Allen Ginsberg was a genius and an a source of great personal inspiration. I'm sensing a short review here, but I'll try to leave myself uncolored by devotion.
James Franco was an at least effective choice for Ginsberg, but within his first few appearances on screen I was seeing the Actor instead of Ginsberg himself. There are few performances indeed where I feel an actor has overprepared, but the timing and pauses were so carefully rehearsed I could hear the clicking and whirring of his mechanical process. I think Mr. Franco's shortcoming is a result of total comprehension as to what it was he was trying to recreate and the forces that would inevitably be working against him in this specific production - or none at all, and he really was just some prettyboy dolt with less talent than enthusiasm. His effort to hit the mark, in some scenes, translated to visible strain. The actor's head popped up above his role several times in fact, and I found him uncomfortable with the homosexually themed segments which did violence to the work overall.
The court scenes were completely one-sided and goofy in their simplicity. It felt like the movie was building up to a conflict that never happened and wasn't ever supposed to. Nobody cared, it didn't matter, and it was impossible to believe in. Which was ironic, because it was (or should have been) the most important part of the movie.
Well, no. The poem itself was and should have been the most important part, and the writing/directing team Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman did a wonderful job of interlacing that at least throughout the work. Anybody who approached the movie knowing full well who this man was and what the poem was all about had heard the thing before, and those who didn't likely wouldn't have been satisfied with a twenty-minute opening, four-pages of shakily imitated spoken word with no context and too many questions to answer at the outset.
One can be sure that the animated sequences are likely to be the most controversial aspect, currently and in retrospect. The problem with any kind of computerized recreation at all (short of a seventy-million dollar budget) is that within six months it will always look insincere and laughable and blocky and might as well have been done with painted cardboard. Which would have been a far more enveloping aesthetic, as a matter of fact, but no less: I was satisfied with the work I was shown in this regard. They chose a medium and ran with it. I can respect that, and in doing so they managed to illustrate the meat of the thing with more clarity than I think anyone ever has or will try to. It was a good mix of literal translation and soaring abstract that added more than it took away. What else can you do during a monologue? I would have been infinitely less impressed with mute scenes of Franco's Ginsberg waltzing down the street looking winsome and disaffected, or still more handicam shots of the actor reading aloud in some candlelit auditorium flophouse. Certainly not more courtroom footage. These people did a good job utilizing the five or six backdrops they had at their disposal, whatever that means.
All in all I would watch it again. It lends credibility to the beast itself and overall does not mishandle the subject material. It is something I would recommend to a friend, and so I will to you.
Watch Howl.
Sunday, September 26, 2010
M's Musings on HOWL
Howl. Written and directed by Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman. Based on the poem by Allen Ginsberg. Ft. James Franco. Werc Werk Works, 2010.
T. and I checked out the Atlantic Film Festival on Friday night, only managing to make it to one show during the whole week plus of festival. We may have only been here for a month, but seriously... We should have tried a little harder. If this film was a testament to the excellent, high-calibre films being featured over the last week, then we really missed out.
This film, which was equal parts obscenity trial, staged interview, poetry reading and computer generated artistic rendering, was a fun and interesting way to connect to Allen Ginsberg and his poetry. While I would argue that some of these sequences were better than others, I liked the pastiche approach and the various interpretations it allowed the poem to operate within simultaneously.
Each of the four parts was shot in a different way, and from a cinematic perspective, I must say I was most drawn to the "documentary style" of the interview with Ginsberg. James Franco managed to support an entire movie where he was the only central, consistent figure. Pretty bad ass, if you ask me. I completely bought that Allen Ginsberg was griping to a journalist in the wake of the obscenity trial he was not a part of.
While I liked the poetry reading sections in black and white, the audience reactions seemed really forced. Would this have been shocking? Ho-hum? Something in between. The clapping and laughter occasionally made me think more of a comedy club then a poetry reading. I felt like the audience of hipsters was titillated, but not truly engaged. Maybe I am just reading too much into it.
In the court room, which was filmed just like any court-type drama, we have very eloquent lawyers giving speeches and attempting to answer bizarre questions. What makes a piece of work literature? What is artistic merit, and how do we determine it? Questions for all the ages, to be sure. I thought the feel-good style of pitting the "bad lawyer" with the prudish witnesses against the "likeable, cares about literature lawyer" with the deep, more thought provoking witnesses almost seemed too extreme. That said, if the reactions really were that polarized, it makes sense. That is the nature of a court case, I would assume.
Also, for the record, I bet those beautiful speeches weren't just from the heart. I bet they had copious notes, if not a full speech for their final statement. Seriously. You can't just pull that kind of thing out of the air.
The visualizations were very interesting, tumbling and bizarre. I found it of note, in a film that frankly deals with issues of "deviant" notions of sexuality for the time period, that the majority of the sexuality being portrayed was so vanilla. Homosexuality was dealt with frankly by parts of the film, but shirked it in other moments, which I thought kind of muddled the message.
For example, here are two photos of Allen with his partner... Only one of these moments is recreated in the film. I bet you can guess which one.
I thought they could have pushed the envelope even further. But then, the visualizations were entirely interpretive, so really, they could have been whatever the CG guys wanted them to be. One thing I know for certain: the flaccid penises were of a generous size.
I liked that the images were constantly in motion, moving and changing shape and scope as the poem was being read. I didn't always know what to do with what I saw, but that didn't invalidate it for me in any way.
Why does an animal howl? Is it an expression of pain or triumph? In titling his poem Howl, I think the answer needs to be somewhere in between. And that's kind of what I thought about this movie. It wasn't universally celebratory, but I'm glad I saw it.
Thursday, September 23, 2010
T's Take on JERRY MAGUIRE
Jerry Maguire himself was meant to be an uber dreamboat in this classic nineties romantic drama about a man who turns his life around upon realizing his place in the world isn't fulfilling, and sacrifices everything to become the man he always wanted to be.
Hm.
The adventure Jerry Maguire brings us along for is, admittedly, sweet and compelling. The message itself, however, rings insinscere in some aspects and leaves the viewer with a bad taste in their mouthes. The guy just wants to do the right thing, and I can respect that in theory, but a few things immediately occured to me upon rewatching this movie with M:
1: If being a sportsagent is so completely unsatisfactory, why would he continue to do it? It is this point in particular that makes much of the movie's message feel twisted and not altogether fully formed. An ethical sports agent? You're in the wrong boat, kid. Watching Jerry swim upstream in a corporate mold that didn't want him felt unnecessarily tragic. I didn't like watching this aspect of the movie, and the nobility to be found in Jerry's 'I did it my way' floundering style came across as a little more pessimistic than likely intended. I would have liked to see him take his education and experience into a position paralell to but unconnceted with bleeding sports teams out of as much money as humanly possible for self-righteous assholes who functionally contribute little to society besides distraction and dream fodder.
2: Most people don't care about sports. Basing so much of the movie around sports themselves confused me, what with the movie being about honesty and integrity and the evolution of one's conscience. The sports world is, as the movie shows us at nauseam, a completely backward franchise worshiping dollars over the health and stability of not only the players but virtually every human facet of the Great Production itself. There is absolutely no good in catering to the breathless wait for injury or next massive impact between helpless dreamers who beg and scrape for deals with corporate Goliaths, which was absolutely the state of things then and even moreso now. The kind of people who watch football are largely uninterested in the trials of someone like Jerry, and the people who are interested in Jerry could not care less about football.
3. Cuba Gooding's character was completely unlikable in virtually every scene. Jerry gives him this advice in one of the few genuine exchanges between them (which is to say that Jerry and Rod's relationship is almost exclusively predicated on Jerry doing his best to suffer through Rod's incessant yammering and spin their dismal situation into something positive):
"Alright. Here's why you don't have your ten million dollars yet. You are a paycheck player. You play with your head. Not your heart. In your personal life? (points) Heart. But when you get on the field you're a businessman. It's wide-angle lenses and who fucked you over and who owes you for it. That's not what inspires people."
You're exactly right, Jerry. That's not at all what inspires people, and I couldn't have summed up Rod Tidwell any better than that. Shortly thereafter we see Rod get hurt, which is sad, but accentuated mortality doesn't necessarily equate to excess of 'heart' in my book. This character experienced absolutely no transformation or progress and wound up with more work than he probably should have gotten.
For a movie that points out people who live their lives without consideration for philosophical attainment and work their jobs in a completely mindless and selfish manner ultimately resulting the creation of armies of unfulfilled sycophants... I don't know. It certainly doesn't mind sport stars who rake in millions for playing a game well when people like Jerry and Dorothy who spend months and years killing themselves begging, borrowing and stealing for said sports stars have difficulty making ends meet. The inherant 'failure' of being initially offered one-point-seven million for three years as a signing contract (that's five-hundred and sixty-six thousand and change per year) is so crushing to the star himself that he almost admits would-be defeat until his wife begs him out of it. This is a man who majored in marketing and played in the NFL. He couldn't get a good job? I don't beleive that, nor do feel an ounce of sympathy for him.
4: The movie itself mentions racial stereotypes as being unfair and arbitrary while consistently cashing in on them. Race is always a hot-button topic, but all the gold-chain loud-mouthed sassy attitude slangin' was vaguely offensive and insulting. It made me hate Rod Tidwell even more, and the effort in this direction just reminded me I was watching a MOVIE that deals with ISSUES and HAS A HEART. I don't care about your agenda, Jerrry Maguire, I want to be entertained, and the best way to entertain me is with compelling people who have unique stories and an interesting point of view. It was a series of cheap shots, and much of these scenes centered around low-hanging fruit I find distasteful
Overall the relationship between Jerry and Dorothy was trivial and situationally convenient which belies the attempted message that if you're true to yourself you really can have it all. The kid was cute, but then what movie kids aren't, the story was reasonably believable but uninteresting and conflicted, and overall the true-to-life feel Jerry Maguire angles for is largely exhausting and disheartening.
Don't watch Jerry Maguire.
Hm.
The adventure Jerry Maguire brings us along for is, admittedly, sweet and compelling. The message itself, however, rings insinscere in some aspects and leaves the viewer with a bad taste in their mouthes. The guy just wants to do the right thing, and I can respect that in theory, but a few things immediately occured to me upon rewatching this movie with M:
1: If being a sportsagent is so completely unsatisfactory, why would he continue to do it? It is this point in particular that makes much of the movie's message feel twisted and not altogether fully formed. An ethical sports agent? You're in the wrong boat, kid. Watching Jerry swim upstream in a corporate mold that didn't want him felt unnecessarily tragic. I didn't like watching this aspect of the movie, and the nobility to be found in Jerry's 'I did it my way' floundering style came across as a little more pessimistic than likely intended. I would have liked to see him take his education and experience into a position paralell to but unconnceted with bleeding sports teams out of as much money as humanly possible for self-righteous assholes who functionally contribute little to society besides distraction and dream fodder.
2: Most people don't care about sports. Basing so much of the movie around sports themselves confused me, what with the movie being about honesty and integrity and the evolution of one's conscience. The sports world is, as the movie shows us at nauseam, a completely backward franchise worshiping dollars over the health and stability of not only the players but virtually every human facet of the Great Production itself. There is absolutely no good in catering to the breathless wait for injury or next massive impact between helpless dreamers who beg and scrape for deals with corporate Goliaths, which was absolutely the state of things then and even moreso now. The kind of people who watch football are largely uninterested in the trials of someone like Jerry, and the people who are interested in Jerry could not care less about football.
3. Cuba Gooding's character was completely unlikable in virtually every scene. Jerry gives him this advice in one of the few genuine exchanges between them (which is to say that Jerry and Rod's relationship is almost exclusively predicated on Jerry doing his best to suffer through Rod's incessant yammering and spin their dismal situation into something positive):
"Alright. Here's why you don't have your ten million dollars yet. You are a paycheck player. You play with your head. Not your heart. In your personal life? (points) Heart. But when you get on the field you're a businessman. It's wide-angle lenses and who fucked you over and who owes you for it. That's not what inspires people."
You're exactly right, Jerry. That's not at all what inspires people, and I couldn't have summed up Rod Tidwell any better than that. Shortly thereafter we see Rod get hurt, which is sad, but accentuated mortality doesn't necessarily equate to excess of 'heart' in my book. This character experienced absolutely no transformation or progress and wound up with more work than he probably should have gotten.
For a movie that points out people who live their lives without consideration for philosophical attainment and work their jobs in a completely mindless and selfish manner ultimately resulting the creation of armies of unfulfilled sycophants... I don't know. It certainly doesn't mind sport stars who rake in millions for playing a game well when people like Jerry and Dorothy who spend months and years killing themselves begging, borrowing and stealing for said sports stars have difficulty making ends meet. The inherant 'failure' of being initially offered one-point-seven million for three years as a signing contract (that's five-hundred and sixty-six thousand and change per year) is so crushing to the star himself that he almost admits would-be defeat until his wife begs him out of it. This is a man who majored in marketing and played in the NFL. He couldn't get a good job? I don't beleive that, nor do feel an ounce of sympathy for him.
4: The movie itself mentions racial stereotypes as being unfair and arbitrary while consistently cashing in on them. Race is always a hot-button topic, but all the gold-chain loud-mouthed sassy attitude slangin' was vaguely offensive and insulting. It made me hate Rod Tidwell even more, and the effort in this direction just reminded me I was watching a MOVIE that deals with ISSUES and HAS A HEART. I don't care about your agenda, Jerrry Maguire, I want to be entertained, and the best way to entertain me is with compelling people who have unique stories and an interesting point of view. It was a series of cheap shots, and much of these scenes centered around low-hanging fruit I find distasteful
Overall the relationship between Jerry and Dorothy was trivial and situationally convenient which belies the attempted message that if you're true to yourself you really can have it all. The kid was cute, but then what movie kids aren't, the story was reasonably believable but uninteresting and conflicted, and overall the true-to-life feel Jerry Maguire angles for is largely exhausting and disheartening.
Don't watch Jerry Maguire.
M's Musings on JERRY MAGUIRE
Jerry Maguire. Written and directed by Cameron Crowe. Ft. Tom Cruise, Renee Zellweger, Cuba Gooding Jr. Sony, 1996.
You know what, I actually had kind of high expectations for this film. I am not usually so swayed, but enough people have talked about this as some ideal romantic comedy, that I kind of thought I was going to be swept away by its brilliance.
Suffice it to say, I wasn't. Not only is the profession of sports agent really difficult to relate to as an audience member, but Tom Cruise is a super weird guy at that. I wanted him to SHOW ME THE MONEY, but instead, all he did was SHOW ME THE CRAZY. I didn't need any more crazy in my day, thank you very much.
Tom Cruise is infinitely unlikeable. He doesn't treat women nicely, in fact, his character has no problem with the fact that he is incapable of intimacy. He runs around all day, screaming and wheeling and dealing, and then comes home and bangs some broad to get out his ya yas. Very respectful, Jerry Maguire. I am definitely fantasizing about THAT tonight.
Barf.
I didn't even feel compassionate toward Renee Zellweger's character. She was starry eyed, overly emotional, and easily manipulated. She is by no means independent, though before she hooks up with Jerry she certainly is able to take care of her own. I think one thing this film did do a good job of expressing was the desire to find a father for one's children over a partner for yourself. The fact that Jerry bonds with the child is important, and the only real source of joy in the whole movie.
That little kid *almost* made this film worth it for me.
Next time, I am not going to be persuaded by promises of romance. Having seen very few romantic comedies, I am hoping that there are some out there that really do tug at my heart strings and make me love again! As of this moment, all these films make me do is think... oh god, please don't tell me anyone is looking at this film as a romantic ideal.
I am so glad I have T. Not only is he sweet, charming and good looking... but he'll never be a sleazeball like Jerry Maguire.
Dear Readers, if you know of a happy romantic movie, send it our way. I am going to suggest skipping the genre all together if we get any more duds.
Sunday, September 19, 2010
T's Take on THE APARTMENT
Not to sound like a completely snoody film buff, but I'm becoming a huge Jack Lemmon fan. The man's timing is impeccable. He plays the sweet moron and conniving neer-do-well perfectly, often both at the same time as a matter of fact, and if you keep your eye on the guy he's always doing something sharp in the background that adds to the scene. I like that about him. I like that I'm never waiting for the funny, or plodding through dialogue with him on our way to the punchline. Indeed, thank God for Jack, because without him I expect this movie would have been swiftly forgotten not long after its release.
This movie came recommended wholeheartedly by a dear friend who was no doubt anxious to see the review, so I find myself at an impasse. My natural tendency toward Authentic Material and instinctive high sense of order completely override gratitude in essentially every situation, naturally, but constructive criticism is never out of reach and I have no real reason to be nasty.
The pacing was my first issue. This was no so much a plotted storyline as it was a rambling tale. It came across in much the way you might imagine your grandfather telling you about this apartment he once had. I could understand if that was the intention, but I'm not sure that it was. It is in attempting to tell a story honestly, the way things likely would happen, that most movies find disagreement with me. I live real life every single day. I am virtually soaked in reality, wrought of its charms and malice minute by minute. I do not move to my telelvision or movies or video games to experience more of it; I want fantasy. This was indeed a fantastical story, but the story matter itself is not on trial here - really more the narrative.
Narrative is more than script. It's the way the medium communicates itself as a whole. That's what I missed here: a cohesive entity unraveling before me with every resource it had at its command. Psycho did that. It was geared for relaying a perplexing story. Not just the set design and lighting and camera work, but also in editorial. I walked out of The Apartment feeling as though the creative team could have cut out about half an hour to forty-five minutes of what we saw without doing violence to the thing as a whole. Much of Baxter's puttering around in his apartment I could have done without, as well as the poor-me characterization of Miss Kubelik. I understood within fifteen minutes of the movie that this guy was loaning out his apartment to departmental-types out of obligation. For the next hour and a half we set up the confluence of events that finds an attempted suicide in Baxter's bed. Why?
The movie was very funny, and very touching, but ther was all this gravity I wasn't expecting. All these people were so exhausted and lost. Even Baxter himself was completely unlikable for nintey-five percent of the movie despite his dithering demeanor and entertaining predicament. Even Fran, though gorgeous and charming, spent so much time pandering after Sheldrake that she lost me early into the flick. I just couldn't care about any of them. Maybe it was a critique on the changing values of the time or a reflection of what big business valued in an office setting juxstaposed against what fulfillment and happiness actually means... I don't know. It didn't speak to me.
But all in all, I'm glad I watched it. Those characters I didn't like? They filled the screen with personality and color such as is too oft uncommon in a black and white. Without realizing it, by the time we hit that two hour mark I'd come to know many of the characters in word and deed. I felt included in the office gossip and real context for the small-world feel I recognized right off the bat with these people. The story is fantastical and tragic and funny and at some times dark, very human overall, and I'd recommend it to anyone. I guess the lighthearted initial feel prepped me for a comedy and delivered a sobering story of lost love and publicly private indecency. If Mad Men stole anything from anywhere, I wouldn't be shocked to find this classic as their case study.
Watch The Apartment.
This movie came recommended wholeheartedly by a dear friend who was no doubt anxious to see the review, so I find myself at an impasse. My natural tendency toward Authentic Material and instinctive high sense of order completely override gratitude in essentially every situation, naturally, but constructive criticism is never out of reach and I have no real reason to be nasty.
The pacing was my first issue. This was no so much a plotted storyline as it was a rambling tale. It came across in much the way you might imagine your grandfather telling you about this apartment he once had. I could understand if that was the intention, but I'm not sure that it was. It is in attempting to tell a story honestly, the way things likely would happen, that most movies find disagreement with me. I live real life every single day. I am virtually soaked in reality, wrought of its charms and malice minute by minute. I do not move to my telelvision or movies or video games to experience more of it; I want fantasy. This was indeed a fantastical story, but the story matter itself is not on trial here - really more the narrative.
Narrative is more than script. It's the way the medium communicates itself as a whole. That's what I missed here: a cohesive entity unraveling before me with every resource it had at its command. Psycho did that. It was geared for relaying a perplexing story. Not just the set design and lighting and camera work, but also in editorial. I walked out of The Apartment feeling as though the creative team could have cut out about half an hour to forty-five minutes of what we saw without doing violence to the thing as a whole. Much of Baxter's puttering around in his apartment I could have done without, as well as the poor-me characterization of Miss Kubelik. I understood within fifteen minutes of the movie that this guy was loaning out his apartment to departmental-types out of obligation. For the next hour and a half we set up the confluence of events that finds an attempted suicide in Baxter's bed. Why?
The movie was very funny, and very touching, but ther was all this gravity I wasn't expecting. All these people were so exhausted and lost. Even Baxter himself was completely unlikable for nintey-five percent of the movie despite his dithering demeanor and entertaining predicament. Even Fran, though gorgeous and charming, spent so much time pandering after Sheldrake that she lost me early into the flick. I just couldn't care about any of them. Maybe it was a critique on the changing values of the time or a reflection of what big business valued in an office setting juxstaposed against what fulfillment and happiness actually means... I don't know. It didn't speak to me.
But all in all, I'm glad I watched it. Those characters I didn't like? They filled the screen with personality and color such as is too oft uncommon in a black and white. Without realizing it, by the time we hit that two hour mark I'd come to know many of the characters in word and deed. I felt included in the office gossip and real context for the small-world feel I recognized right off the bat with these people. The story is fantastical and tragic and funny and at some times dark, very human overall, and I'd recommend it to anyone. I guess the lighthearted initial feel prepped me for a comedy and delivered a sobering story of lost love and publicly private indecency. If Mad Men stole anything from anywhere, I wouldn't be shocked to find this classic as their case study.
Watch The Apartment.
M's Musings on THE APARTMENT
The Apartment. Dir. Billy Wilder. Screenplay by Billy Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond. Ft. Jack Lemmon, Shirley MacLaine, and Fred MacMurray. MGM, 1960.
I know that going in, I really wasn't sure what to expect. Given the title, I first thought it was going to be some kind of psycho thriller. Then, Trev told me it was supposedly a comedy about a guy who had a super sweet apartment that he uses to move up the corporate ladder. Then, I discovered that it was the follow up movie to Some Like it Hot. So, I figured, ha ha! It will be a funny comedy. Then there was Jack Lemmon and I said, alright, let's do this thing!
During the first hour or so, I couldn't help but make connections between this film and Babyface. I kept thinking about how men and women must manipulate the same structures to try to succeed in the corporate world. Sad but true, poor Baxter loses autonomy over his place of residence in exchange for a small boost up the corporate ladder. But, as he moves up, the game stays the same, and he continues to lose more and more.
Enter Fran, the lovely elevator operator. Baxter's innocent love interest. Also, unbeknownst to poor Bax, mistress to Baxter's boss. This is the moment when we know all will be right in the world, as Bax can save the day, get the girl, and get his apartment back.
But this is not exactly how the story unfolds. Having a depressed Baxter bring home a woman on Christmas Eve only to find Fran having attempted suicide and dying is not exactly a fun romp through the corporate ladder.
This movie was dark. And long! I mean, this girl's suicide is blamed on Baxter, is literally cast off by the superior, and is left for Baxter to deal with. And, Fran is still alive, so he has to deal with nursing her while everyone thinks he is the scum of the earth who drove her to do this.
Seriously depressing. I'm not sure if I was in too sombre a mood to appreciate the humour of this movie, because I took it seriously, and thought it was a really bleak take on society. Its not surprising to see how the attitudes propagated there helped create a generation of people like us, looking around, wondering why the economy, etc, is crumbling at our feet.
As much as I liked Fran in the first few scenes, her devotion to her lover seemed unusual after the suicide attempt. I mean seriously... what does this guy possibly having going for him? He has some money, sure, but you returned his "payment", and now are just stuck with his less than stellar personality.
Watching Baxter act as a bachelor was the highlight for me. When he strains his spaghetti with a tennis racket, it made my day. Here is a guy who is just trying to do things right, and is just beaten to shit for it over and over. I wonder if he even got to enjoy his dinner?
The ending of the movie seemed forced given all the horrible stuff that transpired throughout. Though in some respects I got what I wanted, I left this film feeling very unsatisfied. I think this film didn't fit comfortably into a genre, and that's ultimately what got me. It wasn't a comedy or a tragedy. It was just a drama that leaned in both directions at different times.
I think I would have been happier with one or the other.
I know that going in, I really wasn't sure what to expect. Given the title, I first thought it was going to be some kind of psycho thriller. Then, Trev told me it was supposedly a comedy about a guy who had a super sweet apartment that he uses to move up the corporate ladder. Then, I discovered that it was the follow up movie to Some Like it Hot. So, I figured, ha ha! It will be a funny comedy. Then there was Jack Lemmon and I said, alright, let's do this thing!
During the first hour or so, I couldn't help but make connections between this film and Babyface. I kept thinking about how men and women must manipulate the same structures to try to succeed in the corporate world. Sad but true, poor Baxter loses autonomy over his place of residence in exchange for a small boost up the corporate ladder. But, as he moves up, the game stays the same, and he continues to lose more and more.
Enter Fran, the lovely elevator operator. Baxter's innocent love interest. Also, unbeknownst to poor Bax, mistress to Baxter's boss. This is the moment when we know all will be right in the world, as Bax can save the day, get the girl, and get his apartment back.
But this is not exactly how the story unfolds. Having a depressed Baxter bring home a woman on Christmas Eve only to find Fran having attempted suicide and dying is not exactly a fun romp through the corporate ladder.
This movie was dark. And long! I mean, this girl's suicide is blamed on Baxter, is literally cast off by the superior, and is left for Baxter to deal with. And, Fran is still alive, so he has to deal with nursing her while everyone thinks he is the scum of the earth who drove her to do this.
Seriously depressing. I'm not sure if I was in too sombre a mood to appreciate the humour of this movie, because I took it seriously, and thought it was a really bleak take on society. Its not surprising to see how the attitudes propagated there helped create a generation of people like us, looking around, wondering why the economy, etc, is crumbling at our feet.
As much as I liked Fran in the first few scenes, her devotion to her lover seemed unusual after the suicide attempt. I mean seriously... what does this guy possibly having going for him? He has some money, sure, but you returned his "payment", and now are just stuck with his less than stellar personality.
Watching Baxter act as a bachelor was the highlight for me. When he strains his spaghetti with a tennis racket, it made my day. Here is a guy who is just trying to do things right, and is just beaten to shit for it over and over. I wonder if he even got to enjoy his dinner?
The ending of the movie seemed forced given all the horrible stuff that transpired throughout. Though in some respects I got what I wanted, I left this film feeling very unsatisfied. I think this film didn't fit comfortably into a genre, and that's ultimately what got me. It wasn't a comedy or a tragedy. It was just a drama that leaned in both directions at different times.
I think I would have been happier with one or the other.
Saturday, September 18, 2010
T's Take on BIG
Tom Hanks outdid himself in this charmingly winsome tale of magic and betrayal. The story is about a thirteen year old named Josh who's sick of being a pathetic little looser kid with no prospects and zero control over his life. A mystical wish-granting machine turns him into an adult, and upon finding himself a thirty-something the next day he flees his home and life to take on New York and find the mysterious box that did this to him in the first place. Not before leaving his mother convinced he's been abducted, of course, leaving her a terrified wreck and perpetually worried sick over his absence, often for weeks at a time in lieu of his sporadic contact with her. He sends a solitary letter penned in his own hand briefly telling her "they're treating me well" and makes a single phonecall to tell her in a detached, casual way that he has indeed abducted her son (himself), but not to worry, because Josh is in no danger and perfectly healthy. And no, you can't talk to him.
The parts where Tom Hanks is dancing on a massive light-up keyboard and jumping on a trampoline are all well and good, but there's this sort of bewilderingly dark undercurrent the movie does its best to gloss over. In order for this movie to work, his mother had to be positive some huge drooling home-invading reprobate had stolen her son and was doing God knows what with him for a month plus. He never made any demands, so she could only assume his motives were self-evident. Could we have done this movie without totally ruining his parents' lives? I'd like to see the extended cut where his family weeps at his feet thanking him for coming home, and he suddenly realizes the gravity of what he's done.
I understand why the movie ended so simply, of course. Nobody wants to see this kid lying his ass off to teachers and neighbors and family while they haul him to therapists and police stations where strangers administer blood tests and rape kits while everyone around him falls to pieces thanking God almighty he's been returned. I'd be curious to see the outcome of the ongoing police investigation when the dawdling freak everyone in the McMillan toy company has been calling Josh turns out to be a kidnapping pederast and every good thing he thought he'd done comes crashing down around his ears permanently marring every life he's touched. All those adults who spoke with him as an equal now cursing his name and treating the thirteen year old Josh like a wounded child and hapless victim...
Maybe I'm reading too much into this, but I can't help but see the big picture (no pun intended) and all the people this kid hurt. What happens to his apartment? It's just left to rot? What about all the meddling he did in company policy, and the relationship he broke up only to vanish on that poor woman who invested all that time and energy in him? I'm not saying it's believable that this would have occurred as a serious problem to the kid in the movie, but it should have ocurred to the screenwriter. This story could have happened however they wanted. Why do it in this desolate way?
It's an easy movie to get swept away in (clearly) and the good Mr. Hanks did a fantastic job emulating thirteen year olds at large. The movie did a wonders in reminding the viewer what effect the world has on children and the effect children have on adults. I think the message here is that if more people paid more attention to the thoughts and ideas of young people the world would be a better place, because a child's unique perspective is usually much clearer and to the point than the adults around them. As official grown-ups our views have (by and large) been skewed to accomidate mitigating factors we've learned to automatically compensate for. Without accepting these learned boundaries we're capable of so much more. I wish when I was a teen I'd been given the opportunity to learn in a hands-on, practical way in a job setting. With a little allowance for adjustment I'm sure I could have learned a lot more marketable skills than what I have now, but instead I feel crippled by a system that was put into place essentially to keep me busy and out of trouble (neither of which it effectively did) until I society decided I was old enough to contribute.
My father used to use the old "If this were a hundred years ago, you'd have a family and a farm by now!" line on me. I remember thinking to myself that in any society that made any kind of sense, I would. I'd be given the opportunity to take a shot at living. I'd have independence and responsibility and a clear direction. Instead I get held by the hand in a classroom and walked through eighty different kinds of bullshit that I knew then and am positive now did not matter, whatsoever. I didn't take things seriously at that age because there was nothing to take seriously. Young people are truly capable of so much when given the opportunity to adjust. The tragedy, of course, is that they are denied that opportunity, as the rigidity of what we've made the business world today makes the smallest error unacceptable and the largest, policy.
Elizabeth Perkins (Susan, in the movie, Big's female lead) is now and will always be defined to me by her role in Weeds, and I feel like she's so good at that dagger's edge driven bitch character she was trapped inside it long ago, and I'm glad. I don't want to see her range, or goodness, or any kind of talent spectrum whatsoever. She is absolutely hilarious doing exactly what I've seen her doing and I won't ever get tired of it. Big gave me everything I asked for, but rewatching it as an adult brought up some strange questions that never occurred to me as a child.
Watch Big.
The parts where Tom Hanks is dancing on a massive light-up keyboard and jumping on a trampoline are all well and good, but there's this sort of bewilderingly dark undercurrent the movie does its best to gloss over. In order for this movie to work, his mother had to be positive some huge drooling home-invading reprobate had stolen her son and was doing God knows what with him for a month plus. He never made any demands, so she could only assume his motives were self-evident. Could we have done this movie without totally ruining his parents' lives? I'd like to see the extended cut where his family weeps at his feet thanking him for coming home, and he suddenly realizes the gravity of what he's done.
I understand why the movie ended so simply, of course. Nobody wants to see this kid lying his ass off to teachers and neighbors and family while they haul him to therapists and police stations where strangers administer blood tests and rape kits while everyone around him falls to pieces thanking God almighty he's been returned. I'd be curious to see the outcome of the ongoing police investigation when the dawdling freak everyone in the McMillan toy company has been calling Josh turns out to be a kidnapping pederast and every good thing he thought he'd done comes crashing down around his ears permanently marring every life he's touched. All those adults who spoke with him as an equal now cursing his name and treating the thirteen year old Josh like a wounded child and hapless victim...
Maybe I'm reading too much into this, but I can't help but see the big picture (no pun intended) and all the people this kid hurt. What happens to his apartment? It's just left to rot? What about all the meddling he did in company policy, and the relationship he broke up only to vanish on that poor woman who invested all that time and energy in him? I'm not saying it's believable that this would have occurred as a serious problem to the kid in the movie, but it should have ocurred to the screenwriter. This story could have happened however they wanted. Why do it in this desolate way?
It's an easy movie to get swept away in (clearly) and the good Mr. Hanks did a fantastic job emulating thirteen year olds at large. The movie did a wonders in reminding the viewer what effect the world has on children and the effect children have on adults. I think the message here is that if more people paid more attention to the thoughts and ideas of young people the world would be a better place, because a child's unique perspective is usually much clearer and to the point than the adults around them. As official grown-ups our views have (by and large) been skewed to accomidate mitigating factors we've learned to automatically compensate for. Without accepting these learned boundaries we're capable of so much more. I wish when I was a teen I'd been given the opportunity to learn in a hands-on, practical way in a job setting. With a little allowance for adjustment I'm sure I could have learned a lot more marketable skills than what I have now, but instead I feel crippled by a system that was put into place essentially to keep me busy and out of trouble (neither of which it effectively did) until I society decided I was old enough to contribute.
My father used to use the old "If this were a hundred years ago, you'd have a family and a farm by now!" line on me. I remember thinking to myself that in any society that made any kind of sense, I would. I'd be given the opportunity to take a shot at living. I'd have independence and responsibility and a clear direction. Instead I get held by the hand in a classroom and walked through eighty different kinds of bullshit that I knew then and am positive now did not matter, whatsoever. I didn't take things seriously at that age because there was nothing to take seriously. Young people are truly capable of so much when given the opportunity to adjust. The tragedy, of course, is that they are denied that opportunity, as the rigidity of what we've made the business world today makes the smallest error unacceptable and the largest, policy.
Elizabeth Perkins (Susan, in the movie, Big's female lead) is now and will always be defined to me by her role in Weeds, and I feel like she's so good at that dagger's edge driven bitch character she was trapped inside it long ago, and I'm glad. I don't want to see her range, or goodness, or any kind of talent spectrum whatsoever. She is absolutely hilarious doing exactly what I've seen her doing and I won't ever get tired of it. Big gave me everything I asked for, but rewatching it as an adult brought up some strange questions that never occurred to me as a child.
Watch Big.
M's Musings on BIG
Big. Dir. Penny Marshall. Screenplay by Gary Ross, with Justin Schindler and Anne Spielberg. Ft. Tom Hanks, Elizabeth Perkins, John Heard, Jared Rushton and Robert Loggia. 20th Century Fox, 1988.
This movie was heartfelt and delightful from the very beginning. Seeing kids act like kids, but in 80s garb, made my day. It made me think... what more do you need to be happy? Ah... to be able to rock the side ponytail with no repercussions... Sigh.
Tom Hanks was wonderful in this film. Completely enthralling. He captivated me from the moment he took the screen. Seeing him run around in patterned tighty whities, trying to find something to cover himself was sweet. He just really seemed to pull of the youthfulness. I completely bought that he wasn't just playing a kid, but really was a kid stuck in a body that was all stretched out and hard to handle.
The dynamic between him and his best friend was good, though I thought a slightly stronger child actor would have been able to pull it off better. As the dominant member of that friendship, watching Tom Hanks look to the kid to help him find a place and negotiate bank transactions, etc, was just delightful. When he had to spend the first night in his hotel alone, I wanted to jump into that film set twenty years ago and tell him everything was going to be alright. Super sweet.
The dynamic between Josh and Susan was super weird. I never quite got comfortable with that. I know I am a super prude (which T told me throughout this movie no less than fifty times), but kids in sexual situations with adults is never okay. Even in silly fantasy scenarios. That freaked me out and made me super uncomfortable. It would have been better if Susan didn't want him so badly. It was just terrifying. And then... the "maybe you could contact me in ten years" scene at the end... Also too much for me. Seriously lady, keep it together. Think it through.
That said, the best moment in the whole movie was when Josh morphs back into a kid in Tom Hank's fancy suit. It drags along the ground, and he turns back to look at Susan. Seeing the innocence and confusion in his face as he struggles with having taken on more than any kid should have to... was a touching moment that was really well shot.
It was good to be reminded he was still so small and young, and that he had no place in the world of the "big".
All in all, I am glad the film treated this as an ideal scenario, and not some realistic imagining of what it looks like when young people run away from home and end up in big cities. I wasn't ready for Josh to pimp himself out to various male clientele on the streets of New York. I wasn't ready for him to lose twenty pounds and be picking through garbage. I wasn't ready for him to go to jail and be taken advantage of even more... I'd much rather see him designing new toys with a Keep Out sign on his office door.
Awesome movie. It seems sad that I didn't see it before now.
Sunday, September 12, 2010
T's Take on RUSH HOUR 3
M: Start the next movie. Start it. I want this to be over so badly. I want it to be over so badly that I might consider watching four movies today just to wash the taste out of my mouth.
M: I don't like this.
I've decided that the Rush Hour movies don't actually qualify as Jackie Chan movies in that the movies that predominantly feature Jackie Chan are, in fact, movies. This is not a movie, this is a protracted Dudley Do-Right episode. Actually, that doesn't quite fit either, as the producers of Dudley Do-Right would never allow a set of minorities to dance for a predominantly white audience with the obvious intention of exploiting their images and correlating racial stereotypes. I'm sorry for continuously dragging us back to the obvious but come on... There's a difference between being hateful (which I can at leat respect in its honesty) and backhandedly smothering the audience with innuendo while hiding behind Chris Tucker because it's okay for us to say it through him. I can't imagine what they would have done if either or both of the characters had been caucasian or at least of the same race. Probably resort to hiring two hispanic lowlives and forcing them to make taco jokes and howl about gringos like some sort of Speedy Gonzalez throwback.
Now that I mention it:
Exerpt from Rush Hour 2:
Carter stops walking when he comes upon Isabella Molina, a stunning brunette, sitting at the bar drinking a glass of champagne. Carter lights her cigarette for her.
Carter: How you doing, baby? My name is Prince Mubutu from Nigeria.
Isabella: Isabella Molina, from San Juan. That seat is taken.
Carter: San Juan! You must know my good friend Pedro Martinez Hernandez Hector Elizondo.
I swear I didn't plan that, it just occurred to me. Isabella was cited as having been Jackie Chan's girlfriend for awhile, but sadly couldn't make it for the third act, likely having enough intellect to sense a sinking ship when she saw it. Apparently the movie made money, but there's more to life than that. This movie has been long forgotten in the annals of shitty cinema and rightly so.
It's three years later the opening scene is, of course, Rush Hour. A accident occurs due to Carter's total negligence (he is directing traffic, and rightfully so) and he immediately sides with the African American driver, using his position of authority to handcuff and bend two latina girls over the hood of their own car detaining them illegally and threatens to charge them with criminal offences less they date him and a friend to be named later, witholding their drivers' licenses for the time being and forcing them to drive illegally for the rest of the day and night. He then steals/appropriates the car (with the two innocent citizens still inside) and takes off down the freeway (in reverse) and engages in a vehicular gunfight.
This is within the first few minutes of opening.
The list goes on and is not worth belaboring. The film needlessly takes place in Paris and reveals Lee's past which nobody believes or cares about and entangles Carter in yet more intruige. Carter, of course, follows his own dick into numerous situations as is the usual and falls perfectly into place with Lee's serious (though completely illegal and unsanctioned) criminal investigations, 'natch. We are reintroduced to Soo-Yung who, by the movies' logical progreession of three years and three weeks exactly after her original kidnapping at eleven must be roughly fourteen. Typically I am not a stickler for adults playing teenagers in shows like Glee or whatever, but this is a grown woman. She kung-fu fights her way yet another kidnapping, and once she is saved the character herself is completely dropped from the plotline and is never heard from again - much as with the first time this happened in the series.
This movie was shit and insulting to the intelligence of itself and all watching audience. The patriotic element was completely shoehorned in and obtuse, with a french cabdriver equating refusing to give fares to blacks in America with refusing Americans fares internationally (please fuck off) at which point Carter pulls a gun on the cab driver and holds it to his head, forcing him to say that America is awesome and sing the American national anthem. Of course, the cabbie loves him for it and offers to be his cabbie full time, no charge, and after Carter tells him 'no chance' he follows Lee and Cater anyway to save them from imminent danger because he so badly wants to be American.
Allow me to take this opportunity to vomit on my shirt. There's so much wrong with this movie I couldn't begin to describe it... Yet again, neither character has learned nor developed, nothing is solved, no protocol has been followed and nothing from any past movie seems to have carried over. Each movie is a standalone version of an extremely simplistic set of plot devices arranged in identical manner in every other bad police movie ever. It's a perfect example of everything that's wrong with American culture and movies in general.
Don't want Rush Hour 3.
M: I don't like this.
I've decided that the Rush Hour movies don't actually qualify as Jackie Chan movies in that the movies that predominantly feature Jackie Chan are, in fact, movies. This is not a movie, this is a protracted Dudley Do-Right episode. Actually, that doesn't quite fit either, as the producers of Dudley Do-Right would never allow a set of minorities to dance for a predominantly white audience with the obvious intention of exploiting their images and correlating racial stereotypes. I'm sorry for continuously dragging us back to the obvious but come on... There's a difference between being hateful (which I can at leat respect in its honesty) and backhandedly smothering the audience with innuendo while hiding behind Chris Tucker because it's okay for us to say it through him. I can't imagine what they would have done if either or both of the characters had been caucasian or at least of the same race. Probably resort to hiring two hispanic lowlives and forcing them to make taco jokes and howl about gringos like some sort of Speedy Gonzalez throwback.
Now that I mention it:
Exerpt from Rush Hour 2:
Carter stops walking when he comes upon Isabella Molina, a stunning brunette, sitting at the bar drinking a glass of champagne. Carter lights her cigarette for her.
Carter: How you doing, baby? My name is Prince Mubutu from Nigeria.
Isabella: Isabella Molina, from San Juan. That seat is taken.
Carter: San Juan! You must know my good friend Pedro Martinez Hernandez Hector Elizondo.
I swear I didn't plan that, it just occurred to me. Isabella was cited as having been Jackie Chan's girlfriend for awhile, but sadly couldn't make it for the third act, likely having enough intellect to sense a sinking ship when she saw it. Apparently the movie made money, but there's more to life than that. This movie has been long forgotten in the annals of shitty cinema and rightly so.
It's three years later the opening scene is, of course, Rush Hour. A accident occurs due to Carter's total negligence (he is directing traffic, and rightfully so) and he immediately sides with the African American driver, using his position of authority to handcuff and bend two latina girls over the hood of their own car detaining them illegally and threatens to charge them with criminal offences less they date him and a friend to be named later, witholding their drivers' licenses for the time being and forcing them to drive illegally for the rest of the day and night. He then steals/appropriates the car (with the two innocent citizens still inside) and takes off down the freeway (in reverse) and engages in a vehicular gunfight.
This is within the first few minutes of opening.
The list goes on and is not worth belaboring. The film needlessly takes place in Paris and reveals Lee's past which nobody believes or cares about and entangles Carter in yet more intruige. Carter, of course, follows his own dick into numerous situations as is the usual and falls perfectly into place with Lee's serious (though completely illegal and unsanctioned) criminal investigations, 'natch. We are reintroduced to Soo-Yung who, by the movies' logical progreession of three years and three weeks exactly after her original kidnapping at eleven must be roughly fourteen. Typically I am not a stickler for adults playing teenagers in shows like Glee or whatever, but this is a grown woman. She kung-fu fights her way yet another kidnapping, and once she is saved the character herself is completely dropped from the plotline and is never heard from again - much as with the first time this happened in the series.
This movie was shit and insulting to the intelligence of itself and all watching audience. The patriotic element was completely shoehorned in and obtuse, with a french cabdriver equating refusing to give fares to blacks in America with refusing Americans fares internationally (please fuck off) at which point Carter pulls a gun on the cab driver and holds it to his head, forcing him to say that America is awesome and sing the American national anthem. Of course, the cabbie loves him for it and offers to be his cabbie full time, no charge, and after Carter tells him 'no chance' he follows Lee and Cater anyway to save them from imminent danger because he so badly wants to be American.
Allow me to take this opportunity to vomit on my shirt. There's so much wrong with this movie I couldn't begin to describe it... Yet again, neither character has learned nor developed, nothing is solved, no protocol has been followed and nothing from any past movie seems to have carried over. Each movie is a standalone version of an extremely simplistic set of plot devices arranged in identical manner in every other bad police movie ever. It's a perfect example of everything that's wrong with American culture and movies in general.
Don't want Rush Hour 3.
M's Musings on RUSH HOUR 3
Rush Hour 3. Dir. Brett Ratner. Screenplay by Jeff Nathanson. Based on characters by Ross LaManna. Ft. Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker. New Line, 2007.
Having just returned to my computer after four decontamination showers, I am ready to say something about Rush Hour 3.
Chris Tucker was paid $25 million to be in the film. I hope he used the money to do something to work against racial stereotypes, just like the character he played. So, hopefully his future is in drugs and skin. He probably has a very nice fur coat, too. And a rap cd, dropping next month. I apologize for saying such things. This is not the way people should be encouraged to speak or act, unlike this film suggests.
This movie was just awful. I was so sad to see that after three films, there was no attempt to move beyond the typecasting of the first film. I would have liked to see... another film entirely. There is no way to fix this film.
I hope that someday, new non-English speaking talent, as well as racially diverse talent of any kind, can experience a "break through" in the film industry without resorting to taking on roles like the ones written here. This movie was written for people who feel patriotic because they like to exclude people. They are the ones who encourage stereotypes, because they themselves are stereotypically dull and, unfortunately, racist.
I look forward to watching a slew of excellent movies to bury this day in review history.
Please, please don't make another one.
Having just returned to my computer after four decontamination showers, I am ready to say something about Rush Hour 3.
Chris Tucker was paid $25 million to be in the film. I hope he used the money to do something to work against racial stereotypes, just like the character he played. So, hopefully his future is in drugs and skin. He probably has a very nice fur coat, too. And a rap cd, dropping next month. I apologize for saying such things. This is not the way people should be encouraged to speak or act, unlike this film suggests.
This movie was just awful. I was so sad to see that after three films, there was no attempt to move beyond the typecasting of the first film. I would have liked to see... another film entirely. There is no way to fix this film.
I hope that someday, new non-English speaking talent, as well as racially diverse talent of any kind, can experience a "break through" in the film industry without resorting to taking on roles like the ones written here. This movie was written for people who feel patriotic because they like to exclude people. They are the ones who encourage stereotypes, because they themselves are stereotypically dull and, unfortunately, racist.
I look forward to watching a slew of excellent movies to bury this day in review history.
Please, please don't make another one.
T's Take on RUSH HOUR 2
Jackie Chan: "I'll bitch-slap you back to africa."
M: This is the worst movie I've ever half-watched.
James Carter: "I have a dream..."
M: Wow... This is... Not at all going downhill.
James Carter: "I'm tall dark and handsome, you third world ugly."
T: It's like he's saying what we're all thinking.
M: (reading my Rush Hour (1) review) Who's James Carter?
So far so good. And by that I mean, neither one of us have weepingly smashed a window and attempted harri-carri with a massive shard of glass. I can just see M rolling back and fourth n the bed halfway through the next movie swatting my hands away while she rolls over to impale herself screaming "I'll never get it out of my HEAD!!!".
Rush Hour 2 was... Well, it didn't disappoint. It happened, we watched it, and we even chuckled at it. These movies are like the kid in the classroom who acts out making poop jokes, and he's funny, but you know once everyone leaves the classroom there's just no place for him. It's okay in this circumstance, because this is actually the perfect (and only) arena for people like Chris Tucker to completely fall apart in front of a group of people and be praised for it. Having said that, you can tell within minutes that he's not as energetic, not as fresh... He's just not as hungry for it, you know? He's not pushing himself, and testing the limits of his own creative vision. It's sad when young talent is dulled by the glamor of Hollywood. I mean, who is James Carter? Who is he really?
Rush Hour 2 picks up three weeks after the end of Rush Hour (1) where we find the no-nonsense Cheif detective (or whatever) Lee pushing Carter into casework instead of allowing him to relax and vacation. This is a valiant effort on both their behalves, but also wildly inappropriate and in real life would immediately cause a socio-political uproar that would forever change the face of foreign politics.
Can you imagine if you, a bookie and American or Canadian citizen, had your door knocked down by a violent Chinese martial artist who told you he was a Hong Kong inspector or prefect? Imagine he ordered you around crassly making solicitous claims and wild accusations, threatening you viciously before kicking your ass on the spot, handcuffing you and all your friends and badgering you for information about something you might know about just by pure virtue of your having involvement in the criminal underworld previous to that incident? The socio-political fallout would take months or years to sort out and would forever sully that foregn power's name in the international trading place.
The take-no-prisoners approach that the famed Rush Hour-verse presents is a perfect example of why police work is absolutely never conducted in this way. There were a wonderful number of narrow escapes, but when things are done by the book and due process is allowed there is no wiggleroom for criminals to gain the upper hand. Only when some massively stupid boondoggle like this occurs can traps be set and lies be swallowed and organized crime proliferate. It is only with the cooperation or failing of a justice system that people like this continue to do business in this way.
What if Lee and Carter hadn't made it out of that shipping container? They'd have been tortured for three days and had their penises dismembered. And it would have been their own fault. Nobody knew where they were or what they were doing or how to know if they needed help because they just picked a dude and chased him. They used and lied and strongarmed their way through every interaction they had and wound up in deadly situations over and over and over again. The reality here is terrifying and the message even moreso.
Don't watch Rush Hour 2.
M: This is the worst movie I've ever half-watched.
James Carter: "I have a dream..."
M: Wow... This is... Not at all going downhill.
James Carter: "I'm tall dark and handsome, you third world ugly."
T: It's like he's saying what we're all thinking.
M: (reading my Rush Hour (1) review) Who's James Carter?
So far so good. And by that I mean, neither one of us have weepingly smashed a window and attempted harri-carri with a massive shard of glass. I can just see M rolling back and fourth n the bed halfway through the next movie swatting my hands away while she rolls over to impale herself screaming "I'll never get it out of my HEAD!!!".
Rush Hour 2 was... Well, it didn't disappoint. It happened, we watched it, and we even chuckled at it. These movies are like the kid in the classroom who acts out making poop jokes, and he's funny, but you know once everyone leaves the classroom there's just no place for him. It's okay in this circumstance, because this is actually the perfect (and only) arena for people like Chris Tucker to completely fall apart in front of a group of people and be praised for it. Having said that, you can tell within minutes that he's not as energetic, not as fresh... He's just not as hungry for it, you know? He's not pushing himself, and testing the limits of his own creative vision. It's sad when young talent is dulled by the glamor of Hollywood. I mean, who is James Carter? Who is he really?
Rush Hour 2 picks up three weeks after the end of Rush Hour (1) where we find the no-nonsense Cheif detective (or whatever) Lee pushing Carter into casework instead of allowing him to relax and vacation. This is a valiant effort on both their behalves, but also wildly inappropriate and in real life would immediately cause a socio-political uproar that would forever change the face of foreign politics.
Can you imagine if you, a bookie and American or Canadian citizen, had your door knocked down by a violent Chinese martial artist who told you he was a Hong Kong inspector or prefect? Imagine he ordered you around crassly making solicitous claims and wild accusations, threatening you viciously before kicking your ass on the spot, handcuffing you and all your friends and badgering you for information about something you might know about just by pure virtue of your having involvement in the criminal underworld previous to that incident? The socio-political fallout would take months or years to sort out and would forever sully that foregn power's name in the international trading place.
The take-no-prisoners approach that the famed Rush Hour-verse presents is a perfect example of why police work is absolutely never conducted in this way. There were a wonderful number of narrow escapes, but when things are done by the book and due process is allowed there is no wiggleroom for criminals to gain the upper hand. Only when some massively stupid boondoggle like this occurs can traps be set and lies be swallowed and organized crime proliferate. It is only with the cooperation or failing of a justice system that people like this continue to do business in this way.
What if Lee and Carter hadn't made it out of that shipping container? They'd have been tortured for three days and had their penises dismembered. And it would have been their own fault. Nobody knew where they were or what they were doing or how to know if they needed help because they just picked a dude and chased him. They used and lied and strongarmed their way through every interaction they had and wound up in deadly situations over and over and over again. The reality here is terrifying and the message even moreso.
Don't watch Rush Hour 2.
M's Musings on RUSH HOUR 2
Rush Hour 2. Dir. Brett Ratner. Screenplay by Jeff Nathanson. Based on characters by Ross LaManna. Ft. Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker. New Line, 2001.
Thank God there was a second one! God forbid we let this film franchise fade into obscurity. Nah... We'll do it one better: we'll make Rush Hour 2 the top grossing live action "martial arts" film of all time. And then, we'll celebrate it. Take that, China! Take that, kung fu! Who needs you, anyway?
T and I only half watched this movie while writing our carefully thought-through reviews for the last movie. From what I saw, I was impressed. No, honestly, I am serious. This movie was actually better than the last one. They took a more no-holes-barred approach to the humour. Instead of tip toeing around being offensive... this film is like, shit man, I am going to lay out every white stereotype I can about black people AND Asian people in an hour and a half!
Asian people are cuddly, but asexual, "like Snoopy". Black people like titties. Asian men have small penises. Black men need small bills because they are broke ass. Etc, etc, ad infinitum.
The best part of this movie was all the dialogue in Chinese. Particularly for T. and I, who watched it without subtitles. At one point we just looked at each other and said, "It's not like it matters anyway". We need to do a cleanse and watch a good martial arts movie. Maybe it's time we review Hero. It is both beautiful, and stars Zhang Ziyi, who is also beautiful. In Rush Hour 2 she plays the evil villian who never, not once, speaks English (it makes her easier to villify that way).
Before I go wash my eyes out with soap, I'd like to mention one more thing: This movie did not have even a fleeting reference to a Rush Hour.
That is all.
Thank God there was a second one! God forbid we let this film franchise fade into obscurity. Nah... We'll do it one better: we'll make Rush Hour 2 the top grossing live action "martial arts" film of all time. And then, we'll celebrate it. Take that, China! Take that, kung fu! Who needs you, anyway?
T and I only half watched this movie while writing our carefully thought-through reviews for the last movie. From what I saw, I was impressed. No, honestly, I am serious. This movie was actually better than the last one. They took a more no-holes-barred approach to the humour. Instead of tip toeing around being offensive... this film is like, shit man, I am going to lay out every white stereotype I can about black people AND Asian people in an hour and a half!
Asian people are cuddly, but asexual, "like Snoopy". Black people like titties. Asian men have small penises. Black men need small bills because they are broke ass. Etc, etc, ad infinitum.
The best part of this movie was all the dialogue in Chinese. Particularly for T. and I, who watched it without subtitles. At one point we just looked at each other and said, "It's not like it matters anyway". We need to do a cleanse and watch a good martial arts movie. Maybe it's time we review Hero. It is both beautiful, and stars Zhang Ziyi, who is also beautiful. In Rush Hour 2 she plays the evil villian who never, not once, speaks English (it makes her easier to villify that way).
Before I go wash my eyes out with soap, I'd like to mention one more thing: This movie did not have even a fleeting reference to a Rush Hour.
That is all.
T's Take on RUSH HOUR
M: Oh... Oh wait. T, is this... Was that guy in The Fifth Element?
T: He may have been, yes.
M: Oh God...
Okay. This is it. M and I are hunkering down for the big one: our first marathon. She does not yet know it, but marathons will yet frequent this blog. Most movie franchises that extend beyond a sequel are not good at all, so the best thing we can do is break the ice with the worst set of filth I could possible muster. From the darkest recesses of the black pit that is my adolescent viewing experience, I bring to you Rush Hour, one the most base level racially charged "he fall down make funny" pieces of shit ever devoured by the populace at large. May its disgusting dregs numb us to future cinematic horror. Huzza!
You know what? Listen. I'm not going to bore you by going on about racial stereotypes, I'm sure M will do quite enough of that on her own. This movie is meant to be taken at face value, for what it is. By allowing ourselves to get riled up we're playing right into Rush Hour's hands. It wants us to either get swept away with the fun or grant it free press by belaboring its largely harmless thoughtlessness. I'm not sure which is worse, but giggling at titty jokes feels better than righteous indignation at this juncture.
So it seems that the criminal underworld is limited to less than thirty people, and they all happen to know and owe supercop James Carter, who for all his tricks and ability still manages to be the laughing stock of the LAPD. There are too many plotholes to mention, and again, I won't beat a dead horse by belaboring them, but getting to see adorable kung-fu killing machine Jackie Chan say "What's up my nigger?" fully two times immediately followed by a seven-man action sequence was worth it all. Watching Jackie beat dudes up just never gets old. I like that about him.
As far as I'm concerned, Chris Tucker can cash in on his ethnicity all he wants. I don't feel degraded. I'd hate to have to think how many hours he spent weeping in his camper between takes, but it's all well and good so long as the music doesn't stop until I'm done dancing along. Whatever. I'm not positive Chris Tucker is possessed of enough humanity to understand or care what he's actually doing here, but-
No, we're not doing this. I promised myself I wouldn't do this. Racial humor is okay as long as the person making the jokes is African American.
Nevermind! Look! Something blew up! And someone's getting berated for a trivial misstep!
Wicked.
Don't watch Rush Hour.
T: He may have been, yes.
M: Oh God...
Okay. This is it. M and I are hunkering down for the big one: our first marathon. She does not yet know it, but marathons will yet frequent this blog. Most movie franchises that extend beyond a sequel are not good at all, so the best thing we can do is break the ice with the worst set of filth I could possible muster. From the darkest recesses of the black pit that is my adolescent viewing experience, I bring to you Rush Hour, one the most base level racially charged "he fall down make funny" pieces of shit ever devoured by the populace at large. May its disgusting dregs numb us to future cinematic horror. Huzza!
You know what? Listen. I'm not going to bore you by going on about racial stereotypes, I'm sure M will do quite enough of that on her own. This movie is meant to be taken at face value, for what it is. By allowing ourselves to get riled up we're playing right into Rush Hour's hands. It wants us to either get swept away with the fun or grant it free press by belaboring its largely harmless thoughtlessness. I'm not sure which is worse, but giggling at titty jokes feels better than righteous indignation at this juncture.
So it seems that the criminal underworld is limited to less than thirty people, and they all happen to know and owe supercop James Carter, who for all his tricks and ability still manages to be the laughing stock of the LAPD. There are too many plotholes to mention, and again, I won't beat a dead horse by belaboring them, but getting to see adorable kung-fu killing machine Jackie Chan say "What's up my nigger?" fully two times immediately followed by a seven-man action sequence was worth it all. Watching Jackie beat dudes up just never gets old. I like that about him.
As far as I'm concerned, Chris Tucker can cash in on his ethnicity all he wants. I don't feel degraded. I'd hate to have to think how many hours he spent weeping in his camper between takes, but it's all well and good so long as the music doesn't stop until I'm done dancing along. Whatever. I'm not positive Chris Tucker is possessed of enough humanity to understand or care what he's actually doing here, but-
No, we're not doing this. I promised myself I wouldn't do this. Racial humor is okay as long as the person making the jokes is African American.
Nevermind! Look! Something blew up! And someone's getting berated for a trivial misstep!
Wicked.
Don't watch Rush Hour.
M's Musings on Rush Hour
Rush Hour. Dir. Brett Ratner. Screenplay by Jim Kouf and Ross La Manna. Based on a story by Ross LaManna. Ft. Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker. New Line, 1998.
Really had little to do with a rush hour. It seems that in LA the traffic jam was a pretense for the kidnapping of a young girl. Really, this movie centred around something that could not be encapsulated in two words. This is a cop comedy that is also a juxtaposition of extremes from the east and the west. Likely written by a white guy in his basement (note: upon some basic internet research, survey says: it is), this movie is based on the balancing of two different sets of racial stereotypes.
In some ways, we can view this as positive. It inverts the usual racialized sidekick by having them both act equally in this capacity to each other. And, the criminal turns out to be white. So... a big step forward for the film industry?
I think not. This movie had lots of stuff blow up. It also had lots of jokes surrounding mispronunciation and cultural assimilation... I found it was funny, but never in a laugh-out-loud kind of way. I felt like it both was and wasn't trying to be politically correct. It definitely was appealing to the lowest common denominator... In some ways I kind of felt like it was meant to give them a little "culture". What it actually did was showcase how sad and conventional American culture and the film industry continue to be. In this way, I am glad it happened. At least there is no illusions about what we are dealing with here.
Watching the little girl sing along to the radio was sweet. Watching Jackie Chan do the same thing was, well... taking an icon from one country and depriving him of his masculinity and status. He became the butt of the joke, which, I guess, at least made him a ton of money.
Chris Tucker's shrill voice will probably keep me awake tonight. Yeesh.
Really had little to do with a rush hour. It seems that in LA the traffic jam was a pretense for the kidnapping of a young girl. Really, this movie centred around something that could not be encapsulated in two words. This is a cop comedy that is also a juxtaposition of extremes from the east and the west. Likely written by a white guy in his basement (note: upon some basic internet research, survey says: it is), this movie is based on the balancing of two different sets of racial stereotypes.
In some ways, we can view this as positive. It inverts the usual racialized sidekick by having them both act equally in this capacity to each other. And, the criminal turns out to be white. So... a big step forward for the film industry?
I think not. This movie had lots of stuff blow up. It also had lots of jokes surrounding mispronunciation and cultural assimilation... I found it was funny, but never in a laugh-out-loud kind of way. I felt like it both was and wasn't trying to be politically correct. It definitely was appealing to the lowest common denominator... In some ways I kind of felt like it was meant to give them a little "culture". What it actually did was showcase how sad and conventional American culture and the film industry continue to be. In this way, I am glad it happened. At least there is no illusions about what we are dealing with here.
Watching the little girl sing along to the radio was sweet. Watching Jackie Chan do the same thing was, well... taking an icon from one country and depriving him of his masculinity and status. He became the butt of the joke, which, I guess, at least made him a ton of money.
Chris Tucker's shrill voice will probably keep me awake tonight. Yeesh.
T's Take on PSYCHO
One of my favorite things about Alfred Hitchcock is that he always keeps the viewer in mind stylistically. That's a very base and ridiculous thing to say, as any cinematographer does exactly that, but Hitchcock knows exactly what you're expecting to see in any simulated reality situation. He knows just how long a shot takes to creep you out, he knows just where you'll look for continuity errors, he knows exactly what a story needs to flow and act itself out fluidly. Hitchcock did not write Psycho, of course, but he did breathe the sort of life into it that escalates a movie into the realm of Classic Work.
I feel a bizarre sort of kinship with Norman Bates. Not the mother stuff, of course, that's creepy, but really more with the split personality and murderous psychotic episodes. I remember the first time I shoved a corpse-bearing car into a cloudy marsh and watched all their judgement and cruelty and misconstrued preconceptions just slip into the mouth of an all-encompassing ooze. They just stop talking, you know? They can't hurt you anymore. They're just gone, forever, and nothing they think or say matters anymore. Not that it ever did. Stupid whore bitch.
There is no way, in modern Western society or many others, that a known social person can just dissapear without rigorous inquest and followup from the rest of the world. This is for the most part universally true, and I always enjoy it when a movie or book finds some way to keep bringing things like this up to the killer. The viewer feels a sense of relieved satisfaction in such a scenario. This is especially true in a movie like this where more than one character happens across the twisted freak's doorstep and vanishes horrifically into the sludge behind his home and nobody seems to be doing anything about it. The thing that makes a story like this great is when the happenings teeter on the edge of being overlooked completely. It is this fear that reaches the viewer, and less the impending doom befalling the inquisitors once we see the initial act take place.
Indeed, it was difficult to care at all about some nobody private investigator or the cardboard cuttout sister Janet, or the male lead who liked Lila enough to shack up over the weekends but not nearly enough to take a chance on a relationship and embrace the only woman who loves him at all. The characters here were sufficiently jaded and complicated to be reasonably compelling or at least believeable, but never enough to make me cringe when sociopath Norman descended on someone with a huge kitchen knife. These people were doomed from the start, I accepted that the moment I saw them that they would all be felled by cold steel, it was only a question of when. I was looking for more of a Jason Voorhees flick than was delivered (I remembered it being much less chaste with gore and violence) but all in all I would say that which the viewer is offered to sup here was sufficient.
Seriously, though. I will say that the quicksand he kept piling the cars onto was essentially ridiculous. It was the same spot, both times. You're telling me two more women have disappeared in exactly the same way? So we're four cars deep, now, and they're still sinking just as quickly? How deep is this thing? What's his plan if they don't sink all the way? Is he going to wade into this (absolute minimum) thirty-foot deep fucking rift in the tectonic plates just behind his motel and jump on the hood? This Norman Bates character certainly isn't a very logical person, if you ask me.
The pacing was extraordinarily good, the characterization was allotted more than adequate time to marinade, the conversations between the Psycho himself and other characters were believably coherent and sufficiently unhinged... My favorite part was the psychiatrist pacing intently around the office monologing about the crazy in the other room. He was getting off on that shit. It was great. And the suits were all perfect, too. Prim and pressed, with everyone's hair shining like diamonds. Beautiful. If I had to rate this movie, which I don't, I still wouldn't. But I will tell you to watch Psycho.
I feel a bizarre sort of kinship with Norman Bates. Not the mother stuff, of course, that's creepy, but really more with the split personality and murderous psychotic episodes. I remember the first time I shoved a corpse-bearing car into a cloudy marsh and watched all their judgement and cruelty and misconstrued preconceptions just slip into the mouth of an all-encompassing ooze. They just stop talking, you know? They can't hurt you anymore. They're just gone, forever, and nothing they think or say matters anymore. Not that it ever did. Stupid whore bitch.
There is no way, in modern Western society or many others, that a known social person can just dissapear without rigorous inquest and followup from the rest of the world. This is for the most part universally true, and I always enjoy it when a movie or book finds some way to keep bringing things like this up to the killer. The viewer feels a sense of relieved satisfaction in such a scenario. This is especially true in a movie like this where more than one character happens across the twisted freak's doorstep and vanishes horrifically into the sludge behind his home and nobody seems to be doing anything about it. The thing that makes a story like this great is when the happenings teeter on the edge of being overlooked completely. It is this fear that reaches the viewer, and less the impending doom befalling the inquisitors once we see the initial act take place.
Indeed, it was difficult to care at all about some nobody private investigator or the cardboard cuttout sister Janet, or the male lead who liked Lila enough to shack up over the weekends but not nearly enough to take a chance on a relationship and embrace the only woman who loves him at all. The characters here were sufficiently jaded and complicated to be reasonably compelling or at least believeable, but never enough to make me cringe when sociopath Norman descended on someone with a huge kitchen knife. These people were doomed from the start, I accepted that the moment I saw them that they would all be felled by cold steel, it was only a question of when. I was looking for more of a Jason Voorhees flick than was delivered (I remembered it being much less chaste with gore and violence) but all in all I would say that which the viewer is offered to sup here was sufficient.
Seriously, though. I will say that the quicksand he kept piling the cars onto was essentially ridiculous. It was the same spot, both times. You're telling me two more women have disappeared in exactly the same way? So we're four cars deep, now, and they're still sinking just as quickly? How deep is this thing? What's his plan if they don't sink all the way? Is he going to wade into this (absolute minimum) thirty-foot deep fucking rift in the tectonic plates just behind his motel and jump on the hood? This Norman Bates character certainly isn't a very logical person, if you ask me.
The pacing was extraordinarily good, the characterization was allotted more than adequate time to marinade, the conversations between the Psycho himself and other characters were believably coherent and sufficiently unhinged... My favorite part was the psychiatrist pacing intently around the office monologing about the crazy in the other room. He was getting off on that shit. It was great. And the suits were all perfect, too. Prim and pressed, with everyone's hair shining like diamonds. Beautiful. If I had to rate this movie, which I don't, I still wouldn't. But I will tell you to watch Psycho.
M's Musings on PSYCHO
Psycho. Dir. Alfred Hitchcock. Screenplay by Joseph Stefano. Based on the novel by Robert Bloch. Ft. Anthony Perkins and Janet Leigh. Paramount, 1960.
I watched this movie with a bit of trepidation. I can imagine generations of first year film majors watching this and being filled with emotional response and a desire to write... I can imagine academics building their careers through careful interpretation and dissection of this wonderful piece of cinematic history. Books have been written. People have nodded and bowed to this film time and time again.
So, what do I say without fearing judgment? Whatever I want. Such is the awesome power of a review blog that really doesn't try to be written by a critic. All I aim to do is record first impressions of a woman who has had next-to-no exposure to the wide world of film. Here it goes...
It was wonderful that the film built up a relationship with Marion Crane at the beginning of the film. It reduces our ability to anticipate the action, as we like to expect that the characters that are best developed are the characters we see through to the end. The characters that don't appear until well into the film, like Norman Bates, aren't on our radar as a serial killer in the same way, thanks to this introduction.
I found that the black and white cinematography really added to the film. It reminds the viewer they are watching a narrative, and I think that the film can get away with more when being "realistic" doesn't require as much colour matching, but instead more texture producing.
In the infamous "shower scene", I though the choice of many quick shots was really helpful to indicate movement and action without actually showing us anything. These contrasted well with the stagnant, at first bizarre seeming shots of the showerhead or Marion getting her hair wet. By focusing so closely on the eye, and then pulling out to the full face, it forced the viewer to connect with the dead person. It confirmed for us that the star was killed off, with an hour or more to go! Expectations need to be adjusted, or, best case scenario, left at the door entirely.
I thought Norman Bates was well cast. He was a sufficient mix of creepy and sympathetic that we got to keep guessing for awhile. By the time he cleans up the body, we are both beginning to give him sympathy, and beginning to dislike him. His status as an accomplice through clean up and disposal makes him ethically questionable, without being totally without values.
The use of voice over in the film was really interesting. It served to connect the first criminal, Marion, to the mother at the end. We see a more or less healthy imagining of what people would say or do based on past experience, and then we see the extremes of the same behaviour. Marion has to work through, alone, how she should judge herself as a thief. In the same way, Norman went through this type of internal negotiation, except for years with little other human interaction.
From a thriller perspective, this movie, obviously, is the cream of the crop. It doesn't intend to gross out (most of the time), but instead seeks to build anticipation, provide misdirection, and ultimately, leave room for a bit of a twist at the end.
And finally, this film confirmed for me that you can't have a hobby like taxidermy without being somewhat psychologically off... or a serial killer. Don't stuff dead stuff.
Saturday, September 11, 2010
T's Take on NOBODY'S FOOL
Nobody's Fool was one of those tales of redemption that doesn't make you want to puke your guts out. I can honestly say this is the first Paul Newman movie I ever remember seeing. I hadn't watched this movie beforehand and went into it expecting some kind of silly comedy schtick, but what I got was a believable adult story about a curmudgeonly old bastard with an impeccable smile and secret heart of gold. I liked the message of this movie: it's never too late to start over.
The main character had fucked up so hard for so long that everyone but a few key players had given up on him. Or at least that's what the movie wanted you to believe. Really, everyone loved him. Sully is definitely one of the Cool Kids in his small town, and even his arch-nemesis can't help but like hanging out with him. Speaking of Bruce Willis, I don't know if he just didn't care about his wife or he didn't feel threatened by old-ass Sully, but I thought it was funny the way they always came back to Paul Newman loving Willis's wife and his consistent tramping around.
Newman makes for the perfect faux-badass in this cute human story of atonement. He is an asshole and a true friend so often it becomes difficult to know what the character is trying for, like some shift in his life has happened before the movie started, or maybe he's supposed to appear confused about his identity. I think more than likely the philosophical message here was that no dog can finally lie down with that many irons in the fire. He had things to do, knew his life was over, and finally gave up the goat. The major themes in this movie are exactly the kinds of things that will haunt anybody given enough time, especially at Sully's age.
I'm sorry I came into the game late enough to have missed Newman's career at large. Actually, come to think of it, I did see him in Cool Hand Luke, but that's a fleeting memory at a friend's house before I was old enough to understand most of what I was seeing. I remember him as a grining face on a salad dressing container, as I'm sure he will be remembered by many, but I look forward to learning more about this charismatic figure's legacy.
The main character had fucked up so hard for so long that everyone but a few key players had given up on him. Or at least that's what the movie wanted you to believe. Really, everyone loved him. Sully is definitely one of the Cool Kids in his small town, and even his arch-nemesis can't help but like hanging out with him. Speaking of Bruce Willis, I don't know if he just didn't care about his wife or he didn't feel threatened by old-ass Sully, but I thought it was funny the way they always came back to Paul Newman loving Willis's wife and his consistent tramping around.
Newman makes for the perfect faux-badass in this cute human story of atonement. He is an asshole and a true friend so often it becomes difficult to know what the character is trying for, like some shift in his life has happened before the movie started, or maybe he's supposed to appear confused about his identity. I think more than likely the philosophical message here was that no dog can finally lie down with that many irons in the fire. He had things to do, knew his life was over, and finally gave up the goat. The major themes in this movie are exactly the kinds of things that will haunt anybody given enough time, especially at Sully's age.
I'm sorry I came into the game late enough to have missed Newman's career at large. Actually, come to think of it, I did see him in Cool Hand Luke, but that's a fleeting memory at a friend's house before I was old enough to understand most of what I was seeing. I remember him as a grining face on a salad dressing container, as I'm sure he will be remembered by many, but I look forward to learning more about this charismatic figure's legacy.
M's Musings on NOBODY'S FOOL
Nobody's Fool. Written and directed by Robert Benton. Based on the novel by Richard Russo. Ft. Paul Newman, Jessica Tandy, Melanie Griffith and Bruce Willis. Paramount, 1994.
This is the first film with Paul Newman I have ever seen. I can tell you right now, without a doubt in my mind, it is the first of many. A pair of very good friends of ours recommended this movie to us, and we were saving it up for most of the week as a treat. For once, I believe that this is a movie that T has also never seen.
While this film could be incredibly sentimental, and, at times, is, I think it does an admirable job of emphasizing the triumphs and failures of everyday life. As a character, I don't really think Sully "grows". It is the audience more than the character that seems to develop. As the story unfolds, we begin to open ourselves up to the reality of small town living in the world created within the film. I loved that no one in the film was really ahead of anyone else. Everyone was just doing their best to get by, judging each others choices as they attempt to do the same.
Sully's strange flirtations with Toby (Melanie Griffith) definitely seemed a bit over the top. I guess what we are supposed to appreciate is that Sully quietly takes care of everyone in town. He's the guy everyone loves to hate... But he knows how to give people what they need.
I like the idea of being accountable for who you are now, in the moment, instead of constantly atoning for the past. You can't repair all the mistakes you make in your life. But, you can make changes to your life at any point to make a difference in future interactions. Seeing the rekindled relationship with the grandson is particularly touching.
As the film closes, nothing has really changed. Sully leads the same life, while situations around him has changed. But, the outlook is positive. Make the best of what's around.
These are the things that made the film for me. Be sure to look forward to them if and when you check this out!
The relationship between Sully and his landlady. Their every interaction is memorable. I think I'll look for Jessica Tandy in earlier work as well.
The little kid and his watch. That may have been too sappy. But, talk about heartwarming when he clutches the watch while he returns the lawyer's leg!
Driving the truck down the sidewalk. Talk about awesome.
I have a few complaints, though they are minor. I thought the son character was really boring and unlikeable. No wonder the dude didn't want him to help on the job. He needed to be more complex and witty if he was going to stand up to and act against his father. He made English professors everywhere look totally pathetic. I personally don't need that kind of role modelling! In general, I thought Dylan Walsh's performance was mediocre in all aspects.
I also wasn't convinced that the Christmas season needed to piled on. It just pushed things too close to the overly sentimental line. I would have appreciated it more, I think, if it was a crappy, middle of the winter time when we lost that.
Complaints aside, what an uplifting film about making due, and making your own happiness. Loved it!
This is the first film with Paul Newman I have ever seen. I can tell you right now, without a doubt in my mind, it is the first of many. A pair of very good friends of ours recommended this movie to us, and we were saving it up for most of the week as a treat. For once, I believe that this is a movie that T has also never seen.
While this film could be incredibly sentimental, and, at times, is, I think it does an admirable job of emphasizing the triumphs and failures of everyday life. As a character, I don't really think Sully "grows". It is the audience more than the character that seems to develop. As the story unfolds, we begin to open ourselves up to the reality of small town living in the world created within the film. I loved that no one in the film was really ahead of anyone else. Everyone was just doing their best to get by, judging each others choices as they attempt to do the same.
Sully's strange flirtations with Toby (Melanie Griffith) definitely seemed a bit over the top. I guess what we are supposed to appreciate is that Sully quietly takes care of everyone in town. He's the guy everyone loves to hate... But he knows how to give people what they need.
I like the idea of being accountable for who you are now, in the moment, instead of constantly atoning for the past. You can't repair all the mistakes you make in your life. But, you can make changes to your life at any point to make a difference in future interactions. Seeing the rekindled relationship with the grandson is particularly touching.
As the film closes, nothing has really changed. Sully leads the same life, while situations around him has changed. But, the outlook is positive. Make the best of what's around.
These are the things that made the film for me. Be sure to look forward to them if and when you check this out!
The relationship between Sully and his landlady. Their every interaction is memorable. I think I'll look for Jessica Tandy in earlier work as well.
The little kid and his watch. That may have been too sappy. But, talk about heartwarming when he clutches the watch while he returns the lawyer's leg!
Driving the truck down the sidewalk. Talk about awesome.
I have a few complaints, though they are minor. I thought the son character was really boring and unlikeable. No wonder the dude didn't want him to help on the job. He needed to be more complex and witty if he was going to stand up to and act against his father. He made English professors everywhere look totally pathetic. I personally don't need that kind of role modelling! In general, I thought Dylan Walsh's performance was mediocre in all aspects.
I also wasn't convinced that the Christmas season needed to piled on. It just pushed things too close to the overly sentimental line. I would have appreciated it more, I think, if it was a crappy, middle of the winter time when we lost that.
Complaints aside, what an uplifting film about making due, and making your own happiness. Loved it!
Thursday, September 9, 2010
T's Take on CANADIAN BACON
What can I say? It's a classic. Really the only Michael Moore movie I can point to and say the word "classic" without irony. I remember my parents laughing about this movie and talking about it as being hilariously political, but when I watch it now the movie's humor feels somehow sapped. So much of this movie rings true today in so many ways... It was very over-the-top and ridiculous in its time, but even then there was a clear edge of terrifyingly transparent reality. I guess by this point in my life I've seen the messages conveyed here play out some many times over that much if it isn't funny anymore. I'm not afraid of Americans prodding Canada in an effort to stir up war tension. I am afraid of that country bringing some terrible wrath down upon themselves as a result of Government/Big Business crossbreeding, because you know damn well they're not annexing Mexico. Not as a first choice, anyway.
Every time I have a chance encounter with an American they're incredibly guarded and distainful at first, but after about twenty seconds of conversation they they open right up with their opinions and convictions, almost all of which tend to be extremely rational and humanistic (basically). I remember speaking with one woman about box stores: she was telling me with dismay that they used to have a great selection of bookstores where she was from, but a Half Price Books moved in and chased out all the competition. She said it hurt their town and put too many people out of business who cared about books and employed a bunch of fifteen year olds who didn't read because that was the only set of people who would work for what they paid. And yet, everyone shopped there. She said, "This is happening everywhere. Who's going to pay for all of this? I feel so sorry for your generation. Things are just going to get worse."
Hunter S. Thompson wrote on October 16, 2001: "Generals and military scholars will tell you that eight or 10 years is actually not such a long time in the span of human history — which is no doubt true — but history also tells us that 10 years of martial law and a war-time economy are going to feel like a Lifetime to people who are in their twenties today. The poor bastards of what will forever be known as Generation Z are doomed to be the first generation of Americans who will grow up with a lower standard of living than their parents enjoyed. That is extremely heavy news, and it will take a while for it to sink in. The 22 babies born in New York City while the World Trade Center burned will never know what they missed. The last half of the 20th century will seem like a wild party for rich kids, compared to what’s coming now. The party’s over, folks."
I thought Alan Alda made a great stand-in for Bush, even though Jr. wasn't around for years to come when this awesome movie came out. As near-omnipotent superspy Snake Plissken used to say: the more things change, the more they stay the same. It's just one crisis after another, isn't it? The worst part is that they seem more and more authentic. Either the puppetmasters are growing more confident and skilled in their coercion or we're just spiraling faster and faster out of control. If these are the days in which greasy government officials don't need to invent pretend calamities to keep us spending and perpetuate their own control we are well and truly fucked.
Last night Michael Moore gave me chills. Quote me.
This movie is gut-splittingly hilarious and absolutely terrifying at the same time. You feel either one (or both) at any given time because it's not impossible to imagine many of the characters behaving the way we see them in this movie. Here we see a stupendous, goofy world where anything is possible and everything is hilariously over exaggerated. In creating such an environment Canadian Bacon jerks us down to grim realities that North America as a whole has yet to face fully fifteen years later. The actors do a great job of capturing the haplessness and simple-mindedness Michael Moore clearly wanted to portray in the various classes and I caught myself laughing so hard I needed to rewind more than once. Having said that, any instance where the person you're watching some supposed cinematic gold alongside falls asleep repeatedly before ten o'clock it doesn't really say much for the narrative.
No characters learned from their mistakes, we saw no growth or development, everybody in the film was two-dimensional, the schemes were transparent and less than well thought out... The outcomes were predictable and the general tone very baseline. In the end it was all a little too true to life for comfort.
Watch Canadian Bacon.
Every time I have a chance encounter with an American they're incredibly guarded and distainful at first, but after about twenty seconds of conversation they they open right up with their opinions and convictions, almost all of which tend to be extremely rational and humanistic (basically). I remember speaking with one woman about box stores: she was telling me with dismay that they used to have a great selection of bookstores where she was from, but a Half Price Books moved in and chased out all the competition. She said it hurt their town and put too many people out of business who cared about books and employed a bunch of fifteen year olds who didn't read because that was the only set of people who would work for what they paid. And yet, everyone shopped there. She said, "This is happening everywhere. Who's going to pay for all of this? I feel so sorry for your generation. Things are just going to get worse."
Hunter S. Thompson wrote on October 16, 2001: "Generals and military scholars will tell you that eight or 10 years is actually not such a long time in the span of human history — which is no doubt true — but history also tells us that 10 years of martial law and a war-time economy are going to feel like a Lifetime to people who are in their twenties today. The poor bastards of what will forever be known as Generation Z are doomed to be the first generation of Americans who will grow up with a lower standard of living than their parents enjoyed. That is extremely heavy news, and it will take a while for it to sink in. The 22 babies born in New York City while the World Trade Center burned will never know what they missed. The last half of the 20th century will seem like a wild party for rich kids, compared to what’s coming now. The party’s over, folks."
I thought Alan Alda made a great stand-in for Bush, even though Jr. wasn't around for years to come when this awesome movie came out. As near-omnipotent superspy Snake Plissken used to say: the more things change, the more they stay the same. It's just one crisis after another, isn't it? The worst part is that they seem more and more authentic. Either the puppetmasters are growing more confident and skilled in their coercion or we're just spiraling faster and faster out of control. If these are the days in which greasy government officials don't need to invent pretend calamities to keep us spending and perpetuate their own control we are well and truly fucked.
Last night Michael Moore gave me chills. Quote me.
This movie is gut-splittingly hilarious and absolutely terrifying at the same time. You feel either one (or both) at any given time because it's not impossible to imagine many of the characters behaving the way we see them in this movie. Here we see a stupendous, goofy world where anything is possible and everything is hilariously over exaggerated. In creating such an environment Canadian Bacon jerks us down to grim realities that North America as a whole has yet to face fully fifteen years later. The actors do a great job of capturing the haplessness and simple-mindedness Michael Moore clearly wanted to portray in the various classes and I caught myself laughing so hard I needed to rewind more than once. Having said that, any instance where the person you're watching some supposed cinematic gold alongside falls asleep repeatedly before ten o'clock it doesn't really say much for the narrative.
No characters learned from their mistakes, we saw no growth or development, everybody in the film was two-dimensional, the schemes were transparent and less than well thought out... The outcomes were predictable and the general tone very baseline. In the end it was all a little too true to life for comfort.
Watch Canadian Bacon.
M's Musings on CANADIAN BACON
Canadian Bacon. Written and directed by Michael Moore. Ft. John Candy, Alan Alda and Rhea Perlman. Fox, 1995.
My expectations of what this movie was about and my experience watching the film were very different, to say the least. I thought this movie was totally Canadian, set in Canada, and a parody of exclusively Canadian life. When I saw that Michael Moore was director.... I was just confused. The CanCon, while high, was not the real focus.
In actuality, this film is a critique of American culture and society, which hyperbolizes Canada to help emphasize some of the societal and governmental problems of the US. The film doesn't critique Canada, but instead essentializes us as a sweet, docile country with a heart that is an easy and unjustifiable target for America at the end of the Cold War. Without the money that comes from warmongering, many people are out of jobs and desperate. The current president incites hatred against a common enemy, both accusing and blaming Canada to gain political sway.
The movie has a lighthearted tone, and I, for one, mostly like its portrayal of Canada. While not at all realistic, its nice to imagine that overall the American caricature of Canada is friendly and caring, if a bit gullible. The constant rearranging of the RCMP acronym was sweet. My favourite moment was when the "night shift" at the power plant was an old couple reposing in a living room setting. If only life were really like that!
The film does, however, point to the relatively unclear identity of Canada as a nation on the international stage. In general, the portrayal is very diminutive. Its one of those movies where the message is supposed to be that America really needs to reassess its corrupt values and government. But, another of its underlying messages is, well, at least we are brave and strong unlike these sissy, small Canadians. The fact that we could be so easily manipulated and controlled by the government was a frustrating admission to our lack of independence and power.
Though fifteen years old, I think many of the issues presented here are as real now as they were then. The world is still struggling economically, and now the divide between rich and poor is even more extreme. The "closed power plant" scenario of Niagara Falls seems to be applicable to large portions of both countries.
How do we define ourselves and deal with these economic issues? Besides scapegoating and warmongering, tactics that have largely failed, what are our options? Surely to god we can come up with something better. I know it.
While this movie is a comedy, I think its outlook is pretty bleak. National pride is not a useful commodity. It doesn't fix problems... it only seems to provide a sense of security and comfort in uncertain times.
I wouldn't watch this again. I appreciate the film's goal, but I wasn't engaged with it. I had to watch it in two sittings, and then I had to double check plot points before posting. Maybe it just wasn't my genre.
Sunday, September 5, 2010
T's Take on GHOST
Ghost. Dir. Jerry Zucker. Screenplay by Bruce Joel Rubin. Ft. Patrick Swayze, Demi Moore and Whoopi Goldberg. Paramount, 1990.
M: I wish they'd change the hair. Or make them both better somehow. All I see is hair. Bad hair.
M: Why is she dressed like a man?
M: This is one of the top ten romance movies? For what?
M: We should have just watched Beauty and the Beast
M: This movie sucks! It sucks! Why did we watch this movie if you knew it sucked?! You did this to us! You did it with Ghost!
M: Baby... Next time we have sex do you want me to pretend I'm Patrick Swayze in Whoopie Goldberg's body? Is that what this is about?
I sat through this movie for her. I saw it a second time because she wanted to watch something romantic. When she said that, I bit my tongue, because I love her. When she suggested Ghost, I didn't flinch. The man inside me was screaming and crying and scratching at the walls of my psyche, but I held back, because why not? She's done some pretty heroic and incredible things for me in the past. No judgment in brainstorming, after all, and it's not entirely up to me what we watch. The complex inner workings of the Modern Woman are largely unknown to me. Relationships are about compromise, and it was, before tonight, my understanding that chicks dig the Swayze.
Having said that, I was both relieved and dismayed at her response. It's good to know that she is, in fact, a human being with full sensory capacity. But if she's not going to get all weepy about the tragic death of Sam Wheat, why did we watch it? I went into the film hoping for (at the very least) a bargaining chip to be used at a later date. At this point I can't see using Ghost as leverage to get Total Recall into the mix... She's blaming me for this fucking movie. Even now, at this very moment, she's scanning the internet and saying things like:
M: "You know, you can buy Ghost on VHS at Amazon for fifty-nine cents. What a ripoff."
M: "Yes! This movie is commemorated in the top ten worst movie lines ever. 'Ditto.' Pfft."
So what can I say? The story was flimsy and requested far too much suspension of disbelief. I hated all the characters. The storyline itself confuses romance with men jumping through hoops for their partners. I hate that shit. Why does romance always have to circle around a confused, helpless woman? Who cares? I wanted that Pourto Rican dude to kill her. The inevitable 'woman in peril' hook came up far too many times to be effective, and the whole money-laundering thing they kept dragging us back to felt forced.
Again: who cares? This movie was too squeaky clean and predictable to even approach being watchable. Why didn't Sam kill either/both of those guys when he had the chance? You're telling me he wouldn't? He gives four million dollars to the salvation army so that no-one would come after the psychic? Why not have her speak with Molly and divert that whole confluence of events? What? If they both just disappeared to some Caribbean island... I'm getting mad, now, and I'm sorry if we're getting off track.
He couldn't have gotten at least some of it to his girlfriend, who's only source of income is pottery?! I hate to try forcing logic into something that's not meant to be observed practically, but that's why she was with a banker in the first place! Now she's got the mortgage on a New York city townhouse to contend with, funeral bills, even the cost of living in that city would be back-breaking after a few weeks. They clearly weren't married, so what happens with his life insurance? Money never really seems to come into these boiled-down idiotic love stories. It's immaterial when compared to the loss of a loved one, I understand that, but she didn't need to think clearly to recieve the money.
I felt Patrick Swayze was miscast in this movie as an actor. Besides that, the character was not a man. It was not a male person. They tried to make him seem more masculine by having him dislike Macbeth and act hesitantly around the notion of marriage, but that was really the only attempt at humanizing him in that way - everything else was him reacting with an over-exaggerated gasp to the plotline. Every bad movie has some side character who's only job is to push the plot along; everything they say is the next step in the story. Usually this is a roommate, or a sibling, or a best friend. It shouldn't be the male lead.
This was a ghost story. It was a story about a ghost. It wasn't a love story, or a tale of resilliance and lasting affection that supersedes space and time... It was a fucking bank caper. Who cares? It doesn't matter! Things like this happen all the time! It would have been nice to see Demi Moore do anything but cry. Or have anything come out of it that was good. The best thing that happened was Demi Moore learned that she truly was loved by Patrick Swayze, who is now dead and gone forever, so enjoy your reopened wound. You know what? If Swayze hadn't interfered, that Willy guy probably would have avoided her, come back when the house was empty, got the money, and she never would have known the difference. Instead she was menaced by a man with a knife and lead on an emotional roller coaster and came out with the ghost (pardon the bad pun) of a man nobody could ever live up to the memory of. That banker dick probably would have been exed out by whatever faceless and briefly mentioned organized crime outfit (read: "... These people are drug dealers!") he was working for anyway, because when four million dollars goes missing you don't get to keep eighty thousand. You're not getting paid off. They're not real keen on witnesses like that. When that guy goes back for his cut he winds up in a hole. Nobody's giving you money, you idiot!
I guess the underlying current of Justice is what really bothered me about this movie. Bad people go to hell, Good people go to heaven, true love prevails and crime doesn't pay. Because that's not boring and useless and oversimplified at all. Never mind the super creepy Whoopatrick touching scene. Lesbianism isn't creepy. Patrick Swayze posessing Whoopy Goldberg's body and touching on his girl is creepy. Even creepier is the way Whoopy kind of... Submittingly subjected herself to it. Yuck.
Don't watch Ghost.
M: I wish they'd change the hair. Or make them both better somehow. All I see is hair. Bad hair.
M: Why is she dressed like a man?
M: This is one of the top ten romance movies? For what?
M: We should have just watched Beauty and the Beast
M: This movie sucks! It sucks! Why did we watch this movie if you knew it sucked?! You did this to us! You did it with Ghost!
M: Baby... Next time we have sex do you want me to pretend I'm Patrick Swayze in Whoopie Goldberg's body? Is that what this is about?
I sat through this movie for her. I saw it a second time because she wanted to watch something romantic. When she said that, I bit my tongue, because I love her. When she suggested Ghost, I didn't flinch. The man inside me was screaming and crying and scratching at the walls of my psyche, but I held back, because why not? She's done some pretty heroic and incredible things for me in the past. No judgment in brainstorming, after all, and it's not entirely up to me what we watch. The complex inner workings of the Modern Woman are largely unknown to me. Relationships are about compromise, and it was, before tonight, my understanding that chicks dig the Swayze.
Having said that, I was both relieved and dismayed at her response. It's good to know that she is, in fact, a human being with full sensory capacity. But if she's not going to get all weepy about the tragic death of Sam Wheat, why did we watch it? I went into the film hoping for (at the very least) a bargaining chip to be used at a later date. At this point I can't see using Ghost as leverage to get Total Recall into the mix... She's blaming me for this fucking movie. Even now, at this very moment, she's scanning the internet and saying things like:
M: "You know, you can buy Ghost on VHS at Amazon for fifty-nine cents. What a ripoff."
M: "Yes! This movie is commemorated in the top ten worst movie lines ever. 'Ditto.' Pfft."
So what can I say? The story was flimsy and requested far too much suspension of disbelief. I hated all the characters. The storyline itself confuses romance with men jumping through hoops for their partners. I hate that shit. Why does romance always have to circle around a confused, helpless woman? Who cares? I wanted that Pourto Rican dude to kill her. The inevitable 'woman in peril' hook came up far too many times to be effective, and the whole money-laundering thing they kept dragging us back to felt forced.
Again: who cares? This movie was too squeaky clean and predictable to even approach being watchable. Why didn't Sam kill either/both of those guys when he had the chance? You're telling me he wouldn't? He gives four million dollars to the salvation army so that no-one would come after the psychic? Why not have her speak with Molly and divert that whole confluence of events? What? If they both just disappeared to some Caribbean island... I'm getting mad, now, and I'm sorry if we're getting off track.
He couldn't have gotten at least some of it to his girlfriend, who's only source of income is pottery?! I hate to try forcing logic into something that's not meant to be observed practically, but that's why she was with a banker in the first place! Now she's got the mortgage on a New York city townhouse to contend with, funeral bills, even the cost of living in that city would be back-breaking after a few weeks. They clearly weren't married, so what happens with his life insurance? Money never really seems to come into these boiled-down idiotic love stories. It's immaterial when compared to the loss of a loved one, I understand that, but she didn't need to think clearly to recieve the money.
I felt Patrick Swayze was miscast in this movie as an actor. Besides that, the character was not a man. It was not a male person. They tried to make him seem more masculine by having him dislike Macbeth and act hesitantly around the notion of marriage, but that was really the only attempt at humanizing him in that way - everything else was him reacting with an over-exaggerated gasp to the plotline. Every bad movie has some side character who's only job is to push the plot along; everything they say is the next step in the story. Usually this is a roommate, or a sibling, or a best friend. It shouldn't be the male lead.
This was a ghost story. It was a story about a ghost. It wasn't a love story, or a tale of resilliance and lasting affection that supersedes space and time... It was a fucking bank caper. Who cares? It doesn't matter! Things like this happen all the time! It would have been nice to see Demi Moore do anything but cry. Or have anything come out of it that was good. The best thing that happened was Demi Moore learned that she truly was loved by Patrick Swayze, who is now dead and gone forever, so enjoy your reopened wound. You know what? If Swayze hadn't interfered, that Willy guy probably would have avoided her, come back when the house was empty, got the money, and she never would have known the difference. Instead she was menaced by a man with a knife and lead on an emotional roller coaster and came out with the ghost (pardon the bad pun) of a man nobody could ever live up to the memory of. That banker dick probably would have been exed out by whatever faceless and briefly mentioned organized crime outfit (read: "... These people are drug dealers!") he was working for anyway, because when four million dollars goes missing you don't get to keep eighty thousand. You're not getting paid off. They're not real keen on witnesses like that. When that guy goes back for his cut he winds up in a hole. Nobody's giving you money, you idiot!
I guess the underlying current of Justice is what really bothered me about this movie. Bad people go to hell, Good people go to heaven, true love prevails and crime doesn't pay. Because that's not boring and useless and oversimplified at all. Never mind the super creepy Whoopatrick touching scene. Lesbianism isn't creepy. Patrick Swayze posessing Whoopy Goldberg's body and touching on his girl is creepy. Even creepier is the way Whoopy kind of... Submittingly subjected herself to it. Yuck.
Don't watch Ghost.
M's Musings on GHOST
Ghost. Dir. Jerry Zucker. Screenplay by Bruce Joel Rubin. Ft. Patrick Swayze, Demi Moore and Whoopi Goldberg. Paramount, 1990.
No offense to fans of the early 90s... but seriously, didn't you have something better to spend your money on than Ghost? Holy crap this movie was bad. I didn't enjoy a single minute of it. I must have moved around, whined, complained, and blamed T. for the full 127 minutes I spent watching this movie.
Earlier today I figured, we have enough posts under our belt, so, it must be time for something romantic. You know... warm our hearts, help us reconnect with our sappy sides after watching someone like Marilyn Monroe remind us how fake human interaction really is most of the time. We perused some lists of top romantic movies, such as this and this, and I decided, what the hey, this might be a fun mix of supernatural and sentimentality.
But it wasn't. And T. knew it. He had seen this movie before. He let us waste our energy watching this pile of refuse for reasons unknown to me. My guess is that he wanted me to be dissuaded from suggesting romantic movies in the future. But, what he may NOT have realized, is that now the hunt is ON! Since that was so terrible, I want to find one that really takes my breath away, steals my heart, and makes me sigh inadvertently.
T., get ready for every romantic movie you have never before been subjected to! Muhahahhahaaa!
And when you are ready to tear out your eyeballs, remember this: You could have stopped this!
In short: There was no chemistry between the actors. All the acting was really choppy and poor. Especially emotional close-ups of Patrick Swayze. The special effects were distracting and weird. The racial stereotyping was aggravating and not at all comedic. The ghouls and heavenly light were just sad. And, finally, the pinnacle of a movie should never be, "Ditto".
I hope someday people realize how bad this movie is. Twenty years later, I would hope that any attachment to this story is gone. Let me know it is just a hoax. Seriously. Because I just don't get it.
Enough said.
No offense to fans of the early 90s... but seriously, didn't you have something better to spend your money on than Ghost? Holy crap this movie was bad. I didn't enjoy a single minute of it. I must have moved around, whined, complained, and blamed T. for the full 127 minutes I spent watching this movie.
Earlier today I figured, we have enough posts under our belt, so, it must be time for something romantic. You know... warm our hearts, help us reconnect with our sappy sides after watching someone like Marilyn Monroe remind us how fake human interaction really is most of the time. We perused some lists of top romantic movies, such as this and this, and I decided, what the hey, this might be a fun mix of supernatural and sentimentality.
But it wasn't. And T. knew it. He had seen this movie before. He let us waste our energy watching this pile of refuse for reasons unknown to me. My guess is that he wanted me to be dissuaded from suggesting romantic movies in the future. But, what he may NOT have realized, is that now the hunt is ON! Since that was so terrible, I want to find one that really takes my breath away, steals my heart, and makes me sigh inadvertently.
T., get ready for every romantic movie you have never before been subjected to! Muhahahhahaaa!
And when you are ready to tear out your eyeballs, remember this: You could have stopped this!
In short: There was no chemistry between the actors. All the acting was really choppy and poor. Especially emotional close-ups of Patrick Swayze. The special effects were distracting and weird. The racial stereotyping was aggravating and not at all comedic. The ghouls and heavenly light were just sad. And, finally, the pinnacle of a movie should never be, "Ditto".
I hope someday people realize how bad this movie is. Twenty years later, I would hope that any attachment to this story is gone. Let me know it is just a hoax. Seriously. Because I just don't get it.
Enough said.
T's Take on SOME LIKE IT HOT
This is one of the funnest movies we've seen in a long time. Murderous mobster mayhem, love, lust, gender-bending, prohibition and grifting... It's all here, for the low low price of two hours of your time. My favorite thing about this movie is that its simple. You could watch it any number of ways, and I know the film is used to help interpret gender roles worldwide, but it wasn't ever intended to be. It was supposed to be an easy romp through the lives of two half-way crooks who live hand to mouth in Chicago's messy business district. The main characters Joe and Jerry (Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon) are inescapably likable. The actors' on-screen performances have that wonderful classic physical hokiness that softens the movie as a whole in more than a few spots.
Anymore, you'd have to call this overacting. People have no patience for too much bodily embellishment, but the level of film grain and poor sound recording technology they had in the fifties required it. If you're watching, you can tell where the actors are basically yelling in each others' faces from less than a foot away to be heard on camera. Often Daphne's 'whispering' makes his/her voice crack hideously to hilarious effect. So yes, a lot of this movie is unintentionally funny, but I like the way the character makeups force a drifting balance of power between the two men.
First, on the streets of Chicago, Joe's betting and Big Ideas cause the two of them near ruin. Jerry's begging him to be practical and stay focused on what they need, not throw money away on his apparent gambling addiction... Then, as soon as they're disguised and on the train, Joe's reeling in Jerry as he pants excitedly at the skirts of all the surrounding women. The two tragically flawed men working whatever angles appear to them is what keeps the show moving to be sure, and they do an excellent job of carrying the movie. It sure as hell wasn't going to be Sugar or the stiff-as-wood gangsters, or Female Band Member #3.
My favorite part was the ending, when Jerry reveals himself to be a man and his husband-to-be takes it in stride. One can only assume that he understood the game all along, and our final second of film is Jerry acquiescing to a life of homosexuality - one he's always secretly craved and can finally accept. What a beautiful ending to this sordid tale. One thing about the ending that threw me was that Sugar realizes that Josephine has been a dude all along, right? Well, Jerry was the only one who ever did anything to help her. All Josephine ever did was listen to her prattle on about what she needs in a man and use it against her. Did Sugar understand that he pretended to be the millionaire, too? If she didn't, we haven't really resolved anything. Even his millionaire persona wasn't great to her, besides the diamond bracelet he gave her - effectively buying her off. He told her she couldn't possibly satisfy him and then let her peruse him for personal gain. Not a fantastic catch
If you look too close, none of these people are especially likeable, but they're all flawed and dizzy enough that they're fun to watch. The movie could have been shorter, but whatever. It was fun and seminal and everyone should see it once.
Watch Some Like it Hot.
Anymore, you'd have to call this overacting. People have no patience for too much bodily embellishment, but the level of film grain and poor sound recording technology they had in the fifties required it. If you're watching, you can tell where the actors are basically yelling in each others' faces from less than a foot away to be heard on camera. Often Daphne's 'whispering' makes his/her voice crack hideously to hilarious effect. So yes, a lot of this movie is unintentionally funny, but I like the way the character makeups force a drifting balance of power between the two men.
First, on the streets of Chicago, Joe's betting and Big Ideas cause the two of them near ruin. Jerry's begging him to be practical and stay focused on what they need, not throw money away on his apparent gambling addiction... Then, as soon as they're disguised and on the train, Joe's reeling in Jerry as he pants excitedly at the skirts of all the surrounding women. The two tragically flawed men working whatever angles appear to them is what keeps the show moving to be sure, and they do an excellent job of carrying the movie. It sure as hell wasn't going to be Sugar or the stiff-as-wood gangsters, or Female Band Member #3.
My favorite part was the ending, when Jerry reveals himself to be a man and his husband-to-be takes it in stride. One can only assume that he understood the game all along, and our final second of film is Jerry acquiescing to a life of homosexuality - one he's always secretly craved and can finally accept. What a beautiful ending to this sordid tale. One thing about the ending that threw me was that Sugar realizes that Josephine has been a dude all along, right? Well, Jerry was the only one who ever did anything to help her. All Josephine ever did was listen to her prattle on about what she needs in a man and use it against her. Did Sugar understand that he pretended to be the millionaire, too? If she didn't, we haven't really resolved anything. Even his millionaire persona wasn't great to her, besides the diamond bracelet he gave her - effectively buying her off. He told her she couldn't possibly satisfy him and then let her peruse him for personal gain. Not a fantastic catch
If you look too close, none of these people are especially likeable, but they're all flawed and dizzy enough that they're fun to watch. The movie could have been shorter, but whatever. It was fun and seminal and everyone should see it once.
Watch Some Like it Hot.
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