Reel Times: Reflections on Cinema

88 Minutes

2009-07-12T09:07:00.000-04:00

88 MINUTES (Jon Avnet, 2007)

Nine years after forensic psychiatrist Dr. Jack Gramm (Al Pacino) provided crucial testimony in the conviction of serial killer Jon Forster (Neal McDonough), the verdict begins to be called into question. In 88 MINUTES a murder replicating the methods of the old crimes suggests that perhaps Forster was wrongly imprisoned.

The timing is of extreme importance since the killing comes on the eve of Forster's scheduled execution. Clues at the new murder scene open the possibility that Gramm himself is the culprit. Meanwhile, a mysterious caller informs Gramm that he has two minutes shy of an hour and a half left to live and sends him running around Seattle to stay alive and solve the crime.

88 MINUTES is the sort of overblown thriller in which every action, no matter how insignificant, is pregnant with portent, yet it's a film of nothing but red herrings. Director Jon Avnet and screenwriter Gary Scott Thompson have concocted a silly mystery that gets more outrageous and laughable as the clock ticks down to the zero minute.

Again and again 88 MINUTES torpedoes suspicion regarding Gramm and loses internal consistency. Since multiple attempts to kill Gramm occur long before time is up, it's abundantly clear that he is not guilty of what has been set up and that the film's countdown device doesn't matter at all.

The decisions made in 88 MINUTES never make any sense. When the abusive former boyfriend of Gramm's teaching assistant Kim (Alicia Witt) appears with a gun at his front door, she tells her boss to open it because the guy wouldn't hurt her. Never mind that he used to beat her and is thought to be out to kill Gramm. Sure, come on in and make yourself at home!

Equally as implausible as the conspiracy to frame Gramm is how every woman in the the film throws herself at him as though the old professor is America's heartthrob. Leave it to the movies to make it so all females are rendered powerless by the unexplained pull of his erotic magnetism.

The portrayal of Gramm's irresistibility verges on parody. That farcical quality can also be read in 88 MINUTES' preposterous mystery. Unfortunately for the filmmakers, they didn't set out to make a comedy.

Grade: D

Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan

2009-07-10T16:32:00.007-04:00

BORAT: CULTURAL LEARNINGS OF AMERICA FOR MAKE BENEFIT GLORIOUS NATION OF KAZAKHSTAN (Larry Charles, 2006)

Sacha Baron Cohen is fearless. In BORAT: CULTURAL LEARNINGS OF AMERICA FOR MAKE BENEFIT GLORIOUS NATION OF KAZAKHSTAN, the British comedian makes fools of unsuspecting ordinary Americans (and some unordinary ones) while frequently putting his own wellbeing in danger. As Kazakh television reporter Borat Sagdiyev, Cohen shatters the customs of polite society. He makes horribly racist, sexist, and homophobic comments, but his broken English and guilelessness give him a pass (for awhile) with most he encounters. The character allows him to hold up a mirror to such ridiculous attitudes when his new acquaintances use the openings Borat gives them to express similar beliefs.

Ostensibly a road movie and a fake documentary that the other participants don’t know is fake, BORAT follows the enthusiastic reporter and his obese producer Azamat Bagatov (Ken Davitian) as they journey across the country. Their visit to America is supposed to be limited to New York City, but when Borat stumbles upon an old episode of BAYWATCH on his hotel room television, he switches their plans and sets out for Los Angeles so he can take Pamela Anderson as his wife. Along the way he talks with politicians, an antiques dealer, television anchors, fraternity brothers, and more as he takes the pulse of the United States, particularly the South.

At the risk of using hyperbole, BORAT is one of the funniest movies I’ve ever seen. Cohen’s total commitment to the character and control is astonishing. I can’t imagine a more gut-busting and shocking scene than Borat and Azamat’s naked wrestling. Cohen and Davitian go for broke and at least twice manage to top what you expect can’t be topped. While Cohen’s acting may not typify what gets classified as outstanding acting, this is a great performance. In our daily lives we’d find Borat detestable, but on screen, even when being actively mean to undeserving folks, he’s completely likable.

Borat has no boundaries, and much of the humor comes from how he upsets the normal social balance. Whether trying to be friendly with New Yorkers on the subway or southern gentlemen and women at a dinner party, Borat tests the limits of what people will accept before they are offended.

Cohen’s playing the ultimate rube in the big city, but the joke’s on those he meets. On the positive side, BORAT reveals an America where people are happy to accept someone interested in learning about this nation. Although the butts of his jokes, many people are unfailingly polite until Borat exceeds their tolerance for being offended or having personal space invaded. A hotel worker gently corrects Borat when he begins unpacking his belongings in the elevator because he’s under the wrong impression that it is his room.

There’s no doubt that Cohen is pushing his subject’s buttons, and sometimes the results, while a riot, aren’t pretty. Borat highlights American ignorance, particularly when people excuse his most inflammatory words and actions as cultural difference. The more outrageous his statements or deeds, the more someone is willing to chalk it up to the Kazakh way. It doesn’t speak well of our education and beliefs about other cultures when Borat can get away with what he says and does.

Many of the funniest bits are Borat’s interactions with others, but this is a film packed with many less complex laughs. The chicken Borat packs in his luggage is one of the best recurring gags in the film. About the time we’ve forgotten about the animal, it squawks and delivers one of the funniest moments in a movie with wall-to-wall laughs.

Most film comedies, even the good ones, are safe and predictable. Even the “edgy” ones seem too self-conscious in their provocations. BORAT is the rare comedy that operates without a safety net. Cohen and director Larry Charles’ film provides constant laughter and surprises while daring the viewer to be rightfully offended. This is a bold film likely to elicit strong opinions. Put me down on the side of those cracking up even when it feels wrong to be laughing.

Grade: A

(Photos TM and © Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All Rights Reserved.)

Gran Torino

2009-07-09T13:47:00.003-04:00

GRAN TORINO (Clint Eastwood, 2008)

For supposedly his last time performing on screen, Clint Eastwood chooses to go out as the kind of tough, no-nonsense son of a gun that has defined his acting career. In GRAN TORINO Eastwood is newly widowed Walt Kowalski, a crusty Korean War veteran who doesn't suffer anyone or mince words, no matter how inappropriate they might be. Walt's an equal opportunity offender who's just as quick to tell off his own children and grandkids as he is to apply racist terms to the many immigrants who now live in his old Detroit neighborhood.

The retired auto worker's most cherished possession is a 1972 Gran Torino, so he doesn't take kindly to Thao Vang Lor (Bee Vang) a boy from the Hmong family next door, trying to steal it as part of a gang initiation ritual. Walt feels no affection for the Lors, but when gang members try to take Thao, he chases them away.

Thao's grateful sister Sue (Ahney Her) and mother insist that the teen work for Walt as a means of atoning for the attempted car theft. Although Walt is reluctant to accept the offer, he acknowledges that this is a chance to get the neighborhood cleaned up how he wants. Through his work ethic, Thao slowly wins over Walt and increases the senior citizen's protective instinct for foreigners who end up having more in common with him than his own flesh and blood.

Like a new driver learning to operate a manual transmission, director Eastwood's awkward shifting of tones makes the lurching GRAN TORINO a frustrating ride. Parts of GRAN TORINO are clearly supposed to be funny. Eastwood's cranky old man act lets him verbally knock around a baby-faced priest, utter a stream of slurs, and even snarl the oldster rallying cry "get off my lawn" to no-good thugs.

The beloved movie star relishes the chance to put everyone in their place, but Eastwood may be having too much fun as he sets up ridiculously easy targets to hit, such as Walt's etiquette-lacking kin. Even if GRAN TORINO doesn't abide Walt's outdated racist words, it sympathizes with him and makes his offensiveness a charming quirk even in moments when his antiquated attitude shouldn't be humorous.

Nevertheless, actions may matter more than words, particularly when considering those long set in their ways, even if the comedy of Walt's insults can be jarring next to the cross-cultural and generational drama examining Eastwood's prototypical stoic hero. At a time when people rush to unload their innermost thoughts to anyone and everyone, Walt is a relic who clings to and attempts to squash his deepest feelings. How Walt lives is the only statement he needs to make, although it means presenting an incomplete picture to others.

GRAN TORINO is most invigorating when Walt's ways and beliefs are challenged. The crosscutting of culture-spanning similarities provides a strong argument for building understanding, but Walt's softening attitude toward those he once detested is less impactful due to uniformly bad supporting performances. Water may be able to wear down rock, but it's a stretch that the charisma-challenged neighbors would sway Walt.

Grade: C+

Lovely by Surprise

2009-07-08T12:54:00.006-04:00

LOVELY BY SURPRISE (Kirt Gunn, 2007)

Being able to point people toward an unfamiliar but good movie--an overlooked gem, perhaps one that never escaped the festival circuit--is one of the most enjoyable things I can do as a film critic. Yes, negative reviews can be fun to write from time to time, but I didn't start critiquing films so I could piss all over the creative efforts of others. I'd much rather be championing movies than thrashing them, especially because I'd rather see good movies than bad ones.

I'm in my tenth year of doing film criticism online, so by now I'm on enough publicists' lists to be offered a decent number of screeners for review. Because there's only so much time in the day to watch and write about films, I tend to be particular in what I'll request. Granted, there is no guarantee that I'll like what I'll see, but I pick films that I think will interest and appeal to me. Maybe I'll uncover one of those underseen treasures.

Which is all a roundabout way of leading me to the troublesome case of LOVELY BY SURPRISE. I responded affirmatively when asked if I'd like to get a copy for review. After all, the independent comedy/drama from writer-director Kirt Gunn won the New American Cinema Special Jury Prize at the 2007 Seattle International Film Festival. Online reviews aren't plentiful, but most that I've found are glowing. It seemed like the sort of film that fell between the cracks and could use my drop in the bucket of critical support. Sounds good. And then I watched the DVD.

LOVELY BY SURPRISE layers scenes featuring three distinct sets of characters whose paths gradually converge, although not always in expected ways. The film's hub is Marian (Carrie Preston), who is writing an ambitious novel in which actions in the real world affect the characters in the book. Stuck on how to advance the story, she goes to her former writing professor Jackson (Austin Pendleton) for advice. He assesses that Marian's novel contains no conflict. Jackson proposes that this non-dilemma dilemma can be neatly resolved by killing off one of the characters. The idea troubles her, but she agrees to give it a shot.

Marian's underwear-clad characters reside in a houseboat in the middle of a field but cannot leave the landlocked vessel. For subsistence the author provides them with boxed cereal within a spear's throw and a milkman's deliveries. The stout Humkin (Michael Chernus), the one in the baby blue briefs, wants to abandon ship, but his brother Mopekey (Dallas Roberts), he of the yellow underpants, is determined to keep him onboard. When Marian attempts to kill Humkin, she presents the opportunity he needs to jump ship and the written page.

Connecting the separate scenes of the writer and her creations is easy to do, but it's less certain how the moments with grieving car salesman Bob (Reg Rogers) and his daughter Mimi (Lena Lamer) fit into the puzzle. After his wife's death Bob has taken to waxing philosophical with customers and talking them out of new vehicle purchases. He can't stop talking, but Mimi has clammed up.

LOVELY BY SURPRISE'S aggressive quirkiness is off-putting from the get-go and the biggest barrier to engaging with the film. The silly names and affected behavior of Marian's characters are the most glaring examples of a movie trying too hard to be unconventional, but it's the comedic and dramatic tones, off by a smidgen throughout, that can make the film insufferable at times.

While the final scene makes the gist of the film undeniably clear, specific questions arising from the opaque narrative aren't resolved in a satisfying manner. Every little uncertainty doesn't need to be answered, but LOVELY BY SURPRISE doesn't give the impression that it is operating with a consistent internal logic. Whether the blame stems from the screenwriting or editing is hard to say, although it probably can be attributed to both.

LOVELY BY SURPRISE employs flourishes of David Lynch-like dreaminess minus the menace. The disconnected feel, coupled with the annoying eccentricities, establishes another blockade to entering the film. Existing at arm's-length may achieve the goal of exploring the mental investment in creative work and the toll that authorial honesty and writer's block can take, but it makes for a displeasing viewing experience.

Although LOVELY BY SURPRISE drowns in its own preciousness, clearly it boasts some talent in front of and behind the camera. Preston, last seen stealing a scene as the corporate travel agent Clive Owen dupes in DUPLICITY, does a fine job balancing the fragility and intensity Marian draws upon to devote herself fully to her writing. Rogers is strangely compelling as a character obviously failing to hold himself together yet still retaining a measure of persuasiveness.

Cinematographer Steve Yedlin, who also lensed Rian Johnson's BRICK and THE BROTHERS BLOOM, favors a soft, gloomy look with bursts of color that matches the film's emotional palette. Gunn displays an eye for interesting shot composition and maintains a good pace that keeps LOVELY BY SURPRISE watchable in spite of the irritations.

These positive qualities and the DIY effort to get the film seen are why I almost feel like I need to apologize for disliking LOVELY BY SURPRISE so strongly. Almost.

Grade: D+

(LOVELY BY SURPRISE is now available on DVD.)

My Sister's Keeper

2009-07-07T12:41:00.004-04:00

MY SISTER'S KEEPER (Nick Cassavetes, 2009)

In MY SISTER'S KEEPER eleven-year-old Anna Fitzgerald (Abigail Breslin) will do and has done just about anything for her leukemia-afflicted teenage sister Kate (Sofia Vassilieva). Their parents Sara and Brian (Cameron Diaz and Jason Patric) conceived Anna with the plan that she would donate what Kate needed, be it umbilical cord blood or bone marrow, in the fight against cancer.

For all of her young life Anna has provided what Kate requires, although how much of a willing participant she's been is up for debate. As Kate takes a turn for the worse, the time comes for Anna to donate a kidney to keep her sibling alive. Within the family it's accepted--and expected--that Anna will again give part of herself to assist her older sister. Needless to say, Sara and Brian are shocked when their little girl sues them for medical emancipation.

Anna hires lawyer Campbell Alexander (Alec Baldwin) to help her win the right to make decisions about her own body. Prior medical procedures to benefit Kate have had complications and required hospital stays for Anna. A kidney donation would mean lifelong limitations on what activities she can participate in. It also doesn't guarantee Kate will be cured. Anna loves Kate and doesn't want her to die, but the coercive pressure her parents, especially her mother, have put on her has reached a breaking point.

Initially MY SISTER'S KEEPER looks to be a hot button drama about the ethics of donor children, but that sensitive subject is merely the hook for getting into a story about how a family can be torn apart when one member has a terminal illness. The nonlinear storytelling divides the narration among the Fitzgeralds, which allows the film to get a broader understanding of the choices that have led to this crisis and how each person has been affected. Not all of the characters are done justice--Brian and son Jesse (Evan Ellingson) mostly serve to push the action along--but the technique fills in gaps that would exist if it were told from a single perspective.

Based on Jodi Picoult's novel, MY SISTER'S KEEPER is an unrepentant tearjerker, and writer-director Nick Cassavetes and co-writer Jeremy Leven build a solid, albeit exposed infrastructure for facilitating the waterworks. (The screening I attended featured the most audience sniffling and sobbing I think I've ever heard at the movies.)

Sara's apparent inability to consider Anna's well-being and individuality might be interpreted as monstrous behavior--sometimes she loses sight that her youngest child is more than spare parts--although her backstory and Diaz's credible performance make such reactions seem like the natural fallout from years of ferocious caregiving. Sara has so much energy and love invested in Kate that she is blinded to what's happening around her and doesn't know when to let go. Sara may be difficult to like, but Diaz imparts her with conviction and thus makes the character's reasoning seem rational to her.

MY SISTER'S KEEPER might have earned its weepy moments if it had played fair with its central dilemma rather than putting forward a false choice. The film conveniently dodges the question of whether it is moral to have a child for the express purpose of catering to a sibling's medical needs. While MY SISTER'S KEEPER may be primarily concerned with family dynamics during stressful times, the ethical question it raises looms too large for a loophole to render it unimportant in the grand scheme of things.

If the controversial issue wasn't going to be addressed, it didn't need to be introduced. The basis for an emotionally powerful and messy film about love and loss is plainly evident, but the unresolved gimmick distracts from where attention should be directed.

Grade: C+

Whatever Works

2009-07-06T15:28:00.003-04:00

WHATEVER WORKS (Woody Allen, 2009)

WHATEVER WORKS is Woody Allen's fortieth feature film as director. Once again he uses the cinematic forum to voice his ideas and fears about love and death while cracking some jokes along the way.

Boris Yellnikoff (Larry David), a classic version of the Allen protagonist, is a New York intellectual obsessed with his own mortality. Boris may be a string theorist whose genius almost snared him a Nobel Prize, but his true calling is as a professional neurotic. Boris often seems happier when he's miserable. Lord knows he tries to make lemons when life gives him lemonade. Boris dumps his rich, highly compatible wife and jumps out of a window intent to end it all. Since the universe has a twisted sense of humor, he survives and thus has something else to grumble about.

Moving on, Boris finds contentment living alone and following his routines--or as much contentment as an agitated misanthrope can have--but his life gets upended when he meets Melodie St. Ann Celestine (Evan Rachel Wood), a beauty pageant queen from Mississippi who has run away from home to make it in the Big Apple. With little more than a high school letterman's jacket to her name, Melodie needs a place to stay--temporarily, of course. He's resistant to having his space invaded but eventually agrees to let her crash for a night or two.

Then a funny thing happens. Boris discovers that he doesn't mind having Melodie around. She listens with rapt attention to his rants about people and accepts his theories and cultured tastes as her own.

On CURB YOUR ENTHUSIASM David has refined an acerbic personality that turns out to be a perfect match for Boris and his acid-tinged worldview, an increasingly common character trait in Allen's movies. Bitterness has been creeping into the writer-director's work, so it helps that David, eminently comfortable in the Woody Allen role, brings an amused fatalism to the part that keeps this rather toxic-sounding man from becoming unlikable.

Boris kvetches about stupid people a lot, but David's body language tends to reflect an attitude of humored indifference. Allen also eases up on coming off like a crank when it becomes clear that Boris' intolerance and ritual bound behavior, such as his hand washing, are just secular versions of the religious dogma he rejects. Boris may not be a big stretch for David to play, but he makes a consistently funny curmudgeon.

Wood ends up being a better foil for David than expected and makes Melodie sufficiently convincing in the story, which is a pretty tall order. At first her airheaded, molasses-accented character seems like the worst of Allen's conception of non-New Yorkers, but Wood's bright-eyed, irony-free performance has charm and innocence to nicely offset the film's aged astringency. Allen continues to paint a target on his back by having another pretty young thing go gaga for an old man. The May/December romance in WHATEVER WORKS is pretty implausible. Thankfully it's the amusing collision of the brainy and the ditsy that matters more.

WHATEVER WORKS takes a serious downturn in the second half when the focus drifts from Boris. Melodie's mother Marietta (Patricia Clarkson) turns up at his door looking for her daughter, and later on her father John (Ed Begley Jr.) appears too. Not only do the awakenings of these southern conservatives to New York liberalism feel like Allen at his laziest, but also their arcs are just not that funny, interesting, or developed.

Due in part to the sheer volume of Allen's filmography, WHATEVER WORKS is bound to seem familiar, but he's found a winning formula, even if this film's title suggests a less than fastidious approach to getting it right.

Grade: B-

Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs

2009-07-03T22:05:00.001-04:00

ICE AGE: DAWN OF THE DINOSAURS (Carlos Saldanha and Mike Thurmeier, 2009)

When sitcom characters start getting married and having children, the developments often indicate that the creative wells in the writers' rooms are running dry. These warning signs are all over the ICE AGE series, which has now yielded two sequels, with more likely to come as long as the box office receipts, not worthwhile untold stories, warrant them.

The original 2002 animated film was pleasant enough as it followed the comedic exploits of prehistoric creatures during the glacial period, but it didn't suggest untapped tales about these characters. 2006's subpar follow-up ICE AGE: THE MELTDOWN introduced a spouse for woolly mammoth Manny (Ray Romano). As ICE AGE: DAWN OF THE DINOSAURS opens, Manny and his beloved Ellie (Queen Latifah) are waiting for the arrival of their first fuzzy bundle of joy, something which has the expectant pop in a tizzy to childproof the frozen landscape they call home.

The impending mammoth domesticity has other members of the multiple species herd feeling left out. Saber-toothed tiger Diego (Denis Leary) notices that he's losing his predatory edge and elects to strike out on his own. Sid the sloth (John Leguizamo) is mindful that he is experiencing some parental stirrings, but with no nearby female sloths to speak of, he must build a family by adopting three abandoned eggs he discovers underneath the ice.

When the eggs hatch, Sid becomes the dutiful caregiver to Tyrannosaurus rex triplets, but his happiness is shortlived when the displeased momma T. rex comes looking for her babies. She hauls off Sid and the kids to an underground land where some dinosaurs survived the global freeze. Loyal to a fault, Sid's friends venture on a rescue mission by journeying below the ice. There they fall under the leadership of the wily and possibly crazy weasel Buck (Simon Pegg).

Breaking up the main story is saber-toothed squirrel Scrat's never-ending pursuit of an acorn. The addition of the female Scratte for this third go-round presents competition and a love interest for the tireless forager. Scrat's wordless vignettes have been highlights of the previous ICE AGE films, and the nutty scenarios he gets into again are among the funniest parts of this one. Whether straining to be freed from the tar adhering him to a tree or bopping along in a bubble after that darn acorn, Scrat's scenes possess an unforced silliness missing in the primary story.

ICE AGE: DAWN OF THE DINOSAURS needs injections of cartoon merriment and orneriness to cure the blandness afflicting the plot and characters. Buck has his humorously unhinged moments, and Sid's sweet goofiness earns a smile here and there. Otherwise a great affinity with those in the herd isn't developed.

The animation is solid and features a couple nice action setpieces that probably look neat in 3-D--I saw the 2-D version--but what lingers is the predictability and indistinctiveness of it all. ICE AGE: DAWN OF THE DINOSAURS had to concoct an explanation for shoehorning the extinct reptiles into the timeline, so why limit the dinos' expressiveness to mere grunts and roars? It's just one of several signs that the film's modest creative hits and misses qualify it as an unremarkable, fitfully diverting effort than a mammoth letdown.

Grade: C

(Photo credit: Blue Sky Studios, TM and © Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All Rights Reserved.)

Friday the 13th

2009-07-02T12:33:00.006-04:00

FRIDAY THE 13TH (Marcus Nispel, 2009)

The latest FRIDAY THE 13TH is not a remake of the original 1980 film but a reboot of a franchise that refuses to die just like its hockey-masked, machete-wielding killer. Since it begins with a reminder of the killer's fate at the end of the first movie, this FRIDAY THE 13TH might be thought of as a direct sequel.

The return to a present day Camp Crystal Lake introduces a new bumper crop of horny young people partying in the wilderness. The intervening years have not mellowed Jason Vorhees (Derek Mears), so he turns to a combination of brute strength and sadistic inventiveness to begin weeding the landscape of these buff campers.

Six weeks later Clay Miller (Jared Padalecki) comes to the area looking for his sister Whitney (Amanda Righetti), who disappeared along with her friends. The local citizens are no help, and the police have given up their search. The libidinous college students he encounters aren't terribly concerned about his story until Jason starts picking them off one by one.

The first FRIDAY THE 13TH is not a masterwork by any stretch of the imagination, but it has one crucial thing the 2009 edition lacks completely: the element of surprise. This version tries to drum up scares through cranked up, unanticipated noises on the soundtrack but rarely utilizes Jason's presence in such unexpected ways. Instead Jason is often seen before he goes about the business of killing his prey as though it's another routine day at the workplace.

Not only does director Marcus Nispel's strategy drain the moments of any tension, but it also reverses the scenarios from ones of dread to scenes that read as though there's pleasure to be derived from the impending butcherings. Audience identification is with the killer, not the victims. Certainly this bloodlust is nothing new in modern horror film. It's probably the biggest shift from the victim-sympathetic 80s slasher movies to the current wave. Moral implications aside, the tactic eliminates the potential for terror from the equation.

No one goes to a FRIDAY THE 13TH movie expecting great acting or screenwriting, but the pitiful performances, paltry story, and formulaic execution reinforce the lack of effort put into this scare-less twelfth installment. Thirteen years ago SCREAM delivered what seemed like a comedic death blow to slasher film clichés produced in the wake of the first FRIDAY THE 13TH and its slew of sequels and competitors. Unfortunately this latest entry demonstrates that, like Jason, lazy and ineffective cinematic clichés are hard to kill.

Grade: D

Bigger Stronger Faster*

2009-07-01T09:53:00.006-04:00

BIGGER STRONGER FASTER* (Chris Bell, 2008)

Are athletes who use anabolic steroids cheating? Are the drugs detrimental to one's health? The documentary BIGGER STRONGER FASTER*: THE SIDE EFFECTS OF BEING AMERICAN doesn't always provide the expected answers to these questions.

Director and narrator Chris Bell is a weightlifter struggling with the ethics of steroid use. His two weightlifting brothers take them. He's tried steroids but feels there's something wrong about using such performance enhancements. With BIGGER STRONGER FASTER Bell looks for answers regarding the effects of steroids and the culture's obsession with perfection.

The micro purpose of BIGGER STRONGER FASTER is to explore whether anabolic steroid use is as dangerous as it is claimed to be. Bell speaks to those in the bodybuilding community who don't buy into what they consider unsupported statements of steroid use's irreversible consequences.

Presenting his information as a less strident and glib Michael Moore, Bell makes an apologist's case that is neutral toward steroids, if not an implicit endorsement of them. Considering that he expeditiously discredits the only anti-steroids doctor and layman interviewed in the film, some doubt is cast over the strength and evenhandedness of his arguments. Nevertheless, Bell succeeds at muddying the waters when it comes to what we know versus what we're told in the film about the drugs.

BIGGER STRONGER FASTER'S macro purposes are to determine where the line is between cheating and fairness and to examine what Bell believes to be a uniquely American mindset to be the best no matter the cost.

Why are using steroids to build muscle and quicken recovery times deemed unacceptable while Lasik eye surgery to improve vision is permissible? After all, both give competitive advantages. The naysayers would quickly point out that individuals aren't risking deleterious long-term effects on their well-being (or death) with vision correction. Thus, pro sports administrators don't need to legislate against it, but keep in mind the film proposes that the use of steroids is not as damaging as popularly portrayed. The documentary doesn't, nor should it be expected to, resolve the matter, but it raises big, intriguing questions that rarely, if ever, come up in the hubbub about steroid use in professional athletics, particularly Major League Baseball.

Bell is on shakier ground when he theorizes that performance enhancement is an indelibly American obsession. He is correct that our national striving for greatness emphasizes a winner above all else mentality, but Bell overreaches in applying this exclusively to Americans. After all, one of his inspirations, Arnold Schwarzenegger, was an Austrian citizen when he began winning bodybuilding titles, and blood doping isn't limited to American cyclists.

Bell wonders why many of the people in the film and the culture at large refuse to be satisfied with the natural limitations of their bodies. Why isn't fulfilling one's potential good enough? It's on this individual level, when it plays like a personal essay, that BIGGER STRONGER FASTER is most compelling.

The use of performance enhancing drugs in sports is a hot button issue that can't afford room for nuances lest some try to exploit loopholes for gain. Bell's uncertainty about the ethical dilemmas feels like a genuine and appropriate response. Agree or disagree with him, his documentary gives sports fans a lot to chew on.

Grade: B

(Photos courtesy of Magnolia Pictures)

Terminator Salvation

2009-06-29T11:16:00.007-04:00

TERMINATOR SALVATION (McG, 2009)

TERMINATOR SALVATION picks up the series with John Connor (Christian Bale) at the forefront in the war against the machines. Set in 2018, fourteen years after the Judgement Day brought on by Skynet, the scrappy survivors battle the robots trying to purge all humans from the planet. Of particular interest to them is Kyle Reese (Anton Yelchin), the teen destined to be Connor's father.

While the computers hunt for Reese, the resistance believes they have found a signal that will destroy the machines. Connor's broadcasts and mythic status give him claims to a leadership role, and he demands to be the one to carry out the mission.

Meanwhile, death row inmate Marcus Wright (Sam Worthington) wakes up in this future. The last thing he remembers is being prepped for execution fifteen years earlier. Wright's motives and purpose are of great concern to Connor, but eventually he has no choice but to trust him as they team up to rescue Reese and hopefully deliver the crushing blow to the Skynet headquarters.

TERMINATOR SALVATION boasts impressive setpieces that provide eye-popping visual scale, but the story so badly lacks scope that the film feels small and, ultimately, inconsequential.

The killer machines are fast and frightening. The film is jammed with action, something that McG and the kinetic camera capture with dazzling technique. TERMINATOR SALVATION delivers the goods as an action and effects extravaganza, but after awhile the man versus machine mayhem tends to blur into an endless loop. The human characters are severely underwritten, a quality that comes to bear during the beats when the film pauses for exposition.

Practically since birth John Connor has carried the weight of knowing his role in this war, so Bale's stern performance suits the character, even if it's as one-note as the rest of TERMINATOR SALVATION. The screenplay hampers him with little to do but bark at everyone in the vicinity.

Bryce Dallas Howard must have been cast as his wife Kate solely because her red hair keeps the continuity with Claire Danes, who held the role in 2003's TERMINATOR 3: RISE OF THE MACHINES. For a franchise that has offered strong female leads, Kate Connor's near-invisibility in TERMINATOR SALVATION is a disappointment at best. It also means a good actress is underutilized, but so it goes in a film enthralled with computer-generated effects to the point where the humanity is cut out, ironically enough.

Ignoring the fact that the advertising reveals Marcus Wright's secret, the film's bungled introduction of the character leaves little doubt about his intended role in this war. Without any questions as to why Marcus turns up when he does, where's the drama and tension? Then there's the time travel element that makes one wonder if all of the events in the film's universe are predetermined, although that path is better left untraveled lest the fourth TERMINATOR be rendered irrelevant.

TERMINATOR SALVATION is fitfully entertaining in its unceasing futuristic warfare, but if the characters are fighting for humanity's survival, they've already lost on one front. The computers have taken over the filmmaking.

Grade: C

Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian

2009-06-28T10:10:00.009-04:00

NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM: BATTLE OF THE SMITHSONIAN (Shawn Levy, 2009)

In NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM: BATTLE OF THE SMITHSONIAN Larry Daley (Ben Stiller) has traded in his night security guard uniform for a suit and tie as an inventor and TV pitchman. He still swings by the Museum of Natural History to see his old friends that make up the exhibits, but his visits have become fewer during the couple years since their initial adventure.

Larry learns that new interactive holographic terminals are replacing the old displays, which are being packed and shipped to the Smithsonian's archives. Ahkmenrah's tablet is staying in New York, though, which means that miniature cowboy Jedediah (Owen Wilson), Roman soldier Octavius (Steve Coogan), and pals will not come to life at night in Washington D.C.

To their benefit and Larry's aggravation, the sticky-fingered Capuchin monkey steals the tablet and takes it along to the Smithsonian. There the pharoah Kahmunrah (Hank Azaria) tries to get it so he can summon an underworld army to help him rule the planet. Larry poses as a security guard so he can infiltrate the nineteen Smithsonian museums and thwart the pharoah's plans.

NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM: BATTLE OF THE SMITHSONIAN collects and unveils a who's who of television and film comedians like an institution amasses and showcases artifacts. Jonah Hill gets a funny scene as a Smithsonian guard who confronts Stiller as he is about to touch an exhibit. Bill Hader contributes some amusing moments as a tactically-challenged General Custer who is obsessed with his golden locks.

Azaria's Kahmunrah draws laughs from overestimating what he deems to be his fearsome resurrection, and in a charming turn Amy Adams plays aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart as a screwball spitfire. Ricky Gervais and Mindy Kaling are also worth noting in minor roles while Christopher Guest as Ivan the Terrible and THE OFFICE'S Craig Robinson are among those whose talents are squandered.

Descended from the big budget family films of the 1980s, the first NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM was an enjoyable amusement park ride through the halls of history. The sequel has its moments too, mostly due to the fine cast, but this repeat spin gets a little wearying.

The fatigue stems from the characters running among buildings on the National Mall rather than kicking back with old favorites and new acquaintances alike. Just like on a family's summer vacation, when the pressure is on to cram in as many activities and to appeal to every member every second, NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM: BATTLE OF THE SMITHSONIAN can be too cluttered and hyperactive to appreciate its broad pleasures.

Grade: C+

Anvil! The Story of Anvil

2009-06-27T18:08:00.004-04:00

ANVIL! THE STORY OF ANVIL (Sacha Gervasi, 2008)

Canadian heavy metal band Anvil has been hammering out albums for nearly thirty years. They were a key influence on Metallica and Anthrax, among others, yet the band never achieved the same levels of popularity or financial success.

In the documentary ANVIL! THE STORY OF ANVIL director and former Anvil roadie Sacha Gervasi follows the group as they take a break from their day jobs to embark on a European club tour and record their thirteenth album.

As childhood friends lead singer and guitarist Steve "Lips" Kudlow and drummer Robb Reiner formed Anvil in 1978. Despite years of professional disappointments and setbacks, they continue to hold onto the belief that their break may just be around the corner. While they look like (and are) middle-aged men, on the inside they're still teenagers in the garage creating rock masterpieces that the whole world will hear and love someday.

Such Pollyanna-ish confidence sets up the band for the contemptuous laughter of audiences, yet Gervasi's pure love of and respect for Anvil dampens the hoots. An affectionate portrait rather than a sad, derisive takedown, ANVIL! THE STORY OF ANVIL finds inspiration in the passion and tenacity these aging metalheads display.

Regardless of what one thinks about Anvil's brand of rock, Kudlow and Reiner are to be admired for remaining hopeful after banging their heads against the industry's walls for so long. They understand that a breakthrough may never happen, but setbacks and failures can't keep them from doing what they love.

This pie in the sky optimism gives the film a heartwarming side, but it also is employed for comedic effect, naturally. Gervasi models his rockumentary on the mockumentary THIS IS SPINAL TAP and emphasizes Anvil's similarities to their fictional counterparts.

Anvil plays songs with ridiculous sexual lyrics, gets lost on the way to a club in the Czech Republic, and has an amplifier with a setting that goes to eleven. They even visit Stonehenge. Short of opening for a puppet show, Anvil's experiences couldn't overlap more with those of David St. Hubbins and Nigel Tufnel.

Yet one reason why SPINAL TAP remains extraordinarily popular among musicians is that they can relate to the misadventures. Drawing comparisons between Anvil and their unlucky fictional counterpart isn't a slap in the face but an acknowledgement of how dead on SPINAL TAP is regarding the rock and roll lifestyle.

In a good-humored way ANVIL! THE STORY OF ANVIL laughs at the indignities the band is dealt while pounding a path they hope leads to career validation but more often than not guides them into more dead ends. The funny thing is that the documentary proves that their efforts have been worthwhile even if Anvil's rewards haven't been manifested in riches and fame.

Grade: B

Easy Virtue

2009-06-26T23:20:00.007-04:00

EASY VIRTUE (Stephan Elliott, 2008)

Meeting one's in-laws for the first time is a nerve-racking ordeal even for those with the most resolute personalities. For the newly wedded Larita Whittaker (Jessica Biel) in EASY VIRTUE, being introduced to her husband John's family presents a firm test of her self-worth and young marriage.

The Whittakers occupy an enormous estate in the countryside of post-World War I England. The lady of the house, played by Kristin Scott Thomas, sees no reason why her son John (Ben Barnes) should want to leave it. Larita and John's whirlwind romance and marriage do not endear her to her new mother-in-law. Neither do her American citizenship, race car driving occupation, and trail of scandal sheet rumors.

Likewise, John's sisters, the ditzy Hilda (Kimberley Nixon) and sour Marion (Katherine Parkinson), snip at Larita's heels just as much as the family dog. The only sympathy she finds in the house comes from the hired help and Colin Firth as Larita's father-in-law. Mr. Whittaker isn't on the best of terms with the missus after dallying to return home from his battlefield service, so he appreciates the presence of someone he views as a kindred spirit.

Like her character in EASY VIRTUE, Biel strives to prove her respectability and talent in this film adaptation of Noel Coward's play. Known more for her figure and tabloid-documented love affairs, Biel makes a game attempt at proving acting chops that weren't on view in the action film STEALTH or awards bait war drama HOME OF THE BRAVE. While she plays the proper notes, Biel's performance lacks the zing needed to jolt this comedy of manners.

It's a criticism that also applies to the whole of EASY VIRTUE. Thomas and Firth are old hands in this sort of picture, and they spark a few flickers of flinty humor from slinging witticisms. Overall, though, director Stephan Elliott never lets loose the playful bloodsport of conversation regarding disapproved marriage kinship and societal differences. The waggish freedom Elliott does impart to the material comes primarily through anachronistic Jazz Age-styled covers of songs from the likes of Tom Jones and Billy Ocean on the soundtrack.

The easy virtue of the title refers to the presupposed freeness with which Larita has shared her bed, but it could just as well apply to the snap judgments and dismissive attitudes directed toward her and the elder Mr. Whittaker. After all, casting aspersions is easier than receiving them.

The serious turn that EASY VIRTUE takes at a latter stage doesn't feel of a piece with the preceding sections. If Elliott had made the stings of earlier rebukes felt more keenly, then the threat of shattered relationships and futures would seem of greater consequence. As it stands, EASY VIRTUE too lightly considers the costs of frosty familial dealings and is thus neither wickedly funny enough nor substantial.

Grade: C

Michael Jackson 1958-2009

2009-06-25T20:54:00.005-04:00

The first time I remember becoming aware of Michael Jackson was reading in TV Guide about his "Thriller" music video, then unprecedented in cost and length, while I was on the way to summer camp. (Why I was reading TV Guide while in a car is a mystery lost to the ages.) It's likely that I'd heard some of his songs, but I can't recall anything having made an impression on me up to that point as a kid.

You have to remember that in the early 1980s our daily lives weren't immersed in or obsessed with popular culture like they can be today. Still, by the time Thriller was selling copies hand over fist, even an elementary school kid like myself, more interested in sports than pop music, would be hard pressed not to know who Jackson was.

The enormous mainstream adoration he enjoyed nationally and worldwide may have only been surpassed by Elvis Presely and The Beatles. In our niche-oriented culture such massive celebrity is something unlikely to be equalled or even approached again.

That's a large part of the reason why today's news of the singer's death at 50 is such a big deal. Depending on your age, it may be hard to understand or remember how hugely popular he was, especially in light of the freak show the last fifteen or so years of his personal and public life became, but at one time he was a fitting holder of the global title King of Pop.

What do I remember about him? The great, ubiquitous pop songs and the Weird Al Yankovic parodies are first and foremost. I imagine I taped more than a few off the radio. "Billie Jean" is the first music video I recall seeing. I was in my dorm room when I caught the post-Simpsons premiere of the "Black or White" video, which had me amazed with the morphing special effect and weirded out by the controversial coda with him touching himself, breaking things, and turning into a black panther.

There was Captain EO (parts 1 & 2 on YouTube), the Jacksons Victory tour Pepsi cans, and the Oprah Winfrey interview during which he claimed his skin was lighter because of vitiligo. I remember that my high school friends and I were strangely fascinated with Moonwalker. I'm not sure if I ever saw it all the way through, but seeing that trailer again brings back memories of how crazy the film is. I can't leave out the Moonwalker arcade game at Marion's Pizza in Englewood either. (What can't you find on the internet? This longer video apparently features a game played all the way through.)

Believe it or not, I don't own a single Michael Jackson song. It could be because when I became a frequent music buyer I slighted pop confections for more "important" or "authentic" rock. It could be because Jackson was odd and, let's face it, increasingly creepy. He leaves an impressive history of pop music, though, and I ought to have some of it to listen to.

It is, of course, impossible to forget his troubled and eccentric life outside of his singing and performing, and rightfully so. Nevertheless, newcasts and Twitter wouldn't be abuzz about Michael Jackson tonight if it weren't for the musical legacy that put him and his actions so prominently in the public eye. Michael Jackson the entertainer was long ago eclipsed by Michael Jackson the tabloid curiosity, but perhaps in time his music can be salvaged from the wreck that he became.

Year One

2009-06-25T13:29:00.005-04:00

YEAR ONE (Harold Ramis, 2009)

Following in the tradition of Mel Brooks' HISTORY OF THE WORLD: PART I, the comedy YEAR ONE features Jack Black and Michael Cera as primitive, incompetent hunter-gatherers bumbling their way through the beginnings of recorded history. In keeping with their established cinematic personalities, Black's Zed is a cheerful idiot while Cera's Oh is a neurotic weakling.

These best pals are already outcasts in their village before a literal banishment from the tribe verifies their feelings of inadequacy. After being expelled they stumble out of the forest and into a series of encounters with David Cross as the treacherous Cain, Hank Azaria's circumcision-fixated Abraham, and the libidinous and virgin-sacrificing population of Sodom.

Black and Cera's shticks are starting to feel as old as the ancient times their characters inhabit in YEAR ONE. Black's dialed-to-eleven foolishness and Cera's low energy performance produce diminishing results because this plays like a lazily ad libbed film reliant on their familiar comedic postures.

The screenplay is credited to director Harold Ramis and THE OFFICE writers Gene Stupnitsky and Lee Eisenberg, but none of the wit found in their best work is displayed here. More often than not they settle for moments like Black eating crap on purpose and Cera oiling up a hirsute Oliver Platt in the fruitless search for laughs.

Other than rooting the humor in scenarios from religious texts rather than riffing on pop culture references, there's little separating YEAR ONE from Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer comedic wastelands like MEET THE SPARTANS and DISASTER MOVIE.

Seeds of a better film are planted in potentially more fertile ground when YEAR ONE connects jokes regarding how traditions may originate from accidents and the power-mongering of rulers, basically anything but divine decrees, but it's not clever or funny enough to unleash the sorts of potentially blasphemous challenges put forth in Monty Python's LIFE OF BRIAN. This uninspired Torah-lampooning sketch comedy is as arid and empty as the landscapes which the protagonists wander across.

Grade: D+

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

2009-06-24T10:10:00.010-04:00

TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN (Michael Bay, 2009)

Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf) and the altruistic Autobots, led by Optimus Prime (Peter Cullen), may have defeated the Decepticons at the end of TRANSFORMERS, but you can't keep evil alien robots down for long.

In TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN college-bound Sam discovers that he still has a shard of the Allspark, the powerful cube battled over and thought to be destroyed in the first film. Even a small piece of the Allspark can turn ordinary machines into malevolent transformers. Naturally, the Decepticons want this sliver so they can revive their ocean-entombed leader Megatron (Hugo Weaving).

Sam gives the fragment to his girlfriend Mikaela (Megan Fox) for safe keeping but not before he accidentally touches it and has his brain imprinted with visions of alien symbols. This robot language holds clues to the location of an ancient machine that Megatron and his master The Fallen (Tony Todd) want to find so they can harvest the sun's energy.

TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN'S state-of-the-art special effects and humongous scale often make it a sight to behold, but the technical achievements are serving to prop up an ungainly and incomprehensible assault on the senses.

REVENGE OF THE FALLEN isn't significantly different than its predecessor. In fact, the two films are virtually the same. Both of director Michael Bay's franchise behemoths are orgies of robot violence interrupted by exposition payloads delivered through clunky dialogue and goofy, sometimes ill-advised humor. Bay has been criticized before for employing offensive minority stereotypes for laughs, and he's likely to come under fire again, not the least of which is for the shucking and jiving twin Autobots.

The sequel improves the Transformers' character designs, most notably through more distinct facial features, but these changes are often for naught because the robots look like indistinguishable trash-compacted heaps, especially when engaged in combat. Ascertaining which robot is which, let alone what parts of them we're seeing, is a mostly hopeless task.

Whether it's piling up extended action scenes or attempting to spell out the befuddling story's intricacies, TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN is the cinema of overkill. In addition to the main plot points the distended first half crosscuts among the origins of Transformers on earth, an Autobot-military alliance and bureaucratic conflict, Sam's initiation to college life, and his parents' empty nest escapades. The second half is devoted to a thankfully less scattered but ultimately monotonous battle in the Egyptian desert.

With plenty of gigantic, shape-shifting robots ripping it up, the film isn't always a drag, but in this instance, as is usually the case with Bay, more is not for the best. TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN'S 150 minutes is something to endure rather than enjoy.

Grade: D+

A Tribute to Frank Gabrenya

2009-06-04T12:33:00.005-04:00

(Still from Melvin and Howard, which is showing on June 4 at the Wexner Center for the Arts as part of "A Tribute to Frank Gabrenya")

It seems like every couple days Movie City News links to yet another article about a film critic being laid off. Newspapers are struggling, and local arts coverage is often one of the services deemed non-essential by decision makers. Syndicated film reviews, often coming from New York or Los Angeles, replace of the hometown voice and perspective. It may make business sense, although I wonder if losing writers with whom readers form relationships is productive in the long run.

Frank Gabrenya wrote about film for the Columbus Citizen-Journal before moving onto the Columbus Dispatch in 1987. Frank was the fulltime film critic there until this April when he was among 45 Dispatch employees let go.

While the Columbus area has more film critics than the average reader might expect, Frank was the most prominent and, I’m guessing, the longest serving in this community. He continues to write the occasional freelance review for the Dispatch, but it’s not the same as seeing his name attached to bylines for the pieces covering most of the new releases every Friday. (Of course, no disrespect is intended to Nick Chordas and the other freelancers. Nick is doing an admirable job striving to keep a couple locally written reviews in the Dispatch each week.)

Tonight, as a way of saying thanks for his years of service, the Wexner Center for the Arts presents "A Tribute to Frank Gabrenya". He will introduce the Jonathan Demme comedy Melvin and Howard. The program begins at 7 p.m.

Back in 1997, when my Now Playing co-host Paul Markoff and I were new film critics, we asked Frank if he would include us in his annual column surveying local critics on their favorite films of the year. We were (and still are) largely unknown to most in the Dispatch’s readership, but he gladly welcomed us into the fold. It's the least I can do to say thanks here for his help, cooperation, and friendship through the years and to be among those honoring him by attending this evening's tribute.

Views of The Room

2009-05-21T21:21:00.006-04:00

Whether I'm keeping up with new movies in theaters, catching up on films I haven't seen, or rewatching favorites, I don't have the time or inclination for viewing movies that are supposedly so bad that they become good. I chose to make an exception for THE ROOM.

I was unaware of this cult film until reading A.V. Club writer Scott Tobias' New Cult Canon entry on it. (An Entertainment Weekly article about the film and the phenomenon is also essential reading.) THE ROOM sounded intriguingly awful, but I couldn't locate it on Netflix and just assumed it wasn't available on DVD. When I found out about Columbus Alive's private screening of it tonight, I knew I needed to go if possible. Thanks to Alive's Melissa Starker for getting me on the list to attend.

Although it plays as comedy, THE ROOM is a drama about sensitive banker Johnny (Tommy Wiseau) and his cheating, scheming fiancée Lisa (Juliette Danielle). (I'm not buying after the fact claims that THE ROOM is supposed to be as hilarious as it is.) Lisa seduces Johnny's best friend Mark (Greg Sestero), who is conflicted about the affair because he is Johnny's best friend and Lisa knows that he is Johnny's best friend.

THE ROOM is so incompetently made that the terrible acting and writing take a back seat to the comic artlessness. Viewing this on projected video made it hard to notice the camera's infamous focus problems, yet it isn't hyperbole to say that THE ROOM is shot and assembled as though writer, director, and star Wiseau doesn't know the first thing about film grammar.

Characters come and go without explanation. Plot developments are introduced and discarded, sometimes within the same scene. THE ROOM is essentially a long string of non sequiturs that binds the character's (and Wiseau's) heartbreak. Well, that and three--or was it four?--ridiculously long and determinedly unerotic sex scenes in the first thirty or so minutes.

It's remarkably difficult to make a movie this bad on purpose. Only something made out of tremendously misguided passion and arrogance could achieve the magical crapitude of THE ROOM. Wiseau seems deadly serious about his jaundiced take on women and relationships. Laughable as the movie is, his anguish pours out from this personal cinematic statement. Of course, it's such earnestness in incompetency that makes THE ROOM consistently funny.

That sincerity may also be why, for all of its technical and artistic shortcomings, THE ROOM is compulsively watchable. I couldn't wait to see what utter nonsense would come next. Most bad films are routinely bad; THE ROOM is uncommonly bad.

Although I was foiled in my Netflix search for THE ROOM, I've since learned that it can be purchased on DVD. (How else would a projected DVD have been shown this evening?) I wouldn't have wanted to have watched this for the first time at home by myself.

THE ROOM is something that's best seen with a lot of people. Witnessing an astonishingly inept movie with the small group gathered tonight in Surly Girl Saloon's party room made for the kind of fun, communal experience that moviegoing is supposed to be but often isn't. Here's one time when talking during the movie added to the ambience.

Perhaps an enterprising Columbus movie theater will give THE ROOM a midnight movie run. I've got to think this thing would play like crazy.

Ebertfest 2009: Day 3

2009-04-25T00:45:00.007-04:00

The two academic panels that commenced day three of the 11th annual Roger Ebert's Film Festival couldn't have been more apropos for my film critic self. The discussions, titled Movies & Everyday Life and Film Criticism & the Internet, would seem to get to the fundamentals of what I do: thinking about the movies (and seeing them) on a regular basis and writing about them online.

The broadly titled first panel was less about how movies might be incorporated into one's daily life--something I'd propose is increasingly common due to the features and clips available for immediate access online--and more about how films reflect ordinary people and if general audiences are willing to see them. This seems to be a recurring topic for debate at Ebertfest. Much of the talk was familiar to me, especially the dragged out audience comments/questions that needed to be kept in check by Robert's Rules of Order, but it was interesting to hear Ramin Bahrani's thoughts because he's someone who thinks deeply about these issues and can articulate himself well.

(Frozen River actress Misty Upham)

The film criticism discussion suffered from having ten people on the panel. With all those highly opionated people and a broad subject, keeping focus and letting everyone get their say was a challenge. Presumably all of the critics on the panel make a living writing about films, but the current state of the profession suggests to me that for most it is a labor of love and will only become more of a hobbyist's pursuit as newspaper positions are eliminated and paying gigs dry up even more.

(Festival director Nate Kohn, Begging Naked director Karen Gehres, festival blogger Lisa Rosman)

The screening side of the festival's day kicked off with another documentary. It's arguable that everything shown at Ebertfest to this point has been a doc of a sort. Even the lone fiction narrative shown so far, Chop Shop, incorporated a naturalistic style meant to evoke real experiences, and Frozen River, screened later in the day, also possessed a feel for documentary truth. Usually the festival isn't so singleminded, so I wonder if it was purposeful this year.

For nine years Begging Naked director Karen Gehres interviewed her friend Elise Bainbridge Hill to tell her story. The unvarnished look at this woman's life reveals that she ran away from home to New York City at the age of fifteen and quickly became a prostitute and heroin addict. Eventually she cleaned up and made a home in the tight space of a converted air shaft of an apartment building. This was also where she worked on her art, whether painting or making jewelry.

At 30 Hill reentered the sex industry as a stripper in Times Square, but NYC mayor Rudy Giuliani was working on clearing out those businesses. She was eventually left without a job. Her mental condition detiorated, she was evicted, and moved into Central Park where she now lives.

Begging Naked is an unvarnished documentary with great sympathy for and dedication to the person at the center of it. Clearly the film could not have been made without the close relationship between the filmmaker and her subject, but that intimacy breeds an incompleteness in this woman's story. The film feels a lot of righteous anger at how Giuliani's cleaning up of 42nd Street left her friend unemployed and how Hill's eviction pushed her into a deeper set of problems, although it's unclear from the information provided whether the eviction was justified.

My main issue with Begging Naked is one that is far too common with documentaries. Enchanted with the subject, the filmmaker sets up the story but doesn't have enough material to shape it into an arc. Thus the film gets stuck in a loop repeating the same information. In this case that means seeing over the course of years that Hill is living in Central Park and still doing her art. It's fine to a point, but without Hill's scandalous background, I don't know what makes this an exceptional individual story or what the film has to say about homelessness and mental illness in general.

(The Alloy Orchestra's set-up)

Now for something completely different... The Alloy Orchestra's accompaniment of a silent movie is almost an annual occurrence at Ebertfest. It's one of my favorite parts of the festival, perhaps because this is the one time during the year I can experience it, perhaps because they're awfully good at what they do. Their score for The Last Command was more melodic than their typically percussive music, but it was a wonderful complement to the action on screen.

This year the trio wrote and played a score for Josef von Sternberg's 1928 melodrama about a Russian general who led the czar's armies but fled the country when the revolutionists overthrew imperial rule. In The Last Command the once-powerful Grand Duke (Emil Jannings) is now one of many scrabbling for work as an extra in Hollywood films.

It's a vibrant, beautifully crafted film that I feel like I'd have more to say about with the proper time outside of festival fever. Rather than slop together some poorly supported thoughts, I'd rather share some of great intertitles written by Herman J. Mankiewicz, who went on to write some other Hollywood picture. I didn't scribble these down until the movie concluded, but I think I remembered these pretty closely:

-"You are my prisoner of war...and my prisoner of love." (The general says this to a female revolutionist who improbably reciprocates his feelings of affection.)

-"The woman belongs to me. She goes with the coat." (Uttered by a soldier who has taken the general's coat.)

-"And so the backwash of a tortured nation carries another extra to Hollywood." (How's that for describing the general's path from military leadership to one of many Russians in a stack of headshots.)

-"Is that beard supposed to be Russian? It looks like an ad for cough drops." (Hair and makeup people in Hollywood just don't get any respect, do they?)

A happy surprise was that Guy Maddin, whose My Winnipeg screened on day two, joined the post-film discussion on stage. This kind of movie is clearly something near and dear to him, so it was fun to listen to him expound on it.

(WGN's Dean Richards, Frozen River director Courtney Hunt, Misty Upham, and Sony Pictures Classics co-president Michael Barker)

During the post-film discussion for Frozen River director Courtney Hunt joked that there would not be a TV series based on the film. There would not be weekly episodes built upon whoever climbed into and out of the trunk of Ray's car. The thing is that having seen the film a second time, the parallels to AMC television series Breaking Bad were apparent.

Like Breaking Bad's cancer-stricken science teacher Walt (Bryan Cranston) joining up with his burnout former student Jesse (Aaron Paul) to cook and sell meth, Melissa Leo's Ray and Misty Upham's Lila are unlikely partners in smuggling illegals into the United States through Mohawk territory. Both sets of characters are involved in the criminal enterprise out of desperation to survive and provide for their families. They all are largely unconcerned about the ramifications of their actions as long as they get paid. Walt and Ray have a set point they're trying to reach where they get out. Of course, things don't work out how any of them plan, and the suspense comes from identifying with and rooting on main characters doing despicable things in the name of their family's best interest.

Leo and Upham's performances are critical to the success of Frozen River. Seeing Upham in person at the festival presents startling proof of how she deglamorized herself to transform into the character. It would be easy to write off the film's achievement due to powerhouse acting alone, but Hunt's attentive direction and concise and detailed screenplay announces that she's one to watch as much as her lead actresses.

(Grades: The Last Command and Frozen River: B+; Begging Naked: C)

Ebertfest 2009: Day 2

2009-04-24T00:51:00.007-04:00

(Morning panel discussion at the Illini Union Pine Lounge)

While nearly all of the 1600 seats in the Virginia Theatre are usually filled for each screening, a smaller group turns out for the morning panel discussions held on campus at the University of Illinois. Most of the seats are taken, but the numbers simply don't compare.

The lone Thursday panel was titled Movie Making & Distribution in Times of Turmoil. The panelists, pictured above, were Warner Home Video vice-president Ronnee Sass, Woodstock director Michael Wadleigh, Begging Naked director Karen Gehres, Trouble the Water co-directors Tia Lessin and Carl Deal, Sita Sings the Blues director Nina Paley, My Winnipeg director Guy Maddin, and moderator and festival director Nate Kohn. The discussion produced interesting comments from time to time, but since most of the panelists were either first-time feature directors or, in Wadleigh's case, no longer working in the system, perspective on the topic seemed fairly limited.

Having a distributor certainly helps in getting a movie seen, but a better topic might have probed the problem of finding viewers even when a film has distribution. Arthouse theaters have fallen victim to the same kind of model that bigger films have where an opening weekend splash is essential. In the case of these smallers films it's even more important because those first couple days determine if they'll stick in the theaters for another week. With limited promotion, it's an uphill battle for these kinds of movies to stay long enough to reach moviegoers through word of mouth.

(Time Out Chicago film critic Hank Sartin, Guy Maddin, and Ramin Bahrani)

Over at the Virginia Theatre the day began with Maddin's My Winnipeg. I'd seen the film before, although I had found myself in a bit of a fog during that screening. Watching this remembrance of his Canadian hometown I again found myself being lulled into a dream-like state. Maybe there's something in the movie to inspire such haziness. The film itself plays out like an uninhibited lucid dream that gets stuck in loops like the Winnipeg trains that never allow escape from town, and the repetition of words in Maddin's narration seems like a willful attempt to hypnotize.

Maddin's surreal pastiche doesn't resemble what is conventionally thought of as a documentary, yet it would seem that My Winnipeg is factual in spirit and has more basis in truth than I expected. For instance, If Day, in which a fake Nazi invasion of Manitoba was staged to drum up support for the Allies and sell war bonds really happened and wasn't some comedic conceit Maddin dreamed up.

The thin line between documentary and fiction filmmaking continued with Ramin Bahrani's Chop Shop. The neorealist filmmaker--or neo-neorealist, as has been suggested since neorealism is most often associated with post-World War II Italian filmmaking--uses nonprofessional actors and captures something akin to documentary stories even though he's meticulous in crafting scripted narratives.

The story focuses on an orphaned brother and sister living at and working in and around a junkyard's auto body shop in Willet's Point, Queens. Particularly in Chop Shop and Man Push Cart, Bahrani demonstrates his strength for dropping the audience into locations both real and foreign, even if in both instances he's exploring worlds that exist in the United States.

The great economic disparity that exists in the country underlies much of the film, and the looming presence of Shea Stadium visible from the garage provides quiet reminders of the multi-millionaire's playground nearby where kids scrape to survive a daily existence. To say that the kids in the film have been discarded like the piles of parts around them is an obvious metaphor, although it's not presented as blatantly or heavyhandedly in the film.

While I may be making Chop Shop sound like run-of-the-mill independent film miserabilism, Bahrani doesn't dwell on the tough conditions or strive to inspire liberal guilt in viewers. He's interested in seeing what these characters' lives are like and uncovering how they may through day after day. In the end the film's siblings have no choice but to pick themselves up, dust themselves off, and do what's necessary. In it's own way, that's a kind of hope amid the rust and filth.

(Scott Roberts, Kimberly Rivers Roberts with her daughter, Richard Roeper, Tia Lessin, and Carl Deal)

While the day's two previous films dabble in documentary truth and realism, it was fitting for the day to conclude with traditional doc Trouble the Water. Kimberly Rivers Roberts and her family were stuck in their home when Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans. She used a Hi-8 camera to document the storm and flooding after the levees broke. Directors Tia Lessin and Carl Deal incorporate this frequently stunning footage into a story about the Roberts and their struggle to recover from the hurricane's devastation. It's the toll of Hurricane Katrina and the government's response (or lack of one) in miniature.

I'd seen Trouble the Water before the festival and mistakenly believed that I had rated it "mixed"/C+. (I actually was lowercase pro/B-.) Maybe it looks a little better to me after seeing a lot of mediocre documentaries in the last month, but Trouble the Water isn't happy to settle for having landed incredible video and spinning into righteous outrage. It tells the story of these people with care and concern. I appreciate the lack of cheap shots that the film takes and the aspirational and inspirational tack the directors find. For as massively frustrating and frightening as the experience must have been, the Roberts and others depicted in the film don't come off as angry people, which they have every right to be.

Ebertfest possesses the feel of a family reunion, and with Trouble the Water the festival was able to welcome co-director Deal, a hometown boy, back to the area. The fest has also featured its share of post-film musical performances over the years, and this film provided the opportunity for another. Kimberly Rivers Roberts is pursuing a career as a hip hop artist. She capped the evening with a two-song performance that had a predominantly gray-haired audience bouncing along. It was kind of a strange scene, but it was a nice, upbeat note on which to wrap the festival's second day.

(Grades: My Winnipeg and Chop Shop: B; Trouble the Water: B-)

Ebertfest 2009: Opening Night

2009-04-23T01:48:00.004-04:00

(Festival Director Nate Kohn, Chaz Ebert, and Roger Ebert/April 22, 2009)

The 11th annual Roger Ebert's Film Festival welcomed back the man in the event's name. A program on an Apple computer allowed him to deliver some introductory comments. The Urbana, Illinois native's new electronic voice has given him a British accent. Maybe Ebert's just following Madonna's lead. Anyway, it was nice to see him back where he belongs, and the crowd gave him appreciative applause when he appeared on the Virginia Theatre's stage.

The festival kicked off with a screening appropriate for Earth Day: Woodstock, 3 Days of Peace & Music. Honestly, when I saw this title on the list, I wasn't thrilled even though I'd never seen the film before tonight. I like plenty of 1960s music well enough, but my fear was that the movie would be one big self-congratulatory love-in to the flower child generation. Tonight I was further dismayed to discover that we would not be seeing the 184-minute original cut but the longer director's cut. (The festival program lists the running time at 225 minutes. I assume this is the same as the 228-minute director's cut listed on the Internet Movie Database.) Slightly over three hours sounded long enough; verging on four seemed like too much.

Still, I approached Woodstock with an open mind and found it to be a fairly compelling mix of concert film and event documentary. Woodstock is a refreshing change from contemporary music videos and concert films whose directors and editors try to show off their skills to the detriment of watching the performances. Here, whether it's a single camera's intimate, unbroken take of Canned Heat or the three superimposed screens of Ten Years After, seeing the musicians in action is primary. It's a lot easier to get lost in the performance when the visuals are in service to the content rather than the other way around.

That's not to say the film is stylistically austere. The use of split screen was innovative at the time. The mix of music and spot news storytelling--interviewees include affected locals, concert attendees, and the man cleaning the chemical toilets--give an expansive view of the scope and impact of the concert beyond the typical rock and roll movie. The photography in the film is phenomenal and looked fantastic in the pristine high definition source that was screened. (Of course the sound was fabulous too.)

As with any movie in which music is front and center, how much one enjoys it will color the overall experience. There's a lot of good to great stuff. Jimi Hendrix's concluding set proves every single bit why it and he are legendary. The photography, much of it from a low angle that emphasizes his guitar god status, shows how hard he works on his instrument yet how effortless it seems. The close-up of the frets while he interprets "The Star Spangled Banner" does the heavy lifting of music criticism to understand how the sounds the guitar makes ties in with the unsung lyrics. Santana blazes through its one song. The Who tear through three classics. I know it's sacrilege, but I could have done without the folkies, John Sebastian in particular, and Country Joe and the Fish.

(As an aside, is it me or is Sha Na Na a send-up of 1950s youth culture and older America, or is it supposed to be a loving recreation? The performance in the film makes it look like the former.)

As someone who wasn't born when the summer of love took place, I've sort of had enough of hearing how committed and important the Woodstock generation was/is and blah blah blah blah blah. While the film doesn't lack for idealism or sweeping statements about what this concert meant, I was pleasantly surprised to see that these sentiments are mostly kept in check. It was interesting that the festival audience's only applause for a non-performer came when the Port-o-san cleaner was proud to mention he had a son attending the concert and one serving in Vietnam.

The post-film discussion with director Michael Wadleigh, associate producer Dale Bell, and a member of Sha Na Na ventured more into the territory that I was dreading, but fortunately the film speaks well enough for itself. The most interesting thing to come from the talk was the idea that the film's structure roughly takes the shape of The Canterbury Tales in how it weaves together the different stories and perspectives.

(Grade: Woodstock: Director's Cut: B)

Once more with feeling

2009-04-22T16:38:00.007-04:00

In a couple hours I will line up outside the Virginia Theatre in Champaign, Illinois for the start of the 11th annual Roger Ebert's Film Festival. As hard as it is for me to believe, it will be the ninth consecutive year I've come to this university town for the five-day event. Nine years! Where has the time gone?

Prior to 2001, the festival's third year and my first visit to it, I had never attended a film festival of any kind. To be sure, Ebertfest is not like what most people think of when the talk turns to film festivals, and those differences might be what make this event a contender for the ideal film festival experience.

There are no studio bidding wars for the scheduled films or even a prize competition among the pictures. You're not forced to choose among scads of conflicting screenings and rush off to different theaters across the city. Every film is shown once at the Virginia to the entire festival audience. The audiovisual presentation is second to none. The relaxed atmosphere probably helps in making the visiting filmmakers more accessible to festivalgoers. While the price has gone up from the $40 pass I bought to see 14 films in 2001, it's still reasonably priced. People aren't coming to see and be seen. (Well, that's not exactly true when bigger stars come to Champaign-Urbana...) All attention and festival talk is focused on the films and the people who make them rather than the marketplace, which is the way it should be.

I was spoiled the first year I came here. Opening night featured 2001: A Space Odyssey in 70mm. Seated within the first five rows of the cavernous theater, I finally made sense of the film. Its stunning images and powerful sound captivated me and the approximately 1600 other people in the room. (Make no mistake, seeing a big movie with that big of an audience has a different effect than watching something on TV home alone.) Keir Dullea was on stage for a post-film discussion with Ebert, and Arthur C. Clarke chimed in from Sri Lanka via telephone. And this was just the first night of the festival.

I was hooked and have come back each year to try and bottle some of the same cinematic magic that I felt. The films screened in 70mm are often revelatory, and the silents accompanied by The Alloy Orchestra typically rank among each year's highlights. Since Ebert curates the festival, the chance of seeing stinkers is significantly lower, although there are some selected films with which I would take exception with the thumbed critic.

Nowadays returning to Ebertfest is like a reunion at a film festival. There are those who I've become friends with over the years and whose company I get to enjoy for a few days. I was among the younger festivalgoers when I first attended (and still am) since boomers make up an overwhelming percentage of the audience. In that way there's a bit of a Dorian Gray-like experience in coming to the festival. I'll just assume my aging portrait must be squirreled away in the hotel's maintenance room.

In recent years Ebert's health issues have raised concern among those attending the festival--he was unable to attend at all last year--but with his voluminous writing of late and seemingly high spirits, his return should provide a nice lift. The festival has his name on it, and he is obviously part of the attraction for many who show up for five days of movies. Nevertheless, it's the love of films that he possesses and has helped cultivate in those coming to his festival that makes Ebertfest special. I can't wait to feel that buzz of excitement again as I take my spot in the line snaking around the theater.

Coming up at the Wexner Center

2009-04-14T12:10:00.004-04:00

Want to be among the first to find out what's on the Wexner Center's Film/Video calendar this summer?

The Wexner Center will announce its slate of summer films—both the indoor and outdoor series—next Wednesday, April 15 at 2 PM via streaming video at http://www.wexarts.org/live. Film curators Dave Filipi and Chris Stults will announce both the highly anticipated Wex Drive-in Outdoor Film Fest titles and the indoor summer film series. Along with the names of the films, Filipi and Stults will be giving background on the series and taking questions from those viewing the stream via live chat. Information on the films being screened is being kept under wraps until the announcement, but the series are expected to set the “tone” for the summer this year.

Something else to keep an eye on is a June 4 showing of Melvin and Howard as part of A Tribute to Frank Gabrenya. Showing one of the longtime Columbus Dispatch film critic's favorites seems like a fitting way to honor his recently ended career at the paper.

Dragonball Evolution

2009-04-10T15:16:00.002-04:00

DRAGONBALL EVOLUTION (James Wong, 2009)

Aside from awareness of the DRAGONBALL name, I come to this particular manga/anime universe completely cold. Even as an outsider I can ascertain that DRAGONBALL EVOLUTION suffers the pitfalls all niche properties want to avoid in their bids to go mainstream. It's too bland and convoluted for new viewers to recognize what all the fuss is about and, I suspect, too simplified and disrespectful of the source material for the fan base. Except for the presence of Hong Kong star Chow Yun-Fat, this shoddy live-action film is no different or bigger than the sort of junk kids plop down to watch on TV after school.

After two thousand years of imprisonment the alien Lord Piccolo (James Marsters) somehow frees himself and begins a search for all seven dragonballs. When united the glowing orbs grant the possessor one true wish. Seeing as Piccolo is an evil warrior, his heart's desire is more along the lines of world annihilation than a pony or a bicycle.

Standing in Piccolo's way is eighteen-year-old orphan Goku (Justin Chatwin). When his Grandpa Gohan (Randall Duk Kim) is murdered by one of Piccolo's minions, Goku follows the old man's dying wish for him to seek Master Roshi (Chow) for help in continuing his martial arts training and finding the dragonballs. If Goku collects them first, he can use their power to defeat the warlord. Also along to assist with the quest are fame-seeking scientist Bulma (Emmy Rossum), who has developed a dragonball locator, and thief Yamcha (Joon Park).

Fantasy films with complicated backstories can get bogged down in mythological minutiae, so it is to DRAGONBALL EVOLUTION'S partial credit that following the origin mumbo jumbo isn't oppressive for newcomers. Unfortunately, the streamlining that makes the film coherent for the uninitiated also removes all traces of personality and depth. This is a boilerplate epic with single trait characters whose plights are hard to get caught up in because Goku and crew come directly from the cardboard cutout factory.

DRAGONBALL EVOLUTION'S basic story is as old as time, so this sturdy construct needs compelling heroes and villains to distinguish itself from others of this ilk. The characters don't evolve but merely complete tasks on a to-do list. For director James Wong and screenwriter Ben Ramsey the least explanation of character accomplishments and motivations is best.

The ungainly dialogue can be easily imagined coming out of cartoon mouths, especially with these actors' voices. Chow emerges unscathed from this dud because some mischief flickers in his eyes throughout the schematic nonsense. Little of DRAGONBALL EVOLUTION is funny, but at least his performance acknowledges the film for what it is: a quick, inexpensive cash-in on a cult series.

The cheap effects and bargain backlot action wouldn't have wowed anyone twenty years ago, let alone today, proving that going from animation to live-action isn't an advancement for DRAGONBALL EVOLUTION.

Grade: D

CIFF 2009, Day Eight: Love and death

2009-03-27T02:01:00.001-04:00

Back into the bubble. Here's more inelegant but timely reporting on the films seen Thursday at the Cleveland International Film Festival.

-The Candidate (Kandidaten) (Kasper Barfoed, 2008)

Country: Denmark
Genre: Thriller
Synopsis: A lawyer investigating his father's suspicious death is set up to look like a murderer.

Notes: This conventional thriller does nothing to distinguish itself from the many other boilerplate suspense pics that Hollywood churns out. Substitute English for Danish and Mark Wahlberg for this film's lead and you'd have something not only that looks wholly familiar but also wouldn't be deemed worth the time at a festival. Few surprises greet the nondescript main character. As urgent as the circumstances would seem to be, there isn't much tension as he runs around seeking the truth. I've been hoping to come across a solid genre movie, something the fest is light on, but the bland, mechanical Candidate fails to fit the bill.

Grade: C-

-All Around Us (Gururi no koto) (Ryosuke Hashiguchi, 2008)

Country: Japan
Genre: Marital drama
Synopsis: A couple experiences ups and downs during the first eight years of their marriage.

Notes: This is a nicely observed portrait of married opposites and the push and pull of their relationship through new and recurring challenges. Amid all of the misery the husband observes at his job as a courtroom sketch artist, the trauma the wife feels based on expectations of herself and the marriage, and the noncommunication between them, they discover what it takes to make it through the hard times. Unfortunately the image disappeared for a few minutes during a pivotal scene--if not the pivotal scene--so I feel like I may be slightly underrating this based on missing some key moments.

Grade: B

-Melodrama Habibi (Une chanson dans la tête) (Hany Tamba, 2008)

Countries: France, Lebanon
Genre: Melodrama (?)
Synopsis: A washed-up French singer who charted just one song in the 1970s and a lonely 30-year-old Lebanese beautician cross paths when a coffee magnate brings him to Beirut to sing at his wife's birthday party.

Notes: If my synopsis doesn't make this sound hopelessly convoluted, suffice it to say that there's even more nonsense that makes this a film in search of main characters and tone. (I didn't even mention the wheelchair-bound coffee baron's wife being accidentally carjacked and held for ransom along with the Mercedes.) At times it opts for wacky gags. Other moments mine a lightly mournful element. The larger problem, though, is the lack of a firm identification of whose story (or stories) it is. It's too scattered to belong to the singer, played by Patrick Chesnais, or the beautician but just concentrated on them enough to avoid being an ensemble piece. The conclusion seems particularly bizarre considering the relative lightness of everything preceding the downbeat ending.

Grade: C-

-Youssou N'Dour: I Bring What I Love (Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi, 2008)

Country: USA
Genre: Music documentary
Synopsis: The Sengalese pop superstar records, releases, and tours in support of his album Egypt.

Notes: Although the film provides a brief overview of N'Dour's career--most, like me, will know him from collaborations with Peter Gabriel--the bulk of the doc covers his album about the Sufi Islam saints. Reception outside of his homeland is favorable, but in Senegal the album is met with controversy because of the intermingling of popular music and religion. The film can be a bit repetitive, but there's plenty of joyful music to move things along and keep it enjoyable.

Grade: B-

-Quiet Chaos (Caos calmo) (Antonio Luigi Grimaldi, 2008)

Country: Italy
Genre: Grieving process dramedy
Synopsis: A man figures out his own method of dealing with his wife's death and raising their daughter on his own.

Notes: A gentle touch is deployed as Nanni Moretti's executive sets his own process and timeline for responding to the unexpected death of his wife. The actor's placid appearance and demeanor presents a character who must put on a brave face for his child, yet it's also a reflection of his own uncertainty regarding how he should be reacting. The film also utilizes some heartwarming humor, although nothing about Quiet Chaos could be construed as reaching for easy tugs at the heartstrings. With more time to reflect on it, I might be willing to bump up the grade a hair for this splendid film.

Grade: B+

-The Chaser (Chugyeogja) (Na Hong-jin, 2008)

Country: South Korea
Genre: Crime drama
Synopsis: A former police detective turned pimp searches for the man who he believes is capturing and selling his women.

Notes: My genre description and synopsis don't really do justice to what is an unusual movie in a familiar form. Director Na Hong-jin plays to the audience with liberal sprinklings of humor throughout and plays with the viewers as he frustrates satisfying expectations. It's a film that can be goofy in one scene and fairly brutal in the next. I'm not sure that these abrupt shifts are always successful, but it's a compelling film because of its loose spirit. I especially liked how the chases and fights are sloppy in ways that they might actually be in real life rather than the perfectly choreographed and executed action we're accustomed to seeing. One other observation...what is it with South Korean filmmakers and hammers?

Grade: B