Category: Movies

I know you really want to be a Hollywood star. I’m sure it pays a lot better than being a Spanish movie star, and I can’t blame you for wanting the biggest and best career.

But Hollywood movies are almost always in English. And unfortunately, that’s not your best language. Don’t get me wrong, you speak perfectly good English – you just don’t act as well in it.

When you stick to Spanish, you’re radiant and charismatic, and can anchor an entire film. But when you switch to English, you’re just pretty, incidental scenery. As you get older, Hollywood will be looking for prettier, younger actresses to fill that role.

Hollywood fame is fleeting and unpredictable. Your time as the Next Big Thing might already be over. Make more films in Spanish and you can be a great actress and a star whose light shines much, much longer.

Please give it some thought. You know I’m only looking out for your best interests.

(ps – You might want to mention this to Zhang Ziyi if you happen to run into her)

When Superman Returns gets it right, it really gets it right.

Perhaps it’s my childhood fondness for the original films (I even liked Superman III), but as soon as the original theme music starts playing, I get all tingly. On can argue that Bryan Singer held Richard Donner’s original films in too high esteem, but you can’t blame him for being inspired by movies that really understood the heroism, romance, villainy, and comedy that makes the character so compelling. There are those who will tell you that Superman is too powerful and too perfect, but they’re wrong: Superman’s heroism and purity make him a great protagonist, as long as they’re balanced out by Clark Kent’s status as an outsider and perpetual second choice to the love of his life.

So Singer gets the core of Superman: Accordingly, Superman Returns gives us a man who wants to do good, and who will be haunted by the fact he’ll never be able to save everyone; a guy who is loved by everyone, but always feels like he’s on the outside looking in. Brandon Routh pulls off the double role well: His Clark Kent is awkward, but not an outright nerd. His Superman has the requisite swagger of a man who can do almost anything. He’s still the good guy, but he knows he can be pretty awesome. His flirtation with Lois (“Richard takes me flying sometimes”; “Not like this.”) and the confrontation with the robber with the Big Bad Gun show off his acceptable levels of cockiness.

Kevin Spacey’s Lex Luthor drew some criticism, but I can’t complain: He’s having fun. He’s a bit over the top at times, but he’s playing Lex Luthor, y’know? There’s a bit of Gene Hackman’s smarmy bastard in there, but slightly rabid. Spacey’s Luthor is a guy who was doing pretty well for himself at being underhanded and illicit until Superman came along, so it’s understandable he may have gone somewhat insane. Also, he gets Parker Posey as a sidekick; who can complain about that?

Unfortunately, things start to get dicey with the decision to cast Kate Bosworth as Lois Lane. To star with the obvious, she’s just too young: Bosworth doesn’t look like she could have been a star reporter five years ago, let alone now. More importantly, she doesn’t act like it: Most of the time, Bosworth seems like someone who’s trying to look tough, not someone who is tough. She spends entirely too much time moping and mooning to be Lois Lane. While Margot Kidder didn’t take crap from anyone and did pretty much whatever she wanted, Bosworth seems to be playing the role of a teenager whose parents won’t let her have any fun.

And then there’s the kid. I don’t dislike Jason as much as many people seemed to – for a child actor, he’s perfectly decent, and the idea of the character is interesting enough – but it feels like an unneeded addition to the already weighty film. The character of Richard, played ably by James Marsden, provides more than enough romantic and emotional tension: Singer avoided the obvious choice of having Lois hook up with a jerk that clearly didn’t deserve her. While Singer may have made Richard a bit too perfect (and a little bland), it’s a sensible decision compared to what he’s up against: No matter how perfect Richard is, he’s never going to measure up to Superman. But unlike Superman, we know he’s not the sort of guy who’s going to disappear for five years.

Jason doesn’t really hurt the film, but he doesn’t add anything to it, either, and when a film breaks the two-hour mark, elements that aren’t necessary should be cut. Singer clearly liked the father-son idea, as evidenced by the opening monologue by Marlon Brando, but that’s explored enough by the fairly heavy Christ imagery. Superman Returns is a fine film, but begins to strain under the heavy weight Singer imposes in the final half-hour. While the first hour breezes along, and the confrontation with Lex Luthor is suitably tense, the final 45 minutes start to drag. Admittedly, this may be due somewhat to personal bias: When watching the film in the theatre, I really needed to go to the bathroom, but kept thinking “It’s okay, I can wait, it’s probably just another ten minutes.” That doesn’t pose quite the same problem when you’ve got a pause button, but the film could certainly do with some tougher editing.

Bryan Singer gets Superman, and treats the character with the respect he deserves; though he’s not afraid to inject some humour, he stays away from camping things up or lowering the hero in order to make him more accessible. But he probably could have laid off a little: Between the Christ imagery and father-son themes, Singer’s vision can exceed his grasp at times. While some of the blame has to go to Bosworth’s lacklustre Lois, Singer’s tried to do too much, too fast with a franchise that’s spent too much time out of the public eye.

Still, Singer has successfully resurrected Superman for the big screen, and he’s brought a lot of the magic and awe back to the franchise. Ambition and failure is always a more appealing mix than a successful mediocrity, so Superman Returns is appealing enough in that sense. A bit more editing and a stronger Lois Lane (whether Bosworth or someone else) and Singer, like Donner before him, could really hit it out with his second kick at the can.

There are many good movies out now.

Volver has gotten some phenomenal reviews. The Fountain has got some great reviews and some absolutely atrocious ones, but it looks fascinating either way; it promises to be a spectacular and compelling failure, at the very least. And of course there’s Casino Royal, which allows me to see a James Bond film for the first time in a decade. (I have an intense allergic reaction to Pierce Brosnan.)

But you know what I’m going to see this weekend?

Happy Feet.

Why? Because I am an awesome and understanding boyfriend.

I’m sure Happy Feet is okay. It’s got some decent reviews. And it’s showing in IMAX, so that’s pretty cool. But it’s not, you know, a complex and experimental sci-fi philosophy film. It doesn’t have Penelope Cruz or stuff blowing up.

See how awesome I am? If you’re dating me, anyway. If you’re not, then yeah, I suppose I kind of suck, because I’m going to watch a movie about penguins when there’s much cooler stuff to be seen.

My sense of self-worth is fluctuating wildly right now.

I’ve been alternately busy and lazy this week, so I haven’t put together a lot of useful content. But since they’re easy and kill time… a Top Five list!

Samurai movies are great. There’s a lot of crap out there, of course, but the good stuff is really good. Inspired by American westerns, and in turn inspiring more American westerns as well as George Lucas, they’re full of action, drama, suspense, and some fantastic actors. For the record, I’m restricting the list the the “chambara” genre, which emphasized swordplay and action; films like Ran, Rashomon, and Throne of Blood don’t quite count as “samurai movies” in my book, even though they have samurai in them. Watch them anyway.

1. The Seven Samurai: This one is obvious, and yes, it really is as good as everyone says. A group of peasants hire a band of down-on-their-luck samurai to protect their village from bandits. I could write several long posts on the film – and perhaps I shall eventually – but I’m not sure I could sell it any better. It’s got action, drama, comedy, and some tremendous performances by a great ensemble cast. Criterion recently reissued it in an amazing DVD set, so try to buy/rent that if you can. Seven Samurai also inspired The Magnificent Seven, if that helps to convince you.
2. Samurai Rebellion: Masaki Kobayashi’s historical drama just qualifies for the list – it may be 90% drama, but the 10% action puts it over the top. Like the director’s Harakiri, it explores the ideas of honour and obedience to a lord. Toshiro Mifune plays an older samurai on the verge of retiring whose greatest concern is finding a wife for his son. All is good until the local lord orders his son to marry the lord’s former mistress, who has worn out her welcome. The girl is reluctantly taken in, and eventually wins the hearts of the family. But their happy life is broken up yet again when the lord changes his mind. Samurai Rebellion – originally released in Japan as Receive the Wife – is a slow-burning drama that gradually amps up the tension until it reaches a fierce and furious finale. The final confrontation between Mifune and an opponent will stick in your mind, as well as produce thoughts along the lines of “Hey, George Lucas really liked Samurai movies.”
3. Goyokin: Probably the hardest on the list to find, though Amazon does have it available on DVD. Tatsuya Nakadai plays a master swordsman who undertook a self-imposed exile after watching his brother-in-law massacre a village in order to cover up a theft of the Shogun’s gold. When he hears rumours of a second attempt, he vows not to let another crime be commited. From the creepy opening shots of an abandoned village to the tense standoff at the finale, Goyokin is a lesser-known film that deserves to be a classic. It also deserves some credit for having a strong female role in the part of con-artist Ruriko Asaoka. It’s also in colour, in case you’re reluctant to dive into black & white.
4. Sanjuro: This, along with Yojimbo, is probably the closest to a pure action movie Akira Kurosawa made. Toshiro Mifune glowers and menaces while reprising his ronin from Yojimbo, swaggering into a town in the midst of rebellion and tumult. A group of young and well-intentioned samurai are concerned about corruption, but the gruff and cynical Mifune shows them who the real villain is and how to stop him. It’s fairly light and fluffy by Kurosawa’s standards, but still entertaining. Criterion is also doing reissues of Sanjuro and Yojimbo that look quite nice.
5. Kill!: Loosely adapted from the same source material as Sanjuro, this is something of a parody of Samurai film conventions. It’s no Spaceballs, even if you are familiar with the genre, but it’s nonetheless a lighter, funnier film. The corrupt village of Sanjuro receives two newcomers in this film: A down-on-his-luck ronin who just wants to gamble and relax, and an enthusiastic farmer who craves the dramatic and exciting life of the samurai. Tatsuya Nakadai deapans his way through most of the movie, toning down his fierce performances in Goyokin and Sword of Doom to an easy-going guy who just ended up in the wrong place at the wrong time. It’s a lighter side of the genre to dabble in, though probably more fun if you’ve sampled a few of the more serious films first.

Will Ferrell is a boring guy.

Yes, he can be funny. But just look at him – he doesn’t look like a funny guy. He doesn’t look wacky, or even particularly amusing. He has a sort of Bill Murray quality – we know he’s funny because we’ve seen him do funny stuff, but otherwise one might assume him to be a regular, boring guy.

Accordingly, casting him as an IRS auditor who leads a mundane existence, even for an IRS auditor (his fianceé left him for an actuary), seems like a perfectly sensible idea. I’ve always found Ferrell to be at his funniest when dealing in low-key humour – his George W. impersonation is far superior to that horrible cheerleader or the Roxbury clubber – again, not unlike Bill Murray, particularly when directed by someone like Wes Anderson.

Stranger Than Fiction is effectively two movies, or one movie that was rewritten dramatically after the writer realized the original story wasn’t that interesting. Ferrell plays IRS auditor Harold Crick, whose life is uneventful until he meets a beautiful baker with a social conscience played by Maggie Gyllenhall. He falls in love with her carefree ways and sweet baked goods, and changes his life for the better so he can be with her.

This, obviously, is the part that wasn’t all that interesting. Ferrell is fun, and Gyllenhall is charming and adorable, but that alone makes for a fun if generic feel-good romantic comedy. No, the enticing part of Stranger than Fiction is that at about the same time he falls in love, Harold also begins to hear someone narrating his life. That narration comes courtesy of Emma Thompson, playing a chain-smoking, stressed-out novelist who hasn’t published a book in ten years and is in turn stressing out her publisher, who wants her new book sooner rather than later.

The narration is disconcerting enough as it describes Harold brushing his teeth, but it becomes another matter entirely when it mentions his imminent death. Harold realizes he must find out what’s going on with his life before it’s over.

The key to Stranger Than Fiction is Harold’s reformation from a dull and predictable nobody to a guy who lives life to the fullest, whether it’s putting the moves on a pretty baker or learning how to play the guitar. The delightful Gyllenhall is a big part, but even bigger is the unwanted narration: One’s life seems so much more meaningless when there’s a nearly omniscient narrator telling you all about it.

The film hinges on Ferrell’s portrayal of a man changing his entire life, and for the most part it succeeds. He’s by no means a great dramatic actor, but the role of “boring guy who’s confused by stuff” plays to his strength; like Adam Sandler in Punchdrunk Love, Ferrell’s natural strengths are channelled to create an effecitve character. He doesn’t quite come through in the serious moments, but everything up to that point is done so well that one doesn’t really mind.

It certainly doesn’t help that Ferrell is surrounded by some very good actors: Gyllenhall is very good, even if she’s playing the stereotypical “free spirit” that seduces the buckled-down working guy. Dustin Hoffman clearly has some fun playing an English professor (and occasional lifeguard) Harold enlists to help figure out what’s going on. His calm and bemusement in the face of Harold’s crisis (“Aren’t you glad to know you’re not a golem?”) is entertaining, and he can still bring the dramatic chops when his ultimate role in the film is revealed.

The real star of the film, in admittedly much less screen time than Ferrell, is Thompson, who’s both wacky and genuinely distraught as the blocked writer. She’s already stressed out over not being able to write, concocting suicide fantasies as a way of deciding how to kill off poor Harold. (“If you haven’t thought about throwing yourself off a building, how to do you expect to help me write a novel?” she asks her publisher-assigned helper, portrayed by Queen Latifah but really only there for expository purposes) Thompson is all nerves and eccentricity, but never treading entirely into caricature.

Stranger Than Fiction owes a great debt to the films of Charlie Kaufman. Even if screenwriter Zach Helm wasn’t directly inspired by Adaptation or Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, this film probably wouldn’t have gotten made 10 years ago. Thankfully, it’s more like Kaufman’s later films than his earlier, and it maintains a strong emotional core despite its lofty and intellectual concepts. The film lives and breathes with Ferrel’s reformation and Thompson’s career and life-altering decisions, and Helm never gets so caught up in admiring his intellect that he forgets to make the audience care about the characters.

Prior to the film, we saw a trailer for The Pursuit of Happyness, an upcoming film that casts Will Smith as a single, down-on-his-luck father trying to turn his life around. Trailers can always be deceiving, but this one was so desperately trying to sell “Feel Good Story!” that you could practically see subtitles asking us to love the character and assuring us it would all turn out well. It offered a seemingly obvious plot, rags-to-riches, and an almost rock-solid guarantee of a happy ending. People obviously want their happy endings, but this just seemed too much.

On the other hand, Stranger Than Fiction actually does offer an inspiring story of a man who sets out to change his life, yet without promising the audience a happy ending. Emma Thompson tells us Harold is going to die, and its only in the closing minutes of the film that we find out whether her narration is going to come true or not. Harold Crick is a sympathetic and fairly believable character, and we want him get the girl and live happily ever after. But Stranger Than Fiction succeeds because his future is never assured, either romantically or at all.

Speaking of trailers, the ads undersell Stranger Than Fiction quite a bit, playing it up as more of a Will Ferrell comedy. While it is funny, it’s also quite intelligent, emotional, and dramatic. It’s not the sort of film one can adequately sum up in a 30-second trailer, nor is it entirely Ferrell’s film: He owes a lot to Helm’s script, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see Thompson pick up an Oscar nomination for her role. It’s a very good film that happens to be funny and make good use of a big star, but it has quite a bit to offer to just about anyone.

Eek The Cat should be available on DVD.

Someone make this happen. (Or at least point out that it is available but I’m just not aware of it.)

Last year, I saw S.P.L. at the Toronto Film Festival. It was a tremendously enjoyable film, melding cop drama with some phemonenal martial arts sequences. It’s at least several levels above most films in either genre, given its moral ambiguity, tight script, and stylish direction, as well as two major fights at the finale that are absolutely pheneomenal.

I’ve been waiting for it to show up on DVD since then, and was surprised when I found out about this the other day:

Yes, that’s the North American DVD release of S.P.L.. And as much as I’m excited to see the film available on this continent, I’m fairly traumatized at the marketing approach the distributors took.

First: Kill Zone? Okay, I understand that the original title (which is based on the Chinese zodiac signs of the three main character) may lack some dynamism for North American audiences. It’s possible you could come up with something more descriptive and exciting. But Kill Zone? That sounds like a fucking Steven Seagal movie. It’s horribly generic and bland, and really says nothing about the movie.

But at least there’s some synergy going on here, because that cover is just as bland and lifeless. For one thing, I have no idea what the hell Donnie Yen is supposed to be doing; everyone else is standing around trying to look cool, but Yen looks like he’s having some sort of seizure. The guys at the bottom look halfway cool – couldn’t that have been the main cover, with Sammo overshadowing everyone or something?

On the up side, from what I’ve heard there have been no structual cuts or changes made to the film, so what’s inside is still the film I saw a year ago. But both the title and cover undersell the film tremendously, and if I weren’t already familiar with it, there’s no way I’d pick the DVD off a shelf, let alone rent or buy it.

It’s a much, much better film than it looks like. Don’t pass it by just because it looks like every other generic martial arts film out there.

Lars Von Trier doesn’t hate America. Well, perhaps he does – I certainly don’t know the man – but if so, it’s not obvious from his films.

If anything, the maker of Dancer in the Dark and Dogville is simply misanthropic, not holding a lot of hope for humanity in general, whether American, Japanese, or Danish. It’s true that several of his films have focused on the United States, but there are perfectly good artistic reasons for that.

America is a land of contradictions. It is revered, both by its citizens and by foreigners, as the land of opportunity, a beacon of freedom and democracy. Yet it is still plagued by most of the same problems as the rest of the world: There’s plenty of poverty, racism, and inequality; there was slavery even as the founding fathers declared that all men were created equal. What sets America apart, at least from my view as a close-but-not-too-close Canadian, is the willfull blindness and devout patriotism that seems to arise against any criticisms, legitimate or not. “My Country right or wrong” often morphs into “Love it or leave it” and “You’re either with us or against it.”

It’s this contradiction Von Trier finds fascinating, as he showed in Dogville: Smalltown folk who look friendly and welcoming, but are ultimately as mean and selfish as any gangster. People who want to feel as though they’re doing the right thing but can’t quite stop looking out for themselves. With its stark minimalism, Dogville was an incredible, if rather unpleasant, look at transparent motivations and small-town life.

Manderlay is the thematic, and largely literal, sequel to that film. Grace, now played by Bryce Dallas Howard, finds herself on a plantation where slavery was never abolished: The blacks toil in the fields and live in shacks while the white owners live in relative luxury. She finds this appalling, naturally, and manages to upset the status quo: Soon the blacks own the plantation, while the whites find themselves indentured servants until the next harvest.

That act wasn’t good deed enough for Grace, who stays to help everyone adapt to their new lives. Having been under another man’s thumb for all their lives, the blacks don’t quite know what to do with their freedom, so Grace sets about teaching them the ways of business and democracy, and perhaps even civilization.

The central metaphor, then, is set, and it’s not entirely about America. Grace could very well be any Western nation, caught up in the ideal of rescuing and civilizing a people who may or may not be ready for it, or even want it. Grace quickly changes from an equal to an authoritative schoolmistress in Manderlay, as she realizes the people she’s freed aren’t as ready for freedom as she’d thought. At the same time, she sees it her duty to show the whites what it’s like to be degraded and treated as property. Grace may be shocked and appalled by the slaves of Manderlay, but ultimately her attitudes towards them might not be terribly different from those that owned the slaves.

It’s not at all subtle, but that’s not Von Trier’s aim. He’s clearly of the thought that many people won’t pay much attention unless you slap them in the face, so Manderlay is, at times, just as uncomfortable and disturbing as Dogville. It’s about race, and people’s perceptions of it, and all the superiority and alienation that comes with it.

The decision to make Manderlay a more-or-less sequel to Dogville is an interesting one, though not without its drawbacks: One cannot help but feel that anyone would be a downgrade from Nicole Kidman’s portrayal of Grace, and Howard, though earnest, is expectedly not quite up to snuff. Howard is perfectly capable, and her youth and enthusiasm suit Grace’s new role quite well, but it’s simple one of those unfortunate comparisons. Even if Von Trier wanted to maintain certain elements from Dogville, he could have focused Manderlay around Grace’s sister, or some other friend or relation.

Von Trier continues Dogville‘s set conceit of shooting on a sound stage, with buildings marked in outline on the ground and only a few props and accessories actually present. It doesn’t seem quite as striking here, in part because we’re now familiar with it, but also because it doesn’t really tie in to the film’s central metaphor. Dogville was about a small town where everyone knew everyone and no one had secrets; the idea of a set without walls displayed the truthful hypociscy quite effective. But here, it just seems like and idea Von Trier liked and wanted to use again. It’s still a creative approach, and forces the actors to really work for their supper, but one wonders if it won’t grow old by the time Von Trier makes the final film in his American trilogy.

Manderlay both shines and suffers in the shadow of Dogville: The first film prepared us for Von Trier’s vision, and introduced themes that are quite resonant in the second; many of the points, as well as the contrast of Grace’s reactions to the two situations, are built upon nicely. But at the same time, it doesn’t feel quite as fresh, and having to replace a leading lady like Nicole Kidman is no easy task. It is still a very good film, if a challenging and uncomfortable one, and displays Von Trier’s top-drawer filmmaking and insightful, if morbid, grasp of the darker elements of human nature. Those who enjoy Von Trier’s films (as much as one can enjoy such daunting pessimism) will find much to like, but those who dislike him will find little that is new, and those who are unfamiliar would be best served to start elsewhere.

The Producers

That The Producers is very funny isn’t really up for debate: It is. At least, as long as you find Mel Brooks and faux-Broadway funny, which I do. So there.

Matthew Broderick and Nathan Lane are both impeccable in reprising their Broadway roles as an innocent accountant and a down-on-his-luck producer. Gary Beach steals all his scenes as the very talented and very gay director. Uma Thurman is blonde, leggy, and Swedish, which is really all you could possibly want from an entire film, let alone one role. Even Will Ferrell is funny, though he seems to fit neither the Broadway production nor the Mel Brooks script.

The Producers is clearly a great Broadway production. Sadly, it doesn’t hold up quite so well as a film. Director Susan Stronam’s background seems to be almost solely in theatre, so perhaps it’s not surprising that the film often feels like they just took a few cameras to the theatre and set up in the aisles. Not that it’s bad, but most of the shots and editing are pedestrian and run-of-the-mill; there’s not a whole lot of energy or creativity to the film that didn’t come with the actors and dancers.

On top of that, it’s just too long. 130 minutes is perfectly fine for a theatreical musical, but it’s much too long for a film comedy. One suspects Stronam was too in love with the material to make later cuts in editing, but it needed to be done: Several numbers go on too long, and the film as a whole ends up too massive to be lightweight musical comedy.

A less ponderous running time and some more creative staging might have made The Producers as big a hit on the screen as it was on stage; unfortunately, the film seems to have been made by and for people who loved the Broadway version so much that they wanted an exact copy on DVD. Maybe they should have let Mel Brooks direct, and left Stronam to the choreography and staging she knows so well.

Syriana

One cannot accuse Syriana of not being ambitious. In just over two hours (less than the running time of The Producers!) it attempts to explore the politics, economics, and religion that make the Middle East so volatile. It tries very hard to make sense of several different stories, but seems to have bitten off more than it can chew.

George Clooney is a CIA operative who carries out some dirty business in the Middle East. Matt Damon is an economic adviser who ends up working for an Arab prince who eschews American influence and sells a valuable contract to the Chinese. The American bidder ends up merging with another U.S. company, who lays off some of their workers at a Kazakhstan refinery. One of the workers is a boy who finds comfort in a religious camp.

It’s a lot to take in, and occasionally difficult to process. It comes together fairly well in the final half hour or so, but until then there are plenty of confusing and obscure scenes, and characters who come and go with little introduction or explanation. The plots intertwine and weave, but not quite enough to infuse the story with any real momentum. There are a few nice attempts at character building, and George Clooney turns in some excellent work, but the film’s need to address all the characters and stories means that few actors are on screen for even half an hour.

Perhaps there’s a forthcoming director’s cut that will make sense of it all, but the current version tries to do too much with too little. The Clooney and Damon plots tie together nicely, but the corporate merger storyline is complex, dull, and confusing. The religious camp aspect is similarly undeveloped, with nothing tying it to the main narrative except its opening and closing moments.

Syriana could benefit from a serious trimming of the less compelling storylines, or it could use another hour to flesh everything else. I suspect there’s a very good film in there somewhere, and perhaps even a great one, but it needs to take another dip in the editing suite first.