LOCAL TALENT:
The Science of Sleep
Michel Gondry’s first narrative feature not written by Charlie Kaufman is a painful confession wrapped in whimsy, and coated in plaster of paris and cellophane. Gabriel Garcia Bernal (Y Tu Mama Tambien, Motorcycle Diaries) plays a young artist/inventor whose sensitivity, creativity, and sensual lips, aren’t enough to win the heart of his neighbor Charlotte Gainsbourg–primarily because he mishandles every major turning point in their emerging relationship. The storyline has the kind of low stakes and personal tone that one expects from microemotional directors migrating through film festivals with Super-16mm films made starring their ex-girlfriends, or former crushes (Bujalaski, anyone?). But Gondry directs music videos, and his visual efflorescence temporarily camouflages the film’s small scale. Unexpectedly, this is where the film may disappoint; the conceit that Bernal can’t distinguish reality from dreams seems false next to the embarassing honesty of the central story, and the visuals are only occasionally striking, and often retreads of stuff he’s done better in the past. But Gondry has some astute observations that took me offguard: primarily, how unattractive we can be when in love. The behavior is mostly believable, though I like to think this is the kind of shit most of us figure out by the time we’re out of college. God, I hope so, anyways. You only act this way once, but Gondry has finally recorded it with his camera, and made it a little harder to forget.
Employee of the Month
All I can say about this Dane Cook workplace comedy is we watched Clerks 2 as a palate cleanser–suddenly Kevin Smith seemed relevant and witty.
Farce of the Penguins
March of the Penguins spoof, with Bob Saget making funny. One of our oldest customers came in while this was on the televsion: “This is the worst thing I’ve ever seen you guys watching.”
Flags of Our Fathers
Clint Eastwood’s Iwo Jima, Part 1, is a cynical examination of hero worship, spending as much time with the after-effects of the flag-raising as with the actual battle.
Flyboys
Director Tony Bill (My Bodyguard) and producer Dean Devlin (Godzilla) come together to bring us a CGI-filled war and glory film about WWI pilots starring James Franco and Jean Reno.
Gridiron Gang
Based on a inspiring true story about teenagers at a juvenile detention center who gain self-esteem by playing football together. Starring the Rock.
The Grudge 2
Takashi Shimizu has now made this movie six times. This is sad, because he’d gotten it right the first time. By now, though, meowing cell phones and creaking monocromatic little-boy ghosts just don’t pack the same punch.
The Guardian
Kevin Costner is Louis Gossett Jr. and Ashton Kutcher is Richard Gere in this Coast Guard redux of An Officer and a Gentleman. This film is also a prequel to Costner’s Waterworld, as evinced by the ending.
Hollywoodland
Surprisingly clear-eyed examination of the mysterious circumstances surrounding the death of George Reeves, TV’s Superman. Ben Affleck as Reeves delivers his best performance to date. Professionally directed by Allen Coulter, who made his name helming a seasons worth of Sopranos episodes. It’s better than the Black Dahlia, the other 2006 L.A., period noir. Plus, it’s got tons of hot chicks in 50’s fashion.
The Marine (UNRATED!)
The first film solely developed by the WWE is an attempt to make an action star out of John Cena, self-proclaimed “Doctor of Thuganomics”, which I guess he picked up at the School of Hard Knocks. Opens with him inflitrating an Al-Qaeda compound in Iraq. And he looks like a steroidical Mark Wahlberg.
Open Season (animated)
In this amiable, expensive cgi animation, a ragtag group of forrest animals sneak into suburbia, and learn some lessons about friendship and family. Oh, hold, it, I think that’s Over The Hedge. In this one,…ah, whatever.
Running With Scissors
Shot in Dysfunctionoramascope!
Saw III
All of your favorite elements are back: Piss-colored lighting! Sharp, oily metal! Dripping black pipes! Torture! And, most importantly, Jigsaw, the supercilious psycho with the philosophical depths of a Korn lyric. Without spoiling the thrilling ending, I’ll tell you that it involves….ten plus minutes of exposition! The horror!
Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning
The “beginning” is hopefully the end–but horror franchises, like their mass murdering heroes, never really die. Oh, and this is the prequel to the remake, not the original, which was also different than Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation. And, in yet another dimension, the Texas Chainsaw clan use their powers for good by battling crime and protecting wayfarers.
REGION-CODED IMPORTS:
Louis Malle Box Set:
-Black Moon
After the controversy surrounding Lacombe Lucien, a serious film about a French collaborator in WWII, Malle decided to make a film impossible to take seriously, and succeeded. This uncharacteristic foray into fantasy and dream logic by the usually down-to-earth Malle is one of those lysergic Alice in Wonderland movies that proliferated in the 70’s (Polanski’s What?, Lemora). Beautifully shot by Sven Nykvist, a blonde hottie (Rex Harrison’s grand daughter, Cathryn) wanders around a world with a literal war between the sexes, talking animals, unicorns, and Joe D’Allesandro.
-Fire Within
Malle’s most Bresson-influenced film is about a writer contemplating suicide. Featuring Malle’s muse of the time, Jeanne Moreau. Writer Jean Genet celebrated the film, saying, “Malle has effected something phenomenal, having turned literature into film, photographed the meaning of an unsubstantial, touching and rather famous book, and given its tragic intention a clarity it never achieved in print.â€
-The Lovers
Along with Elevator to the Gallows, this film is credited with making a star of Jeanne Moreau.
>-May Fools
Made in 1990, this is one of Malle’s last films. Set during the May ‘68 student riots, you never actually see them, because the movie is a gentle farce about a family that happens to be out of town at the family’s country home for a funeral. Co-written with Bunuel collaborator Jean-Claude Carriere.
-Zazie Dans Le Metro
Made in 1959, Louis Malle’s most “New Wave” film features more film trickery than a gaggle of commercials, prefiguring the zany comedy of Richard Lester. The slender clothesline to hang the various episodes is a day in Paris from the point of view of a 12 year old girl left in the care of her transvestite uncle.
Fried Dragon Fish
An early film by Shunji Iwai (All About Lily Chou-Chou) involving a computer-operator-turned-detective, whose hunt for a stolen fish leads her to a guild of trained assassins, as well as obiquitous heartthrob Tadanobu Asano.
Two Hilarious BBC Spoof Shows
-Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace
A note-perfect contemporary parody of low-budget 80’s horror television, complete with cheesy production values, stilted acting, and bargain basement special effects. The series-within-a-series is set at a haunted hospital, with a new monster every week, and its framing sequences are modern-day “reminiscences” by the cast and creators.
-Look Around You 2
Another brilliant recreation, this one of 70’s children’s science programs, with absurd weekly scientific explanations of subjects like health (including a facelift by the surgical computer Medibot), music (with a contest judged by the ghost of Tchaikovsky), and sports (with the introduction of gonnis, the sport between golf and tennis).
The Goddess of 1967
From Chinese art director Clara Law (Reincarnation of the Golden Lotus, Temptation of a Monk) comes this tale of a Japanese man who travels to Australia to buy a Citroen DS, a car that was nicknamed “Deessee”, or “Goddess” (hence the title). Once there, circumstances force him to hook up with a 17-year old girl and the two set off across the continent. A road picture with gorgeous cinematography that brings out both the beauty and terror of the Outback.
Memories of Matsuko
This tragic novel, tracing the sorrow-filled life of a Japanese woman, is warped by director Testsuya Nakashima (Kamikaze Girls) into a candy-colored comedy with songs, while still somehow retaining its emotional effect.
Torchwood Season One, Part One
Incredibly disappointing spin-off of the recent series of Doctor Who, with square-jawed bisexual American pilot Captain Jack Harkness taking center stage. He’s the head of an incredibly inept special branch of the government, whose purported mission is to protect the world from aliens and supernatural menaces. The biggest problem is that he and his team are complete buffoons, making every possible mistake in handling crises, and often exacerbating them to the point of ridiculous civilian casualties. And, let me stress this, it’s NOT A COMEDY!!! These are our heroes, and while I can respect the creators for attempting to inject some human failings into their characters, there is a big gap between flawed and completely worthless. Torchwood manages to erase that line.
Two Films by Shane Meadows
Shane Meadows is a regional director from the industrial Midlands of England who favors naturistic acting, sometimes by non-professionals, and hand-held but artful camera work.
-Twentyfourseven
Bob Hoskins plays a coach who galvanizes the young men in a working-class own, pulling them away from gangs and into the world of boxing.
-A Room for Romeo Brass
The story of two twelve-year old boys and the charismatic older man who has his eye on one boy’s sister.
Letter From an Unknown Woman
Max Ophul’s classic.
“INDIE”:
The Puffy Chair
Back to Andrew Bujalski.
Like in Bujalski’s festival hits Funny Ha-Ha and Mutual Appreciation, the Duplass brothers have fashioned a understated, tragicomic film about the foibles of 20-something relationships using amateur actors, handheld camerawork, and a budget that could be raised from friends and family. The Duplass brothers are more willing to use classic dramatic structure and comedy artifice, with scenes that, beneath rippling shaky surface, are basically well-constructed farce. Bujalski will probably please the connoisseurs more, but The Puffy Chair is that half-step closer to the mainstream that predicts better commercial success. On a smaller scale, its the same phenomena that explains how a band like Nirvana could take the more challenging, but less accessible, music from cult bands like Sonic Youth, and sugar the pill just enough to make it real pop.
There does seem to be an emerging aesthetic of realism here. Since whats “real” is subjective, it doesn’t “really” exist as anything more than a group of conventions that express certain points of view. John Cassavetes’ reality looks awfully different than Eric Rohmer’s; the camera moves around a lot more, and people really freak out. It’s interesting to see how infectious these conventions can be; watching movies in the years after Husbands , like The Last Movie or anything by Norman Mailer, you often see actors doing there best to have the kind of honest raw emotionality of a Cassavetes film, and lots of repetitive, stultifying dialogue. What The Puffy Chair, Bujalski, and even Curb Your Enthusiasm have most in common, is an agreement of acting style. I found myself wondering how much of this was due to the influence of reality television. It’s like a whole generation learned how to act natural watching The Real World.
Wholphin #3
McSweeney’s publishers Dave Eggers and Brent Hoff named their DVD quarterly “wholphin” after a genuine, but rare, hybrid of dolphin and killer whale to emphasize the singularity of their visual magazine. What’s really unusual is a DVD magazine that’s actually good. Issue three keeps up the high quality with amazing selections by well-knowns like Dennis Hopper and Alexander Payne, festival favorites like the Zellner Brothers, and talented unknowns who are probably soon to be known. Also, the second half of Adam Curtis’ Power of Nightmares! Read the rest of this entry »
