Storm." All three are intrinsically tied to a specific place and era, and yet take on a universal and timeless significance in their empathetic renderings of families striving to live through the maelstrom of hard times. But Kurosawa's real masterstroke reveals itself during "Tokyo Sonata's" gorgeous and cathartic final sequence: Though much of 'Sonata' is almost relentlessly bleak, at the conclusion of his film Kurosawa offers necessary pause, and suggests that there's salvation to be found in even the murkiest of times.</span><span><br /><br /></span><span><br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_28.png"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 104px; height: 160px;" src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_28.png" alt="" border="0" /></a><span>Dark, dark, dark. Boy is Chilean filmmaker <span>Pablo Larrain</span>'s sadistic character study "<span>Tony Manero</span>," set in 1978 Santiago, an unrelenting and often unpleasant experience to sit through. It's something like the twisted, plays-with-matches older brother of another film on this list, Jody Hill's "Observe and Report." Both bear the unmistakable echoes of "Taxi Driver," examining the behaviors of mentally disturbed and violent individuals. But where Hill chose the template of a comedy to house his stinging social critique, Larrain's established tone is much more stark, blanketed in a heavy and oppressive gloom. Both characters are prone to erupt in Adam Sandler-worthy fits of rage, but there's a mechanical, passionless nature to the violence in "Tony Manero" that is particularly striking. Raul (Alfredo Castro, in one of the year's most disturbing and best performances) is a man of few words and intense physicality. He lives in a Totalitarian Chile at the mercy of Pinochet (there are radio snippets and TV clips throughout to remind of this), but he lives for John Badham's 1977 disco-era classic "Saturday Night Fever." Specifically, he's intent on embodying John Travolta's character in that film (the titular Tony Manero), auditioning for a local TV lookalike contest, buying a clean white suit and bartering for muddy glass tiles at a junkyard in order to build a light-up floor in the scuzzy bar he calls home. His exact reasons for obsessing about this particular film (and not, say, "Grease," which also plays at his local theater) aren't entirely clear. But what does seem significant is the escape a polished cinematic work like 'Fever' offers from Raul's putrid, impoverished Chilean existence. Likewise it's the frustrating reminders of Raul's real life that cause him to abruptly lash out with vicious and haunting precision. But Larrain gives us much more than shocking cinema for the sake of it; his film works best as a study of the effects a malfunctioning political and social environment has on a desperate man without options.</span><span><br /><br /></span><span><br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_29.png"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 104px; height: 160px;" src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_29.png" alt="" border="0" /></a><span><span>James Gray</span>'s films are continually dismissed by American critics as being without depth or too straight-forward, when in reality he's just a classical filmmaker, and his work is at worst strangely out of time in modern film culture. Well even Gray's detractors couldn't ignore the director's latest and best film "<span>Two Lovers</span>," which like most of Gray's work is an impeccable piece of filmmaking that values emotional truth and presents sensitively drawn characters – usually males struggling with braggadocio and the conflict between loyalty to family and personal freedom. That's certainly the case in "Two Lovers," which finds Joaquin Phoenix delivering his best performance since maybe Gus Van Sant's "To Die For" as introverted Leonard, a socially awkward suicidal who finds salvation in three woman: his manic neighbor played by Gwyneth Paltrow, Vinessa Shaw's girlfriend-material love interest and Leonard's mother, the regal Isabella Rosselini – all three delivering standout performances, Rosselini especially, better here than she's been in anything in a decade. But "Two Lovers" is Gray's film thoroughly, and it's so structurally sound and stylistically assured – he lends the film an appropriately woozy and dreamlike quality, complementing Leonard's dizzying circumstances – it makes "We Own the Night" (a better film than people give it credit for being) look shaggy and unfocussed by comparison. To this writer, "Two Lovers" is the best American film of 2009 thus far, and one that should end impulsive dismissals of this very skilled director’s work.</span><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /></span></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-61112905240099502232009-08-08T04:02:00.000-07:002009-08-08T04:07:32.894-07:00Film Review: Au Hasard Balthazar [A]Film / Review<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Au Hasard Balthazar</span> [<a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_OLD_HAT/Entries/2009/8/5_Au_Hasard_Balthazar_%281966%29_Directed_by_Robert_Bresson.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">InRO</span></a>]<br />Director: Robert Bresson<br />Year: 1966<br />Part of: <a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/HOME/Entries/2009/7/20_Directrospective_5_-_Robert_Bresson_and_the_Anti-film.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">Robert Bresson & the Anti-Film</span></a><br /><br /><object height="344" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/BC2PseaQyNU&hl=en&fs=1&"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/BC2PseaQyNU&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" height="344" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">No film says more in as economic a runtime or can be read in as many different ways as Robert Bresson’s 1966 masterpiece “Au Hasard Balthazar.” Jean-Luc Godard claimed that "in 90 or 100 minutes, we see the world." As Bresson saw it, this was a world defined by both cruelty and salvation. As is established early on, his protagonist in the film, the Biblically named donkey Balthazar, is destined to suffer for our sins, and despite Bresson's dismissal of traditional Christian practices in his own book, "Notes on the Cinematographer," it's impossible to deny the presence of religion in "Au Hasard Balthazar." From the opening imagery of Balthazar's baptism by a group of children, to the final shot of his death amidst a sea of white sheep, set to the sound of clanging bells and Franz Schubert's elegiac "Piano Sonata No. 20," to the namesake of the virginal Marie, the film's second central character – Catholic mythos looms large here, and though densely allegorical, these elements weave seamlessly with a modest story about a young girl and a donkey, tempted and teased by a world gone wrong.<br /><br />Bresson was a master of his intentionally artless and thus paradoxically artful craft, and here he tells a complex and symbolic story through minimalism, his intense control of both the aesthetic and more organic elements of this picture creating an overwhelmingly powerful cinema. Bresson's visual grammar establishes an intimate bond between his audience and Balthazar through close-ups of the animal's face, specifically his glassy eye, while distancing us from the relentlessly cruel and hopeless Gerard, a leather-clad, motor-bike riding, chain wielding bully often shot at torso level. Sound, too, informs our perception of these characters, whether the loaded silences, the relief of the Schubert or the cracking of twigs and branches snapping under the weight of Gerard's boots as he sneaks up on Marie, his grubby hand reaching from the shadows toward hers, which lays innocently on a bench. Also integral to Bresson’s execution is the reaction of the "models" (his word to describe actors, not mine), or, in this case, the lack of reaction, as impassive gazes reflect the characters' passionless nature.<br /><br />The film opens with the animal Balthazar, his braying disrupting the lilting repetition of the Schubert piece which plays over the credit sequence as he’s being bought by a young girl and her school teacher father. The girl is Marie, and as a child her attention is divided between Balthazar and a boy named Jacques who she promises to marry, and whose name she carves into a wooden bench – the same bench where she will later be confronted by a darker and more sinful desire. The film soon cuts to Balthazar as an adult, being worked relentlessly by a stubborn owner. He's whipped and beaten and strapped to a cart. He eventually escapes and finds his way back to the home of Marie and her family. Marie is now a young adult, played by Anne Wiazemsky, whose immaculate features and porcelain face suggest fragility to be tested. Marie still plans to wed Jacques, but false accusations concerning her proud-but-timid father's unlawful dealings ultimately complicate her life and lead her astray. Weak and impressionable, Marie falls for Gerard (Francois Lafarge), whose strong will and rejection of authority appeal to her.<br /><br />As Marie becomes increasingly obedient to Gerard – telling her concerned mother in one scene that, "If he asked me to, I'd kill myself for him" – her father falls into a deep depression, and disobedience and persistent lying bring the woman who cares for Gerard to tears. Balthazar, all the while, is passed from owner to owner, and Marie usually soon follows. When Marie neglects him, he's handed over to Gerard, who only then successfully seduces Marie; later, Balthazar finds himself in the hands of a cruel, greedy attorney, with Marie having just left Gerard soon arriving at the curmudgeon's estate; and when Balthazar is passed to alcoholic nomad Arnold (Jean-Claude Guillbert), Marie and Balthazar meet once again at a chaotic party orchestrated by Gerard. The meanings to be deciphered in "Au Hasard Balthazar" may be endless, but the world within the film feels inescapably small, with the same dreary scenery repeated and the same characters often involuntarily finding themselves face to face with each other. The party scene in particular beautifully communicates a feeling of congestion, as a hoard of faceless teens dance in sync with each other, none flinching as Gerard busts a mirror with a liquor bottle and destroys the bar. The others neither show disgust nor join in; and this eerie remove recalls and perhaps informs a similar dancing sequence at the opening of David Lynch's "Mulholland Drive," while also complementing the automatism of Bresson's craft.<br /><br />Bresson made many film's that economically present stories rich with meaning and impeccable in presentation, but none feels so vast and all-encompassing in its scope and vision of, as Godard put it, "life." "Pickpocket" and “Mouchette” are more focused and precise; "L'Argent" comes close to the same universality; but the allegory and mysteriousness inherent in "Au Hasard Balthazar’s" animal protagonist make it uniquely great. It's a film that may not endorse Catholicism (its Virgin Marie/y is corruptible, its Christ-like figure is only deemed a saint bitterly just before death, and a priest reads from a Bible dispassionately and in fragments as a man lays dying), but, as film scholar Donald Richie puts it, it's a film aware of "the idea of religion.” Still, it works just as effectively as a simple tale about a girl and her donkey; or about a society struggling to maintain any kind of purity in the midst of financial obligation and material obsession; and as transcendent cinema of Bresson's own unique brand, where the craft is so prevalent and integral to the film's success, but yet also impeccably measured as to never be intrusive. "Au Hasard Balthazar" is all that's great about the cinema in just under 100 minutes.<br /></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-77089183771806778052009-08-08T03:52:00.000-07:002009-08-08T04:01:23.380-07:00Film Review: Pickpocket [A]Film / Review<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Pickpocket</span> [<a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_OLD_HAT/Entries/2009/8/5_Pickpocket_%281959%29_Directed_by_Robert_Bresson.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">InRO</span></a>]<br />Director: Robert Bresson<br />Year: 1959<br />Part of: <a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/HOME/Entries/2009/7/20_Directrospective_5_-_Robert_Bresson_and_the_Anti-film.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">Robert Bresson & the Anti-Film</span></a><br /><br /><object height="344" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/RvUQwW8_uts&hl=en&fs=1&"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/RvUQwW8_uts&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" height="344" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">In Marc Webb's recent lovers' romp, "500 Days of Summer," Joseph Gordon-Levitt's hopeless romantic refers to himself as "adequately handsome." To me, there's no better way to describe the physical appearance of Martin LaSalle, who plays the central character in Robert Bresson's 1959 classic, "Pickpocket." He's not too skinny or too fat. His features are proportionate, though his face is perhaps a bit more narrow than ideal. In fact, everything about Michel seems adequate; his posture, his demeanor, his intelligence. He is not in any way extraordinary, and if he were, Bresson would likely have no interest in him, as this is a filmmaker usually interested in characters with some kind of strain on their life, or with some sort of vice. "Pickpocket" covers both bases, and it's the most Rohmer-esque of the Bresson films I've seen; a pointed morality tale about the persuasive power of commerce, the greed and especially the pride that comes with the pursuit of wealth. In Michel's case, earning money the traditional way has proven ineffective, and so he turns to a life of crime, to the life of a street pickpocket. It's this simple catalyst that allows for Bresson's most carefully choreographed film, imitated often (just this year, and rather convincingly, in Johnny To's "Sparrow"), but never executed with the same grace and precision as shown here: close-ups of hands acrobatically twist and strain around the hem of a jacket like Olympic athletes vaulting over a beam. Much of "Pickpocket's" 74-minute runtime is taken up by these suspenseful sequences, as our daring protagonist is always a thimble's depth away from alerting his targets and spending his life in jail. Of course, there's a story here, and it's a simple yet powerful one, built on three key elements: Michel develops his craft over time, learns from his peers, digs himself a deeper grave (crime); struggles to avoid the ever-watchful eye of a particularly suspicious police chief (punishment); and earns the attention of a pretty but "naive" girl (redemption). The plot is minimalist but strong and complements what I've always felt to be the most compelling element of Bresson's craft: the economy of the filmmaking. In the 95 minutes comprising Bresson's best film, "Au Hasard Balthazar," the director gets as close to the essence of life as any film ever has, but with "Pickpocket,” Bresson zeros in on the life of one individual, and crafts a devastating parable that is arguably the director's most focused and accessible film, one as worthy of classic status as any he's made.<br /></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-79320094640510365632009-07-14T05:33:00.000-07:002009-07-14T05:39:58.105-07:00Film Review: The Hurt Locker [B+]Film / Review<br /><br /><a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_CURRENT/Entries/2009/7/11_The_Hurt_Locker_%282009%29_Directed_by_Kathryn_Bigelow.html"><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Hurt Locker</span></a> [<span style="font-style: italic;">InRO</span>]<br />Director: Kathryn Bigelow<br />Year: 2009<br /><br /><object height="315" width="450"><param name="movie" value="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/10277"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"><embed src="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/10277" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" height="315" width="450"></embed></object><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="line-height: 17px;" class="style_6">Three American soldiers pace cautiously around a cluster of bombs in an Iraqi village as children from balconies and storekeepers from street-level doorways follow their every move. Tension builds throughout the opening scene of Kathryn Bigelow's gut punch of a war film, "The Hurt Locker," stemming here from both the impending detonation and from the threat the many villagers pose, each possibly concealing a detonator and just waiting for the Americans to get close enough to set it off. There are certainly more subtle ways to establish suspense than by introducing a bomb in the first sequence of a film, but, as evidenced from the subsequent explosion and brilliant visual collage of rust scraped from a car's body and sand blowing sky high like a geyser, Bigelow means to heat things up quickly and shake you. </span><br /><span style="line-height: 17px;" class="style_6"></span><br /><span style="line-height: 17px;" class="style_6">The abrasiveness of the “Point Break” auteur’s latest may be its legacy, but there's still a lot more depth here than in one of Michael Bay's CGI'd-to-hell, soul-sucking demolition derbies. In 'Hurt Locker,' we’re shown a humanity representative of American-bred competition and easily agitated tempers, of loyalty to ones brothers and their country, and of fear, the kind spurred by living in a nightmare conflict like Iraq. It's the open-wound vulnerability of Bigelow's characterizations, seeping through layers of macho posturing and bulging muscle, that gives her film its beating heart, but it's both the filmmaker's willingness to avoid sentimental manipulation and the control she wields over her brawny aesthetic – the brutal poetry of her image sequencing and complementing intensity of her intricate sound design – that gives "The Hurt Locker" its quickening pulse.</span><br /><span style="line-height: 17px;" class="style_6"></span><br /><span style="line-height: 17px;" class="style_6">Anthony Mackie (who stole the show in 2006's otherwise overrated "Half Nelson") and Brian Geraghty play soldiers in a three-man unit tasked with disarming bombs daily under increasingly hostile and dangerous circumstances (one of the film's most searing visuals: a soldier tugging the cord on one bomb and unearthing about a dozen more, forming a circle around him). Both actors excel in their respective roles as level-headed, methodical Sergeant Sanborn (Mackie) and Specialist Eldridge (Geraghty), the latter so psychologically damaged by his experience in Iraq that he’s resigned to the inevitability of his own death. Three more big actors have brief, somewhat distracting cameos: Guy Pearce as the unit's initial leader; David Morse as a stupidly grinning, broadly mounted jab at American war-hawk generals; and Ralph Fiennes as a British military officer the unit comes across in the middle of the desert. But 'Hurt Locker' is essentially a character study, and its predominant subject is Staff Sergeant William James, a man who seemingly derives pleasure and thrills from his unfathomably dangerous job. </span><br /><span style="line-height: 17px;" class="style_6"></span><br /><span style="line-height: 17px;" class="style_6">Rising star Jeremy Renner plays James, delivering his most potent performance in a career that's built up momentum over the past decade, with the actor standing out in popcorn fare ("28 Weeks Later"), more dramatic roles (Michael Cuesta's "12 and Holding") and sharing the screen with the likes of Brad Pitt, Casey Affleck and Sam Rockwell as the tragic renegade in 2007's sprawling revisionist-western, "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford." But in 'Hurt Locker,' Renner delivers his most mature performance to date, wringing psychological complexity and emotional depth out of a role that could have been just another riff on rebel-without-a-cause contrarianism, and one that hinges on our understanding his particular mindset. Likewise, Mark Boal's sharp screenplay lets Renner act rangy and impatient, even mean and unfeeling, but gives us a glimpse of his private, more reflective side, establishing a believable inner conflict without being obvious or forced. </span><br /><span style="line-height: 17px;" class="style_6"></span><br /><span style="line-height: 17px;" class="style_6">An unspoken parallel here would be with Sam Fuller's great Korean War picture, 1951's "The Steel Helmet," where a Sergeant James-type loner (Gene Evans, in one of his earliest roles) is softened by the warmth of a South Korean child. In 'Hurt Locker,' it's a young Iraqi boy, selling DVDs and all manner of bootleg entertainment to American soldiers, who's much more self-serving and sly (such are the times), but who enjoys playing soccer with James as the soldier slips him money and gives advice. It's a different kind of bond than that in Fuller's film, but serves as the same gesture: a cultural union formed in the midst of a warring time through mutual appreciation and respect. In fact, Bigelow is a filmmaker who has a lot in common with Fuller, in regard to both her willingness to toe sentimental waters and her ability to side-step manipulative gestures, rarely if ever lessening the impact of her guttural and gritty action films.</span><br /><span style="line-height: 17px;" class="style_6"></span><br /><span style="line-height: 17px;" class="style_6">Considering all that Bigelow gets right with "The Hurt Locker," working within the already tired Iraq War genre and coming out the almost inarguable victor (with competition the likes of Kimberly Pierce's shrill "Stop-Loss" and Irwin Winkler's weepy and pathetic "Home of the Brave," few should contest this), it's easy to overlook the director's few missteps, most taking place in the film's somewhat jumbled third act. 'Hurt Locker' is 106 minutes long, and since the film has no real plot and is mostly made up of episodic bomb-disarmings, the last one or two of these sequences could probably have been scrapped. More noticeable, however, are the two rushed plot tangents the film follows immediately after its incredible climax, both of which relate to irrational and forced decisions made by the brash Sergeant James. But Bigelow quickly rebounds with her fittingly stunning finale, a conclusion which to some may seem too hopeless, but one that feels like the only logical end for the character Bigelow and her team have given us. It's "The Hurt Locker's" defining moment, and one that reveals Bigelow's ambition with this project. In this critic's opinion: mission accomplished.</span></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-78997269813381313792009-06-16T14:59:00.000-07:002009-06-16T15:38:11.311-07:00Music Review: Dirty Projectors [A-]Music / Review<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://blogcritics.org/music/article/music-review-dirty-projectors-bitte-orca/">Dirty Projectors</a> </span>[<span style="font-style: italic;">BlogCritics</span>]<br />Album: <span style="font-style: italic;">Bitte Orca</span><br />Year: 2009<br /><br /><div style="width: 300px;"><object height="110" width="440"><param name="movie" value="http://media.imeem.com/m/SgKrDOPuqf/aus=false/"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><embed src="http://media.imeem.com/m/SgKrDOPuqf/aus=false/" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" height="110" width="440"></embed></object><div style="padding: 1px; background-color: rgb(230, 230, 230);"></div></div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">No release this year better represents a realization of potential than the new album from off-kilter indie collective Dirty Projectors. That Animal Collective record we all know and love could be seen as a similar document in this regard, but whereas the triumph of <span style="font-style: italic;">Merriweather Post Pavilion</span> is that of a band in peak form, exercising their long-established skill, the level of success Dirty Projectors attain on <span style="font-style: italic;">Bitte Orca</span> is of a kind they've never before reached.<br /><br />As chronicled in a series of eccentric albums, the odd EP and one truly confounding reproduction of Black Flag's punk landmark <span style="font-style: italic;">Damaged</span> from memory (2007's <span style="font-style: italic;">Rise Above</span>), lead Projector David Longstreth has proven himself a restless prodigy, delivering inconsistently brilliant collections with just as inconsistent a line-up of musicians under the Dirty Projectors moniker. It's always been apparent that his band, no matter what the incarnation, are a formidable indie-rock collective, but the material they've churned out in the past – wildly eclectic and often maddening compositions coupled with Longstreth's otherworldly falsetto – have made for a musical output much easier to admire than love. Shards of Longstreth's more crystalline art-pop tend to find themselves sandwiched between lesser experiments.<br /><br />Take, for example, the meandering crashings of "Room 13" and the halfhearted sketch of "Untitled" surrounding perhaps the band's best track, "Rise Above," on the album of the same name. Or the David Byrne-aided "Knotty Pine" nearly drowned out by the mediocrity pervading the <span style="font-style: italic;">Dark Was the Night</span> compilation it's a part of. Not so with <span style="font-style: italic;">Bitte Orca</span> though, a collection of nine songs, each just about as good as anything the band's ever done.<br /><br />This isn't just a great album, it's some kind of lightning-in-a-bottle miracle; Longstreth has managed to channel his tendency toward going-nowhere diversions into one song: "The Bride," the only weakness in this whole set which, in reality, is about as compelling as all the other doodles Longstreth has given us (which is to say it's no disaster). Complaints about this album end there, as no other major missteps occur in the 41 minute length between the electric guitar chime of opener "Cannibal Resource" and the fading synths which close percussive stunner "Fluorescent Half-Dome." That's not to say Longstreth and company have abandoned their more artistic impulses for catchy, streamlined pop; it's just that the more jarring moments on <span style="font-style: italic;">Bitte Orca</span> always feel cohesive and never threaten the progression of the songs.<br /><br />Consider the R&B-influenced "Stillness is the Move," which wouldn't be half as compelling and daring without the clipped guitar chords that give it an Afro-pop flavor (surely one of Longstreth's favorite musical stylings). It's one of two songs which make up the middle section of <span style="font-style: italic;">Bitte Orca</span>, both sung by Dirty Projectors' dual female members.<br /><br />Sighing siren #1, Angel Deradoorian, takes the mic for 'Stillness,' tapping into the same poppy vocal runs that make the best of Mariah Carey and Beyonce's output so winning. The track chimes nervously and clangs loudly until the appropriately angelic bridge hits: Angel's layered vocal is given front-and-center treatment backed only by a subtle bass pulse; each of the other elements of the track reenter the mix one by one, plus a swelling string section well-complementing Angel's high-pitched tenure, and the whole thing ascends into the heavens – and to the top of the list of 2009's best singles.<br /><br />Amber Coffman, her voice of an earthier and huskier quality than Angel's, croons over the other feminine track of the set, "Two Doves," her voice gliding atop quivering orchestrations and Longstreth's intricately composed acoustic picking. "Kiss me with your mouth open," Amber insists, and at first the song seems like a love ballad, until the singer starts dropping words like "killer," and the real shocker: "Our bed is like a failure." The song ends with Amber pleading "call on me," her voice cracked and broken and her plea left unanswered. It's the album's most devastating emotional blow, and not without competition.<br /><br />Longstreth-led pieces are just as impressive, if not more so. Like his talents as a composer, his skills as a guitar virtuoso need not be proven further, but Longstreth doesn't seem to be listening; he cooks up more than a few devilishly catchy and technically mind-boggling rhythms here, on "Temecula Sunrise" and on the album's most dazzling stand-alone piece, "Useful Chamber." Six and a half minutes of tempo shifts, surprise bridges, a fashionably late chorus and Yes levels of prog-rock cacophony make up "Useful Chamber," which has to be seen as the most successful meshing of Longstreth's restless desire to experiment and, um, listenability. The revelatory moments come fast and furious, but how about the sudden assault of layered electric guitars or the yelping of the album's title – didn't see either coming.<br /><br />It's almost unfair to point out this stuff, since a great deal of this album's allure is in discovering the unexpected directions it takes. This quality firmly aligns <span style="font-style: italic;">Bitte Orca</span> with another of this decade's defining art-rock statements, 2004's mammoth Fiery Furnaces album <span style="font-style: italic;">Blueberry Boat</span>. Both pride themselves on unpredictability, and making the listener an active participant with the music rather than a passive one.<br /><br />In this sense, the comparatively predictable progression of the album's last three tracks ("No Intention," "Remade Horizon" and "Fluorescent Half-Dome") could be seen as a flaw. But "No Intention," a decidedly more relaxed Longstreth tune, also ranks as one of the artist's more soulful vocal performances, his "Two Doves" moment of emotional rawness. And check that wacky bridge; dueling guitars fight for supremacy, complemented by Amber and Angel's alternating "woos" and "oos." It's followed by "Remade Horizon," probably the album's most cryptic moment lyrically, but no less inventive and engaging musically, further elevated by the playful vocal interplay between all three principles. And finally, "Fluorescent Half-Dome," the most spare track here and an appropriately subdued closer which relies heavily on propulsive, meticulous percussion, a recurring theme of this album exemplified more here than at any other time on <span style="font-style: italic;">Bitte Orca</span>.<br /><br />In performance, the giraffe-necked Longstreth is a twitchy mess of tics, refusing to sit still; in interviews, he's even worse. In the studio, we can only imagine. It remains to be seen if Longstreth has actually gotten his shit together or if this is indeed a fleeting moment of brilliance to be followed by the same uneven work we've come to expect from the artist. But really, it doesn't matter; we'll always have <span style="font-style: italic;">Bitte Orca</span>, Dave, and for that I'm sure we can tolerate whatever bonkers thing you choose to do next – The Beatles' <span style="font-style: italic;">White Album</span> played backwards, perhaps?</div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-61191585807366886122009-06-16T00:26:00.000-07:002009-06-16T14:54:14.361-07:00Film Review: The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 [C]<div style="text-align: justify;">Film / Review<br /><br /><a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_CURRENT/Entries/2009/6/16_The_Taking_of_Pelham_1_2_3_%282009%29_Directed_by_Tony_Scott.html"><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3</span></a> <span style="font-weight: bold;"></span>[<span style="font-style: italic;">InRO</span>]<br />Director: Tony Scott<br />Year: 2009<br /><br /><object height="269" width="450"><param name="movie" value="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/9953"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"><embed src="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/9953" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" height="269" width="450"></embed></object><br /><br />Despite my general indifference toward Tony Scott's taut, but largely uninspired remake of the 1974 thriller “The Taking of Pelham One Two Three,” I'll be one of the first to stand up and defend the director, and to champion some of his most critically reviled offerings. In fact, I'll anger the naysayers one better: Tony Scott is an artist who brings more verve, originality and overall quality to his medium than his overrated older brother, Ridley. The younger Scott has been continually criticized for his hectic visual aesthetic; speed manipulations, whip-quick editing and breathless camera hurtling are his bread-and butter. But his films are among the few pumped out by the Hollywood machine that earn and are even strengthened by their hyperactive pacing and stylistic choices. A consummate auteur, Scott is nearly always in control of his own special-FX maelstroms. See 2005's “Domino,” a flawed and convoluted, densely plotted actioner-on-steroids that succeeds by the sheer force of stylistic fervor it musters; it's fueled by a myriad of aesthetic modulations and a striking use of color that directly correlates to the emotions of its characters. And take 2006’s “Deja Vu” (a film I myself underestimated when reviewing it on its release), which relies on ghostly sci-fi visualizations to fuel its emotional conflict in ways that far best brother Ridley's own psychological sci-fi favorite “Blade Runner.”<br /><br />“Deja Vu” is a particularly relevant point of reference when discussing Scott's latest, which alters the original's title slightly; now “The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3.” Both are elevated by the considerable talents of Denzel Washinton in their respective leading roles, an actor who possesses stoic humility and quiet strength that well-compliment the modest means of Scott's storytelling and classically drawn characters. And, like “Deja Vu,” ‘Pelham’ revels in technological advancements with a focus on surveillance – a theme that pervaded both the former, essentially an exercise in voyeurism, and “Domino” in its Reality TV show commentaries – that informs the aesthetic choices Scott makes. Take, for example, the claustrophobic and humiliating nature of its central character's desk job, emphasized via a massive glowing billboard symbolic of looming responsibility. It's an intentional aesthetic choice that many will write off as mere flashy distraction.<br /><br />Washington plays the soft-spoken Walter Garber, an NYC subway dispatcher who becomes inescapably entangled with a bombastic hijacker calling himself Ryder (John Travolta, tattooed on the neck with eyes and veins abulge), tasked with negotiating a hostage situation. The set-up again speaks to “Deja Vu,” where Washington's detective developed a relationship with the object of his investigation through a futuristic screen, allowing him to peer into her past life. The communication between Ryder and Garber is also limited, this time by the auditory connection between the subway's radio and the dispatcher's microphone. It's a noteworthy emphasis on the distorting or even damning effects of communication through technology. The near entirety of ‘Pelham’ keeps this focus: the film is largely comprised of the ongoing dialogues between its two principals, their faces shot in intense close-ups (an annoying visual motif Scott would do well to ditch). Through their conversations, we learn that Garber was once an MTA big shot who was demoted after accepting a bribe. Even though Washington doesn't leave his cubicle for at least two thirds of the film, he ably conveys Garber's internal struggle as he wrestles with moral responsibilities. And each time his character plaintively insists, "I'm just a guy," his every-man statement could be read as thesis for the film's dramatic pulse.<br /><br />In addition to criticisms over his stylistic choices, Scott is also often accused of "cliched" depictions of modest characters undertaking heroic acts for the sake of their own atonement. However, it's evident in Scott's filmography that there is a very spiritual undercurrent to his work. In this sense, “The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3” can be seen as the conclusion of a trilogy that began with 2004's “Man on Fire” and continued with “Deja Vu.” In each film, Washington takes on the role of Scott's morally conflicted characters, haunted by prior sins or transgressions, and in need of redemption. There's a very Christian ideology present: the need to redeem the spirit through selfless, righteous action. ‘Pelham’ takes its religious convictions one step further than the prior two films; where Washington struggled against largely faceless evils before, here Scott introduces a struggle of faith between both his two principles. (This is evident in Ryder's observation that his cramped, commandeered subway car "reminds me of a confessional.") Unfortunately, this provocative thematic implication never really ignites or goes anywhere; instead, we're left with Travolta's frustratingly one-dimensional and shrill "villain." Ryder is a cartoon, he practices a dubious code of conduct and lectures about stock trades and corporate corruption – relevant economic commentaries only name-checked here.<br /><br />Further perplexing is Scott's comparatively staid visual style in this film, at least in regard to all that takes place between its amped-up opening credits (a characteristically bonkers assault of aesthetic tweakery) and a last act so frenetically assembled that it's difficult to determine what exactly is going on (not unlike many other Scott productions). The majority of ‘Pelham’ though is not driven by special-FX at all; instead, Scott favors a succession of talking heads deliberating over the various conflicts of this procedural's plot. Tension is maintained throughout (a byproduct of those claustrophobic close-ups mentioned earlier), but it's tough not to compare ‘Pelham’ to Spike Lee's hostage-negotiate-er “Inside Man,” which bests Scott's film both stylistically and in the inventiveness of its plotting. But the most egregious of missteps here manifest in noticeably forced action scenes – on the way to deliver the requested sum of 10 million dollars to Ryder, there are not one, not two, but three police car crashes. And in a dubious approach to violence, as Scott undercuts his own morally-conscious ideals. (One scene of ludicrous brutality witnesses two of Ryder's cronies being shot to pieces in super slow-motion.) Again though, this is the norm in a Tony Scott movie: over-the-top displays of action making for sometimes uncomfortable bedfellows with earnest sociopolitical commentaries (a formula paramount to this filmmaker since at least 1998's “Enemy of the State”).<br /><br />Under less scrutiny, “The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3” succeeds as a tense thriller, ratcheting up suspense and keeping the stakes high as it barrels toward its appropriate finale, and is further admirable for placing emphasis on the struggle of its every-man protagonist over the clipped rhythms of its plot (a headache-inducing complexity which, if one really considers Ryder's motivations, is pretty silly). It's a well-made film mostly of a consistent and agreeable style, and it rarely suffers from pacing problems. But it's derivative (it is a remake after all) and lacks the jolt of energy and enthusiasm that invigorates Scott's best films (1993's “True Romance,” as well as the aforementioned Washington-Scott collabs “Deja Vu” and “Man on Fire”). But those who dislike Tony Scott's prior films may find his latest more digestible; it is, after all, the least characteristic film from this divisive auteur in quite some time.<br /></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-44582558357188123922009-06-03T10:00:00.000-07:002009-06-16T14:55:10.788-07:00Cannes Reviews: "Antichrist" [B] & "Mother" [B+]<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:verdana;"><br />Film / Review</span><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:verdana;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:verdana;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><a href="http://theplaylist.blogspot.com/2009/05/cannes-09-review-lars-von-triers.html"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;">Antichrist</span></a> [<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">The Playlist</span>]</span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:verdana;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;">Director: Lars Von Trier</span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:verdana;">Year: 2009<br /><br /><object height="281" width="450"><param name="movie" value="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/10531"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"><embed src="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/10531" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" height="281" width="450"></embed></object><br /><br />"Antichrist" is an exorcism of the foulness and unmitigated hatred stewing inside notorious provocateur Lars von Trier. It's production follows a crippling depression which stifled the Danish master's output for two years, following completion of what could be described as the filmmaker's only conventional film, 2006's office comedy "The Boss of it All." This new work finds von Trier coming out the other side of the woods and leading us in: "Antichrist" is set in the heart of a forested landscape known ironically as "Eden."<br /><br />The film's proverbial Adam and Eve (the cast lists them as "He" and "She") are played by the willowy Charlotte Gainsbourg and previous von Trier collaborator (in 2005's "Manderlay") Willem Dafoe. The couple recently lost their only son (a tragedy depicted as the couple has unbridled sex in the film's heavily-stylized black and white prologue, arguably the most accomplished passage of film this director has ever produced), and the wife has been stricken with inconsolable grief. Her husband (who is also a therapist that arrogantly decides to treat her) attempts to console and rehabilitate his spouse, repelling her sexual advances and embracing her firmly each time she awakes from vivid nightmares. But after the Doc's usual tricks prove largely ineffective ("make a list of what scares you" and "exhale on the count of five," he instructs) it's decided that he must pursue a more severe approach and face her terrors head-on. He leads his wilting wife into a cabin in the woods - into the forest of Eden, the place she fears more than any other. <br /><br />Unsurprisingly, what the couple find in their foliage-ensconced retreat is nothing less than hell on Earth; a fiercely primal series of brutal acts which She inflicts upon Him in some kind of possessed fury and misguided vengeance. Lars isn't fooling around: within the first five minutes, brief penetration is shown on screen (goodbye R-rating), and later on, one character is forced to ejaculate blood and another takes a pair of sheers to their genitals (hello NC-17). All this ultra-violence is given some context through Gainsbourg's pained whisper of a warning: "Nature is Satan's church." <br /><br />Sentiments like these are more than appropriate considering that von Trier has dedicated "Antichrist" to Russian master Andrei Tarkovsky (a dude who seems really popular all of a sudden) whose films were always heavily influenced by their natural environments. Acts of carnality and physical abuse are suggested to be provoked by the influence of Eden's foreboding landscape, which complements the film's primal urgency (especially in regard to the un-sexy and desperate sexual encounters, of which there are many). It's frustrating then that von Trier introduces a more academic motive for the wife's horrific behaviors: we learn that she was working on her Masters Thesis regarding the mistreatment of 18th century woman, suggesting that all this mayhem is the result of some kind of demonic possession (and or just some good ol' misogynistic statement on his part). <br /><br />And then there's 'the three beggars,' a trio of recurring woodland creatures (a deer, a fox and a crow) who pop up in horrific succession during the film. Their implication here is riotous: a fox actually talks at one point (the only point, "Chaos reigns!" he groans, covered in blood from eating himself alive) which understandably was met with hysterical laughter at the premiere screening (and all others for that matter). This is a consistent failing of "Antichrist": the more serious and provocative moments are too ridiculous to be taken as such, and thus often come off as comical, and we have to assume that's not what von Trier was aiming for (though who knows with this guy). <br /><br />Yet however dubious the usually on-point von Trier's symbolic implications may be in this equally dubious return to the horror genre (isn't he past this phase of his career?), his craft is still undeniably accomplished. Both the opening and closing sequences of "Antichrist" have an elevating quality to them that could easily excuse whatever comes between, but von Trier further stuns with his impressionistic therapy sessions, which find the husband instructing the wife to visit the forest in her mind and let it absorb her body-- a sort of catharsis before the storm. <br /><br />When the tempest of brutal, unrelenting violence does hit (like a brick to the dick-- no, literally) von Trier's depiction is just as arresting as it is in his more leisurely sequences. It's a nasty bit of business for sure, frankly depicted without an ounce of irony, and sure to be the cause of many a sleepless nights and heated debates between cinephiles and casual moviegoers alike (that is, if people are actually given a chance to see this thing; I can't imagine "Antichrist" scoring much of a domestic release, what with its likelihood of making the straight-laced MPAA lose their shit). <br /><br />We've been known to bemoan the popularity of the torture-porn genre fervently, so we would feel hypocritical endorsing "Antichrist" and excusing it of similar transgressions. However, the fact is, this is moving cinema; whether you're moved to love it, moved to hate it, or it just churns your stomach with wretched bile, "Antichrist" will undoubtedly inspire a passionate reaction among those who see it. <br /><br />So even if Lars von Trier isn't the "best film director in the world," as he so boldly and, we would assume, tongue-in-cheekily proclaimed in a recent press conference, he's still unquestionably the boss of it all-- a unique artistic force who plays by his own rules and answers to no one. <br /><br />"Antichrist" is, appropriately, an exorcism of hatred and malice from the grimiest bowels of Danish provocateur Lars von Trier, ending a career stifling depression. One question: if this is the aftermath of the director's episode, how fucked up was the real thing?<br /><br /><br />Film / Review<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://theplaylist.blogspot.com/2009/05/cannes-09-bong-joon-hos-mother.html">Mother</a> </span>[<span style="font-style: italic;">The Playlist</span>]<br />Director: Bong Joon-Ho<br />Year: TBA<span style="font-weight: bold;"></span><br /><br /><object height="344" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/9rDeNM-M8p8&hl=en&fs=1"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/9rDeNM-M8p8&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" height="344" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br />Following his crowd-pleasing, box office record-breaking monster movie "The Host," which premiered at Cannes in 2006 as a Midnight Screening, South Korean filmmaker Bong Joon-Ho returns to the genre of his second feature film, the "Zodiac"-esque mystery thriller "Memories of Murder." The director's latest Cannes entry (premiering in Un Certain Regard) is another procedural, this time concerning a widow's attempt to clear the name of her mentally handicapped, 28-year-old son, who is accused of brutally murdering a young woman.<br /><br />All of Bong's films (even the director's loopy rom-com debut, "Barking Dogs Never Bite") are notable for their riotous entertainment and their equally pointed socio-political commentaries, and while "Mother" certainly brings the entertainment (like Bong's other films, it's brisk and breathlessly suspenseful, with twists manifesting at all the right moments to sustain the tension) it doesn't seem to be pushing any broad message or moral. Instead, the picture's primary theme is one of maternal devotion: As the title suggests, this is a film about a mother, one whose role as such takes precedence over anything else. <br /><br />"Mother" sometimes recalls Akira Kurosawa's early noir "Stray Dog," as it surveys a small town rote with secrets and latches on to the desperate, human struggle of its inexperienced detective. Our gumshoe is the titular mother, Hye-ja, played startlingly by middle-aged actress Kim Hye-ja, whose facial contours and wide, sad eyes communicate her character's exasperation. It's a performance that channels the ferocious femmes of Pedro Almodovar's best films with fervent, melodramatic intensity.<br /><br /> Another South Korean genre film at Cannes this year, Park Chan-Wook's noxious vampire thriller "Thirst" (which is infuriatingly in the competition section at this festival), dumps heaps of self-serious exposition in effort to explain the motivations of its protagonist. Bong, too smart and skilled a craftsman to waste a second, opens "Mother" with a surrealist sequence (the first of two bookending passages) which tells us all we need to know about his fickle heroine-- her strength, grace and even her loneliness-- absent the heavy-handed lecturing of Park's film. <br /><br />From here, "Mother" immediately kicks into high gear, leading into a hit-and-run incident which sends characters scurrying about their small, rural town and sows the seeds of a hard-boiled procedural. <br /><br />Do-joon (Korean television star Won Bin), Hye-ja's mentally handicapped son, is hit by a passing Mercedes Benz and convinced by his headstrong friend to take revenge. The two track the automobile to a golf course, where they think they've found the culprits (a group of unsuspecting yuppies), and then proceed to bash their faces in. This understandably earns the attention of the police, and when a later crime is committed (the death of a promiscuous schoolgirl), Do-Joon, who was even seen at the scene of the crime, is convicted and jailed. <br /><br />Convinced of her son's innocence and angered by law enforcement's unsympathetic response to his condition, Hye-ja turns to a pricey lawyer and a friend on the force for help. But when no one seems to give a damn about her and Do-joon, all it takes is some bold advice to make Hye-ja take matters into her own hands: "Don't trust anyone...you go out and find the real killer yourself." Bong's film then quietly segues into the realm of a vigilante picture, akin to Clint Eastwood's "Changeling" (a Cannes official selection last year) but with much more narrative focus and a decidedly sharper characterization of its distressed parent. <br /><br />"Mother" sits well alongside Bong's other films and acts as a sort of compromise between the absurdist fantasy elements of "The Host" and the more plot-driven social-realism of "Memories of Murder." It's not this talented Korean auteur's best film to date, but it does help solidify his status as one of the most gifted directors of his generation (even with only 4 films to his credit). Bong looks to the age-old genre of the film noir for inspiration, but unlike so many filmmakers who obsessively recreate the look and tone of the noir, Bong instead applies his own thoroughly modern aesthetic, but taps in to the same moral gravity which invested Kurosawa's most effective genre films ("Stray Dog," and also one of our favorites of the Japanese master's works, "High and Low"). <br /><br />Bong's "Mother" isn't flawless (it's probably a few scenes too long, with one too many plot twists piling-up towards the end), and its depiction of the mentally handicapped (or, rather, Won Bin's bug-eyed and cartoonish, one note rendering of his imbecilic character) takes away from the resonance of the film's central relationship. Still, as always, Bong's filmmaking skill is totally on point; his sweeping camera movements and evocative colorization complement the overall seething atmosphere of this often Hitchcockian thriller. And one scene, in which a major revelation takes place as a character stumbles backwards out of the frame, punctuated by a goosebump-inducing scream, is actually worthy of the overused Hitchcock comparison. <br /><br />In any case, especially compared to the other films we've seen at Cannes '09 -- again feeling like a weak year so far -- "Mother" probably should have been accepted into the official competition selection.<br /></span></div></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-62619758424358767102009-05-12T02:02:00.000-07:002009-05-12T02:14:38.257-07:00Away Message: Gone to Cannes<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FEATURES/Entries/2009/5/12_Festival_Coverage__The_Festival_de_Cannes_2009_files/shapeimage_2.png"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 377px; height: 156px;" src="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FEATURES/Entries/2009/5/12_Festival_Coverage__The_Festival_de_Cannes_2009_files/shapeimage_2.png" alt="" border="0" /></a><br />Not that I update this old thing a whole hell of a lot anyway, but there will <span style="font-style: italic;">really</span> be no updates over the next couple weeks, as I take to the Cannes Film Festival for the very first time.<br /><br />Should be a blast, so be sure to check out what I'm doing/seeing over on <span style="font-style: italic;">InRO</span>'s <a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FEATURES/Entries/2009/5/12_Festival_Coverage__The_Festival_de_Cannes_2009.html">Cannes Coverage page</a>, where I'll be linking to my coverage for both <a href="http://theplaylist.blogspot.com/">The Playlist</a> and <a href="http://talkcinema.com/">Talk Cinema</a>.<br /><br />When I get back, expect some film reviews of Assayas' "Summer Hours" and of new filmmaker Lee Isaach Chung's superlative debut feature, "Munyurangabo." Both will be in theaters in the next couple weeks, and I'll say this much about them now: see them at the first available opportunity.<br /><br />Until then: go away.Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-7616008359483721582009-05-01T21:34:00.000-07:002009-05-01T21:40:37.424-07:00REVIEW: "Revanche" [3/4]<div><br /></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px; "><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; ">Film / Review</span><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold; "><a href="http://theplaylist.blogspot.com/2009/05/revanche-unconventional-revenge-story.html">Revanche</a></span> [<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic; ">The Playlist</span>]</span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; ">Director: Gotz Spielmann</span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; ">Year: 2009</span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(147, 149, 140); font-family: verdana; font-size: 8px; line-height: normal; white-space: pre-wrap; "><object width="450" height="308"><param name="movie" value="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/10221"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/10221" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" width="450" height="308"></embed></object></span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(147, 149, 140); font-size: 8px; line-height: normal; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(147, 149, 140); font-size: 8px; line-height: normal; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Times; font-size: 16px; white-space: normal; -webkit-text-size-adjust: none; "><div class="paragraph paragraph_style_1" style="overflow-x: visible; overflow-y: visible; color: rgb(88, 77, 77); font-family: ArialMT, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; position: relative; "><span class="style_6" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; line-height: 17px; opacity: 1; ">There's likely to be no better opening sequence in a film this year than that in Austrian director Gotz Spielmann's fifth feature, "Revanche." The quiet calm of a lake reflecting majestic trees on its surface is broken by a sudden splash, as something is thrown into the water from outside the frame. The philosophy of Spielmann's narrative reflects something similar: the slightest action can upset the flow of things. The sequence also expresses the important role nature plays in "Revanche," as the woods and the tranquility of the lake serve as a necessary retreat for Spielmann's morally conflicted characters.<br /></span></div><p class="paragraph_style_6" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><a href="http://i205.photobucket.com/albums/bb52/The_Playlist/more/revanche-austrian-film2.jpg" title="http://i205.photobucket.com/albums/bb52/The_Playlist/more/revanche-austrian-film2.jpg" style="color: rgb(121, 121, 121); text-decoration: underline; "><br /></a></p><p class="paragraph_style_6" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; ">Alex (Johannes Krisch), a brutish ex-con, works at a sleazy Vienna brothel, "The Cinderella," for slick and equally-sleazy owner Konecny (Hanno Poschl). Alex meets in secret with a Ukrainian prostitute from the brothel, Tamara (Irina Potapenko), promising the young immigrant a better life, far away from her scuzzy job and cramped, drab apartment. Meanwhile, Robert (Andreas Lust), a cop in a rural town outside Vienna, lives with his wife, Susanne (Ursula Strauss), in a luxurious house just through the woods from Alex's lonely grandfather, Hausner (Hannes Thanheiser). Predictably, disparate lives intersect when, in the interest of a better future with Tamara, Alex decides to rob a bank. And yet, what would normally be the catalyst for plot progression in a typical genre picture instead becomes the unconventional beginning to a slow-burning character study.<br /></p><p class="paragraph_style_6" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><a href="http://i205.photobucket.com/albums/bb52/The_Playlist/more/revanche-austrian-film.jpg" title="http://i205.photobucket.com/albums/bb52/The_Playlist/more/revanche-austrian-film.jpg" style="color: rgb(88, 77, 77); text-decoration: underline; "><br /></a></p><p class="paragraph_style_6" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; ">Similar to Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck's "The Lives of Others," Spielmann uses voyeurism to explore his characters' tortured psyches: Alex watches Robert and Susanne from a safe vantage point in the woods and, in the throes of his own moral crisis, he observes Robert's visible guilt. But, where von Donnarsmark's Best Foreign Language Oscar-winner progresses with an almost mechanical remove (and often contrivance), "Revanche" (which received a Foreign Language Oscar nomination last year, but did not win), unspools patiently, arriving at a more satisfying emotional climax.<br /></p><p class="paragraph_style_6" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><a href="http://i205.photobucket.com/albums/bb52/The_Playlist/more/revanche-poster-movie.jpg" title="http://i205.photobucket.com/albums/bb52/The_Playlist/more/revanche-poster-movie.jpg" style="color: rgb(88, 77, 77); text-decoration: underline; "><br /></a></p><p class="paragraph_style_6" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; ">Spielmann has been criticized for the role woman play in this film; however, "Revanche" is less about relationships (Robert's to Susanne; Alex's to Tamara) then it is about the shattering of a man's macho resolve. It's clear to everybody but Alex that his plan to rob a bank contradicts his character (his boss at the brothel tells him he's "too soft" for their line of work). Likewise, when Robert's buddies in the police force boast about a violent run-in, he bemoans missing out, yet when a similar conflict presents itself, he only regrets it ever happened.<br /><br />In addition to his thought-provoking thematic concerns, the director also displays an impressive control of his medium. Spielmann frames his characters with wide shots, allowing us to inhabit the same grubby spaces, and using close-ups and obvious camera movement only when necessary, but his masterstroke reveals itself to be his use of location. The cinema of Andrei Tarkovsky is an obvious point of comparison: Spielmann has a knack for capturing nature with the same meditative grace of the Russian director's best work. Tarkovsky found aesthetic sublimity in his "Solaris" through that film's contrasting landscapes-- the warm embrace of nature giving way to the chilly isolation of space-- just as Spielmann accounts for Alex's spiritual rejuvenation through his escape from the confining urban sprawl of Vienna to the calming countryside. It's cause for excitement that there is a filmmaker working today who is this attuned to his environment, and the way in which Spielmann's revenge saga unexpectedly evolves into something more cathartic and meaningful would likely make Tarkovsky proud.</p><p class="paragraph_style_6" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><br /></p></span></span></div></div></span></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-22356976105747511202009-04-24T23:44:00.000-07:002009-04-24T23:47:39.355-07:00REVIEW: "Goobye Solo" [3/4]<div><br /></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px; "><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; ">Film / Review<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><a href="http://theplaylist.blogspot.com/2009/04/goodbye-solo-one-of-years-best-deeply.html">Goodbye Solo</a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; "> [<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic; ">The Playlist</span>]</span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; ">Director: Ramin Bahrani</span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; ">Year: 2009</span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(147, 149, 140); font-size: 8px; line-height: normal; white-space: pre-wrap; "><object width="450" height="285"><param name="movie" value="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/8785"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/8785" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" width="450" height="285"></embed></object></span><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; font-size: 8px; line-height: normal; white-space: pre-wrap; "><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(147, 149, 140); font-family: verdana; font-size: 8px; line-height: normal; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Times; font-size: 16px; white-space: normal; -webkit-text-size-adjust: none; "><div class="paragraph paragraph_style_1" style="overflow-x: visible; overflow-y: visible; font-family: ArialMT, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; position: relative; "><span class="style_6" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; line-height: 17px; opacity: 1; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Ramin Bahrani's first two films, 2006's "Man Push Cart" and 2008's "Chop Shop," wear the Iranian-American director's neorealist influences proudly, and their release marked the arrival of a significant talent. However, those films' tendency to shy away from any real form of tension or narrative momentum can seem forced, and the filmmaking skill on display isn't quite enough to elevate either above the designation of a modest achievement. Thankfully, "Goodbye Solo" steps up his craft, his storytelling ability and his characterizations, without compromising his dedication to realistic cinema, so rare to American independent filmmaking.<br /></span></span></div><p class="paragraph_style_6" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_6" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Bahrani's last film, "Chop Shop," is clearly indebted to classics such as Vittorio de Sica's "Bicycle Thieves" and Francois Truffaut's "The 400 Blows." In it, an impoverished young boy and his sister struggle to carve out a decent life for themselves amidst the garbage and rubble of a ghetto just outside Queens, New York. "Goodbye Solo," in contrast, is a film of prevailing and pervading hope, which finds its inspiration from a work of Bahrani's own heritage. Its basic plot is lifted from native Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami's "Taste of Cherry," but 'Solo' is considerably more engaging, favoring depiction of a strong and inspiring human connection between two unlikely friends, as opposed to the lonely wanderer at the heart of Kiarostami's film. Both are essentially about a man who seeks to end his life, but where Kiarostami found the grim subject matter to be a jumping off point for stoic meditation, Bahrani sees it as a catalyst for hope and renewal. It's that quality which makes 'Solo' both Bahrani's most compelling work, and his most optimistic.<br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_6" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_6" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">The opening sequence here is jarring in its immediacy: We feel as if we've been dropped right into the middle of something that started before we got there. A garrulous Senegalese cabbie attempts to chip away at the frigid resolve encasing his grizzled patron. The affable cab driver is Solo, played by newcomer Souleymane Sy Savane (in one of this year's most striking debuts), and his passenger is William, a curmudgeon who has no interest in chit-chat. Vaguely recognizable character actor Red West inhabits the latter role, with a no bullshit attitude that's appropriate, considering West was once a member of Elvis Presley's "Memphis Mafia." William, who has no use for any kind of friendship, offers Solo a hefty sum of cash to drive him far outside the city limits, and his driver's reluctance to do so frustrates him.<br /><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_6" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Our introduction to Solo and William is their introduction to each other, and the unexpected relationship that develops between them sparks the kind of emotional connection that few films achieve. Much of that investment is owed to the actors, whose interactions have the sort of awkward chemistry that often occurs between two very different individuals. It's Savane who we're attracted to the most, but West ably tempers his screen partner's exuberance, and their presence as a duo ignites our interest in ways Kiarostami's solitary character study doesn't. Admittedly, Bahrani is not the visual artist the Iranian director is, and gritty photography of Winston-Salem, North Carolina doesn't approach the majesty of Kiarostami's poetic, sand-blasted terrains. Bahrani's cinematographer (Michael Simmonds) finds lush beauty in an early morning sunrise and texture in shots of Solo's nighttime cruises in his battered cab, yet the film's major visual coup arrives during its coda: a rapturous communion with nature that has a quiet intensity and lyrical quality on par with anything Kiarostami's done, and that seems earned in a film of straight-forward, character-based dialogues.<br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_6" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_6" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">At a lean 91 minutes, the pacing of Bahrani's film is refreshingly disciplined: We're given enough insight into Solo's life at home with his pregnant wife and stepdaughter, without the film ever feeling aimless or stalling, as "Chop Shop" occasionally did. Solo "adopts" William and, once he learns of his suicide plans, he tirelessly attempts to invigorate the old man's life. Solo's intentions may be honorable and even noble, but his forwardness occasionally borders on obnoxious, and his meddling threatens to be destructive. His desire to help William stems not from a saintly perspective, but from that of someone who desperately wants a down-to-earth friend. His subtle, but noticeable confusion when he thinks he's not getting back from the relationship what he's putting in can only be described as human.<br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_6" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_6" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Pivotal moments such as the reading of a discovered diary, the opening of a letter and, most significantly, a wordless gaze between two men, are presented without intrusive musical accompaniment or any type of embellishment. Bahrani trusts the strength of his material and the tensions it naturally creates. So, in a sense, "Goodbye Solo" is every bit the stripped down and fluid narrative film as Bahrani's other two works, but this one has a propulsive momentum and purpose that the others lack. Bahrani may have always wanted to make films with a commitment to capturing real life, but "Goodbye Solo" feels like the first film of the director's career that, by its minimalist aesthetic, is emboldened rather than stifled.</span></p><p class="paragraph_style_6" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><br /></p></span></span></div></span></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-74227669054602481312009-04-24T23:36:00.000-07:002009-04-24T23:43:56.349-07:00REVIEW: "Observe and Report" [3/4]<div><br /></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px; "><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; ">Film / Review<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_CURRENT/Entries/2009/4/21_Observe_and_Report_%282009%29_Directed_by_Jody_Hill.html">Observe and Report</a></span> [<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">InRO</span>]</span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; ">Director: Jody Hill</span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; ">Year: 2009</span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(147, 149, 140); font-family: verdana; font-size: 8px; line-height: normal; white-space: pre-wrap; "><object width="450" height="255"><param name="movie" value="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/8697"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/8697" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" width="450" height="255"></embed></object></span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(147, 149, 140); font-family: verdana; font-size: 8px; line-height: normal; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Times; font-size: 16px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-size-adjust: none; "><div class="paragraph paragraph_style_1" style="overflow-x: visible; overflow-y: visible; font-family: ArialMT, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; position: relative; "><span class="style_6" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; line-height: 17px; opacity: 1; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">The Band's cover of Bob Dylan's "When I Paint My Masterpiece" plays during the opening sequence of Jody Hill's new black comedy, "Observe and Report," set to panning photography of a suburban mall intercut with close-up profile shots of Seth Rogen's dedicated mall cop, Ronnie Barnhardt. As in the classic opening sequence of Martin Scorsese's "Taxi Driver," the visual aesthetic establishes Ronnie's territorial attitude toward his mundane job. But the song is important too: the first of many 70s-era classic rock jams that play throughout Hill's twisted character study, often set to heroic and imagined montages of Ronnie's ironically unlawful actions. It's Hill's genuine affection and even sympathy for this mentally-unstable misfit that gives "Observe and Report" a gravity few films of its kind can muster. Every scene escalates to inevitable confrontation, and it’s Hill's ability to make us care for his nutcase that transcends the film's vulgarity and violence.<br /></span></span></div><p class="paragraph_style_6" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Ronnie lives at home with his alcoholic mother; his father left around the time he was born, unable to cope with his son's "special needs." He's the head of security at a local mall, and it's a position he understandably takes very seriously. Aside from routinely courting make-up counter bimbo Brandi (Anna Faris), there's little to distract Ronnie from his duties, and when reports surface of a serial flasher, he resolves to</span><span class="style_7" style="font-family: Verdana-Italic, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: italic; font-weight: 400; line-height: 17px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">catch the offender. Real Detective Harrison (Ray Liotta) is officially assigned to the case, but does little to deter Ronnie's efforts, and when Brandi is "targeted" by the flasher, Ronnie's obsession with nailing him is only emboldened. With assistance from right-hand-man Dennis (a hilarious, lisping Michael Pena), a couple of "expendable" Asian twins, and a rookie security guard, Ronnie assembles a "task force" to take down his pervert. Along the way, Hill's Apatowian man-child unsuccessfully attempts to become a real cop, learns the truth about a close friend, and finds out his crush is cheating on him. But because we get the sense that Ronnie has never experienced any such disappointments before, these unremarkable realizations play out in a way that seems abnormally weighty. Ronnie tries to be be better than what he is, better than what he's been content being, and inadvertently unveils the farce of his own delusions of grandeur.<br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">This director means to provoke, as evidenced in sequences of brutal violence, blatant racism and drunken-induced date rape-- all acts committed by Ronnie. In "Taxi Driver," Scorsese's Travis Bickle is the product of the Vietnam War, a ticking bomb of violent urges and disgusted hate. In contrast, Hill's Ronnie is in some ways the product of movies like "Taxi Driver" and Quentin Tarantino's "Reservoir Dogs," and the director swipes the latter film's slow-motion, bad-ass posturing, approximating it here, but with new meaning: this is how Ronnie sees himself and his cohorts, and Hill wisely allows no other characters such visual accompaniment. This makes many of the seemingly flamboyant aesthetic choices, such as use of the montage, more appropriate, as Hill envisions them as character devices rather than stylistics. <br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Rogen, who's mere existence in a film as of late has suggested banality, with seemingly endless comedic roles for the Judd Apatow machine that can only kindly be described as slight variations on the same character, here proves he's up to the challenge of doing something more with himself. Seemingly asked to play a modern day Bickle-- or, more accurately, one who believes himself to be a tough guy but clearly lacks the physicality and know-how-- Rogen delivers a believable intensity, deviating from the likable stoner of films like "Pineapple Express" and "Knocked Up," but harnessing enough of his schlubby persona to suit his character in "Observe and Report." The actor's chummy grins are present, but they mean more here, often masking insecurity or anger, and when Rogen needs to buckle down and get serious, as when Ronnie's house-of-cards emotional state calls for release, the actor's explosive outbursts possess enough shock value to keep them from feeling gimmicky. (This isn't "Happy Gilmore," "Billy Madison," or any other Adam Sandler tantrum comedy, after all.) And, since Hill's film is something of a character study, it's to Rogen's great credit that we almost entirely buy into Ronnie's mental state: He's bi-polar, racist, misogynist, violent, and a mama's boy. As such, Ronnie believes what his mother tells him, that he's a "great man," and if Hill doesn't buy it (the director is smart enough not to excuse his character's bad behavior), he at least makes us understand that Ronnie acts with his id, and because he thinks what he's doing is right.<br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">This all sounds pretty heavy, I'm sure, but another strength of Hill's film is its comedy. The effectiveness of "Observe and Report" as anything more than mere amusement is surely debatable, but anyone who can appreciate the inherent comedy of embarrassing behavior should find this film appropriately uproarious, on par for laughs with the myriad of titles Apatow has written, co-written, directed or produced over the past few years. Unlike that comedy icon's increasingly tiresome creations, however, Hill's screenplay gives minor characters (Faris' Brandi, Liotta's Harrison) enough screen time to make an impression without reducing them to side-show attractions that hang around the periphery of the frame cracking jokes-- think all the extraneous, cameo-like appearances in last year's "Forgetting Sarah Marshall." And clocking in at a palatable 86 minutes, "Observe and Report" is free of the many pacing problems that have hampered the success of so many comedies as of late-- allow me to remind that the critically beloved "Knocked Up" is a patience-testing two hours and 13 minutes. <br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Not everything in "Observe and Report" completely works, and there's one sequence, wherein Ronnie and Pena's Dennis partake in excessive drug use, seemingly contradicting Ronnie's steadfast dedication to upholding the law-- emphasized just one scene later, when the character takes great offense to acts of thievery-- that registers as a misstep. But of all the many American comedies released in the past few years, this one strikes me as one of the best, ranking with last year's Michel Gondry film, "Be Kind Rewind," for consistency and ambition. Both have received little critical acclaim and seem destined to be misunderstood, for whatever reason, but I'll take their genre-elevating visions of comedy over most any Apatow flick (as good as those sometimes are). There’s hardly an offensive moment in “Observe and Report” that isn’t earned and, save the aforementioned plot diversion and a head-scratchingly bland title, the film has few noticeable flaws. Virtually every mistake it does make can be overlooked considering that Jody Hill is clearly aspiring to do something special with his second film (a marked improvement over his first, "The Foot Fist Way"). As the opening sequence slyly posits, Hill may be just trying to paint his masterpiece. For a comedy, such ambition is more than praise-worthy. </span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><br /></p></span></div></span></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-78139228063141650232009-04-03T20:50:00.000-07:002009-04-03T20:51:53.175-07:00My Favorite Film of '09 Thus Far: "Summer Hours"<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(147, 149, 140); font-family: verdana; font-size: 8px; white-space: pre-wrap; "><object width="450" height="298"><param name="movie" value="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/10014"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/10014" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" width="450" height="298"></embed></object></span>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-43138341799700039992009-03-31T23:32:00.000-07:002009-03-31T23:48:22.394-07:00Two Indies: 'Sunshine' and "Gigantic"<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times; "><div style="border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-color: initial; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 3px; padding-right: 3px; padding-bottom: 3px; padding-left: 3px; width: auto; font: normal normal normal 100%/normal Georgia, serif; text-align: left; "><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times; "><div style="border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-color: initial; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 3px; padding-right: 3px; padding-bottom: 3px; padding-left: 3px; width: auto; font: normal normal normal 100%/normal Georgia, serif; text-align: left; "><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Times;"><div style="border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-color: initial; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 3px; padding-right: 3px; padding-bottom: 3px; padding-left: 3px; width: auto; font: normal normal normal 100%/normal Georgia, serif; text-align: left; "><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Film / Review<br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Film: </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold; "><a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_CURRENT/Entries/2009/3/31_Gigantic_%282009%29_Directed_by_Matt_Aselton.html"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Gigantic</span></span></a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Director: Matt Aselton<br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Year: 2009</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; font-size: 8px; white-space: pre-wrap; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><object width="450" height="252"><param name="movie" value="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/8812"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/8812" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" width="450" height="252"></embed></object></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: none; font-family:Times;"><div class="paragraph paragraph_style_1" face="ArialMT, Arial, sans-serif" size="15px" style="overflow-x: visible; overflow-y: visible; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; position: relative; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 48px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times; font-size: 16px; line-height: normal; "><div class="paragraph paragraph_style_1" style="overflow-x: visible; overflow-y: visible; font-family: ArialMT, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; position: relative; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 11px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></span></div><div class="paragraph paragraph_style_1" style="overflow-x: visible; overflow-y: visible; font-family: ArialMT, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; position: relative; "><span class="style_5" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; line-height: 17px; opacity: 1; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Many of cinema's most divisive filmmakers are accused of betraying the story they're trying to tell by utilizing various stylistic affectations. Of course, this is true of all forms of art; those who choose to break away from established formula are often ridiculed for doing so. Wes Anderson, whose work includes "Rushmore" and "The Royal Tenenbaums," has suffered much scrutiny for eschewing traditional behaviors and establishing a wholly unique film grammar. His intellectually verbose and stoical comedies are beloved by many and reviled in equal measure. Perhaps what infuriates his detractors even more than Anderson's own work is the work of others that he inspires. A torrent of films over the past decade have been labeled, sometimes hastily, often appropriately, as 'Anderson knock-offs.' However, this director is only one of the influential figures in this 'quirky new wave' movement. Before Anderson, Hal Ashby was churning out similarly deadpan comedies such as "Harold And Maude" and Terry Zwigoff's "Ghost World" has certainly influenced this decade since its release back in 2000, resulting in films such as "Little Miss Sunshine" and "Juno." Both were Best Picture nominees thanks in no small part to their quirky characters and thesaurus-ready dialogue, tactics that are beginning to suffer the effects of over-exposure.<br /></span></span></div><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">There's something different about Matt Aselton's left-of-center romancer, "Gigantic." Here's a film that had its premiere at the prestigious Toronto Film Festival, as opposed to the usual spawning ground of the "little-movie-that-could"-- Sundance. And, in a sense, I can see why: Aselton's debut may look like an indie comedy, it may sound like your typical 'Anderson knock-off' in its half-mumbled, deadpan delivery, but there's a tonality at work here that feels unfamiliar to me and, dare I say, fresh? For one, "Gigantic" could only be cursorily described as 'funny'; the laughs are sparse, and usually followed by uncomfortable silences or, on occasion, jarring acts of violence. The hallmarks of a typical, quirky comedy are mostly in place: lots of oddball characters; requisite witty dialogue; and an awkward, young-love relationship at the center which also serves as the film's chief redeeming quality.<br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Aselton's film is set in New York City, and stars Paul Dano-- who also Executive Produced "Gigantic"-- as 28 year-old mattress salesman Brian Weathersby, who aspires to one day adopt a baby from China, a dream he's had since he was eight years old. Brian's a very introverted character-- his demeanor is the exact opposite of the fire-and-brimstone preacher Dano played in "There Will Be Blood," and yet more personable than Dano's Nietzsche-loving mute from "Little Miss Sunshine." This is an actor who has proved a willingness to embrace eccentric, moody roles, dating back to his superlative work as a young boy in Michael Cuesta's "L.I.E.," and in Michael Hoffman's "The Emperor's Club." Brian at first appears to be the most even-tempered character Dano has ever given us, but there are undercurrents here that hint at discontentedness. <br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Playing opposite Dano, and as the love interest of the film, Zooey Deschanel seemingly represents the antithesis to her co-star's sad-sack outlook. Her character, Harriet 'Happy' Lolly, is introduced as free-spirited, forward, and impulsive, but her given name is actually more ironic than appropriate, as there are undercurrents here as well. Still, it's unsurprising-- and probably heavy-handed-- that Happy's effect on Brian's life is an eye-opening one, introducing him to a world of indulgent human pleasures. <br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">The catalyst of this romantic meeting is the sale of an expensive Swedish mattress, procured by Happy's robust and blustery father, Al Lolly (John Goodman), from Brian's workplace. Al sends his spacey daughter to pay for the mattress, and thus she and Brian meet, immediately forming a bond when Brian allows Happy to nap in the store for awhile, tenderly covering her with a blanket. The scene is quirky without being too cutesy, which is commendable for this genre. Their romance evolves from here, as Deschanel treads territory similar to that of her work in David Gordon Green's romantic indie, "All the Real Girls." (Though I'm sure I'm not alone when I classify Happy's coyly spoken "Would you like to have sex with me?" as being more idealistic than realistic.) In any event, it's the chemistry- no, the relatable awkwardness of this relationship that becomes the film's saving grace, and affords "Gigantic" pardon for traversing familiar territory, especially when the inevitable 'conflict' arrises and predictably tears the couple apart.<br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Also interesting, though far less effective (and admittedly more curious than successful), are the many subplots that broaden the narrative scope of Aselton's very strange film. Goodman could play sarcastic, bourgeois Al Lolly in his sleep, but a running gag concerning the character's back problems-- and a particularly riotous exchange between he and his chiropractor-- provides the film with some much needed color, as does Brian's senile, shroom-popping father, played by Ed Asner (soon to be seen in Pixar's "Up"), and Jane Alexander as Brian's mom, who delivers the film's knock-out line: "nothing's fucked up, nothing's beyond repair." Clearly the most noteworthy diversion is that of a surrealistic device in the form of a mysterious and hostile homeless man-- you'll have to trust me on this one. Played by increasingly-visible comedian Zach Galifianakis, "Homeless Guy" (as the cast list designates) is psychopathic in his relentless pursuit of Brian, attacking him with a metal pipe on the street, with a gun in the woods, and looming in the periphery on several occasions. It's difficult to share my thoughts on this particular element of the film without spoiling things, but: yes, I do understand it's implication and, no, I don't think it entirely works.<br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">"Gigantic" is an oddity: tonally inconsistent, thematically vague, intermittently entertaining, and even occasionally touching. It's a relationship movie, a romantic comedy, with elements of a horror/thriller, and traces of poignant, convincing drama. Its title continues to baffle. Does it refer to Brian's adopted child's enormous head (which fills the film's final frame), to John Goodman's bulbous character, or to a bear-chested whale of a man who appears mysteriously atop a building at one point? More likely, it means to evoke the huge problems which confront us throughout life, often soothed by the companionship of another. The love we find can be just such a “gigantic” presence and can eclipse the burdensome troubles we cope with. The film's apparent flaws can be ignored, since its impact is undeniable. This is especially true during the final sequence, which has a communal and familial catharsis that approaches that of last year's "Rachel Getting Married" in its emphasis on the importance of caring for others. Matt Aselton's debut feature inarguably draws influence from similar quirky fare, but rather than copy-cat like so many other filmmakers, the director, in an admittedly messy and erratic way, seems to be making noticeable strides, breaking with formula in ways that are somewhat bizarre and bold. For this particular genre to give us a work like "Gigantic," I count my blessings.</span></p></span></span></div></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:medium;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Grade: </span></span></span><span style="font-weight: bold; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:medium;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">2.5</span></span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; "><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Film / Review<br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Film: </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold; "><a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_CURRENT/Entries/2009/3/30_Sunshine_Cleaning_%282009%29_Directed_by_Christine_Jeffs.html"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Sunshine Cleaning</span></span></a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Director: Christine Jeffs<br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Year: 2009</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; font-size: 8px; white-space: pre-wrap; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><object width="450" height="303"><param name="movie" value="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/6727"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/6727" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" width="450" height="303"></embed></object></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 11px; line-height: 17px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: none;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 11px; line-height: 17px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Amy Adams is quite an actress. Excluding her forgettable role as the middle-nun in "Doubt" last year, Adams has turned in consistently compelling and nuanced work in a variety of roles—admittedly most are riffs on the same, rambunctious character. Her latest project, with fellow carrot-topped siren Emily Blunt, is unlikely to convert any of Adams' detractors. Those who find her bubbly positivity to be obnoxious may actually like her less here, since it's her first real, dramatic leading role. What I find appealing about all these seemingly optimistic characters that Adams brings to the screen is their vulnerability. A bit like Sally Hawkins' Poppy in last year’s "Happy-Go-Lucky," Adams' character in "Sunshine Cleaning" is defined by much more than her beaming smile and cheery demeanor. Unlike Poppy, Adams' character uses her optimism as a defense mechanism, or as a way of coping with difficult circumstances. </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: none; font-family:Times;"><div class="paragraph paragraph_style_1" face="ArialMT, Arial, sans-serif" size="15px" style="overflow-x: visible; overflow-y: visible; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; position: relative; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 48px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times; font-size: 16px; line-height: normal; "><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Adams' Rose is a single mom, involved in an affair with her married High School sweetheart, Mac (Steve Zahn), and struggling to make enough to raise her son, Oscar (Jason Spevack), by working a demeaning job as a housekeeper. She was once the envy of her classmates, as the head cheerleader, but now she serves them-- in one scene, Adams painfully captures the embarrassment of cleaning an old classmate's home. By most measures, Rose's life is depressing, but she is "strong" and she "can do anything," as she constantly tells herself in the mirror-- sometimes even believing it. Predictably, her younger sister, Norah (Blunt), is just the opposite: a disenfranchised do-nothing who still lives at home and smokes a lot of dope. Norah runs through menial jobs and causes more stress for Rose than she is worth as Oscar's babysitter. Not surprisingly, neither is happy, and so when Mac suggests they get involved in the crime-scene clean-up "racket," both, desperate for cash, jump at this odd occupational opportunity.<br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">"Sunshine Cleaning" is by-the-numbers indie-dramedy fare, complete with a twinkling, instrumental score that backdrops (in this case) montages of the two girls cleaning blood from shower stalls and tile walls-- which is, at least to this viewer, both unsettling, and tonally off. Still, it’s the performances that make this formulaic material worthwhile: both Adams and Blunt are likable enough to carry this hackneyed screenplay. Adams is the main draw; luminous and graceful as always, there's a heartrending rawness to the actress's performance, and there are few in this line of work whose gaze is more alluring and emotionally penetrating. Blunt is nearly as good, playing Oscar to Adams' Felix, and being appropriately ditzy and oft times vacant. The actresses play off each other well, and it's the authenticity of their sisterly bond that makes "Sunshine Cleaning" more than the sum of its clichéd parts.<br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Aside from a strict adherence to tried-and-true narrative structure, which makes the film too predictable, "Sunshine Cleaning" is largely without glaring faults. However, there are a couple of egregious sequences: the opening scene, for one, which involves a suicide that could have just as easily been suggested rather than shown; a heavy-handed scene in which Rose attempts to speak to her dead mother through a car radio; and just about every scene with Alan Arkin, whose crotchety old geezer grandfather is ripped straight from "Little Miss Sunshine," and makes comparisons between the two films (they also have the same producer and, uh, name) unavoidable. Other secondary characters are similarly ill defined, such as a lesbian doctor (Mary Lynn Rajskub) who befriends Norah after the two cross paths when the girls clean up after her dead mother. Ditto a one-armed store clerk (Clifton Collins Jr.) with a penchant for building model airplanes, who registers as more of a gimmick and as a vessel through which life lessons can be taught to Rose.<br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></p><p class="paragraph_style_7" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; opacity: 1; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Thankfully, none of these failings are fatal, as "Sunshine Cleaning' keeps its focus clear and pronounced, examining the relationship between these two sisters, and developing their characters enough to hold interest. It's far from a perfect film, and this Sundance-bred formula has, at this point, been stretched to the breaking point, but Adams is so good in the lead that she's able to elevate the material.</span></p></span></span></div></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:medium;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Grade: </span></span></span><span style="font-weight: bold; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:medium;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">2.5</span></span></span></span></div></span></span></div></div></span></div></div></span></span></div></div></span></span></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-3513051231729538792009-03-18T08:21:00.000-07:002009-03-18T08:26:23.348-07:00Best Tracks of 2009, Q. 1<div style="text-align: justify;">All of 'em are in the player to the right.<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Write-ups (maybe) coming later, but I'll say now that Phoenix's "1901" is the best '09 track I've heard this year, and that The Beatles leaked "Revolution 1" (Take 20) is the best song I'll hear all year (probably).<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I'd say 'comment away,' but no one ever does, so...<br /></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-87157767451976062432009-03-17T14:39:00.000-07:002009-03-17T15:02:03.679-07:00Review: "Everlasting Moments"<div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Film / Review<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Film: <span style="font-weight:bold;"><a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_CURRENT/Entries/2009/3/16_Everlasting_Moments_%282009%29_Directed_by_Jan_Troell.html">Everlasting Moments</a></span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Director: Jan Troell<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Year: 2009<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(147, 149, 140); white-space: pre-wrap; font-family:verdana;font-size:8px;"><object width="450" height="313"><param name="movie" value="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/8668"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"><embed src="http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/8668" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" width="450" height="313"></embed></object></span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(147, 149, 140); white-space: pre-wrap;font-family:verdana;font-size:8px;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">Everlasting it may not be, but, at 131 minutes, Jan Troell's new Swedish melodrama isn't exactly short. It plods, and it does so while telling an all-too familiar story of turbulent marital relations. <br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">Set in the Sweden of a century ago, “Everlasting Moments” depicts several years in the lives of an ever-growing and impoverished family, specifically mom and dad: Mousey, Finnish-born Maria Larsson (Maria Heiskanen) and her abusive drunkard of a husband, Sigfrid (Mikael Persbrandt). The latter is rarely home, preferring to cavort about town with his young mistress and his anarchist buddy, Englund (Emil Jensen). When Sigfrid and his crew go on strike, Maria has to work longer hours, cleaning the houses of aristocrats. But when she discovers a camera in her closet, leading her to the offices of kindly commercial photographer Sebastian Pedersen (Jesper Christensen), Maria finds another way to support the family. Solace waits for Maria behind the lens of the camera, and it's her love of photography that becomes central to the plot, expressing the film's theme of 'capturing a moment forever,' and obviously inspiring its title. Of course, this concept is nothing new-- Kodak's slogan has purported something similar for at least half a century. The same can be said of the filmmaking on display as well.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">Five-time Academy Award nominee Troell, often considered the second best Swedish director ever (after Bergman), does not live up to his formidable reputation. There's nothing here that we haven’t seen before, and (excepting a few well-placed zooms) the craft isn't striking enough to invigorate this tired material. Troell affects his visuals with sepia tones, a clichéd aesthetic used to convey agedness. Unfortunately, the plot is just as predictable: each moment comes just as we expect it to, and when we expect it to, almost routinely. This makes for a film that feels too balanced in its construction and-- ultimately-- too safe. <br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">There’s enough going on in Maria’s and Sigfrid’s hectic lives to make them interesting; and their characters are given some dimension thanks to strong, nuanced performances from both Heiskanen and Persbrandt. This is especially true of Heiskanen, whose work manages to convey both a firm resolve and a certain vulnerability, transcending the generalized part Troell has written for her. On the other hand, the seven kids of the family have little personality, and differentiating between them often becomes difficult. Even the eldest, Maja (played first by Nellie Almgren, and later by Callin Ohrval-- who's also the narrator of the story), is given little more to do than react to her father's mistreatment of her mother and, later, to engage in a brief and underdeveloped romance with a local boy. It's Maja’s story that's supposedly being told, but so much happens on screen that she couldn't possibly know about (for instance, her father's various escapades), making the narration seem all the more unnecessary, especially when it drops out for long periods of time, only to surface in a very pandering way, explaining that which clearly doesn't require explanation. <br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">What’s worse, the film fails to make us understand why a self-sufficient woman like Maria stays with her abusive, alcoholic, cheating, and slovenly partner. As a result of this failed characterization (and maybe because of my own unwillingness to forgive), I found it hard to stomach the film's 'happy' ending. Nonetheless, Troell's film can be enjoyed for its palatable quaintness, in much the same way I found Chris Noonan's precious "Miss Potter" mildly gratifying. But "Everlasting Moments" is, ironically, not all that memorable.</span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:medium;">Grade: </span><span style="font-weight:bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:medium;">2</span></span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><br /></span></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-34365306951073412482009-03-13T10:39:00.000-07:002009-03-13T19:07:12.134-07:00Directro #2: Claire Denis<div style="text-align: justify;">[From InRO: <span style="font-style:italic;"><a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FEATURES/Entries/2009/3/2_Directrospective_2_-_Claire_Denis_Cinema_of_the_Skin.html">Directro #2: Claire Denis</a></span>]<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Essay: <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;">Claire Denis' Cinema of the Skin</span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><a href="http://s612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/?action=view&current=shapeimage_13.png" target="_blank"><img src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_13.png" border="0" alt="Photobucket" /></a><a href="http://s612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/?action=view&current=shapeimage_13.png" target="_blank"><br /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">All you need do is watch an interview with Claire Denis to understand how sure of herself she is, and how opinionated. She's an artist completely in control of her medium, and even when she makes what I would deem (as a critic) a mistake, I often have to admit that these “mistakes” seem calculated and deliberate. Which, frustratingly, can serve to convince me that maybe I'm the one who's mistaken. Moreover, it's particularly difficult to review her films, because it seems everyone reads a little more (or less) into them. Denis, on the other hand, has a very specific intent of what her films mean, and what they represent, which makes trying to articulate my own understanding and interpretation especially difficult.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">The title of this essay is "Claire Denis’ Cinema of the Skin"; all of this artist’s work involves the skin in one way or another. Whether it be the leathery, rugged skin of Michel Subor's aged body in "The Intruder," which Denis examines in leisurely takes; or the role racial power struggles play in both the director's debut, "Chocolat," and her best film, "Beau Travail"; or, in the strangest instance, the way that skin serves as a titillation in Denis' vampiric horror film, "Trouble Every Day." In each case, the beauty found in the frames of a Denis picture is natural, and imperfect, and skin is often her medium. It's the blemishes on Tricia Vessy's skin in "Trouble Every Day," and the moles and warts on the back of Subor, that give Denis' images texture-- she would have no interest in the "clean and clear and under control" skin that some advertisements promise. In this sense, the types of skin which Denis (and her cinematographer of choice, Agnes Godard) choose to film, could be seen as symbolic of this artist's belief in the natural as opposed to the synthetic. Her films reflect this, as all of them tell stories that, even when they skirt the line of fantasy, are grounded in real emotions and natural characterizations.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">This approach unifies every film in Denis canon, and makes her an "auteur" in the classic sense. As does her decision to reuse actors; only seldom will you see a new face in a Denis film. She has a fondness for striking, French men: Alex Descas, Gregoire Colin, and the legendary Subor; and slightly awkward or abrasive looking women: Beatrice Dalle (who has a giant gap between her teeth), Florence Loiret-Caille, and the creepy Katia Golubeva (the latter of which is probably best known for her role in Bruno Dumont's chilling "Twentynine Palms"). Some could say that the filmmaker favors women less, in fact I've even heard accusations that Denis is misogynist (a claim which I find laughable).<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">Consider Claire Denis to be the inverse of someone like Pedro Almodovar; a male director who "loves woman," as he has claimed, and who often casts men in supporting, less-defined roles ("Volver," for example). Similarly, I think it can be accurately said that Denis loves men. Take "Beau Travail," which finds the director spending long passages to watch the men in her film exercise (an act wherein she keenly observes the homoerotic undertones). But what I think is fascinating about Denis is that her sexually-charged sequences never come off like an artist fawning over her subjects. I wouldn't say her films are clinical, just that Denis never judges or presents an opinion of what is on screen-- her presence is removed from our viewing experience. It's her job to give us images, and it's our job to interpret them-- if we detect a homoerotic undertone in "Beau Travail," that detection is neither right nor wrong.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">Even the most straight-forward films of the director's career have often had a deep-seated meaning that's difficult to suss out. The mystery/procedural/slice-of-life entertainment that is "I Can't Sleep," based on the "Granny Killer" murders in France during the 1980s, is probably Denis' most character/plot-driven work, but it refuses to be taken at face value, or to conform to the expectations of what we think the movie would be about. The central character in "I Can't Sleep" is a Lithuanian woman, come to Paris of her own accord, who just happens to get involved with the murderer. Even here, in a film based on real events (the closest to non-fiction Denis has ever gotten in her narrative work), themes that permeate her most avant-garde films emerge.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">In "I Can't Sleep," the murderer is a gay, black immigrant who never seems as lethal as he apparently is. He's involved in an affair with his accomplice, an older white man, who seems infinitely more sure of his actions. It may be a bit of a stretch to say that, like in "Chocolat" and "Beau Travail," the black character is being exploited by the white. However, all three of these films have a very common theme: that of cultural alienation. In "Beau Travail," it's a Russian legionnaire who arrives at a French outpost in South Africa, and who doesn't understand the conflict he becomes involved in. In "Chocolat," it's a young girl who moves to South Africa with her mother and father to live on a plantation, and who doesn't understand the conflict between her mother and their black servant.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">In "I Can't Sleep," there are two foreigners at odds with their surroundings. Daiga, the Lithuanian woman, does not understand the announcement on her radio that warns of the "Granny Killer" (she knows very little French, as we learn soon after). And so it can reasonably be assumed that Camille (the killer himself), whose life collides with Daiga, and who's also an immigrant, may not comprehend the ramifications of his own actions (the film certainly implies that he is not very educated). And if Denis is suggesting this, then she may also be alluding to-- in a subtle sort of way that one may only pick up on if they consider the larger scope and thematic concerns of this director's work-- the discreet exploitation of Camille's circumstances, by his white lover.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">It's also worth note that this theme is one that is hard-wired into Denis. "Chocolat," the director's most personal film, is relatively autobiographical (Denis had similar experiences when she was a child, growing up in South Africa). The feelings of cultural alienation felt by her characters take on a greater resonance when one considers that the filmmaker probably draws from her own experiences to render her subjects and their motivations. This goes a long way towards explaining how Denis is able to create such in-depth and believable characterizations.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">However, above all else-- above even her incites as an explorer of human emotions-- Denis is an artist, and a great filmmaker. Her cinema is defined by moody atmospherics in such a way that makes each work (even her least successful) feel cohesive and complete. Her signature tone is established through patient and intelligent pacing, Godard's crisp and compelling visuals, and Tindersticks' Stuart Staples' idiosyncratic scores, which burrow into your head and echo for weeks on end (the reverberating cacophony of "The Intruder"'s musical accompaniment still haunts me). It's all of these elements which make her such a unique and valuable voice in modern cinema. And, it's the strength of each individual work she has crafted, and the daring topics she tackles with each new project, that make her truly incomparable.</span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Review: <span style="font-weight:bold;"><a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_OLD_HAT/Entries/2009/3/1_The_Intruder_%282005%29_Directed_by_Claire_Denis.html">The Intruder</a></span> (2005)<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><a href="http://s612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/?action=view&current=shapeimage_6.png" target="_blank"><img src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_6.png" border="0" alt="Photobucket" /></a><a href="http://s612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/?action=view&current=shapeimage_6.png" target="_blank"><br /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">This is a film that challenges patience and understanding in ways I can only describe as thrilling. To watch Claire Denis' "The Intruder" is to be engulfed in rapturous images more haunting than easily understood. Which is to say that Denis imbues every frame with a wealth of meaning, but what that meaning is exactly might not be apparent on a first viewing (or second, or third). It's a movie that asks to be felt rather than comprehended, and which communicates on an emotional level instead of engaging its viewers with a linear narrative.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">This could be said about many of Denis' films; both her debut, "Chocolat," and her defining work, "Beau Travail," were loosely told and often felt like dreams (and both consisted of flashbacks that never seemed like the Hollywood definition of a flashback). But it's "The Intruder" that truly breaks free of the binds of a traditional narrative-- that which hampered prior works like "Trouble Every Day," which is bogged down by its tedious plot, and "I Can't Sleep," which is more straight-forward then her later work. Here, Denis seems to have arrived at the endpoint of an evolutionary cycle, where plot is less and less important and stories can be told through related but ambiguous sequences that resonate in their thematic similarity.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">Denis has described reading the source material for her film-- a 30-page novella by Jean-Luc Nancy-- as a "physical" experience. As such, though her film adaptation is clearly more expansive than the literature (it runs for just over two hours), at least the director has effectively translated this same "physical" quality to the screen. Similarly, Denis describes her reaction to the novella as being "personal," and the same can certainly be said of my own reaction to her film, and what I took away from it. What's more, both works are meant to intrude on those who let them. In the film, "the intruder" is everywhere, and anyone who does not belong, or who penetrates the life of another. For instance, as you read this review, I am the intruder.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">A poetic incantation, spoken by a specter hiding in the shadows of the woods, begins the film: "Your worst enemies / are hiding inside / in the shadow / in your heart." In this film, "the heart" means a lot. Louis Trebor (Michel Subor) is a "man with no heart" (as described by Denis), who suffers from pain in his chest and, eventually, learns that he needs a heart transplant. This 'inciting incident' (though such screenplay cliches are superfluous here) sets him on a path of redemption and reconciliation, where he must leave his life of solitude in the woods (on the French-Swiss border), find a way to spiritually reconnect with his two sons-- one lives close by, the other far away-- and quell the demons of his consciousness. Demons that manifest themselves in the form of one entity; a ghostly Russian woman (Katia Golubeva), the same who whispered the poetry from the film's opening sequence. She is an "intruder"; she haunts Trebor on his journey through lands both strange and familiar, harsh and cold, inviting and tropical.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">I've seen the film four times, and each time I come back to it I make the same mistake. I try to make sense of the story, of the relationships between the characters; which is to miss the point. The only story I've found, aside from the baseline-- a man in search of a heart-- is that which Denis communicates through the stringing together of like-minded sequences. For instance, towards the beginning of the the film, a female cop is seen performing routines with a trained dog (an animal that appears in this film quite a bit), suggesting a position of authority and control. In the next sequence, she heads home to her husband, who seduces her quietly in the kitchen; she is submissive now, no longer in control of her environment. Denis then cuts away to shots of shadowy, faceless figures, bounding through the forrest, hopping over a fence, and intruding on both Trebor's property and the tranquility of the forrest-- as well as the moment itself. The way in which Denis subtlety likens a sexual intrusion to that of the intruders in the woods demonstrates this director's thought process. Even if the two sequences exist separately from each other, on a narrative level, they are linked in that the action of both scenes is the same: an intrusion. The filmmaker further entwines the two disparate occurrences by having the husband weave a forested sexual fantasy for his titillated wife, creating a fluid transition from one scene to the next.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">This scene, and others like it, suggests the power of imagery conjured by the imagination, a running theme here that is explored again later in the film, when Trebor imagines he's being dragged through the snow by a horse-drawn sleigh. Perhaps this is symbolic of the guilt Trebor feels (he kills a young man, out of impulse, towards the beginning of the film), or maybe he just dreads the idea of being dragged back to the snowy landscape he's left behind. Or, maybe, the sequence isn't a dream at all. The fact that Denis opens her cinema up to so many interpretations should be considered a strength, not a flaw, as ambiguity must be valued in this age of modern cinema, where so many filmmakers spoon-feed us. In contrast, Denis lets her scenes speak for themselves, without exposition, which could be seen as something of an auteurist trademark. Ditto her decision to tie characters to their surroundings, making them seem unfamiliar if they're spotted elsewhere. This serves to emphasize a sense of alienation from the world outside ones own environment, and helps to establish Trebor and his ghostly, Russian companion as the only roving beings in a world plagued by stillness. This could be why I've read in many places that those who watch "The Intruder" tend to feel as if they are on some kind of journey themselves, or that they've "lived something," as Stephanie Zacharek of Salon astutely observed. <br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">Even those who argue that the film lacks structure or a sense of pacing don't have a leg to stand on. First of all, that is the point; to rebel against traditional narrative and to tell a story that cares more about making its feelings resonate then following a plot from point A to point B. Regardless, I think the movie has impeccable structure, as becomes apparent when it enters into its third act-- set in the tropical landscape of Tahiti-- where Trebor finally arrives, in search of his long-lost son. The movie follows the linear timeline of a dying heart. The pace suggests this, as it slows considerably in the final act, leading to the inevitable. And the final sequence-- a return to the snow-covered landscape Trebor left behind-- suggests something profound and cyclical. In addition, a final glimpse at the Queen of the Northern Hemisphere (as the credits refer to Denis regular Beatrice Dalle's abrasive character) hints at the fact that redemption may be unattainable for Trebor's sinful soul.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">The result of all this is a film that feels at once alien and familiar. There's a certain disassociation I feel when I watch "The Intruder," but the impression it leaves tends to linger for a long time after each viewing. Which, in my view, is the point; Denis intrudes, as is her intention, and the effects of her intrusion are long-lasting. Understanding it all doesn't really come into the equation.</span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Grade: <span style="font-weight:bold;">3.5</span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Review: <span style="font-weight:bold;"><a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_OLD_HAT/Entries/2009/3/2_Trouble_Every_Day_%282002%29_Directed_by_Claire_Denis.html">Trouble Every Day</a></span> (2002)<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><a href="http://s612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/?action=view&current=shapeimage_4.png" target="_blank"><img src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_4.png" border="0" alt="Photobucket" /></a><a href="http://s612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/?action=view&current=shapeimage_4.png" target="_blank"><br /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">"Trouble Every Day" is Claire Denis most disliked film. Even among her ardent fans, the feature is often seen as something of a failure (unless, of course, they happen to be one of the movie's few, fervent supporters). I, however, fall somewhere in the middle; I acknowledge its many flaws, but can't shake its haunting visuals. I'm consistently drawn to this bold material: an erotic parable which imagines a world where a certain group of afflicted individuals engage in sex as foreplay to violence; a predatory process which awakens in them an intense primal urge to attack and kill their partner (taking rough sex to a whole new level).<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">The idea for the film began with a nightmare the director had when she was a child, wherein her mother's goodnight kisses morphed into vicious bites. This concept-- the fine line between lip and tooth-- manifests itself right at the outset, when a couple is seen making out in their car, scored by Stuart Staples' (of Tinder Sticks) tension-racked orchestration, establishing dread and suspense that would normally give way to some kind of brutal action. But this is not a traditional horror movie, and such violence doesn't take place at this time. Denis understands that patience is a bedfellow of suspense, and fulfillment comes later.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">While making a short film in New York City, a friend of hers in the industry asked Denis if she might be interested in making a genre film. Her response, many years later, is "Trouble Every Day," which is in many ways not a genre film at all. It bears resemblance to various vampire movies, and the director claims that she's always been interested by that particular creature's mythology, but she hesitates to count her film among those that explore it. And understandably so; there's a brutality of an entirely different persuasion in "Trouble Every Day." Sucking blood is not so much the motivation here; instead, the afflicted are prone to ravaging the bodies of their prey with a primal urgency, spattering the screen with blood. Not gore, however, which is an important point to make, as Denis claims (and I'm inclined to agree). The director makes no apologies for the blood in her films, but she insists that there is no gore, and that the term implies a certain "nihilism" which her film does not posses.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">At first, "nihilistic" struck me as an accurate way to describe "Trouble Every Day," as its bleak vision of an alienated people living with very little hope of a normal life suggests. But, upon further examination, to designate it at such is to overlook the love shared between these characters. Core (Beatrice Dalle), for instance, is possessed by this bizarre malady and cared for by her handler, Leo (Alex Descas), who's also her husband. The heartless way in which Leo unleashes his wife on unsuspecting victims (a chilling introduction to both characters) is given further dimension through an undercurrent of melancholy, evidenced by regret written all over Descas' face. Leo is not an evil man; he's a desperate one, obligated to carry out this horrifying procedure to keep his wife alive. Similarly, the relationship between the infected Shane (tall, dark and creepy Vince Gallo) and his new wife June (Tricia Vessey) is one of great affection, and their on-screen romance contrasts that of Leo and Core. The latter two find themselves disassociated from each other, accepting the inevitability of their circumstance, and living selfishly. Shane, on the other hand, represses his violent urges, and fighting his condition in hopes that he can have a normal life with his partner.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">Much of the film is devoid of dialog, as is the case with many Denis films, placing emphasis on tone and atmosphere-- again, nothing new for those familiar with the director's unique brand of storytelling. But, unlike Denis' best films ("Beau Travail," "The Intruder"), the plot which emerges here is needlessly confusing and distracting: something involving Leo (who's apparently a scientist of some kind), his involvement with Shane, and the research both have done in effort to cure this debilitating disease. The specifics are left vague, and an attempt to establish a preexisting relationship between Shane and Leo's wife, Core (they were perhaps once lovers) is headache-inducing. And yet, as much as this unintelligible plot does serve to dilute the purity of Denis' visceral cautionary tale-- one far more chilling than, say, "Basic Instinct"-- it's the intrigue this concept commands that makes the film compelling.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">Emotionally-charged sequences, shot sublimely by the reliably brilliant cinematographer Agnes Godard, burn into the memory. These include basically every tense moment and longing glance shared between Shane and June, who yearn to connect with each other so completely that Shane occasionally forgoes caution, and gives in to temptation; only to be stifled by a mark on June's shoulder, reminding him of past transgressions and of his own limitations. Scenes like this perfectly encapsulate Denis' thematic concern: dangerous love. As such, "Trouble Every Day" becomes so much more than a "hysterical yet humorless disquisition on the thin line between sucking face and literally sucking face," as one critic naively has described it. It's a movie which concerns itself with the relationship between allure and danger, asserting its theme forcibly, with every lustful glance and pining gesture. Some may find this approach too subtle, preferring that the director lecture us and present us with some kind of metaphorical iteration (a filmmaker less trusting of their audience may slap on a narration to drive the point home, something like, "a rose is gorgeous, but it has thorns").<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">"Trouble Every Day" is all about inaction, and so most horror enthusiasts will likely be repelled by the quiet moments, which make up the majority of its runtime. However, this sparseness is necessary, as it enables the two instances in which violence does take place on screen to be all the more jarring. Both these sequences are nearly-unwatchable in their unrelenting brutality, and will likely disturb the viewer more than anything that, say, the 'Saw' franchise has to offer. Which is why, thankfully, they are used sparingly-- as exclamation marks, not sentences-- and so I find them to be necessary evils that elicit the reaction required to understand this particular piece of art on its own terms. They're not entertaining or even titillating (both take place during sex). They're sadistic, but they serve a purpose: cautioning the fulfillment of lustful desire.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">An agreeable tone is established early on, and the movie effortlessly coasts by for much of its duration. Staples' soaring strings, tapping percussion and shakers score panning shots of skin, photographed by Godard like the rosiest of apples; as seductive to the viewer as to predators like Shane and Core. Like many of Denis' films-- though, admittedly, more fascinating here than anywhere else in her oeuvre-- the roll that skin plays is intrinsic to the narrative. Not only is it shot to look delectable and inviting, but it's treated as delicate and easily damaged; the thin layer of protective coating separating the afflicted from their sustenance. In fact, the film's power of suggestion, and its effectiveness as an allegory, make it hard to admit its many and glaring flaws.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">At its least effective, "Trouble Ever Day" feels over-thought (not a common attribute of a Denis work), and far too literal (ditto). The worst scenes tend to involve Leo and his many bizarre experiments. When the plot shifts into mystery/procedural territory towards the end of the second act, its overly scientific preoccupations (talk of neurological disorders and brain samples in petri dishes) fly in the face of the narrative's more naturalistic progression, and the almost innate, animalistic behaviors of these characters. It's occurred to me that Denis may be trying to make some kind of statement on the futility of man-made serums and scientific solutions in combating basic human nature, but if that is the case, her argument is both vague and abstract.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">Despite all of this, Denis overcomes, and delivers a thesis both controversial and undeniably thought-provoking: The director posits that all desire-- sexual, violent, or otherwise-- is intrinsically linked. Just as blood and skin are the same (part of our DNA), carnal urges are equivalent to violent urges, and the two exist on the same plane of fulfillment. The separation, essentially, is defined by an individual's own ability to control their actions in the heat of the moment. It's a theory which virtually no genre film would have the audacity to suggest, and I can think of few concepts more terrifying.</span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Grade: <span style="font-weight:bold;">2.5</span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Review: <span style="font-weight:bold;"><a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_OLD_HAT/Entries/2009/3/3_Beau_Travail_%282000%29_Directed_by_Claire_Denis.html">Beau Travail</a></span> (2000)<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><a href="http://s612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/?action=view&current=shapeimage_3.png" target="_blank"><img src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_3.png" border="0" alt="Photobucket" /></a><a href="http://s612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/?action=view&current=shapeimage_3.png" target="_blank"><br /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">This is Claire Denis' masterwork. "Beau Travail" is an adaptation of Herman Melville's "Billy Budd," relocated to a French legionnaire camp in Northern Africa, where jealousy and braggadocio inform an intense power struggle and elevate a classic parable to the level of Greek tragedy. Galoup (Denis Lavant), perhaps the ideal legionnaire-- stoic, solemn, dedicated-- looks after his soldiers like a "watch dog," as he puts it, for the recognition of his superior, Commander Bruno Forestier (the legendary Michel Subor), whom he idolizes and whose respect and attention he yearns for. It's only when a foreigner arrives, Russian legionnaire Gilles Sentain (Denis regular Gregoire Colin), that this delicate balance of power is upset-- that which has isolated Galoup and Forestier from the lower ranking legionnaires; here portrayed as nameless, without identity, and part of a pulsating, muscular machine. Sentain performs one heroic act-- rescuing the survivors of a helicopter crash-- and earns the attentions of Forestier. Galoup, already suspicious of the Russian legionnaire, becomes consumed with jealousy, and sets about to "destroy" the young soldier.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">In the opening scene, Sentain and Galoup circle each other predatorily, as if they were competing for the same lioness; the two soldiers are established as silent rivals, as conveyed through intense physical gestures: penetrating stares, arched backs, clenched fists. Denis constructs an environment where the line is blurred between machismo and homoerotic tension, and spends much time watching the men exercise; an act which suggests both inclinations. This director's cinema is all about suggestion; erotic tension abounds, but no fulfillment. When Galoup gazes at Forestier is it with desire or admiration? Is Sentain aware of the reason for Galoup's contempt, or does he simply think that his superior is pushing him, taken a dislike to him for some other reason? When a helicopter crashes, the explosion is witnessed fragmentarily, from beneath the water. The next take is longer, watching the wreckage bob steadily in the waves. Denis' focus is inaction rather than action; the soldiers rehearse tirelessly for a battle that never comes, and their usefulness only manifests itself when they're called upon to rebuild a road. This may be why Denis' film is so suspenseful and full of tension, a kind that's hard to pin down. The themes of her filmography are all present: the relationship between the French and Africa; unspoken sensuality; and an emphasized physicality that is as ambiguous as the intentions of her characters.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">Blacks often become the casualties of senseless conflicts between the white characters. When one black soldier leaves his position briefly the act, which would normally be acceptable, gives Galoup the opportunity to set a trap for Sentain. Galoup punishes the black soldier, making him dig a hole until he gives the order to stop. He does this only to provoke Sentain, and to force him to act out of line himself. A shot of the black soldier's hands smeared with blood illustrates France's exploitation of Africa as poignantly as any shot in modern cinema, and recalls the final sequence in Denis' debut, "Chocolat." It's this contrast between surreal beauty and striking brutality that makes the director's films (particularly this one) so compelling, and her stylized visuals truly meaningful-- for that, Denis can thank her reliably brilliant cinematographer, Agnes Godard. What emerges is film of a rare quality; a poeticized Greek tragedy, hushed and restrained, communicating on a visceral level through body language. Denis' characters lumber across the screen, exhibiting a silent yet forceful command of their terrain, a control which mirrors that which the director has over her material.</span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Grade: <span style="font-weight:bold;">4</span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Review: <span style="font-weight:bold;"><a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_OLD_HAT/Entries/2009/3/9_I_Cant_Sleep_%281997%29_Directed_by_Claire_Denis.html">I Can't Sleep</a></span> (1997)<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><a href="http://s612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/?action=view&current=shapeimage_10.png" target="_blank"><img src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_10.png" border="0" alt="Photobucket" /></a><a href="http://s612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/?action=view&current=shapeimage_10.png" target="_blank"><br /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">Leave it to Claire Denis, a director more in touch with humanistic sensibilities than perhaps any other living filmmaker, to take a simple plot (based on a true story) about a couple of thugs who kill elderly woman for cash, and turn it into a complex study of sinful behaviors. In the hands of just about any other filmmaker, "I Can't Sleep" (this director's third film) would most likely have become a murder mystery procedural. Denis, however, harnesses the tenseness of this material for different purposes. "I Can't Sleep" stretches itself across a nearly two-hour runtime, patiently and evenly developing its many characters. Much of it takes place in the grimiest of Parisian city streets, in the nighttime, where these sinners sin and dread the coming daylight. At the center is Daiga (Katia Golubeva), a tall and wispy Lithuanian beauty, who comes to visit a relative in Paris, and to find work. She doesn't speak much French, and so when a radio announcer warns of the "Granny Killer," she doesn't understand; the audience, however, does. Daiga's character in "I Can't Sleep" serves as our entry point into this dark and surreal world, and in it we feel just as uprooted as she does-- and just as fascinated, too. Denis has said that she wanted us to "discover" the killer in the film, in much the same way one would discover a story like this in a newspaper. It's a daringly anti-dramatic and natural approach, and it pays dividends in the last act, when insight into the mindset of the killer is gained through our understanding of Daiga, an outsider who stumbles into the middle of something sinister (just like we do). It's through Daiga's alienation that we come to understand Camille (Richard Courcet), a transvestite immigrant from Martinique who we learn commits the heinous murders in the film with his white, older lover. Camille lives a dangerous life, one of prostitution and drugs. In contrast, his older brother, Theo (Alex Descas), chose the preverbal high road-- he has a kid and a job. But Theo gets no more respect for it, as an early scene shows; a Parisian woman tries to scam Theo out of a couple hundred francs. Denis clearly does not find the immigrant experience in Paris to be ideal. But if that's her message, at least she doesn't hammer it home too hard. Instead, she's content to free her film of message-pedaling and traditional narrative structure. What she gives us in its place is something that approaches the illusive idea of "pure cinema." Characters are formed around their actions and interactions with other people, and through them the film finds its tempo. Theo's wife (Beatrice Dalle) is selfish, taking off every time she and her husband get in a fight and threatening never to come back. Just as Daiga is ultimately defined by her greed (as becomes apparent in the last act). There are no heroes in "I Can't Sleep"; innocence is scant, and certainly not without counterbalance. But the city visibly fights back against this corruption-- granny's take up martial arts to defend themselves, the cops show up everywhere, and those with any shred of humanity reach out to others, often in vain. Denis is too smart to create a film rote with cynicism, so she finds the gray areas, even tender moments shared between flawed individuals-- when Camille dances with his mother, an act of compassion, you could be forgiven for forgetting that he's a murderer. Denis understands that people sin, but she also knows that they regret. The title of her film may suggest that even the most grave of offenders lose sleep over their transgressions.</span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Grade: <span style="font-weight:bold;">3</span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Review: <span style="font-weight:bold;"><a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_OLD_HAT/Entries/2009/3/9_Chocolat_%281988%29_Directed_by_Claire_Denis.html">Chocolat</a></span> (1988)<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><a href="http://s612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/?action=view&current=shapeimage_9-1.png" target="_blank"><img src="http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/shapeimage_9-1.png" border="0" alt="Photobucket" /></a><a href="http://s612.photobucket.com/albums/tt204/roco133/?action=view&current=shapeimage_9-1.png" target="_blank"><br /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">Born in Paris, but spending much of her childhood in Africa, where her father was stationed as a French Official, Claire Denis is a filmmaker well attuned to racial politics. She has said in interviews that her family moved often, changing houses every couple of years just so they could come to understand the "geography" of the region. This also, it's safe to assume, helped her better comprehend the culture and its people. Each one her films exemplifies this understanding, but it's her first feature, “Chocolat,” that uses that knowledge specifically to form its narrative. This is also the only work by this artist that could be rightfully considered autobiographical. Set in Africa, during the same period in which Denis grew up, the film traces the experiences of a young girl whose adolescent life bears much similarity to Denis' own upbringing. But before the director introduces us to that world, she first employs a plot-framing device I usually find constraining, making it work on her own terms. Without narration, she sandwiches the meat of the film between two present-day sequences; an equally stellar prologue and epilogue involving France (a person, not the country), an adult, visiting Cameroon, Africa after years away from the land where she grew up.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">In the opening sequence-- a series of images wherein not a word is spoken-- Denis delivers her thesis. The first shot depicts France sitting awkwardly on a log, wearing headphones and looking very out of place in her environment; the next shows a black man and his son playing in the water, then laying down and letting the waves wash over them, as the dark and muddy soil cakes their skin; finally, one more shot of France, before cutting to a close-up of her foot as she scrapes the very same dirt from between her toes. Denis, as she often does, makes her point without dialogue: No matter how hard foreign colonists like France try to acclimate themselves to African culture, they cannot blend in, just as this young woman and her ivory skin will always stand out against the country's black soil.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">Flashback a couple decades. We're now situated during the waning days of French colonialism in Africa. France, here only seven years old, rides along contentedly, in the back of a pickup truck with her houseboy, Protee (Isaach De Bankole). The dynamic set-up by this sequence (France and Protee in the back of the truck, the girl's parents inside it), illustrates the emotional distance France feels from her parents-- the effects of which her adult incarnation displays-- just as it also informs of Protee's role as a surrogate parent. Aimee (Giulia Boschi) and Marc (Francois Cluzet) Dalens are France's real parents, and the latter of the two spends much time away from the family's plantation home in Cameroon, due to his line of work. Which is why, in absence of a male paternal figure, Protee is left to fill the role. He accepts the task, and cares for the child, giving her the attention her father does not. But Protee is confronted with another role, one which doesn't suite him; that of the alpha male, the 'man of the house.'<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">It's for this reason that Aimee often treats Protee so coldly, as she's rebelling against his near-inevitable ascension to her level, and to his role as the dominant male figure in the Dalens family home. Aimee desires him; her glances and gestures (however coded) often suggest as much. This is especially true in one key scene, set in Aimee's bedroom, where she invites Protee inside to button her dress and their eyes meet through the reflection in a mirror. It's his lower rank that keeps Aimee from acting on her apparent emotions, and if that invisible line of class separation were to cease existing-- as it eventually does-- there would be nothing to stop her. Unfortunately for Protee, Aimee's erratic behavior confuses his sense of boundaries, which causes “Chocolat”'s most devastating scene to occur. This is spurred on by a string of events that begin with the scene by the mirror, and continue in a later sequence; Protee enters Aimee's room without receiving permission, only to be ordered away by his mistress. The culmination of these events comes while Protee is at his most bare and vulnerable, showering out doors, in broad-daylight. All it takes is the sound of Aimee's voice, returning from a picnic with France, to make him crack.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">In the scene, Protee sobs uncontrollably (one of the few if not only times we see the character display such emotion), and I remember at first believing this to be a manifestation of his own frustrated feelings of unfulfilled love. But, as I've come to understand, the film suggests the contrary and I'm now convinced that neither of these characters love each other at all; in fact, Protee may not even like Aimee very much. It makes more sense to conclude that, in this moment, Protee experiences a welling up of shame which overpowers his usually stoic resolve. The weight of his circumstance, and his quality of life (or lack thereof) is crippling, and the voice of this woman, whose feelings towards him he may not understand, is too much to bear.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">Throughout, France exists in the background, a conscious observer, like the audience. But she's far from passive; she engages in the most vital of actions on screen: learning. What she learns from her mother is most difficult to articulate; it's probably easier to suggest that she inherits her mother's removed fascination with the culture of Africa. What she learns from her father is far more concrete: he imparts to her a line as symbolic as any in the film, one which designates the horizon as an "invisible line" (an obvious but nonetheless effective metaphor for the same undefinable line which separates Protee and Aimee, and their respective classes). Still, what France learns from Protee is most vital, and is communicated in yet another excellent scene. France visits Protee and points to a generator pipe, asking if it's hot. Protee responds by reaching out and grasping the pipe, so France does as well, withdrawing her hand quickly when it burns her. This cannily illustrates the old adage "if you play with fire...," but it also teaches France a valuable and unforgettable lesson about the dangerous nature of trust. It's the most significant act Protee takes as France's guardian, equivalent to a mother bird throwing her chick out of the nest, to teach it how to fly.<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:x-small;">“Chocolat” has a sensory effect on many different levels. It's a passionate work full of sexual tension (however indefinable and subtle); it works as a wholly realized commentary on race relations, and on the relationship between Africa and the 'civilized' world; and its landscapes, though deserted and desolate, exude an awe-inspiring beauty and tranquility that pleases on a visual level. The more one considers the craft on display, and the intricate symbolism woven into the plot, the more it becomes increasingly impressive to think that this is a debut feature. Even on her first time out-- granted, after collaborating as assistant director with some of world cinema's most daring and original artists (Wim Wenders, Jacque Rivette)-- Denis had already developed a very specific and affecting formula, and she accomplished all this while working with a story so personal. Denis may have been a late bloomer (she didn't make this film until she was 40), but her first work feels as impeccable and studied as any she's made since.</span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Grade: <span style="font-weight:bold;">3</span><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div>Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1179427564646885705.post-85844477117455430592009-02-13T07:30:00.001-08:002009-02-13T07:31:55.084-08:00"The Class" (Laurent Cantet)<p style="clear: both">Film / Review </p><p style="clear: both"><a href="http://web.me.com/inreviewonline/inreviewonline/FILM_REVIEW_-_CURRENT/Entries/2009/2/12_The_Class_(2008)_Directed_by_Laurent_Cantet.html" target="_blank">Film: "The Class"</a><br />Director: Laurent Cantet<br />Year: 2008</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style=" text-align: center; display: block; margin: 0 auto 10px;"><object height="295" width="480"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/Hy158dWdbpw&hl=en&fs=1" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always" /><embed allowfullscreen="true" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/Hy158dWdbpw&hl=en&fs=1" allowscriptaccess="always" height="295" width="480"></embed></object></span><br />Awarded the Palm D'or at this year's Cannes film festival, Laurent Cantet's fluid and free-form drama, “The Class,” commits itself to the natural, unaffected representation of the student/teacher relationship. Free from the binds of a traditional dramatic arc, Cantet's film finds a rhythmic pace and settles into an agreeable ebb and flow. The narrative alternates between extended takes inside the classroom and a sort of behind-the-scenes look at the meetings held in the teacher's lounge. Both situations are presented from the perspective (and viewed through the moral lens) of Mr. Marin, a French teacher at the school, who at the start of the film is beginning his fourth year. This is a refreshing approach since so many films of this particular genre (if you choose to call it that) find a fresh, upstart educator arriving at a run-down school with the dream of making a difference; Marin seems to just want to make it through the year. That's not to say that he doesn't want to genuinely help these kids and give them a good education, he's just not naive about his role; he knows his limits. And however you feel about films like “Lean on Me,” “Dead Poets Society,” and (yuck) “Dangerous Minds,” I still think you'll find Cantet's dynamic to be a nice change of pace, as well as an effective way of capturing the natural back-and-forth between teacher and student.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">In my opinion, it's the best film made about this subject that I've seen. Like Nicolas Philibert's stellar 2003 documentary, “To Be And To Have,” Cantet's film finds beauty and fascination in the simple process of imparting knowledge to a future generation. But whereas ‘Have’ is set in a rural French village, and focuses on a kindly, middle-aged preschool teacher, “The Class” finds its principal character braving more violent waters. Unfurling over the course of a riveting two hours, Cantet's narrative feature utilizes its modest setting, a middle school in a tough inner-city Paris neighborhood, and explores universal themes of race relations and economic strife. Acting as a microcosm of modern Parisian society, the class which Mr. Marin teaches is populated by blacks, whites, and asians, who demonstrate the desire to coexist that their parents perhaps do not, as well as cautious paranoia that unearths hidden prejudices. Fascinatingly, arguments over which nation has a better sports team serve as a sort of compromise, stifling much more volatile disagreements and cultural rifts. They also serve as a reminder of the domesticity of these immigrant-born natives, one of which struggles to retain his heritage by tattooing his faith-based beliefs on his arm.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Marin and the rest of the faculty at this particular school could be viewed as those on the front lines, but to say that is to imply a metaphorical war between the two, which overly-simplifies the complex job these teachers have. They're tasked with making very tough decisions, such as the intense moral quandary which confronts them at the end of the film (its one dramatic conceit). “The Class” imparts to its audience the gravity of a teacher's choice, especially when it comes to deciding whether an act of insubordination can be treated with disciplinary action or whether that will simply inflame the behavior. More than almost any other profession, teaching requires emotional nuance and empathy, to do the job well, and Cantet and his cast clearly understand this.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">So much here could have gone wrong. The performances (everyone here is a non-actor) could have tipped too far in one direction or the other, by being either histrionic or amateurishly distracting. The script could have felt over-cooked, overtly telegraphing important information about its many characters, or singling out those who would later become more important to the story. And the filmmaking could have stifled the work's artistic merit with poorly framed shots or awkward transitioning. None of these problems present themselves, as Cantet is an extremely talented craftsman who knows how to shoot and pace a film. In fact, I find it very difficult to pinpoint any flaws “The Class” possesses, at the very least any that it does have are not worth expounding on in this review.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Cantet understands the necessity to find a cast who can play variations on themselves without actor-y pretense. These are traits which certainly don't apply to François Bégaudeau, who plays Mr. Marin in the film. His is a performance that ever-so-carefully balances sincere good-intentions with cynicism and pride, flaws and strengths of the human condition which congeal to form a full-blooded and complex character, one who embodies various contradictions. Bégaudeau may not be an actor, but he draws his inspiration for the part from a different source; he's an author, and he in fact wrote the autobiographical book of the same name which “The Class” is based on. So it's his knowledge and experience which imbue the film with both authenticity and credibility, but it's Cantet who brings it all together. Knowing when to back off and let a scene play out is a vital skill, but so is the instinct to know when it's time to get on to the next scene, and the director musters a formidable momentum all-the-more commendable when one considers the unique dramatic approach.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">This is Cantet's fourth film and of the three that I've seen it is by far his best. 2002's exceptionally crafted “Time Out” ably critiqued economic and social stigma in the modern world via its allegorical story of a man who loses his job and can't bring himself to tell his family (all the more topical now), but it was dwarfed by an often suffocating and unnatural stillness. While 2005's 70s-set Haitian drama, “Heading South,” presented a vision of race relations and exploitation between middle-aged white women and their young black escorts, yet suffered from an all-too literal approach rote with heavy-handed symbolism and predictable plot turns. Both films saw a talented director exploring important and thought-provoking themes, but leaning a bit too hard on filmmaking/screenwriting 101 crutches (the fourth-wall breaking confessionals in ‘South,’ the convenient occupational opportunity in ‘Time’). In contrast, “The Class” finds Cantet figuring it all out, fulfilling the promise he showed in his earlier films, and relying on his material and his strengths as a filmmaker to communicate with the audience on a visceral level.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Grade:<strong> 3.5/4</strong></p><br class='final-break' style='clear: both' />Sam C. Machttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16609053589969473116noreply@blogger.com0