The Secret Life of Bees

THE SECRET LIFE OF BEES is one of those movies that doesn't feel like a movie. It feels like an adaptation of a play or a book or a limerick, not something that stands on its own with its own, vibrant life.

Don't get me wrong: this movie has a lot going for it. Though it stars Dakota Fanning, the only human resident of the Uncanny Valley, it also features fine turns from the wonderful Queen Latifah, the brilliant Sophie Okonedo, the remarkably talented Jennifer Hudson, and "Wire" vet Tristan Wilds. The normally likeable Paul Bettany clearly enjoys himself as the violent, trashy peach farmer who can barely take care of himself, much less raise a daughter, and the whole film drips with the kind of love and compassion that one normally finds only in young adult fiction.

But it creaks. We hear the gears grind and clash. We can't lose ourselves in the moment because we never sense that the moment is cinematically authentic. Rather, it feels like a retelling of a telling, one given with love but without spark. I wanted to care about Girlbot, but I never believed she was real. I wanted to find comfort in a home clearly designed for it, but I couldn't lose myself. I wanted to root for the bright young people who'd have to work hard to overcome a world that could be capricious and cruel, but I never once doubted that they would succeed.
I'm sure there are people who love THE SECRET LIFE OF BEES. It was, after all, made for loving. I'd like to be one them, but I can't fall in love with a xerox.

The Haunted Mansion

So I'm working on my sci fi spec script, the one I can't get anybody interested in, and I think I've figured out why. My script, a searing greed allegory about a transvestite interstellar conqueror who preys upon civilizations that don't have flags, is missing the critical element that says "Green Light!" If only I can figure out how to turn my transvestite interstellar conqueror into a transvestite workaholic dad who needs to learn to spend more time with his family, I'm sure I'll have a winner.

How do I know this will work? Why, it's the only reason I can imagine why horrible, horrible scripts such as the one for THE HAUNTED MANSION get made. See, the workaholic dad is the screenwriter's target audience. In the brutally Darwinian world of film production, there's only one way to get oneself into the position to greenlight a movie: one must be a workaholic. Since we're talking about an industry dominated by men, it follows that many of these workaholics are, in fact, workaholic dads. So when one of these workaholic dads reads THE HAUNTED MANSION or JACK FROST or any of a hundred films of their ilk, he thinks, "Hey, there's something about this script that's real. It speaks to me."

In THE HAUNTED MANSION, Eddie Murphy plays a workaholic dad who happens to be a realtor. Since he knows that realty is a boom or bust business, he's making money while there's money to be made. Meanwhile, the guy's getting zero support at home. His wife's all, "I don't want a nice home in a nice neighborhood. Take some time off and let's go live in a van down by the river." His kids are all, "We don't like having our own rooms and health care. Let's go live in a van down by the river." So, fine. He packs the family into the 700-series BMW so he can drive them to the cabin by the lake that he earned through all his hard work, but he's gotta make a detour, do a little business, because you never know when it's gonna be 2008 and you're gonna be Lehman Brothers.

The work involves meeting a potential client in a huge, creepy Louisiana mansion. Even though the mansion has, supposedly, been in the client's family for centuries, everyone there has an English (vice Cajun, or even upper class Cajun) accent. Creepy. And there's this whole backstory about forbidden love between the poncy master of the house and his Creole paramour, who happens to be the spitting image of the unsupportive wife. Naturally, poncy rich guy is planning to seduce unsupportive wife so he can finally be reunited with his lost love because, hey, everyone knows that reincarnation works by making you look exactly like whomever you were in your most pertinent past life (Hey, come to think of it, maybe it's not so bad that I'm aging into Edward Everett Horton!). I say, count your blessings, poncy English-Cajun ghostly rich guy: this chick has no idea how hard a man's gotta work to keep up a creepy mansion like yours. You're gonna be all, "Sweetheart, I must go over the numbers. Something's not right on the plantation," and she'll be all, "Screw that. Let's go live in a van down by the the river," and you'll be all, "What's a van?"
So before you know it, there are zombies and ghosts and a green gypsy woman in a crystal ball and Eddie's mugging like there's no tomorrow and his cowardly kid overcomes his fears and the poncy ghost sees the error of his ways and the good ghosts go to heaven and the bad ghost goes to hell. And, More Importantly, Eddie Murphy Learns an Important Lesson about the Evils of Workaholism and the Importance of Spending More Time with his Family.

I watched this one with my 9-yr-old after we'd put the younger kids to bed. He loved it. It was just scary enough, just funny enough, to press all his buttons. The zombies looked enough like the zombies from the Thriller video to remove any peril they may have represented, and the bad guy had such silly hair that he was clearly not a serious threat to anyone. There were jokes and sight gags and I think he found the damsel attractive in a "Jimmy Neutron's mom" kind of way. But in my inner monologue, I was hanging in Gracie Mansion's belltower, thinking that if Wallace Shawn and Terence Stamp can't save a movie, noone can save a movie.

But hey, at least I've worked out the problems with my script. Now, it's going to be a movie about an executive transvestite workaholic dad. Beware the competing firm that does not have a flag.

Zack and Miri Make a Porno

How do you write up a movie that's so remarkably meh?

ZACK AND MIRI MAKE A PORNO isn't funny, but it isn't bad enough to engender outright hatred. It just sits there, like a joke no one laughs at, but without a follow-up joke to sweep it off the stage.

Kevin Smith's jokes don't sing. His tempo is repetitive. He goes for shocking humor, but his shock humor isn't shocking. As a director, he makes Elizabeth Banks overemote so dramatically that I thought she was going to burst out of her skin nearly every time the camera focussed on her.

But the film isn't hateful. It isn't mean spirited. It's downright sweet, so I can't hate it. It's just there, an amusing premise gone wrong. I wanted to like ZACK AND MIRI MAKE A PORNO. I really did. But the film is just plain too much a failure to let me.

Star Trek

STAR TREK does all the things a good summer action movie should do. It has pathos. It has jokes. It has sex. It blows lots of stuff up real good. It's also a surprisingly good picture, one made to entertain the general public while throwing plenty of bones to the trekkies in the audience.

Here's the deal: the charismatic and dangerous Eric Bana (Really, you should see CHOPPER) plays an angry guy out for revenge through multi-planetary genocide. BOTTLE SHOCK's terrific Chris Pine is li'l Captain James T. Kirk, the only cat in the Federation bad enough to take him on. Joining li'l Kirk is li'l Spock, li'l McCoy, and the rest of the gang. They crack jokes. They have conflict. They blow stuff up. Li'l Spock gives li'l Kirk one of those manly nods of the head saying, "I guess you're ok, after all." Most importantly, Leonard Nimoy shows up as Big Spock, and there is no such thing as a film that is worse off for the presence of one Leonard Nimoy.

The thing about "Star Trek" that the post - original series showrunners never got was that nobody cares about make believe diplomacy among imaginary alien races. Nobody cares about heavy handed, though well meaning, depictions of of the Marxist utopia of the future. People care about the friendship of Kirk, Spock, and McCoy. That's the dynamic that has always made Star Trek worth watching, and J.J. Abrams gets it. STAR TREK may spend lots of time on space battles and angry villains, but it's really about that friendship, about sharing in the feeling that there are people around you who've got your back. It's a good feeling, and it's a good way to spend a couple of hours at the movies.

114 Ghastly Films

I haven't had the chance to see anything for a few days, so I present you with a list of 114 ghastly films. These aren't the worst movies ever. They're just the worst movies I've seen.

Armageddon (1998)
At First Sight (1999)
Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001)
Austin Powers 2 (1999)
Babel (2006)
Bad Santa (2003)
Basic Instinct (1992)
Batman & Robin (1997)
The Beastmaster (1982)
Blackballed: The Bobby Dukes Story (2006)
Blood Work (2002)
Brewster's Millions (1985)
The Cable Guy (1996)
Caligula (1979)
Canadian Bacon (1995)
The Cannonball Run (1981)
Comic Book: The Movie (2004)
Con Air (1997)
The Corporation (2004)
Crocodile Dundee 2 (1988)
Cutthroat Island (1995)
Days of Thunder (1990)
Death Becomes Her (1992)
The Debut (2000)
Desperately Seeking Susan (1985)
Dick Tracy (1990)
Drop Dead Gorgeous (1999)
Dungeons & Dragons (2000)
Election (1999)
Evita (1996)
Exit to Eden (1994)
Fair Game (1995)
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998)
Fifteen Minutes (2001)
Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (2001)
The Foot Fist Way (2006)
Funny Farm (1988)
Get Carter (2000)
Gods and Generals (2003)
Great Expectations (1998)
The Great Outdoors (1988)
Guarding Tess (1994)
Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man (1991)
Hercules in New York (1970)
Hideaway (1995)
Highlander 2: Renegade Version (1990)
Hollow Man (2000)
Hot Rod (2007)
House II: The Second Story (1987)
How to Make an American Quilt (1995)
Impromptu (1991)
An Inconvenient Truth (2006)
Iron Eagle (1986)
Jaws 3 (1983)
L'Eclisse (1962)
Life Stinks (1991)
Little Children (2006)
Loser (2000)
Lost & Found (1999)
Madonna: Truth or Dare (1991)
Mamma Mia! (2008)
Men in Black II (2002)
Mercy (1999)
Mortal Kombat: Annihilation (1997)
Mrs. Doubtfire (1993)
My Father the Hero (1994)
Naked Weapon (2002)
Napoleon Dynamite (2004)
Notorious C.H.O. (2002)
The Nutty Professor II: The Klumps (2000)
The Pagemaster (1994)
Pearl Harbor (2001)
Plan 9 from Outer Space (1958)
Pretty Woman (1990)
The Quest (1996)
Rat Race (2001)
The Ref (1994)
The Replacement Killers (1998)
Respiro (2002)
Riding in Cars with Boys (2001)
Rising Sun (1993)
Rush Hour 3 (2007)
Serial Mom (1995)
She Devil (1989)
Showgirls (1995)
Sneakers (1992)
Son of Godzilla (1967)
Species (1995)
Spies Like Us (1985)
Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron (2002)
Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (1989)
Star Trek: Insurrection (1998)
Star Trek: Nemesis (2002)
Stargate (1994)
Starship Troopers (1997)
Stealth (2005)
Strange Days (1995)
Sudden Death (1995)
Summer Rental (1985)
Superman III (1983)
Superman IV: The Quest for Peace (1987)
Talladega Nights (2006)
Thomas and the Magic Railroad (2000)
Three Times (2005)
The Toy (1982)
Under Siege 2: Dark Territory (1995)
Wagons East (1994)
Waterworld (1995)
Weekend at Bernie's (1989)
What About Bob? (1991)
Wild Wild West (1999)
Wing Commander (1999)
XXX: Special Edition (2002)
Zoom: Academy for Superheroes (2006)

Man on Wire

I don't get MAN ON WIRE. This film, which has garnered near-universal praise, is about a bunch of people who passionately devote themselves to a deadly project that is a complete waste of time.

I mean, ok, I can get a documentary about people and their obsessions. But I can't get a documentary about a guy whose obsession is tempting death. And for what does he do it? Does anyone benefit in any way? Sure, a very limited number of people get an awesome spectacle of excellence, but at the risk of many more people seeing, right up close, a man fall to his death and, essentially, liquify before their eyes.

The film, the story of Philippe Petit's tightrope dance between the two towers of the World Trade Center, takes it as a given that it's fun to waste enormous amounts of energy, money, and time on his frivolity. Further, it takes as a given that it's fun to outfox $3.75/hr security guards and get through the WTC's security to pull it off. All I could think was, "How many security guards lost their livelihoods over this stunt?"

It must be me. Maybe it's my approach to risk. I understand that there are dangers in the world, and that one must make risk/benefit calculations when coming to prudent decisions. But the risk here is so great and the reward so ephemeral that I couldn't get behind the project, couldn't root for the people, couldn't exult in their triumph.

That's not to say that you won't enjoy MAN ON WIRE. I may be the odd man out on this one. But I'm way out. I'll never see this movie again, and that's ok with me.

Role Models

ROLE MODELS is your standard comedy about man-children who learn an important Life Lesson and find their way to actual adulthood. You’ve seen its every beat before and it has nothing new to offer in the way of conception, scoring, technical wizardry, or artistry.

It’s also funny. Very funny. Laugh – out – loud funny. Paul “why is this guy not a huge star” Rudd and Seann William Scott are a great comic duo, playing off one another with the perfect combination of affection and exasperation. Elizabeth Banks turns a thankless “love interest” part into gold, and Jane Lynch is just one or two more parts this great away from joining Cloris Leachman in the Hall of Great Comic Actresses (I don’t know why Jane Lynch reminds me of Cloris Leachman. She just does. It’s a compliment.). This is a movie that goes from broad, physical bits to Marvin Hamlisch jokes and back again with flawless delivery and perfect timing.

Yes, it should be crap. You know it. I know it. The guys who wrote it know it. But they took a crap outline, fleshed it out with great jokes, put it in the hands of first-rate comic actors, and turned it into a freakin’ masterpiece.

Who’d’a thunk it.

PS I used to run down the ravine behind the University of San Diego. At the bottom of the ravine, there’s a park. On Saturdays, that park would be filled with people dressed like hot dog vendors at the Renaissance Fair, merrily whacking one another with foam rubber swords. Just so you know, there are folks out there who really do see that as a fun way to spend their Saturday.

Jumanji

In my review of SITA SINGS THE BLUES, I noted that most of the films we see are achingly average. For Exhibit A, I present to you JUMANJI, a feature-length adaptation of a picture book by Chris van Allsburg. The picture book, a trifling story that gives van Allsburg an excuse to draw things like monkeys making a mess of a kitchen and rhinos charging down Main Street, gets the full Hollywood treatment. It’s shoehorned into a three act structure about a kid who learns to deal with fear, it gets Robin Williams as a star, and it’s a full-throated combination of CGI and practical effects that veers between fun and terrifying, depending on the viewer’s combination of wildlife and insect – related phobias. (Yeah, yeah. I know. Arachnids aren’t insects. Everyone loves a pedant.)

While some of the effects are quite good (I particularly loved the giant plastic spiders – fishing line and all.), JUMANJI doesn’t plant the combination of danger and adventure. Its world is so dangerous that it’s hard to have much fun in it. That leaves the kids out, and it makes the parents so conscious of the effect it may be having on their kids that it leaves them out, as well.

Still, stars Williams, Kirsten Dunst, Bradley Pierce, and Bonnie Hunt do professional work, and I’m a sucker for father-son relationship stuff, so I’m not willing to call JUMANJI a right-out failure. It’s just achingly average, like so much else we see.

Sita Sings the Blues

SITA SINGS THE BLUES opens with the best credits sequence I’ve ever seen. It begins gently enough, but it soon explodes into a vibrant and exciting combination of music and animation. If the film could have found a way to maintain that level of energy throughout its run time, it could well have become one of the best films I’ve ever seen.

While SITA SINGS THE BLUES unspools to become, over the next hour and a half, a fine, imaginative, wonderful movie, it doesn’t stay on track to earn “best ever” status. But hey, whom are we kidding? Most of the movies we sit through are achingly average, so why pick nits over whether a refreshingly innovative, original, and beautiful film ascends to the pantheon of “best ever”? It’s enough that this film takes material with which most of us are unfamiliar, adapts it in a way both entertaining and illuminating, and even manages to reacquaint our culture with the artistry of a performer long-passed.

SITA SINGS THE BLUES retells The Ramayana, a Hindu myth in which the noble Rama and his beloved Sita deal with exile, war, jealousy, and the vicious power of rumor. It tells it in wonderful 2-D animation, with different styles reflecting different storytellers, stories, or stories-within-stories. And it does it to the music of one Annette Hanshaw, a popular jazz singer of the ‘20s and ‘30s, in an innovative twist on the time honored practice of making that which was old new again.

Unfortunately, filmmaker Nina Paley failed to clear the rights to Ms. Hanshaw’s music prior to putting four years into creating this wonder on her home computer. Consequently, you can’t find SITA SINGS THE BLUES on Netflix or at your local art house movie theater. You can, however, find it for free download or stream at http://www.sitasingstheblues.com/, a site created by Paley to distribute her film via a creative commons license. I’m no lawyer, but I’m going to assume it’s legal. So I encourage you to check this movie out. If you like it, flip Ms. Paley a couple of bucks through the link on her site. I, for one, would love to see what she comes up with next.

Synecdoche, New York

SYNECDOCHE, NEW YORK made me want to jump off a cliff. A 50-footer, with a sheer face standing against the swell of a royal blue sea. It made me want to stand on the precipice, feeling the sun on my face and the wind on my body. It made me want to leap forward, chest out, arms back, and feet together, and fall a perfect arc through the air before clasping my hands above my head, tucking my chin into my chest, and entering the ocean like a knife into butter. It made me want to relish the sharp contrast of warm air to cold water, revel in the sharp forces of momentum and buoyancy when I arch my back to change my body’s direction and stroke the two short meters back to the surface. It made me want to live, to revel in being alive, to bask in the joy of simple existence. And it did it because SYNECDOCHE, NEW YORK doesn’t understand what it means to be alive. Not at all.

This film is so consumed with death, so focused on the existential dilemma, that it forgets what makes life valuable in the first place. Its protagonist ignores his family in favor of obituaries, which he reads not as celebrations of lives but as harbingers of doom. When his family chooses to ignore him, he wallows in self-pity. He feels stunted and frustrated with his career putting on the theatrical Standards for the people of Schenectady. When given the freedom create his own original work, he puts on nothing for nobody, wallowing in his sense of importance but refusing ever to actually put his work out there to succeed or fail. He wants, he wants, he wants, but he gives so very little. He doesn’t get it: he never does. And the film wants us to take this journey with him, wants us to find meaning in his lack of such, wants us to feel the existential dilemma for ourselves.

But there is no dilemma. We live. We die. We like to tell ourselves that there’s more to come but, in our heart of hearts, we doubt it. We do some good, we do some bad. And we have a choice. We can run away from life in contemplation of death, or futility, or the inevitability of physical and mental decline. Or we can embrace life, embrace everything about it, do the good we can and avoid the evil we can. We can laugh and cry and love and hurt and run and fall. We can succeed spectacularly and we can fail miserably and, occasionally, we can touch a higher plane that we think does not exist but, in our heart of hearts, we know really does. And we’re gonna die. You’re gonna die and I’m gonna die. Even the Sun is gonna die, a blink of an eye on the galactic timeline. But while we’re here, while we have minds to think and bodies to feel, we can revel in the joy of existence.

SYNECDOCHE, NEW YORK doesn’t even know that joy exists, so I’ve got no time for it. I’ve got living to do.

The Band Wagon

Musical! Musical! I’m sick of these artificial barriers between the musical and the drama! In my mind, there is no difference between the magic rhythms of Bill Shakespeare's immortal verse and the magic rhythms of Bill Robinson's immortal feet. I tell you, if it moves you, if it stimulates you, if it entertains you, it’s theater. –Jack Buchanan as Jeffrey Cordova in THE BAND WAGON

He’s right.

He’s particularly right when the actor playing Bill Robinson is Fred Astaire. In discussing this film, my brilliant and insightful wife observed that it’s of a time when “People would go to the movies to be entertained. To see singing and dancing and talent and all that human beings can achieve.” She’s right about the first part, but she’s even more right about the second. For the dancing of Fred Astaire and Cyd Charisse is entertaining, sure, but it’s more than entertaining. It’s the very best that we can do as a species. It’s all that human beings can achieve.

Movies like THE BAND WAGON exemplify what’s so wonderful about movies. Thanks to this medium, humanity can revel in the unbridled excellence of Astaire and Charisse for generations to come. It’s there, right there, just a mouseclick or a DVD slipcover away. Whether THE BAND WAGON is an entirely successful film or not, their performances are here to stay.

As it happens, THE BAND WAGON is not an entirely successful film. Yes, Astaire and Charisse are ably supported by Buchanan, as well as Nanette Fabray and (my personal favorite) Oscar Levant. The writing team of Betty Comden and Adolph Greene (on whom Fabray and Levant’s characters are based), who’d done SINGIN’ IN THE RAIN the year prior, deliver a fine story. But the movie suffers because not every number moves the story forward. Some just feel like old songs that MGM owned rights to and wanted to get out there.

So it isn’t the tightest of narratives. But that’s ok, because it’s a showcase for the pyramids, for Hamlet, the Apollo program. It’s a showcase for the best that we can do. And that’s entertainment.

They Were Expendable

Gungy [guhnj] (adj) gung'y Navy Slang: To be particularly, perhaps ridiculously, motivated. Filled with love for the Naval Service and afire with patriotic fervor. "I just banged out five miles. I'm feeling gungy."

When I was a plebe at USNA, Saturday morning was "gunge day." After the morning run, we plebes would be permitted to sit on couches in the upperclass wardroom, hear some brief talk about a military subject, and watch a gunge movie. Something like 12 O'CLOCK HIGH or RUN SILENT, RUN DEEP or THE SANDS OF IWO JIMA. I was the guy who never really bought it, not really. Maybe it's the German in me, but I have this deep distrust for love of institutions; and rampant, "hail to the heroes" style patriotism makes me uncomfortable.

THEY WERE EXPENDABLE pushed gunge buttons I didn't even know I had. The opening credits include the ranks of people who worked on the film, including CAPT John Ford, USNR; CDR Robert Montgomery, USNR; CDR Frank Wead, USN (Ret); LCDR Joseph August, USN; and CAPTJames Havens, USMCR (Reservists represent!). The score weaves in chanties and traditional Navy songs I learned in Annapolis. The movie's first big action sequence, a Japanese airstrike on Subic Bay, made me want to want to be Robert Montgomery, commanding a squadron of PT boats in a desperate fight (Aside: if a movie can make an aviator want to be a surface warfare officer, it's gotta be something special!).

But THEY WERE EXPENDABLE, while certainly a gunge movie (it's wartime propaganda), doesn't tell the story of victory against impossible odds. It tells a story of loss, of underequipped and undermanned forces losing to a Japanese war machine that, at the time, appeared unstoppable. People sabotage their boats. The love interest is lost in Bataan. The heroes are ordered to flee, leaving their men behind to take their chances with the Japanese. And it's mostly handled in true military fashion. Shut up and do your job, and the best epitaph a man can hope for is that he did his.

Some of the film's elements don't fit, but they make sense when taken in historical context. When the men see MacArthur leave the Philippines, the film tries to sell it as an uplifting, patriotic moment. "There goes the great man," the PT sailors seem to think. While the reality is that line soldiers and sailors saw MacArthur's departure from the Philippines as a betrayal that helped earn him the nickname "Dugout Doug," the fact is that America needed heroes in the latter years of WWII, and there's no way a film of that period was going to show the American fighting man looking at the Great General with anything less than awe. The film also goes out of its way to wave the flag for those left behind. The flag waving doesn't fit in with the businesslike tone of the rest of the proceedings, but we should recall that this film was made in a time of total war, a time when America was preparing to fight its way back into the PI and rescue those whom we'd left behind.

Robert Montgomery, John Wayne, and Donna Reed are all fine here, with Wayne great fun as a fireball junior officer and Reed acting her butt off in pretty stock role. The action sequences are rousing and awesome, particularly when we recall that they were done with practical effects. This is a fine picture, a picture worthy of preservation, a gunge picture.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some pushups to do.

Let The Right One In

LET THE RIGHT ONE IN is either a horrifying story about two lost and lonely kids who find one another in a harsh and unforgiving world or a horrifying story about a brutal monster who throws over her old, incompetent Renfeld and seduces a new familiar. Either way, it ranks among the best vampire films I’ve ever seen.

The film, a recent import from Sweden, does everything right. It creates believable, relatable characters, some of whom are evil, and puts them in a horrifying situation. It lets events play out tightly, seamlessly, with actions onscreen illuminating facets of the protagonist’s journey without appearing to do so. It makes brilliant use of atmospherics, of sound and music, to create a tone and uses that tone to heighten and contribute to the narrative. And it does so without connecting all the dots for its audience, with a strong dose of ambiguity and empathy, and with that certain special something that sets the memorable film apart from the merely good.

Some movies you see because they’re gonna make you laugh. Others, because they’re gonna make you think, or thrill, or cry, or shudder. Some you see because they’re just plain brilliant. LET THE RIGHT ONE IN is one of these. You owe it to yourself to spin it up.

My Dog Skip

MY DOG SKIP opens with a slow pan across the knickknacks that line the shelves of a WW-II era boy’s bedroom. It’s drenched in the golden light of treasured memory, and an orchestral score glides along in the background.

It’s deadly dull. And the movie doesn’t get any better from there.

Here’s a picture about a boy who falls in love with a dog. This should speak to me. I, after all, was a boy. And I had a dog. But everything’s too precious, every memory too golden, and everything too slow. Watching MY DOG SKIP is like being stuck in a plane with some guy who’s just dying to tell you the story of his life but lacks the ability to make that story interesting. You smile, you nod, you try to change the subject (to yourself because, let’s face it, you’re far more interesting), but on he drones. And on and on and on.

Sure, the movie looks fine. Kevin Bacon and Diane Lane, as the parents, are fine. Frankie Muniz, as the boy, is fine. But I just wanted the plane to land so I could get away.

Frequency

FREQUENCY is not a great movie, but it has a great core and two central performances that sell it.

Here’s the setup: through the magic of sunspots and HAM radio, NYPD detective John Sullivan finds himself able to communicate with his father, NYFD firefighter Frank Sullivan. Where John’s sitting, it’s 1999. Where Frank’s sitting, it’s 1969. Frank doesn’t believe that it’s his son on the other end of that radio transmission. But when John tells his father all about the fire he’ll fight the next day, and about how he’ll die in it unless he goes against his instinct and zigs when he’d normally zag, Frank’s intrigued. The next day, of course, the son’s prophecies come true and the father believes.

OK, and this is where the movie gets me. Frank comes home, kisses his wife (who tells him she heard he had a close call), and goes upstairs to look in the now 7-yr-old son who, 30 years in the future, will save his life by warning him yesterday. Dennis Quaid, who plays Frank, looks at the sleeping child with an expression that captures everything I feel when I look in on my boys, then adds appreciation and respect for the man this boy will grow up to become. He goes downstairs, contacts his son on the magic radio, and tells him he loves him. “I love you, too, pop.” Then, in the 1969 timeline, the boy comes downstairs, half asleep. Quaid tells him to get dressed: tonight, together, they’re going to master the challenge of riding that bike once and for all.

Waterworks, I’m tellin’ ya. Waterworks. I get choked up even writing about it. Yeah, there’s this whole plot about a serial killer (and really, what ‘90s movie didn’t work a serial killer in there somewhere) and the unexpected consequences of messing with the timeline and chasing and shooting and all that stuff. There’s also a lot of time travel hokum that’s basically just asking the audience to believe in magic and go with it. But the core of FREQUENCY, the love between a father and his son and a boy and his dad, resonates so powerfully with me that I overlook the weaknesses and spend all my time locked into the performances of Dennis Quaid and Jim Caviezel. What man doesn’t want to be the father Dennis Quaid is in this movie? What man doesn’t want to have the father Dennis Quaid is in this movie? What man doesn’t want his son to grow up to be the kind of guy Jim Caviezel is in this movie?

This picture works, and it speaks to me in a deep and powerful way. Whenever I need to test to make sure the plumbing still works, I need only to spin this one up to make the water flow. FREQUENCY may not be a great movie, but it hits its mark.

Choke

I didn’t know that Sam Rockwell existed before I saw this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1LWg1jFp4E . It’s amazing how one video can catapult a guy into near – CDNW territory. In CHOKE, an adaptation of Chuck Pahlaniuk’s novel about a historical reenactor / sex addict / possible cloned son of Jesus Christ who, um, well, let’s just leave it at that, Rockwell seals the deal. Ok, I’ve only seen a few of his pictures, and I didn’t even particularly like his portrayal of Zaphod Beeblebrox, but to hell with it – Sam Rockwell Can Do No Wrong.

Why? Because he takes this tragic, deeply flawed, possibly irredeemable man and makes him the funniest comic character I’ve seen since Jason Segel in FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL. And he does it not in a comedy that lurches from set piece to set piece, that works the old rhythm of setup – payoff – setup – payoff, but in a quirky and interesting character study of the kinds of people we avoid in real life but are great fun to hang out with on the silver screen. CHOKE is an adult comedy in that, sure, it has sex and profanity and all that kind of stuff; but CHOKE is an adult comedy because it operates with adult and finds its humor in people, places, and actions that it takes a few miles on the odometer to appreciate.

And Rockwell, he knows how to tread the line between villain and rascal. He knows how to be funny while acting dead serious, and here he creates a character so serious that we can’t help but laugh. I rented CHOKE on the strength of his name on the poster, and he doesn’t disappoint. This is my comedy to beat for 2009.

Saturday Night Fever

There’s this scene in SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER in which Tony’s riding in a car with his crew. His friends are complaining about how the game is rigged, about how The Man is keeping them down, about how they’ll never get anywhere because no one will give them a break. Tony’s looking out the window. He’s thinking, “I know thee not, old man.”

OK, he’s probably not thinking those exact words, even if he did take Shakespeare in high school. But he’s thinking something very much like them. You see, Tony Manero is a young man on the cusp of going from Hal to Henry, from potential energy to energy in motion, from boy to man. He’s realizing something that his friends do not know and may never know: what’s worth having is worth working for, and what’s worth working for is too valuable to want someone to give it to you.

Tony’s basically a good boy. Ignored on the street, stuck in a dull job, living at home in a quasi-functional family, he’s nobody. He’s small time. But get him with his crew, and he’s a leader. Get him on the dance floor, and he’s a god. Tony rules Odyssey 2001, the disco where, every Saturday night, he burns through his week’s wages with unfettered joy. But even here, at the beginning of the movie, he’s different. He rehearses. He doesn’t pop or snort. He poses, but he’s essentially celibate (and potentially gay. I think one could make the case for it. I think the film’s “eye” is definitely gay. If you doubt me, notice how the camera caresses Tony’s body just before he awakens in his bed.). He’s in love with dance, with the way he feels when he’s lost in the moment, about the fact that finally, somewhere, he’s the best at something.

But working at a job that gives him just enough money to spend on Saturday night isn’t manhood. Being the big fish in a small pond isn’t manhood. Tony’s got to get out there, he’s got to earn his bones, he’s got to find his way. SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER is the story of how that realization goes from vague feeling to actionable reality. It works because we believe in Tony, flawed and limited though he may be. We understand that when he does that thing he loves, he really is special, amazing. He has something that’s worth working to cultivate, something that can lead to goals worth achieving, something too pure to be sullied by begging for handouts from The Man.

Sure, this movie has issues. There are subplots that go nowhere. Tony does things that are unforgivable. Some of the ADR is downright bad. But at its heart, SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER communicates truths so universal that they speak across decades, taste, and fashion. SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER is about leaving behind childish things, and that’s a theme that speaks to me. Can you dig it? I knew thatcha could.

Soul Men

SOUL MEN asks the cinematic question, "Do you like hanging out with Bernie Mac and Samuel L. Jackson?" If the answer is yes, you'll enjoy this paper thin road movie about two worst enemies and best friends reuniting for one last show. If the answer is no, you'll hate this paper thin road movie filled with crude humor, simplistic characterizations, and so much bad acting you'll bug your eyes out.

Me, I like hanging out with Bernie Mac and Samuel L. Jackson. Mac does his Scammer with a Heart of Gold and Jackson his Angry Man schtick, but those schticks are so well worn because, hey, they work. Sure, the movie's crude and simplistic, but it made me laugh out loud, tap my foot to the music, and generally have a good time.

Destiny

Fritz Lang's DESTINY is an inventive, entertaining film that captured my imagination.

Somewhere in preindustrial Germany, a young couple sets out upon their life's journey. But Death takes the man away, and the woman will try anything to get him back. She confronts Death and begs for her husband, who responds, "I'm tired of being hated for doing God's will. I'll make you a deal: you get three chances to defeat me. If you succeed, I'll give you your husband back."

And thus the film takes us to palace of the Caliph, where a young Frenchman conspires with the sister of the Caliph to find true love's way. From there, it's on to Venice, where jealousy plays at rapiers with love. Finally, DESTINY takes us to mythic China, where the Emperor takes whom he wants, no matter whether she loves another.

DESTINY's framing device gives each of these tales an overarching urgency, but they'd work as well as stand alone short films. Lang cuts loose here, exploring film's ability to conjure palaces of the imagination, armies of magical miniatures, and the very gates of mortality as he tells the simple story of a woman trying to save the life of her one true love. This is a sumptuous film, full of lore, popular religion, and tales that could find a home in the _Arabian Nights_.

For many, Charlie Chaplin *is* silent film. That's fine, really - he served as my gateway to the era. For the person looking to explore silents outside the realm of comedy, DESTINY is a great place to start. It'll grab you early, it won't let go, and it'll make you glad you sat down with it.

Spring in a Smal Town

SPRING IN A SMALL TOWN is a quiet film, a sad film, a heartbreaking film about missed opportunities, the futility of secrecy, and the compromises of adulthood.

It’s 1948. The Japanese are out of China and the Maoists have yet to consolidate their power. In the ruins of what was once a fine home live Liyan (Shi Yu) and Yuwen (Wei Wei), six years into a marriage marked more by duty and sadness than anything else. Liyan’s teenaged sister, Xiu (Zhang Hongmei) and family servant Huang (Cui Chaoming) round out the household. Liyan’s a broken man, his (mild) tuberculosis serving as a ready excuse to flee the crumbling world around him and take refuge in his garden. But Yuwen is very much alive, though she seeks to bury her vitality in her walks and her chores. Then, Zhichen (Li Wei), Liyan’s boyhood friend, appears after over a decade away. Zhichen and Yuwen grew up together. They are clearly, inescapably, forever in love.

That’s the first fifteen minutes.

But SPRING IN A SMALL TOWN isn’t just about love denied. It’s about the sacrifices, big and small, we make to get through the day, the week, the month, the year. It’s about the hidden gesture, about intuition, about how those who love us know us better than we think they do. It’s about all those little moments that make up a life, and the big ones that shape it. SPRING IN A SMALL TOWN is beautiful, not just in the portraits it creates, but in its compassion and understanding for its subjects. It’s an unforgettable film, one worth watching.