Ishtar

directed by Elaine May (1987)

I watched Ishtar when it was first released.  I was one of the few people who actually saw it in theatres and enjoyed it.  When it started getting harsh reviews,  I didn't understand why this comedy about two mild mannered musicians in a mid life crisis mode who bumble their way through spy games in Morocco elicited such vitriol.  Worst movie ever???  To my mind it was pretty funny and entertaining, not much different than other comedies of the time, but for whatever reason it tanked,  HARD.  It earned a measly 12.7 million, and that only covered the salaries of the two leads. Hoffman and Beatty got 5 million each, and the total budget ran to 55 million.  So yeah, it was a financial disaster, but the film itself is not that epic a failure by any means.

Rewatching it,  I'd say the best part of the movie is the set up in New York, where you meet Lyle, (Warren Beatty), and Chuck, (Dustin Hoffman), and see how they come together. The movie is very silly in terms of the spyjinx plot once the location switches to Morocco, but the backdrops are interesting, and the fact that the same political shell games are still being played in the Middle East, gives a bit of texture and gravitas to the fluff.  It's still not very engaging though. I admit I got a bit bored by the action, but the desert shenanigans are simply the framework for the further development of Lyle and Chuck's relationship.  They are such sweet and deluded doofuses and it's their interactions that make the film worth watching.  I enjoyed seeing Beatty play against type as he's very believable as a simple good hearted hick - Lyle reminds me of Thomas Haden Church some.  Hoffman's Chuck, "call me Hawk",  and his overconfident braggadocio provides great contrast, especially when he switches to jags of piteous crying while bemoaning his lot in life.  His angsty whining provides some hilarious moments where Lyle props his self esteem back up, and Chuck does the same for Lyle in his darker moments.

Lyle to Chuck:

It takes a lot of nerve to have nothing at your age, don't you understand that? Most guys'd be ashamed, but you've got the guts to just say 'to hell with it'. You say that you'd rather have nothing than settle for less, understand? 

It's a sweet relationship, and if you like Dumb and Dumber, this has a similar appeal.

Paul Williams and Elaine May did the music and the tunes they wrote for Chuck and Lyle are really funny.  The two musicians are not great, really they aren't.  Their agent says, "You guys are old, you're white and you got no schtick!"  True dat, but they have big dreams eh?  Probably, if it were set now, they'd be satisfied doing Karaoke.  Also, I think Tenacious D and The Flight of the Conchords owe a lot to this film.

I especially like the scenes where the guys are working on their tunes.  Telling the truth can be dangerous business...

Isabelle Adjani doesn't particularly stand out, she does look good, even in dude drag, but I guess Elaine May had a hard time giving direction to women, and maybe a problem directing in general.

I ganked this from the IMDB forum on May, with thanks to Tom Cruise's Testicles.

"Everyone knew there was a problem with the film during production, most of it because of May. She killed her own career with her behavior. Even she knew she was over her head, removing entire battle scenes because she didn't know how to shoot them. When Beatty and others offered to help her storyboard it, she threatened to quit- refusing to accept help. Most of the crew learned early on that whenever they suggested something, she would do the opposite of what they proposed. So in order to get her to make the right decisions, they had to suggest the opposite of what they wanted her to do. One of the more famous stories is when shooting in the desert, because the sun moves, the light in the morning is different then the light in the afternoon. In order to get shots to match, they move the actors to a different hill and no one in the audience can tell because all areas of the desert look the same. She would not listen when the DP told her this and the result was tons of unusable footage. 

Everyone knew she was an eccentric before hiring her and a bit of a perfectionist. But no one, not even Beatty who produced the film(in fact, he got the film green lit for her because of her help on Heaven Can Wait and Reds, not just for her writing but also her incredible work helping to edit those films) were aware of her major flaws as a director. One of the major ones being she detest actresses, refusing to give any direction at all to Adjani. 

There are plenty of places where you can read about the behind the scenes stories on Ishtar(some made up, like her flattening sand dunes with a bulldozer for the film). The amount of money lost is a very small part of why she stopped directing. The main reason is her own actions and decisions. 

No one wants to work with someone who is out of control and doesn't know what they are doing. Even if they are a genius."


Charles Grodin plays a CIA operative and since he had been one of many options for casting Benjamin Braddock, I kept wondering what The Graduate would have been like if he had gotten the role instead of Hoffman. Another connection to The Graduate - Elaine May had an uncredited role.  She played the university girl who hands the note from Elaine to Benjamin.

I also noticed Max Headroom, (Matt Frewer), in a small role.  I wonder if Max will ever get a reboot?

The Apparition

written and directed by Todd Lincoln (2012)

Horror films have a fairly low threshold to reach in terms of being entertaining.  All they need a premise that puts people in danger and this premise doesn't even have to make much sense as long as the characters are threatened somehow. This flick has that basic apparatus in place and provides serviceable scares, but it's not great by any means.  Spoilers follow...

It starts off with grainy 70's film stock of a seance, then whoosh,  you're in modern times watching some college kids, while they set up an experiment recreating the seance of the 70's.  The leader of the ill advised paranormal ghost hunt is Patrick, played by Tom Felton, aka Draco Malfoy, so you know he's not going to be able to handle what happens eh?  Anyhow, they're trying to contact the same 70's seance entity to PROVE that ghosts are really real.  He's a super spooky looking dude who isn't give a backstory, so I don't even remember his name.   I dunno why they'd want to contact such an evil looking bastard.  I know you can't judge a book by it's cover, but c'mon dude looks straight up EVIL.  Of course, it goes off the rails wrong, and one of them, not Draco, gets sucked into blackness.

Next you're getting acquainted with a couple in some desert city, Arizona or Nevada, maybe it's California, but it doesn't really matter where.  All that matters it's a big ole suburb that Kelly and Ben have just moved into, and it's basically full of empty houses - they have ONE neighbour.  Aside from the product placement purpose of the Costco shopping scenes,  why are all these shots of the Kristen Stewartish girl, (Ashley Greene), and her boyfriend, (Sebastian Stan), doing their just moved in, need to do some nesting chores, taking up so much screen time?  In a good film, stuff like this is character development.  Scenes that show them doing everyday people things, establish the protagonists and clue you into caring about them.  This is an important step, because you need to care about the film folk, otherwise seeing them getting threatened isn't nearly as spooky.  Make connection with audience.  Check...barely.  Now on to the spooks!

The progression of the haunting was slooow and the entity has random abilities.  First it's moving stuff around, opening doors and then it manifests as mold.  Ooooo gross! Mold!  That stuff really is deadly, ya know.  Also the entity manages to kill the neighbour's  dog.  The dog just keels over so it wasn't gross, just sad.  I thought it was mean to kill off a dog, but I guess it made the ghostie seem more threatening.

Actually the worst part of the movie is that the boyfriend Ben KNOWS something bad is happening, but he hides this from his girlfriend.  I was confused actually, because I didn't realize that the boyfriend was the camera guy from the experiment.  I thought it just switched to a random couple with no connection to the opening scenes, because you NEVER saw the boyfriend/camera man's face in the video footage of the seance recreation experiment.

Kinda cheap, but horror is rife with the cheap tricks.  Whatever works eh?  In any case, Ben is a shitty fucking boyfriend.  He saw that girl get sucked into blackness, and you know what?  That was his girlfriend!  OMG what a douchey guy.  He eventually gets found out and tries to explain his douchey behaviour, saying he thought if she didn't know about the experiment, she'd be safe.  Whatever guy, and what a load of paternalistic crap too.

Actually none of the haunting stuff makes any sense, nor the ghostbustery stuff that is supposed to create the monster, or let the entity come through or whatever the bullshit story was.  There was no logic to it.  I think it was likely written backwards -  dude thought of some spooky scenes he could shoot and strung them together with the story attached awkwardly with lots of metaphorical duct tape.

The movie is gonna appeal to teenagers and they probably won't even mind that it's a dumb flick that makes no sense, because they likely haven't experienced many good horror films.  Unfortunately this one does nothing to change that situation either.

REup the reviews, and big ups to the RIP VIP's

I took a break from writing about the movies I watch for awhile, but I'm back at it again.  I'm half way through February and I hope to run through the backlog by the end of September - just in time for the VIFF.   I saw a few flicks I really enjoyed during my down time so I'm sad I didn't capture my immediate thoughts on them (I'm looking at you, Beyond The Black Rainbow and Prometheus), but that just gives me an excuse to watch them again eh?

RIP Martin Hamlisch and Judith Crist!

Safety Not Guaranteed

directed by Colin Trevorrow (2012)

A movie based on a meme?  I had my doubts but it's actually a good indie flick with a couple great character arcs, with some real tension to the story brought about by you wondering if there's a time machine or not.   It's sweet and funny and poignant and romantic and it's got good morals too.  It has some crazy bashing at the beginning, but on the whole it redeems itself with the idea of respecting people and being honest about who you are, the value of relationships, etc etc. I really enjoyed it.

It's produced by the Duplass brothers, (Jeff Who Lives At Home)  and stars Mark Duplass as the man with the plan, the ad,  and the time machine? There lies the mystery.  Also there's Jake M. Johnson as a an assholey magazine writer? editor? on a road trip out of Seattle supposedly to check out the story behind the classified, but really he sees it as a vacay opportunity to look up an ex while exploiting his interns - Aubrey Plaza and Karan Soni.  The interactions between Duplass and Plaza are where the heart of the story lies, also much of the humour.  Plaza is especially good with the deadpan cynicism, but the movie is ultimately about abandoning the comfort of cynicism.  I'd suggest you don't watch the trailer unless you enjoy having the majority of the plot points spoiled.   Or watch it if you like knowing the shape and colour of a flick beforehand, but personally I think that creates a less satisfying movie experience.

Here's a song from it I really liked - it doesn't wreck the story.

This trailer gives some background to the development of the flick, more than it telegraphs the story.

And this is the trailer where you it's pretty much whoomp there it is, we've connected most all the dots for you already.

Headhunters

directed by Morten Tyldum (2011)

My first impression with this film was geez, this is ripe for a remake with Tom Cruise as the greedy art thief.

My second impression?  I didn't think much of the set up.  It's got a corporate headhunter, (Aksel Hennie), who steals and sells art work, because he's got to keep up with the beyond his means lavish lifestyle his blonde trophy wife is accustomed to.  He's a pragmatic, amoral, sort,  and his art thieving is not much different from his day job where he looks for executives to poach, usually stealing them out from under the employ of one corporation for another.  The relative poverty driving the artwork snatch and sell sidejob, is not a situation most people can relate to; "Oh no I can't afford the payments on my luxury mansion or luxury car!"  Actually a whole lot of people can relate to not being able to afford the lifestyle they have,  it's just that the lifestyle he felt he needed to maintain was a bit much.

As the plot unspooled I was feeling all sneery about seeing another story about rich white people, and thinking, "fuck these greedy resource pigs and their stupid money problems!",  because greed and lavish lifestyles like you see at the upper echelons of society, rather than impressing me, more tends to disgust me. Excessively excessive is just plain fucked up.  The other day a friend was telling me about a guy who renovated his G5 jet so all the surfaces were gold plated or marble.  He spent x amount of dollars, untold millions, I guess, and for what?  So his JET was shiny?

Jesus.  Of course it's Donald Trump's jet.

The movie got better though.  It's got good heists with twisty drama, and what I appreciated most, aside from the great cinematography, was the moral thread running through it. The protagonist is interesting too.  He's vulnerable; his narration reveals his weaknesses,  and that's what got me to liking him.  The movie had been hyped to me though, so it took me awhile before my expectations wound down and I got into it for what it was - a well shot action/crime story with some characters growing.   Near to the beginning,  I turned to my guy and said, I don't LIKE anybody in this film.  They're all selfish fucks.  Pretty standard character types for noir type works, but this one also has some redemptive realistic qualities in the characters, except when it comes to the antagonist, (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau).  He was a little too much of a phony baloney, comic book, super soldier, spy guy, human monster, stereotype for my taste.  Still, all criticism aside, it was a good ride, and I liked how it ended.

I think in the remake, they'll do it from the perspective of the bad guy and have him triumph, because greed is still good in the eyes of the majority of the haves making media in America.

Bernie

directed by Richard Linklater (2011)

I went into this cold, knowing only that it starred Jack Black, Shirley MacLaine, and Matthew McConaughey and I think that is the BEST way to see this movie - knowing nothing about it AT ALL.  It will suprise you and isn't that one of the greatest things in life - when something surprises you?  When a movie can do that, it's like a present you weren't even expecting.

So don't read anymore if you ain't seen it yet, because now I'm gonna head into spoiler territory.  (Don't watch the trailer - it pretty much tells you everything that happens.)

It's a based on a true story of a 1996 murder in Texas.  I thought it was a regular old made up story, and when I realized at the end, that it really happened, and that those townspeople were the actual spectators to the incident talking about a real person and a real murder, well I was just delighted.  Not that this awful crime took place - it was a terrible thing Bernie did -  more that this movie was made ya know?  The best most genius part was having how the interviews with the townspeople were intermingled with the recreations of the relationship between Bernie and Marjorie.

It's such a great story too, like they tagline says, "A story so unbelievable it must be true."  And I thought it was so appropriate how it was structured, starting off showcasing Bernie's unbelievable goodness.  You can't help but like and root for Bernie.  Even though he shot an old lady 4 times IN THE BACK, then stuffed her in a freezer, you still want to forgive him.  It shine's a light on this peculiar aspect of the human condition - how prejudiced we all are, and how easily we can be swayed to forgive when we like a person.   With our friends, or people who are likeable, we'll want to cut them slack,  and give them a break, but for people we don't like, or who we can't relate to?  All those wrongdoers?? Well they can go to hell.

It's the American way, well acually it's the way most people are the world over.  Unfortunately, as a people, we are highly and irrationally prejudicial.

It's a good flick.  Well worth your time.  I really enjoyed it. I also thought Jack Black's role would have been great for Zach Galifianakis.

Now with more updates!

I think I'm going to start updating from both ends of the 65 movie backlog.  The number has remained constant since  I keep seeing new movies!  9 so far this month, and while I think it's more methodical to do it in chronological order, I'm thinking I'll get caught up quicker if I post recent stuff as well.

Most of the backlog comes from February which was a mental month for me watching flicks - 40 movies!  I had 4 movie channels that were playing all kinds of classic flicks, plus whatever theatre shows I could get out to as well.

Anyhow, I think I'll be doing the updates more randomly, or at not least not completely chronologically.

Catch up.

I have been neglecting the upkeep of this movie blog and have accumulated 65 unpublished entries.

This is entirely too many. 

I will be gradually catching up, because I have some new movie channels and that means more movies will be coming down the pike.

Gotta watch them all!  Well no, that's crazy talk.  There's no way to watch 'em all and actually that sounds terrible.  There are way too many awful films out there, and most of them are not so bad it's good...most are just bland and boring.

Tedium is far more terrible than outrageously awful.

Higher Ground

directed by Vera Farmiga (2011)

This is Vera Farmiga's directorial debut, and she also stars in this exploration of faith and religion.  It's based on the book, This Dark World, a memoir authored by Carol S. Briggs.  It has the mundane ordinariness of a real person's story rather than the high drama of made up conflict, but that doesn't make it less interesting.  In fact I found it a very rewarding watch.  The heart of the flick centres on Corinne Walker's (Farmiga) struggle with faith, belief, and dogma.  The film tracks her religious journey starting right from childhood when she accepts Jesus into her heart at bible camp.  I could relate to that scene.  I went to bible camp the summer I was 10, and I felt such pressure there to embrace a fundamentalist faith.  I wanted to believe so bad I almost convinced myself I did.  I so wanted to belong to that Christian cult, and I really did want Jesus to live in my heart too.  I remember how they told me how I'd burn in hell if I didn't believe, and that saddled me with guilt and shame. I didn't want to be a sinner damned to hell.  I felt inadequate and ashamed because I bought into their propaganda, but when they told me I was a sinner, that only resonated because I already felt unsure of myself.  That's the default mode of the modern human condition,  and it's part and parcel of growing up that you feel inadequate and unsure of who you are or how to define yourself.  And that uncertainty and fear and plasticity of identity is what religion, especially Christianity capitalises on, at least the more fundamentalist branches of Christianity really push that whole shame thing down your throat with the idea of original sin.

And what is up with original sin anyhow?  It seems like such contrived bullshit to me.  The idea is just silly! When I see animals or children doing their thing,  the absurdity of sin as a concept becomes so obvious, because kids and animals are just natural, and wild, and free, and sin has no place in their actions.  I don't thin either kids or animals ponder much on the morality of their actions.  Perhaps they do, but original sin?  Come on, that idea seems entirely man made.  In fact, morals, ethics, all that jazz, are just so much ideas and abstraction borne of self aware consciousness.

Back to the movie though...

Vera has a whole lot happen in her life, not big bad things, just general life kinda stuff that makes her question religion and the validity of doubt, or rather the validity of faith.  At least that's what I got out of the film.  There's a great scene at the end where she does a monologue on her gradual acceptance of her doubt, and to me that was much more liberating and enlightening than the dogmatic ritual of the faithful could ever be.  I even agreed with her envy of their faith. I used to wish I could have that comfort and assuredness that seems to come with belief.  I just don't seem to have that in me though.

Yeah, I am a doubting Thomas, and I don't think there's anything wrong with that.  In fact, I think there's a whole lot more right with being a doubter than there is right about being a believer.  I could be wrong about that, but it's not that important.  I'm content being a questioner; it fits me better than zealotry.

I liked the soundtrack a whole lot too..  There's a bunch of gospel musics, many of them sung by Ollabelle and the lovely voiced Amy Helm. 

Farmiga sings some too and she's got a good voice as well, but what I've always noticed first about her is the way she looks.  Not to take away from her achievements as an actor/director, either.  I just think she's gorgeous and that her looks would fit well in period pieces.  I always get the feeling of the past and art models when I see her, a Pre-Raphaelite or maybe a Vermeer.  She's a Botticelli on the band-shell, performing gospels in the this flick.

Footloose (2011)

directed by Craig Brewer (2011)

The town that banned dancing!  This is a ridiculous premise for a movie, but I guess when you're doing remakes from the 80's you're forced to stay within the confines of whatever terrible concept.  I mean, you don't absolutely have to, some remakes only borrow the name to bring brand familiarity to the game.  This remake is not one of those though.  Too bad. It could have been about a dude who dances his way across America in a wheelchair after a terrible tour in Iraq,  or maybe a guy who couldn't stop dancing, like in that fairytale The Red Shoes. Or even a thiller solving the mystery of all the feet washing up on the shores of B.C.

Whatever, I don't remember the original very well except for the song and Kevin Bacon dancing around in tight jeans and cowboy boots to the Kenny Loggins' song.  I have vague recollections of the plot.

Actually, watching the remake revived more memories, like it was John Lithgow doing the preacher dude, I mean he wasn't doing him haha,  just portraying him.  This time it was Dennis Quaid playing the holy roller, and I kept thinking that it was kind of appropriate that Jerry Lee Lewis got all religious and turned his back on rock and roll.

I don't remember why the town banned dancing in the original, but I'm assuming it's because of a terrible drinking and driving auto wreck which wouldn't have happened if there hadn't been dancing before that to loosen the morals of the kids towards all that boozing for sexy time made them forget about how stupid it is to drink and drive, at least that's what happens in the remake.  The accident is pretty shocking.  I didn't expect it because I forgot that it was about a town that banned dancing and I was just enjoying the opening party dancing scene.  Gotta gotta cut loose.  I have to tell you it was a pretty harsh contrast and brought the start of the movie way down low.

When the Kevin Bacon replacement (Kenny Wormald) goes to school and almost gets into a fight with a tall hayseed, (Miles Teller),  I suddenly remembered, oh yeah, Christopher Penn  (RIP) played the local, because this guy is totally doing Christopher Penn doing that hayseed part.  It was my fave part of the movie.  Hayseed don't know how to dance so he's got to learn in a montage sequence, first the Kevin Bacon replacement's little cousins are teaching him their cute little girl dance moves - I guess they know the moves from watching TV or the kids teach each other, dance knowledge was only suppressed 3 years back, so I dunno, these girls are young, they probably only remember a town without dancing so dance osmosis potential has got to be the highest at their young age.   Whatever, it's a cute sequence, him all bumbly toed and then bringing it home with proper line dancing and what not.  I liked him the best in the film. Christopher Penn replacement, you dun good.

IMO, for a movie about kids being all footloose, there is too much emphasis on NON-dancing.  I know this is a town that banned dancing and the kids have to dance in secret, like the drive in hoedown, (btw it was kinda ridiculous that the old dude was smuggling in the crunk sounds - did this town ban the internets too?)  I just think there should have been more depictions of secret dance clubs and West Side Storyesque dance fighting or something, because the replacement activity - reckless car driving at the track, was not as much fun.  I mean it was OK, just I didn't expect Fast and Furious in the fields ya know?  And really, not as many people can race cars as can dance.  And the only racing that has a plot point is actually school bus racing which is not that fast to be honest.

The movie is dumb, but it's based on a dumb movie.  It's fun, but it has stretches of boredom and eye rollery stupid dialogues.  I particularly liked "You're hotter than socks on a rooster." I think the original was the same though.  Still I think the original is probably better.  The 80's version has better acting, but less dancing, though more iconic dancing I'm guessing.  I'm not sure though, the angry dance scene in the remake is maybe better, for sure more over the top with the emotive expression.  He is really venting with his choreography. They are both campy, so probably hit the old one if you're a retro hound with principles of holding out against the future or if you're feeling the 80's and want to see old stars when they were young. Check the remake if you want to hear remixes of the old tunes and  see new stars before they fizzle or shoot up or  should that be out? Who knows, both probably, this is the folks what live in n Hollyweird, and odds are some of these folk will end up in rehab.   Not Miles Teller I hope.  He's got a bright future I'd bet.

The Stunt Man

directed by Richard Rush (1980)

It starts off with a buzzard hanging around on a pole watching a yellow dog licks his privates.  I'm guessing the buzzard is the audience and the dog is Hollywood, something like that.

The movie is not very good in terms of being a believable story; it's more an arty pastiche of moviemaking.  As long as you're ok with over the top performances and general craziness, it's entertaining as hell, and a pretty great look at behind the scenes action too.  You get to see crane set ups, action sequences outta control and gone wrong, while a helicopters totes a camera are all over the place.  Peter O'Toole in his camera crane is like a mad scientist in his robot creation, overseeing his minions, the dues ex machina hand of god, manipulating everyone in order to get his movie in the can.

Truthfully, the story is really silly, it involves a escaped prisoner or guy with a warrant, (Steve Railsback), I forget why this guy was on the run from the law, but he is, and O'Toole takes him in hiding him among his crew,  as a replacement for a stunt man who's gone missing.  Dude needs a place to duck out from the man,  and the director needs to finish his movie....by any means necessary!  O'Toole is making an antiwar film but it looks trite, lots of battle scenes, and tragic love storiness, but mostly explosions and scenes needing mucho stunt work. It's a fun watching the stunt work, and there's some good dialogue too.  This bit from O'Toole sums up the message of the flick pretty well.


"We're shaking a finger at them Sam, and we shouldn't.  If you've anything to say, it's best to slip it in while they're all laughing and crying and jerking off at all the sex and violence.  You should do something outrageous!"

It was nominated for 3 Academy Awards: best director, best adapted screenplay, and best actor for Peter O'Toole.  It won a Golden Globe for best score.

I liked the movie, and the director says it's about perception, so watch it with an open mind and see what you make of it.

Official site

The World of Henry Orient

The World of Henry Orient (1964) directed by George Roy Hill

I thought this was going to be a comedy starring Peter Sellers.  He's in it, playing a pianist, and he's funny, but he's not the star.  It's mostly about 2 young teens following him around after one develops a crush on him.  It's a weird film, half wholesome Disneyesque giggly girl bonding, and half Benny Hill G rated sex comedy with one particularly obvious oggling upskirt sequence when the girls are running down the street hopping over fire hydrants and the camera.  What??!!  Maybe I'm just a prude, but that felt yuck.  It's  thematically odd, having the adolescent boy craziness and the joys of girl friendship contrasting with the grown up sex comedy.  Made me feel uncomfortable some.  It's played very lighthearted though, and not much actually happens in the flick aside from girl drama. The scenes of them playing games of pretend and being enthusastic about their stategies following Henry Orient around reminded me of the movies by Mary Kate and Ashley Olson that my neices liked to watch - sweet but kinda tedious too. There was a lot of slapstick in those also.

I really enjoyed Peter Sellers as the buffoonish object of affection.  He's pretty hilarious as a lazy pianist obscuring his Brooklyn roots with fake European airs.  I could see Sacha Baron Cohen doing this role easily.  Anyhow, he's desperate to get married Paula Prentiss back to his apartment to finalize his seduction, but the girls stalking him, keep thwarting these plans.

Angela Lansbury does nasty neglectful adulterous mom very very well, reminiscent of her role in The Manchurian Candidate.  She`s a real piece of work.  This flick was a miss for me, but I would have liked one that focused on the adulterous affairs of both her and Peter Sellers, seemed a bit riper for material along their plot lines. I prefer my sleazy lasciviousness more risque and I'll pass on the family friendly girlish antics.

Adding to the sleaze factor is the fact that the director seduced one of the girls.  According to her post on imdb, Tippy Walker's first love was George Roy Hill.  During the filming, he took her aside one day telling her, he was going to teach her how to French kiss.  If I was 16, I might be naive enough to find that romantic, but I'm pretty sure most everyone would agree, that's f'd up.  I guess the relationship was fairly chaste, but it was a secret and it messed her up.  Read her description under whitedogandharriet in this thread.

Skin Game

Skin Game (1971) directed by Paul Bogart

Another weirdo film from the past.  This one a comedy about slavery starring James Garner, (he actually produced it too), and Louis Gossett (no Jr.) as a couple of con men in pre Civil War era American.  Gossett is a 4th generation freeman from Chicago who pretends to be a slave, so Garner can sell him, then rescue him.  Then they both run off to the next town to pull the scam again.

It's got very bizarre sensibilities, probably because it's 40 years old but I have to admit I found it shocking to hear the n word used so casually.  But I think it's mostly because the slavery aspect is played for laughs, and I found it hard to find the humour in it especially considering how  hardly ever depicting how very terrible it was.

I kinda liked it though.  It was crazy stupid and silly at times, but it mostly took advantage of the situation to establish a few times over, the awful insanity of people being bought and sold and deprived of dignity and freedom because of the colour of their skin.

Makes me think that slavery is the ultimate end of capitalism and libertarianism.  Why shouldn't people be commodities?  Who are you to deny a person the right to sell themselves to the highest bidder?  It's bullshit, but it's in line with their principles.


trailer

Dial M for Murder

directed by Alfred Hitchcock (1954)

I got kinda bored with this one.  It's too easy to figure out, and you gottta wade through a whole lotta yadayada before you get to the denouement satisfactions.

Ray Milland is defintinely evil, and nasty, greeedy, coldhearted, so I wanted to see him suffer.  He's always got the stiff upper lip though, so his suffering isn't that entertaining.   It's definitely the devious selfish machinations where he delivers; his duplicitous actions are what'll get you all incensed and rooting for him to get nailed.

Grace Kelly is very gorgeous in this, but she's so bland and helpless too.  I felt like her character was being punished too much by the script, though. She's so tortured!  So often the damsel in distress is a boring character of function, just there as a beautiful thang to get threatened and rescued.  Even though she's put through the wringer, at least she had some complexity beyond just being a victim.

I guess I was expecting this to be more crazy than it was.  It's so highly rated, that set me up for something more than what it is - a tightly wound mystery thriller - sorta like a CSI episode.  It feels like a play and that makes sense since it was originally a Broadway production by Fredrick Knott, and he adapted the screenplay as well.  Maybe I'd have liked it better if I saw it in 3D, like it was originally shot.

One scene made me laugh, one cop is walking off with some evidence: a women's purse.  He's got it dangling dainitly on his arm, and as he sets off on his way back to the station, a detective stops him short. "You can't walk around like that, you'll get arrested." And the cop puts the purse inside a satchel to cover up the gender crime.  Holy eh? You'll get arrested!  This is really true though.  At one point in English history, you could be arrested for wearing clothes that didn't define your gender "properly".  It's the actual legal reason behind Joan of Arc getting burned at the stake.  In hindsight, it makes more sense that Albert Nobbs was so terrified to be outed.

In case you're wondering, the Hitchcock cameo is in BITD school photo of the blackguard Milland.

The Secret World of Arrietty

directed by Hiromasa Yonebayashi (2010)
screenplay by Hayao Miyazaki

Japanese anime can be so very good at the sentimental.  This one was kinda melancholy too.

Girls will really dig this.  The animation is straight up gorgeous, just what you'd expect from a Studio Ghibli production and it's drawn from good source materials since it's based on The Borrowers - a best selling series of children's books by Mary Norton.  I loved the books when I was a girl, and seeing this movie I can see why.  You've got a plucky girl going on adventures, and she's meeting up with a handsome boy who wants to save her. So you've got appropriate amounts of action and romance pitched to a preteen level. It's a very engaging story for kids, but it's especially gonna hit home and be empowering for the YA girls who are bound to identify with Arrietty.  Her secret world is secret not simply because the heart of a young girl is mysterious, yeah to that but more because she's really for real living a secret life.  She's a teeny tiny miniature person living with her family inside the walls of a regular person's house.  She's just like people though, just small and she's at the age where she's eager to get out from under her parent's thumb and meet up with the big wide world - a little corner of it anyhow.   It's fun, and there's magical little people, well they aren't really magical except that they exist, plus there's helpful animals and what all boycrazy girls will appreciate - in spite of obvious complications, sparks still fly between the boy and the girl.  Who cares that they come from different worlds and aren't even close to the same size?  They speak the language of love.  Aw... I ate this up when I was 11, and I still found it sweet as an grown up.

I have a greater appreciation for reality and tragedy now though.  I think if I'd watched this when I was a kid I'd have felt really disappointed at the ending.

There are 2 different English language dubs, one for American audiences and one for the UK.  The books were written by an English woman, so maybe that's why that happened.  Or maybe it's because the producers wanted the broadest possible audience and figured American people wouldn't want to listen to "foreign accents."  I heard the American version, and it was pleasant, but I can't help but wonder if the movie would have sounded better in the other dub.

Also, I liked hearing Carol Burnett in a small role as a housekeeper.  I could easily picture her animated character as the cleaning lady she did at the close of her variety TV show.

The cat was pretty great too.

The Way We Were

directed by Sydney Pollack (1973)

A Valentine's Day viewpoint.

I always dismissed this because I thought it was a sappy romance, mostly because of the super over the top sentimental theme song by Streisand and Marvin Hamlisch - misty water coloured mammaries, gooshing the milk of nostalgia.  It's a great song if you can accommodate the melodramatic melancholia - it won the Academy Award for best song - but the movie is better.  It's sincerely emotional too, but it's trying way harder to be something meaningful rather than simply emotionally evocative.

It spans a number of interesting periods in American history, and is full of lefty, pinko, pedantic scenes that explain and broadly outline the political stances popular at the time it was made - at least those among the dirty commie cultural arbiters in Hollywood - the peace movement, feminism, social justice etc.  Mostly it's done through arguments between Streisand and Redford.  She's starts out a poor, but smart kid, working her way through Harvard on an activist/journalist trip, and he's a wannabe writer who's making his bones.  He's intrigued by her, and she wants him baaad.   She's got a chip on her shoulder over class and has resentment for his pretty boy privilege though, so there's obstacles to their coupling.

I really enjoyed it and I didn't expect that I would. Sydney Pollack is known for making quality flicks though, so I perked up when I saw he was the director.  It's still rich white people problems though.  Really it's a relationship flick, but it aims higher than the majority of what you'll find in the romance genre.  It's steeped in the issues and politics of its time eg. the McCarthy bullshit, and will seem silly and dated in some aspects, but it's a superb document of that era and the viewpoint filter it applies to the immediate past.  I totally appreciate when "issues" are addressed in a plot - it makes a story so much more interesting.

Pollack, Streisand, and Redford

Robert Redford reminds me of Brad Pitt so much in the scenes where he's drunk and Streisand takes him home.  I thought it was such a sign of the times that she'd take advantage of his inebriated state to seduce him, well actually she just crawled into bed with his passed out form and engaged his automatic hump instincts. Wtf eh? Women's lib was in full force in 1973, but she couldn't directly pursue him because that would be too too slutty I guess.

trailer

deleted scenes

whole movie - youtube

RIP Mr. Hamlisch!  You made good musics.

Assassination Tango

directed by Robert Duvall (2002)

This movie was weird and it made me feel weird too. It's about a hitman who takes up tango dancing and romancing while he's stuck in Buenos Aires waiting on an opportunity to wack a former General.   I think Duvall wrote it for Robert De Niro and De Niro wouldn't do it so, Duvall had to step in, because it's like Duvall is doing a De Niro pastiche. It's truly an unwieldy combo of tango dance romantic fluff with a side of improbable hitman drama/action and I think either of the plots probably would have worked better independently. I found the dancing stuff was better developed, but maybe the hitman plot was what got the flick its finding.  On a story level, it was hard to buy that it would be difficult to find someone in Argentina who could manage a murder job.  And was it just me, or was Duvall taking credit for assassinations down south, saying that Ortega wouldn't still be around if he'd been on the job?

The action is pretty good aside from the, yeah this would really happen, snark! aspect though.

Now for the weird...

I felt uncomfortable about the relationship he had with the daughter of his girlfriend.  He obviously loved the little girl; their relationship was really sweet with him teaching her to dance and the general interactions made me feel aw...but there were also times when I got yucko feelings, like something is wrong here and I was dreading worse to come, saying to Joe, I hope there isn't a child abuse angle Duval's working.  I had to question my reaction.  Was I twigging to something that wasn't there?  He wasn't shown molesting the girl, and not even sure that was implied, but he for sure had terrible boundaries.  He talked about how she was better than a daughter, and that he loved her more than the mom?  I can't understand ever thinking it would be right to tell a kid that. Oh yeah, btw, your mother?  I don't really love her, it's you I love.  The feeling is understandable; romantic attachments often wither, but parental ones, not so much.  Still, that aspect felt like a real miscue, or that it was alluding to a situation that WAS abusive that wasn't developed properly. Or maybe that was the point?  His character was really selfish in all his interactions, totally self serving and it's with people like the hitman, where kids are getting exploited and abused, and generally nobody notices.  Or even worse when people do notice somethings up, they just ignore the problem.  Somebody else's business!  I feel like I'm reading too much into a small part of a character study story;  it's just that the stuff with the kid felt OFF and I don't know why, or to what purpose.  Probably the shittiness with the little girl was more to do with him being a selfish guy who only operates out of self interest. I mean, a decent guy would never put a child in a position where they could get revenge murdered, let alone lay a heavy trip on them that their mom's partner loves them more than their mom.  In any case, I didn't like the development of that subplot, and I thought the hitman was a tool.  I guess you'd have to be a tool to be a hitman  to begin with though.

Luciana Pedraza, the tango dancer he sparks on, is Duvall's actual wife and she's 42 years younger than him and a professional dancer.

When I found that out, it made me wonder, was this whole flick an ego massage to justify the massive age difference between them? To maybe silence charges of of dirty old man! What?  Hey man, who doesn't love dancing?  Life IS a dance! And besides, age ain't nothing but a number? Massive age differences don't have to translate as  incestous or inappropriate!!  On one level, yeah that's true.  Of course people should be with who they love. Yet I still feel conflicted, because I really did get squicked feelings from the flick.  I have to admit, even if it makes me a judgemental, uncool,  not liberal enough moral relativist, I think it's problematic when there are vast discrepancies between partners, whether they be of age, wealth, class, or even level of attractiveness.  Yeah, it's simple and silly to want people to have equity in all areas, but on a basic fundamental level, that feels right too.  It seems a bit sad to me when people get together, and there are great imbalances between them, because on an inherent sense of fair play, it seems likely someone is giving more.  Perhaps that's too literal a way to think of things.  Relationships do not operate with balance sheets after all.

All told it wasn't super great, but it wasn't super awful either.  Some of it made me uncomfortable, but it did make me think about and clarify my position on some important issues, for sure.  And the dancing and musics are great.  I say, if you're into dancing and gunfights, and don't mind some disjointedness,   put this one on and get ready to Taaaango!!

Duvall's dance moves

more dancing (spoilers)

trailer

Another Woman

directed by Woody Allen (1988)

A Woody Allen flick I ain't ever watched! His films never disappoint; even a lesser Woody Allen flick is still entertaining, though I wouldn't categorise this one as lesser.  I really liked it.  It's about a professor of philosophy, (Gena Rowlands), who's seemingly content with her life.  She's writing a book and rents a studio space so she can focus on that.  It's adjacent to a psychiatrist/psychoanalyst's office and there's an amplifying vent connecting the two spaces through which she can hear every single word of the very intimate revelations that go on in the sessions.  It's after she eavesdrops on another woman's sessions, (Mia Farrow), that cracks begin to develop in the facade she maintains.  

It's a great flick.  A mid life crisis is ripe fodder, and that it's a woman's made it that much more interesting to me.  Juicy, juicy, scenes in this.

The movie is FULL of famous actors, the first thing I thought when I saw her husband was: Hey! That's the robot who tried to kill Ripley!  Ian Holm is a cold fish, heartless cardiologist.

Plus it has narration!  Flashbacks and dream sequences too.  Yay!

The scene where she runs into Sandy Dennis, the best friend of her youth, who drifted away, is amazing.  Dennis accuses her of betrayal and Rowlands denies it, but the guilty is pretty obvious, even if subconscious.  (This youtube has the whole movie, scene starts 30 mins in.)

Apparently it's very similar to Ingmar Bergman's Wild Strawberries.  I haven't seen that yet, but I don't think there's anything wrong with various perspectives on similar themes.  Movies are like music.  I like hearing different takes on a good song.  A story is the same thing.   Some people get shitty about the idea of originality and copying ideas, but I think that's bullshit.  And besides, Woody Allen has always been forthright about his admiration for Bergman,  and how much he's been influenced by his films.

It's worth a watch

trailer

Barry Lyndon

directed by Stanley Kubrick (1975)

I have to say I was thoroughly entertained by this.  I was expecting to be bored, because I was so bored with Emma, but this period piece has lots more stuff going on during the 3 hours plus running time than the slight romantic comedy of relationships found in Emma.  Perhaps it's unfair to compare the two, since they are different genres and even different eras, but they are both about the gentry/ruling class,  just that NOTHING happens in Emma, except some people get married.  I was also expecting to be bored because I'd had this movie for years and years and years, and could never bring myself to watch it, even though it was a Stanley Kubrick flick, and every film I've seen of his has been genius.  I'd glace at the spine when looking amongst my collection of VHS for summat to watch, and groan feeling like oh noes, homework time, when I'd consider watching it.  It's like reading a classic because you feel like you "should" have.  I don't have a VHS collection anymore, so when it came up on one of the movie channels, I jumped on it out of the same old feeling of obligation to watch something I believe that as a self avowed movie nerd, I should have already seen.  It's not quite like not having seen The Godfather, Citizen Kane, or Star Wars, but it's in that neighbourhood.

It starts off great, with a duel and quickly moves on to introducing our protagonist, Redmond Barry (Ryan O'Neal), the son of the man who died in the duel.  Kubrick wanted Robert Redford for the role,  but Redford passed due to scheduling conflicts.  Kubrick had to chose from the 10 top US box office draws that year to get financing for the film.  O'Neal and Redford were the only ones who came close, both being about the right age and of Irish heritage too.  I wonder what it would have been like if Clint Eastwood, or Charles Bronson played the lead.  Very different flick I tell you what. Who would Kubrick have cast if he had free rein? Maybe Malcolm Mcdowell would have landed the role.  He'd have been more interesting I think.  Though O'Neal's opaque quality was a good fit, he's not nearly as nuanced an actor.

The film tracks Barry's progress out of the gentry and his climb towards nobility, through duels and deaths, wars and intrigue. They were mad about duelling back then, duel duel duel, it was the all the rage.  There are 3 duels in the flick and they are all crazy.  Who the fuck does this stupid shit?  Stand in front of each other and shoot for honour.  EVERYONE, well every soldier anyhow, because that's how they used to fight wars.  Just line up in and shoot each other into oblivion.  Reload and do it again.  Nutty!  It's based on a serialised novel by Thackeray and it's narrated.  That's one of my favourite plot forwarding movie devices.  I really, really, like narration, not all the time, I just like how it functions, how much it simplifies the story when there's an omniscient device that can delve into character's minds and express their thoughts and motivations.  Stuff like that can be extremely hard to convey with just visual action, and too much expository dialogue can be unrealistic as most people don't naturally go around explaining themselves or their actions.  I also like movies that have sequences where people read letters.

The movie is really really gorgeous, I'm serious, it looks like master's paintings. Kubrick wanted it to look like Gainsboroughs and it does.

screenshots vs paintings

Luscious locations, landscapes, castles, and costumes oh my! At times, the action is framed so statically I felt like I was falling into a painting.  Slow sweeping pans and deep zooms suck you right in, or pull you out to a breathtaking splendour.  Absolutely incredible cinematography. Kubrick used a wide aperture lens for the candle light scenes and there's such a warm glow to the images.  Beautiful, beautiful flick.  It won Academy Awards for art direction, cinematography, costume, and music, and distinguished itself with 13 other awards and 11 nominations.


I recognised the caretaker from the Shining.  Philip Stone, plays a servant/accountant type.

Phillip Stone site

And I really liked the musics, especially the theme by Handel.

..and this bit of dancing too.

It's a long movie, Kubrick shot for 300 days for the 184 minute runtime but that's not a record. He beat that with  Eyes Wide Shut: 15 months, with an unbroken period of 46 weeks, setting a Guinness Record for Longest Constant Movie Shoot.

I didn't mind a single minute.  I even went back and rewatched some scenes the next day, and again later.  It took me awhile before I felt like I could delete it from the PVR and it pained me some to do that.  It's so gorgeous, I'd be willing to watch it again some day, especially in a theatre.  It's Martin Scorcese's favourite Kubrick film and I agree. It's awesome.

original theatrical trailer

fun action style fan made  trailer