Saw Vampyr, a film by Carl Dreyer. It's largely a special-effects extravaganza, although 1930s technology, so mainly camera tricks are used. That said, the camera tricks are great. There's a cool sequence where shadows of people and objects don't match up. A baby's skeleton in a doctor's office seems to have black shadowy wings. Very cool. We follow a bewildered protagonist as he makes his way (seemingly at random) to an old manor where the father of the family living there promptly dies. His daughter is suffering from some strange malady (can you guess what it is?) and much morbid spookiness abounds.
The film is a bit slow. It has sound, but also title-cards and is definitely still in a silent-era mindset. However, the freedom of the camera is amazing. It tilts and whirls about, disorienting and weird. Ghostly dissolves and double-exposures are used to great effect. Several times iconic little images show up, such as an early moment when a farmer carrying a scythe rings for the ferryman to take him across the river. Interesting and scary in a dated, Edgar Allen Poe-ish way. Incidentally, the main character looks an awful lot like Lovecraft.
May 31, 2014
May 30, 2014
Death Race
Saw Death Race, a remake of the original 1970s Death Race 2000. It is similarly set in the near future where racers horribly race each other to the death with weaponized cars. It retains the original's distrust of establishment and disgust at the spectacle, but it also retains the original's schizophrenia about itself. Is it the very grotesque spectacle that it's condemning, or is it ironically above all of that and is it in fact high satire. Well, high satire it is not (at least so far as I can tell.) It's too muddy and unclear to be definitely allegorical. It is aware of its own ridiculousness and has many moments that flirt with punchy commentary. For example, the protagonist is an ex-miner who is stiffed on his last paycheck by his faceless, scumbag employers. The collective group of miners start shouting and the cops come in and there's a mini-riot and it all feels very Kent State, very Tea Party/Occupy Wallstreet. I feel like something's about to make a point... but then nothing does.
He just goes home after that and is framed by a masked man for the murder of his wife (this lets him be sexily windowed by the way... Ladies.) I think the exploitation of the miners is supposed to sort of set up this general feeling of paranoia and make the more personal exploitation of the protagonist more hard-hitting, but it all feels so generic. On the one hand it's an interesting tie between the social and the personal, but how is it different from an action movie motivating the protagonist with the kidnap of his daughter? The whole thing is very fun, mind you. It's not boring, just not novel. Anyway, In prison there's more little gestures at relevance, with the deadly female warden derisively hissing at the hero "what would you do with your freedom?" and the reality-TV-style Death Race ads and so on. There's something maybe-clever going on with the racers' pro-wrestler-style personae and rivalries, but all of this is overshadowed by the spectacular video-game-like titular Death Race.
The death race is fun to watch, in a dumb loud sort of way. A lot happens but nothing really matters. People die of course, but you're never really surprised by who does die. Non-spoiler alert: the hero lives for quite a while. It's kind of fun to watch the heroes defeat the smug powers-that-be, but it kind of grated on me as a whole. The obsession with cars, guns and posturing is a siren song I don't respond to. I am probably missing the point of this film. I suspect there's something going on under the hood but I'm so turned off by the trappings of the film that I'm not going to investigate. A puzzling film which I, for reasons of cognitive dissonance reduction, condemn as a mess.
He just goes home after that and is framed by a masked man for the murder of his wife (this lets him be sexily windowed by the way... Ladies.) I think the exploitation of the miners is supposed to sort of set up this general feeling of paranoia and make the more personal exploitation of the protagonist more hard-hitting, but it all feels so generic. On the one hand it's an interesting tie between the social and the personal, but how is it different from an action movie motivating the protagonist with the kidnap of his daughter? The whole thing is very fun, mind you. It's not boring, just not novel. Anyway, In prison there's more little gestures at relevance, with the deadly female warden derisively hissing at the hero "what would you do with your freedom?" and the reality-TV-style Death Race ads and so on. There's something maybe-clever going on with the racers' pro-wrestler-style personae and rivalries, but all of this is overshadowed by the spectacular video-game-like titular Death Race.
The death race is fun to watch, in a dumb loud sort of way. A lot happens but nothing really matters. People die of course, but you're never really surprised by who does die. Non-spoiler alert: the hero lives for quite a while. It's kind of fun to watch the heroes defeat the smug powers-that-be, but it kind of grated on me as a whole. The obsession with cars, guns and posturing is a siren song I don't respond to. I am probably missing the point of this film. I suspect there's something going on under the hood but I'm so turned off by the trappings of the film that I'm not going to investigate. A puzzling film which I, for reasons of cognitive dissonance reduction, condemn as a mess.
May 29, 2014
Oscar
Saw Oscar (thanks, Chris!) It was a farce starring Stallone as a gangster trying to go straight on a day that the universe seems to be conspiring against him. I expected some rather dark humour but instead got a very goofy farce. Like most farces, it serves equally as a cautionary tale against being unable to explain yourself succinctly. This is a pure farce, uncut with any other style of film. Don't bother searching for trenchant allegory or rich symbolism, instead enjoy the film's simple misunderstandings and strange coincidences. Everyone's suitcases look identical, everyone claims to be everyone else, sanity is questioned at the drop of a hat, and everyone's bewildered. The film is light, funny, and frustrating. It keeps twists coming so furiously it seems to be composed entirely of twists.
The style of comedy is very kind. No one seems evil as a result of the jokes. Compare this to the comic style of the show Seinfeld (to take a well known example) where we usually laugh because the main characters are revealed to be so petty and mean. Here the characters are high-strung but (nearly) universally well-meaning. The villains are established as such at the very beginning and are even kind of humanized in the climax. Stallone, the don, struck me as kind of a wimpy gangster at first (oh he's clearly in charge, but he's a far cry from Brando's ominously growling godfather) but as the film progressed I realized we are meant to sympathize with him. It's not by accident that he's the most sympathetic character.
I'm not a big fan of farces. I prefer my comedy a bit crueler (I think Rick and Morty is the funniest thing I've seen in a long time and it often uses existential despair as a punchline) and find farces in particular kind of frustrating. I keep thinking if only they would explain themselves how much shorter the film would be. However these criticisms are more pointed toward the farce genre in general, rather than at this film in particular (and are completely my own personal tastes anyway so, y'know, feel free to ignore entirely.) This film is the epitome of a farce so, farce-lovers, dig in. Its a great piece of plate-spinning. Its plot is surprising and its heart is soft. It isn't blatantly sexist or racist, as the farces of the 20s often are, and although the main character is long-suffering he's doing so with one hand behind his back. I never felt sorry for him (as I did for the poor paleontologist in Bringing Up Baby) which is what usually ruins a classic farce for me. A nice film, is all senses of the word.
The style of comedy is very kind. No one seems evil as a result of the jokes. Compare this to the comic style of the show Seinfeld (to take a well known example) where we usually laugh because the main characters are revealed to be so petty and mean. Here the characters are high-strung but (nearly) universally well-meaning. The villains are established as such at the very beginning and are even kind of humanized in the climax. Stallone, the don, struck me as kind of a wimpy gangster at first (oh he's clearly in charge, but he's a far cry from Brando's ominously growling godfather) but as the film progressed I realized we are meant to sympathize with him. It's not by accident that he's the most sympathetic character.
I'm not a big fan of farces. I prefer my comedy a bit crueler (I think Rick and Morty is the funniest thing I've seen in a long time and it often uses existential despair as a punchline) and find farces in particular kind of frustrating. I keep thinking if only they would explain themselves how much shorter the film would be. However these criticisms are more pointed toward the farce genre in general, rather than at this film in particular (and are completely my own personal tastes anyway so, y'know, feel free to ignore entirely.) This film is the epitome of a farce so, farce-lovers, dig in. Its a great piece of plate-spinning. Its plot is surprising and its heart is soft. It isn't blatantly sexist or racist, as the farces of the 20s often are, and although the main character is long-suffering he's doing so with one hand behind his back. I never felt sorry for him (as I did for the poor paleontologist in Bringing Up Baby) which is what usually ruins a classic farce for me. A nice film, is all senses of the word.
May 27, 2014
Tabloid
Saw Tabloid, a documentary about an American woman, Joyce, who kidnapped the Mormon love of her life and then lost him back to the church and to a swirling maelstrom of British tabloid exploitation. She tells her story, spinning it as a desperate love affair that the world conspired against. The tabloid reporters, with knowing smile and jaundiced eye, tell a tale of exploitation of a woman who may well be insane. Joyce's mental health is the most fascinating thing in the film. She clearly does not take the British kidnapping charges seriously at all, traipsing around in farcical disguises and selling "her story" with a smile and wink. Has she told herself a lie so often that she now believes it or is she just the slightly-calculating flower child she presents herself as? At one point, she compares herself to narcissus. It's unclear if this is supposed to be flattering or self-deprecating.
Her would-be boyfriend is unfortunately not available for interview, but it is his contention that he was grabbed at gunpoint, with chloroform. She contends that the Mormon church brainwashed him. An ex-Mormon provides some perspective, that the social/religious mores of the church may have contributed to the situation, but he never exactly sides with Joyce. Joyce's past and actions don't jibe with her persona. We hear she worked as a model but that she can easily produce envelopes full of cash. What kind of model she is exactly becomes clear (although Joyce contends that the photos are all composites and frauds.) Clearly we aren't hearing the true story (Joyce herself, font of accidental insight, tells us only god knows the truth) and the stories we are hearing are contradictory and powerfully evocative. In the end, it's more interesting and more fun to fantasize about a sex-crazed madwoman kidnapping a Mormon than it is to contemplate a failed elopement (which may very well be the truth.)
Rashomon-like, the film obscures as it reveals. An interesting film, it mainly allows the characters to tell their own stories, the reporters bemusedly telling their interpretation or spin on the facts, Joyce chuckling and weeping, and old friends wrinkling their brows. There's also a bewildering twist ending involving dog-cloning which functions (I guess) to reinforce the theme of obedience and mastery. As a whole the film seems to argue that Joyce was a would-be master over her lover, but that she became a slave to the (possibly concocted) narrative. Fascinating, lurid, bewildering stuff.
Her would-be boyfriend is unfortunately not available for interview, but it is his contention that he was grabbed at gunpoint, with chloroform. She contends that the Mormon church brainwashed him. An ex-Mormon provides some perspective, that the social/religious mores of the church may have contributed to the situation, but he never exactly sides with Joyce. Joyce's past and actions don't jibe with her persona. We hear she worked as a model but that she can easily produce envelopes full of cash. What kind of model she is exactly becomes clear (although Joyce contends that the photos are all composites and frauds.) Clearly we aren't hearing the true story (Joyce herself, font of accidental insight, tells us only god knows the truth) and the stories we are hearing are contradictory and powerfully evocative. In the end, it's more interesting and more fun to fantasize about a sex-crazed madwoman kidnapping a Mormon than it is to contemplate a failed elopement (which may very well be the truth.)
Rashomon-like, the film obscures as it reveals. An interesting film, it mainly allows the characters to tell their own stories, the reporters bemusedly telling their interpretation or spin on the facts, Joyce chuckling and weeping, and old friends wrinkling their brows. There's also a bewildering twist ending involving dog-cloning which functions (I guess) to reinforce the theme of obedience and mastery. As a whole the film seems to argue that Joyce was a would-be master over her lover, but that she became a slave to the (possibly concocted) narrative. Fascinating, lurid, bewildering stuff.
May 26, 2014
A Tale of Two Sisters
Saw A Tale of Two Sisters, a very interesting horror. It's scary enough in places that I had to pause a few times and wimp out for a second, but the film makes heavy use of jump-cuts and montage in a way I haven't seen a horror film do before (not that it hasn't been done, I just haven't seen it.) The plot revolves around two sisters who gain a step-mother after their father remarries. Tension manifests and festers until full-blown stalkings and night terrors arise. The film is essentially a ghost story, but the ghost is obliquely referenced and is only made definite very near the end (and anyway this is just my interpretation.) The film is Lynchianly uninterested in explaining what's going on (though most questions are answered (or answers hinted at anyway) by the end, so don't worry if you're the type of person who gets hung up on ambiguity) so much of the film can be argued and re-interpreted.
The film's jump-cuts are also very evocative and interesting. At one point a character grabs the arm of another one and won't let go. The camera begins a frantic dance, mirroring the physical struggle, jumping between the faces of the two characters, their interlocking arms, the room they're in, and even another character waiting in the hallway outside, ending when the character finally wrenches her arm away. At another time, a character is frantically searching for scissors. Rooting about in the kitchen drawers, she turns and we suddenly see a clip of the step-mother mechanically swallowing pills. Then we're back with the girl searching for scissors again. Like I say, it's not always very clear exactly what's up in this film.
Childbirth and menstruation are themes for the horror sequences. The film's plot and psychodrama unfortunately only really make sense in retrospect, after all twists have twisted, so be prepared to re-watch. Mirrors and duplication abound which should be taken as a warning that some characters may be imaginary, and that identity will be rather fluid in any case. This adds another layer of confusion atop a film which already requires a lot of unpacking. The whole thing falls apart a bit for me at the end, when explanations begin seeping out, but there's enough evocative imagery and weird juxtaposition to keep me interested. If only it didn't have to be a horror.
The film's jump-cuts are also very evocative and interesting. At one point a character grabs the arm of another one and won't let go. The camera begins a frantic dance, mirroring the physical struggle, jumping between the faces of the two characters, their interlocking arms, the room they're in, and even another character waiting in the hallway outside, ending when the character finally wrenches her arm away. At another time, a character is frantically searching for scissors. Rooting about in the kitchen drawers, she turns and we suddenly see a clip of the step-mother mechanically swallowing pills. Then we're back with the girl searching for scissors again. Like I say, it's not always very clear exactly what's up in this film.
Childbirth and menstruation are themes for the horror sequences. The film's plot and psychodrama unfortunately only really make sense in retrospect, after all twists have twisted, so be prepared to re-watch. Mirrors and duplication abound which should be taken as a warning that some characters may be imaginary, and that identity will be rather fluid in any case. This adds another layer of confusion atop a film which already requires a lot of unpacking. The whole thing falls apart a bit for me at the end, when explanations begin seeping out, but there's enough evocative imagery and weird juxtaposition to keep me interested. If only it didn't have to be a horror.
May 25, 2014
L'Eclisse
Saw L'Eclisse, an Italian film about a woman fresh out of a long-term relationship. She is a secretary who was dating her employer so she is also out of a job. In a limbo between relationships and jobs, she wanders about, meeting friends and being dwarfed by giant futurist buildings that are going up near her apartment. Her isolation is artfully evoked by eerie impersonal statues and the buildings. She eventually begins seeing her mother's foxily attractive stock broker who spends his days in a frantic dash around the trading floor, fleecing fat men at the stock exchange and bellowing "Pronto! Pronto!" into telephones. Unsure if she really wants a relationship with him, she floats around, leading him on slightly but perhaps only teasing him.
The film is shot is a very oblique manner. The woman's isolation is mainly shown by setting (of all weird things.) Just before things get physical with the stock-broker, she opens a window and there's an ominous shot of tiny men dotted around a giant courtyard, a pair of nuns walking through its centre. Clearly she's thinking about sex but feeling unsure about it, but we infer this only from the vista outside of a window. The various opulent apartments which serve as default sets are covered with art pieces whose meaning is themed but obscure (for example, her old boyfriend has only abstract art on the walls. As soon as she dumps him, she puts a newly-bought fossilized flower on her shelf. Something's up here, but I don't know what.)
The film ends with another ominous and meaningful montage whose meaning I don't entirely grasp. There's a shot of water running out of a barrel into the street and down a drain which suggests squandered opportunity, but the water is washing away dirt as well, suggesting a cleansing, rather than wasteful, event. Perhaps the montage is only meant to be evocative and ambiguous. The film is rather to obscure for me. The surface-level plot of the romance is not interesting enough to keep my attention, but the poetic imagery and composition suggests hidden depths and flatters the viewer when the viewer is clever enough to crack pieces of the code. An interesting movie overall, but I think I wasn't ready for it yet.
The film is shot is a very oblique manner. The woman's isolation is mainly shown by setting (of all weird things.) Just before things get physical with the stock-broker, she opens a window and there's an ominous shot of tiny men dotted around a giant courtyard, a pair of nuns walking through its centre. Clearly she's thinking about sex but feeling unsure about it, but we infer this only from the vista outside of a window. The various opulent apartments which serve as default sets are covered with art pieces whose meaning is themed but obscure (for example, her old boyfriend has only abstract art on the walls. As soon as she dumps him, she puts a newly-bought fossilized flower on her shelf. Something's up here, but I don't know what.)
The film ends with another ominous and meaningful montage whose meaning I don't entirely grasp. There's a shot of water running out of a barrel into the street and down a drain which suggests squandered opportunity, but the water is washing away dirt as well, suggesting a cleansing, rather than wasteful, event. Perhaps the montage is only meant to be evocative and ambiguous. The film is rather to obscure for me. The surface-level plot of the romance is not interesting enough to keep my attention, but the poetic imagery and composition suggests hidden depths and flatters the viewer when the viewer is clever enough to crack pieces of the code. An interesting movie overall, but I think I wasn't ready for it yet.
May 23, 2014
Death Race 2000
Saw Death Race 2000, a messy, campy, strange 70s picture. Set in the indefinite future, the film revolves around a nation-wide race where the racers are given points for how many pedestrians are hit. The racers are decorated and costumed in themes that are all vaguely unpleasant or decadent: Nazi, gangster, roman emperor, cowboy (this last makes more sense from a 60s counter-culture perspective. The cowboy has become a less threatening figure today.) and Frankenstein. Team Frankenstein is a personal friend of the president of the world (or something) we discover and there's a group of rebels (there's always rebels) trying to take him down. It turns out, though, that team Frank is Not All He Seems(!!)
The Death Race is clearly supposed to be grotesque and campy, with toothy announcers crowing about points and shouting "holy Chrysler!" At one point pensioners are set up like bowling pins outside of a hospital. But when a person is hit, there's this overblown, comic boi-oi-oing or zoop sound, rendering their whole grotesquery kind of half-baked. If we're meant to sympathize with the victims, why are their deaths made ridiculous? In addition to wacky sound-effects, there's geysers of paint-red blood and limbs flying everywhere. Are we meant to take nothing seriously and just enjoy the spectacle? Why then are we obviously condemning those who enjoy the spectacle? I think we're meant to be semi-revolted and that the dark comedy of the premise is supposed to carry on thematically, compromising the virtue of the protagonists and leaving us amused but sad when we think about it.
The overall effect of the plot is confusing, but the imagery is striking. There's a lot of female chest-al nudity (as well as a lot of male mostly-nudity, which is very progressive, I guess.) The governmental sets are designed to evoke opulence and decadence and are very weird and fun to look at. There's a lot of little throw-away ideas (like a death-cult of fans who sacrifice themselves to the racers) that don't go anywhere and an ending which drives the cynicism home. In my self-indulgence, I'd have preferred a more upbeat ending, but what can you do? It was the 70s. This film would be a good party-film to laugh at and be bewildered by.
The Death Race is clearly supposed to be grotesque and campy, with toothy announcers crowing about points and shouting "holy Chrysler!" At one point pensioners are set up like bowling pins outside of a hospital. But when a person is hit, there's this overblown, comic boi-oi-oing or zoop sound, rendering their whole grotesquery kind of half-baked. If we're meant to sympathize with the victims, why are their deaths made ridiculous? In addition to wacky sound-effects, there's geysers of paint-red blood and limbs flying everywhere. Are we meant to take nothing seriously and just enjoy the spectacle? Why then are we obviously condemning those who enjoy the spectacle? I think we're meant to be semi-revolted and that the dark comedy of the premise is supposed to carry on thematically, compromising the virtue of the protagonists and leaving us amused but sad when we think about it.
The overall effect of the plot is confusing, but the imagery is striking. There's a lot of female chest-al nudity (as well as a lot of male mostly-nudity, which is very progressive, I guess.) The governmental sets are designed to evoke opulence and decadence and are very weird and fun to look at. There's a lot of little throw-away ideas (like a death-cult of fans who sacrifice themselves to the racers) that don't go anywhere and an ending which drives the cynicism home. In my self-indulgence, I'd have preferred a more upbeat ending, but what can you do? It was the 70s. This film would be a good party-film to laugh at and be bewildered by.
May 22, 2014
The Cabin in the Woods
Saw The Cabin in the Woods (thanks, Kim!) It was amazing. Joss Whedon simultaneously deconstructs and honours the horror genre. Five college kids go to the cabin from Evil Dead and awaken ancient evil. This is a move that's obvious, right? Ash does it in the Evil Dead and cabins in the woods are ground zero for serial killers, monsters, ancient evils, etc. But when the ancient evil comes, it is still completely unexpected. Again and again Joss has his cake and cunningly eats it too. For example, when we meet the characters, one's a bubbly blonde who urges her brunette friend to leave her books behind. Ah, we think, here is the dumb slut, Daphne, talking to Velma. It turns out we're right, but for unexpected reasons.
Watching the action of these kids is a team of scientists/techs of some kind. They make mysterious meta-level commentary on the proceedings (even saying the phrase "ah, the dumb blonde" at one point.) They seem to be directors of the proceedings, both in a filmic and in an actual sense. When their co-workers criticize their methods, they respond in a defence not only of their actions but the actions of horror directors everywhere (though this reading requires a sort of ridiculous conception of the audience as all-powerful, vengeful monsters.) The scientists' words provide the deconstruction of the horror, but their actions provide the horror itself.
The film is loads of fun, more comedy-horror than horror although it has very little pure comedy. The film is extremely clever and this provides enough revelatory amusement to prevent any horror from really taking root. The film also provides enough plot and action to keep us entertained and interested. It's a real treat. I'm kind of latet o the party (as ever) but if anyone was on the fence about this film, check it out. It's clever and fun, not dry and trenchant, and certainly not boring or dumb. Good entertainment for the eyes and the brain.
Watching the action of these kids is a team of scientists/techs of some kind. They make mysterious meta-level commentary on the proceedings (even saying the phrase "ah, the dumb blonde" at one point.) They seem to be directors of the proceedings, both in a filmic and in an actual sense. When their co-workers criticize their methods, they respond in a defence not only of their actions but the actions of horror directors everywhere (though this reading requires a sort of ridiculous conception of the audience as all-powerful, vengeful monsters.) The scientists' words provide the deconstruction of the horror, but their actions provide the horror itself.
The film is loads of fun, more comedy-horror than horror although it has very little pure comedy. The film is extremely clever and this provides enough revelatory amusement to prevent any horror from really taking root. The film also provides enough plot and action to keep us entertained and interested. It's a real treat. I'm kind of latet o the party (as ever) but if anyone was on the fence about this film, check it out. It's clever and fun, not dry and trenchant, and certainly not boring or dumb. Good entertainment for the eyes and the brain.
May 21, 2014
Paris, Texas
Saw Paris, Texas, a film which starts out with a man wandering the desert. He collapses in a tiny town, spurring his reunion with his family. The man says almost nothing for the first hour of the film. He is always with a pair of binoculars, surveying things from far away, remote, untouchable. As we uncover more about his past, we hear about an old romance which went wrong in every way a relationship can go wrong (when we finally hear the story, it's unbelievably gothic.) This relationship produced a child who is on the cusp between being a sincere 70s child and a precocious 80s child. The silent man tries to somehow repair the destroyed family he left to wander the desert.
The film is slow, brooding and comfy, it soothes the viewer with moaning steel guitars and pulls us in with lingering shots of the characters. The first half of the film, where the silent man is revealing his past and re-entering the world, is slightly counter-culture-ish. It's not pushy or anything, but the family who collects him works at a billboard manufacturing place. The weird, monolithic consumer icons which dwarf them are placed in opposition to the wild, craggy mountains that surround the mute protagonist. He wants to walk his son to school, but the son (who is obsessed with Star Wars and is shown inaccessibly playing a video game) whines "Nobody walks anymore. Everyone drives."
The second half of the film is mainly focused on the man's past and on his efforts to heal that past. This is done in a believable way. There is no panacea that leaves us feeling justice has been done. We feel (ie I feel) that the characters have at last moved past their suffering, but that there is more messy work to be done. I found it intriguing that they distinguish between giving up old pains and giving in to the despair of those pains. Fun stuff.
The imagery is very powerful. As mentioned, there's the towering billboards, but there's also bright, coloured lights (usually red, blue, or green) everywhere. At one point the man's face is reflected, superimposed over his ex-wife's face. It's a stirring image, but I don't know what to make of it. The final emotional showdown happens on either side of a two-way mirror, so only one character can see the other at a time. I believe this has metaphorical significance (as it is just too cute not to) but I can't see what that might be. An interesting movie, quite long but friendly and deliberate.
The film is slow, brooding and comfy, it soothes the viewer with moaning steel guitars and pulls us in with lingering shots of the characters. The first half of the film, where the silent man is revealing his past and re-entering the world, is slightly counter-culture-ish. It's not pushy or anything, but the family who collects him works at a billboard manufacturing place. The weird, monolithic consumer icons which dwarf them are placed in opposition to the wild, craggy mountains that surround the mute protagonist. He wants to walk his son to school, but the son (who is obsessed with Star Wars and is shown inaccessibly playing a video game) whines "Nobody walks anymore. Everyone drives."
The second half of the film is mainly focused on the man's past and on his efforts to heal that past. This is done in a believable way. There is no panacea that leaves us feeling justice has been done. We feel (ie I feel) that the characters have at last moved past their suffering, but that there is more messy work to be done. I found it intriguing that they distinguish between giving up old pains and giving in to the despair of those pains. Fun stuff.
The imagery is very powerful. As mentioned, there's the towering billboards, but there's also bright, coloured lights (usually red, blue, or green) everywhere. At one point the man's face is reflected, superimposed over his ex-wife's face. It's a stirring image, but I don't know what to make of it. The final emotional showdown happens on either side of a two-way mirror, so only one character can see the other at a time. I believe this has metaphorical significance (as it is just too cute not to) but I can't see what that might be. An interesting movie, quite long but friendly and deliberate.
May 18, 2014
Kairo
Saw Kairo (AKA Pulse) The mythology behind this J-horror film is that the afterlife is becoming too full and ghosts are leaking into the internet. The ghosts, jealous or hungry for our lives, trap us humans in "loneliness." These lonely human/ghosts are sealed into basements and one-room apartments with ceremonial-seeming red tape. It's a little bit luddite-ish and a little queasy, but it's got something to it. The idea that the shared solitude of the internet is real and infectious is creepy. One character has a clever monologue arguing that digital videos of us are literally our ghosts (ephemeral echoes of our selves, doomed to relive moments of our lives forever.) It's got something to it, but that something is a bit too intellectual and philosophical I think. The film doesn't really give this horror of isolation a kick. The situation is perhaps tragic, but not scary.
The film has moments that are genuinely creepy, often coming from sudden intimacy, such as the several times ghosts whisper "help me" right into our ears. These whispers are not jumps though, just extremely weird and jarring. They work against the central thesis of the film however, that isolation is the horrible thing. There are also a few suicides which are worrying mainly in their casualness. The film also contains a plane crashing into a city and the twice-repeated image of a person with a black sack over their heads. The film's wariness of modernity has several dimensions it seems.
Its ending is a bit muddled, devolving as it does into an almost action-film-like flight from the city, but the beginning is fascinating and creepy, in a dreamlike way. A good film for wimps like me who can take anything so long as it's not sudden. The concept should be refined and reworked (and remade not into a shitty American knock-off with the word "co-eds" in its imdb plot summary.)
Edit: Reading the comments on imdb, I have to add, this film is very brooding and atmospheric. There's a refreshing lack of screaming and super-saturated shakey-cam. The colours are muted and flat. The film is helpless and bleak. It's just a bit muddly-feeling to me.
The film has moments that are genuinely creepy, often coming from sudden intimacy, such as the several times ghosts whisper "help me" right into our ears. These whispers are not jumps though, just extremely weird and jarring. They work against the central thesis of the film however, that isolation is the horrible thing. There are also a few suicides which are worrying mainly in their casualness. The film also contains a plane crashing into a city and the twice-repeated image of a person with a black sack over their heads. The film's wariness of modernity has several dimensions it seems.
Its ending is a bit muddled, devolving as it does into an almost action-film-like flight from the city, but the beginning is fascinating and creepy, in a dreamlike way. A good film for wimps like me who can take anything so long as it's not sudden. The concept should be refined and reworked (and remade not into a shitty American knock-off with the word "co-eds" in its imdb plot summary.)
Edit: Reading the comments on imdb, I have to add, this film is very brooding and atmospheric. There's a refreshing lack of screaming and super-saturated shakey-cam. The colours are muted and flat. The film is helpless and bleak. It's just a bit muddly-feeling to me.
May 17, 2014
Celine and Julie Go Boating
Saw Celine and Julie Go Boating, a confusing film. For example, the title event does literally occur, they do go boating, but it's almost the very last thing they do and of almost no importance. The film follows the librarian Julie and the magician Celine. They meet in a park after Julie draws a magic circle in the dust with her foot. Celine breaks Julie out of her hum-drum life, disrupting her library job and rejecting her lovers in her guise. Julie seems to be inspired by Celine's very presence into rebelling in childish, self-indulgent ways and is soon giving as good as she's getting, spoiling Celine's professional advancement as Celine has spoiled Julie's romantic advancement.
The film relies on cinematic short-hand for these scenes. Julie is being contacted by an old childhood love who we are to understand, by virtue of his childhood loveliness, is a perfect mate. Similarly Celine's career is going to receive the big break it needs when two sun-glasses-wearing suits watch her preform. This opportunity is destroyed by Julie in an interesting, almost fourth wall breaking, performance. The lover is rejected in similarly strange, unreal ways. Left with only each other, they find a house and enter it one by one. Within the house they have a strange experience which they cannot understand or remember except in brief flashes.
After resorting to further magic, they uncover more of the experience in the house. They realize the events in the house repeat once a day starting at noon, leading Julie to quip that it's a matinee. This is a hand-tipping moment for the film I feel, revealing the house be a metaphor for a film (or a play, perhaps.) They bring their film-breaking, magical irreverence to this strange event as well, doing their best to pry into its workings. We have now entered into meta-film territory where the going gets worse. In one scene Julie and Celine recall the events of the house via magical candy. They sit side-by-side reacting to their synchronized memories, but looking exactly like they're watching TV. They laugh and gasp at seemingly random times, or perhaps with hip, ironic, irreverent sophistication.
As the women dive deeper into the magic, they behave less and less conventionally, becoming sort of liberated feminist witches, one could argue. The two women become more intensely connected, initially revealing a psychic link of some kind by echoing words an thoughts. I wondered if there might be a lesbian undertone to their relationship, but it seems like a too modern take on this film (which comes from the 70s.) The central women are fun and winsome and make the film very fun (at one point, they burgle magic books from their local library and roller-skate away, dressed in catsuits.) I also believe this film to have inspired David Lynch. In addition to the connections to Mulholland Dr. (two women with a strange, intense relationship, the theater and theme of reality/theatricality) there's strangely intense scenes of inscrutable activity and slight morbidity although the pixie-like women stop the film from diving into true Lynchian nightmare. The film is quite long (3 hrs) so take care, but I think it's worth it if you can stay awake long enough. An interesting film.
The film relies on cinematic short-hand for these scenes. Julie is being contacted by an old childhood love who we are to understand, by virtue of his childhood loveliness, is a perfect mate. Similarly Celine's career is going to receive the big break it needs when two sun-glasses-wearing suits watch her preform. This opportunity is destroyed by Julie in an interesting, almost fourth wall breaking, performance. The lover is rejected in similarly strange, unreal ways. Left with only each other, they find a house and enter it one by one. Within the house they have a strange experience which they cannot understand or remember except in brief flashes.
After resorting to further magic, they uncover more of the experience in the house. They realize the events in the house repeat once a day starting at noon, leading Julie to quip that it's a matinee. This is a hand-tipping moment for the film I feel, revealing the house be a metaphor for a film (or a play, perhaps.) They bring their film-breaking, magical irreverence to this strange event as well, doing their best to pry into its workings. We have now entered into meta-film territory where the going gets worse. In one scene Julie and Celine recall the events of the house via magical candy. They sit side-by-side reacting to their synchronized memories, but looking exactly like they're watching TV. They laugh and gasp at seemingly random times, or perhaps with hip, ironic, irreverent sophistication.
As the women dive deeper into the magic, they behave less and less conventionally, becoming sort of liberated feminist witches, one could argue. The two women become more intensely connected, initially revealing a psychic link of some kind by echoing words an thoughts. I wondered if there might be a lesbian undertone to their relationship, but it seems like a too modern take on this film (which comes from the 70s.) The central women are fun and winsome and make the film very fun (at one point, they burgle magic books from their local library and roller-skate away, dressed in catsuits.) I also believe this film to have inspired David Lynch. In addition to the connections to Mulholland Dr. (two women with a strange, intense relationship, the theater and theme of reality/theatricality) there's strangely intense scenes of inscrutable activity and slight morbidity although the pixie-like women stop the film from diving into true Lynchian nightmare. The film is quite long (3 hrs) so take care, but I think it's worth it if you can stay awake long enough. An interesting film.
May 14, 2014
Daybreakers
Saw Daybreakers, a vampire movie which takes place after the vampocalypse has swept the globe. Everyone's a sexy vampire now (they've really embraced the professional goth CEO look) and humans are farmed as a food supply. Unfortunately, that food supply is dwindling which causes riots and a breakdown of the vampire society (now, if only there were some way to produce new, baby humans from old, adult humans but sadly this is impossible.) Without blood, the vampires turn into Nosferatus and become un-sexily evil. Our hero is a blood chemist vampire who's searching for a vampirism-cure or a formula for synthetic blood (whichever.) His evil boss gloatingly confides that even with a synthetic blood stock, they're still eat humans, just for the sake of novelty and rarity.
The vampires are a sort of grab-bag of societal ills. At one point there is literal class warfare and the whole farming humans thing could easily be read an exploitation of a precious natural resource. The elimination of reproduction of the humans is a very odd omission. Vampires are often (and definitely in this film) metaphors for more worldly, decadent, experienced people. The "turning" process, so often male-on-female and taking place in the dead of night, blood soaking the bedsheets and leaving the victim gasping and limp, is a metaphor for sex and it's therefore very weird that in this sexy, sex-fuelled sexiverse the idea of simply breeding the humans doesn't come up. Maybe it was considered too icky for audiences (which to be fair it kind of is.)
Anyway, the soft-hearted scientist vamp teams up with some humans and fight back, ala la resistance. It's very comic-book-ey. There's a lot of reaction shots and sudden close-ups. The characters are distinguished by shorthand and are incapable of acting outside of their alignment. Grand socio-political events apparently hinge on the actions of one CEO, and are apparently stopped by a rag-tag group of rebels. It's very simplistic but takes itself seriously. There's various stabs at cultural relevancy (the class warfare, the greed of corporations, etc) but they're more broad swipes than incisive jabs and I believe are there mostly for plot reasons and so we don't forget who's the bad guy. I want there to be some cleverness though, because the elements are all there, just in a jumble. The film ends with society literally eating itself alive.
The vampires are a sort of grab-bag of societal ills. At one point there is literal class warfare and the whole farming humans thing could easily be read an exploitation of a precious natural resource. The elimination of reproduction of the humans is a very odd omission. Vampires are often (and definitely in this film) metaphors for more worldly, decadent, experienced people. The "turning" process, so often male-on-female and taking place in the dead of night, blood soaking the bedsheets and leaving the victim gasping and limp, is a metaphor for sex and it's therefore very weird that in this sexy, sex-fuelled sexiverse the idea of simply breeding the humans doesn't come up. Maybe it was considered too icky for audiences (which to be fair it kind of is.)
Anyway, the soft-hearted scientist vamp teams up with some humans and fight back, ala la resistance. It's very comic-book-ey. There's a lot of reaction shots and sudden close-ups. The characters are distinguished by shorthand and are incapable of acting outside of their alignment. Grand socio-political events apparently hinge on the actions of one CEO, and are apparently stopped by a rag-tag group of rebels. It's very simplistic but takes itself seriously. There's various stabs at cultural relevancy (the class warfare, the greed of corporations, etc) but they're more broad swipes than incisive jabs and I believe are there mostly for plot reasons and so we don't forget who's the bad guy. I want there to be some cleverness though, because the elements are all there, just in a jumble. The film ends with society literally eating itself alive.
May 13, 2014
Utamaro and His Five Women
Saw Utamaro and His Five Women (thanks, Basil!) It was a Japanese film from the 40s that I largely let get away from me. It follows the (probably) fictional life of Utamaro, a famous wood-block artist. He is known for his sensual portraits of women. In the film he draws one woman after another, each woman's portrait leaving a mark on the subject in some way. The woman which he most dramatically effects has his work tattooed into her skin. In a modern film, these women would be introduced to the camera in very comprehensible, hand-holding ways. Unfortunately, I needed my hand held a bit for this film. The five women are difficult enough to keep straight, never mind their lovers, their families, their rivalries. The film is difficult, not least for its plot.
So, with this in mind, I nervously embark on analysis of the film. The film is heavy with rich themes. The portraits of the women show them more beautiful and desirable than the women ever thought of themselves. They gather the strength from these portraits to become more in control of their own lives. Usually this control manifests in really going after the guy they like, but this is the 40s and we can't have our entire feminist cake just yet. There is also interesting observations to be made about Utamaro's relationships with the women and an artists relationship with their subject, their work, and society at large. At one point Utamaro annoys a shogun who places him in handcuffs for 50 days. This is near the end of the film and betrayals and revelations are flying fast. He is stuck in the midst of all of the chaos, ineffectively shouting "oh god, I want to draw!"
The film is fairly busy, so don't watch it too tired (as I did) and as I say, the characters rush about in intricate graph structures. It's a film that needs a second viewing to really understand, but alas, I will selfishly move on.
So, with this in mind, I nervously embark on analysis of the film. The film is heavy with rich themes. The portraits of the women show them more beautiful and desirable than the women ever thought of themselves. They gather the strength from these portraits to become more in control of their own lives. Usually this control manifests in really going after the guy they like, but this is the 40s and we can't have our entire feminist cake just yet. There is also interesting observations to be made about Utamaro's relationships with the women and an artists relationship with their subject, their work, and society at large. At one point Utamaro annoys a shogun who places him in handcuffs for 50 days. This is near the end of the film and betrayals and revelations are flying fast. He is stuck in the midst of all of the chaos, ineffectively shouting "oh god, I want to draw!"
The film is fairly busy, so don't watch it too tired (as I did) and as I say, the characters rush about in intricate graph structures. It's a film that needs a second viewing to really understand, but alas, I will selfishly move on.
May 12, 2014
Standard Operating Procedure
Saw Standard Operating Procedure, an Errol Morris documentary. It's about the human rights abuses at Abu Ghraib. We interview almost all of the principal actors in the by now infamous pictures. We see those pictures again here, almost artistic in their representation of suffering and of the guards' indifference. Morris starts off the documentary with a description of Donald Rumsfeld's visit to a freshly liberated Abu Ghraib. After he sees a gallows, delicate Rummy cannot stand to see anymore and refuses to tour the torture chambers. He leaves, but we know now that the abuses occurred by the (perhaps tacit) approval of his administration (and perhaps even he himself.) Morris suggests that we are perhaps not much better than Saddam.
There's an interesting bit about war being a man's world. The prisoners are forced to wear women's panties to humiliate them. The backwards Iraqis cannot stand being subservient to a woman, but so too, we discover, are the American soldiers. Another parallel is drawn, but this is the last one. The air of moral and cultural superiority sufficiently stolen from the Americans, the film now sets to work on the utilitarian front. A charming but professionally creepy "civilian interrogator" (employed by this weird company) talks about the frustrating loss of information incurred by these amateur kids messing with the prisoners. One of the prisoners, a general, was ready to tell all but was ignored because the kids wanted to shave his eyebrows. After being thus humiliated he clammed up and refused to talk. The interrogator shakes his head at such waste. We are also told that many of the prisoners were uninvolved civilians. Taxi drivers or even the family-members of actually wanted men, being held hostage.
As usual, Morris is more interested in the people behind these stories so, after the preceding low-level condemnation of the events, we hear from the soldiers. Linndie, the woman in the most recognizable thumbs-up-&-pointing-at-wieners picture, is the most interesting of the bunch to me. She is pugnacious and defensive, talking about how she was manipulated. At first this seems like a legal fabrication, but we hear from other people and discover that everyone was lied to, were told that they were allowed to do anything short of killing the prisoners (but of course a few were accidentally tortured to death anyway, we find.) In the media circus aftermath everyone denied responsibility (many denied that anything wrong had even been done at all) leaving us with a national moral failing that was (of course) nobody's fault.
There's another soldier who is an excellent source of accidental poetry. He talks about not being involved, "although some blood did get on my uniform." It's accidental but cute anyway. Each of the soldiers is asked if they regret it and Linndie, out of all of them, accepts the experience. She recognizes that what happened was wrong, but wants to move on, to forget. She is perhaps running away from the experience, but it seems to me that she is more whole than that and that she is embracing it.
There's an interesting bit about war being a man's world. The prisoners are forced to wear women's panties to humiliate them. The backwards Iraqis cannot stand being subservient to a woman, but so too, we discover, are the American soldiers. Another parallel is drawn, but this is the last one. The air of moral and cultural superiority sufficiently stolen from the Americans, the film now sets to work on the utilitarian front. A charming but professionally creepy "civilian interrogator" (employed by this weird company) talks about the frustrating loss of information incurred by these amateur kids messing with the prisoners. One of the prisoners, a general, was ready to tell all but was ignored because the kids wanted to shave his eyebrows. After being thus humiliated he clammed up and refused to talk. The interrogator shakes his head at such waste. We are also told that many of the prisoners were uninvolved civilians. Taxi drivers or even the family-members of actually wanted men, being held hostage.
As usual, Morris is more interested in the people behind these stories so, after the preceding low-level condemnation of the events, we hear from the soldiers. Linndie, the woman in the most recognizable thumbs-up-&-pointing-at-wieners picture, is the most interesting of the bunch to me. She is pugnacious and defensive, talking about how she was manipulated. At first this seems like a legal fabrication, but we hear from other people and discover that everyone was lied to, were told that they were allowed to do anything short of killing the prisoners (but of course a few were accidentally tortured to death anyway, we find.) In the media circus aftermath everyone denied responsibility (many denied that anything wrong had even been done at all) leaving us with a national moral failing that was (of course) nobody's fault.
There's another soldier who is an excellent source of accidental poetry. He talks about not being involved, "although some blood did get on my uniform." It's accidental but cute anyway. Each of the soldiers is asked if they regret it and Linndie, out of all of them, accepts the experience. She recognizes that what happened was wrong, but wants to move on, to forget. She is perhaps running away from the experience, but it seems to me that she is more whole than that and that she is embracing it.
May 11, 2014
Paranormal Activity
Saw Paranormal Activity. Being the colossal wimp that I am, I approached the film with great trepidation. Gimmicky sales techniques aside, it's a modern horror and thus chances of a jump scare are optimal. Well, I need not have worried. This film is the classier sort of horror, light on visceral adrenaline (thank god) and heavier on psychology. This is not to say it's a hoity-toity film in the mould of the 70s' morbid "horror"s. It deals with a young couple where the girl is apparently haunted. Everywhere she goes she has night terrors which get worse after her douchey boyfriend taunts the ghosts into further action. The ghosts only come out at night so, fellow fraidy cats, there is always ample warning for when to tense.
Though the jumps are not so sudden, the film instead cruelly tries to target exactly the kind of pedestrian, irrational fears of burglars and so forth that everyone has. A creak that could be an intruder, inexplicable open doors and sounds, a light turns on but nobody touched it, etc. It's the kind of thing that preys on your mind after the day is over. There's also of course the tether to the more prosaic horror of the deterioration of the couple's relationship. The boyfriend is fascinated and wants more tangible evidence of his girlfriend's haunting, the girl understandably wants to leave everything alone. The boyfriend resorts to a browbeating kind of bargaining with her and wears her down in the most petty and transparent ways. She alternates between being furious with him and begging him to stop. My sympathy is with her.
Anyway, the film is well put together. It uses the contrast of the supernatural happenings and the Ikea-pedestrian surroundings to great effect. Nobody can seriously believe in demons in the morning, sitting on their spotless, white, affluent couch drinking coffee from a colourful mug. But at night, half-asleep, everyone believes in monsters of some kind.
Though the jumps are not so sudden, the film instead cruelly tries to target exactly the kind of pedestrian, irrational fears of burglars and so forth that everyone has. A creak that could be an intruder, inexplicable open doors and sounds, a light turns on but nobody touched it, etc. It's the kind of thing that preys on your mind after the day is over. There's also of course the tether to the more prosaic horror of the deterioration of the couple's relationship. The boyfriend is fascinated and wants more tangible evidence of his girlfriend's haunting, the girl understandably wants to leave everything alone. The boyfriend resorts to a browbeating kind of bargaining with her and wears her down in the most petty and transparent ways. She alternates between being furious with him and begging him to stop. My sympathy is with her.
Anyway, the film is well put together. It uses the contrast of the supernatural happenings and the Ikea-pedestrian surroundings to great effect. Nobody can seriously believe in demons in the morning, sitting on their spotless, white, affluent couch drinking coffee from a colourful mug. But at night, half-asleep, everyone believes in monsters of some kind.
May 9, 2014
Nights of Cabiria
Saw Nights of Cabiria, a punchy Fellini film. It follows Cabiria, a whore who starts off the film by being almost murdered by her boyfriend/pimp. She survives and decides she wants no part of romance anymore. She is impulsive and has an adorable, open, guileless manner. There is some meta-filmic business where a famous but jilted actor picks her up to soothe his sorrows, only for his girl-friend to show up. Cabiria watches them reunite through the bathroom keyhole, the music swelling with strings, she is a voyeur. She is us.
This also sets the thematic tone for her character. She is exploited and shunted aside whenever convenient by people who are supposedly her betters. She has accepted this fate and is semi-complicit in it, but clearly she is discontent and yearns for more. She goes to a fanatic, orgiastic religious ceremony, hoping a benediction is all she needs, but sits drunk and disillusioned moments later when her life fails to feel any different and her whore friends fail to be transformed into saints. The church scene is awesome and breathtaking, full of zeal and fervour. It's slightly grotesque, but Cabiria provides comic relief when she brays out a prayer, accidentally extinguishing her candle. Fellini seems to be using the film to imply that she is too improper, too inelegant and awkward to be saved, but this is a sly trick, for this only makes us root for her all the more.
This film was made in the 50s however, so the poor prostitute Cabiria can't wind up totally happy (this fact renders the preceding sentence a maybe critique of the films of the 50s.) Sure enough, she goes to a magic show, hosted by what is clearly a symbolic devil, and is introduced to a small-time clerk who seems to love her, but the manner of their introduction casts a bit of a pall over their romance. We end with a procession of partying teenagers, smiling at her and absurdly barking like dogs. Her life makes no sense, but it is hers. She hurts but is not allowed to wallow. She will survive.
A stirring movie, it's got a lot of low-hanging handles for drama-fans like me to grab hold of. Our emotions about Cabiria and her surroundings are expertly manipulated. No sooner are we feeling sorry for her than we come across a whore so badly-off that she literally lives in a hole in the ground. We are not allowed to feel complacent in our feelings, but are always kept more or less on course. A good show by Fellini, but then it would be wouldn't it?
This also sets the thematic tone for her character. She is exploited and shunted aside whenever convenient by people who are supposedly her betters. She has accepted this fate and is semi-complicit in it, but clearly she is discontent and yearns for more. She goes to a fanatic, orgiastic religious ceremony, hoping a benediction is all she needs, but sits drunk and disillusioned moments later when her life fails to feel any different and her whore friends fail to be transformed into saints. The church scene is awesome and breathtaking, full of zeal and fervour. It's slightly grotesque, but Cabiria provides comic relief when she brays out a prayer, accidentally extinguishing her candle. Fellini seems to be using the film to imply that she is too improper, too inelegant and awkward to be saved, but this is a sly trick, for this only makes us root for her all the more.
This film was made in the 50s however, so the poor prostitute Cabiria can't wind up totally happy (this fact renders the preceding sentence a maybe critique of the films of the 50s.) Sure enough, she goes to a magic show, hosted by what is clearly a symbolic devil, and is introduced to a small-time clerk who seems to love her, but the manner of their introduction casts a bit of a pall over their romance. We end with a procession of partying teenagers, smiling at her and absurdly barking like dogs. Her life makes no sense, but it is hers. She hurts but is not allowed to wallow. She will survive.
A stirring movie, it's got a lot of low-hanging handles for drama-fans like me to grab hold of. Our emotions about Cabiria and her surroundings are expertly manipulated. No sooner are we feeling sorry for her than we come across a whore so badly-off that she literally lives in a hole in the ground. We are not allowed to feel complacent in our feelings, but are always kept more or less on course. A good show by Fellini, but then it would be wouldn't it?
May 8, 2014
The Running Man
Saw The Running Man, a deeply ridiculous but crowd-pleasing film about a deeply ridiculous but crow-pleasing reality TV show where men and women are hunted down for sport. It stars the governator, that Austrian death machine, however so there's no moral ambiguity about the film. This is clearly a bread & circus to keep the public under the sway of a presumably corrupt or otherwise evil dictatorship or something. The nature of the evil of the government is not really plumbed. Instead the TV show is made out to be just as evil as can be. There's even a speech at the end about how television teach us (us the masses) what's cool and uncool, what to eat, drink, and wear.
The whole thing falls a bit flat in an intellectual sense. It feels very protest-y and counter-culture-ish but it doesn't give us anything specific to protest or any bit of culture to be counter to. It makes that little jab about television, but mass media's a pretty easy mark. Also, it suggests nothing as a replacement. It's all very well to tell me to think for myself, but what if I choose (of my own free will) to let TV think for me? Is that not sufficiently for myself? Bah. The film is raging against the machine, but that machine might as well be a traffic light.
Anyway, irrelevant armchair-philosophy aside, the film is entertaining and fun. Arnold's one-liners are tedious but to be expected. It's fun to watch him and his chums struggle through a death maze and the message is an uplifting (if empty) one about casting off fetters and so forth. The AK-47-wielding rebels play a little chillier in these insurgent-riddled times, but the feeling is mostly warm. A silly film, but not a bad one. I was entertained.
The whole thing falls a bit flat in an intellectual sense. It feels very protest-y and counter-culture-ish but it doesn't give us anything specific to protest or any bit of culture to be counter to. It makes that little jab about television, but mass media's a pretty easy mark. Also, it suggests nothing as a replacement. It's all very well to tell me to think for myself, but what if I choose (of my own free will) to let TV think for me? Is that not sufficiently for myself? Bah. The film is raging against the machine, but that machine might as well be a traffic light.
Anyway, irrelevant armchair-philosophy aside, the film is entertaining and fun. Arnold's one-liners are tedious but to be expected. It's fun to watch him and his chums struggle through a death maze and the message is an uplifting (if empty) one about casting off fetters and so forth. The AK-47-wielding rebels play a little chillier in these insurgent-riddled times, but the feeling is mostly warm. A silly film, but not a bad one. I was entertained.
May 7, 2014
The Adromeda Strain
Saw The Adromeda Strain (thanks, Chris!) It was a sort of throw-back-ey hard scifi. The idea is that a satellite lands in a town and everybody dies. We don't see them die, we see them dead. The government scoops up four scientists in a fun gathering of the troops montage and brings them to a super-secret-n-secure bio-weapons lab. There they study the satalite to discover what about it makes it so toxic. The film is filmed and plotted like a 1950s science fiction, with every scientist wearing a government-issue pair of horn-rim glasses and every tech wearing a monochrome jumpsuit. The men are lumpy, the women mom-ishly attractive. Everybody acts in a very clenched, subdued way. There's little drama or hysterics for me to chew over, but there's interesting imaginary science going on.
It's interesting to watch the alien bacteria be subjected to tests and to watch the scientists just use giant pieces of machinery. They throw the lingo around in the super-precise but kind of corny way that scientists used to always speak. I must say it's refreshing to not have the scientists be arrogant assholes or wild-eyed hippie-wizards. These are normal, almost boring, people earnestly working on solving a problem. Their excitement/fascination is palpable and contagious and they're fun to watch. Of course the climax has them running around Chekhov's nuclear warhead comes into play, but I guess we need something to offset all the conversation.
In spite of the tech-fetishism on display, the film seems to be kind of Jurassic-Park-ianly dismissive of mankind's mastery over nature. Several times little faults manifest in huge failures, which is usually a way of forcing us to admit we can't account for everything. Okay, whatever. There's also an incongruously freaky scene where the virus 'kills' a rhesus monkey. It looked real enough that I had to pause the movie and make sure that I didn't just see a monkey be murdered for my dry entertainment (the monkey is okay. It was suffocated by carbon dioxide and revived immediately afterwards, but it convulses and weakly flails and really looks dead, my friends. It's a creepy scene.) That scene aside (which anyway seems to have come from an alternate universe where David Lynch directed this) the film is sleepy but interesting and I recommend it to any budding super-scientist. Its dark themes aside, it's kind of inspirational.
It's interesting to watch the alien bacteria be subjected to tests and to watch the scientists just use giant pieces of machinery. They throw the lingo around in the super-precise but kind of corny way that scientists used to always speak. I must say it's refreshing to not have the scientists be arrogant assholes or wild-eyed hippie-wizards. These are normal, almost boring, people earnestly working on solving a problem. Their excitement/fascination is palpable and contagious and they're fun to watch. Of course the climax has them running around Chekhov's nuclear warhead comes into play, but I guess we need something to offset all the conversation.
In spite of the tech-fetishism on display, the film seems to be kind of Jurassic-Park-ianly dismissive of mankind's mastery over nature. Several times little faults manifest in huge failures, which is usually a way of forcing us to admit we can't account for everything. Okay, whatever. There's also an incongruously freaky scene where the virus 'kills' a rhesus monkey. It looked real enough that I had to pause the movie and make sure that I didn't just see a monkey be murdered for my dry entertainment (the monkey is okay. It was suffocated by carbon dioxide and revived immediately afterwards, but it convulses and weakly flails and really looks dead, my friends. It's a creepy scene.) That scene aside (which anyway seems to have come from an alternate universe where David Lynch directed this) the film is sleepy but interesting and I recommend it to any budding super-scientist. Its dark themes aside, it's kind of inspirational.
May 4, 2014
Nothing But Trouble
Saw Nothing But Trouble, a strange film from the comedy-rich era of the late 80s/early 90s. It stars John Candy and Dan Aykroyd in almost every role. Dan is a big important businessman from New York city who gets stranded in the boonies by a back-woods petty tyrant judge. There he tries to avoid various means of execution and also save The Girl (there's a girl along for the ride.) Also along for the ride is an affected and Brazilian, rich, brother-sister duo who are just depressing. Their one shtick is that they're stupid and have accents and I guess that was once considered high comedy.
The film is a lumpy, disjointed mess. It introduces entirely new and important characters half an hour from the end and intersperses b-plots and side-stories at random. A henchman decides he's had enough and is going to leave the judge's compound but is only shown packing his bags half an hour later. Prosthetics are used heavily and I believe are supposed to make everyone look hilariously disgusting but only makes them look disgusting. There's a lot of tired, joke-like material here as well. John Candy dresses in drag to become an unacceptably fat woman (fat women... am I right, fellas?) who the main character must marry (whuh oh!) The evil judge's nose is transformed into a penis (twice! Neither time funny!) A passel of black dudes is produced only for the sake of a musical interlude. I imagine they had some kind of contract or something. It's just a random stab at relevancy via hip-hop. So it fails as a comedy for me. However, it's not a totally awful waste of time. It has no good comedy, plot, or character, this is true. But it does have one great strength: set design.
The judge's compound is on a junk yard and the judge is supposed to be some kind of engineering genius and his house is amazing. Little trap doors, revolving walls, conveyer belts and rickety gears are everywhere. Collections of books and clocks clog the hallways as well as children's toys and dolls. What happens in front of these tableaux is almost entirely tedious but the sets themselves are beautifully creepy. Fussily Victorian and overcrowded, brutal and cartoonish when they need to be, everything is a fascinating mess. If I'd seen this as a child, I'd have wanted to live in the judge's house (side note: I did actually see a glimpse of this as a child. Scared the hell out of me.) So the film's one redeeming feature is the fun-house through which the characters run. This should not be considered a glowing endorsement. See this movie only if you're already a fan of the dumb 80s comedy. It has a nice house, but the occupants are boring and unpleasant.
The film is a lumpy, disjointed mess. It introduces entirely new and important characters half an hour from the end and intersperses b-plots and side-stories at random. A henchman decides he's had enough and is going to leave the judge's compound but is only shown packing his bags half an hour later. Prosthetics are used heavily and I believe are supposed to make everyone look hilariously disgusting but only makes them look disgusting. There's a lot of tired, joke-like material here as well. John Candy dresses in drag to become an unacceptably fat woman (fat women... am I right, fellas?) who the main character must marry (whuh oh!) The evil judge's nose is transformed into a penis (twice! Neither time funny!) A passel of black dudes is produced only for the sake of a musical interlude. I imagine they had some kind of contract or something. It's just a random stab at relevancy via hip-hop. So it fails as a comedy for me. However, it's not a totally awful waste of time. It has no good comedy, plot, or character, this is true. But it does have one great strength: set design.
The judge's compound is on a junk yard and the judge is supposed to be some kind of engineering genius and his house is amazing. Little trap doors, revolving walls, conveyer belts and rickety gears are everywhere. Collections of books and clocks clog the hallways as well as children's toys and dolls. What happens in front of these tableaux is almost entirely tedious but the sets themselves are beautifully creepy. Fussily Victorian and overcrowded, brutal and cartoonish when they need to be, everything is a fascinating mess. If I'd seen this as a child, I'd have wanted to live in the judge's house (side note: I did actually see a glimpse of this as a child. Scared the hell out of me.) So the film's one redeeming feature is the fun-house through which the characters run. This should not be considered a glowing endorsement. See this movie only if you're already a fan of the dumb 80s comedy. It has a nice house, but the occupants are boring and unpleasant.
May 3, 2014
Friday the 13th
Saw the classic Friday the 13th. The archetypical slasher flick, with attractive college-aged kids playing high-school-aged kids, gallivanting about in their little jogging shorts and bathing suits and being killed off one by one. The film is a little tame by today's standards, but then it blazed the trail I guess (though in ways I am sadly unfamiliar with.) There's a lot of staples of the slasher genre: crazy old dude who warns the teens of impending doom, frustrating inability of people to understand scared women, fake-out "no I was just joshing!" non-death scene. The film has a moralistic way of killing off the teens just after some necking in the woods. Also, there's a deeply creepy way the film quickly dispatches the males but lingers in slow motion and close-up on the female deaths. Then again I don't know if there's a non-creepy way to present death as entertainment, so I'm perhaps getting too high up in my ivory tower.
Overall I found the film fairly humdrum. I have the advantage over the film though, having grown up with the parodies and refinements of the film. It's sort of spoiled by its success. Without its legacy, this would be a fun and creepy film. With it, it's just... eh. It also knows it's kind of campy, by the way. It embraces and acknowledges the thinness of the premise (attractive guys and girls run around and get killed, the end) by not taking itself too seriously. It never takes a stab at profundity and good for it. The most serious it ever gets is when we're delving into the killer's motivation. So, not a serious or terrifically entertaining film, but not a bad one and worth name-checking.
Overall I found the film fairly humdrum. I have the advantage over the film though, having grown up with the parodies and refinements of the film. It's sort of spoiled by its success. Without its legacy, this would be a fun and creepy film. With it, it's just... eh. It also knows it's kind of campy, by the way. It embraces and acknowledges the thinness of the premise (attractive guys and girls run around and get killed, the end) by not taking itself too seriously. It never takes a stab at profundity and good for it. The most serious it ever gets is when we're delving into the killer's motivation. So, not a serious or terrifically entertaining film, but not a bad one and worth name-checking.
May 2, 2014
The Crowd
Saw The Crowd, a film from 1928 which is either oddly prescient or timeless. It tells the story of a man who comes to New York, full of optimism and enthusiasm (you can see where this is going.) He gets a job adding numbers, meets a pretty woman and quickly marries her. They settle into a miniscule apartment and he plugs away, wishing for a raise which never comes. Finally enraged by the contrast between his dreams his reality, he quits his job and things get worse. The film has a treacly tone, like Thorton Wilder, but without the pathos. The romance is cute, the camaraderie at the job is cute. The hard times later on are sad, but in a Charlie Chaplin-ey cute way. The film plays off of social isolation in the big city, where it's so easy to get lost in the crowd. For a 20s picture this is fairly novel. I believe the loneliness of crowds really became big in the 80s (this is based on hazy recollection. Someone correct me.)
The ending is fairly bleak for a 20s picture. They liked happy endings back then (even more than we do now) and the ending is left ambiguous. You can imagine that the protagonist gets a high-paying job that can use him, if you wish, but then again perhaps he only impressed some guy in a suit. A sweeping pan out from the pair, across an endless theatre of laughing faces, renders the promise of the scene a little anonymous and a bit chilly. Frequently this film veered into 'too real' territory. As someone who will soon be entering a global workforce, I feel full of enthusiasm and promise (but of course, you can see where this is going.)
The ending is fairly bleak for a 20s picture. They liked happy endings back then (even more than we do now) and the ending is left ambiguous. You can imagine that the protagonist gets a high-paying job that can use him, if you wish, but then again perhaps he only impressed some guy in a suit. A sweeping pan out from the pair, across an endless theatre of laughing faces, renders the promise of the scene a little anonymous and a bit chilly. Frequently this film veered into 'too real' territory. As someone who will soon be entering a global workforce, I feel full of enthusiasm and promise (but of course, you can see where this is going.)
May 1, 2014
Pontypool
Saw Pontypool, a very original zombie film. Like something straight out of Borges or Shintaro Kago, the zombie-pathogen here is not viral or supernatural, but transmitted via audio. A phrase or word is imbued with meaning which, when unpacked by our minds, renders the listener incoherent and violent. I love this idea. There's so much retreading and recycling in the films I see. It's been pointed out by smarter people than I that monsters are always essentially human. There's never been an undead element, a blood-sucking wavelength, a were-wind. The monster of this film manifests as the tired old zombie, it's true, but the concept so amazing I can't bring myself to add spoiler tags. Awesome, well done idea.
The film opens with a discussion of momentous events rippling forward and backward in time. Seemingly a threat of empty repetition and pointless symbolism, like a cheap knockoff of a P T Anderson film. Instead we get a fairly by-the-numbers survival horror (and light on the horror to boot. Except for one early jump-scare, it's more high-concept then visceral.) The film is set at a radio station, a temple of the spoken word. The film progresses ominously and sleepily. We hear of some kind of disaster (spurred by the word appearing on a poster, we later discover) and conflicting reports come in, the radio staff accuse each other of playing a joke. The usual. Under the high concept, actually, unfortunately, is a fairly straightforward film.
There's some gestures at interesting themes. In addition to the radio-station setting, the film is also set in Quebec, a province with deep tensions surrounding language. It seems to be stealing slightly from Infinite Jest, the book which contains a fascinating Quebecois film. The characters reverse-engineer some clevernesses of the writers as well. The film's ending leaves it feeling fairly bleak, and there's a post-credits coda that I didn't know what to make of at all. The two central characters are found in a Japanese restaurant talking about where there life should go from here. It feels like stylistic empty posturing, like something from a Zack Snyder film.
An interesting film, mostly for its interesting concept. It reminds me of the sci-fi films of the 70s, with their low-key exploration of a large concept, but goosed with horror trappings, to keep the audience interested. It's not a great film. High concept can only get you so far and when the film delves into character or philosophy it seems to default to cliched short-hand and sophomoric noodling. It's good enough to entertain me though and a lot better than the paint-by-numbers zombie film I was expecting.
The film opens with a discussion of momentous events rippling forward and backward in time. Seemingly a threat of empty repetition and pointless symbolism, like a cheap knockoff of a P T Anderson film. Instead we get a fairly by-the-numbers survival horror (and light on the horror to boot. Except for one early jump-scare, it's more high-concept then visceral.) The film is set at a radio station, a temple of the spoken word. The film progresses ominously and sleepily. We hear of some kind of disaster (spurred by the word appearing on a poster, we later discover) and conflicting reports come in, the radio staff accuse each other of playing a joke. The usual. Under the high concept, actually, unfortunately, is a fairly straightforward film.
There's some gestures at interesting themes. In addition to the radio-station setting, the film is also set in Quebec, a province with deep tensions surrounding language. It seems to be stealing slightly from Infinite Jest, the book which contains a fascinating Quebecois film. The characters reverse-engineer some clevernesses of the writers as well. The film's ending leaves it feeling fairly bleak, and there's a post-credits coda that I didn't know what to make of at all. The two central characters are found in a Japanese restaurant talking about where there life should go from here. It feels like stylistic empty posturing, like something from a Zack Snyder film.
An interesting film, mostly for its interesting concept. It reminds me of the sci-fi films of the 70s, with their low-key exploration of a large concept, but goosed with horror trappings, to keep the audience interested. It's not a great film. High concept can only get you so far and when the film delves into character or philosophy it seems to default to cliched short-hand and sophomoric noodling. It's good enough to entertain me though and a lot better than the paint-by-numbers zombie film I was expecting.
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