A Film Blog

It’s been a while since I’ve reviewed, and I’ve careened through about twenty or so flicks since then. I’ll start with the worst, and lead up to the best. I proudly welcomed a new entry to the Bottom 50 list, taking the number five spot; Vincenzo Natali’s Cypher (0.5 stars, Flick). After watching Cube, which is awesome (though slighty less awesome now that I’ve finished Natali’s filmography), I knew I had to check out more of the director’s work. Instead, I continued with the Cube trilogy; Cube 2: Hypercube and Cube Zero currently inhabit the number two andthirty-two spots on the Bottom 50 list, respectively. Natali’s making of Cypher is a perfect example of having an awesome idea in your head, but having absolutely no technical or intellectual prowess to convey into a film. Which leads me to Nothing, Natali’s third feature (2 stars, Flick). Slightly better than Cypher, but nowhere near Cube, Nothing is just as it sounds. Two butt-buddy best friends wish all their worries would go away, but instead, the world literally disappears around their house, leaving a white, bouncy void of nothing. The stars of the film wrote it with Natali, and you can tell it was one of those ‘hey, I have a crazy idea for a movie!’-type deals that snowballed way too much. It demonstrates such a poor understanding or emotion, narrative structure, and morals. And for a supposed guy movie, it’s pretty gay and has a complete lack of women. On a lighter note, Natali directed a 17-minute short in ‘96 called Elevated, which features three people in a trapped in an elevator by an unknown, outside threat. Hands down, the best live-action short film I’ve ever seen (Geri’s Game still takes the whole cake).

Speaking of shorts, Partly Cloudy, the pre-Up short, is an impressive entry into the Pixar Shorts collection. Probably number three behind Geri and Presto. Speaking of Up (5 stars, Film), my take-two (complete with 3D), was even more amazing; I was reduced to even more tears (and started tearing up just by knowing what was coming). I can envision at least one more stop to see that before the summer’s out. The 3D isn’t there for spectacle, it’s just there to make an amazing film even more layered; not for pop-outs.

Back to the bad, we have Crash (2004, Moviefilm), the ‘Best Picture’ winner of 2005 (2 stars). Straight-up, some ‘ole bullshit. People don’t think/talk/act like that. You can’t expose and comment on the nature of racism by being straight-up racist. The high-tension emotional moments were laughable, and the morals were childish. Does a Best Picture Oscar mean anything any more? Next, we have David Cronenberg’s Videodrome (2.5 stars, Flick), his 1983 morality tale about violence on television. It’s sort of autobiographical; James Woods plays a TV-exec trying to get the most violent and pornographic programming on his TV network for the public to see. Kind of like Cronenberg himself during the time. Some effects were cool and innovative (a living, breathing VHS tape, a VCR in your stomach), but some were laughable and cheap (a bubbling television). It’s message gets muddled and it’s dialogue is painfully un-‘there,’ so see it just for the passable effects. Up next is Mike Judge’s 2006 dystopian comedy Idiocracy (2.5 stars, Movie). I read somewhere that someone said ‘it’s sad that Judge is probably more right than Kubrick, Orwell, and Huxley at predicting the future;’ a world full of retards is already what we’ve become, so he’s pretty much right. Some contrived humor, but overall a good watch. Some lol moments, but most of the draw was the film’s release woes.

Next we have Michael Haneke’s original 1997 German-language film Funny Games (3 stars, Film); if you’re a fan of the remake, you don’t really need to watch the exact same movie… a trap I obviously fell into. Trust me, there’s nothing new to be gotten from it. I completed a much anticipated watch with David Gordon Green’s 2000 debut feature George Washington (3 stars, Film), the stories of some interconnected youths in an unnamed southern U.S. shithole town. I love how DDG makes shithole towns look like beautiful, artful landscapes of emotional discovery. Something about it didn’t fully click for me, but I know look at All The Real Girls in a new, more welcoming light; the kinks I found in GW are worked out and some of the same themes are presented better. Next is Robert Altman’s 1984 experimental piece Secret Honor (3.5 stars, Film), starring only Philip Baker Hall as Dick Nixon. It’s kind of boring, but for any president/PBH nut, it’s a must see. Just him getting drunk and trying to set his story straight; completely fictional, but completely heartfelt and pro-Nixon. Ocean’s Eleven (3.5 stars, Moviefilm), the 1960 Lewis Milestone (great name) rat-pack feature is a fun Vegas romp that lets you know the roots of your favorite heist franchise. In this one, they rob 5 casinos at once. I wouldn’t say it’s good, but I’d definitely say it’s fun, enjoyable, quick, and interesting.

Moving into 4 stars territory, we have Alejandro Jodorowsky’s 1973 epic The Holy Mountain (4 stars, Film). I’ll explain it using a few things featured in the film: immersible human feces bong, latino parapalegic, cheetah heads for breasts (on a man), and a shrine of testicle jars. Interested? It has a great plot, actual characters, and a great message. Probably the most ‘out there’ and ‘different’ film I’ve ever seen (and I’ve seen Salo). Definitely recommended if you like films that create extremely dense visuals and push the envelope all the way (a rarity). Next we have Roman Polanski’s 1965 creation Repulsion (4 stars, Film), a chronicle of a young schizophrenic woman who traps herself in an apartment physically, and starts to imagine seen and unseen horrors. It’s slow going, but it’s the start of great style for Polanski (and the start of his ‘apartment trilogy’). Overall, it’s worth it. I’ve Loved You So Long (4 stars, Film), the debut feature from French director Phillipe Claudel heralds the start of a great career. Kristen Scott Thomas, awesome, blah blah blah; it’s great. Lacked the extreme emotional punch I really wanted, but it’s effective nonetheless. The International (4 stars, Film), Tykwer’s first film since Perfume, is a solid entry into his heavily-stylized filmography; it delivers on all levels of action and suspense, but lacks a little on emotional bravada and characterization. Better than any Bourne film; the Guggenheim-replica shootout scene is aaaammmazing. Check it out if just for that. Next we have Norman Jewison’s 1968 original version of The Thomas Crown Affair (4 stars, Moviefilm); while extremely underplotted and undercharacterized, we get a visually astounding heist feature with none other than Faye Dunaway and Steve McQueen to lubricate our senses. It’s pretty much all show, and it works like a charm. With Paths Of Glory (4.5 stars, Film), Kubrick strikes again with this beautifully crafted French/German war film set in the 1910s. The atrocities of war are laid bare, and they are foul. Fun fact: there’s only one woman in the entire film, and she’s on screen for, at most, two minutes. And Stanley Kubrick married her. A top thirty film for me.

For new releases, we have The Hangover (4.5 stars, Moviefilm), a perfect guy movie with a perfect cast and a perfect story; you have to see it to believe how ridiculously funny and awesome it is. Best live action film of 2009, so far. Also from 2009, we have Soderbergh’s quiet little experiment, The Girlfriend Experience (4.5 stars, Film), starring porn star Sasha Grey as a high-class prostitute in NYC trying to navigate through her job and personal life. It’s probably one of the most simple character studies I’ve ever seen, but Grey proves she can do more than porn, and assuredly astounds. #4 for 2009. The most important film I need to talk about is 2006’s controversial 9/11 film, United 93 (4.5 stars, Motion Picture). I was so against World Trade Center (2006) and this for the longest time because I thought they were made to profit off of tragedy and marr an otherwise sacred event. I gave in, and in turn, was given one of the most heart-wrenching and glorious tales of heroism, triumph, and miscommunication; no matter if it’s true or not. A top twenty-five film for me. Taking the cake, though, is a small Norwegian gem from ‘06, Den brysomme mannen (The Bothersome Man) (5 stars, Film). It’s open for quite a bit of interpretation, but we follow a man in a purgatory-hell-like city where no emotion is exhibited, and nothing tastes. It appealed 100% to my ‘not everything is as it appears to be’ and ‘unfamiliar dystopia’ benchmarks, taking the #3 spot in the top one-hundred. Highly recommended, if you want a heady, fantastic, Norsk journey into an unknown world.

In progress on: Edtv, Get Carter, Irreversible, Natural Born Killers, Solaris (1972), Spartan, Stereo, The Ninth Configuration, The Dead Zone, and many others. Up next?: Schindler’s List (need a good, solid watch in a non-classroom environment), Das Experiment, and Spider. Coming soon: Reviews for Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen, The Brothers Bloom and Paranoid Park.