Jonathan Levine
2008
Full disclosure: I fully expected to hate The Wackness. The graffiti themed promotional materials displaying a hip-hop loving whiteboy pot-dealer, who pays his troubled shrink in weed, appeared to be the absolute zenith of trite indie-film posturing. Add a heap of Sundance buzz, an Oscar winning legend, and a young actor in a crossover bid and you’re asking for a perfect storm of self-consciously “edgy” cinema. Yet despite my preconceptions The Wackness manages to be a seriously well-crafted effort, and an earnest piece of storytelling. The film is also a bit of a period picture, set in New York City’s summer of ’94, with a great rap soundtrack featuring some of the era’s most classic jams.
College bound Luke Shapiro (Nickelodeon vet Josh Peck) has just graduated high school and is in the throes of some mondo teenage angst. His extracurricular drug dealing makes him the life of parties he’s not invited to, and like most young men, he’s far more concerned about losing his cursed virginity than his family’s looming financial problems. Friendless Luke vents his woes to off kilter shrink Dr. Squires (Sir Ben Kingsley), a shaky and conflicted man stuck in a loveless marriage. It’s the doc’s stepdaughter Stephanie (Olivia Thirlby) that Luke is after, and thanks to the typically desolate New York summer this admittedly “out of his league” girl unexpectedly latches onto him. Meanwhile, the specter of Rudy Giuliani’s citywide crackdown serves as an ominous harbinger of things to come, and the suicide of Kurt Cobain still hangs like a pall in the air.
Not to be overly cynical, but this sort of film seems made for Sundance success. Its the ultimate shout-out to wiggerdom – where black music and culture are celebrated and glorified, but made easily digestible by filling the bill with a lovably dopey white kid. It would appear that the only thing keeping The Wackness from multiplexes would be the inclusion of sexually active teenagers and some heavy drug use. Otherwise, the romance between Luke and Stephanie, and Dr. Squire’s midlife crisis could easily be the stuff of Hollywood focus-groupthink.
The film’s biggest problem comes from Kingsley’s character and performance, which for starters is complicated by a completely unconvincing and inconsistent accent. It would seem that Jonathan Levine has never put in face time with a real shrink considering that nothing even close to psychiatric help transpires in Luke and Squire’s meetings. Instead the office acts more as a crucible to both exercise and conjure up the generation gap’s demons. Squires wants to escape while Luke wants to fit in, Luke wants mind-numbing meds while Squires wants Luke’s youth. In a wonderfully clichéd move, the doc flushes his many medications and goes on a much needed bender with Luke which culminates in a night in jail and a makeout session with a ridiculously dreadlocked druggie (Mary Kate Olson in a jaw droppingly weird bit part). This emancipation isn’t particularly ridiculous from a scripting standpoint as Squires is stuck with a stepdaughter that barely tolerates him and a wife who treats him as if he were invisible (Famke Janssen with a cigarette perpetually glued between her fingers), but Sir Ben’s performance is so over the top as to leave the impression that the older actor is having a blast on the job, leaving Levine too intimidated to bring him down.
That said the film is quite well done overall. Peck’s performance as Luke in particular, is played with a mouth-breathing stoner charm that isn’t so much stupid as enthrallingly naïve and sincere. There’s also a pleasant level of sophistication in the depiction of Luke and Stephanie’s families. Both are troubled and imperfect, yet there’s no direct claim that either is abusive or “bad,” and despite the seemingly inflammatory moral shortcomings of the kids (promiscuity, the distribution of illegal drugs), you’d be hard pressed to consider either of them as truly bad seeds. The film’s sex scenes range from genuinely hilarious to embarrassingly overwrought, and while the drug use is generally handled with an elegant naturalism, there are a few scenes in which the actors are guilty of overdoing it. Still, Levine shows tremendous aptitude for depicting teenage pathos in a way that’s simultaneously amusing and honest.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
Friday, August 08, 2008
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Mongol
Sergei Bodrov
2007
Award winning director Sergei Bodrov’s Mongol is a research-informed cobbling of the early life and rise to power of the boy/man who would eventually become the infamous Genghis Khan. Genre nuts will be delighted to see Tadanobu Asano (Ichi the Killer, Vital) taking over the role of the famed barbarian king. Filmed in the same windy steppes in which Genghis himself was reared Bodrov strives for an earnest verisimilitude in depicting the life of twelfth century Mongols in a film of Russian production, subtitled from Mongolian, and starring a multiethnic cast.
Ostensibly, the film takes the form of the historical epic with its sweeping, omnipresent landscape and tale of a hero rising from dire circumstances. However, there’s only one large-scale battle, and Temudgin’s (Genghis Khan’s birth name) presumably Machiavellian rise to power is glossed over in a few title cards. What’s left is the many hardships suffered by a thrice enslaved boy, a complicated and competitive relationship with his blood brother Jamukha, and most prominently, a romance between him and wife Borte. Think Braveheart minus all those expensive battle scenes.
Of course, the stereotypical view of Genghis Khan is that of a loin-clothed brute surrounded by a harem of slave wenches, wolfing down a mutton shank and sucking liquor from a wineskin (you remember Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, right?). This is the old legend that Bodrov intends to rectify. There’s a tremendous remoteness in Asano’s performance that’s also in opposition to the classic Khan myth. The hedonistically rampant Id of legend is played as a soft-spoken introspective man who frequently prays, and appears completely unimpressed by material gain.
No attempt has been made to candy-coat Mongol life, in which prepubescent boys pick out their wives for marriage and men raid other tribes when they’re not drunkenly wrestling before the bonfire or heading to a nearby kingdom to unload slaves. Yet the rule of law remains vital and is oft mentioned (though sometimes broken), while the dual bonds of family and society hold together a certifiably bona fide culture. It is in this milieu that Temudgin marries for love in youthful defiance of his father, and secretly breaks Mongol law by going to war over a woman when his wife is apprehended by a rival tribe. There’s definitely a degree of tried and true movie magic in Bodrov depicting Temudgin as the sentimental Casanova in a decidedly unsentimental culture – an exaggeration in favor of provocation.
The majority of the film takes place outdoors, making the foreboding hard-scrabble landscape a perpetual backdrop to the action. The cinematography devoted to the steppes is a bit of a letdown, adequate, but by no mean awe inspiring. Instead the empty land acts as a brilliant stage for the audio in which the pound of every hoof cuts through a nearly oppressive stillness. This amplified sense of sound lends a tremendously visceral nature to the storytelling too, as Temudgin runs from would-be captors his fatigue doesn’t come so much from the weary look on Asano’s face, but from the sound of his ragged footsteps.
Out of the three battle scenes the first two, smaller in scale, feel much more satisfying than the final climax. The use of CGI blood has really come a long way and looks excellent here as Temudgin hacks away at masked assailants from a rival tribe and litters the ground with the corpses of Jamukha’s army in another. A particularly effective device is used in the latter of these two fights in which a time cut brings us to the end of a battle to find the ferocious Temudgin still making mincemeat out of enemies after all his comrades have bought the farm. The final showdown is much less exciting in its predictability with aerial shots full of little CGI ants on each side against a sandy, unconvincing CGI backdrop.
Bodrov does a hell of a job in inventing a new mythos for an established historical figure. Considering the film is supposed to be the first installment of a trilogy on Genghis Khan it will be particularly interesting to see what the director does with this unique take on a man whose empire covered half the globe.
2007
Award winning director Sergei Bodrov’s Mongol is a research-informed cobbling of the early life and rise to power of the boy/man who would eventually become the infamous Genghis Khan. Genre nuts will be delighted to see Tadanobu Asano (Ichi the Killer, Vital) taking over the role of the famed barbarian king. Filmed in the same windy steppes in which Genghis himself was reared Bodrov strives for an earnest verisimilitude in depicting the life of twelfth century Mongols in a film of Russian production, subtitled from Mongolian, and starring a multiethnic cast.
Ostensibly, the film takes the form of the historical epic with its sweeping, omnipresent landscape and tale of a hero rising from dire circumstances. However, there’s only one large-scale battle, and Temudgin’s (Genghis Khan’s birth name) presumably Machiavellian rise to power is glossed over in a few title cards. What’s left is the many hardships suffered by a thrice enslaved boy, a complicated and competitive relationship with his blood brother Jamukha, and most prominently, a romance between him and wife Borte. Think Braveheart minus all those expensive battle scenes.
Of course, the stereotypical view of Genghis Khan is that of a loin-clothed brute surrounded by a harem of slave wenches, wolfing down a mutton shank and sucking liquor from a wineskin (you remember Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, right?). This is the old legend that Bodrov intends to rectify. There’s a tremendous remoteness in Asano’s performance that’s also in opposition to the classic Khan myth. The hedonistically rampant Id of legend is played as a soft-spoken introspective man who frequently prays, and appears completely unimpressed by material gain.
No attempt has been made to candy-coat Mongol life, in which prepubescent boys pick out their wives for marriage and men raid other tribes when they’re not drunkenly wrestling before the bonfire or heading to a nearby kingdom to unload slaves. Yet the rule of law remains vital and is oft mentioned (though sometimes broken), while the dual bonds of family and society hold together a certifiably bona fide culture. It is in this milieu that Temudgin marries for love in youthful defiance of his father, and secretly breaks Mongol law by going to war over a woman when his wife is apprehended by a rival tribe. There’s definitely a degree of tried and true movie magic in Bodrov depicting Temudgin as the sentimental Casanova in a decidedly unsentimental culture – an exaggeration in favor of provocation.
The majority of the film takes place outdoors, making the foreboding hard-scrabble landscape a perpetual backdrop to the action. The cinematography devoted to the steppes is a bit of a letdown, adequate, but by no mean awe inspiring. Instead the empty land acts as a brilliant stage for the audio in which the pound of every hoof cuts through a nearly oppressive stillness. This amplified sense of sound lends a tremendously visceral nature to the storytelling too, as Temudgin runs from would-be captors his fatigue doesn’t come so much from the weary look on Asano’s face, but from the sound of his ragged footsteps.
Out of the three battle scenes the first two, smaller in scale, feel much more satisfying than the final climax. The use of CGI blood has really come a long way and looks excellent here as Temudgin hacks away at masked assailants from a rival tribe and litters the ground with the corpses of Jamukha’s army in another. A particularly effective device is used in the latter of these two fights in which a time cut brings us to the end of a battle to find the ferocious Temudgin still making mincemeat out of enemies after all his comrades have bought the farm. The final showdown is much less exciting in its predictability with aerial shots full of little CGI ants on each side against a sandy, unconvincing CGI backdrop.
Bodrov does a hell of a job in inventing a new mythos for an established historical figure. Considering the film is supposed to be the first installment of a trilogy on Genghis Khan it will be particularly interesting to see what the director does with this unique take on a man whose empire covered half the globe.
Reprise
Joachim Trier
2006
Joachim Trier’s debut feature Reprise is a solid art house import with an incisively penetrating tendency towards character study – a film that elegantly portrays the youthful condition in which anything is possible, both for better and for worse. Despite the remarkable display of candor and insight there is an unpleasant degree of filler in the form of woefully conventional and hackneyed devices: the party scene music video, the young protagonist meeting and receiving advice from his hero, the boorish fratboy eventually sucking face with a girl he had previously offended, and a wedding epilogue. Ironically these are all clichés that the two young authors at the center of Reprise would find genuinely hokey.
Fast friends Phillip (Anders Danielsen Lie) and Erik (Espen Klouman-Hoiner) chide each other and giggle nervously as they are preparing to send out their first manuscripts to publishers. A self-conscious zoom into the mailbox-slot heightens the couple’s anxious optimism and zips ahead in time to where the butterflies have subsided and we find that gaunt, beaky Phillip’s book has achieved a minor cult success leading to a heavy dose of insecurity and psychological damage. Erik, disappointed but undaunted by his manuscript’s rejection, continues plugging away while becoming increasingly wary of Phillip’s fragile wellbeing.
The majority of the film’s success lies in the tremendous performances of these lead roles. Erik’s “straight-man” is full of youthful yearning and a palpable striving for greatness, which Trier takes to task by imbuing the blonde moppet with a harmlessly comic does of pretension. The film starts in earnest with Phillip being released from the pysch-ward after a suicide attempt, and the core of Danielsen Lie’s performance suggests a jaded world-weariness so profound that becomes no longer a question of whether he’ll publish another novel, but whether he’ll make it through the night. Its a show-stealing performance in which nearly every scene involving Phillip is so charged with tension, so riddled with anxiety, that there’s a strong element of classic suspense ingrained within the drama.
On the periphery of these sad young literary men are friends, girls, and the humdrum lull of life in Oslo. Phillip’s girlfriend Kari (Viktoria Winge) is primarily, though unintentionally, responsible for his growing dementia, and their mutual refusal to let go is a constant source of concern. Its not hard to see how one could lose his mind over such a gal considering that Winge’s radiant beauty is frequently and hungrily meditated upon in Trier’s starry-eyed lens. If there’s such a thing as “screen presence,” than she’s got it in spades. Most of Erik and Phillip’s leisure time is spent with a small coterie of friends, mostly ex-punks who’ve eased into advertising jobs and chronic beer swilling. These are the kind of guys who will keep one grounded, a colorful and necessary entourage of jokesters that adds a sense of fun and lightheartedness to a film mainly concerned with a pair of heavy-minded boys.
While many of the stylistic devices in Reprise verge on annoying, (superfluous use of flashbacks, an amateurish reliance on voiceover) the use of sound in key emotional scenes is stunning. Many conversations between Phillip and Kari are imbued with a poetic disjoint between sound and image, with conversation taking place while the screen presents tender touches, and close-ups of neck napes, hair wisps, and furtive glances. It would be the stuff of cheesy romance fiction were it not handled with Trier’s exuberant heart-on-sleeve sensibility – the kind of openness and vulnerability presented by many great authors.
While all the cutesy male bonding and quasi-macho pose is funny and familiar, the depiction of women is a bit troubling. When Phillip flies Kari to Paris in an identically retrace of the trip where they fell in love, she’s subjected to some of Phillip’s most unhinged mental malaise yet acts fairly oblivious to the awful position she’s been thrust into. Its an outrageous display of passivity, more the fault of the script and direction than that of the actress. Meanwhile Erik’s long-suffering girlfriend is used more as a device then presented as a real character. Finally, there’s plenty of discussion between the boys about how women are the bane of male creativity. None of this proves to be much of a deal-breaker however, as Trier’s light touch prevents things from becoming a royal PC bummer.
2006
Joachim Trier’s debut feature Reprise is a solid art house import with an incisively penetrating tendency towards character study – a film that elegantly portrays the youthful condition in which anything is possible, both for better and for worse. Despite the remarkable display of candor and insight there is an unpleasant degree of filler in the form of woefully conventional and hackneyed devices: the party scene music video, the young protagonist meeting and receiving advice from his hero, the boorish fratboy eventually sucking face with a girl he had previously offended, and a wedding epilogue. Ironically these are all clichés that the two young authors at the center of Reprise would find genuinely hokey.
Fast friends Phillip (Anders Danielsen Lie) and Erik (Espen Klouman-Hoiner) chide each other and giggle nervously as they are preparing to send out their first manuscripts to publishers. A self-conscious zoom into the mailbox-slot heightens the couple’s anxious optimism and zips ahead in time to where the butterflies have subsided and we find that gaunt, beaky Phillip’s book has achieved a minor cult success leading to a heavy dose of insecurity and psychological damage. Erik, disappointed but undaunted by his manuscript’s rejection, continues plugging away while becoming increasingly wary of Phillip’s fragile wellbeing.
The majority of the film’s success lies in the tremendous performances of these lead roles. Erik’s “straight-man” is full of youthful yearning and a palpable striving for greatness, which Trier takes to task by imbuing the blonde moppet with a harmlessly comic does of pretension. The film starts in earnest with Phillip being released from the pysch-ward after a suicide attempt, and the core of Danielsen Lie’s performance suggests a jaded world-weariness so profound that becomes no longer a question of whether he’ll publish another novel, but whether he’ll make it through the night. Its a show-stealing performance in which nearly every scene involving Phillip is so charged with tension, so riddled with anxiety, that there’s a strong element of classic suspense ingrained within the drama.
On the periphery of these sad young literary men are friends, girls, and the humdrum lull of life in Oslo. Phillip’s girlfriend Kari (Viktoria Winge) is primarily, though unintentionally, responsible for his growing dementia, and their mutual refusal to let go is a constant source of concern. Its not hard to see how one could lose his mind over such a gal considering that Winge’s radiant beauty is frequently and hungrily meditated upon in Trier’s starry-eyed lens. If there’s such a thing as “screen presence,” than she’s got it in spades. Most of Erik and Phillip’s leisure time is spent with a small coterie of friends, mostly ex-punks who’ve eased into advertising jobs and chronic beer swilling. These are the kind of guys who will keep one grounded, a colorful and necessary entourage of jokesters that adds a sense of fun and lightheartedness to a film mainly concerned with a pair of heavy-minded boys.
While many of the stylistic devices in Reprise verge on annoying, (superfluous use of flashbacks, an amateurish reliance on voiceover) the use of sound in key emotional scenes is stunning. Many conversations between Phillip and Kari are imbued with a poetic disjoint between sound and image, with conversation taking place while the screen presents tender touches, and close-ups of neck napes, hair wisps, and furtive glances. It would be the stuff of cheesy romance fiction were it not handled with Trier’s exuberant heart-on-sleeve sensibility – the kind of openness and vulnerability presented by many great authors.
While all the cutesy male bonding and quasi-macho pose is funny and familiar, the depiction of women is a bit troubling. When Phillip flies Kari to Paris in an identically retrace of the trip where they fell in love, she’s subjected to some of Phillip’s most unhinged mental malaise yet acts fairly oblivious to the awful position she’s been thrust into. Its an outrageous display of passivity, more the fault of the script and direction than that of the actress. Meanwhile Erik’s long-suffering girlfriend is used more as a device then presented as a real character. Finally, there’s plenty of discussion between the boys about how women are the bane of male creativity. None of this proves to be much of a deal-breaker however, as Trier’s light touch prevents things from becoming a royal PC bummer.
Mr. Lonely
Harmony Korine
2007
For a long time I've been fairly dismissive of Harmony Korine, but after recently reexamining his work I was pleased to find that my relationship to the auteurist art punk has become more of a love/hate affair than one of total disinterest. Korine's latest film, clearly his most mature and arguably most accomplished, now threatens to tip the scale in his favor. Mister Lonely may be the director's turning point from sleazy quasi-exploitative youth shockers, to well crafted adult cinema.
Barely successful Michael Jackson professionally impersonates the King of Pop, but has been relegated to honing his craft in Parisian parks and hosting the occasional gig at the local old folks home. After a flirtatious run-in with a Marilyn Monroe (Samantha Morton) impersonator Michael is swept away to a castle in the Scottish highlands, and is introduced to a seemingly utopian community of celebrity impersonators ranging from James Dean to the Queen of England - from The Pope to the Three Stooges. Theirs is a childish fantasy world marred by the love triangle between Michael, Marilyn, and her capricious and abusive husband Charlie Chaplin. These impersonators' well meaning escapism is further complicated by the stony realities of diseased livestock and an apathetic public. After all, what's a performer without an audience?
For Korine, this is a remarkably restrained film in which the signature white trash/ghetto-fab freak show is replaced with competent acting and believably honest sentiment. In dealing with a cultural phenomenon like celebrity impersonation Korine benefits by bringing forth a host of characters that create certain presupposed impressions. Therefore unsurprisingly, both Michael and Marilyn have a childlike naivety, James Dean and Sammy Davis Jr. are preoccupied with style, while Abraham Lincoln and the Pope are prone to spout off in blustery bouts of public address.
The major roles are superbly acted, with Morton's Marilyn as the proverbial cherry on top in a performance that trumps the real McCoy in its delicate vulnerability. Her imperfect looks and non-cover-girl figure lend her a satisfying accessibility: the cinematic equivalent of comfort food. Along with Marilyn, Diego Luna's Michael is given more dimension with characterization beyond his self-assumed identity. At times he seethes with the quality of an awkward tween in a man's body, something like a low self esteem Peter Pan. Denis Lavant as Chaplin effectively creates a two-faced clown with his tomfoolery and pratfalls masking a wickedly pitted face, and cruel dark eyes. Also of note, Werner Herzog puts in his second appearance in a Korine film, after his turn as the maniacal patriarch of Julien Donkey-Boy. This time he plays Father Umbrillo, a wisdom imparting missionary priest who leads a troupe of flying nuns. As an actor, one can only expect Werner Herzog to play Werner Herzog - not necessarily a bad thing considering his powerful presence and subtly comic delivery.
Seeing as it hardly pertains to the main action, Father Umbrillo's clucking and kibitzing is the kind of superfluous indulgence that could weaken or muddy the film, however Director of Photography Marcel Zyskind's photography of miraculous nuns falling through clear blue is genuinely breathtaking, and ads a playful layer to the wide-eyed tone. Much of the cinematography is effortlessly intimate with probing closeups and candid performances. Sammy Davis Jr. practices his routine on the castle parapet, and Buckwheat swoons over the chickens he's charged with caring for.
Mister Lonely is not wholly without its detractions. Abe Lincoln possesses a notably foul mouth, and his frequent cussing is played more for cheap laughs than worthwhile characterization. Michael's jaunt in the old folks' home gives us a hefty dose of Korine's standby anthropological gawking, as the near-catatonic elderly grotesques are wheeled up to the camera lens. Admittedly this scene is played with a degree of playful fun as opposed to the bratty pretensions of Gummo's (1997) "Down Syndrome beauty," but nevertheless the scene retains a hokey element of misplaced comic relief.
It would be trite to say that Mister Lonely is a coming of age picture, yet it has many of the genre's trappings, and many familiar tropes are used. Questions of identity, longing, and confusion with one's place in the world are core themes of the film, and if that doesn't speak volumes of the modern teenage experience I don't know what does. The film ends with an uncertain future for the commune, and not all characters make it through. Michael has returned to the Parisian streets Marilyn found him on, but his Scottish adventure has created a sea change in his identity which provides a new set of challenges and a new purpose. For Korine, like Michael, this appears to be a step towards a change in his identity as an artist. He's the same man at heart, just a little more grown up now.
2007
For a long time I've been fairly dismissive of Harmony Korine, but after recently reexamining his work I was pleased to find that my relationship to the auteurist art punk has become more of a love/hate affair than one of total disinterest. Korine's latest film, clearly his most mature and arguably most accomplished, now threatens to tip the scale in his favor. Mister Lonely may be the director's turning point from sleazy quasi-exploitative youth shockers, to well crafted adult cinema.
Barely successful Michael Jackson professionally impersonates the King of Pop, but has been relegated to honing his craft in Parisian parks and hosting the occasional gig at the local old folks home. After a flirtatious run-in with a Marilyn Monroe (Samantha Morton) impersonator Michael is swept away to a castle in the Scottish highlands, and is introduced to a seemingly utopian community of celebrity impersonators ranging from James Dean to the Queen of England - from The Pope to the Three Stooges. Theirs is a childish fantasy world marred by the love triangle between Michael, Marilyn, and her capricious and abusive husband Charlie Chaplin. These impersonators' well meaning escapism is further complicated by the stony realities of diseased livestock and an apathetic public. After all, what's a performer without an audience?
For Korine, this is a remarkably restrained film in which the signature white trash/ghetto-fab freak show is replaced with competent acting and believably honest sentiment. In dealing with a cultural phenomenon like celebrity impersonation Korine benefits by bringing forth a host of characters that create certain presupposed impressions. Therefore unsurprisingly, both Michael and Marilyn have a childlike naivety, James Dean and Sammy Davis Jr. are preoccupied with style, while Abraham Lincoln and the Pope are prone to spout off in blustery bouts of public address.
The major roles are superbly acted, with Morton's Marilyn as the proverbial cherry on top in a performance that trumps the real McCoy in its delicate vulnerability. Her imperfect looks and non-cover-girl figure lend her a satisfying accessibility: the cinematic equivalent of comfort food. Along with Marilyn, Diego Luna's Michael is given more dimension with characterization beyond his self-assumed identity. At times he seethes with the quality of an awkward tween in a man's body, something like a low self esteem Peter Pan. Denis Lavant as Chaplin effectively creates a two-faced clown with his tomfoolery and pratfalls masking a wickedly pitted face, and cruel dark eyes. Also of note, Werner Herzog puts in his second appearance in a Korine film, after his turn as the maniacal patriarch of Julien Donkey-Boy. This time he plays Father Umbrillo, a wisdom imparting missionary priest who leads a troupe of flying nuns. As an actor, one can only expect Werner Herzog to play Werner Herzog - not necessarily a bad thing considering his powerful presence and subtly comic delivery.
Seeing as it hardly pertains to the main action, Father Umbrillo's clucking and kibitzing is the kind of superfluous indulgence that could weaken or muddy the film, however Director of Photography Marcel Zyskind's photography of miraculous nuns falling through clear blue is genuinely breathtaking, and ads a playful layer to the wide-eyed tone. Much of the cinematography is effortlessly intimate with probing closeups and candid performances. Sammy Davis Jr. practices his routine on the castle parapet, and Buckwheat swoons over the chickens he's charged with caring for.
Mister Lonely is not wholly without its detractions. Abe Lincoln possesses a notably foul mouth, and his frequent cussing is played more for cheap laughs than worthwhile characterization. Michael's jaunt in the old folks' home gives us a hefty dose of Korine's standby anthropological gawking, as the near-catatonic elderly grotesques are wheeled up to the camera lens. Admittedly this scene is played with a degree of playful fun as opposed to the bratty pretensions of Gummo's (1997) "Down Syndrome beauty," but nevertheless the scene retains a hokey element of misplaced comic relief.
It would be trite to say that Mister Lonely is a coming of age picture, yet it has many of the genre's trappings, and many familiar tropes are used. Questions of identity, longing, and confusion with one's place in the world are core themes of the film, and if that doesn't speak volumes of the modern teenage experience I don't know what does. The film ends with an uncertain future for the commune, and not all characters make it through. Michael has returned to the Parisian streets Marilyn found him on, but his Scottish adventure has created a sea change in his identity which provides a new set of challenges and a new purpose. For Korine, like Michael, this appears to be a step towards a change in his identity as an artist. He's the same man at heart, just a little more grown up now.
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Son of Rambow
Garth Jennings 2007
Read my review for the Knoxville Metro Pulse!
http://www.metropulse.com/news/2008/may/28/second-blood/
Read my review for the Knoxville Metro Pulse!
http://www.metropulse.com/news/2008/may/28/second-blood/
Tuesday, April 01, 2008
Paranoid Park
Gus Van Sant
2007
With the release of Paranoid Park Gus Van Sant sadly caps a cinematic hat trick that started with 2002's Gerry and ended with 2005's Last Days. A hallmark of this trilogy (that also included the superb Columbine meditation, Elephant) was the participation of Director of Photography Harris Savides, whose lensing skills are noticeably absent from this production. In breaking this fruitful partnership, and opting for Christopher Doyle to shoot instead (also a prior collaborator), Van Sant's film suffers from an aesthetic confusion unbecomingly amateurish in light of his prior achievements.
The picture borrows its story from the YA book of the same title, a teenage Crime and Punishment in which skater Alex is wracked by guilt over his part in the accidental murder of a railway security guard. The simple plotting is complemented by a fractured chronology that provides a measured and candid view into Alex's inner life. His mundane interactions with parents, adults, and peers comprise the bulk of the picture, and are far more deft and illuminating than the hokey murder mystery anyway. Van Sant's been good with youth actors in the past, but unfortunately only Gabe Nevins' lead performance comes off as something more meaningful than the cloying quality a failed non-actor performance always seems to possess, though to be fair, Lauren McKinney's bleach-streaked alternateen has charm to spare.
The Oregon grey and copious amounts of concrete on display add to the muted and washed out aesthetic, creating a cliched look which screams "disaffected youth." This drab-by-default palette is puzzling considering the look is directly at odds with the anti-fashion, anti-buzzword portrait Van Sant attempts to bring out of his subjects. Additionally, the practice of filming skate sessions in super-8 (or some identical looking process) and co-opting skateboard video devices is an appallingly trite riff on the subculture. Its a cheesy cop-out that places the filmmaker's age squarely and unnecessarily on his sleeve.
What seems most frustrating is that this is ground Van Sant has previously trod, and done so with sincerity and panache. It feels as if something's missing this time around, an amorphous discord between direction and performance, photography and tone. I can't help but imagine what may have been were Savides behind the camera. For an accomplished and increasingly admirable artist, this feels like two steps back.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
2007
With the release of Paranoid Park Gus Van Sant sadly caps a cinematic hat trick that started with 2002's Gerry and ended with 2005's Last Days. A hallmark of this trilogy (that also included the superb Columbine meditation, Elephant) was the participation of Director of Photography Harris Savides, whose lensing skills are noticeably absent from this production. In breaking this fruitful partnership, and opting for Christopher Doyle to shoot instead (also a prior collaborator), Van Sant's film suffers from an aesthetic confusion unbecomingly amateurish in light of his prior achievements.
The picture borrows its story from the YA book of the same title, a teenage Crime and Punishment in which skater Alex is wracked by guilt over his part in the accidental murder of a railway security guard. The simple plotting is complemented by a fractured chronology that provides a measured and candid view into Alex's inner life. His mundane interactions with parents, adults, and peers comprise the bulk of the picture, and are far more deft and illuminating than the hokey murder mystery anyway. Van Sant's been good with youth actors in the past, but unfortunately only Gabe Nevins' lead performance comes off as something more meaningful than the cloying quality a failed non-actor performance always seems to possess, though to be fair, Lauren McKinney's bleach-streaked alternateen has charm to spare.
The Oregon grey and copious amounts of concrete on display add to the muted and washed out aesthetic, creating a cliched look which screams "disaffected youth." This drab-by-default palette is puzzling considering the look is directly at odds with the anti-fashion, anti-buzzword portrait Van Sant attempts to bring out of his subjects. Additionally, the practice of filming skate sessions in super-8 (or some identical looking process) and co-opting skateboard video devices is an appallingly trite riff on the subculture. Its a cheesy cop-out that places the filmmaker's age squarely and unnecessarily on his sleeve.
What seems most frustrating is that this is ground Van Sant has previously trod, and done so with sincerity and panache. It feels as if something's missing this time around, an amorphous discord between direction and performance, photography and tone. I can't help but imagine what may have been were Savides behind the camera. For an accomplished and increasingly admirable artist, this feels like two steps back.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Criterion Eclipse Series 7: Postwar Kurosawa
I've taken quite a shine to Criterion's Eclipse line series of reasonably priced (for Criterion) DVD sets highlighting a specific era of a noted or overshadowed director's work. Series 3: Late Ozu goes down like pure cinematic opiate, and Series 5: The First Films of Sam Fuller is nothing short of required viewing. One of the more recent volumes takes a look at 5 films Kurosawa made over a roughly ten year period follow Japan's WWII defeat. Its an interesting crop of films, made all the more interesting because they're not all that successful. Its also worth taking into account that the best Kurosawa films of that period have already been released in proper Criterion DVD editions. Still, the Eclipse series is a very watchable portrait of a young director just starting to hit his stride.
No Regrets For Our Youth
1946
Fans of Yasujiro Ozu will be shocked to see his perennial star Setsuko Hara, leave behind her crisp kimono and prim shyness for dirty peasant rags and manual rice paddy labor. Centering on bourgeoisie Hara's journey from activist, to the wife of a radical, to filial daughter-in-law, to a champion of rural labor, the film is splintered in focus and poorly paced, missing the mark until its satisfying third act. Hindsight being 20/20 it looks a little disingenuous of Kurosawa to make a film celebrating student protests in the face of imperial Japan's rising fascism considering he was complicit in the war effort. The film instead provides a too-late apology from a defeated and occupied country. I'm curious as to how the film's final message, which has all the gooey sweetness of communist propaganda, made it through U.S. occupation censors.
One Wonderful Sunday
1947
This is a nice Capra-esque social-realist comedy that does a great job of conveying the stifling poverty and frustrations of postwar Japan, spiced with a youthful glimmer of a brighter future. A young couple, essentially broke, meet on their Sundays for cheap dates. He's mopey, she's sunny, and the two go back and forth between enjoying their time together, and lamenting their current situation. Kurosawa in no way skirts harsh reality and presents it memorably onscreen in the form of a lost-soul child beggar, and an upscale nightclub that fronts a low-rent yakuza whorehouse. This down and dirty approach pleasantly contrasts and justifies the schmaltzy Disney-like sequences of hope, as the young man pantomimes running his own imaginary cafe amongst a literally ruined cityscape, and conducts a nonexistent orchestra in a desolate venue. This unexpected treat is one of the better films in the box.
Scandal
1950
The weakest selection in the set features Toshiro Mifune as a hunky painter who is inadvertently caught up in tabloid notoriety after an innocent encounter with a famous chanteuse at a rural inn. Taking a quasi-courtroom drama form, the picture has almost none of the genre's signature tension and feels woefully rote in its plotting. Pocketed lawyer Takashi Shimura's legal and moral predicament is fairly interesting but predictable, and the depiction and inclusion of his angelic, tubercular daughter as a sickly sweet golden child makes for near unforgivable cliche. Its hard to believe that this weak effort is bookended in Kurosawa's career by the genuinely intriguing (and very postwar) Stray Dog and the utterly classic Seven Samurai.
The Idiot
1951
A very decent adaptation of Dostoevsky's novel considering the overly ambitious production ran into trouble with the studio and thus Kurosawa's grand vision was compromised (the original cut was supposed to run close to three and a half hours). Its fairly remarkable how the easily 19th century Russian characters are altered to fit Japanese ones in a snow-blanketed postwar Hokkaido. Fans of Ozu will again be shocked to see goody-good Setsuko Hara's image twisted under Kurosawa's direction into a vampy kept-woman of the world. Lead actor Masayuki Mori's subtly un-Japanese features aid the "pure soul" outsider innocence his performance . The film has several great setpieces chock full of the rich turmoil and laden with all the madness of some of Dostoevsky's most fevered writing, particularly a defiant Setsuko Hara chucking a hefty bundle of Yen into a fireplace, and Mifune and Mori's addled chatter as they share a cold room with Mifune's murder victim.
I live in Fear
1955
The most well known film in the box also contains one of Toshiro Mifune's best roles as the overly-physical young actor transmutes his trademark swagger and growl to the bent stoop and clipped terseness of an elderly magnate. The deep seated nuclear terror of Hiroshima/Nagasak has convinced Mifune that he must move his family, mistresses and bastard children included, to the remote safety of the Brazilian countryside. Unsurprisingly, the Nakajima family has little interest in this proposed displacement and takes the issue to family court which eventually leads part-time lawyer Takashi Shimura to examine his own atomic fears. Mifune's cockeyed plan smacks of male fantasy. His vision of Brazil is a polygamist Eden that he can dictate and preside over as a wise, greying patriarch. While Nakajima senior's personal a-bomb demons tend to manifest theatrically in tortured expressions and manic fits during thunder storms, Takashi Shimura's dread is more realistic in its chilling inward contemplation. Disturbingly, the fear of these characters is not the simple vestigial zeitgeist of 50's Japan, as we continue to, and will most likely always, live in a world mere push-buttons away from annihilation.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
No Regrets For Our Youth
1946
Fans of Yasujiro Ozu will be shocked to see his perennial star Setsuko Hara, leave behind her crisp kimono and prim shyness for dirty peasant rags and manual rice paddy labor. Centering on bourgeoisie Hara's journey from activist, to the wife of a radical, to filial daughter-in-law, to a champion of rural labor, the film is splintered in focus and poorly paced, missing the mark until its satisfying third act. Hindsight being 20/20 it looks a little disingenuous of Kurosawa to make a film celebrating student protests in the face of imperial Japan's rising fascism considering he was complicit in the war effort. The film instead provides a too-late apology from a defeated and occupied country. I'm curious as to how the film's final message, which has all the gooey sweetness of communist propaganda, made it through U.S. occupation censors.
One Wonderful Sunday
1947
This is a nice Capra-esque social-realist comedy that does a great job of conveying the stifling poverty and frustrations of postwar Japan, spiced with a youthful glimmer of a brighter future. A young couple, essentially broke, meet on their Sundays for cheap dates. He's mopey, she's sunny, and the two go back and forth between enjoying their time together, and lamenting their current situation. Kurosawa in no way skirts harsh reality and presents it memorably onscreen in the form of a lost-soul child beggar, and an upscale nightclub that fronts a low-rent yakuza whorehouse. This down and dirty approach pleasantly contrasts and justifies the schmaltzy Disney-like sequences of hope, as the young man pantomimes running his own imaginary cafe amongst a literally ruined cityscape, and conducts a nonexistent orchestra in a desolate venue. This unexpected treat is one of the better films in the box.
Scandal
1950
The weakest selection in the set features Toshiro Mifune as a hunky painter who is inadvertently caught up in tabloid notoriety after an innocent encounter with a famous chanteuse at a rural inn. Taking a quasi-courtroom drama form, the picture has almost none of the genre's signature tension and feels woefully rote in its plotting. Pocketed lawyer Takashi Shimura's legal and moral predicament is fairly interesting but predictable, and the depiction and inclusion of his angelic, tubercular daughter as a sickly sweet golden child makes for near unforgivable cliche. Its hard to believe that this weak effort is bookended in Kurosawa's career by the genuinely intriguing (and very postwar) Stray Dog and the utterly classic Seven Samurai.
The Idiot
1951
A very decent adaptation of Dostoevsky's novel considering the overly ambitious production ran into trouble with the studio and thus Kurosawa's grand vision was compromised (the original cut was supposed to run close to three and a half hours). Its fairly remarkable how the easily 19th century Russian characters are altered to fit Japanese ones in a snow-blanketed postwar Hokkaido. Fans of Ozu will again be shocked to see goody-good Setsuko Hara's image twisted under Kurosawa's direction into a vampy kept-woman of the world. Lead actor Masayuki Mori's subtly un-Japanese features aid the "pure soul" outsider innocence his performance . The film has several great setpieces chock full of the rich turmoil and laden with all the madness of some of Dostoevsky's most fevered writing, particularly a defiant Setsuko Hara chucking a hefty bundle of Yen into a fireplace, and Mifune and Mori's addled chatter as they share a cold room with Mifune's murder victim.
I live in Fear
1955
The most well known film in the box also contains one of Toshiro Mifune's best roles as the overly-physical young actor transmutes his trademark swagger and growl to the bent stoop and clipped terseness of an elderly magnate. The deep seated nuclear terror of Hiroshima/Nagasak has convinced Mifune that he must move his family, mistresses and bastard children included, to the remote safety of the Brazilian countryside. Unsurprisingly, the Nakajima family has little interest in this proposed displacement and takes the issue to family court which eventually leads part-time lawyer Takashi Shimura to examine his own atomic fears. Mifune's cockeyed plan smacks of male fantasy. His vision of Brazil is a polygamist Eden that he can dictate and preside over as a wise, greying patriarch. While Nakajima senior's personal a-bomb demons tend to manifest theatrically in tortured expressions and manic fits during thunder storms, Takashi Shimura's dread is more realistic in its chilling inward contemplation. Disturbingly, the fear of these characters is not the simple vestigial zeitgeist of 50's Japan, as we continue to, and will most likely always, live in a world mere push-buttons away from annihilation.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
Monday, February 25, 2008
Diary of the Dead
George A. Romero
2007
I entered George Romero's latest undead opus with a fair amount of trepidation. Diary of the Dead takes its form from the Blair Witch/Cloverfield school of passing off edited first person "documentary" footage as a fictional film. Let's call it for what it is: a gimmick. However, after having seen the film I'm a bit ashamed I ever doubted the maestro as Diary is not only brilliantly executed in its chills and satirical relevance, but is also on par with the best installments of the series, Night of The Living Dead and Dawn of the Dead.
We open with the first reported case of the rising dead, as the victims of a family's murder/suicide spring from their gurneys to prey on witless EMT and news-crew workers. When a group of film students (shooting a corny mummy movie) catch wind of the rising panic they decide its high time to get the hell out of Dodge, and begin trekking across Pennsylvania in a Winnebago with the hopes of returning to their parents' homes. Diary of the Dead becomes a road movie, an apocalyptic travelogue in which the film's "director" becomes singularly obsessed with documenting society's disintegration for posterity.
At 68 Romero shows more understanding of our technologically aided information saturation than most Youtube brats and "new media" propagators. Student director Jason Creed's impulse to record isn't presented preciously as a moral or philosophical imperative, but instead as a sick impulse, leaving the zombie ass-whooping to his proactive gal-pal Debra. Romero has always used diagetic media to brilliant effect in the form of radio broadcasts, televised punditry and government spin, but its never been quite so satisfying as it is here, at the conception of the crisis. As expected, Romero keeps things fun with the creative juxtaposition of fantastically macabre subject and ho-hum reality. Treats include a zombie birthday clown, the undead siege of an opulent mansion, a squad of no-nonsense Black Panther-esques stockpiling supplies, and the oft referenced "acid head" shot.
What sets Diary of the Dead apart from prior installments in the series is its (comparatively) positive tone.
Whereas prior pictures tended to focus on precarious survival situations unraveling through human selfishness, stupidity, greed, and a general pall of "ugliness," this time we're introduced to a younger, more appealing human race, one that actually seems worth saving. Land of the Dead may have opened Romero up to a scope of Hollywood filmmaking previously unavailable to him, but now, back on the outside, he's closer to his creation's pulse.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
2007
I entered George Romero's latest undead opus with a fair amount of trepidation. Diary of the Dead takes its form from the Blair Witch/Cloverfield school of passing off edited first person "documentary" footage as a fictional film. Let's call it for what it is: a gimmick. However, after having seen the film I'm a bit ashamed I ever doubted the maestro as Diary is not only brilliantly executed in its chills and satirical relevance, but is also on par with the best installments of the series, Night of The Living Dead and Dawn of the Dead.
We open with the first reported case of the rising dead, as the victims of a family's murder/suicide spring from their gurneys to prey on witless EMT and news-crew workers. When a group of film students (shooting a corny mummy movie) catch wind of the rising panic they decide its high time to get the hell out of Dodge, and begin trekking across Pennsylvania in a Winnebago with the hopes of returning to their parents' homes. Diary of the Dead becomes a road movie, an apocalyptic travelogue in which the film's "director" becomes singularly obsessed with documenting society's disintegration for posterity.
At 68 Romero shows more understanding of our technologically aided information saturation than most Youtube brats and "new media" propagators. Student director Jason Creed's impulse to record isn't presented preciously as a moral or philosophical imperative, but instead as a sick impulse, leaving the zombie ass-whooping to his proactive gal-pal Debra. Romero has always used diagetic media to brilliant effect in the form of radio broadcasts, televised punditry and government spin, but its never been quite so satisfying as it is here, at the conception of the crisis. As expected, Romero keeps things fun with the creative juxtaposition of fantastically macabre subject and ho-hum reality. Treats include a zombie birthday clown, the undead siege of an opulent mansion, a squad of no-nonsense Black Panther-esques stockpiling supplies, and the oft referenced "acid head" shot.
What sets Diary of the Dead apart from prior installments in the series is its (comparatively) positive tone.
Whereas prior pictures tended to focus on precarious survival situations unraveling through human selfishness, stupidity, greed, and a general pall of "ugliness," this time we're introduced to a younger, more appealing human race, one that actually seems worth saving. Land of the Dead may have opened Romero up to a scope of Hollywood filmmaking previously unavailable to him, but now, back on the outside, he's closer to his creation's pulse.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
Friday, February 22, 2008
4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days
Cristian Mungiu
2007
Ok kids, playtime's over. I know you had lots of fun learning to live and love and appreciate the foibles of life with the recent pregnancy comedies Knocked Up and Juno, but now its long past due to change out of the fuzzy jammies and see unplanned pregnancy for what it is for most people: a huge fucking nightmare.
Set in Ceausescu's oppressive late 80's Romania, University student Otilia agrees to aid her friend/roommate, frail and skittish Gabita, to illegally procure an abortion, a crime for which even casual collaborators are sent to the clink. An already shaky plan is made worse through Gabita's weak-willed lying, and a callous abortionist.
What's most successful about the picture is that while the gray cement, and beige linoleum of Bucharest is plenty bleak, our heroines are prominently middle class. The waters are never muddied by the maudlin poverty depicted in so many films on totalitarian regimes, leaving clear and unfettered view of the drama. Otilia's resilience and sacrifice is in some ways reminiscent of Lars Von Trier's "golden hearts" girls, yet her unemotional nuts-and-bolts practicality eschews all his uncomfortable melodrama in favor of uncomfortable reality. Otilia's faultless alpha-female quality provides a strange and moving contrast to the understandably flawed people surrounding her. Gabita's sniveling reticence is irritating, but innocent, and one feels a touch of sympathy for Otilia's boyfriend as he's blindsided at his mother's birthday.
The decent cinematography is at times marred by cliched shaky-cam, though many of the exterior tracking shots do a brilliant job of heightening the tension. The use of static long takes, frequently centered on Otilia's face are by far the best cinematic touch, particularly during a scene in which she's stuck at a hellish literati dinner party, with no escape and no idea how Gabita's post procedure is shaping up. The camera's unflinching stare is also brought to bear on the terminated fetus, a sadly lame looking prop that is nonetheless successful in conveying the tragedy of body horror. A date movie, this certainly is not.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
2007
Ok kids, playtime's over. I know you had lots of fun learning to live and love and appreciate the foibles of life with the recent pregnancy comedies Knocked Up and Juno, but now its long past due to change out of the fuzzy jammies and see unplanned pregnancy for what it is for most people: a huge fucking nightmare.
Set in Ceausescu's oppressive late 80's Romania, University student Otilia agrees to aid her friend/roommate, frail and skittish Gabita, to illegally procure an abortion, a crime for which even casual collaborators are sent to the clink. An already shaky plan is made worse through Gabita's weak-willed lying, and a callous abortionist.
What's most successful about the picture is that while the gray cement, and beige linoleum of Bucharest is plenty bleak, our heroines are prominently middle class. The waters are never muddied by the maudlin poverty depicted in so many films on totalitarian regimes, leaving clear and unfettered view of the drama. Otilia's resilience and sacrifice is in some ways reminiscent of Lars Von Trier's "golden hearts" girls, yet her unemotional nuts-and-bolts practicality eschews all his uncomfortable melodrama in favor of uncomfortable reality. Otilia's faultless alpha-female quality provides a strange and moving contrast to the understandably flawed people surrounding her. Gabita's sniveling reticence is irritating, but innocent, and one feels a touch of sympathy for Otilia's boyfriend as he's blindsided at his mother's birthday.
The decent cinematography is at times marred by cliched shaky-cam, though many of the exterior tracking shots do a brilliant job of heightening the tension. The use of static long takes, frequently centered on Otilia's face are by far the best cinematic touch, particularly during a scene in which she's stuck at a hellish literati dinner party, with no escape and no idea how Gabita's post procedure is shaping up. The camera's unflinching stare is also brought to bear on the terminated fetus, a sadly lame looking prop that is nonetheless successful in conveying the tragedy of body horror. A date movie, this certainly is not.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Teeth
Mitchell Lichtenstein
2007
While relieving myself in the mens room following a screening of this nifty genre oddity I realized how easily this dangerously campy picture could have teetered into complete schlock, causing theaters full of NYU jocks to grab their crotches in mock agony and hoot and holler at the screen. As I stood there pissing contentedly I smiled as I heard a card-carrying bro turn to his friend and say "dude, that was awkward."
Teenage Dawn is an allstar speaker in her local abstinence club, and her wholesome life is rounded out by a loving mother and stepfather. Home-life would be perfect were it not marred by the presence of her sodomy-obsessed metalhead step brother (complete with spike labret piercing!). While crushed out on a hunky fellow abstainee, Dawn confusedly stumbles headfirst into sexuality and realizes something's not quite right with her ladyparts.
Teeth's admittedly corny spin on the Vagina Dentata myth throws us some none-too-subtle hints as to why Dawn's unmentionables seem to be harboring some nasty chompers. First there's the ubiquity of the nuclear cooling towers looming above the suburban idyll, as well as a classroom discussion regarding Darwinism, Creationism, and freak mutation which comes off gracefully as a sucker punch. All the menfolk who lose digits and members to these titular teeth are certainly deserving of feminine retribution, but the pictures suffers for lack of a truly satisfying villain. Even the cause of big bro's monstrous priggishness is illuminated in flashback.
Instead, Teeth acts as a quasi coming of age tale through the introspection and depth of Jess Weixler's performance (rare for a fright flick) combined with Lichtenstein's sly tone. The abstinence kids are an easy target, ripe for pratfalls, yet while they are treated to a fair amount of ribbing there's a noticeable absence of malicious mockery. The film is fun, but its not exactly a balls-out riot either, relying on solid ironic humor and jittery suspense scenes. There's a genuine sense of satisfaction in Dawn's eventual acceptance, and appreciation of her unique form, and while there's plenty to be said about the psychological implications of womens' body and sexuality issues as presented in the film, I'll leave that to Freud and continue to chuckle as our blonde heroin looks on dispassionately at a hungry Rottweiler scarfing up a freshly mutilated penis.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
2007
While relieving myself in the mens room following a screening of this nifty genre oddity I realized how easily this dangerously campy picture could have teetered into complete schlock, causing theaters full of NYU jocks to grab their crotches in mock agony and hoot and holler at the screen. As I stood there pissing contentedly I smiled as I heard a card-carrying bro turn to his friend and say "dude, that was awkward."
Teenage Dawn is an allstar speaker in her local abstinence club, and her wholesome life is rounded out by a loving mother and stepfather. Home-life would be perfect were it not marred by the presence of her sodomy-obsessed metalhead step brother (complete with spike labret piercing!). While crushed out on a hunky fellow abstainee, Dawn confusedly stumbles headfirst into sexuality and realizes something's not quite right with her ladyparts.
Teeth's admittedly corny spin on the Vagina Dentata myth throws us some none-too-subtle hints as to why Dawn's unmentionables seem to be harboring some nasty chompers. First there's the ubiquity of the nuclear cooling towers looming above the suburban idyll, as well as a classroom discussion regarding Darwinism, Creationism, and freak mutation which comes off gracefully as a sucker punch. All the menfolk who lose digits and members to these titular teeth are certainly deserving of feminine retribution, but the pictures suffers for lack of a truly satisfying villain. Even the cause of big bro's monstrous priggishness is illuminated in flashback.
Instead, Teeth acts as a quasi coming of age tale through the introspection and depth of Jess Weixler's performance (rare for a fright flick) combined with Lichtenstein's sly tone. The abstinence kids are an easy target, ripe for pratfalls, yet while they are treated to a fair amount of ribbing there's a noticeable absence of malicious mockery. The film is fun, but its not exactly a balls-out riot either, relying on solid ironic humor and jittery suspense scenes. There's a genuine sense of satisfaction in Dawn's eventual acceptance, and appreciation of her unique form, and while there's plenty to be said about the psychological implications of womens' body and sexuality issues as presented in the film, I'll leave that to Freud and continue to chuckle as our blonde heroin looks on dispassionately at a hungry Rottweiler scarfing up a freshly mutilated penis.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
Monday, February 11, 2008
10 Best Films of 2007
10.) Hot Fuzz
The exemplary duo of Wright and Pegg manage to hit another fanboy pastiche out of the park. This action film parody remains firmly rooted in comic soil, yet delivers the "fuck yeahs" as rapidly and readily as any installment of the Die Hard franchise. A supposedly "surprise" ending will seem ironically believable to anyone whose grown up in upper/middle class suburban America. Meanwhile, the welcome inclusion of graphic violence is at times surprising, but always entertaining, which seems to be the bottom line for these two. Wright/Pegg have all the makings of Quentin Tarantino's logical evolutionary leap forward: a film-history obsessed duo eager to reflect our popular cinema in a decidedly more commercial way, without all the foot-fetishism and stray navel-gazing.
9.) Grindhouse
Its a bit embarrassing that this gutsy, synthetic B-movie hybrid was marketed with creased, weathered posters, and a digital patina of scratch and wear considering that, for the most part, these pictures stand up admirably on their own. Rodriguez's Planet Terror is the belle of this ball with a biohazard induced zombie outbreak that is liberally peppered with such charming genre touches as a prominently featured jar of severed testicles, and the lovely Rose McGowan outfitted with a high caliber pegleg. Tarantino's Deathproof is definitely the more "meta" of the two with its heavy hot-dose of hipster babble, and meandering auteurist approach to the grindhouse ethos. His first outing as Director of Photography is not to be trifled with however, as the fresh compositions and color treatments convey all the exuberance of the motormouthed director himself. The faux trailers, guest directed by some of genre cinema's best, are the icing on the corpse...er, cake.
8.) I'm Not There
This year Todd Haynes gave us a film as baroque and unkempt as the mop (more of a mistreated broom really) atop Dylan's head. Eight incarnations of the singer are stitched together in what thankfully results in a complex engagement with celebrity in lieu of cowardly hero worship. The more far-out Dylans, a black blues-playing youth, the poet Rimbaud, and an age-mellowed Billie the Kid, are nicely anchored by the familiar rockstar/actor, and Cate Blanchett's stringy-hiared artist under duress. Special note is deserved for Charlotte Gainsbourg who has the tremendous ability to switch between potently appealing feminine confidence, to haggard, defeated weakness, not just from scene to scene, but from shot to shot. Hers is the best performance of the film, and is sadly buried beneath the ensemble.
7.) Eastern Promises
In its simplest terms, David's Cronenberg's Russian Mafia flick is an auteurist stab at the gangster genre - a tantalizing prospect since the viscera-loving Canuck's later work is more marked by its stylization than categorization. While A History of Violence had its mob elements, these were presented more as dress-up and pastiche: a foil to coax out Viggo Mortensen's dark side. This time around, thanks to an orphaned-baby Macguffin, a (rather bland) Naomi Watts wades into a scuzzy world where the viewer is treated to secretly kept women, grotesque stiffs stowed away in freezers, and an epic, nude bathhouse battle. The latter scene, with a brazenly vulnerable Mortenesen locked in mortal combat with two gorillas definitely lives up to the critical hype. Let's see perennial big-boxoffice actioners Bruce Willis, or Jamie Foxx try and pull of a scene that raw. Here's looking forward to a Cronenberg western, or even a Cronenberg musical. One can hope after all.
6.) Persepolis
The most beautifully animated film this year springs forth from Marjane Satrapi's illuminating life story and her larger than life ego. From the heartbreaking hardships suffered under hardline regime and violent revolutions, to alienating languish in exile, Satrapi evokes sympathy for herself and her country generally free of maudlin theatrics. Simultaneously, her rebellion (innocent and unsophisticated though it may be) is illustrated in a most endearing and honest fashion. Through Iron Maiden cassettes and leather jackets, through booze-fueled underground parties with shed burqas, dancing, and makeup comes an earnest defiance, and meaningful rejection of authority. It may have a little of that Bon Jovi cheese-factor, but kicking out the jams proves to be an inspiring weapon against Sharia: Spuds MacKenzie meets Che Guevara.
5.) Margot at the Wedding
I'll admit a soft spot for that specific type of East Coast intellectual melodrama, ideally directed by a nebbish in hornrimmeds. Myopic or not, Noah Baumbach seems to have picked up those frames, and carries them admirably with Margot at the Wedding. Watching the Baby-Booming "me" generation flounder in coping with the mediocrity of an ordinary existence is delectable in its schadenfreude, yet also provides the kind of embarrassingly solipsistic release us regular Joes/Janes don't always have access to. Its a vicarious kind of pleasure, whose Bergmanesque grievances are always most appropriately played along the coast of Long Island's grey ocean. Baumbach revels in muddy character morality, and while I think the cruelty of Kidman's Margot is overly exaggerated, there's still a recognizability that goes all the way down to her stupid fuchsia hat. The biggest wart here is Jack Black, who I've yet to see fully succeed in a non-comedic role, as his overbearing quality tends to betray a subtle or nuanced performance. Finally, the film's expired-stock aesthetic is a surprisingly inspired choice. A dark, grainy existence is only fair for characters that can't, or chose not to, see the forrest for the trees.
4.) The Host
I'll happily raise my glass to fresh blood and vitality in the worn-out monster movie genre. And what a reinvigoration it is! Focusing on a central family that is hopelessly dysfunctional yet limitlessly endearing, director Bong doles out unctuous globs of comedy and pathos in equal measure to create a film with as much emotional verism as madcap fantasy. The multi-mandibled amphibioid biohazard springing from the Haan may not be rendered in the best CGI money can buy, but he Animators deserve kudos anyhow for their ballsiness in bringing this beastie's rampage against humanity in cold, clear daylight. As if the monster weren't a formidable enough foe, the real baddies come in the form of pasty-faced Orwellian americans in banana-yellow suits (several shades of Romero's The Crazies). How remarkable and telling that an American audience embraced a foreign film in which the U.S. plays the villain (veiled or otherwise). Novel and fresh use of cliched slo-mo, a cattle-driving score, and velvety tracking shots put the polish on a picture that appeals to the fragile, narcoleptic, fuck-up nodding off in all of us.
3.) There Will Be Blood
PT Anderson delivers his first mature film in the form a dry and dirty American epic culled from the muckraking of Upton Sinclaire and made flesh by the world's (arguably) most important actor. Daniel Day Lewis' Daniel Plainview is certainly a cad, but his twinkle-eyed charisma, moustache-wax and boot-polish slickness, and animal cunning speak to our collectively suppressed Nietzschean bully. And we love him for it. Robert Elswit's visceral cinematography is a soiled valentine to barren, inorganic climes - the photography of fingernails that stay dirty in defiance of soap and water. Paul Dano's characterization of a small-town preacher whose questionably trained sermons inherit a rich vein of backwoods gothic, is superb. While diminutive in size he's Plainview's peer in spirit and provides the perfect lightning rod for Lewis to crash against. Of course Plainview's relationship with his son is of interest, but babying audiences with a flashback shot after the final confrontation between father and son does the film no favors. Anderson always seemed to have talent in working with actors, and its encouraging that he's finally done something worthwhile with it.
2.) No Country For Old Men
The Coen Brothers' latest picture is a neo-noir Western existing in a nearly wordless vacuum with the inhospitality of the moon. Joel and Ethan again prove their mastery of stylistic, yet surprisingly unsensational violence in this cooly casual cinema of the local butcher hacking away at a side of beef, or the matter-of-fact presence of roadkill. This year Rob Zombie was supposedly directing Michael Myers, but it turned out to be "in name" only as the blank evil of Javier Bardem's bogeyman was easily the more terrifying portrait of singularly driven malevolence. The brothers Coen love a sordid morality play, and as Tommy Lee Jones' tired sherif rhapsodizes on the copious amount of blood spilled into dry earth it brings to mind Fargo's Frances McDormand's attempts to rationalize the seemingly inhuman brutality of Peter Stormare's character. No Country For Old Men is a return to that disillusioned melancholy, the realization of what horrors our fellow man is capable of, for such insignificant rewards.
1.) This is England
This Is England is an odd and lovely duck indeed, an arthouse picture indifferent to the visual poetics of a Terrance Malick or a Lynne Ramsay, and a period picture that uses its time frame in service of narrative as opposed to cinematic spectacle. This celebration of an admittedly photogenic subculture rarely devolves into fashion fetishization, and the ugly, perpetually snarling antagonist is presented as something beyond a one dimensional monster, a believably vulnerable human. The scene in which a shoe shopping trip ends with Shaun unable to get a pair of the archly coveted Dr. Martin's boots is a prickly bit of close-to-home nostalgia, bringing back memories of that developmental stage where you know (or at least think know) what's cool, though your body hasn't caught up to the fit.
Compiled by Brett A. Scieszka
The exemplary duo of Wright and Pegg manage to hit another fanboy pastiche out of the park. This action film parody remains firmly rooted in comic soil, yet delivers the "fuck yeahs" as rapidly and readily as any installment of the Die Hard franchise. A supposedly "surprise" ending will seem ironically believable to anyone whose grown up in upper/middle class suburban America. Meanwhile, the welcome inclusion of graphic violence is at times surprising, but always entertaining, which seems to be the bottom line for these two. Wright/Pegg have all the makings of Quentin Tarantino's logical evolutionary leap forward: a film-history obsessed duo eager to reflect our popular cinema in a decidedly more commercial way, without all the foot-fetishism and stray navel-gazing.
9.) Grindhouse
Its a bit embarrassing that this gutsy, synthetic B-movie hybrid was marketed with creased, weathered posters, and a digital patina of scratch and wear considering that, for the most part, these pictures stand up admirably on their own. Rodriguez's Planet Terror is the belle of this ball with a biohazard induced zombie outbreak that is liberally peppered with such charming genre touches as a prominently featured jar of severed testicles, and the lovely Rose McGowan outfitted with a high caliber pegleg. Tarantino's Deathproof is definitely the more "meta" of the two with its heavy hot-dose of hipster babble, and meandering auteurist approach to the grindhouse ethos. His first outing as Director of Photography is not to be trifled with however, as the fresh compositions and color treatments convey all the exuberance of the motormouthed director himself. The faux trailers, guest directed by some of genre cinema's best, are the icing on the corpse...er, cake.
8.) I'm Not There
This year Todd Haynes gave us a film as baroque and unkempt as the mop (more of a mistreated broom really) atop Dylan's head. Eight incarnations of the singer are stitched together in what thankfully results in a complex engagement with celebrity in lieu of cowardly hero worship. The more far-out Dylans, a black blues-playing youth, the poet Rimbaud, and an age-mellowed Billie the Kid, are nicely anchored by the familiar rockstar/actor, and Cate Blanchett's stringy-hiared artist under duress. Special note is deserved for Charlotte Gainsbourg who has the tremendous ability to switch between potently appealing feminine confidence, to haggard, defeated weakness, not just from scene to scene, but from shot to shot. Hers is the best performance of the film, and is sadly buried beneath the ensemble.
7.) Eastern Promises
In its simplest terms, David's Cronenberg's Russian Mafia flick is an auteurist stab at the gangster genre - a tantalizing prospect since the viscera-loving Canuck's later work is more marked by its stylization than categorization. While A History of Violence had its mob elements, these were presented more as dress-up and pastiche: a foil to coax out Viggo Mortensen's dark side. This time around, thanks to an orphaned-baby Macguffin, a (rather bland) Naomi Watts wades into a scuzzy world where the viewer is treated to secretly kept women, grotesque stiffs stowed away in freezers, and an epic, nude bathhouse battle. The latter scene, with a brazenly vulnerable Mortenesen locked in mortal combat with two gorillas definitely lives up to the critical hype. Let's see perennial big-boxoffice actioners Bruce Willis, or Jamie Foxx try and pull of a scene that raw. Here's looking forward to a Cronenberg western, or even a Cronenberg musical. One can hope after all.
6.) Persepolis
The most beautifully animated film this year springs forth from Marjane Satrapi's illuminating life story and her larger than life ego. From the heartbreaking hardships suffered under hardline regime and violent revolutions, to alienating languish in exile, Satrapi evokes sympathy for herself and her country generally free of maudlin theatrics. Simultaneously, her rebellion (innocent and unsophisticated though it may be) is illustrated in a most endearing and honest fashion. Through Iron Maiden cassettes and leather jackets, through booze-fueled underground parties with shed burqas, dancing, and makeup comes an earnest defiance, and meaningful rejection of authority. It may have a little of that Bon Jovi cheese-factor, but kicking out the jams proves to be an inspiring weapon against Sharia: Spuds MacKenzie meets Che Guevara.
5.) Margot at the Wedding
I'll admit a soft spot for that specific type of East Coast intellectual melodrama, ideally directed by a nebbish in hornrimmeds. Myopic or not, Noah Baumbach seems to have picked up those frames, and carries them admirably with Margot at the Wedding. Watching the Baby-Booming "me" generation flounder in coping with the mediocrity of an ordinary existence is delectable in its schadenfreude, yet also provides the kind of embarrassingly solipsistic release us regular Joes/Janes don't always have access to. Its a vicarious kind of pleasure, whose Bergmanesque grievances are always most appropriately played along the coast of Long Island's grey ocean. Baumbach revels in muddy character morality, and while I think the cruelty of Kidman's Margot is overly exaggerated, there's still a recognizability that goes all the way down to her stupid fuchsia hat. The biggest wart here is Jack Black, who I've yet to see fully succeed in a non-comedic role, as his overbearing quality tends to betray a subtle or nuanced performance. Finally, the film's expired-stock aesthetic is a surprisingly inspired choice. A dark, grainy existence is only fair for characters that can't, or chose not to, see the forrest for the trees.
4.) The Host
I'll happily raise my glass to fresh blood and vitality in the worn-out monster movie genre. And what a reinvigoration it is! Focusing on a central family that is hopelessly dysfunctional yet limitlessly endearing, director Bong doles out unctuous globs of comedy and pathos in equal measure to create a film with as much emotional verism as madcap fantasy. The multi-mandibled amphibioid biohazard springing from the Haan may not be rendered in the best CGI money can buy, but he Animators deserve kudos anyhow for their ballsiness in bringing this beastie's rampage against humanity in cold, clear daylight. As if the monster weren't a formidable enough foe, the real baddies come in the form of pasty-faced Orwellian americans in banana-yellow suits (several shades of Romero's The Crazies). How remarkable and telling that an American audience embraced a foreign film in which the U.S. plays the villain (veiled or otherwise). Novel and fresh use of cliched slo-mo, a cattle-driving score, and velvety tracking shots put the polish on a picture that appeals to the fragile, narcoleptic, fuck-up nodding off in all of us.
3.) There Will Be Blood
PT Anderson delivers his first mature film in the form a dry and dirty American epic culled from the muckraking of Upton Sinclaire and made flesh by the world's (arguably) most important actor. Daniel Day Lewis' Daniel Plainview is certainly a cad, but his twinkle-eyed charisma, moustache-wax and boot-polish slickness, and animal cunning speak to our collectively suppressed Nietzschean bully. And we love him for it. Robert Elswit's visceral cinematography is a soiled valentine to barren, inorganic climes - the photography of fingernails that stay dirty in defiance of soap and water. Paul Dano's characterization of a small-town preacher whose questionably trained sermons inherit a rich vein of backwoods gothic, is superb. While diminutive in size he's Plainview's peer in spirit and provides the perfect lightning rod for Lewis to crash against. Of course Plainview's relationship with his son is of interest, but babying audiences with a flashback shot after the final confrontation between father and son does the film no favors. Anderson always seemed to have talent in working with actors, and its encouraging that he's finally done something worthwhile with it.
2.) No Country For Old Men
The Coen Brothers' latest picture is a neo-noir Western existing in a nearly wordless vacuum with the inhospitality of the moon. Joel and Ethan again prove their mastery of stylistic, yet surprisingly unsensational violence in this cooly casual cinema of the local butcher hacking away at a side of beef, or the matter-of-fact presence of roadkill. This year Rob Zombie was supposedly directing Michael Myers, but it turned out to be "in name" only as the blank evil of Javier Bardem's bogeyman was easily the more terrifying portrait of singularly driven malevolence. The brothers Coen love a sordid morality play, and as Tommy Lee Jones' tired sherif rhapsodizes on the copious amount of blood spilled into dry earth it brings to mind Fargo's Frances McDormand's attempts to rationalize the seemingly inhuman brutality of Peter Stormare's character. No Country For Old Men is a return to that disillusioned melancholy, the realization of what horrors our fellow man is capable of, for such insignificant rewards.
1.) This is England
This Is England is an odd and lovely duck indeed, an arthouse picture indifferent to the visual poetics of a Terrance Malick or a Lynne Ramsay, and a period picture that uses its time frame in service of narrative as opposed to cinematic spectacle. This celebration of an admittedly photogenic subculture rarely devolves into fashion fetishization, and the ugly, perpetually snarling antagonist is presented as something beyond a one dimensional monster, a believably vulnerable human. The scene in which a shoe shopping trip ends with Shaun unable to get a pair of the archly coveted Dr. Martin's boots is a prickly bit of close-to-home nostalgia, bringing back memories of that developmental stage where you know (or at least think know) what's cool, though your body hasn't caught up to the fit.
Compiled by Brett A. Scieszka
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
Grindhouse
Robert Rodriguez / Quentin Tarantino / Guests
2007
Initially the biggest issue with 'Grindhouse' is the sheer impossibility of completely recreating grindhouse cinema. Not only were ambitions and production values (rightly) set high, but in an all but DVD-driven market there is no hope of audiences flocking to theaters for basic, low-budget exploitation . In this sense, 'Grindhouse' is a paradox in origin. Pastiche and parody become the best one could hope for, but Tarantino/Rodriguez achieve more than that, which makes me wish they had opted for a more fine arts, gallery-oriented film, an exploration of the history, an evocation of the grindhouse feel.
Wistful pretension aside, both films on this double bill manage to deliver. 'Planet Terror,' Rodriguez's opener, is the better of the two. The film contains, but is not limited to, flesh-eating zombies, a renegade military squad, a jar full of severed testicles, and of course, Rose McGowan with a machine-gun pegleg. This fantastic genre outing is high on cheeky style, chock full of gross-out makeup effects (all hail Greg Nicotero!), and full of wink-wink references for the nerds. Its almost embarrassing that a gutsy genre plot like this needs to be marketed in such a self referential package, considering the film stands up fine on its own.
Tarantino's production is more problematic. In it, Kurt Russell stalks various groups of girls in his tricked-out muscle car, eventually killing them in collisions. Its quite a sexual thrill for him after all. 'Deathproof' is far more meta in terms of a grindhouse style film. For a flick about high octane automotive mayhem, it is extremely slow paced, which is a lot to ask from an audience that has already sat through one feature. The real failure here is in the seemingly endless dialogue scenes, completely uninteresting, and hackneyed. I don't want to say that the 'Tarantino style' has shot its wad, but most of the hipster talk comes off as a bad parody of the guy who directed 'Jackie Brown.' Ole' Quentin went behind the camera himself for this one, and while the footage is absolutely gorgeous in its freshly amateur compositions, and treated colors, I think this could be the cause of the story's shortcomings.
As a package 'Grindhouse' really shines with its small touches. The retro 'coming attractions' and 'feature presentation' title cards and the unforgettable faux trailers, made by some of the finest names in genre filmmaking, are highlights in and of themselves. A special mention should go to Eli Roth for his 'Thanksgiving' trailer, its not to be missed.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
2007
Initially the biggest issue with 'Grindhouse' is the sheer impossibility of completely recreating grindhouse cinema. Not only were ambitions and production values (rightly) set high, but in an all but DVD-driven market there is no hope of audiences flocking to theaters for basic, low-budget exploitation . In this sense, 'Grindhouse' is a paradox in origin. Pastiche and parody become the best one could hope for, but Tarantino/Rodriguez achieve more than that, which makes me wish they had opted for a more fine arts, gallery-oriented film, an exploration of the history, an evocation of the grindhouse feel.
Wistful pretension aside, both films on this double bill manage to deliver. 'Planet Terror,' Rodriguez's opener, is the better of the two. The film contains, but is not limited to, flesh-eating zombies, a renegade military squad, a jar full of severed testicles, and of course, Rose McGowan with a machine-gun pegleg. This fantastic genre outing is high on cheeky style, chock full of gross-out makeup effects (all hail Greg Nicotero!), and full of wink-wink references for the nerds. Its almost embarrassing that a gutsy genre plot like this needs to be marketed in such a self referential package, considering the film stands up fine on its own.
Tarantino's production is more problematic. In it, Kurt Russell stalks various groups of girls in his tricked-out muscle car, eventually killing them in collisions. Its quite a sexual thrill for him after all. 'Deathproof' is far more meta in terms of a grindhouse style film. For a flick about high octane automotive mayhem, it is extremely slow paced, which is a lot to ask from an audience that has already sat through one feature. The real failure here is in the seemingly endless dialogue scenes, completely uninteresting, and hackneyed. I don't want to say that the 'Tarantino style' has shot its wad, but most of the hipster talk comes off as a bad parody of the guy who directed 'Jackie Brown.' Ole' Quentin went behind the camera himself for this one, and while the footage is absolutely gorgeous in its freshly amateur compositions, and treated colors, I think this could be the cause of the story's shortcomings.
As a package 'Grindhouse' really shines with its small touches. The retro 'coming attractions' and 'feature presentation' title cards and the unforgettable faux trailers, made by some of the finest names in genre filmmaking, are highlights in and of themselves. A special mention should go to Eli Roth for his 'Thanksgiving' trailer, its not to be missed.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
Thursday, April 05, 2007
The Host
Bong Joon-Ho
2006
Spring is here, bringing rebirth, renewal, hormonal overdrives, and the bountiful growth we've come to expect from the season. Something is growing bountifully indeed in Korea's Han river, but its not due to sunshine and fresh air; this little mutant 's the product of gallons of toxic formaldehyde sent down the drain at the behest of an anal american mortician. The Host, named for the killer virus our beastly star is potentially carrying, is by no means a reinvention of the monster flick but is instead a wildly entertaining return to form.
At the heart of the story is a hopelessly dysfunctional, yet limitlessly endearing family, running a prepackaged-ramen kiosk on the river's concrete banks. Dad offers daughter a beer while watching Auntie choke at her archery competition, meanwhile uncle stumbles back to the stand after a hard morning's shochu binge, as bumbling Gramps tries to placate customers. Its a snappy setup that segues right into the big guy's entrance. Out of the river and onto terra-firma springs a rampaging multi-mandibled, dino-amphibioid bruiser who tears up the scenery before returning to the drink, with little Hyun-Seo in tow. The CGI effects aren't the best you've ever seen, nor are they particularly consistent, but they're adequate considering the ballsiness of shooting a decent sized CG monster running around in broad daylight. Traditionally you get a lot more wiggle room when the visual effects are done in low and dramatic light situations.
The geopolitical satire a la Romero kicks in as the survivors of the fracas are corralled into an emergency center, and ultimately an Orwellian medical facility, by government guys in banana-yellow hazmat suits (more than a little reminiscent of The Crazies). As the U.S. intervenes in "the incident" they become a good go-to bully oppressor. There's more than a little anti-American sentiment here, and the resentment is palpable in the depiction off a handfull of duplicitous, pasty officials talking down and muscling their hapless Korean victims. It doesn't help that the formaldehyde premise is taken from an actual mishap in 2000.
The picture benefits from an adventurous score that heightens the action and prods the film along like a cattle drive. When the film hits its most somber moments the spirited music drives the family on to right the wrongs, and to "look out for ours." The camerawork is superb too, with the most graceful tracking shots I've seen in years, and a surprisingly novel use of that perpetual action cliche, slow motion. The film's humor and shifting tone are its greatest assets. Though this is the first of Bong's films I've seen, I'm willing to wager this vein of spot-on comedy is a hallmark of his direction. Bouts of hilarity mesh with deft action setpieces, and disastrous tragedy to provide a gripping final product. The family remains charmingly goofy throughout the ordeal, but is put through a wringer of hardships so severe that their perseverance makes them lovable. While the film's plotting is the stuff of madcap fantasy there's an emotional verism to these characters, and an appeal sent directly to the fragile fuck-up narcoleptically nodding off in ourselves.
2006
Spring is here, bringing rebirth, renewal, hormonal overdrives, and the bountiful growth we've come to expect from the season. Something is growing bountifully indeed in Korea's Han river, but its not due to sunshine and fresh air; this little mutant 's the product of gallons of toxic formaldehyde sent down the drain at the behest of an anal american mortician. The Host, named for the killer virus our beastly star is potentially carrying, is by no means a reinvention of the monster flick but is instead a wildly entertaining return to form.
At the heart of the story is a hopelessly dysfunctional, yet limitlessly endearing family, running a prepackaged-ramen kiosk on the river's concrete banks. Dad offers daughter a beer while watching Auntie choke at her archery competition, meanwhile uncle stumbles back to the stand after a hard morning's shochu binge, as bumbling Gramps tries to placate customers. Its a snappy setup that segues right into the big guy's entrance. Out of the river and onto terra-firma springs a rampaging multi-mandibled, dino-amphibioid bruiser who tears up the scenery before returning to the drink, with little Hyun-Seo in tow. The CGI effects aren't the best you've ever seen, nor are they particularly consistent, but they're adequate considering the ballsiness of shooting a decent sized CG monster running around in broad daylight. Traditionally you get a lot more wiggle room when the visual effects are done in low and dramatic light situations.
The geopolitical satire a la Romero kicks in as the survivors of the fracas are corralled into an emergency center, and ultimately an Orwellian medical facility, by government guys in banana-yellow hazmat suits (more than a little reminiscent of The Crazies). As the U.S. intervenes in "the incident" they become a good go-to bully oppressor. There's more than a little anti-American sentiment here, and the resentment is palpable in the depiction off a handfull of duplicitous, pasty officials talking down and muscling their hapless Korean victims. It doesn't help that the formaldehyde premise is taken from an actual mishap in 2000.
The picture benefits from an adventurous score that heightens the action and prods the film along like a cattle drive. When the film hits its most somber moments the spirited music drives the family on to right the wrongs, and to "look out for ours." The camerawork is superb too, with the most graceful tracking shots I've seen in years, and a surprisingly novel use of that perpetual action cliche, slow motion. The film's humor and shifting tone are its greatest assets. Though this is the first of Bong's films I've seen, I'm willing to wager this vein of spot-on comedy is a hallmark of his direction. Bouts of hilarity mesh with deft action setpieces, and disastrous tragedy to provide a gripping final product. The family remains charmingly goofy throughout the ordeal, but is put through a wringer of hardships so severe that their perseverance makes them lovable. While the film's plotting is the stuff of madcap fantasy there's an emotional verism to these characters, and an appeal sent directly to the fragile fuck-up narcoleptically nodding off in ourselves.
Monday, February 26, 2007
The Taste of Tea
Katsuhito Ishii
2004
This pleasant comedy is a slightly scattered, multi-faced picture with influences ranging all the way from Jacques Tati and Luis Bunuel to some of Takashi Miike's more surrealist impulses, as well as the pleasantly meandering quality of Ozu. Its a steady, unhurried Sunday afternoon of a film centering around family togetherness, the foibles of childhood, and good-clean laughs.
The film concerns itself with a family living in out-of-the-way Tochigi prefecture in some extremely green and rural looking surroundings. Mamma's an aspiring manga artist, Dad's some sort of hypnotherapist, Uncle Ayano's a semi-listless shaggy haired audio mixer, little sis is plagued by an enormous avatar of herself, and big brother is a perpetually crushed-out Go enthusiast. Let's not forget a second weirdo uncle with a fierce bowl-cut and a grandfather who looks and acts like the anime characters he used to draw. This is an offbeat yet immensely recognizable family illuminated by the less-than-ordinary domestic idyll of Ishii's script.
Deliberate filmmaking is the name of the game here. The cinematography is simultaneously wry and deadpan, punctuated with brilliantly timed jokes and performances that are psychologically serene, pleasantly candid, and emotionally resonant. At times the picture is guilty of being overly sentimental, occasionally veering into corny and sappy. Ishii also comes dangerously close to the overly quirky, soulless posturing of film's like Zach Braff's "Garden State." Thankfully the director always manages to pull it back from the brink, preventing his quaint family study from becoming a heartless hipsters' tin-man. Some notably wonderful sequences include a (literally) shat on yakuza ghost, a pair of enthusiastic otaku sporting some seriously nerdy robot/hero costumes, and a brutal beatdown dispensed by a petit, squeaky-voiced secretary to name a few. This brush with violence aside, there is little slapstick to be had, and much of the humor is quietly mused over as the family members enjoy cups of the film's eponymous beverage together during mornings and evenings.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
2004
This pleasant comedy is a slightly scattered, multi-faced picture with influences ranging all the way from Jacques Tati and Luis Bunuel to some of Takashi Miike's more surrealist impulses, as well as the pleasantly meandering quality of Ozu. Its a steady, unhurried Sunday afternoon of a film centering around family togetherness, the foibles of childhood, and good-clean laughs.
The film concerns itself with a family living in out-of-the-way Tochigi prefecture in some extremely green and rural looking surroundings. Mamma's an aspiring manga artist, Dad's some sort of hypnotherapist, Uncle Ayano's a semi-listless shaggy haired audio mixer, little sis is plagued by an enormous avatar of herself, and big brother is a perpetually crushed-out Go enthusiast. Let's not forget a second weirdo uncle with a fierce bowl-cut and a grandfather who looks and acts like the anime characters he used to draw. This is an offbeat yet immensely recognizable family illuminated by the less-than-ordinary domestic idyll of Ishii's script.
Deliberate filmmaking is the name of the game here. The cinematography is simultaneously wry and deadpan, punctuated with brilliantly timed jokes and performances that are psychologically serene, pleasantly candid, and emotionally resonant. At times the picture is guilty of being overly sentimental, occasionally veering into corny and sappy. Ishii also comes dangerously close to the overly quirky, soulless posturing of film's like Zach Braff's "Garden State." Thankfully the director always manages to pull it back from the brink, preventing his quaint family study from becoming a heartless hipsters' tin-man. Some notably wonderful sequences include a (literally) shat on yakuza ghost, a pair of enthusiastic otaku sporting some seriously nerdy robot/hero costumes, and a brutal beatdown dispensed by a petit, squeaky-voiced secretary to name a few. This brush with violence aside, there is little slapstick to be had, and much of the humor is quietly mused over as the family members enjoy cups of the film's eponymous beverage together during mornings and evenings.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
Thursday, January 25, 2007
Pan's Labyrinth
Guillermo del Toro
2006
Pan's Labyrinth provides a nice companion piece to del Toro's The Devil's Backbone (2001) in its use of supernatural and fantastic elements set squarely within the milieu Spain's civil war. While Backbone's ghostly chills reflected the visceral horrors of the war, del Toro's new offering presents a fascist hell bearable by only the strongest spirt. This grim coming of age is loaded with shades of "Alice in Wonderland" and contains a healthy dose of special effects, yet no matter how nightmarish our little heroine's fantastic double-life grows, the harsh reality of Franco's regime is far worse.
Young Ofelia is carted off to the country along with her pregnant mother, Carmen, to the home of mom's new fiance, the tyrannical Captain Vidal. Understandably-bummed Ofelia has trouble getting along with her menacing step-dad, who treats her mother as little more than an heir-factory, better seen than heard. Solace comes in the form of kindly, underground rebel house-marm Mercedes and the discovery of an old stone grotto housing a mystical Faun who kindly informs Ofelia she is the rightful blood princess of a glorious underkingdom. To prove her mettle, the little girl must complete three otherworldly tasks before the moon is full, while simultaneously navigating an oppressive household and a country at war.
The visual effects qualities used are interesting and admirable but far from brilliant. The CGI bugs/fairies look behind the times in terms of technical rendering and the Faun's aesthetic is too whimsical for the film's dark tone, too cuddly to be appropriately creepy. The most successful effect comes from the child-eating "Pale Man" character, a faceless ghoul with saggy skin and skeletal legs.
Its an ambitious film to say the least, clearly more than a mere effects picture, however at times the real life drama between fascists and guerillas seems to inappropriately take precedence over Ofelia's point of view. Simply put, Pan's Labyrinth needs more Pan. With a minimum amount of fantasy setpieces, and a gripping albeit sprawling war yarn the film ends up with two excellent plots competing disharmoniously against each other. Of course del Toro is no greenhorn, and his experience and passion come through during even the most tenuous moments. Its an imperfect picture, but a worthy accomplishment nonetheless.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
2006
Pan's Labyrinth provides a nice companion piece to del Toro's The Devil's Backbone (2001) in its use of supernatural and fantastic elements set squarely within the milieu Spain's civil war. While Backbone's ghostly chills reflected the visceral horrors of the war, del Toro's new offering presents a fascist hell bearable by only the strongest spirt. This grim coming of age is loaded with shades of "Alice in Wonderland" and contains a healthy dose of special effects, yet no matter how nightmarish our little heroine's fantastic double-life grows, the harsh reality of Franco's regime is far worse.
Young Ofelia is carted off to the country along with her pregnant mother, Carmen, to the home of mom's new fiance, the tyrannical Captain Vidal. Understandably-bummed Ofelia has trouble getting along with her menacing step-dad, who treats her mother as little more than an heir-factory, better seen than heard. Solace comes in the form of kindly, underground rebel house-marm Mercedes and the discovery of an old stone grotto housing a mystical Faun who kindly informs Ofelia she is the rightful blood princess of a glorious underkingdom. To prove her mettle, the little girl must complete three otherworldly tasks before the moon is full, while simultaneously navigating an oppressive household and a country at war.
The visual effects qualities used are interesting and admirable but far from brilliant. The CGI bugs/fairies look behind the times in terms of technical rendering and the Faun's aesthetic is too whimsical for the film's dark tone, too cuddly to be appropriately creepy. The most successful effect comes from the child-eating "Pale Man" character, a faceless ghoul with saggy skin and skeletal legs.
Its an ambitious film to say the least, clearly more than a mere effects picture, however at times the real life drama between fascists and guerillas seems to inappropriately take precedence over Ofelia's point of view. Simply put, Pan's Labyrinth needs more Pan. With a minimum amount of fantasy setpieces, and a gripping albeit sprawling war yarn the film ends up with two excellent plots competing disharmoniously against each other. Of course del Toro is no greenhorn, and his experience and passion come through during even the most tenuous moments. Its an imperfect picture, but a worthy accomplishment nonetheless.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
Monday, January 22, 2007
Tears of the Black Tiger
Wisit Sasanatieng
2000
Better late than never is the long overdue U.S. release of this singular Thai curry-western. A film of Interlocking genres complemented by a surreal kaleidoscopic palette with a predominantly pink Bangkok, a blood red river, and a swirling backdrop painting just past the horizon line.
Dum the Black Tiger is the most prized gunslinger in bandit Fai's gang of rootin' tootin' outlaws. When his childhood sweetheart Rumpoey is affianced the local do-gooding Police Captain Kumjorn, Dum resolves to protect his love in the looming battle between Fai and the police, though it means winding up on wrong side of both factions.
Cowboy trappings aside the melodrama between Dum and Rumpoey, told mostly through flashback, has a strongly Eastern feel and saddles and six-shooters are mostly absent. Old timey Thai pop records fortify feelings of longing and heartbreak in this poor-boy meets rich-girl forbidden love story. This gooey frosting is mercifully cut with scenes of pure gonzo mayhem as cops and informers clash with the outlaws. The almost absurdist scenes of violence incorporate plenty of machine guns, an astronomical body count, and rocket launchers! The macho element is further played up in Dum's tenuous friendship with fellow sharp shooter Mahesuan, a pastel and neon wearing betelnut chewer with a quick temper and drawn-on moustache.
The film is remarkably well balanced for its indulgence and the stylistic elements are consistent and sure-footed. Every time Sasanatieng is in danger of going overboard he switches gears in another direction. This fanciful fare also benefits from an emotionally jarring and utterly sobering finish that goes a long way towards redeeming the film from being mere oddity. Let's hope there's a good edition DVD release on the way.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
2000
Better late than never is the long overdue U.S. release of this singular Thai curry-western. A film of Interlocking genres complemented by a surreal kaleidoscopic palette with a predominantly pink Bangkok, a blood red river, and a swirling backdrop painting just past the horizon line.
Dum the Black Tiger is the most prized gunslinger in bandit Fai's gang of rootin' tootin' outlaws. When his childhood sweetheart Rumpoey is affianced the local do-gooding Police Captain Kumjorn, Dum resolves to protect his love in the looming battle between Fai and the police, though it means winding up on wrong side of both factions.
Cowboy trappings aside the melodrama between Dum and Rumpoey, told mostly through flashback, has a strongly Eastern feel and saddles and six-shooters are mostly absent. Old timey Thai pop records fortify feelings of longing and heartbreak in this poor-boy meets rich-girl forbidden love story. This gooey frosting is mercifully cut with scenes of pure gonzo mayhem as cops and informers clash with the outlaws. The almost absurdist scenes of violence incorporate plenty of machine guns, an astronomical body count, and rocket launchers! The macho element is further played up in Dum's tenuous friendship with fellow sharp shooter Mahesuan, a pastel and neon wearing betelnut chewer with a quick temper and drawn-on moustache.
The film is remarkably well balanced for its indulgence and the stylistic elements are consistent and sure-footed. Every time Sasanatieng is in danger of going overboard he switches gears in another direction. This fanciful fare also benefits from an emotionally jarring and utterly sobering finish that goes a long way towards redeeming the film from being mere oddity. Let's hope there's a good edition DVD release on the way.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
Wednesday, January 10, 2007
The Bleach Bypass 10 Best Films of 2006
Here is the second annual "10 Best" list of 2006 according to Bleach Bypass' Brett Scieszka
10.) Sympathy For Lady Vengeance - Park Chan-Wook
Not as flashy, heady, or stylish as its brothers in Park's "Revenge Trilogy," but provides a fittingly elegiac coda, a solid anchor to round out the cycle. While the film may be more delicate than its manga inspired predecessors Park's extreme sensibilities are brought along for the ride in the form of graphic finger amputations and eccentric torture scenarios. The black comedy's played a little more subtly this time and Lee Yeoung-Ae's performance is further proof that Park is impeccable in his casting.
9.) Hostel - Eli Roth
The lousy marketing for this film failed to entice me in the slightest: another dull torture film with a dash of xenophobia, etc. Thankfully I didn't miss what would turn out to be one of the most fun horror films of the year. Roth presents us with a handfull of gory setpieces so deft and raw-dog that one cannot help hooting and hollering at the screen (hanging eyeball! hanging eyeball!). Can't wait to see this one as a midnight screening.
8.) The Descent - Neil Marshall
This should be required viewing for anyone interested in serious horror. Marshall wastes little time in creating a hell-on-earth scenario involving claustrophobia and interpersonal trust issues. Then the monsters show up. 'The Descent' is neat as a pin, tight as a drum, and pitch perfect. No cheesy "cave lighting" here either, the cinematography is ingeniously natural with little more than helmet lights and lamps to illuminate the underworld. The audience sees just as little as the poor spelunkers.
7.) Marie Antoinette - Sofia Coppola
The ingenue of ennui hits another ball out of the park with her latest daydream. If you squint real hard you can almost see Coppola's own privileged upbringing on the screen, set to '80's hits, and romanticized to the hilt. The supporting roles (particularly Steve Coogan, Rip Torn, and Molly Shannon) are wry little winks in and of themselves, and this proves to be Jason Schwartzman's best role since 'Rushmore.' Who else can turn a tragic French Queen's life story into a teenage girl's ultimate fairy tale fantasy? No wonder Coppola has pink cans of champaign named after her.
6.) The Queen - Stephen Frears
Frears has directed a lot of crud over the years but comes through admirably with his latest picture. Historical fact and weighty subject matter are handled with a wonderfully light, almost comic touch that suggests just a hint of Lubitsch. Real world politics rarely seem to interfere with what becomes an artfully constructed drama and character study. It is also blissfully convenient that the Never Neverland quality of royal life lends itself quite well to cinematic treatment.
5.) The Hills Have Eyes - Alexandre Aja
Easily the most terrifying film of the year. Aja proved his mettle with the slasher 'High Tension' and now crosses the pond to run amok. A fist-fuck of visceral violence and relentless brutality, rounded out with dark Americana in the form of an "ugly American" family and our shared shady nuclear legacy. The initial mutant assault on the hapless travelers is one of the most intense scenes ever committed to film. Let's not forget the great dog role. There's something so satisfying about a good canine role in genre film.
4 .) The Departed - Martin Scorcese
Since the turn of the century Scorcese has become increasingly good at churning out well-crafted, large-scale films with pleasant auteurist pretensions and wide release appeal, and this is the best of the lot. The ensemble cast is a treat to watch, ubber-ham Nicholson isn't given a chance to hog the screen (to the film's benefit), and the Boston accents are charmingly theatrical. Its a rough and tumble tussle worthy of Scorcese's best work.
3.) Old Joy - Kelly Reichardt
As reviewed in Bleach Bypass.
A lovely meditative picture not wanting for melancholy or heart. This is small scale cinema of the very best kind, with eye-candy cinematography and warm performances. NY based Reichardt is the discovery of the year (though she's no stranger to the film biz), and hopefully we'll be seeing more of her. Great score by Yo La Tengo and another great dog role.
2.) Slither - James Gunn
Its a real tragedy that everybody (myself included) slept on the theatrical release of this brilliant gob of entertainment. A box office bomb with "cult classic" written all over it, containing some of the wackiest and most creative creature scares to come along in the last decade. The Troma veteran sensibility shines through (in a good way) and the realization of what must have been a bitch of a script to film is commendable. So many good setpieces here, and while it is comic-horror the laughs are served straight up as opposed to the infuriating tongue-in-cheek manner so woefully in vogue today.
1.) Wassup Rockers - Larry Clark
As Reviewed in Bleach Bypass
At the beginning of the year, if someone told me the best film of 2006 would be a Larry Clark picture I probably would have doubled over laughing. Turns out the joke's on. Clark serves up ebulliently honest portrait of youth without a hint the director's exploitative sensationalist proclivities. A two-part verite meets punk-chaos vibe only helps to compound the fist-pumping energy. A jaw droppingly good film. Who knew Clark had it in him?
10.) Sympathy For Lady Vengeance - Park Chan-Wook
Not as flashy, heady, or stylish as its brothers in Park's "Revenge Trilogy," but provides a fittingly elegiac coda, a solid anchor to round out the cycle. While the film may be more delicate than its manga inspired predecessors Park's extreme sensibilities are brought along for the ride in the form of graphic finger amputations and eccentric torture scenarios. The black comedy's played a little more subtly this time and Lee Yeoung-Ae's performance is further proof that Park is impeccable in his casting.
9.) Hostel - Eli Roth
The lousy marketing for this film failed to entice me in the slightest: another dull torture film with a dash of xenophobia, etc. Thankfully I didn't miss what would turn out to be one of the most fun horror films of the year. Roth presents us with a handfull of gory setpieces so deft and raw-dog that one cannot help hooting and hollering at the screen (hanging eyeball! hanging eyeball!). Can't wait to see this one as a midnight screening.
8.) The Descent - Neil Marshall
This should be required viewing for anyone interested in serious horror. Marshall wastes little time in creating a hell-on-earth scenario involving claustrophobia and interpersonal trust issues. Then the monsters show up. 'The Descent' is neat as a pin, tight as a drum, and pitch perfect. No cheesy "cave lighting" here either, the cinematography is ingeniously natural with little more than helmet lights and lamps to illuminate the underworld. The audience sees just as little as the poor spelunkers.
7.) Marie Antoinette - Sofia Coppola
The ingenue of ennui hits another ball out of the park with her latest daydream. If you squint real hard you can almost see Coppola's own privileged upbringing on the screen, set to '80's hits, and romanticized to the hilt. The supporting roles (particularly Steve Coogan, Rip Torn, and Molly Shannon) are wry little winks in and of themselves, and this proves to be Jason Schwartzman's best role since 'Rushmore.' Who else can turn a tragic French Queen's life story into a teenage girl's ultimate fairy tale fantasy? No wonder Coppola has pink cans of champaign named after her.
6.) The Queen - Stephen Frears
Frears has directed a lot of crud over the years but comes through admirably with his latest picture. Historical fact and weighty subject matter are handled with a wonderfully light, almost comic touch that suggests just a hint of Lubitsch. Real world politics rarely seem to interfere with what becomes an artfully constructed drama and character study. It is also blissfully convenient that the Never Neverland quality of royal life lends itself quite well to cinematic treatment.
5.) The Hills Have Eyes - Alexandre Aja
Easily the most terrifying film of the year. Aja proved his mettle with the slasher 'High Tension' and now crosses the pond to run amok. A fist-fuck of visceral violence and relentless brutality, rounded out with dark Americana in the form of an "ugly American" family and our shared shady nuclear legacy. The initial mutant assault on the hapless travelers is one of the most intense scenes ever committed to film. Let's not forget the great dog role. There's something so satisfying about a good canine role in genre film.
4 .) The Departed - Martin Scorcese
Since the turn of the century Scorcese has become increasingly good at churning out well-crafted, large-scale films with pleasant auteurist pretensions and wide release appeal, and this is the best of the lot. The ensemble cast is a treat to watch, ubber-ham Nicholson isn't given a chance to hog the screen (to the film's benefit), and the Boston accents are charmingly theatrical. Its a rough and tumble tussle worthy of Scorcese's best work.
3.) Old Joy - Kelly Reichardt
As reviewed in Bleach Bypass.
A lovely meditative picture not wanting for melancholy or heart. This is small scale cinema of the very best kind, with eye-candy cinematography and warm performances. NY based Reichardt is the discovery of the year (though she's no stranger to the film biz), and hopefully we'll be seeing more of her. Great score by Yo La Tengo and another great dog role.
2.) Slither - James Gunn
Its a real tragedy that everybody (myself included) slept on the theatrical release of this brilliant gob of entertainment. A box office bomb with "cult classic" written all over it, containing some of the wackiest and most creative creature scares to come along in the last decade. The Troma veteran sensibility shines through (in a good way) and the realization of what must have been a bitch of a script to film is commendable. So many good setpieces here, and while it is comic-horror the laughs are served straight up as opposed to the infuriating tongue-in-cheek manner so woefully in vogue today.
1.) Wassup Rockers - Larry Clark
As Reviewed in Bleach Bypass
At the beginning of the year, if someone told me the best film of 2006 would be a Larry Clark picture I probably would have doubled over laughing. Turns out the joke's on. Clark serves up ebulliently honest portrait of youth without a hint the director's exploitative sensationalist proclivities. A two-part verite meets punk-chaos vibe only helps to compound the fist-pumping energy. A jaw droppingly good film. Who knew Clark had it in him?
Tuesday, November 21, 2006
Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan
Larry Charles / Sacha Baron Cohen
2006
The high-buzz big-screen translation of Sacha Cohen's most popular character comes off a bit too hokey, and much less effectively than its boob-tube beginnings. Here, the ersatz Kazakh may be reaching a wider audience (emphasis on the "may"), but in return Cohen gives up a good cut of laughs in exchange for a fluffy road story with a lot of superfluous filler. Essentially the film boils down to a season of "Da Ali G Show's" Borat segments padded with a hasty, insincere, rigidly-structured plotting. Through it all the Borat character is played true to form, and there's plenty of good, familiar laughs here, but the forced nature of the writing and direction disappoint when compared to the nimble and concise television version.
The filmmakers opt for a more digestible mockumentary style that broadly personalizes Borat, giving him accessible emotions, and an absurdly specific quest: to track down and marry Pamela (Pam-ay-la) Anderson, by force if necessary. The picture would greatly benefit by taking the form it claims to - an informational documentary about American culture for Kazakh viewers. Cohen is brilliant at victimizing his unwitting subjects through improvisation, but unfortunately meticulous scripting robs the film of much of its wit. Its a shame that Cohen is willing to take the piss out of some of his own jokes. Showing his Kazakh town (a weak visual portrayal at best) ruins all the dead-wife and prostitute-sister jokes that are staples of the act. Also, the use of a hired actress for Borat's working-girl love interest, and Pamela Anderson's complicity in the wedding sack gag is contrary to the core of Sacha Cohen's comedy. Borat's usually hilarious interviews are clipped and shortened, rarely giving time for the brutally uncomfortable faux pas to set in.
The only advantage the film has over the show is the inclusion of Borat's "producer" Azamat, a perfectly cast and costumed squat penguin man who manages to rub his naked hairy ass and scrotum on Borat's face (Kazakh wrestling!) before the film's end. Also, the scene where a hitchhiking Borat is picked up by drunk, racist, chauvinist, frat boys in a too-cramped RV is as good and as classic as anything from the TV series.
I've always been under the impression that a motion picture version of a successful comedy show should pull at least one gargantuan stunt to get butts in seats and sell tickets. There's no such moment here, and Borat's laughing all the way to the bank with the box office returns. I'm curious to see how Cohen's next movie (mit Bruno!) works out, but if this is any indication I'll stick to reruns on HBO.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
2006
The high-buzz big-screen translation of Sacha Cohen's most popular character comes off a bit too hokey, and much less effectively than its boob-tube beginnings. Here, the ersatz Kazakh may be reaching a wider audience (emphasis on the "may"), but in return Cohen gives up a good cut of laughs in exchange for a fluffy road story with a lot of superfluous filler. Essentially the film boils down to a season of "Da Ali G Show's" Borat segments padded with a hasty, insincere, rigidly-structured plotting. Through it all the Borat character is played true to form, and there's plenty of good, familiar laughs here, but the forced nature of the writing and direction disappoint when compared to the nimble and concise television version.
The filmmakers opt for a more digestible mockumentary style that broadly personalizes Borat, giving him accessible emotions, and an absurdly specific quest: to track down and marry Pamela (Pam-ay-la) Anderson, by force if necessary. The picture would greatly benefit by taking the form it claims to - an informational documentary about American culture for Kazakh viewers. Cohen is brilliant at victimizing his unwitting subjects through improvisation, but unfortunately meticulous scripting robs the film of much of its wit. Its a shame that Cohen is willing to take the piss out of some of his own jokes. Showing his Kazakh town (a weak visual portrayal at best) ruins all the dead-wife and prostitute-sister jokes that are staples of the act. Also, the use of a hired actress for Borat's working-girl love interest, and Pamela Anderson's complicity in the wedding sack gag is contrary to the core of Sacha Cohen's comedy. Borat's usually hilarious interviews are clipped and shortened, rarely giving time for the brutally uncomfortable faux pas to set in.
The only advantage the film has over the show is the inclusion of Borat's "producer" Azamat, a perfectly cast and costumed squat penguin man who manages to rub his naked hairy ass and scrotum on Borat's face (Kazakh wrestling!) before the film's end. Also, the scene where a hitchhiking Borat is picked up by drunk, racist, chauvinist, frat boys in a too-cramped RV is as good and as classic as anything from the TV series.
I've always been under the impression that a motion picture version of a successful comedy show should pull at least one gargantuan stunt to get butts in seats and sell tickets. There's no such moment here, and Borat's laughing all the way to the bank with the box office returns. I'm curious to see how Cohen's next movie (mit Bruno!) works out, but if this is any indication I'll stick to reruns on HBO.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
Tuesday, November 14, 2006
Goke, Body Snatcher From Hell
Hajime Sato
1968
This neat little Japanese horror/sci-fi mishmash is apparently a favorite of pop-culture-junkie loudmouth Quentin Tarantino. The film borrows heavily from Don Siegel's "Invasion of the Body Snatchers," with a stock vampire flavor, and most intriguingly, a Romero-esque take on human nature in crisis.
An orange spaceship flying through a strange red sky causes a commuter jet to crash in a craggy no man's land. One of the passengers, a white clad assassin by trade, becomes host to the gelatinous Gokemidoro, a murderous alien hellbent on annihilating the human race. Parasite and host begin to prey upon the crash survivors who are having a rough time getting along. The assortment of character types are a hoot: a corrupt politician, a morally bankrupt businessman and his trophy wife, a would-be terrorist youth, a psychologist, a professor, a grieving American widow, and the noble flight crew. Each character is unsubtly caricatured and melodramatically portrayed, easily falling victim to the survival instinct of their Id. This makes for some pretty great moments.
There's not a lot of money up on the screen, but a one-two punch of clever filmmaking and decent special effects makes the film sufficiently creepy and fun. The photography's garish color palate complements exaggerated acting and slick aircraft models. Split heads, bodies drained of blood, and desiccated corpses mount in the waterless fever pitch of the crashed jet. Nothing is quiet or quaint here, as the passengers' predicament is highly politicized, mirroring the turbulent climate of the times. Political assassination, the Vietnam War, and the growing rift between classes are stuffed into a plane and smashed upon rocks. And of course, no Japanese sci-fi would be complete without its ubiquitous superstar the mushroom cloud, which makes its appearance here both onscreen and through metaphor in the film's apocalyptic finale.
The naive antiwar statement in cautionary-tale clothing makes a nice backdrop for all manner of bizarre and terrifying invaders, and for all independence days and wars between worlds, the Gokemidoro know its a little too late for us this time around.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
1968
This neat little Japanese horror/sci-fi mishmash is apparently a favorite of pop-culture-junkie loudmouth Quentin Tarantino. The film borrows heavily from Don Siegel's "Invasion of the Body Snatchers," with a stock vampire flavor, and most intriguingly, a Romero-esque take on human nature in crisis.
An orange spaceship flying through a strange red sky causes a commuter jet to crash in a craggy no man's land. One of the passengers, a white clad assassin by trade, becomes host to the gelatinous Gokemidoro, a murderous alien hellbent on annihilating the human race. Parasite and host begin to prey upon the crash survivors who are having a rough time getting along. The assortment of character types are a hoot: a corrupt politician, a morally bankrupt businessman and his trophy wife, a would-be terrorist youth, a psychologist, a professor, a grieving American widow, and the noble flight crew. Each character is unsubtly caricatured and melodramatically portrayed, easily falling victim to the survival instinct of their Id. This makes for some pretty great moments.
There's not a lot of money up on the screen, but a one-two punch of clever filmmaking and decent special effects makes the film sufficiently creepy and fun. The photography's garish color palate complements exaggerated acting and slick aircraft models. Split heads, bodies drained of blood, and desiccated corpses mount in the waterless fever pitch of the crashed jet. Nothing is quiet or quaint here, as the passengers' predicament is highly politicized, mirroring the turbulent climate of the times. Political assassination, the Vietnam War, and the growing rift between classes are stuffed into a plane and smashed upon rocks. And of course, no Japanese sci-fi would be complete without its ubiquitous superstar the mushroom cloud, which makes its appearance here both onscreen and through metaphor in the film's apocalyptic finale.
The naive antiwar statement in cautionary-tale clothing makes a nice backdrop for all manner of bizarre and terrifying invaders, and for all independence days and wars between worlds, the Gokemidoro know its a little too late for us this time around.
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
Thursday, September 21, 2006
Old Joy
Kelly Reichardt
2006
Kelly Reichardt isn't exactly a new voice in American independent cinema per se, but hopefully her latest picture, "Old Joy," will edge her further into the spotlight. This latest offering is a simple meditation on the exact point of a friendship's organic disintegration in the vacuum of an isolated weekend getaway.
Expecting father Mark (Daniel London) gets a call from out-there buddy Kurt (memorably but over-comically played by musician Will Oldham), who wants to know if he'd be interested in hitting up some hidden hot springs in the mountains. After an awkward exchange with third-trimester wife Tanya, Mark sets off in the family station wagon to meet Kurt. What follows is a minor journey between two men, contemplative and reflective, but far from serene. It slowly emerges that Mark and Kurt are a pair of puzzle pieces that no longer fit: seemingly hippy-calm Kurt is an aimlessly drifting bundle of anxieties, while grownup Mark bought into square society a long ways back.
Oddly enough, borders and confinement crop up frequently in a movie that spends much of its time outdoors. The confinement of the car provides an inescapable forum for bouts of uncomfortable catch-up and chitchat. Mark focuses on the road while Kurt regresses into himself with puffs off a weed pipe. The austere scenery is frequently focused on, but is perpetually passing, and one can palpably feel a yearning to reverse this inside-looking-out view. When the two camp out for the night they are just as confined within the low light of the bonfire and a tight camera frame. Finally at the springs, they break from each other and cocoon themselves in separate bathing tubs. The closeness and confrontation of the trip provides no jarring change or concrete resolve, just the solemn, mostly wordless, and bittersweet parting of friends no longer able to connect,
The performances are physically spot-on, and while Oldham and London tune in perfectly to the film's desired tone, delivered lines feel woefully scripted throughout the first half of the picture. Much like its subjects the film is bristling with honesty and control, and only slips when a beer-buzzed Kurt breaks the social contract by verbally lamenting the dissolving friendship. The soundtrack by Yo La Tengo is an unexpected treat, and easily the best film score I've heard in awhile. The steady, free-spirited guitar and gentle drumming provide an integral and life giving heartbeat that tends to provide a reflective segue way between key scenes. Being an ex Yo La Tengo fan I feel a bit embarrassed that I never saw the band's potential for film music.
While Kurt and Mark's relationship is clearly the focus of the film, the two supporting ladies leave powerful imprints, and have a strong, if ethereal hand in shaping it. Wife Tanya has only a few minutes of sreen time and a brief handful of lines, but her quasi- disapproving attitude and semi-nagging presence bind Mark in a way that is completely alien to Kurt's sensibilities. Her cellphone presence is Yoko Ono intrusive, not in an overtly vulgar sense, but as concrete proof of how far gone Mark is. The second lady, Mark's fabulously photogenic canine Lucy, comes along for the ride. Her reciprocated affections towards Kurt provide a subtle layer of tension. Wayward Kurt gets to goof off and play with Lucy, while sensible Mark is burdened with actuality of owning her and dealing with her "separation anxiety" as she barks from the unattended auto.
"Old Joy" really succeeds in its combination of performance, photography, and tone. Its a subtle mood piece that lingers with, and haunts you for awhile after viewing. Unspoken communication has rarely felt this intense on screen, and I think everyone can relate to the to the sad reality of drifting away from a once loved friend. Its this universal factor of human experience, realistically played to the hilt, that is the triumph of "Old Joy."
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
2006
Kelly Reichardt isn't exactly a new voice in American independent cinema per se, but hopefully her latest picture, "Old Joy," will edge her further into the spotlight. This latest offering is a simple meditation on the exact point of a friendship's organic disintegration in the vacuum of an isolated weekend getaway.
Expecting father Mark (Daniel London) gets a call from out-there buddy Kurt (memorably but over-comically played by musician Will Oldham), who wants to know if he'd be interested in hitting up some hidden hot springs in the mountains. After an awkward exchange with third-trimester wife Tanya, Mark sets off in the family station wagon to meet Kurt. What follows is a minor journey between two men, contemplative and reflective, but far from serene. It slowly emerges that Mark and Kurt are a pair of puzzle pieces that no longer fit: seemingly hippy-calm Kurt is an aimlessly drifting bundle of anxieties, while grownup Mark bought into square society a long ways back.
Oddly enough, borders and confinement crop up frequently in a movie that spends much of its time outdoors. The confinement of the car provides an inescapable forum for bouts of uncomfortable catch-up and chitchat. Mark focuses on the road while Kurt regresses into himself with puffs off a weed pipe. The austere scenery is frequently focused on, but is perpetually passing, and one can palpably feel a yearning to reverse this inside-looking-out view. When the two camp out for the night they are just as confined within the low light of the bonfire and a tight camera frame. Finally at the springs, they break from each other and cocoon themselves in separate bathing tubs. The closeness and confrontation of the trip provides no jarring change or concrete resolve, just the solemn, mostly wordless, and bittersweet parting of friends no longer able to connect,
The performances are physically spot-on, and while Oldham and London tune in perfectly to the film's desired tone, delivered lines feel woefully scripted throughout the first half of the picture. Much like its subjects the film is bristling with honesty and control, and only slips when a beer-buzzed Kurt breaks the social contract by verbally lamenting the dissolving friendship. The soundtrack by Yo La Tengo is an unexpected treat, and easily the best film score I've heard in awhile. The steady, free-spirited guitar and gentle drumming provide an integral and life giving heartbeat that tends to provide a reflective segue way between key scenes. Being an ex Yo La Tengo fan I feel a bit embarrassed that I never saw the band's potential for film music.
While Kurt and Mark's relationship is clearly the focus of the film, the two supporting ladies leave powerful imprints, and have a strong, if ethereal hand in shaping it. Wife Tanya has only a few minutes of sreen time and a brief handful of lines, but her quasi- disapproving attitude and semi-nagging presence bind Mark in a way that is completely alien to Kurt's sensibilities. Her cellphone presence is Yoko Ono intrusive, not in an overtly vulgar sense, but as concrete proof of how far gone Mark is. The second lady, Mark's fabulously photogenic canine Lucy, comes along for the ride. Her reciprocated affections towards Kurt provide a subtle layer of tension. Wayward Kurt gets to goof off and play with Lucy, while sensible Mark is burdened with actuality of owning her and dealing with her "separation anxiety" as she barks from the unattended auto.
"Old Joy" really succeeds in its combination of performance, photography, and tone. Its a subtle mood piece that lingers with, and haunts you for awhile after viewing. Unspoken communication has rarely felt this intense on screen, and I think everyone can relate to the to the sad reality of drifting away from a once loved friend. Its this universal factor of human experience, realistically played to the hilt, that is the triumph of "Old Joy."
Review by Brett A. Scieszka
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