I saw The Fighter last night, one of those movies that seems to get a gravitas bump by virtue of being released in December. Slated for wide release on 12/17, it got a week-early exclusive release in Hollywood, all part of the long-ball game known as Awards Season.
Don't get me wrong, it's not a bad movie, but it is being mis-marketed as a boxing movie and one of the lead performances throws the whole thing off-kilter because all the other elements are just so-so.
Directed by David O. Russell (aka "The Shouter," for those who have seen the footage of him and Lily Tomlin going at it on the set of his last movie, 2004's uneven I Heart Huckabees.), The Fighter nominally tells the story of Lowell, MA welterweight Micky Ward (Mark Wahlberg), footing the line between contender and 'stepping stone,' between fighter and road paver. Then there's his half-brother, Dicky Eklund (Christian Bale -- another YouTube "shouter"), the Pride of Lowell who's coasting on a long-ago Sugar Ray Leonard bout and a present-day crack habit. Their shared mother is the richly unlikeable Alice Ward, played by Melissa Leo (whom I've loved as an actress since Homicide: Life on the Streets, and is also a regular on David Simon's Treme on HBO). Mom loves, loves, loves her Dicky.
Wahlberg may outweigh him, but it's Bale who score the TKO in this film. It's impossible to take your eyes off Bale, whippet thin (though not as skeletal as in The Machinist), hyper, raised to be a narcissist by their monstrous mother but lacking the self-love to pull it off. (I'd pay money to see a cage-match between Melissa Leo's Alice from The Fighter and Jackie Weaver's Janine Cody from Animal Kingdom. Most destructive movie mom of the year. Go!). The rest of Micky's family consists of his father and seven of the skankiest sisters ever imagined, all with nicknames -- Little Alice, Pork, Tar, Red Dog, Beaver, etc. -- and ratted-out hair. This may be the most pernicious family since Faulkner's Snopes. I wanted Micky to punch ever single one of them. Hard.
It's Bale's performance that stands out, so much so that the rest of the movie can't keep up. Maybe he's tired of grunting behind the Bat-Mask, or pissed that he was blown off the screen by the likes of Sam Worthington in Terminator: Salvation (maybe he was shouting because he saw the dailies?), but it's too much, and when Dicky goes to jail and is removed from the boxing storyline it's the only time any of the other characters/performances have room to breathe.
In the end, the movie itself really seems to be about Dicky. Micky's story, like Micky, seems to just be a punching bag to bring home some box office cash, but Dicky's the golden boy (but who wants to market a movie about a crack addict? Talk about a bummer!). Ryan Gosling earned an Best Actor nomination for his role as a crack-addicted teacher in Half-Nelson (2006), a much more realistic performance than the melodramatics of The Fighter, but I wouldn't be surprised if Christian Bale gets noticed for his more showy, but ultimately lesser, work.
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
'Somewhere' Man
My friend Derrick lived at the Chateau Marmont for about a month, back in the 1990s. He had one of the garden cottages, tucked past the pool. It had a living room, kitchen, bedroom and bathroom, all very low-key homey, though. Old tile, original fixtures, kind of old money utilitarian, not the uptighty-whitey, breath-holding vibe of modern hotels. The Chateau was/is the kind of private place someone rich and famous could live at and be relatively unmolested, or consensually molested, if one so desired. It's also the setting of Sofia Coppola's new film, Somewhere.
The film begins with a metaphor: a fancy black sports car being driven in circles, coming in and away from the frame, on a track in the middle of nowhere. From the car emerges Johnny Marco (Stephen Dorff), Somewhere's directionless protagonist.
As much of a character in this film as the elegant, but sterile, high-rise of the Park Hyatt Tokyo was in Lost in Translation, the Chateau is home to Johnny, whom one can charitably assume is between gigs, much as one can assume about Stephen Dorff, an actor who has been in few films of any discernible quality. He's like Kiefer without a 24 under his belt. Let's call him Kiefer-Lite.
Kiefer-Lite falls down the stairs in the Chateau's lobby and unenergetically breaks his arm (whereas Real Kiefer wrestles Christmas trees in London hotel lobbies when he raises hell). Kiefer-Lite spends his days smoking and his nights being visited in his room by twin pole dancers (and falling asleep during their performance), and seducing women (and falling asleep, mid-lick). (Johnny's is the same room Benicio del Toro, in a sublime elevator cameo, says he met Bono in.)
Kiefer-Lite has a nice 11-year-old daughter named Cleo (Elle Fanning), who comes to visit him periodically, and then for a bit longer as her one-scene mother has some kind of melt-down that requires more me-time and conveniently forces Johnny to spend more time with his daughter. To call it quality time would be a stretch, although Cleo seems well-adjusted (she makes her dad and uncle eggs Benedict in the tiled kitchen) or maybe she has realistically low expectations for her addled father.
Kiefer-Lite goes to a press junket/photo shoot across town, where he gets verbally bitch-slapped by his former co-star (and lover). He and Cleo go to Milan for him to accept an award on a ludicrous Italian TV show (although the idea that Kiefer-Lite needs a police escort from the airport to the hotel is even more absurd). Once again he is accosted by a former co-star/lover. And so it goes.
I'm not sure what Somewhere is meant to be about. Criticizing a Sofia Coppola movie for being ephemeral would be like criticizing the Farrelly brothers for being scatological. (Clearly I wasn't the only one struggling to get a handle on Somewhere, as in the bathroom of the Hollywood theater where the film was playing, I overheard two lissome cineastes likening it to Fellini's 9 1/2. Somehow, I managed to clap a hand over my mouth in time.) Somewhere has some interesting moments/vibes, but nothing that would want to make me watch it again, whereas Lost in Translation is one of my favorite films of the last 10 years.
I've heard people complain that Lost in Translation isn't really about anything, but I couldn't disagree more. It's a film about coming to terms with marriage, the "translation" of adult love. Bill Murray's Bob is 25 years in and Scarlett Johansen's Charlotte a mere two, but both are struggling with their marriages in different ways. There is a real tenderness between Bob and Charlotte, a true connection that seems to be missing from all the relationships in Somewhere. And there's Bill Murray, who has hit his stride as an actor in films off the beaten path (especially in this film and his multiple works with Wes Anderson). It's as impossible to imagine Lost in Translation without Bill Murray as it is impossible to not imagine that Somewhere might have been a better movie with someone other than Stephen Dorff in the lead. I wonder what Kiefer Sutherland's up to these days?
The film begins with a metaphor: a fancy black sports car being driven in circles, coming in and away from the frame, on a track in the middle of nowhere. From the car emerges Johnny Marco (Stephen Dorff), Somewhere's directionless protagonist.
As much of a character in this film as the elegant, but sterile, high-rise of the Park Hyatt Tokyo was in Lost in Translation, the Chateau is home to Johnny, whom one can charitably assume is between gigs, much as one can assume about Stephen Dorff, an actor who has been in few films of any discernible quality. He's like Kiefer without a 24 under his belt. Let's call him Kiefer-Lite.
Kiefer-Lite falls down the stairs in the Chateau's lobby and unenergetically breaks his arm (whereas Real Kiefer wrestles Christmas trees in London hotel lobbies when he raises hell). Kiefer-Lite spends his days smoking and his nights being visited in his room by twin pole dancers (and falling asleep during their performance), and seducing women (and falling asleep, mid-lick). (Johnny's is the same room Benicio del Toro, in a sublime elevator cameo, says he met Bono in.)
Kiefer-Lite has a nice 11-year-old daughter named Cleo (Elle Fanning), who comes to visit him periodically, and then for a bit longer as her one-scene mother has some kind of melt-down that requires more me-time and conveniently forces Johnny to spend more time with his daughter. To call it quality time would be a stretch, although Cleo seems well-adjusted (she makes her dad and uncle eggs Benedict in the tiled kitchen) or maybe she has realistically low expectations for her addled father.
Kiefer-Lite goes to a press junket/photo shoot across town, where he gets verbally bitch-slapped by his former co-star (and lover). He and Cleo go to Milan for him to accept an award on a ludicrous Italian TV show (although the idea that Kiefer-Lite needs a police escort from the airport to the hotel is even more absurd). Once again he is accosted by a former co-star/lover. And so it goes.
I'm not sure what Somewhere is meant to be about. Criticizing a Sofia Coppola movie for being ephemeral would be like criticizing the Farrelly brothers for being scatological. (Clearly I wasn't the only one struggling to get a handle on Somewhere, as in the bathroom of the Hollywood theater where the film was playing, I overheard two lissome cineastes likening it to Fellini's 9 1/2. Somehow, I managed to clap a hand over my mouth in time.) Somewhere has some interesting moments/vibes, but nothing that would want to make me watch it again, whereas Lost in Translation is one of my favorite films of the last 10 years.
I've heard people complain that Lost in Translation isn't really about anything, but I couldn't disagree more. It's a film about coming to terms with marriage, the "translation" of adult love. Bill Murray's Bob is 25 years in and Scarlett Johansen's Charlotte a mere two, but both are struggling with their marriages in different ways. There is a real tenderness between Bob and Charlotte, a true connection that seems to be missing from all the relationships in Somewhere. And there's Bill Murray, who has hit his stride as an actor in films off the beaten path (especially in this film and his multiple works with Wes Anderson). It's as impossible to imagine Lost in Translation without Bill Murray as it is impossible to not imagine that Somewhere might have been a better movie with someone other than Stephen Dorff in the lead. I wonder what Kiefer Sutherland's up to these days?
Gritty, Gritty, Bang, Bang
True Grit is the only John Wayne movie I saw in a theater. I was 8 years old. My parents were not John Wayne fans, although I suspect my father may have harbored some admiration for him, the way a lot of men do. My parents' politics were quite farther to the left than Wayne's and things in American in 1969 were very politically divided (sound familiar?).
As a child of the NJ suburbs, I found the whole Western thing quite exotic, but with notable exceptions (Robert Altman's McCabe & Mrs. Miller and the HBO series Deadwood) I find it an easy genre to overlook, no doubt in part because so many of the female roles are so uninteresting to me, mostly a lot of prostitutes -- including Mrs. Miller -- and hardscrabble ma's.
Now come the Coen Brothers, a couple of nice Jewish boys from the suburbs of Minneapolis (A Serious Man, their last film, was a paean to their upbringing), with a Christmas release of an Old Testament story of retribution. Returning to the source material, a novel by Charles Portis, and claiming not to have seen the John Wayne film, the Brothers Coen, kings of the violently grim/whimsical genre of their own devising, have done the story justice and made a damn fine film in the process.
Jeff Bridges continues to savor his grizzled character actor status, which must be a relief of sort after years of pretty boydom (back on digital display in the new Tron reboot). With no trace of The Dude in sight, Bridges plays Reuben "Rooster" Cogburn, one-eyed Marshall of ill-repute (and irritable bowels), who is nonetheless possessed of the kind of ruthless "true grit" that prompts the 14-year-old Mattie Ross (an astonishing Hailee Steinfeld) to make hire of him to track her father's killer, a ne'er-do-well by the name of Tom Chaney (Josh Brolin). Joining the hunting party into Indian country is LaBoeuf, a vainglorious Texas Ranger chasing Chaney on a prior crime. This time around, he's played by Matt Damon, who has considerable fun jangling his spurs, but brings some shaded nuance to LaBoeuf's insecurities. (The less said about the original LaBoeuf, played by Rhinestone Cowboy Glen Campbell, the better.)
Both Cogburn and LaBoeuf are hardened mercenaries who try to leave Mattie behind, despite her insistence of witnessing Mr. Chaney's justice. After she swims her horse across a river to catch up with them, they come to respect their fiercely determined patron, dressed in the oversized coat and hat of her dead father. Naturally Chaney has fallen into the bad company of the gang headed by Lucky Ned Pepper, a nemesis of Cogburn's (played with impressive snaggle-toothiness by Barry Pepper, no relation, I hope), which ups Cogburn's emotional stakes in the business at hand.
Long stretches where nothing much happens, reflective of the pace of travel on horseback, are punctuated by crackling dry dialog and moments of explosive violence (although, for a Coen Brothers movie, the violence is less shocking than usual, and the film is rated PG-13). The stunning cinematography is by Roger Deakins, who has shot most of the Coen's films and also The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford and, oddly enough, Sid and Nancy (although think of that gorgeous, doomed-love shot of them kissing by an alley dumpster while trash floats down from the sky). The outdoors in this film is both beautiful and pitiless, especially when married into a scene of Cogburn racing through a night bursting with stars to get Mattie critical -- and far-off -- medical attention.
There is humor in True Grit, more so than in the Coens' recent modern-day Western, No Country for Old Men, but it is dry (and gritty), not the loosey-goosey stuff in Burn After Reading or O Brother, Where Art Thou?. Think of a less-verbose Deadwood, minus the "cocksuckers."
Hailee Steinfeld is truly amazing, so hat's off to the casting director who found her. Maybe I would have liked Westerns better if the original Mattie hadn't been played by a 21-year-old actress in a bob (Kim Darby), but instead by a fierce, grounded 14-year-old in braids.
And I'm somewhat amazed to remember two scenes from the original, which also appear in this film: Rooster riding at a full gallop, reins between his teeth to free up both his hands for shooting, and Rooster slicing open Mattie's snakebite and sucking the poison out of it. That struck me as an essential bit of survival skill to learn, even though I seldom encountered snakes in the wilds of suburban NJ.
As a child of the NJ suburbs, I found the whole Western thing quite exotic, but with notable exceptions (Robert Altman's McCabe & Mrs. Miller and the HBO series Deadwood) I find it an easy genre to overlook, no doubt in part because so many of the female roles are so uninteresting to me, mostly a lot of prostitutes -- including Mrs. Miller -- and hardscrabble ma's.
Now come the Coen Brothers, a couple of nice Jewish boys from the suburbs of Minneapolis (A Serious Man, their last film, was a paean to their upbringing), with a Christmas release of an Old Testament story of retribution. Returning to the source material, a novel by Charles Portis, and claiming not to have seen the John Wayne film, the Brothers Coen, kings of the violently grim/whimsical genre of their own devising, have done the story justice and made a damn fine film in the process.
Jeff Bridges continues to savor his grizzled character actor status, which must be a relief of sort after years of pretty boydom (back on digital display in the new Tron reboot). With no trace of The Dude in sight, Bridges plays Reuben "Rooster" Cogburn, one-eyed Marshall of ill-repute (and irritable bowels), who is nonetheless possessed of the kind of ruthless "true grit" that prompts the 14-year-old Mattie Ross (an astonishing Hailee Steinfeld) to make hire of him to track her father's killer, a ne'er-do-well by the name of Tom Chaney (Josh Brolin). Joining the hunting party into Indian country is LaBoeuf, a vainglorious Texas Ranger chasing Chaney on a prior crime. This time around, he's played by Matt Damon, who has considerable fun jangling his spurs, but brings some shaded nuance to LaBoeuf's insecurities. (The less said about the original LaBoeuf, played by Rhinestone Cowboy Glen Campbell, the better.)
Both Cogburn and LaBoeuf are hardened mercenaries who try to leave Mattie behind, despite her insistence of witnessing Mr. Chaney's justice. After she swims her horse across a river to catch up with them, they come to respect their fiercely determined patron, dressed in the oversized coat and hat of her dead father. Naturally Chaney has fallen into the bad company of the gang headed by Lucky Ned Pepper, a nemesis of Cogburn's (played with impressive snaggle-toothiness by Barry Pepper, no relation, I hope), which ups Cogburn's emotional stakes in the business at hand.
Long stretches where nothing much happens, reflective of the pace of travel on horseback, are punctuated by crackling dry dialog and moments of explosive violence (although, for a Coen Brothers movie, the violence is less shocking than usual, and the film is rated PG-13). The stunning cinematography is by Roger Deakins, who has shot most of the Coen's films and also The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford and, oddly enough, Sid and Nancy (although think of that gorgeous, doomed-love shot of them kissing by an alley dumpster while trash floats down from the sky). The outdoors in this film is both beautiful and pitiless, especially when married into a scene of Cogburn racing through a night bursting with stars to get Mattie critical -- and far-off -- medical attention.
There is humor in True Grit, more so than in the Coens' recent modern-day Western, No Country for Old Men, but it is dry (and gritty), not the loosey-goosey stuff in Burn After Reading or O Brother, Where Art Thou?. Think of a less-verbose Deadwood, minus the "cocksuckers."
Hailee Steinfeld is truly amazing, so hat's off to the casting director who found her. Maybe I would have liked Westerns better if the original Mattie hadn't been played by a 21-year-old actress in a bob (Kim Darby), but instead by a fierce, grounded 14-year-old in braids.
And I'm somewhat amazed to remember two scenes from the original, which also appear in this film: Rooster riding at a full gallop, reins between his teeth to free up both his hands for shooting, and Rooster slicing open Mattie's snakebite and sucking the poison out of it. That struck me as an essential bit of survival skill to learn, even though I seldom encountered snakes in the wilds of suburban NJ.
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
Here's How You Know
James L. Brooks, writer/director of the excellent Terms of Endearment and Broadcast News and producer of The Simpsons, has a new movie out. It's called How Do You Know (sans question mark).
Sadly, rather than being of the quality of his first two movies (listed above) is in more of the quality of the three that followed them: I'll Do Anything (which began as a musical, with songs by Prince, then was aborted into the Nolte + a kid mess that was released), As Good As It Gets (never a more unfortunately apt title -- plus anything that gives people the idea that Helen Hunt can act can only be the work of the devil) and Spanglish (which, of the three, I prefer most. See "damning with faint praise").
The new mishegoss stars Reese Witherspoon, Owen Wilson, Paul Rudd and Jack Nicholson (in his fourth Brooks movie) as, respectively, a pro softball player, a Washington Nationals baseball player, a businessman being investigated for wire fraud, and the businessman's father and business owner. If you question how any of these characters could be remotely intertwined, you are correct.
Reese's softball player hooks up with the Butterscotch Stallion's baseball player, gets cut from her team and undergoes some sort of lack-of-personality crisis. Paul Rudd is given the pretext of calling Reese (got her number from a teammate) so they can have a pointlessly awkward phone conversation just as he's being served notice of his wire fraud charge. He gets drunk enough to call her back and ask her on a date, during which she asks that they both eat in silence, easily my fave part of the film. Jack Nicholson shows up to hoarsely bellow, hoarsely speak and to look bloated.
I think actors like Brooks because they are always guaranteed lots of lines to speak. This used to be a good thing. So, how do you know your film has too much g.d. dialogue? When the characters speak incessantly and have nothing to say.
The verbosity of Holly Hunter's Jane and Albert Brooks' Aaron in Broadcast News is a function of character. They are a hyper-articulate TV news producer and writer who are professional & personal intimates. Debra Winger & Shirley MacLaine in Terms of Endearment are an only-child daughter & widowed mother whose lives overlap each other's without any successful attempt at boundaries, so they have a great deal to talk (and talk) about.
Reese's jockette is filled with sports platitudes and she has no real intimacy with either of the males who are rivals for her affection. She's not "unlikeable" -- which is what rumors say caused reshoots -- she's just uninteresting and has uninteresting things to say. (Reese has never played a more unlikeable character than Tracy Flick in Alexander Payne's Election -- and she's never given a better performance, either.) Ditto for Paul Rudd, whose vague niceness does not a character make. Owen Wilson's narcissist will live to find another pointy-chinned blonde, so he feels no big loss. Mostly I left the theater worried about the state of Jack Nicholson's real-life health.
Ok, I'm going to stop talking now. Full stop.
Sadly, rather than being of the quality of his first two movies (listed above) is in more of the quality of the three that followed them: I'll Do Anything (which began as a musical, with songs by Prince, then was aborted into the Nolte + a kid mess that was released), As Good As It Gets (never a more unfortunately apt title -- plus anything that gives people the idea that Helen Hunt can act can only be the work of the devil) and Spanglish (which, of the three, I prefer most. See "damning with faint praise").
The new mishegoss stars Reese Witherspoon, Owen Wilson, Paul Rudd and Jack Nicholson (in his fourth Brooks movie) as, respectively, a pro softball player, a Washington Nationals baseball player, a businessman being investigated for wire fraud, and the businessman's father and business owner. If you question how any of these characters could be remotely intertwined, you are correct.
Reese's softball player hooks up with the Butterscotch Stallion's baseball player, gets cut from her team and undergoes some sort of lack-of-personality crisis. Paul Rudd is given the pretext of calling Reese (got her number from a teammate) so they can have a pointlessly awkward phone conversation just as he's being served notice of his wire fraud charge. He gets drunk enough to call her back and ask her on a date, during which she asks that they both eat in silence, easily my fave part of the film. Jack Nicholson shows up to hoarsely bellow, hoarsely speak and to look bloated.
I think actors like Brooks because they are always guaranteed lots of lines to speak. This used to be a good thing. So, how do you know your film has too much g.d. dialogue? When the characters speak incessantly and have nothing to say.
The verbosity of Holly Hunter's Jane and Albert Brooks' Aaron in Broadcast News is a function of character. They are a hyper-articulate TV news producer and writer who are professional & personal intimates. Debra Winger & Shirley MacLaine in Terms of Endearment are an only-child daughter & widowed mother whose lives overlap each other's without any successful attempt at boundaries, so they have a great deal to talk (and talk) about.
Reese's jockette is filled with sports platitudes and she has no real intimacy with either of the males who are rivals for her affection. She's not "unlikeable" -- which is what rumors say caused reshoots -- she's just uninteresting and has uninteresting things to say. (Reese has never played a more unlikeable character than Tracy Flick in Alexander Payne's Election -- and she's never given a better performance, either.) Ditto for Paul Rudd, whose vague niceness does not a character make. Owen Wilson's narcissist will live to find another pointy-chinned blonde, so he feels no big loss. Mostly I left the theater worried about the state of Jack Nicholson's real-life health.
Ok, I'm going to stop talking now. Full stop.
Friday, December 17, 2010
MonoTRONous
You know those really cool car ads? The ones with the thumping techno music, sleek, speeding vehicles and swirling lights? They are the coolest 30 seconds of your day -- an implant of buysexybuy that makes your pulse race. Who wouldn't want to extend that feeling to a feature film length?
The problem, of course, is that a feature film requires stuff like plot, dialogue and interesting characters to sustain the buzz. And even if you manage to come up with enough of those things, some buzzes still can't be sustained. (Also, if your constant state of being is altered, how are you ever really "high"?)
I never saw the original Tron, which came out when I was in college. I know I wasn't alone in skipping it, although clearly it has influenced many films since. They don't, however, tend to be films that interest me. I'm not a player of what we used to call videogames, and I'm more of a fan of actual, rather than virtual, reality.
Last night I had to screen Tron: Legacy, a new 3D offering from Disney.
It's meant to be a sequel, wherein the son of the Jeff Bridges character (Kevin Flynn) in the original somehow follows him down the digital rabbit hole he vanished into some 20 years earlier. Not-so-young Sam Flynn, played by someone named Owen Best (who is clearly a devotee of the constipated smirk school of acting that gave us Hayden Christiansen) finds himself in some gridworld that is led by a fascist avatar named Clu, who was created by his father and who bears a deathmask version of Jeff Bridges' younger face. (And yes, Clu, your digital jumpsuit with the iradescent orange piping does make your ass look lumpy.)
As a new denizen of gridworld, Sam is obliged to reenact some scenarios from the Thunderdome Road Warrior, the Death Race remake (the one where they took the satire out) and other sundry dystopian action films (all the while, keeping the action to PG, if you please). There are sticks that turn into motorcycles, giant NuvaRings that everyone has to wear on their backs and use as detachable weapons and other assorted magical crapola.
Sam is rescued from the Thunderdome by some girl in an asymmetrical haircut who whisks him off to see his dad, now living on the outskirts of wherever in some space that resembles dying Dave's dream room from 2001: A Space Odyssey, now with Asian floor throw pillows.
Dear old actual Jeff Bridges now spouts zen and sports a kimono, with occasional dabs of The Dude thrown in. There's some sort of complication as to why dad couldn't return home (a portal that closes? maybe its meant to be a vagina -- non-phallic symbolism? Ha!) Asymmetrical Hairdo takes Sam to some weird club with thumping music in downtown Grid City that's run by an albino version of David Bowie, circa Aladdin Sane (Michael Sheen, the only one having -- or giving -- any fun in the whole film).
Various yawn-inducing complications arise -- naturally Clu wants to break free of gridworld (just like Russell Crowe did in Virtuosity) -- but Sam & Asymmetrical Hairdo manage to return to the anonymous city he lives in where they are going to "change the world." I'd be satisfied if he could change his facial expression -- start small, dude.
I can't speak to the quality of the 3D, as I took the glasses off. (I hate 3D: good movies don't need it and it won't redeem a bad script.) The audience coming out of the midnight shows seemed to really have enjoyed it, so, good for them.
But I found Tron: Legacy uninvolving on any level. I was expecting it to at least have some cool visuals -- especially when I saw a short clip of some early footage over a year ago -- but I think it comes back to my analogy at the start: brief moments of visual splendor shine in commercials but quickly become monotonous when the same tricks are used repeatedly in a feature film. (It reminds me of how keen I was to see Moulin Rouge when the trailer came out, but how turned off I was when I saw that the film itself was edited in the same epilepsy-inducing style as the trailer.)
I didn't see a single image in Tron: Legacy that could hold a candle to Inception, not to mention the novelty and creativity of telling an original story, rather than jump-starting a merchandise franchise (not that Christopher Nolan doesn't scratch that itch when he's Batmanning.).
If you like movies in this genre, by all means queue up and fork it over for Tron: Legacy. If these types of films don't appeal to you, this one will not make you change your mind.
The problem, of course, is that a feature film requires stuff like plot, dialogue and interesting characters to sustain the buzz. And even if you manage to come up with enough of those things, some buzzes still can't be sustained. (Also, if your constant state of being is altered, how are you ever really "high"?)
I never saw the original Tron, which came out when I was in college. I know I wasn't alone in skipping it, although clearly it has influenced many films since. They don't, however, tend to be films that interest me. I'm not a player of what we used to call videogames, and I'm more of a fan of actual, rather than virtual, reality.
Last night I had to screen Tron: Legacy, a new 3D offering from Disney.
It's meant to be a sequel, wherein the son of the Jeff Bridges character (Kevin Flynn) in the original somehow follows him down the digital rabbit hole he vanished into some 20 years earlier. Not-so-young Sam Flynn, played by someone named Owen Best (who is clearly a devotee of the constipated smirk school of acting that gave us Hayden Christiansen) finds himself in some gridworld that is led by a fascist avatar named Clu, who was created by his father and who bears a deathmask version of Jeff Bridges' younger face. (And yes, Clu, your digital jumpsuit with the iradescent orange piping does make your ass look lumpy.)
As a new denizen of gridworld, Sam is obliged to reenact some scenarios from the Thunderdome Road Warrior, the Death Race remake (the one where they took the satire out) and other sundry dystopian action films (all the while, keeping the action to PG, if you please). There are sticks that turn into motorcycles, giant NuvaRings that everyone has to wear on their backs and use as detachable weapons and other assorted magical crapola.
Sam is rescued from the Thunderdome by some girl in an asymmetrical haircut who whisks him off to see his dad, now living on the outskirts of wherever in some space that resembles dying Dave's dream room from 2001: A Space Odyssey, now with Asian floor throw pillows.
Dear old actual Jeff Bridges now spouts zen and sports a kimono, with occasional dabs of The Dude thrown in. There's some sort of complication as to why dad couldn't return home (a portal that closes? maybe its meant to be a vagina -- non-phallic symbolism? Ha!) Asymmetrical Hairdo takes Sam to some weird club with thumping music in downtown Grid City that's run by an albino version of David Bowie, circa Aladdin Sane (Michael Sheen, the only one having -- or giving -- any fun in the whole film).
Various yawn-inducing complications arise -- naturally Clu wants to break free of gridworld (just like Russell Crowe did in Virtuosity) -- but Sam & Asymmetrical Hairdo manage to return to the anonymous city he lives in where they are going to "change the world." I'd be satisfied if he could change his facial expression -- start small, dude.
I can't speak to the quality of the 3D, as I took the glasses off. (I hate 3D: good movies don't need it and it won't redeem a bad script.) The audience coming out of the midnight shows seemed to really have enjoyed it, so, good for them.
But I found Tron: Legacy uninvolving on any level. I was expecting it to at least have some cool visuals -- especially when I saw a short clip of some early footage over a year ago -- but I think it comes back to my analogy at the start: brief moments of visual splendor shine in commercials but quickly become monotonous when the same tricks are used repeatedly in a feature film. (It reminds me of how keen I was to see Moulin Rouge when the trailer came out, but how turned off I was when I saw that the film itself was edited in the same epilepsy-inducing style as the trailer.)
I didn't see a single image in Tron: Legacy that could hold a candle to Inception, not to mention the novelty and creativity of telling an original story, rather than jump-starting a merchandise franchise (not that Christopher Nolan doesn't scratch that itch when he's Batmanning.).
If you like movies in this genre, by all means queue up and fork it over for Tron: Legacy. If these types of films don't appeal to you, this one will not make you change your mind.
Thursday, December 16, 2010
A Dud in Venice
There's never a knife-wielding dwarf in a red raincoat when you need one.
I couldn't help but think this as I suffered through the banal "star vehicle" of The Tourist, a vehicle that resembles a garbage barge piled with reeking, witless dialogue and bored movie stars.
This is the kind of film that wants to be To Catch A Thief, one of Hitchcock's lighter films. Set on the French Riviera, To Catch A Thief (1955) drifts along on the gossamer wings of Grace Kelly's beautiful Edith Head gowns and Cary Grant's charm. It's one of those films that looks deceptively simple, but is devilishly hard to recreate.
No doubt hoping to replicate that formula of glamor and ease by using today's biggest Movie Stars, aka Angelina & Johnny, whoever green-lit The Tourist instead stuck us with a leaden effort that leaches away even the pleasure of an armchair visit to Venice. Its idea of a witty through-joke is to have a character use Spanish words instead of Italian. Que merde.
Angelina Jolie, a stick figure with vag lips & spider lashes, clomps along in too-high heels and wrestles with a too-posh accent. Johnny Depp looks like crap -- wan and puffy, like he worked out his post-signing regret with extra tiramisu at the crafts table. He has never been less memorable in a film.
The action sequences are among the lamest I've ever seen on film. In broad daylight, a foot chase on tile roofs, with no sense of peril at all. A boat chase in short canals, where no speed is possible. It's not like you can't do action in Venice -- there have been three James Bond movies with scenes shot there, including the concluding action scene of Casino Royale, with the watery demise of Bond's beloved Vesper.
The Tourist is such a lazy film, I can't even be bothered to enumerate all its flaws. And forget the waste of "talent" -- the real waste is how underused Venice is as a location in The Tourist. Venice has been an indelible setting for many films; its nighttimes of mysterious echoes and cobblestone cul-de-sacs have disoriented many a protagonist.
If you're looking to see a good film set in Venice, I suggest the following:
A Death in Venice -- Visconti's adaptation of Thomas Mann's story of forbidden (read: gay) love. Released in 1971 and starring Dirk Bogarde. Winner of Cannes Palm d'Or, Best Director, Best Actor.
Don't Look Now -- Nicholas Roeg's complex adaptation of a Daphne Du Maurier short story. Released in 1973 and starring Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie (that sex scene!) and a sinister Venice.
The Comfort of Strangers -- Paul Schrader directing a script by Harold Pinter, adapted from the Ian McEwan novella. Released in 1990. Christopher Walken, Helen Mirren, Natasha Richardson and Rupert Everett as two couples in a twisted dance. Also, Christopher Walken's father was a big man. You'll understand this later.
The Wings of the Dove -- Ian Softley's adaptation of the Henry James' 1902 novel. Released in 1997 and starring Helena Bonham Carter (both sumptuously costumed and starkers) and Linus Roache. Breathtaking, even without the TB.
I couldn't help but think this as I suffered through the banal "star vehicle" of The Tourist, a vehicle that resembles a garbage barge piled with reeking, witless dialogue and bored movie stars.
This is the kind of film that wants to be To Catch A Thief, one of Hitchcock's lighter films. Set on the French Riviera, To Catch A Thief (1955) drifts along on the gossamer wings of Grace Kelly's beautiful Edith Head gowns and Cary Grant's charm. It's one of those films that looks deceptively simple, but is devilishly hard to recreate.
No doubt hoping to replicate that formula of glamor and ease by using today's biggest Movie Stars, aka Angelina & Johnny, whoever green-lit The Tourist instead stuck us with a leaden effort that leaches away even the pleasure of an armchair visit to Venice. Its idea of a witty through-joke is to have a character use Spanish words instead of Italian. Que merde.
Angelina Jolie, a stick figure with vag lips & spider lashes, clomps along in too-high heels and wrestles with a too-posh accent. Johnny Depp looks like crap -- wan and puffy, like he worked out his post-signing regret with extra tiramisu at the crafts table. He has never been less memorable in a film.
The action sequences are among the lamest I've ever seen on film. In broad daylight, a foot chase on tile roofs, with no sense of peril at all. A boat chase in short canals, where no speed is possible. It's not like you can't do action in Venice -- there have been three James Bond movies with scenes shot there, including the concluding action scene of Casino Royale, with the watery demise of Bond's beloved Vesper.
The Tourist is such a lazy film, I can't even be bothered to enumerate all its flaws. And forget the waste of "talent" -- the real waste is how underused Venice is as a location in The Tourist. Venice has been an indelible setting for many films; its nighttimes of mysterious echoes and cobblestone cul-de-sacs have disoriented many a protagonist.
If you're looking to see a good film set in Venice, I suggest the following:
A Death in Venice -- Visconti's adaptation of Thomas Mann's story of forbidden (read: gay) love. Released in 1971 and starring Dirk Bogarde. Winner of Cannes Palm d'Or, Best Director, Best Actor.
Don't Look Now -- Nicholas Roeg's complex adaptation of a Daphne Du Maurier short story. Released in 1973 and starring Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie (that sex scene!) and a sinister Venice.
The Comfort of Strangers -- Paul Schrader directing a script by Harold Pinter, adapted from the Ian McEwan novella. Released in 1990. Christopher Walken, Helen Mirren, Natasha Richardson and Rupert Everett as two couples in a twisted dance. Also, Christopher Walken's father was a big man. You'll understand this later.
The Wings of the Dove -- Ian Softley's adaptation of the Henry James' 1902 novel. Released in 1997 and starring Helena Bonham Carter (both sumptuously costumed and starkers) and Linus Roache. Breathtaking, even without the TB.
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Dear Sundance Channel
If it was up to me, more than raindrops would be falling on the head of whichever dumbass in your marketing department thinks it's okay to paste ads into the frames of the movies you air.
Right now I'm watching Eraserhead, with a full sixteenth of the frame obstructed with three lines of copy for some crap excuse of a show called "Girls Who Like Boys/Who Like Boys"/All New Tuesday 10p.
First, David Lynch is considered a true cinematic artist and his feature debut, Eraserhead, is wondrously strange and nearly devoid of dialogue (though never silent, for the world of Lynch is an aural trip as much as it is a visual one). That the gorgeous black & white compositions in Lynch's film must give up any of the frame at all is unbelievable on a channel that pretends to promote the excellence of filmmaking.
Second, not for a New York minute will there by anything "new" on a show with that title. That shit has being going on since time immemorial (or at least as long as Judy & Liza have been around, which is basically the same thing).
You're the Sundance Channel. You should not be participating in this blight form of advertising when you run feature films. You're getting your nut covered by Chase Sapphire, after all. How's about you just put your kneepads on and air films without interruption ... or obstruction.
Right now I'm watching Eraserhead, with a full sixteenth of the frame obstructed with three lines of copy for some crap excuse of a show called "Girls Who Like Boys/Who Like Boys"/All New Tuesday 10p.
First, David Lynch is considered a true cinematic artist and his feature debut, Eraserhead, is wondrously strange and nearly devoid of dialogue (though never silent, for the world of Lynch is an aural trip as much as it is a visual one). That the gorgeous black & white compositions in Lynch's film must give up any of the frame at all is unbelievable on a channel that pretends to promote the excellence of filmmaking.
Second, not for a New York minute will there by anything "new" on a show with that title. That shit has being going on since time immemorial (or at least as long as Judy & Liza have been around, which is basically the same thing).
You're the Sundance Channel. You should not be participating in this blight form of advertising when you run feature films. You're getting your nut covered by Chase Sapphire, after all. How's about you just put your kneepads on and air films without interruption ... or obstruction.
And Now, A [Retracted] Word From Our Censors
Let me say right out of the gate that I don't believe in censorship in any way, shape or form. Write what you want, read what you want, see whatever movies or TV shows you care to, it makes no difference to me. Jackass 3D? Have at it -- it's your $18. Just don't sit in the splash zone.
You can, however, choose to abstain from whatever you want as well, or to have your children abstain from certain things until they are of sufficient maturity to process them. What age that is exactly depends on the individual child -- or on the laziness of the parents. I remember seeing the ashen face of a 7-year-old boy whose "parents" thought it would be appropriate to take him with them to Martin Scorcese's R-rated The Departed. What's the matter, had the babysitter also been shot in the fucking head that night?
Last week, I had the opportunity to attend an advance screening of Blue Valentine, a film which, until about an hour ago, was rated NC-17. Deadline Hollywood story
A sad, realistic film about a couple freefalling out of love, director Derek Cianfrance spent a dozen years bringing it to the screen. He has done so in a stunning manner, with the fearless collaboration of Michelle Williams and Ryan Gosling, two of the most authentic actors working in film today. I am loathe to say much about it in a reviewing style; it is a feeling that you must experience for yourself. One thing I can say is that this film should never have been rated NC-17.
I cannot abide the idea that some shadowy entity can side-step my fellow Americans' First Amendment rights and effectively ban a film. And make no mistake, that is what the kiss of the NC-17 rating will do for a film. NC-17 films are not shown at all by most major theater chains, and some newspapers won't even run ads for them (which is really saying a lot, given the state of newspaper ad revenues).
A bit of backstory: Ratings in the U.S. are determined by a group called the Motion Picture Association of America, MPAA for short. Wikipedia's thorough MPAA article.
A spinoff of the original Hays Code, the MPAA has several problems (apart from its loathsome purpose). One, it's a secret society, with members and criteria cloaked from public view. People who work in secrecy do so with impunity, a scenario that tends to end badly for the rest of us. The second problem with the MPAA as an organization is that it is funded by the major studios, whose films seem to slide through the process like shit through a goose. Independent films from smaller companies often lack the legal resources to fight a rating. A third problem is that the MPAA seems to have little to no issue with violence and a Victorian hysteria about sexuality, especially female sexuality.
In the Q&A that followed the Blue Valentine screening, Derek Cianfrance identified the scene with which the MPAA took issue. It's a 45-second scene of cunnilingus, with the only nudity being a single bare leg. To Cianfrance, this scene is a "dialogue piece," in that young couples 'dialogue' with each other through sex. It also has a parallel scene later in their relationship, when the woman pushes her now-husband away -- that which was so pleasurable to her earlier, no longer desired.
That's it. Oh, and I believe you see the female character's breasts at one point. No one's 'junk' is visible, just their heartbreak. Put this in contrast to the execrable Love & Other Drugs (rated R & marketed heavily to young adults), in which you repeatedly see Anne Hathaway's breasts and Jake Gyllenhaal's buffed-to-a-shine ass. I would say the nudity in that film is gratuitous, except that without it there really is no other reason for its existence.
Blue Valentine is being released with its fresh-on-appeal R rating by the Weinstein Company on December 31 (bug your local theater about getting it), but another R-rated Weinstein film is already in theaters.
The King's Speech, which lost its appeal, is a genteel film stuck with an R due to a scene in which a speech therapist portrayed by Geoffrey Rush is attempting to shock away the hellacious stutter of the future King George VI (Colin Firth) by having him use profanity. For that, no Americans under the age of 17 can see the film without their mum or da in attendance.
Update: Alas, I wish the following was true, however The King's Speech has retained its R, despite the erroneous report I read earlier this afternoon. Curses, foiled again. [Original, now in error: In an amazing turn of events today, not only was Blue Valentine's NC-17 changed to an R on appeal, but the rating of The King's Speech has been lowed to PG-13. Pip-pip, cheerio and it's about fucking time.]
Harvey Weinstein really showed some brass balls by making the MPAA appeal for Blue Valentine personally. However, if he had done this literally, instead of figuratively, it would have gotten an NC-17.
You can, however, choose to abstain from whatever you want as well, or to have your children abstain from certain things until they are of sufficient maturity to process them. What age that is exactly depends on the individual child -- or on the laziness of the parents. I remember seeing the ashen face of a 7-year-old boy whose "parents" thought it would be appropriate to take him with them to Martin Scorcese's R-rated The Departed. What's the matter, had the babysitter also been shot in the fucking head that night?
Last week, I had the opportunity to attend an advance screening of Blue Valentine, a film which, until about an hour ago, was rated NC-17. Deadline Hollywood story
A sad, realistic film about a couple freefalling out of love, director Derek Cianfrance spent a dozen years bringing it to the screen. He has done so in a stunning manner, with the fearless collaboration of Michelle Williams and Ryan Gosling, two of the most authentic actors working in film today. I am loathe to say much about it in a reviewing style; it is a feeling that you must experience for yourself. One thing I can say is that this film should never have been rated NC-17.
I cannot abide the idea that some shadowy entity can side-step my fellow Americans' First Amendment rights and effectively ban a film. And make no mistake, that is what the kiss of the NC-17 rating will do for a film. NC-17 films are not shown at all by most major theater chains, and some newspapers won't even run ads for them (which is really saying a lot, given the state of newspaper ad revenues).
A bit of backstory: Ratings in the U.S. are determined by a group called the Motion Picture Association of America, MPAA for short. Wikipedia's thorough MPAA article.
A spinoff of the original Hays Code, the MPAA has several problems (apart from its loathsome purpose). One, it's a secret society, with members and criteria cloaked from public view. People who work in secrecy do so with impunity, a scenario that tends to end badly for the rest of us. The second problem with the MPAA as an organization is that it is funded by the major studios, whose films seem to slide through the process like shit through a goose. Independent films from smaller companies often lack the legal resources to fight a rating. A third problem is that the MPAA seems to have little to no issue with violence and a Victorian hysteria about sexuality, especially female sexuality.
In the Q&A that followed the Blue Valentine screening, Derek Cianfrance identified the scene with which the MPAA took issue. It's a 45-second scene of cunnilingus, with the only nudity being a single bare leg. To Cianfrance, this scene is a "dialogue piece," in that young couples 'dialogue' with each other through sex. It also has a parallel scene later in their relationship, when the woman pushes her now-husband away -- that which was so pleasurable to her earlier, no longer desired.
That's it. Oh, and I believe you see the female character's breasts at one point. No one's 'junk' is visible, just their heartbreak. Put this in contrast to the execrable Love & Other Drugs (rated R & marketed heavily to young adults), in which you repeatedly see Anne Hathaway's breasts and Jake Gyllenhaal's buffed-to-a-shine ass. I would say the nudity in that film is gratuitous, except that without it there really is no other reason for its existence.
Blue Valentine is being released with its fresh-on-appeal R rating by the Weinstein Company on December 31 (bug your local theater about getting it), but another R-rated Weinstein film is already in theaters.
The King's Speech, which lost its appeal, is a genteel film stuck with an R due to a scene in which a speech therapist portrayed by Geoffrey Rush is attempting to shock away the hellacious stutter of the future King George VI (Colin Firth) by having him use profanity. For that, no Americans under the age of 17 can see the film without their mum or da in attendance.
Update: Alas, I wish the following was true, however The King's Speech has retained its R, despite the erroneous report I read earlier this afternoon. Curses, foiled again. [Original, now in error: In an amazing turn of events today, not only was Blue Valentine's NC-17 changed to an R on appeal, but the rating of The King's Speech has been lowed to PG-13. Pip-pip, cheerio and it's about fucking time.]
Harvey Weinstein really showed some brass balls by making the MPAA appeal for Blue Valentine personally. However, if he had done this literally, instead of figuratively, it would have gotten an NC-17.
The Freak Flag of Jim Carrey
I have mixed reactions to most Jim Carrey films. I cannot abide his mainstream films like Liar, Liar or the distracting hyperactivity he brought to Horton Hears a Who, but I think he really shines in roles that are as far out there as possible. Think Hank in the Farrelly Brothers' Me, Myself & Irene.
His latest, I Love You Phillip Morris is very outre indeed, and all the better for it. It's gaygaygay, as Carrey's true-life character Steven Russell might say, but it's other things as well. It is at its core a love story, and despite the external trappings, has enough universal elements that it's both disappointing and puzzling that the film has struggled to be released (although much of it has to do with the business side of the film's distribution). The long and short of it is that it is not playing in many theaters, and that's unlikely to change, especially given how crowded with product theaters are this time of year. I can't help thinking they should have waited and released it for Valentine's Day weekend.
Steven Russell's living the con of a Christian straight life in Virginia Beach (a cop, just like Hank's meek other, Charlie), then as a produce seller in Texas, but chucks it all to come out and live high off the hog in Miami, the problem being how expensive a proposition that is. Soon, he's living the life of a financial con man, and then one as an incarcerated felon.
They "meet cute" in the prison library -- Steven and the wispy Phillip Morris (a blondblondblond Ewan McGregor). Soon they are swooning in smuggled correspondence, and when Steven hustles a cell transfer, the lovebirds slow dance to Johnny Mathis while the Texas Penal System burns around them.
The sexuality is frank -- Phillip blows Steven the minute he enters his cell -- but no more so than in other films (see Love & Other Drugs in current release -- or better yet, save your money and wait until it's on cable. Or better still, don't see it at all.). Mostly there is lots of kissing and eyes-locked romance -- this is love, not a hookup.
When they get out of prison, Steven cons his way into a job as a CFO (don't let those reference calls stand in your way) and finds a genius way to make his company some extra money, but keep a "finder's fee" to keep Phillip in style. And I wouldn't dream of revealing his final con, which stands "acceptably gay" films like Philadelphia on their ear. (Not that I take issue with Philadelphia as a film, just the idea that gay = tragic that has been used in mainstream films.)
I Love You, Phillip Morris provides one of the year's most indelible screen images: Jim Carrey in red leather hotpants, fishnet stockings & heels, proudly strutting down a prison corridor, escaping both prison and convention. Long may he strut.
His latest, I Love You Phillip Morris is very outre indeed, and all the better for it. It's gaygaygay, as Carrey's true-life character Steven Russell might say, but it's other things as well. It is at its core a love story, and despite the external trappings, has enough universal elements that it's both disappointing and puzzling that the film has struggled to be released (although much of it has to do with the business side of the film's distribution). The long and short of it is that it is not playing in many theaters, and that's unlikely to change, especially given how crowded with product theaters are this time of year. I can't help thinking they should have waited and released it for Valentine's Day weekend.
Steven Russell's living the con of a Christian straight life in Virginia Beach (a cop, just like Hank's meek other, Charlie), then as a produce seller in Texas, but chucks it all to come out and live high off the hog in Miami, the problem being how expensive a proposition that is. Soon, he's living the life of a financial con man, and then one as an incarcerated felon.
They "meet cute" in the prison library -- Steven and the wispy Phillip Morris (a blondblondblond Ewan McGregor). Soon they are swooning in smuggled correspondence, and when Steven hustles a cell transfer, the lovebirds slow dance to Johnny Mathis while the Texas Penal System burns around them.
The sexuality is frank -- Phillip blows Steven the minute he enters his cell -- but no more so than in other films (see Love & Other Drugs in current release -- or better yet, save your money and wait until it's on cable. Or better still, don't see it at all.). Mostly there is lots of kissing and eyes-locked romance -- this is love, not a hookup.
When they get out of prison, Steven cons his way into a job as a CFO (don't let those reference calls stand in your way) and finds a genius way to make his company some extra money, but keep a "finder's fee" to keep Phillip in style. And I wouldn't dream of revealing his final con, which stands "acceptably gay" films like Philadelphia on their ear. (Not that I take issue with Philadelphia as a film, just the idea that gay = tragic that has been used in mainstream films.)
I Love You, Phillip Morris provides one of the year's most indelible screen images: Jim Carrey in red leather hotpants, fishnet stockings & heels, proudly strutting down a prison corridor, escaping both prison and convention. Long may he strut.
Friday, December 3, 2010
Mr. Aronofsky's Wild Ride -- Now With Tutus
If there's one thing I've learned from Darren Aronofsky's last two films, it's that jobs that require you to wear leotards are really hard work. For both Mickey Rourke in "The Wrestler" and Natalie Portman in Aronofsky's new film, "Black Swan" (opening today in 18 theaters and moving into wider release next weekend), the elasticized second skins they wear seems to be the only thing holding them together.
Natalie Portman's Nina is a ballerina whose face is a near-frozen rictus of fear. Raised by an infantalizing stage mother (played by Barbara Hershey), Nina lives in a girly dream world turned nightmare, keep in a pink-walled uterus of a room, haunted to sleep by her music box (which plays Tchaikovsky's "Swan Lake," of course) and stared down by an army of stuffed animals.
Nina is a lonely practitioner of the most sadomasochistic of the arts. To say her life revolves around the ballet is wrong; without the ballet, she would have no existence at all.
The closed, competitive world of the corps has left the paranoid Nina with only rivals. The arrival of a new dancer from San Francisco (Mila Kunis) is enough to cause Nina to fall off her toes, mid-audition.
Despite the justifiable doubts of Tomas, the director (the always dangerous French actor, Vincent Cassel), as to whether Nina has what it takes to play both the White (chaste) and the Black (seductress) Swan, he awards her the role of the Swan Queen to which she so nervously aspires.
Her big break quickly turns into her Big Break.
Yes, there are parts of the film that are melodramatic and over-the-top, but the immersion in the specifics of this world (such as when the camera joins the dances) is so complete, that I just went with it (especially when the music took over -- I'll never hear it quite the same way again). Performances are all good with the exception of Winona Ryder as the aging prima ballerina being given the boot -- she was an over-the-top character I wasn't buying. But Natalie Portman was riveting -- just the right classic look for this character (but then you look around at the rest of the corps and they are all little bun-wearing, gamine beauties. Ain't life unfair sometimes?).
Nina's total commitment to her role is mesmerizing; to find her inner Black Swan comes with a price, and like the White Swan, her release is final.
Natalie Portman's Nina is a ballerina whose face is a near-frozen rictus of fear. Raised by an infantalizing stage mother (played by Barbara Hershey), Nina lives in a girly dream world turned nightmare, keep in a pink-walled uterus of a room, haunted to sleep by her music box (which plays Tchaikovsky's "Swan Lake," of course) and stared down by an army of stuffed animals.
Nina is a lonely practitioner of the most sadomasochistic of the arts. To say her life revolves around the ballet is wrong; without the ballet, she would have no existence at all.
The closed, competitive world of the corps has left the paranoid Nina with only rivals. The arrival of a new dancer from San Francisco (Mila Kunis) is enough to cause Nina to fall off her toes, mid-audition.
Despite the justifiable doubts of Tomas, the director (the always dangerous French actor, Vincent Cassel), as to whether Nina has what it takes to play both the White (chaste) and the Black (seductress) Swan, he awards her the role of the Swan Queen to which she so nervously aspires.
Her big break quickly turns into her Big Break.
Yes, there are parts of the film that are melodramatic and over-the-top, but the immersion in the specifics of this world (such as when the camera joins the dances) is so complete, that I just went with it (especially when the music took over -- I'll never hear it quite the same way again). Performances are all good with the exception of Winona Ryder as the aging prima ballerina being given the boot -- she was an over-the-top character I wasn't buying. But Natalie Portman was riveting -- just the right classic look for this character (but then you look around at the rest of the corps and they are all little bun-wearing, gamine beauties. Ain't life unfair sometimes?).
Nina's total commitment to her role is mesmerizing; to find her inner Black Swan comes with a price, and like the White Swan, her release is final.
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
The Woodman
It's both Woody Allen's 75th birthday and the first night of Hanukah? Grammy Hall would be so pleased. And for all you haters, Woody and Soon-Yi will be celebrating their 13th wedding anniversary later this month. Lace is traditional; textiles or furs are the modern gifts.
Hazard Pay
Bad news/good news scenario: I had to watch "Burlesque," but got paid to do it. Christina Aguilera has some killer pipes, but no screen presence -- she's about as good an "actress" as Jessica Alba. The story was a sack of familiar tropes, but at least there were no day-job welding scenes. Stanley Tucci's playing the same sidekick he was in "The Devil Wears Prada," and having Alan Cumming wasted in a cameo only makes me wish I was watching "Cabaret" instead. Cher's embalmer did a heck of a job, though.
Grease Spots
Ugh... I managed to squirt butter on my face & all down my shirt last Saturday working in concessions. Didn't burn myself, but it definitely required a Silkwood shower when I got home. At least it was real butter.
Conventional Wisdom is Only the First Part
People like to handicap the Oscar race based on what the geezers in the Academy (of which there are more than a few) will like and historical weepies seem to be popular. However, now that people who came of age in the industry in the 1960s, like Warren Beatty & Jack Nicholson, are approaching geezerdom, I suspect (nay, hope) we may see a shift in what types of films the Academy will embrace.
Speech, speech
"The King's Speech" was very good. Well-crafted, entertaining, and the acting duet between Colin Firth & Geoffrey Rush was outstanding. Best film of the year? Not so much, but it's a pleasure to watch.
Yuletide Greetings
The Grinch song on the mall muzak, lights strung on the top of the Capitol Records building, watching cranes affix the twin pompadours of (young & old) Jeff Bridges on a TRON billboard. Yep, it's beginning to feel a lot like an LA Christmas.
Dear Casting Director of "Love & Other Drugs"
No one on this Earth could possibly believe that the Jonah Hill-wannabe cast as Jake Gyllenhal's brother in your film shares a single speck of DNA with him.
Welcome to the Cineplex ... of my mind
I'm a fairly sharp person who happens to work at a movie theater, so I see a lot of movies. Actually, I've been an avid moviegoer my whole life. It's what my family did instead of church on weekends, and to this day I'll take a matinee over a sermon every time.
Even a matinee of "Jonah Hex."
I'll be posting periodic film reviews and observations from life in the popcorn-slinging trade, all coming to a virtual theater near you.
Even a matinee of "Jonah Hex."
I'll be posting periodic film reviews and observations from life in the popcorn-slinging trade, all coming to a virtual theater near you.
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