I am a happy, HAPPY blogger.
Today's imdb poll (always good for a brief amusement) was particularly interesting today. The question was of twenty iconic horror movie-villains which scares you the most? I voted for my favorite, Frankenstein's monster, though I take umbrage at Frankenstein's momster being called a villain. He's an inherently sympathetic character, if not THE most sympathetic character in most iterations of the Frankenstein myths. In fact many monsters on the list are misunderstood or just want to be left alone. The fact remains that quite often man (and I apologize for the forthcoming cliche) is the greatest monster of all.
Why is Frankenstein my favorite, you may wonder? Well, simply because Frankenstein's monster is the monster trying to do right. He's what we feel like when we look in the mirror and feel ugly, despised, foolish. We look to the heavens and reach out for understanding, asking why were we created. You can attach all sorts of meanings on Frankenstein but basically he's the ultimate emo monster. He was born into a world he never asked for and his "monstrous" stems primarily from being misunderstood. Plus, no lie, the guy has the most consistently quality films (excepting that awful Branagh one, ugh). I wouldn't mind seeing Guillermo Del Toro or Mark Romanek or Frank Darabont take a crack at the big guy.
The man is suave, laconic and disarmingly handsome. His fedora is perfectly cocked, his trench-coat does not have single crease. He is a killer, but he follows the code of the samurai, he is Alain Delon's Jef Costello in Jean-Pierre Melville's Le Samourai.
It wouldn't be the first Melville film I would recommend to newbies but it's a marvelous example of the prodigious style and atmosphere that Melville is capable of creating within his frame. Cool, baby, very cool.
How can one even begin to critically disseminate a film like Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay? People who liked the first film are obviously going to enjoy the return of these two stoner characters and those who missed the first aren't likely to jump on now. The new film, like the first is really just a loose series of encounters strung together by the duos traveling shenanigans. What gave the film it's ballast the first time out was the strong undercurrent of resentment towards modern America's enduring stereotypes and discomfort with the other. To have two Asian protagonists in a mainstream comedy was, and still remains, something of an anomaly. Sure there was plenty of bits of scatological, anatomical and pot humor in the first film but at it's heart is that it's the story of two characters who are fed up being the sidekicks in their own lives.
Right, that was it. Neil Patrick Harris makes a welcome return to the world of Harold & Kumar as a sort of raging id demi-god. He pulls up to the boys right when they need help in a sports car blasting hip-hop, devouring baggies of mushrooms and chugging a bottle of Jack Daniels with a hankering for whores. When Harris is on-screen the film regains the originals go-anywhere, do-anything energy. Too bad he isn't around for very long (though the faithful would do well to stick around to the end credits). One wonders why Harris isn't around more as his appearance really does give the film a goose at the half-way mark, perhaps we'll get a NPH spin-off film.
SC Pick: Get Smart (June 20)
SC Pick: Son of Rambow (May 2)
SC pick: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (May 23)
SC pick: The Foot Fist Way (May 30)
The film's premise is simple enough. TV composer Peter Bretter (Segel) is dating the star of the police procedural drama he works on, Sarah Marshall (Kristen Bell). Peter is doting (maybe a little too doting) and not quite as compatible with Sarah as he thinks and right at the start of the film he is dumped, a fact made all the more embarrassing that he is completely naked (the film is more than happy to show you as much flaccid Segel meat as possible). Peter becomes a total mess and follows up a suggestion by his best-friend/step-brother (the always delightful Bill Hader) goes to Hawaii to, well, forget about Sarah Marshall. Unfortunately upon arriving at the resort Peter runs into Sarah and her new beau the Bono-esque Aldous Snow (British star Russel Brand). Peter sinks further into misery, but not the audience. He eventually comes to grips with the break-up through the aide of an customer-service rep Rachel, played by the effervescent Mila Kunis, along with a variety of oddball hotel workers and guests.
The film is confidently scripted by Segel and collaborator/director Nick Stoller. It not only quickly sketches its characters and then moves smoothly from sight gags, to killer one-liners to hilarious set-pieces (many of which concern a Dracula musical...with puppets). This is the kind of film where one misses jokes because they're so busy laughing at the previous one. As a comedy it's an absolute success. The film fares less well under the relationship microscope. Rachel and Peter connect more easily then one might expect and one never sees what initially attracted Sarah to Peter. The film also trots out an awful lot of characters in it's second act and while they are all funny the plot loses some of it's momentum. The film also relies heavily on a sort of male-biased logic in order to solve a third act complication. I've talked with several women about this and across the board it seems agreed upon that Peter's actions are irredeemable. This won't be helping anyone trying to make the case for Apatow's movies trending toward a male heavy bias.
Angry Spoilers follow: In case this movie passed you by (oh how I envy you if it did) the story is about Lars (Ryan Gosling), a quiet, shy man who can't bear human contact decides to order himself a real doll and pretend that it's a real person he is dating, much to the chagrin of his brother (Paul Schneider) and the surprise of his sister-in-law (Emily Mortimer, who Lars is in love with secretly). Dr. Patricia Clarkson says the best thing for Lars is for people to treat Bianca like she's real. It should help pull Lars out of his delusion. I suppose Lars could probably recover with a few people playing to his delusion but the WHOLE TOWN DOES IT! Even when Lars ISN'T AROUND! I can understand doing it when he's there but to record a voice for her to read to school children (without Lars in attendance) is fucking MADNESS! The whole town should be thrown into the loony bin. Oh those poor children. Lars eventually redirects his affection to some cute co-worker played by Kelli Garner (one of Di Caprio's chippies in The Aviator) and allows the doll to die (there is a an emergency trip to the hospital and a funeral and EVREYTHING).
This post is part of the Andrew Sarris and The American Cinema blogathon.
I can think of no more worthy entrant into the category of Expressive Esoterica then Canadian auteur David Cronenberg. Most narrative mainstream film is marked by it's characters transformations over the course of the film; the workaholic father learns the value of hearth and home, the slacker youth straightens up under the weight of newfound responsibility, the whore with the heart of gold marries Richard Gere and so on. Heroes journeys are inherently transformative, but the films of director David Cronenberg embody transformation on a cellular level. Cronenberg has utilized graphic, fantastic transformations to underline the changes of his characters and it is one of his many marks as a director that elevates what in the hands of a less talented director be the stuff of late-night cable TV. Throughout his career Cronenberg's work has been marked by its fascination with alterations that are intimate and extraordinary and explore characters identity.
Cronenberg's success lies not just in revealing his themes and telling stories but as an accomplished director of actors. Many directors of genre pictures may put their emphasis on their fx or if we're lucky on their stories, but Cronenberg from the beginning has a penchant for making decent actors effective and making good actors outside the norm appear great. Men like Christopher Walken, James Woods, Jeff Goldblum, Jeremy Irons and Viggo Mortensen have all done career best work under Cronenberg and it has all been to their advantage. None of these men would be considered matinee idols (with the possible exception of Mortensen who couldn't care less about being a movie star) they're all a bit rough hewn, off the beaten path type acors who Cronenberg has revealed to have enormous depths of feeling in the midst of fantastic chaos. The fact that he has dorected several of the men to Oscar nominations is well worth noting. Cronenberg has done wonders with his actresses as well a distingusihed group that includes Geena Davis, Genvieve Beujold, Maria Bello, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Holly Hunter. His female protagonists have been more then just scream queens, they are genuinely damaged by the horrors they see or impressively overcome them.
Cronenberg's acceptance by critics and audiences has grown by leaps and bounds over the years but while he's ventured further out into the mainstream he has lost none of the edge that fist helped him make his mark in 1975's Shivers (the image of a women being attacked by mutant parasites in the tub is still so potent as to have inspired the marketing and a key sequence of James Gunn's Slither nearly three decades later). Consider the fervor that was stirred up by Nikolai's nude bathhouse knife-fight in Eastern Promises and one is reminded of the outcry from viewers when Max Renn perused a channel where people were whipped and beaten in Videodrome. Both scenes have huge resonance and speak volumes about their characters, themes and the remarkable man who helped bring both scenes to life.
Director Bharat Nalluri is an accomplished British TV director and he certainly makes the film look good, Adams is never shot to look anything less than breathlessly gorgeous and especially so in one breathless scene as she barges down a hallway quick changing into perfection as she goes. However he encounters the same pacing problems that Clooney’s Leatherheads has, namely that the film has an uneven tone and never gets revved up properly with genuine screwball comedy pacing. With all the beauty and pageantry on display it’s a case of too much “ball” and not nearly enough “screw.” Adams certainly give the proceedings a buoyant energy as her Delysia is a cross between Marilyn Monroe’s Sugar Kane and Katherine Hepburn’s flustering society ditz in Bringing Up Baby. Adams rubs off on everyone but the goings are rough at the start, the film doesn’t have any oomph but by the time Delysia is showing off black lingerie and a jazz version of Anything Goes plays on the soundtrack I had a smile going from ear to ear. The problem is that the film offers nothing new to the genre. There are flashes where the film tries to contrast the frivolity of the characters by having McDormand and Hinds discussing the brutality and destruction wrecked by the first War. However these moments, while well acted, seem out of pace in the otherwise featherweight proceedings. Perhaps if the film had decided to use the contrast to deconstruct screwball farce then it would provide the film with a bit more ballast. As it stands though the film is a brief, forgettable delight, a perfect date movie for an evening with the bigger plans on the agenda.
I recently got a chance to see a much beloved modern film (though it doesn't get much talked baout in my "film circle") 24 Hour Party People. The movie reminded me what I so throughly enjoy about director Michael Winterbottom (aside from his hilarious last name) is that he is capable of working in a wide range of styles and genres (drama, romance, satire, documentary and even sci-fi). 24 Hour Party People chronicles the rise and fall of Factory Records in Manchester, England and the colorful personalities that inhabit this world and period. The film is shot in a messy, improv'ed, pseudo-mockumentary style that frequently reflects on it's own post-modernist touches. Some may find it pretentious and too self-conscious for it's own good but that's what I dug about it. At the center of this world filled with experimental punk rock, drugs, sex, booze, violence and genera anarchy is the supremely confident (and completely ridiculous) Tony Wilson played by British comedy God, Steve Coogan. Coogan marches through the film like a cross between Ron Burdgundy, Sid Vicious and Ferris Bueller, he never gets bogged down in the noise, mess and clutter that surround him even though he comments "I'm a minor player in my own life story." Coogan is hardly alone though, the movie is packed to the brim with top-flight British talent. Check out this list; Shirley Henderson, Paddy Considine, Andy Serkis, Rob Brydon, Christopher Eccleston, Simon Pegg and the list goes on. The movie does a solid job filling you in on the world of the Manchester music scene but I still felt there was a whole layer of film that I was completely missing because I lacked virtually any prior knowledge of the world the film inhabits (I have a collection of New Order singles and Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols but that's it).
For those of you who don’t know Mary Poppins is probably my personal FAVORITE movie of all-time. I’m not saying it’s the greatest (The Godfather), I’m not suggesting it’s the coolest (The Good, the Bad and the Ugly or Le Cercle Rouge), most structurally sound (Seven Samurai) or the most worthy of critical dissection (Discreet Charm of the Burgeoise or Citizen Kane or Rules of the Game or Manhattan or, or, or or…)., but my personal favorite. I really want to share with you all WHY it’s my favorite and so I will be starting a new series in the coming week; The Sickness Cinema Personal Cannon. In this ongoing semi-weekly feature I will introduce a new inductee into my own personal list of favorites. The first entry will feature first and still most favorite enchanted Disney lady..Mary Poppins. Get ready with that spoonful of sugar and medicine Miss Poppins cause here comes the Sickness.
Around prequel number two my enthusiasm (wait let's call it what it really was, sick obsessive love) for Star Wars fizzled into nothingness. Oh the money I poured onto this franchise; on movies, novels, action figures, video-games, comics and posters. The hours spent examining every scrap of news posted up on theforce.net and so on. Yikes, it's amazing I was able to develop a personality in high school. You can only be an apologist for so long before one solid kick to the head by the flannel-bearded one (he who shall not be named) undoes it all. I still love the classic trilogy, warts and all (though I admit that with the exception of Empire they're not particularly well-made films by any stretch of the imagination). I've seen a lot of production photos from these movies but I'd never seen this one before. Awesome.
This picture makes me endlessly happy. I particularly love that Linus is The Comedian. I wonder if Sally (not pictured) would still call him her sweet baboo if she saw him beat and kill that Vietnamese woman and rape her mom. For those of you who don't recognize these outfits, these are the Peanuts gang dressed as the protagonists of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons comic masterpiece Watchmen. Watchmen the movie directed by Zak Snyder will be in theaters in 2009.
Me: Hey you guys hear, Charlton Heston died the other day?And that ladies and gentleman is why I will be sad to be leaving for LA. For a more...um...fitting Chuck Heston tribute this one is pretty thorough.
PsychLovinGal: Yep.
Scott: Uhuh, 83.
Me: Yep.
Scott: Awwww sad.
PsychLovinGal: Not so sad.
Me: Ouch.
Scott: But come on man. He was MOSES!
Me: It's true, when you grow up Jewish there is no one more legit than Moses.
PsychLovinGal: Yeah, I guess. Plus he was what's his name...Platypus.
Scott: Ummmm.
Me: Spartacus, she means Spartacus. And that wasn't him. He was Ben Hur.
