Rural's Week of the Dead (Part Deux)

So ... I got sick again, and I decided to take in some more zombie-lore. Here it goes.

There's spoilers. Duh.

Survival of the Dead (2010): So ... Oh, George Romero. You have really gone off the deep end. I mean, OK ... the first thing we have to talk about is the fact that there are two Irish farming families living on an island off the coast of Delaware.

Why did they have to be Irish? I mean, it's not like those actors were REALLY Irish, right? Pretty sure this was 100% Canada.

I understand it's a sort of sequel to his 2007 film Diary of the Dead, but I am kind of over the Blair Witch rip off schtick (unless it's done well like in Paranormal Activity) so I can't say I saw it. I'm a little bit confused about why Romero's later films seem to be, like, approaching zombies from a humanitarian point of view. OK ... They can be trained to eat horses. Great ... I'd bet they'll still eat humans, too.

Anyway, this really wasn't that bad, Irish accents aside. I wouldn't call it a return to form at all, but it was certainly a lot better than Land of the Dead, which I didn't particularly like in the first 'Week of the Dead' post. Romero has always been a low budget director, and you can definitely tell when comparing the fun of this movie to Land of the Dead.

HOWEVER ... CGI can be great, but if it's cheap CGI don't bother. The CGI here is horrific.

Oh, Tom Savini. Come back to us!

We're Alive: Well, I wasn't able to take in any more zombie films, but I have started listening to
this great little podcast/radio drama that follows a group of survivors who've fortified themselves in an abandoned skyscraper in Los Angeles after zombies begin to walk the earth.

It's a really good listen and a really good story. Check it out if you so desire.

Rural's (Not Entirely) FABULOUS Night

Now, before you start reading this, you should know that this isn't nor is it intended to be an exploration of the greatest GLBT films out there. This is really just me searching through Netflix and watching any gay themed film that can stream and doesn't look like a home video I made with my cousins when I was 11.

I should just say right off the bat that this was a strange project for me, unexplainable except for a strange mood combined with a fit of insomnia. I usually (for better or worse) don't bother with a lot of queer cinema. A lot of it is mopey, cliched, silly, and gratuitous, and there's only so many times you can watch a scene of a gay teen coming out to parents or clashing over religion before the movies just blend together. Nevertheless, here we go.

Were the World Mine (2008): Date rape. I'm pretty sure that's what this movie about. I know it's pitched as a sort of magical realism infused fable about high school, but I dunno. The main character mixes up an elixir and uses it to essentially have his way with the school jock. That's sweet . . . I guess. Honestly, this movie doesn't make a lick of sense, and even within the bizarre universe of this movie there are plot holes and unexplained questions that boggle the mind. Does the elixir make everyone gay or just make them fall in love with the first person they see? I really couldn't tell you. This, I think, is a CONCEPT that got out of control, burying the story under piles of glitter and sub par, Julie Taymor-lite musical interludes. That's a shame, really, because lost among all the frenzy is a pretty decent story, anchored by a solid performance by Judy McLane as the main character's single mother. The relationship between her and her son is rather honest and sweet. She's conflicted about his sexuality, sure, but her love is ferocious. It's not gone into much, but it's implied that she's in the process of getting her life back on track, getting a job as a saleswoman for a Mary Kay-like company. How she landed what is described as a pretty sweet gig isn't really explained, but that's pretty far down on the totem pole of this film's impenetrable enigmas. Zelda Williams (daughter of Robin) might be the most polished of the cast even if she's essentially playing Janis Ian.

Dorian Blues (2004): Well, this was a nice surprise. I understand that the writer/director is straight, and he doesn't approach this so much as a coming out story but more as a growing up story. Not coincidentally, this is the best of the three movies I viewed last night by a fairly large margin. Michael McMillian, who you may or may not know as the fire and brimstone reverend on "True Blood," stars as an awkward teenager coming to terms not so much with his sexuality (though there's plenty of that) but with his life in general. His father is domineering and angry, his mother is barely present, and his younger brother is the star of the family. This is a movie full of the melancholy of its lead character, but it makes room for plenty of humor alongside the pathos (for example, when Dorian's plan to have sex with a prostitute/stripper to turn him straight turns into a swing dance lesson). This is a movie that doesn't take itself too seriously, but, unlike the next movie, doesn't undermine its efforts at making a point with too much whiz bang posturing. McMillian certainly isn't the twinky stereotype usually found in these kinds of films, and casting him was a wise move that enables the film to feel more at home in the real world, the world where people look like everyone else. He has a great flair for dry comedy and dramatic introsection that serve the character well. It's certainly not a perfect movie, but it's always nice to be genuinely surprised by just how much a film can deliver above expectations.

Prom Queen: The Marc Hall Story (2004): Well . . . this was definitely made in Canada. Aaron Ashmore (who I honestly just assumed was Shawn Ashmore working on a very busy schedule until now) gives what I thought was a very good performance as Marc Hall, a Canadian teenager who sued his high school when they wouldn't allow his 21-year old boyfriend to come with him to prom. With blue hair and slightly eccentric clothing, Ashmore does a good job of *ahem* playing gay without turning it into a queeny stereotype, if you know what I mean. This isn't true of all gay men, but some do carry themselves a little bit differently. Whereas, say, Heath Ledger is playing it pretty straight in Brokeback Mountain, Ashmore puts a little more zing in his step, and I appreciated that he was able to walk that fine line without ever once falling into caricature. As for the rest of the movie? Eh . . . there's just a lot going on here. I did appreciate that the coming out scene was rather low key and didn't fall into the trap of becoming a cliche. His parents already know, his mother says. After all, his hair is blue and he has a poster of Celine Dion in his bedroom. But, wow . . . there are some strange things going on in this movie. I knew what I was in for when, in the first scene, the film gives us a tongue in cheek Christ metaphor followed by WACKY sound effects. Directors, don't put wacky sound effects in your movie. There was also some bizarre, Canadian version of one of those direct to DVD American Pie sequels going on involving tech geeks, three inexplicable teenage girl characters, and a lot of talk about renting hotel rooms for prom and getting laid, etc . . . I guess I'm glad this movie didn't take itself too seriously, but there's a line and I'm pretty sure you cross it when you have two older women in lawn chairs doing double takes at drag queens. You could find worse ways to spend 90 minutes, and Aaron Ashmore sure is cute, but be prepared to turn off your brain and let the bright colors and loud noises take over.

Cock Tease: The Movie (2009)

Hi. I'm Paul Walker's abs. You might remember me from a movie that delivered on its promises.

It's really very simple, makers of Fast and Furious.

You take Paul Walker, he of the piercing blue eyes and mouth watering body. You add Vin Diesel, he whose imposing largeness and gravely voice makes you want him to like you just so he won't kill you dead. You have fast cars that, ya know, go fast and run into things. I wouldn't have thought it was brain surgery BUT . . .

Here's a side-by-side comparison of what I want from a movie called Fast and Furious and what the makers of THIS movie think I want.

Me: Loud, stupid car chases down a strip of road in Korea-town or something, briefly punctuated by character moments that give all the crashing, speeding sexiness some kind of a point.
Them: Boring, stupid scenes full of characters talking about FBI protocol and being introspective, briefly punctuated by car chases in underground tunnels so that they can put cars on the poster.

Me: Paul Walker naked or half-naked. Frequently.
Them: Paul Walker in baggy T-shirts. Exclusively.

Me: Over-the-top camp. Winking at the audience because, yes, we know this is a movie about car chases and Paul Walker's ability to take his shirt off.
Them: Gooey earnestness. PLEASE TAKE US SERIOUSLY! THIS ISN'T JUST A MOVIE ABOUT THINGS THAT EXPLODE! WE HAVE SOOOO MUCH TO SAY ABOUT THESE CHARACTERS AND THEIR INNER TURMOIL! LET'S GO TALK ABOUT OURSELVES OVER COFFEE AT A FUCKING ROADSIDE DINER!

Me: Sex scenes. Gratuitous swearing. Tank tops, low rise jeans, and booty shorts. Various, R rated hijinks.
Them: Bland, Pg-13 rated cock teasing. No sex. Paul Walker feeling up Jordana Brewster while she's sitting on a kitchen counter in A FUCKING CARDIGAN!

Needless to say, I did not have nearly enough mind numbing fun in this movie, because this movie didn't want me too. This movie wanted me to feel for these characters and their emotions and their self-doubt. For every scene of Vin Diesel driving underneath a flaming oil tanker flipping in the air or blowing up his car with a cigarette lighter, there were endless scenes of Vin Diesel brooding and Paul Walker starring in a play school dress up episode of Law and Order.

Well, I've got news for you. The dialog in this script was written by a group of first year screenwriting students who haven't talked to a real human being in quite some time. I cannot emotionally connect to characters who barely manage to stutter words with two syllables.

I don't really have anything to say about the plot except to wonder when Vin Diesel's character began having psychic visions. Maybe I missed something, but he pegged the guy who he was looking to lay the smack down on because . . . he looked like the shadowy figure he envisioned at the scene of the crime?

I have exactly the same problem with this movie as I did with Quantum of Solace. This movie was too embarrassed to just be what it is: a big, dumb movie full of explosions. Just do that. It's what you're there to do.

So, makers of this movie, when you make a sequel (and they will, if the number of people who came to the showing I went to tonight are any indication) just have fun with it. You don't need to try to win people over. We're there because we know what we're getting. Your movie is called Fast and Furious. Just get Jordana Brewster and Paul Walker naked, put them in a car, and let them drive down a steep road at 120 miles per hour.

Rural's Week of the Dead

I was sick last week and, in between episodes of Degrassi and American Idol, I got the zombie bug and ended up watching a string of zombie films for no real reason other than I started and couldn't stop. All of these were first viewings.

There's spoilers. Duh.

Dawn of the Dead (1978): Is Zack Snyder's remake maybe just a teensy bit more fun to watch? Sure. I watched the extended version so perhaps that played a part, but it seemed like this one took a little long to really get going. But Snyder's version is not nearly as smart. It's refreshing to see a horror movie with a cast of human beings. Like, the people at the center of this movie just feel real, and I liked them for it. I didn't feel like there were any characters I was actively being forced to root against. I felt a little bad for them when they got into trouble. I know Romero gets some grief nowadays for making the ending less nihilistic, but I kind of like the idea that our central characters are flying off in a helicopter headed for god knows where. It adds a little hope, yes, but how much when you really think about it?

Day of the Dead (1985): So, I understand this had collected a bit of a cult following over the years, and I can understand why. This is certainly a much more cerebral film than the first two entries in the series which, unfortunately, makes it a lot less entertaining at times. It's quite dour and claustrophobic which works toward the mind set of the characters, of course. It just makes it a little hard to get through. You can see in the military characters too that Romero was starting to devolve into good vs. bad guys plot lines (see Land of the Dead further down). And I think I understand that this is the chronological last film in his series, coming even before Land of the Dead. That's crazy because we really don't get a lot of closure about what happens to the world. The characters end up on a tropical island somewhere, literally counting their days, but I guess we're just supposed to assume that the world is pretty much over? Whoa.

Day of the Dead (2008): First of all, this has absolutely nothing to do with the original other than the fact that the army is involved. These aren't even technically zombies, if you want to be technical, since they're actually infected like the creatures in 28 Days Later, not to start that debate up or anything. This isn't a horrible movie, actually, if you remove it from the original, certainly compared to a lot of straight to DVD horror. It's just kind of silly. And all I can say is thank god they killed of Nick Cannon badly playing Samuel L. Jackson, though I think a much longer death would've been in order. And, really, when did it become commonplace to fill horror movies with so many unpleasant people that bicker the whole time and have poorly timed personal conversations? Also, it's time to retire the last second jump-cum-promise of a sequel from the zombie movie.

Land of the Dead (2005): Ok . . . so the credits SAY this was directed by George A. Romero, but I'm pretty sure Steven Spielberg did it. Like, what was with the E.T.-ification of the zombies? I'm sorry. I don't feel sorry for them. They want to eat me. Maybe you should kill the lead zombie who's teaching them to use guns instead of playing inspirational music and letting them go ahead on their journey bla bla bla. Also, really? A 9/11 metaphor? Really, George? Again . . . ZOMBIES EAT PEOPLE! What's with all of this Guantanamo-zombie posturing? Asia Argento is in this movie, though, so I cannot hate this movie. It's true that her character had tenuous ties at best to the plot, but you get Asia in there however you can.

Dance of the Dead (2008): Future horror filmmakers, please hear this. NEVER work overtime to make a character or characters obnoxious and then expect me to enjoy the fact that they have lived in the final reel. If you're going to set up characters as unlikeable, at least have the decency to off them as they gain redemption yada yada etc . . . The two nerdy characters really grated on my nerves. I'm sorry. I know I'm supposed to find them endearing, but no. Otherwise, though, this is a pretty fun little movie. Funny in all the right places and featuring a pretty creative use of dead frogs. BUT . . . if you're going to sell your movie as a prom/zombie movie, you might want to actually show us the prom, ya know. Why segregate your main characters when you have a whole gym full of horny teens ready to get bitten? Or at least that's what Stacie Ponder thinks. All in all, the movie IS a lot of fun, despite its faults, and surprisingly well-acted.

Dead and Breakfast (2004): So here's what I think happened. Someone with a lot of marginally famous celebrity friends (i.e. Portia de Rossi, David Carradine, Erik Palladino, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Jeremy Sisto, Diedrich Bader) had some money lying around and thought it would be fun to make a supernatural voodoo zombie movie. My prime suspect's Miranda Bailey since she happens to star and executive produce. I mean . . . I dunno, I suppose it's funny and gory enough, but it was all just a little bit confusing. There's a lot of bells and whistles with the country singer/narrator and the Buddhist monk, etc . . . Some of the gory scenes work well, though. It's watchable even if you get the sense it kind of wasn't meant for anything else than a home movie between friends who got bored and decided to pass the time.

'The Wrestler' (2008)

Sometimes the greatest successes can come out of the biggest failures, and The Wrestler is exhilarating, vibrant proof of this fact.

After struggling since 2002 to pull together his last film, 2006's metaphysical fantasy The Fountain, Darren Aronofsky found himself in the unfamiliar position of critical whipping boy. His first two features (1998's Pi and 2000's Requiem for a Dream) were critically praised, and he was hailed as one of the most refreshing new voices in cinema. It must have been pretty tough to see a film that was four years and a new set of lead actors in the making fail to measure up when it finally opened in theaters.

Luckily, Aronofsky used the criticism and went back to the basics, abandoning the metaphysical components and complicated timeline that turned many people off of The Fountain and directed this film, his best to date.

The Wrestler is a simple film, a look into the life of an aging, Hulk Hogan-like professional wrestler played by Mickey Rourke (Sin City). His name is Robin but is happier being known as Randy the Ram Robinson. His glory days are gone, and the little fame he has left is tied up in grungy weekend matches at convention halls and meet and greets where he takes Polaroids with a few kids more interested in the glory days of his career than anything he might have to say.

There's a potential love interest in his life: a stripper, played fearlessly by Marissa Tomei (Before the Devil Knows You're Dead), but her interest in him might not extend past frequent lap dances, and his estranged daughter (Evan Rachel Wood of thirteen) isn't speaking to him anymore.

As many critics have already noted, this is nothing short of a resurrection for Rourke. It's impossible to talk about this film without noting that the story of a beat up, faded star could describe both the narrative journeys of Randy the Ram and Rourke himself.

After getting attention for work in (at the very least) noteworthy films like Diner, Rumble Fish and 9 ½ Weeks, a combination of hard living and poor career choices relegated him to cheap rip offs and bit parts. But in The Wrestler, Rourke proves that his charisma and appealingly grizzled screen presence are still fully in tact.

In short, this is the perfect synchronization of character and actor.

In today's environment where hope has become a buzzword, there's a tendency by some critics to unearth an optimistic message in the majority of films released, but The Wrestler doesn't make any concessions toward an easy ending affirming the power of the underdog.

What makes The Wrestler an encouraging piece of work, then, is not the underlying narrative of the film. It's the idea that anyone, a fallen golden boy like Aronofsky or a troubled big screen personality like Rourke, can come back from failure in spectacular fashion.

The Wrestler is one of the best films to come out in months and serves an example of the best of what today's generation of young American filmmakers have to offer.

Rural's Thoughts While Watching . . .

Sex and the City (2008)

- Okaaaaay, so Fergie . . . This movie and I are NOT of to a good start.

- STEVE! I LOVE STEVE!

- Patricia Fields needs to get a real job. Stop sticking glitter and crap you find on the street on to dresses and calling yourself a designer. Just stop.

- STEVE'S ASS!!!!!!

- I like you a lot Candy Bergen, but maybe it's time to try something new. There's only so many ways you can play Candice Bergen. I mean, you're great at it, and I'm sure the houses you're buying are gorgeous. But still.

- Look at Steve crying, Miranda! How can you NOT forgive him?

- MOLE!

- Oh. Jennifer Hudson. Fuuuun.

- AWWWW. Steve and Miranda together again. Remember when Miranda professed her love for him at Brady's birthday in the laundry

room with the cake and he was all, "I love you, too." I love that episode. I really want to watch that episode again.

- This movie is long. Benjamin Button long.

- So . . . Samantha is 50 and single and jobless(?). And this is empowering?

- Not as bad as I was expecting (thank god). Definitely had its moments. Definitely made me want to watch some old episodes again. Still . . . maybe a little TOO much. I mean, 2 1/2 hours?

- I've missed you Steve.

It is Written: Slumdog Millionaire (2008)

I flat out love Danny Boyle, and I'm not afraid to admit it.

What makes Boyle a great and brave filmmaker is that he's always teetering on the edge of over direction and unnecessary strangeness, but (with the exception of the very bizarre The Beach) he has the skill to never quite fall over the line. His films have always celebrated a kind of magical realism, whether it be through visions of dead babies climbing on the ceiling, manifestations of Hindu gods, or visions of patron saints.

Really, the only fairly bland entry in his diverse filmography is A Life Less Ordinary, the one time Boyle attempted to make (essentially) a typical Hollywood romantic comedy, casting Cameron Diaz in the lead, an actress who might as well change her name to 'we've run out of ideas' at this point.

Boyle needs to take risks. He needs to indulge his inner schoolboy and let his imagination run wild to keep himself engaged in the process. He'll never really fit in among mainstream Hollywood because of it, and I really hope he doesn't try.

Kids.

Listen, I don't want to like out myself here as cold hearted but I really cannot stand children in movies about 90% of the time. Every time I see a trailer for a movie starring Jayden Smith or Connor Cruise, I can practically smell the contract negotiations and Caesar Salads eaten by lawyers and publicists in development meetings. I was really happy with the kids in this movie. A LOT of this movie relies on the performances of the kids playing the younger versions of the film's 3 main characters, and (as Boyle has proven before) Boyle knows how to direct children. The kids are cute, without being precocious. The kids are skilled, without feeling unbelievably over rehearsed and hollow.

Dev Patel is, as many have already noted, charming as Jamal, and Frieda Pinto is likeable, sweet, and really knows how to look alluring in lots of yellow, but if I were to single out one performance, I would probably highlight Madhur Mittal's work as the adult version of Jamal's older brother, Salim. With what probably amounts to no more than a maximum of 10 minutes of screen time, Mittal makes a pretty distinct impression that should be getting a lot more press.

Slumdog Millionaire is a really interestingly and beautifully realized Dickensian fable that only a maniac like Danny Boyle could have directed.

Oh . . . and my co worker has a theory that anyone who walks out before the credits sequence is over has no soul. He may be right.

(Yes, I'm rooting for it come Oscar time)

A Boy and His Toys: Doubt (2008)

The best thing to be said about Doubt is it IS a believable film. As much as I enjoyed Proof (and specifically Gwyneth Paltrow's performace in it), that was a movie that was very clearly adapted from a play. The acting was larger than the medium of film should normally contain, and the script made no attempt to tone down the dialog for an audience not sitting in the nosebleed section. Doubt, on the other hand, feels like a film. Yes, the acting is bombastic, and the script is monologue heavy, but Shanley managed to fit his script into a setting that could contain it and give it a cinematic quality.

Meryl Streep, admittedly bringing to mind a stern Mother Goose in certain scenes, plays the stern Sister Aloysius with skill and relish, injecting some wry humor into an otherwise stony woman. She gets to exercise her flair for accents once again, but doesn't overdo it by overstressing it. Better to just committ to the humanity of the character and let the vocal specifics follow. As an actress, she almost always raises the bar high, and doesn't disappoint in this film.

The other actors are more than up to the challenge. It is difficult, in this day and age, for an audience not to automatically assume the guilt of a priest, so it is to the credit of both the script and the performance of Philip Seymour Hoffman that the film manages to mantain a level of the titular doubt while still hinting at a level of creepy intensity simmering below the surface. Viola Davis, in her one scene, stands toe to toe with Meryl Streep, more than justifying the buzz that has followed her since the film was announced. I GUESS I can understand why Amy Adams is being highlighted as the weakest link, but I personally found the way she managed to underline her usual cheerful mousiness with a level of melancholy to be fairly impressive.

AND THANK GOD AMY ADAMS GOT THE ROLE OVER RUMORED NATALIE PORTMAN! As much as I've liked her in other things, the last thing this film needed was a quirky, vegan version of Sister James to twitch and empower herself all over the place. Sister James requires an actress willing to embrace an inner meekness, willing to stand in the shadow of her co stars and say more with her silence than any grand scene.

The main problem with Doubt, then, is the direction. Specifically, there is far far too much of it.

You can tell John Patrick Shanley's been dying to get behind a camera and make a movie ever since 1995's Joe Versus the Volcano. And make a movie he certainly did, using just about every camera trick and symbolic angle placement he thought up in his 13 year break. He tilts the camera at strange angles, shoots characters from above and below, and pans past numerous lines of hymn-singing children.

I'm not sure Shanley had a reason for a lot of these decisions other than his desire to 'get creative.' The problem? Creativity only really works when it's not detracting attention from the central story and characters. It's hard to pay attention to Philip Seymour Hoffman and Amy Adams sharing a dramatic moment when you randomly cut to shots peering up from the ground an up into their nostrils. It just is.

Doubt is not a bad movie, certainly, but one that could have benefited from a fresh set of eyes.

I Drink Your 'MILK'-shake (2008)

Sometimes, it's best to just come out and admit that you can't be 100% objective about a film, and as much as I'd like to be able to analyze Milk on a purely intellectual level, I really can't. Here is a film perfectly suited to its time and place. Here is a film that speaks to the anger, the drive, and the hope for something better. Here's a film that makes you want to act, makes you want to do SOMETHING.

That's not to say their isn't a level of technical achievement present, because there certainly is. Gus Van Sant quite successfully blends news and archived footage into the narrative that grounds the film in its time and place. Aided by a screenplay written by Dustin Lance Black, he does a great job of setting the film amidst the backdrop of the 1970s San Francisco without having to resort to clunky asides or random historical references. Milk is set in the past, but it feels as present as if it were set in 2008.

I haven't always been the biggest fan of Sean Penn, but this is an undoubtedly great performance. Similar to Poppy in Happy-Go-Lucky, Harvey Milk is a character who could come off overly cheery or mannered in the hands of an actor who isn't completely committed to the humanity at the heart of the person. He spends a great deal of the film surrounded by much younger actors, but the youthful vibrancy and charm he uses in the performance make it easy to believe so many people would be drawn to and inspired by him.

If, perhaps, the film as a whole does not flesh out these surrounding characters as much as the man himself, Van Sant was smart enough to fill Milk with a skilled ensemble that is more than up to the task. Josh Brolin, in a role largely absent from the film's first half that still looms tall over the film's narrative, is given the difficult task of hinting at the psychology behind Dan White's actions without ever being given a scene to verbalize them. And though I'm not quite sure I completely bought his drunken tirade near the film's end, it's great to see him continue to his string of impressive performances. I was similarly impressed with James Franco and Emile Hirsch who never get lost amongst the film's sprawling cast. Diego Luna is, I know, taking some flack for his performance, but I don't think there was anyway to win a character like that. And in a performance that I've heard NO ONE talk about, Alison Pill has a memorable turn as Harvey's campaign manager and delivers a small, poignant moment in her last shot of the film that really struck a chord with me.

And speaking of great ensembles . . .

DISCLAIMER: THE FOLLOWING IS A COMPLETELY GRATUITOUS SEXTION OF THIS REVIEW.
There was a lot of '70s era hotness going on in this movie. Like, not only did we get lots of James Franco's midriff and a brief look at his ass, but Emile Hirsch was rocking those tight bell bottoms, and whatever costume designer was painting those slacks onto Joseph Cross every morning did a bang up job. A job I'd very much like to have.
DISCLAIMER: THE PRECEDING WAS A COMPLETELY GRATUITOUS SEXTION OF THIS REVIEW.

Anyway . . . what was I saying? Right.

Milk is up-lifting, funny, tragic, and couldn't have come at a more prescient time. Does it get overly cute and literal in parts? Sure (I'm speaking specifically of a pair of phone calls he receives from a young teen and an opera metaphor). But did those moments get to me? You betcha. As the last scene unrolled and an endless line of candles filled the San Francisco streets, I knew the film had me.

If a film can work (at least for me) on such a visceral level, somebody is doing something right.

Dear Zachary (2008)

In 2001, Dr. Andrew Bagby was found murdered and suspicion immediately fell on his ex-girlfriend, Dr. Shirley Turner, whose inconsistent stories to the police made her the chief suspect in the crime. The sequence of events that followed (some of which director Kurt Kuenne documents as they occur) were beyond even the worst nightmares of his family, friends, and colleagues.

But to say the facts of the case make up the bulk of the film would be a misnomer.

The body of the film is the result of Kuenne's cross country (and cross Atlantic) trip to interview anyone who came into contact with Andrew, his childhood friend. It's an interesting thing to see so many people working through their grief, expressing it in different ways. Most affecting are the interviews with Andrew's parents whose lives are tied up in the legal and personal dramas that unfold around the trial. In the end, this film becomes as much about their dedication and resiliency as it does about their son.

Dear Zachary is a tricky film to review because so much of what's wonderful about it is indescribable to somebody who hasn't seen it. It's a raw, angry, passionate, overwhelming, sweet, heart breaking tearjerker of a documentary, and so much of it's power comes from developments Kuenne had no control over, though it would be wrong to say that nobody saw them coming. The audience is introduced to revelations in the same way as every one interviewed for the film.

This is not an extremely polished film, but Dear Zachary wouldn't feel as emotionally honest as it does had it been so. The film is almost a home movie and, perhaps, would have been so had the story of Bagby family proceeded differently. It is a gripping, powerful movie and is easily amongst the best films of the year.

Sometimes a film doesn't need a shiny polish if it's got a beautiful heart.

Rural's Thoughts While Watching . . .

The Apple (1980)


- I don't wanna, like, call out the emperor on his new clothes or anything, but this new BIM Mark the characters keep raving about is a sticker. You would think in a future as crazy as 1994 is going to be that we might not be so easily impressed.

- Hmmm . . . what is it EXACTLY about the protagonists that just doesn't seem right. Ah! Now I have it. They are (how can I put this?) boring, and their songs are syrupy disasters. I kind of prefer the cheesy, over produced ridiculousness of the songs produced by . . . I guess he's the devil (?)

- Also, why are they dressed in hand me down J.C. Penney fashions in a movie populated by characters dressed by the House of Ziggy Stardust?

- Actually, yeah, I'm just gonna admit right now that some of these songs are infectious. You listen to them once, and there's really no
getting rid of them.


- So the flamboyant man with the voice of a night club crooner who wears silver capes and lip gloss is fooling around with the female singer? Uh-huh.

- "Meet an actual, actual, actual VAMPIRE!" Oh, a vampire. That's . . . fun, I guess. It's hard to rhyme with 'desire'.

- From New York out to LA, everybody does it her way. Poppin' power, by the hour. SPEEEEEEEEEED!"

- Finally a music number revolving around date rape. Can't tell you how long I've been waiting.

- Bet you can't guess what the song 'Coming' is about!

- I would have chosen the hot singer with the triangle on his forehead, myself. He's a little less . . . useless.

-Ummm . . . I'm just gonna go ahead and call this the strangest recorded case of deus ex machina since the term was coined. Either I'm losing my mind, or God just descended from the sky in a Cadillac and whisked our heroes and their hippie commune off to Mars.

Turner Classic Movies showed this as part of it TCM Underground series this Friday night/Saturday morning as a double bill with another crap classic: Roller Boogie. It stars Linda Blair, but the only real reason to see it is for lots of Jim Bray in those fab short shorts they seem to have loved so much back in the day.

Who loves short shorts?

I love short shorts!

He is not, unfortunately, a great actor so watching Linda Blair come onto him so strongly in the beginning of the film comes across a little TOO . . . predatory. She just seems much more, err, EXPERIENCED than he does.

Wanna take a ride with me and my car phone, little boy? Grrrrrrrr.

Luckily, director Mark L. Lester has moved on to directing bigger and better things . . . Cameron Daddo taking on cheap CGI dinosaurs on the Sci Fi channel, for instance

Thoughts While Watching 'My Fair Lady' (1964)

I do so love Aubrey Hepburn, but I finally found one thing she can't do very well: lip synch.

I suppose it's not entirely her fault. I KNOW what Audrey Hepburn sounds like, and I doubt very much that even the best synching could convince me that she sounds anything like Marni Nixon.

Anywayz . . . just my two cents.

Speed Racer (2008)

Sigh . . . I wish Hollywood would realize that obnoxious children are not funny. They just aren't. I don't want to pay money to be annoyed. This movie tried so hard to make the kid everyone's favorite character, but I really just wanted him to suffer.

Anyway, I would say that this is a film that works about 50% of the time. It has the same weaknesses and strengths of The Matrix trilogy, in fact. The action sequences (as computer game-y as they were) made for pretty thrilling viewing when the Wachowskis weren't throwing too many talking heads around (literally, talking heads), but the rest was fairly hit or miss. There was some really BIZARRE flash back techniques they used that just made everything needlessly complicated, and one in particular involving Matthew Fox at the end was laughable.

I would say pretty much every actor was severely underused, including poor Christina Ricci who barely had a point. Matthew Fox did a nice job, I would say, except in the aforementioned flash back scene. Then again, it's hard to be too good when your head is floating across the screen every 3 seconds like a ping pong ball while exposition plays out in the background.

IF you go see this, I would say IMAX is the way to go . . . unless you're prone to seizures in which case I would never see this movie. The whole thing kind of looks like the inside of a pin ball machine. There's lots of colors and sounds, and you're not sure what's going on, but it sure is fun to see.

Now, if you're going to ogle some man flesh, the Wachowski's apparently have you in mind because the guys look great in this. Emile Hirsch walks around with Danny Zuko hair the whole time looking like jail bait. There's one scene in which he walks into the kitchen after just waking up with his hair all messy in a white t-shirt that was almost worth the price of admission. Matthew Fox and Rain get to show off their chests a few times and parade around in leather suits and artfully ripped shirts, respectively. Oh . . . and I don't believe Kick Gurry ever wore sleeves.

Maybe I would have liked it more had I ever SEEN an episode of Speed Racer, but I would give it a C+, probably.

And for no reason:

So . . . I Finally Saw 'The Wicker Man' (2006)

Alice's Sense of Shame Doesn't Live Here Anymore

I could give this movie a proper review, but, really, what's the point?

Sure, I could discuss the plot. But really all that happens is Nicolas Cage goes to an island populated entirely be Shrewish Lesbian Honey Witches™, throws on a bear suit, punches some women, and dies. That's it. Sure, Ellen Burstyn gets to dance around like Puck from 'A Midsummer Night's Dream' with her face painted like Mel Gibson's in 'Braveheart', but, that's not necessarily interesting or campy enough to make the movie worth your while. You'd probably just be better off watching this YouTube video of all the best bits spliced together:


Most of this stuff happens in the last 20 minutes, and there's a lot of Nicolas Cage grimaces and 'IT'S A DREAM-no, it's not-BUT IT IS' moments that you have to get through before getting to the Leelee Sobieski throat kick.

Oh . . . and P.S. Aaron Eckhart, I saw you! Don't even think you can get away with being in this. Because you can't.

Stop Loss (2007) Directed by Kimberly Pierce

Caution: There Be Spoilers

First of all, I think it's awesome that a woman directed this. The first 5 to 10 minutes or so of the film (though it could have been longer), set primarily during an ambush on the squad led by Ryan Phillippe in Iraq, is a tense and well executed bit of action on Pierce's part. It's nice that Sofia Coppola can make an ambitious labor of love about a French queen who enjoys shoes and that Sarah Polley can make a heartfelt tribute to the ageless beauty of Julie Christie, but sometimes it's just nice to find a female director who really knows how to kick some ass. I read an interview with Pierce a while back in which she said she wasn't afraid of blowing things up. In fact, she said she enjoys it.

I suspect that this is partially why Stop Loss is, overall, more succesful than the other recent batch of Hollywood Iraq pictures. Maybe It's unfair for me to say so having not seen Lions for Lambs or Rendition, but the reviews alone indicate that, at least critically, Kimberly Pierce's film is regarded as a better statement about our times and about our present military conflicts. Rather than shaking her finger at the war at large, Pierce chooses to focus on a singe issue and celebrate the military as a group of dedicated citizens while criticizing some of its institutional policies. In its best moments, Stop Loss is less anti-war, more pro-soldier.

I say 'in its best moments', because there are moments in which Pierce can't help but indulge her Hollywood tendencies towards prostelytizing. I WISH WISH WISH WISH WISH that we could put a moratorium on ending films with little facts and statistics. If there's something you want to say in your film, you better make damn sure you say it within the context of your story. You can't just tack some information to the end and expect the audience to absorb it. Half of them are already half way to the exit.

If only the rest of the movie could have been as thrilling as the first section. Perhaps it was inevitable that the rest of the film would feel like a let down after the heights reached in the beginning, but I think the problem reaches deeper than that. The film is still working at a pretty good level as the soldiers return home and struggle to readapt to their life. But, after Ryan Phillippe's character is stop lossed and he hits the road, the film kind of loses focus. He heads to D.C. to appeal to a senator he knows, but I never really bought that as a viable option. The story kind of derails here as he goes from stop to stop on the road to nowhere, only to end back where he started.

Ryan Phillippe is definitely the star of this movie. He may have not bowled me over, but he can definitely open a film as the lead. Channing Tatum and Joseph Gordon Levitt both deliver pretty solid turns as well, with Abbie Cornish backing them up as Tatum's fiance and Phillippe's traveling companion while on the run. Also, is Margo Martindale trying to be in every movie? She has the market cornered on Southern office staffers.

So, overall, is it worth seeing? I would say yes . . . but that doesn't necessarily mean that you need to rush out. The scenes set in Iraq might work a little better on the big screen, but the rest will play just as well at home. Don't be scared off by the war plot line, though. Rendition 2 this is not.

BY THE WAY, THANK YOU Kimberly Pierce! Thank you for not having Phillippe's character hook up with Abbie Cornish. Thank you for avoiding that obvious trap that SO MANY directors constantly fall into.

Rural's Thoughts While Watching . . .

Beyond the Valley of the Dolls



- Petronella Danforth, Z Man Barzell, Lance Rocke, Emerson Thorne, Ashley St. Ives, Baxter Wolfe . . . I'm not sure the characters actually HAD names (thanks IMDB), but these sound like characters out of a porno.

- This is a porno.

- BOOBS!

- If they're going to make me sit through full-length performances of this girl group, it would help if they didn't suck.

- I can't tell the difference between these two brunette girls.

- David Gurian is attractive . . . even while bopping around in a turtleneck.

- Are we POSITIVE Roger Ebert wrote this? Because I refuse to believe this isn't completely ad libbed.

- BOOBS!


- What is the editor's aversion to letting people end sentences?

- Why does everyone in this movie bleed neon orange?

- I can't follow this whole B plot. Why is what's-her-face trying to get money from that one guy? Does it really matter?

- Did she just say 'Up yours, square,"?

- For being 'revolutionary' and 'hip', they still can't resist hooking the black girl up with only black guys.

- I think someone accidentally spliced in a light saturated, slow motion running sequence from a Barbra Streisand concert special.

- Wait? He raped her? When?

- BOOBS!

- I'm pretty sure you wouldn't survive a jump from the rafters of an auditorium . . .

- . . . but, if you did, I'd imagine you wouldn't be wheeling around so soon afterwards.

- She got over that rape and that abortion awful quick . . .

- . . . and now she's a lesbian.


- MAN IN A LEOPARD THONG!

- I think that Z Man is supposed to be losing his mind at the end, but he isn't really acting any crazier than usual . . .

- . . . although this is the first time he has chopped someone's head off with a sword.

The Movie-a-Thon Update

Crossing off Atonement, The Savages, and There Will Be Blood

Before the Devil Knows You're Dead
Lars and the Real Girl
Gone Baby Gone
I'm Not There
Persepolis
4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days
The Orphanage

The Savages: I'm pretty sure I'm reaching the saturation point for quirky, Sundance dramedies about misery and family squabbles. When this film opened up on a parade of elderly women in cheer leading outfits, I was pretty sure I wasn't going to enjoy the next few hours. When the family of their father's dead girlfriend were all 300 pounds, I was aggressively turned off by this attempt to both set the film in the real world and play up its own quirkiness once again.


However, as the film progressed and as it became clear that this was less a film about nursing home antics and more about the lives of two troubled siblings who just happen to be thrown together by a family problem, I started to gain a greater appreciation for what the film was doing. Similar to Margot at the Wedding, this film is one writer/director's attempt to explain themself or, rather, attempt to explain how a person's past and present influence their creative processes. In both films, the central characters are writers, depicted as sad individuals either too afraid to explore their inner feelings or too eager to exploit them without realizing the effects it can have on the people closest to them.


Philip Seymour Hoffman is easily one of the the top 5 actors working today, and Laura Linney's unmistakable persona is always a welcome addition to any film, sometimes the only welcome addition (The Nanny Diaries, for example). Here, they're as reliable as ever, managing to make watchable the lives of two sad sack characters who are still struggling to figure out their lives. The Savages is, if nothing else, a director driven film, and Jenkins was fortunate to secure such great actors for her film.

Atonement: What can you say about a movie you've been anticipating for 6 months, a movie that's score you listened to endlessly, a movie that filled your photobucket with stills of Keira Knightley and James McAvoy on a country estate?

As much as I'd like to say that it's my favorite film of all time, I can't. As much as I'd like to say that it's one of the Top 5 films made this year, I can't. Any other year, it would have easily made it but not this year.

But did I love it? Absolutely. Have I seen it more than once? You bet. Am I going to buy the DVD? Yes.


As a big fan of Joe Wright's previous film Pride & Prejudice and, let's face it, an obsessive follower of all things Keira Knightley and James McAvoy, I couldn't help but expect a lot from this film. And, for the first section, it really did deliver. Bolstered by a quite impressive performance by Saoirse Ronan, the first third of Atonement, set against the back drop of a hot summer's day on an English country estate before the start of World War 2, is gorgeously light saturated and sensuous. When McAvoy is writing a letter to Cecilia, operatic music soaring behind him, we are given glimpses of Knightley as smoke and light fill our field of vision. We are just as infatuated with her as McAvoy. Joe Wright knows how to capture Keira Knightley, how to play up her beauty and sensual haughtiness. It is a testament to Joe Wright's skill that, through little touches like this, it becomes easy to imagine that these two are meant to be together, even as circumstances prevent their budding romance to build on normal terms.

At this point, let me just say that, having read the novel that this is based on, Christopher Hampton's screenplay impressively manages to maneuver around the book's sometimes time jumbling and inner monologue driven narrative. When the story requires a certain scene to be viewed from different perspectives, the screenplay wisely sticks to this, ignoring the temptation to simplify. And, in the end, when Vanessa Redgrave is called on to make a 5 minute part as memorable as she possibly can, the completely new set up for the film's final chapter thankfully finds a way to reveal the secrets of the film outside of the book's inner monologue resolution that would not have worked here.


You'll notice that I haven't mentioned the middle section of the film up until now. The reason for this is simple: though very well done and satisfying, the middle section of the film doesn't work as well as the first. James McAvoy does deliver an absolutely spectacular performance in this part, that much is assured, and the scope of the Dunkirk sequence is certainly admirable, but there's something about it that doesn't quite seem to measure up. I'm not sure what. Maybe it's just that Joe Wright is more at home in the light saturated universe of Pride & Prejudice and this film's first third, or maybe it's the screenplay. That being said, I don't want to undersell how good James McAvoy is here, how well he inhabits this overwhelmingly good man who has had his life unfairly ruined by lies. The shot of him, exhausted and standing in front of a film screen as a romantic scene unfolds, is an image I will carry with me for quite some time.

When all the characters again come together in the section headed by Romola Garai's strong turn as a grown up Briony, things pick up, but the quality of the first third is never really duplicated until Vanessa Redgrave brings the film to a close, both shattering the illusion of a happy ending and somewhat providing it. Yes, this is yet another 2007 film in which a writer struggles to reconcile their art with their reality, but it works well here. We begin to understand that all the typing we've heard throughout the film in the masterful score by Dario Marianelli is meant to signify Briony telling her story, the story of how one lie destroyed so many lives.

There Will Be Blood: Wow.

I mean, wow.

First off, let me just say that I've never been a big fan of Paul Thomas Anderson. Watching Magnolia was, for me, like having a teeth pulled for 3 hours by a very self-important dentist who probably could've pulled the tooth out more effectively in 90 minutes (if that analogy makes sense), and I didn't make it past ten minutes of Punch Drunk Love.


So, imagine my surprise when I came out of this movie blown away. This is the kind of film directors dream of making, the kind of out there project they dream of getting the financing to realize. If nothing else, this is a directorial masterwork. The sheer scope of what Anderson is creating here-from the bombastic spiritual sessions to the flaming rivers of oil shooting from the ground-clearly announces to the world that Paul Thomas Anderson is a force to be reckoned with. Much like his film's central character, Anderson is a man obsessed, compelled even, to strive towards something better on his own terms.

As that title character, Daniel Day Lewis continues to impress, adding another overwhelmingly committed performance to his already brimming canon. But it is Paul Dano, all bottled up aggression exploding in fire and brimstone platitudes-that really impressed me. It takes a lot to face off against such an intensely dedicated actor like Daniel Day Lewis, and Dano more than holds his own. This is, after all, less a film about the oil business then a film about the conflict between these two people, driven to madness by such different yet oddly similar forces, and both actors have to be at the top of their game.


Much like No Country, a lot of who you feel about this film may depend on your interpretation of the ending. Some may be turned off by its devolution to sheer insanity but, as many major critics have pointed out, its hard to imagine how else this story could have resolved itself.

My only complaint: I am not as big a fan of the score as some. There are moments when it reaches incredible heights, but there are others when it just seems gratuitous to the scene. I wish directors today would realize that, sometimes, a scene can be more powerful simply by the decision NOT to accompany it with strings and horns.

The Movie-A-Thon Update

Crossing off Margot at the Wedding. Oh . . . and my local indie video store had the Korean Secret Sunshine DVD, but I couldn't get the audio to work. I'm pissed, but what are you gonna do?

Atonement
Before the Devil Knows You're Dead
There Will Be Blood
Lars and the Real Girl
Gone Baby Gone
Starting Out in the Evening
I'm Not There
The Savages
Persepolis
4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days
The Orphanage


On to the main event: how is Margot at the Wedding? First off, Nicole Kidman is fantastic. It's easy to forget how good she can be when you're watching year after year of her in crappy remakes and bizarre missteps, but she really creates a great character here. Margot is bitchy, manipulative, neurotic yet completely self-deluded, indecisive, damaged, and self involved. At this time of year, it's refreshing to see an actress play a fictional human being rather than a used up singer with a receding hair line or . . . a used up male singer in a world of black and white. Kidman manages to retain watchability in every scene, even when her character's actions cause you to cringe. In the last scene, when her sister's words about her are proven true, the look of triumph on her face doesn't ring true, but it's not supposed to. Margot is still self deluded, and Baumbach allows the film to end with the audience keenly aware of it.

As for the rest of the film, it is not on as consistent a level of film making as The Kite Runner, but I'd be lying if I said I enjoyed this less. Whereas The Kite Runner operated at a constant level of 'good', Margot at the Wedding takes more risks and, at the very least, goes into very uncomfortable places. Because of this, all the great moments of the film (Margot climbs a tree, the croquet game)are coupled with elements that, for whatever reason, don't seem to quite fit (the redneck neighbors, the babysitter).

Jack Black . . . I get what he was going for and understand why he was cast. I do (Baumbach wanted a Sandler/Ferrell type of performance), but I just don't think he was up for it 100%. There were too many scenes near the end of the film in which I was just not sure whether I was supposed to find his misery funny. I wasn't alone. My theater was full of nervous titters during these scenes, as if most people couldn't figure it out either. I don't know if this was due to Black's performance, the screenplay, or both. Jennifer Jason Leigh was Jennifer Jason Leigh, meaning she was good. She delivered a fine performance, and I was not at all surprised by this. It's Jennifer Jason Leigh so I expect as much.

One other quibble: What's with the shaky cam? Is this an action movie? I kept expecting to see Jason Bourne jump out of the ocean and punch Nicole Kidman in the throat. I'll give you the last few scenes (it seemed to suit those a bit better), but what was the point?

So, did I enjoy the movie? Yes and no. Part of it may have been that the relationship between Margot and her son IS my mom and my brother, and the character of Margot's son IS my brother 3 years ago. Dreams of becoming a singer, semi-depressed, odd, spotty hygiene practices . . . that IS him at that age. He even has the exact same hair style my brother has today. It's only a matter of time before the kid is playing in bars with a bunch of recovering alcoholics, wearing a leather headband, and arguing with Margot about his lifestyle. I mean, the characters were more . . . New England than my family, but it still hit close to home. So . . . no, I wouldn't call it enjoyable to watch people screw with each other for 90 minutes, but I would call it interesting. THANK YOU Noah Baumbach for telling a linear story that goes from point A to point B without starting in the middle of the story and having Jennifer Jason Leigh REMEMBER the entire plot while staring out of a window or something.

Overall, Margot at the Wedding is a film that is either working well or not really at all. At times, it can feel like Baumbach is just interested in complaining about what a shit childhood he had (I mean, he must have), but he doesn't have so much contempt for Margot that he robs her of anything compelling to say or do. You get the impression that, if given the chance, he would never choose to spend time with these people in real life, but he can't really escape them either. They're part of him, whether he likes it or not.

The BIG Movie-A-Thon Update

I decided I would do a big post, just giving my thoughts about all the movies I missed that I'm trying to absorb over the holidays. Right now, my MUST SEE list is down to:

(Crossing off Sweeney Todd, The Kite Runner, Enchanted, and The Diving Bell and The Butterfly)

Atonement
Before the Devil Knows You're Dead
Margot at the Wedding
There Will Be Blood
Lars and the Real Girl
Gone Baby Gone
Starting Out in the Evening
I'm Not There
The Savages
Persepolis
4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days
The Orphanage

It may seem like an impossible task. However, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead has checked out of theatres, Lars and the Real Girl is no where to be found, and Gone Baby Gone is just that. Oh . . . and 4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days isn't being released here until February or something.

So far, here are some thoughts on the films I HAVE seen in my mad movie spree. I didn't really hate anything, which is nice, but I find I rarely do. I only usually see movies I think have a chance of being good, so I don't often catch an out and out bomb.


No Country for Old Men: Your opinion of this film will probably come down to whether or not you buy into the way the Coens structure and shoot the ending. After thinking about it, I did appreciate what they manged to do, challenging what would traditionally be expected from a film of a similar ilk, painting a much bleaker portrait of the world as a result. Javier Bardem may not have been the greatest thing since sliced bread, but he was chillingly intense and terrifying throughout, earning Anton Chigurh a place in movie villain infamy. Having seen a lot of desert in Texas, I appreciated the way the Coens shot the landscape (even if a lot of it was shot in New Mexico)and captured the wind swept isolation one can feel amidst the flat grounds and sparse vegetation. Kelly MacDonald, Josh Brolin, and Tommy Lee Jones seem to have been ignored, in large part, due to the juggernaut that is Bardem, but each play a part in making the film what it is.

The Kite Runner: When did linear storytelling become out of fashion? When did everyone decide 50% of films should open in the chronological middle or end of the story so that a flashback is needed to fill in the gaps? No less than 5 of the films I've seen on this film binge has done this, and I'm curious as to why. Sometimes it works, as it largely does in this film, but it's just as easy to screw it up. But nevermind . . . how is the film as a whole? I would call it good. It's not great, but it's competent and well-made. The acting is good, the screenplay is good, the direction is good . . . basically, it succeeds at everything, but never excels. I did enjoy the performances of Khalid Abdalla, previously seen in Untited 93, as Amir and Homayoun Ershad as his father, even if I wasn't always invested in what their characters were doing. The young child actors did impressive considering it was their first film, but a few of the things they were asked to say sounded unlike any child I've come across. I'm on the fence about Marc Forster . . . I really enjoyed Stranger than Fiction but, as a director, I don't know that he's quite come into his own yet. There are a few leaps in logic we're asked to make near the end but, not having read the book, I couldn't say if they are hold overs or not. Still, it's a decent film worth seeing, on the big screen even if only to appreciate the beauty that can be found in the surrounding countryside.

Away From Her: From any director, this would be a skilled and assured musing on life and love. From a first time director, it's something of a miracle that it manages to be as accomplished. It's a quiet film, a beautiful film. Julie Christie is almost borderline supporting in the movie, but she does a great job of breaking our hearts again and again. When she tells her husband, 'You confuse me . . . ,' we can still sense the brave sole her husband once knew fighting to hold on. As that husband, though, it is Gordon Pinsent who our sympathies and hearts truly go out to. As the nurse at the clinic, beautifully played by Kristen Thomson, tells him, 'It's never too late to become what you might have been,' and nothing could be more true for the character. As a man still trying to atone for past acts and demonstrate his love, the sacrifices he makes for the love of his life, the woman he still sees as a radiant, radical beauty with wind swept hair, Pinsent gives life to the character laid out marvelously by Polley in her script. Perhaps the way in which the film jumps around in time detracts from the film, but not enough to deny it a reccomendation.


Enchanted: Have I mentioned how much I love Amy Adams? Because I really do, and this film is nothing if not the Amy Adams show. Usually, I'm just another kind of a cynical, jaded college student but damned if I can't help being obsessed with this girl. Played wrong, the character of Giselle could have been one of the more annoying protagonists of the year, but Amy Adams manages to play it just right, with incredible sincerity and sweetness.There was a bit of irony in there too, but not more than the film would actually support. James Marsden is a lot of fun too, and he wears tights the whole time so . . . there's that. Patrick Dempsey usually bores me, but I liked him here. I do have to give credit to the makers of the film because, really, this story would have been unwatchable if it was chock full of too many eye winks and in jokes (ala Shrek). It's a kids' film, but I left the theatre feeling pretty entertained and have been listening to 'That's How You Know' non stop.

La Vie En Rose: Does Marion Cotillard deliver the best female performance of the decade as so many are claiming? I dont know . . . who's to say, anyway? If you said yes, I could probably come up with performances I liked better, and you, in turn, might not even like those performances. There's really no point in debating the statement, since it's unprovable. So, a better question: does she give a good performance? Yes, yes she does. It's certainly . . . gimmicky at times, but, not knowing much about Edith Piaf, it's possible she was just as eccentric and strange as Cotillard plays her. There's no debating that it's a transformation, at least physically, because I've seen Marion Cotillard and she does not jut her teeth out, nor do I suspect she will look so used up at the end of her life. The scene in which she screams 'Marcel!' and wanders through her house is heartbreaking. As for the rest of the film, I didn't mind the jumping around in time as much as everyone else seemed to (it beats yet another entry into the musical biopic formula), but it eventually got to the point where it was just impossible to place who everyone was and how they fit into her life. She had a husband, but I'm still not sure who exactly he was or when he left her. Her boss was killed with her as a suspect, but I'm still not sure where that actually fit in the timeline of her life. The film throws in a truly bizarre segment about her having a child that I still can't make heads or tails of 2 weeks later.

Eastern Promises: Did this seem pretty conventional for a Cronenberg film to anyone else? Because, if it hadn't been for the naked bathhouse fight and the intense throat slitting, this really wouldn't have seemed at all like a Cronenberg flick. Viggo Mortenson is fine, as is Naomi Watts, but I wasn't exactly bowled over by either of them. Vincent Cassel was quite annoying throughout the film, but that may have just been the character who I didn't much care for. It was certainly well made, but, when the ending inevitably came, I couldn't help feeling like what I had just watched was just a better than average crime thriller. I still much prefer it over A History of Violence, though.


Juno: I 'get' the Ellen Page thing now. I really do. She's awesome in this movie, and I THINK that, if Juno MacGuff were a real person, I would want to be friends with her. Page is as great as you've heard (although everyone has mostly seen Juno already), and the scene between her and Michael Cera in the hospital at the end shows that her characterization of the title character is more than a one trick approach. JK Simmons and Alisson Janney are her parents. I mean . . . that's amazing. Do you need an excuse to see Alisson Janney in something? Jennifer Garner finally actually did a good job in a movie worth her trouble. Do I think it deserves a nomination for Best Picture? Probably not . . . but I've made no apologies for my love of Diablo Cody and seeing her at least nominated for best screenplay would suit me just fine. I do have to question the seemingly unnecessary Rainn Wilson cameo, but I really really liked most of the movie. Oh . . . and I'm keeping my eye on this Olivia Thirlby.

Into the Wild: I went in with LOW LOW expectations. I am by no means a fan of Sean Penn. As an actor, media personality, and political whatever, I find him pretty insufferable. Imagine my surprise when, after a shaky start, I started to really get into this film. Sean Penn's dedication to his own script certainly cost the film overall, and parts of it were a bit . . . over directed, but it came together quite nicely in the end thanks, in large part, to a great group of actors delivering pretty amazing performances. Emile Hirsch, Brian Dierker, Kristen Stewart, Catherine Keener, and especially Hal Holbrook are all memorable. It's always nice to be completely surprised by a film, so I give Into the Wild major points for far exceeding my expectations.


Sweeney Todd: I don't think there is anyone better suited to this material than Tim Burton, Johnny Depp, and Helena Bonham Carter . . . I really don't. The visuals and over the top style were just perfect for the story, and the two leads were pretty much what I would have pictured. Plus, the orchestration is fantastic. What held the film back a bit, I think, has more to do with the source material than anything Burton may have done. The main problem I had was with the two young lover characters who essentially brought the film to a stand still every time they came on screen. I don't know if this was due to the actors' themselves or just the overall blandness of the characters. I suspect Burton would have cut them out almost entirely if it wouldn't have incurred the wrath of the Sondheim-nation. Overall, though, Sweeney Todd is a wicked good time and certainly worth a trip to the theatre.

Control: I was really prepared to love this film, but it never fully came together for me. That being said, it is probably one of the more beautifully photographed films of the year, and Sam Riley does quite well as Joy Division lead Ian Curtis. Casting a relative unknown was a stroke of genius because I really don't think the film would have worked as well as it did with, say, Jonathan Rhys Meyers or someone of his ilk in the lead. The story was refreshingly straight forward: it never attempted to 'explain' how he came up with songs like in 'Ray' nor did it fly around his life, throwing vignettes at the audience and hoping they stick as the makers of 'La Vie En Rose' resorted to at the end of that film. I will always call Samantha Morton one of the finest actresses working today, and this film gives me no reason to doubt, even if her character isn't much to write home about. The first 1/3 of the film is great but, once the usual rock star trajectory starts up (drugs, screaming wives, mistresses, angry band members), one can't help but feel this is just a more stylish version of what we've seen already.

Walk Hard: I dunno . . . I feel like this movie could have been a lot funnier at points. Don't get me wrong. I laughed, but not as much as I would have liked. The definite high point was the songs that worked both as parodies and songs that could have believably existed in the era of music they were aping. John C. Reilly and Jenna Fisher were on their A-game, there were some great gags . . . but it never quite became the 'Spinal Tap' or 'Airplane!' that it wanted to become. Part of this is that, for all the truly great bits (John C. Reilly aping Bob Dylan as his back up singers claim, 'It's DEEP'), there were parts that were just too broad to land on target (Jonah Hill's from another movie role as the ghost of Reilly's brother). It's a definite rental, but I don't think it's necessarily something you'd need to rush out and see.


The Diving Bell and the Butterfly: Keeping in mind how far behind I am, I can confidently call this at least my #2 film of the year (Once is fighting for the top spot with this). It deserves pretty much every ounce of praise it's getting, and Persepolis better be a damn fine movie to justify passing this up as France's entry into the Foreign Oscar race. This is a FANTASTICALLY directed and written piece of work. Schnabel manages to take a story about a paralyzed man who communicates through blinking and turn it into the one of the most engrossing and lyrical films this year. I was surprised about how funny it was, how much I grew to love these characters. Through only what we see in their interaction with the main character, these people grow into human beings. When they leave the room, we miss them just as much as our protagonist does. The actresses in this film better appreciate Schnabel, because I doubt they'll ever be seen lovelier.

I also caught Stardust, which I was thoroughly prepared to hate, and I actually really enjoyed myself, Claire Danes and all. Oh . . . Michelle Pfeiffer is more awesome then ever, and Charlie Cox is adorable.


That is all.