Inception

And then the street just stops and things start exploding, but not real explosions with fireballs and stuff like that, but disintegrations upon disintegrations as the very fabric of the universe comes apart. Yet noone gets hurt and noone seems to notice, except for the ones doing the dreaming and building and destroying the world and trying to figure out what’s real and what isn’t.

The girl from JUNO and the guy from “Third Rock” who did that great SNL monologue last season and the dude who played the medium in DRAG ME TO HELL and Cillian Murphy and some underwear model and that Watanabe cat from LETTERS FROM IWO JIMA and even the guy who played the good sergeant in PLATOON jump from one dream to the next, from dreams to dreams within dreams, reality shifting and colliding and rules changing. Some of them work for Leonardo DiCaprio, who has transformed into a Consequential Actor, and DiCaprio works for at least one of them, in a way, and then there’s this French woman whose character is named Mal (which either means Bad or that Christopher Nolan is a Browncoat) and she screws everything up, as French women are known to do, but we can’t know if she’s alive or dead because Nolan has written and directed his film with ambiguity in mind.

In an interview, DiCaprio likened the film to 8½, and I can see what he’s going for, because the last time my bride and I saw 8½, we had to call the sitter for extra time while we went to a café and had coffee and hashed it out again and again and again, as I imagine we will do from time to time until one of us dies. Since this film is more overtly a puzzle, however, I don’t know how much staying power the proposition has because at some point you just say, “Nolan is screwing with us” and leave it at that.

That’s the problem with ambiguity, at least in terms of plot. You, as the audience member, walk out of the film with these amazing images burning in your mind and the story you’ve just experienced coalescing to a digestible narrative, visions and characters and actors and ideas all jumbled together but slowly, as you digest them, smoothing out.

Once things do smooth out, you’re left with a puzzle, but not a thematic puzzle or a character development puzzle. You’re left with an analytic puzzle, trying to put together pieces that have been created to not quite fit. And you feel at bit let down, like there wasn’t as much there as you’d thought.

And you go on and see the next picture or go back to work and the movie subsides into your subconscious and, perhaps, into your dreams. And you think that you’ll try to see it again on the big screen and you may see it on DVD when it hits there and you’re glad you’ve kept up with the zeitgeist but the monologue keeps unspooling and there wasn’t enough there to merit night after night of consideration, nothing like a WOMAN IN THE DUNES that stick with you and reappears in your imagination even when you’re not necessarily even thinking about movies because it’s that damn good.

But you keep coming back to that exploding streetcorner and those cobblestones and chairs breaking into smaller and smaller pieces and you think, “Wow, that’s big-time summer filmmaking” and you think about the fact that even as you dismiss INCEPTION you’re still thinking about it and you respect it enough to try something completely different even though it probably won’t work and hey, maybe you’re wrong.

Maybe you’ve just seen Real Art.

Zombieland

We’ve seen the zombie horror film, the zombie action film, even the zombie romantic comedy.  What’s next?  With ZOMBIELAND, it’s the zombie coming of age film.

I’ve gotta tell ya – I like zombies.  They’re great monsters, defying all logic (How does zombie metabolism work?  What do they eat when they run out of brains?  Why don’t we ever see Harryhausenesque skeleton zombies?  Ok, that last one’s easy – because then they’d be scary skeletons, not zombies.  Work with me here, people.).  Like great monsters, artists can adapt them to nearly any kind of story.  And they’re cheap to make – get a bunch of college kids together, buy ‘em thrift store clothes, cover them in corn starch and licorice (for that dried blood look), and feed ‘em chicken wings and beer for a day, and you’ve got half your cast right there.  And I like coming of age stories.  It’s hard to find one’s place in life, and it’s easy to relate to other who are trying to do so.  Put the two together, and you have a win on concept alone.

Fortunately, ZOMBIELAND works not just in concept, but execution.  Jesse Eisenberg (also known as Michael Cera’s Michael Cera), desperately needs to find his place in the world.  Yeah, he needs to find his place in a world filled with zombies, but still.  He needs a role model, a girl friend, and someone to look up to him.  Can he do it?  Well, will college kids work for chicken wings and beer?  There you go.  The story bops along from one episode to the next, maintaining its sardonic sense of humor and its joy of zombie smashing throughout.  It never stops being fun, it never stops having fun, and it never ceases to entertain.

Yeah, SHAUN OF THE DEAD covered much of the same territory and, frankly, did much of it better.  But ZOMBIELAND does fine.  If you like zombies and you like coming of age stories, you’re sure to like ZOMBIELAND.

Salt

SALT is the best American escapist fantasy spy thriller I’ve seen since THE BOURNE IDENTITY.

The best spy thrillers I’ve seen since THE BOURNE IDENTITY are ARMY OF SHADOWS (about the French Resistance), BODY OF LIES (Iraq), BLACK BOOK (Dutch Resistance), and FLAME AND CITRON (Danish Resistance), but they were entirely different animals. They were about plausible people doing heroic things in tough situations, while SALT is about superhuman people doing heroic things in tough situations.

Angelina Jolie plays Evelyn Salt, a superhuman CIA agent whom the world has passed by. She’s a Cold Warrior, a fluent Russian speaker and #2 in the covert side of CIA’s Russia Section (You know she’s important because she shares a cubicle with #1. That’s government work for ya.), but the Cold War’s been over for a long time. What’s left? Ferreting secrets out of the North Koreans (Here’s the supersecret debrief on DPRK: its government is not acting in the best interests of its people. And it has nukes.)? But then a Russian defector walks into her supposedly secret office building, accuses her of being a Russian mole, and the game is on.

Strap in for an hour and fifteen minutes of stunts, chases, gunfights, and stuff blowing up real good. It’s well-done work, mostly practical and perfectly choreographed, anchored with a tough yet ambivalent Jolie performance that keeps us guessing as to her real allegiance. Add fine supporting performances by the reliably excellent Chiwetel Ejiofor and Liev Schreiber and a script with plenty of twists and turns, and you’re in for a good time at the movies.

I didn’t even want to see this picture – it started half an hour before INCEPTION and my wife and I were pressed for time – but SALT showed me a great time at the movies. Color me very pleasantly surprised.

Beer Wars

BEER WARS begins with a confessional: the writer, director, and star tells us (I paraphrase), “I ran Mike’s Hard Lemonade (Slogan: Helping high school girls get pregnant since 1999!) until I got tired of corporate bullshit.  Then I quit and tried my hand at venture capital, living in an ashram, and basically screwing around on my cushion of money.  I got bored after a while and decided to make this documentary about how evil big companies don’t roll over and let little companies eat their lunch.  Share my post-hippie, comfortably wealthy outrage.”

Well, la de da.

The rest of us work for a living, lady.  So excuse me if I don’t share your anger at Wal Mart (selling good stuff at low prices to people who couldn’t otherwise afford it), Microsoft (revolutionizing humanity’s relationship with information), and Anheuser Busch (Slogan: helping high school boys work up the courage to hit on high school girls since 1852!).

Watching this film, I felt like I’d just been cornered at a cocktail party by the most loathsome person within three city blocks.  Not only was her manifest self-fascination repulsive, her scattershot approach to her subject matter prevented her from building a coherent, compelling case.

Her thesis goes as follows:  Gigantic beer companies, in cahoots with legally sanctioned distributers, conspire to keep smaller companies from reducing their market share.  Ok, this could be interesting.  Make the case that monopolistic behavior is stunting entrepreneurship and call me to arms.  Dilettante filmmaker Anat Baron kills the interest, however, by wasting my time with the story of an entrepreneur flogging a poorly conceived and ultimately unappealing brand of beer (The hook: it has caffeine!  What about tasting good?).  She’d have done much better by focusing all her attention on Sam Calagione, who doesn’t get nearly enough screen time.  Calagione runs Dogfish Head Brewing Company, and he has two things going for him: he’s charismatic and he makes great beer.  I’d have learned more, and been more entertained, by following this guy around for a year.  Wanna show me how megabreweries, with armies of lawyers and harems of politicians, keep the little guy down?  Don’t squawk it at me: just let me watch it unfold as Calagione fights his legal, commercial, and political battles against steep odds.  Stay focused: that’s how you’ll entertain and inform me.

Or just sail around the world or something – whatever self-satisfied rich people do.  I don’t want to hear about it.

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs

UP has spoiled the genre of children’s animation. Where I used to be content with a mildly amusing light show to wow my kids, UP has conditioned me to expect a real, substantial film that will also wow my kids. CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS exists only to wow my kids, so the best I could do was to kind of hum along.

Here’s the idea: a quirky inventor on a small island off America’s East Coast creates a device that turns raindrops into food. Chaos ensues, love happens, we get a few jokes, and everyone learns a Valuable Life Lesson.

That’s it, and it’s fine, but it ain’t UP. There’s nothing in this kids’ film that adults don’t already know, so mom and dad are forced to rely on spectacle to get them through. CLOUDY has plenty of spectacle and it wowed my kids, so I shouldn’t complain.

It isn’t fair, and it isn’t CLOUDY’s fault. But I want another UP.

Notes on Some Films

I don't have much time to write at the moment, so I'll submit these brief notes on the films I've seen the last couple of weeks.

ZOMBIELAND

A fun, but ultimately forgettable, take on the zombie genre. Doesn't do anything that SHAUN OF THE DEAD doesn't do better.

THE GREEN ZONE

Two hours of a guy solving a mystery we already know all too well. Nice job of capturing military culture, and look out for another great performance from the undervalued Greg Kinnear.

CLASH OF THE TITANS.

Not nearly as bad as I'd feared. My kids are going to love this.

THE GHOST WRITER

A perfectly fine, if (again) forgettable thriller.

A PROPHET

Brilliant, harrowing, nail-biting slice of life in the modern French penal system. One of the best films I've seen this year.

HAMLET 2

I chuckled all the way through this clever little dark comedy. Rock me, sexy Jesus!

MacGruber

One of my favorite forms of comedy is out-of-place vulgarity or obscenity.  I don’t know why, but the unexpected intrusion of the gutter into the world of propriety gets me every time.  MACGRUBER loves vulgarity and obscenity, but it spends so much time with them that it never creates a proper world for them to upset.  MACGRUBER only offers vulgarity and obscenity.  It wears us down and wears us out, and it does so early in the film.  Since it has little else to offer, it becomes a slog to the credits, punctuated by the occasional chuckler but not much else.

The film, a feature – length version of a recurring “Saturday Night Live” sketch mocking “MacGuyver,” brings MacGruber out of retirement to foil Val Kilmer’s evil plan to blow up Washington, D.C. (which, since I live in the DC metropolitan area, I don’t find particularly amusing).  It’s a serviceable framework on which to hang an hour and a half’s worth of jokes, when the jokes are good (Note: one joke does stand out, a REAL GENIUS sight gag that made me chuckle.  But that’s about it.).  When the jokes are bad, it’s a groan-inducing, tiresomely hackneyed plot whose only twist is its lack of a twist.  Ouch.

MACGRUBER is one of the worst films I’ve seen this year.  Save your money.

Up in the Air

UP IN THE AIR hits close to home.  The film, about a guy (George Clooney) who spends so much time on the road that he becomes unmoored, strikes me as a personal, cautionary tale of what I could become.

I'm a professional pilot.  I’m writing this in a hotel room.  I know many of the TSA agents at airports in DC and New York, I have a system for getting through airport security in the minimum possible time, and I can move into or out of a hotel room in five minutes.  I use the express lanes at car rental counters and I scoff at Clooney’s Travel Pro rollerboard, knowing that real pros go with Luggage Works.  I’m not entirely like him, however.  I don’t pick up women in hotel bars: I watch movies and Skype my family.

And there it is: family.  I’ve still got one, unlike many people in my profession, because I work to keep those ties strong and because when I’m home, I’m completely home.  But there’s always more money to make, and I make that money by going away.  If I chase too much money, if I go away too often, I could unmoore just like Clooney.  And then where would I be?  Alone in one hotel room after another, mistaking professional courtesy for actual goodwill.

Yeah, UP IN THE AIR isn’t quite so much a feel-good movie.  It is, however, an excellent one.  First, it pulls off the superhuman feat of making us identify with George Clooney.  Second, it builds a compelling story around him and his dawning realization that being unmoored is not synonymous with freedom.  Third, it personalizes the massive downsizing that resulted from our recent (and ongoing) economic turmoil.

But for me, its greatest value is as a cautionary tale.  I don’t want to be like George Clooney.  How many movies can get a guy to say that?

Daybreakers

Hey, who put the science fiction in my horror movie?

DAYBREAKERS looks like a horror movie, with vampires, crossbows, and buckets of gore. In its heart, however, it’s a science fiction movie. Why? Because it does what good science fiction does: it uses its milieu to comment on an issue of the day.

DAYBREAKERS flips over THE OMEGA MAN and gives us vampire civilization. They’ve won, and the few remaining humans are hunted or farmed, but the supply is running low. That’s a problem, ‘cause vamps gotta eat and pig blood is running low, too. Scientists labor to create artificial blood, but the work is not going well. Now what?

Sound familiar? I think somebody took “blood for oil” and ran with it. Good for them.

Narratively, the film relies on a standard “fugitive” structure, using gun battles, close escapes, and a poorly fleshed out love interest to keep things moving along. It’s effective enough, and the performances are fine, and the film does maintain a good balance of action and horror. However, as with many science fiction stories, the ideas are more compelling than the plot. What will the world look like when the oil’s about to run out? How will we adapt? This is interesting stuff, packaged for the genre audience, and delivered well.

Nice.

Notorious

How can anyone watch NOTORIOUS and not fall in love?  Ingrid Bergman is luminous and tortured and vulnerable and brave.  Cary grant is stylish and capable and conflicted and cool.  In a film that could have gotten away with “These are currently the two most beautiful people in the world.  Darwin demands that they mate,” NOTORIOUS gives these characters actual stories and conflicts and reasons to get involved.  All that and a spy thriller that turns even the details of catering into nail-biting, suspenseful business.  This is as good as Alfred Hitchcock movies get – and Alfred Hitchcock movies get very good.

 

Begin with Bergman as Alicia Huberman, the notorious woman of the title.  Her father is a felon, convicted for treason shortly after WWII.  She’s a party girl, the kind who, decades later, would feature on tabloid covers and scandal websites.  But when the government recruits her to fly to Rio serve as a honey pot to ensnare Claude Rains, she’s up for the task.  Never mind that maybe she doesn’t want to party until the wheels come off.  Never mind that maybe she’s about finished with her postadolescent rebellion.  Never mind that she’s in love with her handler and her heart breaks a little more every minute that she works at her assignment.  She has a job and she’s going to do it, even though it will probably get her killed.

Go on to Grant, the handler.  He’s an intelligence man, worldly and cynical.  He’s so cool that he’s, well, he’s Cary Grant.  He recruits Bergman, he gets her to Rio, and he sets her up to meet Rains.  Never mind that he’s in love with his agent.  Never mind that it kills him to see her and her mark together.  Never mind that he won’t allow himself to believe in her best self.  And never mind that his heart is breaking every minute she works at her assignment.  She has a job and he’s going to see her through it, even though it will probably get her killed.

These two characters must be together, need to be together.  The film’s genius lies in its manipulation of audience antici … pation, separating them through their roles in life, their senses of duty, the real danger presented by Rains and his Nazi cohort.  I dare you to watch it and not have your heart break.  I dare you to watch it and not fall in love.

The A-Team

Y’know, I’m all about character and story and craftsmanship and art.  I love for films to challenge me, to bring me into cultures I don’t understand and introduce me to people I don’t know.  I like to think and I like to revel in beautiful cinematography and music.  I also like to watch stuff blow up real good. 

THE A-TEAM blows up lots of stuff real good.  Not only that, it features Herc action.  Hot Herc action.  Lots and lots of hot Herc action.  A C-130 Hercules takes out a squadron of F/A-18s.  A Herc engages in a protracted air combat duel with a couple of fighter drones (oh yeah, and treats us to a full flare show, in the process).  A Herc even brings the thunder with an airstrike that blows up stuff better than real good – it blows stuff up real real good.  Hercs can do anything, and THE A-TEAM does everything with them.  Awesome.

The hot Herc action is so awesome, in fact, that it overcomes the film’s disregard for the laws of physics, the basics of military life, and even the destructive potential of weapons like the rocket-propelled grenade.  It overcomes the film’s quick-cut editing style, a style that often made me wonder who was doing what to whom and why.  It even overcomes the fact that the members of the A-Team fascinate themselves more than they do us.  You can get away with a lot when you pile on the Herc porn.

The Flowers of St. Francis

Perhaps I’m lost.

THE FLOWERS OF ST FRANCIS, an Italian film about the early ministry of St. Francis of Assisi and his followers, is supposed to retell beloved parts of Francis’s tale to the faithful. I think we’re supposed to be inspired by the faith, the humility of Francis and his followers.

All I saw was a bunch of lunatics wandering around in the mud.

Humility, service, sacrifice – I get it. But when Francis remonstrates with one of his disciples for “trying to hurt brother fire” by not putting enough fuel under the cooking pot, all I can think is, “Brother Fire? Are you kidding me?” When Francis tells one of his disciples that true happiness can be found by hassling people (in the middle of the night) to serve Jesus as they do, all I can think is, “I’d call the cops if these guys banged on my door at three in the morning.”

Am I supposed to see these guys as role models? As examples of perfect faith? If so, then my practical Lutheranism ain’t cuttin’ it. Perhaps THE FLOWERS OF ST FRANCIS is actually subersive, designed to make us question the activities it beatifies.

Regardless, this film made me spend too much time in utter mystification to work as an entertainment. For me, THE FLOWERS OF ST FRANCIS represented an hour and forty-five minutes of wondering, “What were they thinking?”

The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call - New Orleans

I am so happy to have Nicolas Cage back.

The man’s career began so well, with idiosyncratic work in commercial films like VALLEY GIRL and RAISING ARIZONA.  But then he went for the money, shaming himself in the unwatchable CON AIR and pandering to audiences with pictures like WIND TALKERS and BANGKOK DANGEROUS.  Sure, there was the occasional LORD OF WAR or the wackiness of GHOST RIDER to remind us Cage still harbored that spark of genius, but I thought that the risk-taking phase of the man’s career had passed.

KICK-ASS seemed a fluke, a one-off.  But THE BAD LIEUTENANT: PORT OF CALL -NEW ORLEANS confirms that Nicolas Cage has dialed himself back in.  Not only is he crazy as hell in this remake of BAD LIEUTENANT, he’s also absolutely outstanding as a physical actor.

It begins with the walk.  Early in the film, Cage’s character (the eponymous bad lieutenant) injures his back.  The actor walks like a guy with a bad back, a guy who’s trying to gut out his pain and stay on the job anyway.  As the film progresses and the lieutenant deteriorates, the back gets worse.  Cage distorts his body, for a time grows Nixon-like.  Toward the end, he becomes both Frankenstein’s Monster and Igor, both trapped in the same body.  It’s amazing.  And I haven’t even mentioned the sleep deprivation.

Look, everyone knows that Nicolas Cage can do crazy eyes.  We’ve got that.  But this progressive physical distortion is a testament to craft and discipline.  Can you imagine finding just the right posture for a character going through so many phases of unwellness, day after day and take after take?  The achievement rivals Lon Chaney.  I’m impressed.

As for the film, it’s a Werner Herzog picture, for crying out loud.  Of course it’s outstanding.  It might even blow your mind.  See it.

Black Narcissus

BLACK NARCISSUS is a Command Movie with a twist: it’s set in a convent high in the Himalayas, and its commander is a young nun who is in far over her head.  It’s a spotty film, with brilliant moments balanced with groaners and a great setup marred by a poor resolution.

Deborah Kerr plays the nun, a smart and wealthy Irish girl who forsakes her home for the austerity of service.  Her order sends her to a decrepit old compound up in the mountains, in a part of Raj-era India so remote that it can’t even boast a proper English presence.  To succeed, she must lead the nuns assigned to her (whether she likes them or not), win the respect of local leaders and villagers, and defeat the elements and scratch subsistence out of the rocky soil.

It’s a great setup, right?  Toss in a rakish young David Farrar as the local satrap’s English advisor and default sex symbol to the women of the convent, and you could really be on to something.  And for the first two-thirds of the film, BLACK NARCISSUS is.  Yes, there’s an annoying subplot about a local prince and a girl of low reputation, but the film doesn’t let that kill it.  BLACK NARCISSUS gives us all the personality conflicts, culture clashes, and delightfully quaint colonial color we could desire.  It even builds up to a series of cascading crises that put both me and my ten-year-old boy on edge.

But then, in the last act, it all falls apart.  Because the film can’t adequately manage cascading crises, it tries to merge them all into one climactic sequence that depends, for its success, on disregarding previously established geography and an editing style that makes the audience wonder who’s doing what to whom.

What a disappointment.  BLACK NARCISSUS has so much going for it, especially early on.  If only it had followed through.

Shutter Island

SHUTTER ISLAND, Martin Scorcese’s brilliant and unsettling film, captivated me from beginning to end.  Its story combined horror and suspense, its performances drew me in, and its flamboyant visual style never strayed from serving the tale to serving itself.

The film is set in 1954.  Leonardo DiCaprio and Mark Ruffalo come to Shutter Island, an Alcatraz – like mental facility for the violently insane.  They turn in their US Marshals’ badges and their sidearms at the gate, meet the warden, and commence their investigation of an inmate’s disappearance.  It seems like the setup for a delicious locked-room mystery, but the film won’t stop there.  The inmate in question had committed a crime so heinous that it can not exist in a ‘delicious mystery.’  Further, DiCaprio, the lead marshal, senses that something is off.  Why does the Warden and Chief Psychiatrist (Ben Kingsley, chillingly solicitous) insist on inserting himself into every phase of the investigation?  Why does everyone, patients and staff alike, seem off-kilter even for a mental institution?  What is it about this place that keeps him flashing back to The War and its horrors?  What’s going on here?

The film goes to dark, creepy, scary places.  And it stays there, knowing that dread and foreboding and that tickle at the back of your brain telling you to stay alert are far scarier and more effective than monsters and gallons of Kensington Gore.

The people in these places, people like the aforementioned DiCaprio, Ruffalo, and Kingsley; as well as Max von Sydow, Patricia Clarkson, and Jackie Earle Haley, among others; get under our skins, each in their own ways.  Not only are they fully realized human beings, but they seamlessly advance the story, build dread, and even give us the feeling that what seams they may show are actually faces to meet the people that they meet.  When you’re Martin Scorsese, these are the kinds of actors with whom you get to work.

While Scorsese gets the best from his performers, he pays considerable attention to his cinematographer, editor, designers, and artists.  This work feels like that of a master of his art, delighting in his ability to create worlds both fanciful and pedestrian.  From the brilliant juxtaposition of past and present to the contrasts in dress, demeanor, and even worlds of different characters, to Shutter Island itself, the film works in bold, assured strokes, delighting in storytelling and its medium, confident that we will stay for the whole ride.  I saw this film on my basement enormovision, but I wish I’d done better: I wish I’d seen it on the big screen.

For SHUTTER ISLAND is successful in every way.  I can’t wait to see it again.

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan

STAR TREK II: THE WRATH OF KHAN is a ripping good sea yarn.

All the hands are here, in new, visually striking uniforms and a new interior of USS ENTERPRISE that looks more like a warship than it did in STAR TREK: THE ONE WITH THE BALD CHICK. We kick off a nice little subplot about aging and coming to grips with the passage of time, and then we’re off to the main show: Ricardo Montalban as Khan the Villain has been marooned by Kirk on a desert planet with limited food, but a kickass gym and a Vidal Sassoon franchise. Now he’s free, and he’s out for blood.

I know. “Yawn, another villain out for blood. We’ve seen this before.” Yes, but this is Ricardo Montalban, and he demonstrates why this type of character, when done right, has propelled film after film after film. He’s dangerous, charismatic, and just plain fun, and watching him try to outwit the Kirk/Spock team is treat.

Note that I wrote “outwit,” not “outfight.” STAR TREK II, like any good sea yarn, doesn’t culminate in a fistfight. Rather, its climax is one of dueling captains and crews trying to outmaneuver one another. Layer on the contrast between the leadership styles of hero and villain, and you have the delicious tension of watching hulls come about and wondering who’ll be first to bring his guns to bear. Oh man, this is so much more interesting than just another hand-to-hand stuntfest. Having seen the film before, I knew what was going to happen; yet it still put me on the edge of my seat.

I almost wish, however, that this film hadn’t been so successful. After retreading the “opposing captain out for revenge” angle in III, VI, NEMESIS, and the reboot, this franchise could stand to step away from II’s example. It’s not like they were ever going to top it, anyway.

Flame and Citron

1944.  The Nazis occupy Denmark and the Resistance grows fractured and weary.  The Allies will come eventually, but when?  And who will arrive first, the Russians or the Americans?

Welcome to the world of FLAME AND CITRON.  The film, based upon the lives of Danish national heroes Flamme and Citronen, begins in the dark days of the war, then gets darker.  Flamme and Citronen, an assassination team, have made a name for themselves by targeting Danish collaborators.  But when the word comes down to start going after Germans, the duo go from just another thorn in the Gestapo’s side to Enemy #1.

This film works simultaneously as a spy thriller, a study of the effect of killing on the human soul, and a showcase for some of the most beautiful cinematography I’ve seen in some time.

As a spy thriller, FLAME AND CITRON covers all the bases.  It has double and triple agents, mysterious meetings in dark niches, and levels of intrigue among different levels of an already shady command structure.  It has shootouts, close escapes, and the paranoia that comes with resistance.  And no one knows how things will turn out, because this is a true story.

While the spy thriller aspect of the film moves things along, FLAME AND CITRON also works as a character study.  What kind of man shoots people in the head during the day, then goes home and sleeps at night?  Are some men born that way?  Can others train themselves to it?  And what kinds of men pull the strings of the trigger pullers?  Can they be trusted to wield their power responsibly?  What if they can’t?

So we have a good story, one with some meat on it.  FLAME AND CITRON presents the story wonderfully well, with outstanding cinematography by Jørgen Johansson.  The film cost $10M, but it looks much more expensive than that.  Though a combination of cleverly set up shots and seamless location and matte work, this film puts us right into wartime Copenhagen.  It’s gorgeous.

Simply put, FLAME AND CITRONEN works in every way.  I’m glad I saw it.

Revanche

“Your problem,” says the pimp to the thug, “is that you’re soft.  You try to act tough, but people see right through you.”

Maybe that’s not a bad thing.

In REVANCHE, the thug loves the hooker.  The hooker works for the pimp, who is not soft.  The thug and the hooker plan to escape, but can they?  Is the thug tough?  Must he be?  And what of the aftermath?

This sounds like the premise for a thriller, but REVANCHE goes in a different direction.  Rather than twists, turns, and tension, REVANCHE offers us character.  It considers these people, cares about them, takes the time to tell their stories. 

Here’s a keen exploration of love, bravado, and unintended consequences.  By the time the credits roll, you’ll the know the people of REVANCHE not as The Thug and  The Hooker, but as Alex and Tamara.  You’ll think not only of the journeys they’ve taken, but of journeys still ahead.  And you’ll think about yourself, about your supposed weaknesses and your supposed strengths.  You’ll wonder if they are what you think, or if you’ve (perhaps) misjudged yourself.

REVANCHE is that kind of film: the kind that rewards thought.  In fact, the more I think about it, the more I like it.  Given time, it could become one of the best pictures I see this year.

7th Heaven

My good friend Chris Dashiell turned me on to 7th HEAVEN.  He absolutely nails his review, so I bring it to you here (with his permission).

In Paris, an orphaned waif named Diane (Janet Gaynor) is whipped and almost murdered by her vicious sister (Gladys Brockwell) after Diane is too honest about their dissolute life with an aunt and uncle Nana tries to fool for money. The girl’s life is saved by Chico (Charles Farrell), a sewer worker embittered against God for his bad luck. When the police come to take Diane away on Nana’s instigation, Chico claims that they are married in order to protect her. They must keep up this pretense for awhile, so Diane moves into Chico’s little flat on the seventh floor of a tenement. He is a bit insensitive, and a braggart too, but their arrangement gradually turns into love. Then the advent of World War forces them apart.

The story, based on a play by Austin Strong, is extreme melodrama, and in less talented hands it could have been pure schmaltz, but Borzage knew how to combine passion with a kind of ethereal spirituality, and this is reflected in the film’s look, especially the lighting and camera movement. The nighttime sequences, and the action in the little attic and on the rooftops, seem almost lit from within, as if suffused with romantic memories. The crane shots with the lovers running up to the seventh floor, the overhead shots of Paris, Gaynor walking across a plank through the window in a wedding dress, Farrell holding her up in the air when he declares his love, a ray of light falling on the couple—the picture is filled with such beauty, like an intoxicating and sometimes feverish dream.

The plot becomes more outlandish during the separation of the lovers by war. The villainous sister returns, and then the tragedies pile up. Meanwhile, Diane and Chico are shown to have a supernatural connection with one another. They communicate across time and space. We have grown out of these kinds of dramatic devices, but with Borzage we willingly suspend disbelief most of the time. What I find most interesting is that this elevated notion of love is at the same time grounded in the life of Paris and in relationships with friends. Spiritual love, for Borzage, does not retreat from the world, but transfigures it.

The 20-year-old Gaynor is luminous. This was the big year in which she also starred in Sunrise, and won the Best Actress award for Seventh Heaven and Street Angel. She has great chemistry with Farrell, and after Seventh Heaven became a smash hit they were paired together eleven more times. The movie has finally been released by Fox in an excellent print as part of a Borzage box set.

The Slammin' Salmon

I like Broken Lizard, the comedy troupe that broke out with 2001’s SUPER TROOPERS and went on to make CLUB DREAD and BEERFEST. SUPER TROOPERS is one of those movies I enjoy springing on people, CLUB DREAD gets funnier with each viewing, and, BEERFEST, um, featured beer. Broken Lizard’s members play well off one another, they know how to set up a joke, and their rapid fire style keeps us laughing even as it forces us to pay attention.

THE SLAMMIN’ SALMON takes place in an eponymous upscale Miami restaurant. The manager, needing a big night on the sales floor, announces a contest with fabulous prizes for the highest-earning server. Which is fine, but really only serves to create a story arc on which to hang a series of gags. For this is very much a gag movie, with philosophy seems of, “Didn’t like that one? Here’s another. And another.” Which is great for me, because I liked the gags. THE SLAMMIN’ SALMON kept me laughing out loud from beginning to end, generating enough goodwill to erase the skunky memory of BEERFEST and fire me up for the troupe’s next film. These guys are fantastic.

The Men Who Stare at Goats

THE MEN WHO STARE AT GOATS is silly and I chuckled all the way through it. 

Here’s the premise: Ewan McGregor is an Ann Arbor newspaper reporter whose life is going nowhere.  He’s stuck interviewing crackpots like some guy who claims to have been part of a secret Army psychic warrior corps.  His wife left him.  He needs a change.

History gives him one when America invades Iraq.  Eager for a story, any story, MacGregor flies to Kuwait where … he … goes … nowhere.  Then he meets George Clooney, who professes to be a member of the same psychic warrior corps Crackpot McCrazy talked about back home.  Clooney’s on a mission into Iraq, and MacGregor comes with him.  Oh, yeah, there’s a problem: Clooney gives every indication of being nuts.

And we’re off.  THE MEN WHO STARE AT GOATS spends the next hour and a half going from MacGregor’s adventures in the present day to recounting the history of the New Earth Army, a supersecret band of psychic warriors who call themselves Jedi Warriors and follow their leader, Jeff Bridges in full hippie mode, to the edges of perception, ability, and credulity.  But could the New Earth Army still be around, working in Iraq?  Does MacGregor have what it takes to become a Jedi Warrior?  And what’s the point in sitting around and staring at goats, anyway?

OK, so I’ve just spent three paragraphs recapping the picture, which makes for a super-lazy review.  Shut it.  This stuff is free.

Anyway, THE MEN WHO STARE AT GOATS works because it embraces the silliness of its premise while playing it absolutely straight.  Clooney really believes he has amazing psychic powers.  Bridges creates the most earnest hippie colonel in the history of the United States Army.  And MacGregor, well, if anyone deserves to become a Jedi Warrior, it’s this guy.  Have fun.

I Sell The Dead

Now this is what I’m talkin’ about.

I SELL THE DEAD, made on a shoestring and using Staten Island as a stand-in for 18^th-Century England, loves gothic horror, loves comedy, and loves movies.  Starring Dominic Monaghan and Larry Fessenden as grave robbers who specialize in the exotic, this movie offers wall-to-wall monsters, jokes, atmosphere and goodwill.  Add supporting work from genre favorites Angus Scrimm and Ron Perlman, and you have everything you could want in a horror comedy.

I SELL THE DEAD features vampires, zombies, villains wearing bowlers, knife-throwers, and at least one beheading.  Oh, and it also features joke after joke after joke, creating a sense of general delight and carrying it all the way through the film’s running time.

So if gothic horror-comedy is your idea of a good time (it’s certainly mine), see I SELL THE DEAD.  It’s a great time at the movies.

Iron Man 2

IRON MAN 2 is a great, great movie.  That is, if you love reading Popular Mechanics.  Because if there’s one thing IRON MAN 2 delights in showing us, it’s long sequences of guys welding.  And dragging cables.  And doing, y’know, Metal Shop stuff.

Me, I don’t read Popular Mechanics.  I never took Metal Shop.  Long stretches of IRON MAN 2 bored me out of my mind. 

That’s not to say that Robert Downey, Jr. isn’t fantastic in what will become his signature role.  Or that Scarlett Johansson (as a superduperspy) doesn’t look great in a catsuit.  It doesn’t even mean that stuff doesn’t blow up real good.  It just means that I didn’t care.

I didn’t care about Iron Man’s big fight with his best friend (a role demanding far less gravitas than The Great Don Cheadle brought to bear).  I didn’t care about the Big Villain’s boring revenge story.  And I certainly didn’t care about the intricacies of corporate reorganization.

By the time the Big Villain, who wasn’t nearly as interesting as the Little Villain, unleashed his evil plan, I’d grown so worn out with pseudo-physics, quasi-engineering bull$#!^ that I could only marvel that this film failed to learn the basic lesson of the Star Wars prequels.  To wit, fighting robots are dull.  Their destruction carries no emotional heft, because they’re things.  You might as well have given me twenty minutes of Iron Man unplugging refrigerators.

For all that, however, IRON MAN 2 does offer something to make it worth seeing.  It’s not on the posters and it’s not in the ads, however: it’s a secret weapon named Sam Rockwell, upon whom I now formally grant Can Do No Wrong status.  Rockwell plays the Little Villain, the CEO of Stark Corporation’s primary competitor in the weapons business.  His name is Justin Hammer, and he’s a weasely, sniveling wannabe Tony Stark who absolutely steals every second he’s on screen.  Let me say that again:  Sam Rockwell (CDNW) steals the screen from Robert Downey, Jr., Gwyneth Paltrow, and The Great Don Cheadle.  I didn’t think anyone could upstage any of these actors; but Rockwell’s Justin Hammer is so deliciously slimy, so wily yet such a doofus, that he runs away with this movie.  After GALAXY QUEST, THE HITCHHIKER’S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY, CONFESSIONS OF A DANGEROUS MIND, CHOKE, MOON, and now IRON MAN 2, I can safely assert that Sam Rockwell has arrived.  This actor, truly, can do no wrong.

So, yeah, IRON MAN 2 has a whole lot working against it.  But its bright spot is very, very bright.  If they make another film in this series, I hope they call it JUSTIN HAMMER.

Crazy Heart

CRAZY HEART understands. It understands how alcoholics function, and how those around alcoholics find ways to function. It understands music as both art and commerce. It understands the heart.

Jeff Bridges anchors CRAZY HEART as Bad Blake, faded Western Music legend. [NOTE: The film calls his music Country, but it’s simplifying for the uninitiated: he’s doing straight Western, with the occasional detour into Zydeco. How can you tell the difference? It’s easy: if it sounds kind of like Country, but doesn’t suck, it’s Western.] He’s a degenerate alcoholic: drunk, broke, and giving lousy performances to tiny crowds in crappy venues. He once mentored a promising musician who has since gone on to wealth and fame, and his envy wears at him as surely as his alcoholism. And here’s the magic of casting: because it’s Jeff Bridges under that grizzle and gristle, we as the audience apprehend why people put up with him. He’s just so damn gifted, so charismatic, that we put up with him, too. We like Bad Blake. We want him to pull out of his death spiral.

Maybe he will. He meets a reporter (Maggie Gyllenhall) who may represent his last chance. And here’s where CRAZY HEART’s understanding asserts itself. The Gyllenhall role could have gone wrong in so many ways, but the character works because we believe her. We believe that she’s smart, yet capable of making poor choices. We believe that she’s wise, yet has room to grow. We believe that she believes she can handle an alcoholic. We believe that she’s old enough to know better yet still young enough to believe.

As the story develops, we go on to meet that once-promising musician and find, to our pleasant surprise, that he’s a decent guy. This role, too, could have gone wrong in so many ways, but CRAZY HEART presents this character (well played by Colin Farrel – I like him so much more when he’s, y’know, acting) like a real guy. Yes, he’s a guy who pursues fortune, but there’s nothing wrong with that in America. More importantly, he’s a guy who sees Bad Blake for who he is: a genius drowning in cheap whiskey.

And so it goes. CRAZY HEART is a film about the way real people respond in real ways to real problems. Bad Blake’s a committed alcoholic and musical genius and a decent guy when he’s sober. Many alcoholics find death at the bottom of a bottle, but this film makes us hope Blake doesn’t. It understands our hearts, and plays them to create one hell of a film.

The Blind Side

I distrust the “Ain’t White Folk Grand” genre.  You know what I’m talking about: films in which White Folks swoop down on some downtrodden Non-White Folk and save them from their squalid lives while learning an Important Life Lesson of their own.

It’s not that I don’t think White Folk are grand – I’m white, after all, and I consider myself reasonably grand.  It’s not that I don’t think people should help those who need it.  And it’s not that I’m against Important Life Lessons.  It’s just that I find the genre so tedious.  Uplift is great and all, but hardly anyone ever blows up a car.

All of which is meant to give you some context when I say that THE BLIND SIDE is about as good as “Ain’t White Folk Grand” movies get.  Sandra Bullock and Tim McGraw are great at playing White Folk, Quinton Aaron does a fine job of getting rescued, and everything rocks along right through a closing credits sequence that shows us photos of the actual family upon which the film is based.  It’s fine, really, and it achieves its goals in an engaging and professional way.

In other words, it’s exactly what you expect when you plunk down your money for a film of this genre.  If only they’d blown up a car.

The Yakuza

Sydney Pollack directs Robert Mitchum and Ken Takakura in a Robert Towne – Paul Schrader neo-noir thriller set in the Tokyo underworld. If you haven’t already clicked “Add to Queue,” I don’t know what to do with you.

Brian Keith, Robert Mitchum, and Herb Edelman were buddies during the war. They served in the occupation of Japan, and it changed their lives forever. Edelman became a scholar and lives modestly in Tokyo, where he teaches at the university. He also has an awesome collection of weapons, legal and illegal. (I’ll tell you, friends, if you ever find yourself trapped in a noir plot, be sure to have an old buddy with his very own armory.) Keith’s into shipping, smuggling, and the Yakuza for a whole lot of money. And Mitchum, well, he’s Robert Freaking Mitchum, and that’s all you need to know.

So Keith needs help with his little Yakuza problem. He buys Mitchum a ticket to Tokyo, asking him to work things out. It’s wintertime in Japan: cold, slushy, and nasty. Mitchum knows enough of the patois and the culture to get by, but he’s still an alien in an alien land. The Japanese, even (and especially) the gangsters, have these rigorous moral codes that are damn hard to crack. He needs someone to help him out, to show him the way, and he calls on Takakura (at the time, Japan’s biggest star). That’s when things get interesting.

See, Takakura’s a force in his own right. A Kendo master with deep, if conflicted, ties to Mitchum, he’s on his home turf. This sets up a great dynamic, one that’s unique in the world of noir. See, Mitchum can’t play the part of “the one good man” in Tokyo; the city would eat him alive. He also can’t be the “lone tough bastard,” at least not all the time; again, the city would eat him alive. Thus, he’s put in the position of sidekick for much of his own film. It works. Takakura has such a commanding, formidable presence that we buy Mitchum taking his lead. And as the story twists and turns, with the two stars swapping leadership roles as the situation requires, we’re right there with them. For a while, we even start to think that everything’s going to be ok.

But it’s Tokyo, Bobby. It’s Tokyo. And there are some things a foreigner will never understand.

Sleep Dealer

My first introduction to science fiction, real science fiction, came by way of a two-volume collection of Hugo Award – winning short stories.  The stories; by luminaries of the Golden Age of Science Fiction such as Asimov, Heinlein, Anderson, and Dick; used science fiction as a way to get at social and psychological ideas.  They explored the flaws in our civilization and thought of ways we as a people could solve them or we as people could endure them.  The explored the relationship of man and machine, asking what it means to be human and how, in some possible futures, we could lose that humanity.  Most importantly, they were good yarns.  They involved, entertained, and stimulated.  They were the good stuff.

SLEEP DEALER is the good stuff.  Set in a future perhaps fifty years off, it tells the story of Memo, a young man from dry, dusty Oaxaca.  He has come to Tijuana to seek a better life and finds work in a “sleep dealer,” a factory that works its employees so hard, they often collapse on the job.  Standard stuff so far, but here comes the science fiction part: sleep dealers hook their employees’ nervous systems, via nodes implanted in their bodies, into the global information network.  Once plugged in, the workers remotely operate robots that do the menial and dangerous tasks illegal aliens perform today:  high-rise construction, fruit picking, domestic labor.  To paraphrase one character, “We give the first world what it wants: work without workers.”  And away we go.

Sure, there’s a love interest and a revenge plot and all the things we expect in narrative storytelling, but they don’t make SLEEP DEALER interesting.  SLEEP DEALER captures the imagination because it uses its milieu and the tools of narrative to explore the nature of immigration, the dehumanizing effects of global political and financial inequity, and the implications of the virtual life.  In other words, it explores the flaws in our civilization and thinks of ways we as a people could solve them or we as people endure them.  It explores the relationship of man and machine, asking what it means to be human and how, in one possible future, we could lost that humanity.  All that, and it’s a good yarn that involves, entertains, and stimulates.  This is the good stuff.

Which leads me back to those Hugo Award – winning stories of yesteryear and the Golden Age of Science Fiction.  With films like MOON and TIMECRIMES and, now, SLEEP DEALER making it into theaters and onto DVD shelves, I suspect a second Golden Age may have arrived.  Once again, science fiction is doing what it’s supposed to do: challenge and probe and think and thrill and entertain.  I can’t wait to see what’s next.

PS  Special thanks to Devin Faraci at CHUD.com.  Without his well-written review of SLEEP DEALER, I'd never have known this film existed.

What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?

Bette Davis owns every minute of WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE?

She’s crazy. She’s creepy. She’s Ms. Davis in a brave, crushing, terrifying performance as a woman going from plain old mean to absolutely unhinged. She’s Ms. Davis never putting a foot wrong, scaring the hell out of us as we wonder what she’s going to do next. She’s Ms. Davis convincing us that she is capable of utterly cowing Joan Crawford, putting Ms. Crawford under her thumb and keeping her there until the bitter end.

Here’s the deal: Baby Jane Hudson was a child star on the vaudeville circuit. She always outshone her sister Blanche, the “plain one” who’d vowed to get her revenge one day. Things don’t always work out for child stars, of course, and Blanche got her revenge by growing up to become a movie star. Until one night, when a mysterious accident renders Blanche a cripple, leaving her trapped in a big old Hollywood home and subject to the tender mercies of dear old Jane. But that was years ago. Blanche and Jane have settled into a routine as invalid and caregiver. But Jane has a plan.

WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE? lives and dies with the performances of Bette Davis as Jane and Joan Crawford as Blanche. In an industry that values youth, both women (55 and 58, respectively) bravely allow themselves to be photographed in the most unflattering makeup, the worst lighting, the least glamorous angles. Crawford sells us on Blanche, a once-strong woman so tired of fighting that she’s on the verge of finally giving in. Davis steals the film as a woman who’s evil and insanity grows within her like a cancer. And the film itself, well, it’s a slow burn, a film that enjoys taking its time as it ratchets up tension and fear. This film knows that anticipation of fright is more delicious than fright itself, and it revels in it.

Yes, there’s a cheap twist, but don’t let that spoil things for you. See this film for Davis. Let her creep you out. Let her try to win you over, which will creep you out even more. But try not to think too hard about her. You might not get to sleep tonight.

Ghidorah: The Three-Headed Monster

GHIDORAH: THE THREE-HEADED MONSTER is just plain terrific.  It has four – count ‘em, four! – classic monsters in Godzilla, Mothra, Rodan, and the titular Ghidorah.  It has Martian princesses, secret service agents, even cute kids.  And it has … wait for it … Takashi Shimura in a supporting role as a brave scientist who comes through in the clutch.

Toss in solid puppet and costume work, a funky soundtrack, and even kaiju détente, and you have the makings of a great film for a rainy Saturday afternoon.

No, I’m not going to outline the plot.  It’s a mid-‘60’s Godzilla movie, but it’s one of the good ones.  That’s all you need to know: either you’re down with it or you aren’t.  In the absence of critical reflection or even a by-the-numbers review, I’ll instead offer this little vignette, direct from the couch in my basement.

INT.  ELLERMANN BASEMENT – AFTERNOON

A heavy rainstorm thrums outside.  ALEX (the father) and IAN (the son) sit on the couch watching a Godzilla movie.  ALEX has the remote in his hand.

ALEX (pausing the remote)

See that man, Ian?  That’s Takashi Shimura.  He’s one of the greatest actors the human race has ever produced, and he’s been in some of the greatest films ever made.  That, son, is what excellence looks like.

                                    IAN

Was he in “Kung Fu Panda?”

                                    ALEX

No.

                                    IAN

Was he in “Rocky?”

                                    ALEX

No.

                                    IAN

What was he in, then?

                                    ALEX

He was “Ikiru,” “Yojimbo,” “The Seven Samurai,” “Stray Dog,” and even the original “Gojira.”

                                    IAN

“Gojira” was too scary.  I like the later Godzilla movies, where the monster looks more fake and they’re kind of silly.

                                    ALEX

He was in “Mothra,” too.

                                    IAN

Oh, cool!  “Mothra” was awesome!

                                    ALEX

There you go.

Beauty in Trouble

BEAUTY IN TROUBLE has three acts, a heroine, no antagonist, and a weak resolution. It takes us to interesting places in the company of decent people, and it certainly rates as a pleasant way to spend a couple of hours. But there’s nothing propulsive about it. There’s no reason why we absolutely must see the next scene, or the one after that.

The film, a Czech production about a woman with two kids, a husband in jail, limited prospects, and maybe one last chance to provide a good life for her family, suffers from that lack of an antagonist. Sure, there are some jerks (and one man (who could’ve played Gollum without CGI) who would have made an estimable villain in a more formulaic picture), but the trouble in which our beauty finds herself seems more a general life trouble than actual peril. Granted, life troubles are serious and challenging. But hey, I’ve got life troubles of my own. Battle a giant spider or something.

See, Marcela’s a decent woman. She works in a travel agency. Her husband’s an auto mechanic. Or at least he was, until a flood wiped out the garage and he’s turned his place into a chop shop to make ends meet. Once he’s caught and imprisoned, however, Marcela’s got to figure out how she’s going to feed her kids. She’s moved everyone into Mom’s apartment, she’s barely getting by, and her stepfather’s losing patience. And he may be a lecher. But then a wealthy, handsome stranger shows up. He owns a Tuscan vineyard (but he doesn’t seem to ever actually work at it – it must be one of those ornamental vineyards). He’s nice to the kids. He takes pity on her and takes her in. Problem is, she still loves her husband.

And, y’know, that’s it. She makes decisions: some good, some bad. Life circumstances change. Some things get better and some worse. But nothing happens that makes this stuff any more interesting than the gossip I hear about friends and relatives all the time. Life is hard. Relationships are tough. It sucks that we often don’t have the money we need or want. Fine, fine, and (as I said) these are decent people and the scenery’s nice and I rocked along pleasantly for two hours. But there’s no magic of cinema here. There's no particularly compelling narrative. There’s no photography to make me say “Wow,” and simply filming Tuscany is cheating. I was joking about battling giant spiders, but c’mon: surprise and delight me, for Pete’s sake. Or at least, blow up a car.

So, BEAUTY IN TROUBLE. It’s at least as interesting as keeping up with your Facebook feed. But I’d have liked a little more.