For anyone out there with the guts to read another blog:
"Conversely" of "Upper Limit Music; Lower Limit Speech" has joined forces with me in starting up a new blog titled "The Paterson Project." The blog is an ongoing journal where he and I will work together on an album of music/poetry based on Chapter III of William Carlos Williams' "Paterson: Book Four." Sound totally rad to you, too? Well, you should check it out, then. The web address should be linked above, but if you need it, it is:
http://patersonproject.blogspot.com
Posts should be coming frequently over there - we have a lot of work to do. As for "Atom Smashing," it's still up and running, even if the entries have slowed down since the Fall term started. I'll do my best to get back on schedule over here.
As the Magician said to Frosty the Snowman: "Busy, busy, busy!"
Friday, September 22, 2006
Monday, September 11, 2006
GENERAL.
In honor of today's anniversary, please forgive me for saying a few more words:
Five years ago today, most of us watched on television as far too many of the nation's policemen, firemen and rescue workers went back into a burning building to save the victims of a tragedy they too would ultimately become victims of. Their shared belief that the worst was over, documented in interview after interview in the months that followed the morning of September 11, echoes far too loudly now, in a time when no situation can begin before its most disastrous outcome is anticipated. We have resolved ourselves, those of us who are here, to never again experience the shock of that morning, that sweeping sense of disbelief at the sheer magnitude of an event that paralyzed so many of us at a time of such desparate need. And in this preparation, we have shed more than our perceived vulnerability.
As the son and brother of firemen, I thank those who have and continue to help others. I would like to remember, in whatever small way I can, those who were lost in the attacks of September 11 and those who have been lost in the conflicts resulting from that day. And I also hold out hope, foolish as it may be, for a time when the belief that good can still be done again outweighs the fear and darkness of a violent act.
In honor of today's anniversary, please forgive me for saying a few more words:
Five years ago today, most of us watched on television as far too many of the nation's policemen, firemen and rescue workers went back into a burning building to save the victims of a tragedy they too would ultimately become victims of. Their shared belief that the worst was over, documented in interview after interview in the months that followed the morning of September 11, echoes far too loudly now, in a time when no situation can begin before its most disastrous outcome is anticipated. We have resolved ourselves, those of us who are here, to never again experience the shock of that morning, that sweeping sense of disbelief at the sheer magnitude of an event that paralyzed so many of us at a time of such desparate need. And in this preparation, we have shed more than our perceived vulnerability.
As the son and brother of firemen, I thank those who have and continue to help others. I would like to remember, in whatever small way I can, those who were lost in the attacks of September 11 and those who have been lost in the conflicts resulting from that day. And I also hold out hope, foolish as it may be, for a time when the belief that good can still be done again outweighs the fear and darkness of a violent act.
Tuesday, September 05, 2006
The "Mid-Year" Top Ten, #5 - #1
MOVIES.
5. BUBBLE (dir. Steven Soderbergh)
***1/2 out of ****
Steven Soderbergh has made a career out of rotation. Rising into the Hollywood limelight in 1989 with the small-market indie SEX, LIES & VIDEOTAPE, Soderbergh has spent the majority of his career attempting to balance big-budget projects like the Danny Ocean films and 2000's TRAFFIC with smaller, more personal films financed through his own production company that, as he admits, are designed to "keep him true to his roots." Whether or not this process works is debatable - certainly, OCEAN'S 13 feels like a paycheck movie - but it has also led to some of Soderbergh's strongest work, including 1996's SCHIZOPOLIS, the ERIN BROKOVICH follow-up, SOLARIS, and now the blink-and-you'll-miss-it BUBBLE. The idea behind BUBBLE is simple: write the bare bones of a script about three co-workers in blue collar America, cast non-actors in the main parts, rely on improvisation for 90% of the film's dialogue and let the essential low-budget independent movie unspool in front of you. Yet even more impressive than the guts behind this experiment is the strange and humbling film that this apparent stunt produces; BUBBLE is a shockingly well-realized movie with a tight and meaninglful plot, strong visual direction and startlingly good performances. The result of this collective effort excels not only as an efficient "purge" for its Hollywood crew, but also as a moving statement about the drama that fuels human lives - and the genuine horror of a cause-and-effect situation that entangles the film's three main characters in a way that feels as fated and unavoidable as the jobs and lives they each possess. Released simultaneously in theaters and on DVD, I recommend checking this one out - unfortunately, you won't see anything else like it this year.
4. MONSTER HOUSE (dir. Gil Kenan)
***1/2 out of ****
Alright, for those of you who are throwing out my credibility right about...now, I offer the following items for my defense: THE PRINCESS BRIDE. THE GOONIES. STAND BY ME. For those of you who turn your noses up at the notion of celebrating a "kids" movie, just take this moment to look back at your own childhood and the movies that shaped it, and now tell me with a straight face that there wasn't something special and united in the movies you remember. Maybe it was a sense of daring, a seemingly-unnecessary curse word, the sight of something gross or scary or mean-spirited that at the time seemed so delightfully out of place in the movie you were watching. For me, I think about two things: the faces melting in RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK and the dead body in STAND BY ME. I'll never shake how much seeing those two images made me feel like I had finally grown out of Saturday morning cartoons and moved into an infinitely more tantalizing and taboo adulthood. Now, is MONSTER HOUSE one of those films? In a way, yes - there are dead bodies, murders, suicides, even a snaggle-toothed Jason Lee drinking and pissing on an old man's lawn. But more importantly, MONSTER HOUSE is a movie about those kinds of films, and particularly, those kinds of moments - and when it comes to mixing the shock of the macabre with the curious delight of childhood, Kenan's very-solid animated film delivers on both fronts. And it should also be noted that it has one helluva monster house. Don't say I didn't warn you.
3. V FOR VENDETTA (dir. James McTeigue)
***1/2 out of ****
Often unfairly compared to the MATRIX films, McTeigue (who directed exactly none of the Matrix movies) gives us a film that relies on style, sure, but one that also tries awfully hard to have something more to say by the time the credits roll than "Whoa." VENDETTA, which uses a dystopian London as an obvious stand-in for contemporary America, does its best to not only critique a global power system that seems to slant ever-dramatically toward authoritarianism, but also indicts quite harshly those truly responsible in any democratic state: the masses. The moves within the film to this extreme - the masked anyman and everyman, V, the tempered rebel Evey (played very well by Natalie Portman), the pattern of social injustices aimed not at individuals but transparent types - all work incredibly well, and by the time the film reaches its climax, it has not only braved the question of terrorism, it has moved through it and past it to a conclusion that feels frighteningly right - and that is by far any film of this nature's greatest strength and accomplishment.
2. THE THREE BURIALS OF MELQUIADES ESTRADA (dir. Tommy Lee Jones)
***1/2 out of ****
It is surprisingly difficult for me to sum up my thoughts on this movie. Jones's film, which weaves in and out of a variety of flashbacks to tell the story of a Border Patrol agent (Barry Pepper) who accidentally kills a Mexican man only to face the vengeance of that man's best friend, American cowboy, Pete (director Jones), works less as a film narrative and more as a film experience. To clarify this awfully fuzzy distinction, let me talk about Pete: Pete is that rarest of movie characters - a man of marginal intelligence played both convincingly and without condescension. For Pete, Melquiades's death is an absurdity, something almost entirely incomprehensible. The Mexican man, whom Pete hired and worked with on a small Texas farm, means so much more to the cowboy than even a traditional Hollywood notion of love encompasses - he was, simply put, Pete's best friend, and for his life to be taken in an act of allegedly instigated violence goes against everything Pete understands about his world. All that follows this initial act - Pete's kidnapping of the Border Patrol agent, the disastrous journey - with corpse in tow - to Melquiades hometown in Mexico - is still tied deeply to Pete's own grieving process, and this beautiful and tragic fulfilment, paced literally to the steps of Pete's understanding, works not only as an enjoyable and moving film experience, but also as a singularly unfolding depiction of cause and effect as it might exist when removed from linear constraints. Okay, fair enough - you say that's impossible. But watch the movie. Then tell me what you would call this trick Jones's film does so, so well.
1. LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE (dir. Jonathan Dayton, Valerie Faris)
***1/2 out of ****
So, the top of the list. What can I say? I've bought into this year's indie darling, LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE. I knew this was going to happen. I saw it coming, slowly from town to town, in releases larger and more widespread, and I tried to brace myself for its stream of adulation, its wave of both gotta-see-it love and don't-buy-the-hype cynicism that would, inevitably, shape my own view of the film. But this last Saturday, as I walked out of the theater, I couldn't shake this amazing smile that, if only for a moment, kept me from thinking along the lines of any of the dozen reviews and articles I'd read since SUNSHINE debuted at Cannes last spring. Instead, all I could focus on was just how good the movie I just saw was. I don't know exactly what I can say to defend this position; sure, the plot worked alright, the characters were all unique and enjoyable, the big point of the whole thing felt good and unforced, but there was something else in this movie that really clicked with me, and it wasn't until I was half way home from the theater that I realized just what it was: I really, really dig unironic symbolism. There was something so downright pleasant about the metaphorical family vehicle that was that bizarro family's yellow VW van - this immediately-available and sincere image of a totally misfit family sticking together simply because they couldn't get anywhere alone. From the moment that van's clutch went out and I saw Steve Carell's suicidal homosexual Frank pushing alongside eight-year-old beauty contestant Olive, the Nietzche-obsessed misanthrope Dwayne and their ridiculously self-help obsessed father, Richard, I knew this was an image I wouldn't shake - and sometimes, that's perfect. You can complain about coincidence all you like, but there's no attempt here at realism - this is a movie about a wacked-out family driving 70o miles to deliver their bespectacled daughter to a beauty pageant she's a fish-out-of-water at - but its shooting at something both accepting and cohesive about the way we interact with each other - and if a movie can do that and make me laugh out loud - well, I have to say, it's on to something wonderful.
So, there we go: the Mid-Year Top Ten. Are there some big holes here? Well, yep, there's not denying it. But believe me, we could do worse than those top few movies - and with any luck, these next four months will bring a lot of movies that are even better. I know I've got my picks for the fall season, as I'm sure you do (that's a whole different list), but for now, these ten will have to do - and warts and all, these are movies we owe it to ourselves to remember before that Oscar rush sweeps all us movie-lovers up in an awards-crazy wave that each and every year leaves a special handful of movies from the previous spring and summer behind - unless, of course, we take the time to "list" them. After all, what could be more debatable than that?
Until December, enjoy yourselves everyone.
KMC
5. BUBBLE (dir. Steven Soderbergh)
***1/2 out of ****
Steven Soderbergh has made a career out of rotation. Rising into the Hollywood limelight in 1989 with the small-market indie SEX, LIES & VIDEOTAPE, Soderbergh has spent the majority of his career attempting to balance big-budget projects like the Danny Ocean films and 2000's TRAFFIC with smaller, more personal films financed through his own production company that, as he admits, are designed to "keep him true to his roots." Whether or not this process works is debatable - certainly, OCEAN'S 13 feels like a paycheck movie - but it has also led to some of Soderbergh's strongest work, including 1996's SCHIZOPOLIS, the ERIN BROKOVICH follow-up, SOLARIS, and now the blink-and-you'll-miss-it BUBBLE. The idea behind BUBBLE is simple: write the bare bones of a script about three co-workers in blue collar America, cast non-actors in the main parts, rely on improvisation for 90% of the film's dialogue and let the essential low-budget independent movie unspool in front of you. Yet even more impressive than the guts behind this experiment is the strange and humbling film that this apparent stunt produces; BUBBLE is a shockingly well-realized movie with a tight and meaninglful plot, strong visual direction and startlingly good performances. The result of this collective effort excels not only as an efficient "purge" for its Hollywood crew, but also as a moving statement about the drama that fuels human lives - and the genuine horror of a cause-and-effect situation that entangles the film's three main characters in a way that feels as fated and unavoidable as the jobs and lives they each possess. Released simultaneously in theaters and on DVD, I recommend checking this one out - unfortunately, you won't see anything else like it this year.
4. MONSTER HOUSE (dir. Gil Kenan)
***1/2 out of ****
Alright, for those of you who are throwing out my credibility right about...now, I offer the following items for my defense: THE PRINCESS BRIDE. THE GOONIES. STAND BY ME. For those of you who turn your noses up at the notion of celebrating a "kids" movie, just take this moment to look back at your own childhood and the movies that shaped it, and now tell me with a straight face that there wasn't something special and united in the movies you remember. Maybe it was a sense of daring, a seemingly-unnecessary curse word, the sight of something gross or scary or mean-spirited that at the time seemed so delightfully out of place in the movie you were watching. For me, I think about two things: the faces melting in RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK and the dead body in STAND BY ME. I'll never shake how much seeing those two images made me feel like I had finally grown out of Saturday morning cartoons and moved into an infinitely more tantalizing and taboo adulthood. Now, is MONSTER HOUSE one of those films? In a way, yes - there are dead bodies, murders, suicides, even a snaggle-toothed Jason Lee drinking and pissing on an old man's lawn. But more importantly, MONSTER HOUSE is a movie about those kinds of films, and particularly, those kinds of moments - and when it comes to mixing the shock of the macabre with the curious delight of childhood, Kenan's very-solid animated film delivers on both fronts. And it should also be noted that it has one helluva monster house. Don't say I didn't warn you.
3. V FOR VENDETTA (dir. James McTeigue)
***1/2 out of ****
Often unfairly compared to the MATRIX films, McTeigue (who directed exactly none of the Matrix movies) gives us a film that relies on style, sure, but one that also tries awfully hard to have something more to say by the time the credits roll than "Whoa." VENDETTA, which uses a dystopian London as an obvious stand-in for contemporary America, does its best to not only critique a global power system that seems to slant ever-dramatically toward authoritarianism, but also indicts quite harshly those truly responsible in any democratic state: the masses. The moves within the film to this extreme - the masked anyman and everyman, V, the tempered rebel Evey (played very well by Natalie Portman), the pattern of social injustices aimed not at individuals but transparent types - all work incredibly well, and by the time the film reaches its climax, it has not only braved the question of terrorism, it has moved through it and past it to a conclusion that feels frighteningly right - and that is by far any film of this nature's greatest strength and accomplishment.
2. THE THREE BURIALS OF MELQUIADES ESTRADA (dir. Tommy Lee Jones)
***1/2 out of ****
It is surprisingly difficult for me to sum up my thoughts on this movie. Jones's film, which weaves in and out of a variety of flashbacks to tell the story of a Border Patrol agent (Barry Pepper) who accidentally kills a Mexican man only to face the vengeance of that man's best friend, American cowboy, Pete (director Jones), works less as a film narrative and more as a film experience. To clarify this awfully fuzzy distinction, let me talk about Pete: Pete is that rarest of movie characters - a man of marginal intelligence played both convincingly and without condescension. For Pete, Melquiades's death is an absurdity, something almost entirely incomprehensible. The Mexican man, whom Pete hired and worked with on a small Texas farm, means so much more to the cowboy than even a traditional Hollywood notion of love encompasses - he was, simply put, Pete's best friend, and for his life to be taken in an act of allegedly instigated violence goes against everything Pete understands about his world. All that follows this initial act - Pete's kidnapping of the Border Patrol agent, the disastrous journey - with corpse in tow - to Melquiades hometown in Mexico - is still tied deeply to Pete's own grieving process, and this beautiful and tragic fulfilment, paced literally to the steps of Pete's understanding, works not only as an enjoyable and moving film experience, but also as a singularly unfolding depiction of cause and effect as it might exist when removed from linear constraints. Okay, fair enough - you say that's impossible. But watch the movie. Then tell me what you would call this trick Jones's film does so, so well.
1. LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE (dir. Jonathan Dayton, Valerie Faris)
***1/2 out of ****
So, the top of the list. What can I say? I've bought into this year's indie darling, LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE. I knew this was going to happen. I saw it coming, slowly from town to town, in releases larger and more widespread, and I tried to brace myself for its stream of adulation, its wave of both gotta-see-it love and don't-buy-the-hype cynicism that would, inevitably, shape my own view of the film. But this last Saturday, as I walked out of the theater, I couldn't shake this amazing smile that, if only for a moment, kept me from thinking along the lines of any of the dozen reviews and articles I'd read since SUNSHINE debuted at Cannes last spring. Instead, all I could focus on was just how good the movie I just saw was. I don't know exactly what I can say to defend this position; sure, the plot worked alright, the characters were all unique and enjoyable, the big point of the whole thing felt good and unforced, but there was something else in this movie that really clicked with me, and it wasn't until I was half way home from the theater that I realized just what it was: I really, really dig unironic symbolism. There was something so downright pleasant about the metaphorical family vehicle that was that bizarro family's yellow VW van - this immediately-available and sincere image of a totally misfit family sticking together simply because they couldn't get anywhere alone. From the moment that van's clutch went out and I saw Steve Carell's suicidal homosexual Frank pushing alongside eight-year-old beauty contestant Olive, the Nietzche-obsessed misanthrope Dwayne and their ridiculously self-help obsessed father, Richard, I knew this was an image I wouldn't shake - and sometimes, that's perfect. You can complain about coincidence all you like, but there's no attempt here at realism - this is a movie about a wacked-out family driving 70o miles to deliver their bespectacled daughter to a beauty pageant she's a fish-out-of-water at - but its shooting at something both accepting and cohesive about the way we interact with each other - and if a movie can do that and make me laugh out loud - well, I have to say, it's on to something wonderful.
So, there we go: the Mid-Year Top Ten. Are there some big holes here? Well, yep, there's not denying it. But believe me, we could do worse than those top few movies - and with any luck, these next four months will bring a lot of movies that are even better. I know I've got my picks for the fall season, as I'm sure you do (that's a whole different list), but for now, these ten will have to do - and warts and all, these are movies we owe it to ourselves to remember before that Oscar rush sweeps all us movie-lovers up in an awards-crazy wave that each and every year leaves a special handful of movies from the previous spring and summer behind - unless, of course, we take the time to "list" them. After all, what could be more debatable than that?
Until December, enjoy yourselves everyone.
KMC
Monday, September 04, 2006
The "Mid-Year" Top Ten, #10 - #6
MOVIES.
Alright Ladies and Gentlemen, it's that time again. August is over, we're into the last four months of the year, and now (at long last), the marketing-driven enigma that is Hollywood will start that slow-ebb building to a dam-burst of quality film releases that will push its way through limited releases from now until the true end of the movie year - the 2007 Oscars. So what, you say? So it's time to put together a modest Best Of - the greatest of all Lists - for the year thus far, of course. But aren't the best movies of each year held back until the Fall? For the most part, you know it! And doesn't that mean the pickings are slim? You bet! But every year, you can count on a handful of films - small indies, odd little studio experiments, and occassionally that rarest of rare species, the good summer blockbuster - to be found amidst the endless schlock horror flicks and THX-fueled action spectaculars (such an odd term, don't you agree?) of the first eight months of the year. So without further ado, here are my picks for the best ten flicks this year released between January 1, 2006 and the up-to-the-minute present. Interested?
10. CLERKS II (dir. Kevin Smith)
*** out of ****
Kevin Smith's return to the Quick Stop, made famous in 1994's slacker-comedy for the townie set, CLERKS, is a pretty pleasant one, especially for those with a healthy respect for Smith's small town Jersey-film universe. The jokes work a fair amount of the time, the raunchiness and audacity are both welcome and used in controlled doses, and most importantly, the storylines for our returning heroes - perpetual fall guy Dante Hicks and indulgent smart-ass Randal Graves - feel natural; it doesn't seem out of place for the two to still be working in service industry jobs - in fact, it feels more appropriate than the first film's "maybe-college" ending did. Although the plot itself has a few rough patches - most notably the absurd notion that Rosario Dawson would ever be interested in the very Jersey-looking (and -sounding) Dante Hicks - the ending is not only strong for its interests within the film, it reminds us of the cultural relevance the first film had; what is out there for twenty-somethings that either couldn't or chose not to go down the bachelor's degree path? It's a good question, I think, and I'm glad Smith chooses to ask it - especially this time of year, even if the jokes that were smart twelve years ago (STAR WARS) are only a source of embarassment now (STAR WARS).
9. A SCANNER DARKLY (dir. Richard Linklater)
*** out of ****
Ah, A SCANNER DARKLY. Rarely has the convoluted nature of a film's title so accurately predicted the movie that follows it. Linklater's take on the Philip K. Dick short story makes for an excellent study of the art of adaptation, particularly as it treats the director's interpretation of Dick's dystopian view of law enforcement and its cultural concerns, but despite a handful of revelatory moments, the overall film here falls a bit flat (especially at the end). The strengths of the film that deserve fair credit lie mostly in the performances of several of the leads, most notably Robert Downey Jr., whose performance somehow slips around (or perhaps through?) a winking treatment of his own past with drug abuse to a much more moving and affective look at the strange reality of paranoia. Where this film works best is in its depiction of its titular "scanner's" home life, where he wastes time away with friends and sporadic doses of the mystery drug, "D." Linklater's decision to show the joys and pleasures of addiction in addition to the costs of drug use - most clearly expressed in a scene in which Keanu Reeve's scanner is forced to watch a friend skirt death from a monitoring station - work to question the viewer rather than lead him or her, resulting in an approach that allows us to buy SCANNER's closing dedication to "those who were punished far too severely for their crimes" much more than a more straightforward take on the original short story might have.
8. MIAMI VICE (dir. Michael Mann)
*** out of ****
I've got to say, this is a movie that disappointed me. You see, Michael Mann was the director I picked up off waivers in the Hollywood Fantasy Draft, and I've always relied heavily on him to deliver surprisingly good movies on what seem like cookie-cutter premeses. Curious about my success? See LAST OF THE MOHICANS, THE INSIDER or COLLATERAL. Every time, Mann delivers the goods, at least to the point of making the movie far better than it really has any right to be. But with MIAMI VICE, perhaps I wanted to much. I went in looking for another HEAT, and instead I got another MANHUNTER (the first in the Hannibal Lecter trilogy, if one wanted to know). And that isn't necessarily an all-bad thing - both films work in a specific way, but they aren't what you want, dammit - I can't put it a better way than that. MIAMI VICE has a goal: it wants to drop you deep undercover in as realistic and emotional a way as possible. But it chooses perhaps a too-real way to do that - the film opens without any credits, without a studio logo, without anything: you're in the middle of a club, looking through a crowd at Jamie Foxx and Colin Farrel, and you can't understand a word they're saying. And that doesn't change. The entire film is an exercise in picking up on a conversation, trying to slip by unnoticed, being undercover, but as clever as this strategy is, it's still a movie, for pete's sake. There's still a booming soundtrack, a series of quick-cuts to reveal the gunshot wound from the most cinematic angle possible. The movie has its moments - a shoot-out in a trailer park, a final gunfight - and there is no denying the aesthetic joy of watching Mann shoot a movie, but in the end, you need more than the circumstantial evidence this movie gives you, and although the effort is a uniformly interesting one, its just not enough to really secure the verdict I think Mann is looking for. (Take that, punny Gene Shalitt!)
7. WORLD TRADE CENTER (dir. Oliver Stone)
*** out of ****
Oh wow, I'm not sure what to say about this movie. It floored me. That I should get out of the way. I wept in the theater, I wept on my way home and if I think about the wrong scene as I'm typing here, I might break down over the keyboard. But I can also say firmly that Oliver Stone's film deserves only a small part of the credit for this reaction. As a film, WORLD TRADE CENTER manages a handful of impressive ideas, but it ties itself so closely to a format clearly designed to honor its subject without asking unsettling questions that it never really gives us any exceptional moments. It is raw, and perhaps most impressively, it uses our knowledge of the events of September 11, 2001 to establish seemingly-undirected foreshadowing; what I mean is, we don't get set-ups or visual cues to impending disaster - no "this thing's gonna collapse!" lines - but instead we are forced to watch the characters behave with absolute innocence, and that is, quite deliberately, the film's most horrible aspect. But once the Towers fall, we're left with a rescue story. That's it. We see our lost policemen in the dark, talking about each others' families, struggling to stay alive; we intercut these dark scenes with mourning wives and mothers, people waiting by telephones, rescue workers frantically searching for one thing or another they have to get right this second...but we know they will. It's not a question, there's no doubt - just as we knew the World Trade Center would get hit, that the buildings would collapse, that it was a deliberate act of international terrorism. The result is a film that teeters on individual relevance - Maggie Gylenhal's performance is a beautiful study of how to grieve for someone you don't know is dead, Nicholas Cage's reliance on his wife to stay awake and alive in the rubble is half-realized as more than a cliche - but in the end, WORLD TRADE CENTER settles for playing on the pre-existing relevance of its topic rather than its own artistic efforts. The result is a film that moves you deeply not by opening your eyes to something you haven't seen but to something you have - and have wanted to close them to ever since. Whether or not that's admirable is up for debate, but if the question is whether or not it works; for better or worse, it does.
6. PRAIRIE HOME COMPANION (dir. Robert Altman)
*** out of ****
This is a simpler review. Altman's PRAIRIE HOME COMPANION is exactly what it seems to be at first glance: a charmingly simple film wrapped around the last night of a semi-fictitious radio show. What's so beautiful about this set-up comes from that appeal: the ease of Altman's script, written in part by Prairie Home mainstay, Garrison Keilor, both teases out the artifice of Keilor's radio show's "old-timey" affectation and imbues it with a much more sincere warmth. At the film's end, it's not so much that we want Tommy Lee Jones's "Axe Man" to be stopped from cancelling the show as it is that we hope he changes his mind; for all the silliness of the songs and jokes and biscuit advertisements Companion plays, its the show's community that wins our hearts - and we sincerely hope it will win his in the end, too. Of course, such a premise is right down the fairway for Altman, whose notoriety as an "ensemble director" is well known. I've wondered before (and I am wondering now) if this play on community that PRAIRIE HOME COMPANION focuses so much on is a wink to those of us in the audience who wonder if Altman is capable of doing anything else - maybe a show about an ensemble makes singular what his movies so often make plural, not unlike putting enough fish together leaves you, in the end, with a school - but then again, that man is aaawwfully crafty, and if nostalgia has taught me anything, it's that old men always have a trick (or a false set of dentures) in their pockets for any kids who spend too much time nosing about. To that extent, I'll be happy with what he has left us: a fine, sweet film about pretty downright nice people, mixed with juust enough metaphorical (and allegorical) whispering to keep your brain working on the drive home - and of course, if we're in the Midwest, that could be a long trip indeed.
THE "MID-YEAR" TOP TEN, #5 - #1 COMING SOON.
Alright Ladies and Gentlemen, it's that time again. August is over, we're into the last four months of the year, and now (at long last), the marketing-driven enigma that is Hollywood will start that slow-ebb building to a dam-burst of quality film releases that will push its way through limited releases from now until the true end of the movie year - the 2007 Oscars. So what, you say? So it's time to put together a modest Best Of - the greatest of all Lists - for the year thus far, of course. But aren't the best movies of each year held back until the Fall? For the most part, you know it! And doesn't that mean the pickings are slim? You bet! But every year, you can count on a handful of films - small indies, odd little studio experiments, and occassionally that rarest of rare species, the good summer blockbuster - to be found amidst the endless schlock horror flicks and THX-fueled action spectaculars (such an odd term, don't you agree?) of the first eight months of the year. So without further ado, here are my picks for the best ten flicks this year released between January 1, 2006 and the up-to-the-minute present. Interested?
10. CLERKS II (dir. Kevin Smith)
*** out of ****
Kevin Smith's return to the Quick Stop, made famous in 1994's slacker-comedy for the townie set, CLERKS, is a pretty pleasant one, especially for those with a healthy respect for Smith's small town Jersey-film universe. The jokes work a fair amount of the time, the raunchiness and audacity are both welcome and used in controlled doses, and most importantly, the storylines for our returning heroes - perpetual fall guy Dante Hicks and indulgent smart-ass Randal Graves - feel natural; it doesn't seem out of place for the two to still be working in service industry jobs - in fact, it feels more appropriate than the first film's "maybe-college" ending did. Although the plot itself has a few rough patches - most notably the absurd notion that Rosario Dawson would ever be interested in the very Jersey-looking (and -sounding) Dante Hicks - the ending is not only strong for its interests within the film, it reminds us of the cultural relevance the first film had; what is out there for twenty-somethings that either couldn't or chose not to go down the bachelor's degree path? It's a good question, I think, and I'm glad Smith chooses to ask it - especially this time of year, even if the jokes that were smart twelve years ago (STAR WARS) are only a source of embarassment now (STAR WARS).
9. A SCANNER DARKLY (dir. Richard Linklater)
*** out of ****
Ah, A SCANNER DARKLY. Rarely has the convoluted nature of a film's title so accurately predicted the movie that follows it. Linklater's take on the Philip K. Dick short story makes for an excellent study of the art of adaptation, particularly as it treats the director's interpretation of Dick's dystopian view of law enforcement and its cultural concerns, but despite a handful of revelatory moments, the overall film here falls a bit flat (especially at the end). The strengths of the film that deserve fair credit lie mostly in the performances of several of the leads, most notably Robert Downey Jr., whose performance somehow slips around (or perhaps through?) a winking treatment of his own past with drug abuse to a much more moving and affective look at the strange reality of paranoia. Where this film works best is in its depiction of its titular "scanner's" home life, where he wastes time away with friends and sporadic doses of the mystery drug, "D." Linklater's decision to show the joys and pleasures of addiction in addition to the costs of drug use - most clearly expressed in a scene in which Keanu Reeve's scanner is forced to watch a friend skirt death from a monitoring station - work to question the viewer rather than lead him or her, resulting in an approach that allows us to buy SCANNER's closing dedication to "those who were punished far too severely for their crimes" much more than a more straightforward take on the original short story might have.
8. MIAMI VICE (dir. Michael Mann)
*** out of ****
I've got to say, this is a movie that disappointed me. You see, Michael Mann was the director I picked up off waivers in the Hollywood Fantasy Draft, and I've always relied heavily on him to deliver surprisingly good movies on what seem like cookie-cutter premeses. Curious about my success? See LAST OF THE MOHICANS, THE INSIDER or COLLATERAL. Every time, Mann delivers the goods, at least to the point of making the movie far better than it really has any right to be. But with MIAMI VICE, perhaps I wanted to much. I went in looking for another HEAT, and instead I got another MANHUNTER (the first in the Hannibal Lecter trilogy, if one wanted to know). And that isn't necessarily an all-bad thing - both films work in a specific way, but they aren't what you want, dammit - I can't put it a better way than that. MIAMI VICE has a goal: it wants to drop you deep undercover in as realistic and emotional a way as possible. But it chooses perhaps a too-real way to do that - the film opens without any credits, without a studio logo, without anything: you're in the middle of a club, looking through a crowd at Jamie Foxx and Colin Farrel, and you can't understand a word they're saying. And that doesn't change. The entire film is an exercise in picking up on a conversation, trying to slip by unnoticed, being undercover, but as clever as this strategy is, it's still a movie, for pete's sake. There's still a booming soundtrack, a series of quick-cuts to reveal the gunshot wound from the most cinematic angle possible. The movie has its moments - a shoot-out in a trailer park, a final gunfight - and there is no denying the aesthetic joy of watching Mann shoot a movie, but in the end, you need more than the circumstantial evidence this movie gives you, and although the effort is a uniformly interesting one, its just not enough to really secure the verdict I think Mann is looking for. (Take that, punny Gene Shalitt!)
7. WORLD TRADE CENTER (dir. Oliver Stone)
*** out of ****
Oh wow, I'm not sure what to say about this movie. It floored me. That I should get out of the way. I wept in the theater, I wept on my way home and if I think about the wrong scene as I'm typing here, I might break down over the keyboard. But I can also say firmly that Oliver Stone's film deserves only a small part of the credit for this reaction. As a film, WORLD TRADE CENTER manages a handful of impressive ideas, but it ties itself so closely to a format clearly designed to honor its subject without asking unsettling questions that it never really gives us any exceptional moments. It is raw, and perhaps most impressively, it uses our knowledge of the events of September 11, 2001 to establish seemingly-undirected foreshadowing; what I mean is, we don't get set-ups or visual cues to impending disaster - no "this thing's gonna collapse!" lines - but instead we are forced to watch the characters behave with absolute innocence, and that is, quite deliberately, the film's most horrible aspect. But once the Towers fall, we're left with a rescue story. That's it. We see our lost policemen in the dark, talking about each others' families, struggling to stay alive; we intercut these dark scenes with mourning wives and mothers, people waiting by telephones, rescue workers frantically searching for one thing or another they have to get right this second...but we know they will. It's not a question, there's no doubt - just as we knew the World Trade Center would get hit, that the buildings would collapse, that it was a deliberate act of international terrorism. The result is a film that teeters on individual relevance - Maggie Gylenhal's performance is a beautiful study of how to grieve for someone you don't know is dead, Nicholas Cage's reliance on his wife to stay awake and alive in the rubble is half-realized as more than a cliche - but in the end, WORLD TRADE CENTER settles for playing on the pre-existing relevance of its topic rather than its own artistic efforts. The result is a film that moves you deeply not by opening your eyes to something you haven't seen but to something you have - and have wanted to close them to ever since. Whether or not that's admirable is up for debate, but if the question is whether or not it works; for better or worse, it does.
6. PRAIRIE HOME COMPANION (dir. Robert Altman)
*** out of ****
This is a simpler review. Altman's PRAIRIE HOME COMPANION is exactly what it seems to be at first glance: a charmingly simple film wrapped around the last night of a semi-fictitious radio show. What's so beautiful about this set-up comes from that appeal: the ease of Altman's script, written in part by Prairie Home mainstay, Garrison Keilor, both teases out the artifice of Keilor's radio show's "old-timey" affectation and imbues it with a much more sincere warmth. At the film's end, it's not so much that we want Tommy Lee Jones's "Axe Man" to be stopped from cancelling the show as it is that we hope he changes his mind; for all the silliness of the songs and jokes and biscuit advertisements Companion plays, its the show's community that wins our hearts - and we sincerely hope it will win his in the end, too. Of course, such a premise is right down the fairway for Altman, whose notoriety as an "ensemble director" is well known. I've wondered before (and I am wondering now) if this play on community that PRAIRIE HOME COMPANION focuses so much on is a wink to those of us in the audience who wonder if Altman is capable of doing anything else - maybe a show about an ensemble makes singular what his movies so often make plural, not unlike putting enough fish together leaves you, in the end, with a school - but then again, that man is aaawwfully crafty, and if nostalgia has taught me anything, it's that old men always have a trick (or a false set of dentures) in their pockets for any kids who spend too much time nosing about. To that extent, I'll be happy with what he has left us: a fine, sweet film about pretty downright nice people, mixed with juust enough metaphorical (and allegorical) whispering to keep your brain working on the drive home - and of course, if we're in the Midwest, that could be a long trip indeed.
THE "MID-YEAR" TOP TEN, #5 - #1 COMING SOON.
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