Tag: Film

Charade (1963) (R)

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IMDb / Taylor
Written by Peter Stone
Directed by Stanley Donen

A different type of film entertainment existed in the middle of last century. It was funny and thrilling, breezy and clever, a classy sort of movie that captivates all who go into the cinema but leaves little to no lasting impact. They were made by people with a love for and great knowledge of cinema – Hitchcock, Reed et al – and they were designed only to keep your eyes glued to the screen. You don’t really see this today. Instead we get shit like Failure to Launch, Norbit and Saw 47, none of which resemble quality film entertainment. But don’t let’s get bogged down in the rubbish polluting cinema screens here and now.

Charade is the most enjoyable example of that classy entertainment that I’ve seen. It has just about everything: danger, romance, double-crossing and witty banter. A great director at the peak of his powers. Three huge stars, and another who would go on to become a legend. A twisting, cracking script, and excellent production values. Everything seems so effortless, but to get so many different aspects working perfectly in sync takes a lot of work, so the people involved were clearly professionals of the highest order.

Hepburn plays Reggie, a widow, who is being chased by three men (including James Coburn) who think she’s carrying $250,000. Cary Grant appears to want to protect her, and Walter Matthau’s CIA staffer wants to help her, but who’s jeepin’ who? The plot unfolds at a swift pace, supported by a steady stream of great lines, most of which come in conversations between Grant and Hepburn’s characters. It’s easy to see why these two would rank extremely highly on lists of the greatest movie stars ever (I believe Premiere magazine rated Grant at #1), because their very presence on screen is enough to ensure a contented smile from me. With Stone’s wonderful words to back them up, they create iconic roles which made me wish for an infinite reserve of one-liners and comebacks.

For me, though, the real star is Donen. I always figured Singin’ in the Rain was more Gene Kelly’s show than his, but on the basis of this, he’s a fantastic director in his own right. One could film this script with these stars like a sitcom, and it would still entertain; he lifts it to another level by employing wonderful dollys and pans, and timing each shot just right so that the line gets the biggest laugh. He wasn’t yet 40 when he made this; unfortunately, he became swiftly less active as the years went on.

Aside from not having anything to keep your brain ticking over after leaving the cinema, the only quibble I might have harks back to an earlier point: people like Grant, Hepburn and Matthau are (were) such massive stars that they only really needed to turn up to get the audience on-side. That isn’t to say they don’t do a good job; it’s just that I sometimes wish for real characters when I watch these movies, not another identical performance in that star’s typical groove. I suppose that familiarity was precisely what made them famous and what got them the big roles, but acting has come a long way since then, and someone like Tom Cruise has to work extremely hard just to separate the audience’s preconceptions from the character he’s playing. And quite often, to my mind, he does it.

Anyway, if you enjoy life, see this movie. Two hours could hardly pass more swiftly and enjoyably. That makes it very hard to write about – it’s light entertainment, but made with the utmost precision to mine the most out of the material. All you can do is doff your cap, then move on to the next thing.

‘Babel’ (2006) (C) – A Debate

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IMDb / Bradshaw / Lumenick
Written by Guillermo Arriaga
Directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu

What follows is Oscar Yesenin’s take on the film, followed by my response. Something like a debate. This is Oscar’s annual bit of film writing for the site (last year’s being this), unless he decides to do this more often. I enjoy his expletive-laden style, though I do wish he were more focused and comprehensible in his rage. Anyway, I’ll leave it up to you from here.

OY

Babel (Selfish God’s act of giving a people a linguistic handicap. God, you are such a prick)

Ok, what the fuck is happening to the Cannes Film Festival? How could they give this film the Best Director Award for 2006? I am highly disappointed in the quality of the decision made by the judges. Who is the head of judges of 2006 Cannes? It’s fucking Wong Kar Wai! Jesus fucking Christ! Check the name of the other members of the jury: Monica Bellucci, Samuel L. Jackson, Tim Roth!!! They should know what good films are; 2006 must have been the shit year of films, if Babel could come up this high. Or, Cannes is just turning into another Academy Award kind of shit-fest. Trying to exploit the profit for US, money grabbing assholes. No morals, more cash.

I’ll just give you a quick review of this film because there is not much to talk about. Babel is plus average film, because it’s really weak in overall quality, especially in character development, while some of the cinematography in the film has something worth looking at. Thing is, at the end of the film you’ll feel like, “So what?” Because there is really no meaning in the film. You don’t feel you learnt something or had your way of thinking challenged. Every issue raised in the film is so shallow, not deeply engaged as a part of the film. It scratches the surface of the problems, like just reading the newspaper headline, but ignoring the content of the article. It is not open-ended or ambiguous; it is just a lump of issues dumped in the film. Examples: drug issues, stereotypes (Edward Said’s theory of Orientalism), human ego, physical handicaps, border politics and many others. Just like, ‘here is the topic’ – that’s it, nothing else. This is not being ambiguous or open-ended; it is just being an undecisive motherfucker. The director doesn’t even give us his thoughts about the topic, it’s just being used within the film for no real good reason or to argue any case.

Take, for example, the use of Moroccan hash in part of the plot of the film to get a patient relaxed (by the way lots of the hashish in Holland is imported from Morocco, apparently it’s good shit), ‘so what?’ What are you trying to tell us? Weed is good in some uses? Anyway, it’s used very badly in the film, since patient was having a sort of panic attack before taking the grass – in reality if you take hash in that kind of condition, it could really give you a very bad trip and cannot be recommended. Sure, it can be used as a painkiller, but does more harm than good mentally. There’s other shit like this all the way across the film, this is just one example; you just don’t understand what the director wants to say with his film. Does the director try to incorporate Edward Said’s theory of Orientalism for stereotyping (‘Middle East = Terrorist country’ or ‘Arab = terrorist’) within Western cultures in the film to give an example to the audience? There are lot of ways to talk about film theory in any films, but if the director does not make a strong point within the film, either by using filmic language or plot, it just becomes a lump of shit.

The film shows us a series of characters making critical mistakes. (Fuck-ups beyond common sense, which fucks me off. In a way the film did provoke me, but it’s fucking pointless. They do this, they do that, here’s the outcome, The End.) As the film progresses their mistakes just get worse and worse. The film highlights the shadows of human behaviour, however it does not get into detail. It becomes like a shopping list of the fuck-ups you can do in critical situations. A few parts in the film tried to put themselves into an Italian Neo-Realism form of plot, to try to highlight the realism in the film and to be open ended, but it just does not work. They needed to choose either Art film or Art House film, you can’t be both ways because they contrast each other. That is why they’ve been differentiated into different categories. Anyway, the plot is very dramatic, so there is no way that this film could be manipulated into Neo-Realism form. The film failed to incorporate the details in filmic language within the mise-en-scene. It talked about light and dark, but it is very grey. Cannot say it a good film or a bad film, just a disappointment.

Oh – the film also used the same piece of music used in The Insider called ‘Iguazu’ by Gustavo Santaolalla. Iñárritu somehow decided to use this music in a similar way to how it was used in The Insider. It is not creative at all and I don’t think it’s a homage to Michael Mann either; it’s just a rip-off. Also I don’t get the significance of the title… Babel: ‘Sound of many voices talking at one time, especially when more than one language is being spoken’, yeah many other films are like that too. It’s just ironic that this film needs more filmic language though. It’s lazy, couldn’t be fucked thinking of a good title. What happened to those days with long-ass, thoughtful and original titles? Now film titles are so simple and most of the time meaningless.

Fuck it, I’m going to sleep.

BHM

Thanks for that explosion of innards, Oscar. I can’t say understand all of it, but I get the gist, and while I have similarly low opinion of the film to what you do, it’s largely for different reasons. You see, Oscar is a film academic, so he views things differently to an amateur like me; still that doesn’t make him right.

First of all, there is meaning in the film. It’s a clear attempt to make viewers see the similarities between our many disparate cultures, despite the obvious differences on the surface (the most influential being language). He called it Babel after the Tower of Babel, collective humanity’s Biblical attempt to build a tower to the heavens which God swiftly smote and, to drive home the point, messed up our common language so that we spoke in all different tongues. Iñárritu wants to show us that our distrust of each other – especially those from different cultures – is keeping us from reaching common ground. The whole movie is summed up in the look on Brad Pitt’s face as he looks at his long-suffering guide and translator, just before he gets into the helicopter. It’s a look that shows a connection has developed between them, but knows he worked against making that happen, and… oh, a whole lot of other things besides. It’s only a couple of seconds, but it is perfectly acted, and if the whole movie had been that clearly focused it would’ve been the masterpiece it ought to have been.

Second, what’s all this shit about categories of film? This is why I am so distrustful of academic writing on film: the need to categorize everything devalues the entire art. What’s the point of arguing whether the film is an ‘art’ or an ‘art house’ film? What’s the fucking difference? Do me a favour, man – it’s a ‘film’, that’s all, and should be discussed on its own terms. Of course it’s reasonable and helpful to look back at films that cover similar filmic or thematic ground, but dumping on it by saying the filmed it in the wrong category seems incredibly foolish to me. Of course, this has nothing to do with the film itself, only with your reading of it. Maybe I’m wrong, who knows? As it is, I disagree strongly with you.

One place I agree is in your disbelief at the character motivations, or lack thereof. Seriously, this is the movie where endlessly ridiculous actions are taken and you just stare at the screen, mouth agape, wondering why the bloody hell did they do THAT? Gael Garcia Bernal’s character is the major anomaly, a walking plot device so obvious he may as well be in the theatre, tapping each patron on the shoulder and explaining to them what’s going to happen next. A shopping list of fuckups? Great line, and 100% the truth. I was also kind of pissed when ‘Iguazu’ came on the soundtrack, because all it did was remind of how good The Insider was, and how shitty Babel had become.

What Oscar failed to directly mention is how much of a mess the script is, especially in the managing of different storylines. It’s all balanced out, with each plot strand taking up about the same amount of time, but each one would’ve been much better as its own film. This is from Guillermo Arriaga, who had proven himself one of the most deft storytellers in the current scriptwriting ranks with previous works, but now must be questioned as to his versatility. Babel is more or less a crash between Amores Perros, 21 Grams and The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada, without the dramatic resonance of any of them. If you short-change your characters in a film like this, then you lose control of the movie, and it ends up a gelatinous mess.

I don’t mind saying the Japan-set stuff is actually pretty strong, and if it had been a 90-minute stand-alone film I probably would have liked it a lot. As 40 minutes in a 140 minute film, however, it is underdone, offering only glimpses of what it could have been. That’s the story of the whole movie, though. For every great facial expression from Pitt, there’s Bernal’s decision to step on the gas. For that amazing club sequence, there’s Barraza wailing around the desert having inexplicably left the kids by themselves. Yeah, what an incredible disappointment. Babel doesn’t allow itself to be hated because there are so many strong elements, but I can’t get behind a film that knows what it wants to say but doesn’t know how to say it. Most of the positive reviews out there were written, I suspect, by people who filled in the vast gaps for themselves. Me, I’m happy to think about that stuff, but I’m not going to give the film any credit for what I come up with.

2006: Good Movies (10-1)

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At this point I must mention what films I didn’t get to in 2006 that I would like to have. This is in accordance with Andy Horbal’s much-referenced best-of lists critique (embraced by Jim Emerson among others). My writing isn’t yet strong enough to get behind everything he says, so my list is more description than discussion; next year I’ll no doubt be more adventurous and confident.

So: A Scanner Darkly and Fast Food Nation were two new films by Richard Linklater, one of my favourite directors. His failures are more interesting than most directors’ successes, and when he gets it right, his work is like nothing else (see Before Sunset).

Likewise, I missed Michel Gondry’s two releases, The Science of Sleep and Dave Chappelle’s Block Party, which I chastise myself over because Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind was so good. How would he do without the safety net of Charlie Kaufman’s great screenwriting? I’ll have to find out later.

49 UP and Jonestown: The Life and Death of Peoples Temple were the documentaries I most regretted missing. As you can see from my list (and last year’s), I consider documentary cinema to be on equal footing with fiction, and as Hollywood’s outlook seems to change for the worse every year, the growing popularity of documentaries is a wonderful side effect.

Finally, I probably ought to have seen Casino Royale, Flags of our Fathers and The Squid and the Whale. And there’s probably a hundred other films that were good that I didn’t really know anything about. Instead, I saw a few twice (#2, #3, #5, #10). But with that out of the way…

10. Children of Men – Alfonso Cuarón
The Mexican director/cinematographer pair of Cuarón and Emmanuel Lubezki turned my world upside down with this, the most groundbreaking film of the year. I’ve never seen anything like it; I would liken it more to the computer game Half-Life 2 than anything seen before in cinema. And that’s a huge compliment – it is a very good game, but my point is that this film is arguably the most immersive ever made. A script that is excellent in places and incredibly weak in others is totally overshadowed by some of the most incredible long takes and set pieces we’ll see for a while, and they all contribute to a sense of being part of the action. It’s also set in a childless future where anarchy mostly reigns, and it features fine acting from Clive Owen and Michael Caine among others. The film that surprised me most this year, but don’t I wish it could have ended differently.

9. Munich – Steven Spielberg
Bursting through almost unprecedented media attention (no small thing given Spielberg’s often controversial and extremely well-examined career), this film showed itself to be nothing like the defamatory, politically driven piece of work that was written about by so many. Perhaps because of this, it seemed to be somewhat overlooked by many, where in fact it may be the best film of Spielberg’s illustrious and varied oeuvre. A long, expansive film, it was Spielberg at his best in all facets of the craft: visually superb, great use of music, perfectly paced, and a great example of narrowing a wide focus down to one simple thing – the effects of the events in question on one man. Many questions were asked of us, many challenges laid down, and one could not help but leave the cinema in deep thought.

8. Waves – Li Tao
Certainly the least seen film on this list, Waves deserves as wide an audience as possible. It is very much a New Zealand story, but its scope is truly global. Boundaries are breaking down, and in her chronicle of four Chinese high school students being educated in New Zealand, Tao gets inside their experiences so intimately that we feel as if we know them personally afterwards. They are all very different people, and we understand why they live their lives as they do. Never ‘messagey’, never forced, this film will strike a chord with all who see it, because it offers a way of seeing that acknowledges cultural differences and shows how we are all similar. A vital, thought-provoking work.

7. Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room – Alex Gibney
I saw this right at the end of the year on DVD, and I just thought, wow – documentary perfection. The subject matter is fascinating, the talking heads insightful and passionate, the music expertly chosen, and the archive footage perfectly edited into place. It all adds up to a masterful blow-by-blow account of just what made the Enron debacle one of the most incredible events in Wall Street history. It’s a parade of scum, low human beings who knew they were fucking over millions and just laughed about it, even as they kept the public outlook positive. It would make a fine double bill with #6 – two films that expose the hubris and sheer audacity of some of our most powerful members of society.

6. Good Night, and Good Luck. – George Clooney
No messing about from Clooney on this, his second feature, which heralds a very encouraging future behind the camera. Respect for the audience is paramount as this straightforward, free-flowing films moves quickly through the story it has to tell. And what a story, especially in these times of pandering and dishonest journalism – much of the dialogue is directly taken from what the real people said, but their words are clearly chosen to reflect our current climate. Shot in glorious black and white, and enlivened by great acting by all (especially David Strathairn’s amazing performance as Ed Murrow), this is a finely orchestrated, highly enjoyable film. If it had been a bit longer, I might have placed it higher.

5. Tristram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story – Michael Winterbottom
Not quite as flat-out enjoyable as the director’s earlier 24 Hour Party People, this was still one of the funniest movies of the year. More than that, though, it was one of the better films about films, a look at how absurd film sets really are. It is rambling and unfocused, like its predecessor, but the characters – from Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon hilariously playing themselves, to Naomie Harris’ passionate PA, to Mark Williams’ enthusiastic battle expert, to Elizabeth Berrington’s fragile costume lady, ad infinitum – are so well-drawn that you just slip straight into their world. Almost like real life! It helps if you love movies, but their ought to be something for everyone here.

4. Syriana – Stephen Gaghan
The one film of the year that had my brain in a total storm afterwards, I really, really need to see this again – it’s been almost a year. Each time I look back on it, my admiration grows. I had no idea how to write about it then, and I still struggle to have any coherent thought to express. It drops you right in the characters’ world without any preparation – the opening bombing set piece is masterfully executed, and sets the tone for the whole film – and throughout you feel one step behind, just as the characters invariably do. It’s like nobody connected with oil knows exactly what’s going on; many can see one small part of the picture, but never the whole thing. Either that or the people that can see it all are exploiting for all it’s worth. Like I said, I’d have to watch it again to make any sound judgment on it, but such daring, urgent filmmaking as this has to be encouraged.

3. De battre mon coeur s’est arrêté – Jacques Audiard
More excellence from one of France’s strongest filmmakers currently working, The Beat My Heart Skipped was probably my favourite film of the year (though obviously not quite the best). Like with his earlier (and slightly superior) Sur mes lèvres, Audiard places us in the utterly subjective film universe of Romain Duris’ Tom, a nervy, tension-filled ‘real estate developer’ looking to go straight by getting back into classical piano. Brilliantly, it is shown that practising the piano is a far more infuriating and spirit-crushing enterprise than beating up thugs for collection money. Alexandre Desplat’s score is great as usual, especially alongside the Paris dance-pop that is almost always in Tom’s ears. The epilogue will alienate many, but I thought it put the perfect full stop on an exhilirating and fascinating film.

2. Caché – Michael Haneke
Haneke’s latest assault on his own class is a clinical, endlessly debatable work that, like everything else he’s done, is deliberately designed to provoke. He doesn’t care if you walk out pissed off, upset or suicidal, as long as you have a reaction. And you will. What were they saying in that final shot? Should we feel sympathetic towards or disapproving of Auteuil’s character? The questions didn’t stop for me; in fact, I saw it twice to see if I could ‘get it’ on a second viewing (I didn’t). Afterwards, I felt manipulated like a patron at a magic show, but I’m damned if I wasn’t awed. This guy is in total control, and his brand of unsettling cinema is something I will return to again and again.

1. United 93 – Paul Greengrass
In the ultimate year of challenging, questioning cinema, United 93 outstripped everything else with its raw intensity. Instead of asking questions, it just laid the events bare and let you question things yourself. I was incredibly distressed by it, particularly a final shot of such horror and audacity that I am wary of seeing it again. There are no hidden agendas; this film is about nothing more than the events that occurred on September 11, 2001. No room for proselytizing or polemic here, just cold, hard facts. Many saw this as signifying a lack of meaning, a kind of needlessness; me, I thought it showed how Greengrass nailed our feelings by cutting through the hype and emphasizing how purely bloody frightening the whole thing was. Imagine being in that plane! Now you don’t have to. A staggering achievement.

2006: Good Movies (20-11)

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Because I live in New Zealand, and better yet, in the South Island, I get to see most films between 3 months to a year after their original US/UK release. As a result, several films on this list appeared on many US critics’ 2005 lists, and the films appearing on their 2006 lists will have to wait until next (this) year for me.

Not that I’m complaining. I saw more movies last year than probably any other year in my life, and I enjoyed a great many of them. For the first time, I kept records of what I saw, which ended up tallying around 150; between 30 and 40 of these were at the movies. For me, there’s no better way to spend my disposable income than to go to the cinema, and I am totally unrepentant about that.

On with the list, anyway. I saw enough to have a top 20 instead of a top 10 this time, so I’m splitting in half to make it more digestible. Also, I’m counting down rather than up, because I find that reading someone’s top choice first renders the rest of their list less interesting. Part 2 will appear sometime in the next couple of days.

20. Manderlay – Lars von Trier
More straightforward and less challenging than its predecessor, the excellent Dogville, von Trier’s latest brash critique of human nature is still a difficult film to wrap one’s head around. Like all his films, it is designed to bring about a reaction in the viewer, be it positive or negative; he wrings this from us not with subtlety, but with tremendous insight. Many would consider this a pack of lies and a waste of time, but I think he got it right again: we are weak in more situations than we are strong, and racism, especially views of one’s own race, does not die out.

19. The Aristocrats – Paul Provenza
Dozens of comedians tell their own variations of the world’s filthiest joke, and in doing so provide us with a few of the mechanics of what makes something funny, and/or offensive. I expected a good laugh, and it gave me that (once I’d settled into the baseness of it all), but there was also a strong awareness that most of these people were very intelligent as well as highly amusing. They knew exactly where to insert beats, when to take it further, when to cut it off. A fascinating and hilarious film.

18. L’Enfant – Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne
Silly young Bruno deserved none of our sympathy, but the Dardennes forced it from us without resorting to any kind of cheap cinema trick. He’s just a kid, after all – a kid who went out into the world too soon, who had a child too soon. This Palme d’Or winner at Cannes in 2005 is an intimate, unsentimental account of one very naughty boy’s actions and desperate attempts to make amends, and I was moved by its simple truths.

17. The Queen – Stephen Frears
Frears has directed a great variety of good films over the years, from to My Beautiful Laundrette to High Fidelity to Dirty Pretty Things. He did it again here, but Helen Mirren was the reason for going with her pitch-perfect performance. All the sternness and unshakeability was there, but in the film’s best scenes, so was a vulnerability we couldn’t imagine HRH QEII displaying in public. In particular, the scenes involving the stag stood out in a film that did the basics right – a good (but not great) script, adequately directed, with fine acting across the board.

16. Darwin’s Nightmare – Hubert Sauper
Helplessness was the key word here in one of the most depressing, spirit-crushing films ever to be made. It is important that people see films like this to have their eyes opened to the horrors still going on in parts of the world – things we can’t imagine in our First World cocoon – but when it ended, I felt impotent. What could I do to help someone like Eliza, the prostitute servicing foreign fish-plane pilots (who are often violent) for a dollar a trick? What could I do to give the fish-frame sellers a better go at life? Sauper wisely doesn’t offer up any solutions, because no doubt he’s just as clueless; still, he’s getting the word out there.

15. An Inconvenient Truth – Davis Guggenheim
For the first time in nearly 40 years as a movie reviewer, Ebert told his readers “you owe it to yourself to see this film”. And he’s right. Half of it may be a vanity project for Al Gore, but the other half is so vital and surprising that if you do not see it, or are not aware of the things it discusses, then you are taking the future for granted when you should not be. The effects of global warming are real, and we have to start doing something about it, now. Gore is a good speaker, and his high-budget presentation is worth every penny if half the people that see it change their views.

14. Out of the Blue – Robert Sarkies
I’m somewhat embarrassed to say that I only got to two New Zealand films this year, skipping River Queen, No. 2, and Sione’s Wedding among others. This was the second, a vast improvement on Sarkies’ earlier Scarfies, and a solid entry in the Paul Greengrass-led documentary fiction genre. Through a few brilliant shots, Sarkies shows how much of a wake-up call the Aramoana massacre was, subtly embracing the bigger picture while carefully portraying the events in chilling fashion. Non-professional Lois Lawn gave one of the performances of the year as 73 year-old Helen Dickson, one of the heroes of the real event; Karl Urban was bloody good too, showing there’s life after Doom.

13. The Proposition – John Hillcoat
The best Western in years, driven by Nick Cave’s poetic screenplay and music, and by Guy Pearce’s typically excellent less-is-more performance. The film meanders aimlessly at times, but that is offset by the impressiveness of some scenes, and by the overall look and feel Hillcoat and his team achieve. Its stripped-back nature worked in its favour, keeping things unmuddied by unnecessary plot elements, but always retaining a sense of something extra going on (as indeed is revealed in the final scenes). Also, it represented the beginning of my fascination with Danny Huston, who seemed to pop up in every other film I saw last year.

12. Miami Vice – Michael Mann
If your name is Michael Mann, you don’t need a good script. Collateral had an okay script which Mann enlivened with his new-found love for digital video and general badass-edry; Miami Vice was a shitty, even awful script which he managed to fashion into one of the most intriguing and thrilling films of the year. Again using Dion Beebe’s incredible DV, he crafted a lengthy atmospheric piece that barely hung together plot- and character-wise, but when the atmosphere is that thick, I don’t care what’s going on. It was a true triumph of style over substance, like Kill Bill, or as I will discuss in part 2, Children of Men. In particular, it had the most artful violence of the year.

11. Brokeback Mountain – Ang Lee
A fine tragic love story, free of pretension or sentimentality (apart from an occasionally grating score). Heath Ledger’s performance won all the plaudits, and excellent though he is, I say don’t overlook Jake Gyllenhaal. Both commit themselves to their roles completely, and their scenes together (of which there are less than I expected) are by far the strongest in the film. Rodrigo Prieto provides his usual high standard of cinematography, but it’s very much Lee’s film with its careful compositions and thoughtful, meditative pace. You think you ain’t never goin’ to see a movie about no queers? Watch this, and be surprised at how much you care.

Children of Men (2005) (R)

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IMDb / French / Cossar
Written by Alfonso Cuaron and Mark Fergus & Hawk Ostby and Timothy J. Sexton & David Arata
Based on the novel by P.D. James
Directed by Alfonso Cuaron

There’s kind of a rule when it comes to screenwriting: the more writers collaborate on a screenplay, the lower the quality of the finished product. Point of trivia: the use of an ampersand (&) in screenwriting credits indicates collaboration, while the use of the complete word ‘and’ indicates a separate re-write. I’m not even sure if what I’ve used above is correct here – I’m just going by what Yahoo! tells me – but if I’ve got it right, that’s a minimum of three separate writes and re-writes for this script. So, it must be rubbish, right?

Yes and no. Yes, the screenplay for Children of Men is loaded down with plot holes, contrivances, out-and-out stupidity and a large degree of overwrought (usually religious) symbolism. No, because if a poor screenplay can attract a good director, gold can still be spun. It was the case with Miami Vice – Mann’s script was crap even before Jamie Foxx forced him to change half of it – and it is the case here. Cuaron’s direction is better than good – it’s great, and most surprisingly, it offers something almost completely new in cinema.

It’s not unusual for directors to indulge in long takes: extended, carefully choreographed and skilfully created shots that make what is happening seem all the more real. But in scenes of high action? Almost unheard of, especially these days when you’ve got films like Batman Begins preventing you from seeing anything in the fight scenes because of their 0.1sec average shot length. Here, Cuaron has his most thrilling sequences play out in shots of up to four or five minutes in length, and the plight of his characters takes on such an immediacy that when the camera moves into an unprotected place, we fear for it as we fear for the characters. He cheated by patching shots together to make them look like one – this is obvious in at least two places – but it’s still remarkable, and never loses its novelty or impact.

So, as we check off more boxes on the hokum list – animals love hero, Mary-figure draped in old cloth, a boat to salvation called ‘Tomorrow’ – we are forced to put the clipboard away and marvel at what’s being shown up there on the screen. Likewise, as advantages materialise in front of our hero, we don’t really mind because it all feels so real. (Occasional comment poster Helen Back would disagree, but ignore her if she pipes up, even though she’s partly right.) Kudos must be extended at this point to the excellent work done by the cinematographer and production design team, because they create a vision of the future which is at once believable and nightmarish. Wisely, they add little to what already exists today, instead concentrating most of their efforts on what would be missing.

Praise also be to Clive Owen, who gives his most complex, wide-ranging film performance yet. I’ve never been quite sure what to think of him because he always seems kind of flat, like he’s just playing himself, but he uses everything he has here without making it look obvious. It would have been so easy to drift into caricature, being as his Theo is the classic put-upon hero, but with his stumbles and swearing he crafts a unique screen character. (I really love it when film actors can swear well repeatedly; I think it’s a great sign of quality.) The supports are good too, especially Michael Caine as a Steve Bell-type with a great taste in music.

Children of Men is a strange beast, then. Like so many films, the greatness of some aspects (direction, cinematography, design) fights tooth and nail against the crapness of others (screenplay, screenplay, screenplay). However, unlike most of these films, the greatness wins out over the crapness for a change! Seeing as Cuaron was heavily involved in the writing, he doesn’t deserve all-consuming praise, but as a director he’s produced some of the best work on offer this year. Forget all the bullshit flying around the story, and watch it for the darkness (and dark humour) that drips off the screen.

Out of the Blue (2006) (R)

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IMDb / Wong
Written by Robert Sarkies and Graeme Tetley
Directed by Robert Sarkies

I couldn’t find a still of the image I wanted to run with this review, so I’ll describe it. Helen Dickson, 73, sits quietly in her kitchen under a duvet as David Gray, 33, stands outside her window holding a rifle. She’s cradling an injured dog, and she grips her hand around its mouth to stifle its whimpers. David can be seen through a chink in the curtains, and for a second or two, he thinks he hears something and peers around into the house. His gaze is pointed directly down the camera at the audience. That moment is a metaphor (and I’m speaking for New Zealand residents here): we’re in that kitchen with Helen, hoping that this evil outside won’t notice us and come in to destroy us. It’s done all sorts of evil deeds elsewhere, but surely it’s not going to get us – is it?

I might be stretching things, but it’s a great moment – one of several in a quality film. Our national psyche might be a bit more wary now, but in 1990, we knew we were cut off from much of the world and the bad things that can happen. Then Gray lost his mind, and we wondered about that strange guy down the street in our town or suburb. I’m not old enough to remember exactly the strength of the impact this massacre had on our society, but Out of the Blue, despite a few loose treatments of the truth, suggests that it opened many of our eyes to nastiness.

The film is at its best when it follows Nick Harvey (Karl Urban) and his fellow frightened cops as they vainly attempt to neutralise the threat posed by Gray. The nervous behaviour of men on both sides rings completely true. Gray doesn’t really have a plan, he just wants to stay alive as long as possible; the policemen fear for their lives, and lack the grit (and training) to do him in. It’s appropriately shocking at times, too: the first killing is hand-over-the-mouth brutal, and a half-second shot where Gray appears in the distance behind someone is genuinely scary.

However, points are lost during the early scenes with Gray. He is filmed mostly in pointed close-up to emphasise how alone he is, which is okay up to a point, but starts to become forced; then we see how out of step he is with the rest of the world, as schoolkids on the bus laugh at him, and starts yelling in a bank (a scene so out-of-synch with reality I couldn’t help but smile). Matt Sunderland is impressive all the way through, though – it must have been an extremely difficult role to play, and I think he got it absolutely right.

Urban is good, too. He’s doing all right for himself over in the States, and that’s because he can play any part with strength and sensitivity. He has to carry large portions of this film almost single-handedly, and he manages that easily. The real diamond here, though, is Lois Lawn as Dickson. A non-professional, there isn’t a single second of her performance that doesn’t feel like documentary. The way she speaks on the phone, the fearful but pragmatic look in her eyes, her final glance at the bedsheets fluttering in the wind – it’s all perfect, and she ought to win awards.

Sarkies has taken a few cues from Paul Greengrass (United 93), but with a few cinematic additions, such as a complex sound design (sometimes overly so) and occasional shots of calm amidst the insanity. If there are missteps, they are over-balanced by even more impressive points in the film’s favour. And as the obligatory roll of names and ‘what happened next’ info came up before the final credits, I suddenly became choked up. They’re all real people, you know? Dickson really did crawl home twice; Chiquita Holden really did get shot and see her father die. Out of the Blue doesn’t function as entertainment; it’s a warning, a reminder of what could be just around the corner, and of what happens if we neglect the marginals of society.

(What most disappoints me is that the title of this film makes me think of that horrific Delta Goodrem song about Mark Philippoussis, which has been running through my head since I left the cinema. But I’m sure I’ll be all right.)

L’Enfant (2005) (R)

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English title: ‘The Child’
IMDb / Ebert
Written and Directed Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne

During the screening of L’Enfant that I attended, a group of ladies in the row behind me tutted and sighed their way through as young Bruno made one foolish decision after another. Normally I might be annoyed by such loud and obvious reactions, but I found myself shaking my head along with them, the same way you would at a kid randomly pressing buttons in museum exhibits, or running up and down escalators. Whenever Bruno (pictured above) sees an opportunity, he leaps on it without hardly a first thought. They are almost always decisions that will make his already poor life even worse, and between our noises of condemnation, we wonder how he got to be like this.

The film begins with Bruno’s girlfriend Sonia cradling their newborn son, Jimmy, as she looks for Bruno and a place to sleep. She eventually finds him wandering around a busy intersection asking drivers for spare change, and when shown his son for the first time, he acts selfishly and irresponsibly. He lives out of an abandoned shack and commits petty crime to make a living; his existence is completely unenviable. Well, not quite. He appears to have a loving relationship with Sonia. But he destroys that when he realises that Jimmy could be worth a bit, and calls up some people who will give him 5000 euros for his nine day-old son.

It quickly becomes clear that the child of the title is not little Jimmy but Bruno. His actions are entirely motivated either by his own advancement or protection. Gradually he gets into more and more strife – first with passers-by in the street, then with more powerful criminals, and finally with the police – he continues to repeatedly make the wrong decision. He endangers not only himself, but his partner and child, and kids he’s roped into his various pathetic criminal enterprises. Many times, we see him tentatively crossing a busy road, as if to suggest that he is adrift in an adult world he thrust upon himself too early.

At no point does he take responsibility, but neither does he dismiss his actions as inconsequential. He knows he should own up, but he can’t bring himself to do so, and the accompanying guilt spurs him to keep behaving foolishly. The catharsis of the final scene, for Bruno and for us, is immensely powerful given what’s gone before. He knows he fucked up again and again, and at last he is opening himself to the forgiveness of others. Had the film ended any other way – say, for example, he ran away from his troubles – it would be infinitely less powerful and truthful. He is laid bare, exposed as the simple, stupid young kid that we’ve recognised all along, and from there we hope he can begin to grow up.

L’Enfant reminded me a lot of Sweet Sixteen, in that it details with the gritty reality of kids getting involved in things they’re too immature to really understand. It’s difficult to say which of the two is the better film. Sweet Sixteen has more complex characters, so I’d probably give it the nod, but there is much to be admired about the directness and clarity of vision in L’Enfant. The Dardennes seek to present a very basic truth in an unusually straightforward (for these times) cinematic manner, and the result is an accurate, perceptive and quite moving tale. It isn’t pretty, but it’s certainly effective.

Little Miss Sunshine (2005) (W)

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IMDb / Cale
Written by Michael Arndt
Directed Jonathan Dayton & Valerie Faris

Little Miss Sunshine is proudly and unabashedly a feel-good film, daring you to remain cynical through its outrageous, transparently sentimental conclusion. Usually I would gag and spit as things turned sappy, but in this case I smiled and clapped along, content to be caught up in one family’s great reconciliation. The difference is that in most of these films, the characters never really behave like real people, and there comes a point where you realise you’ve been hoodwinked into watching stereotypes for an hour and a half. Here, the family dynamic resembles something like reality: the ‘fuck’ count is through the roof, Mom and Dad bicker and row then laugh about it, and they’re always having to rush to get places on time.

The title refers to a beauty pageant for 6 and 7 year-olds. The youngest of the Hoover clan, Olive (Abigail Breslin), has reached the finals. To me, this is a uniquely American concept: dress little girls up in cute costumes, slather them with makeup and fake tan, push them to cultivate a ‘talent’ that has virtually no use in later life, and most importantly, have them smile all the time. These parents create a somewhat lifelike robot then parade it in a horrible freakshow to see which one will be declared most frightening.

Olive isn’t all white teeth and peroxide hair, though; she’s an original, and not just because of her oversized spectacles and straggly hair. She’s a living, breathing entity, unlike all those other girls because she has cultivated original thought processes. She’s there because she enjoys it, not because her parents (Greg Kinnear and Toni Collette) have pushed her into it. Kinnear’s Richard is a pathetic creation, an aspiring self-help guru who will never know true positivity; Collette’s Sheryl is, well, it’s Toni Collette, so you know she’s somehow different from all the other characters she plays, despite being identical on paper. This actress needs to be rewarded with more great roles like what she was given in Japanese Story – she’s always compelling, always believable, always consistent.

Rounding out the family are Paul Dano, Steve Carell and Alan Arkin as the moody teenager, suicidal brother and crazy grandfather respectively. Again, in two words I can only describe them as though they are pure stereotypes, but each one is unique and well-acted. Especially Dano, whose sense of comedic timing is perfect. He’s taken a vow of silence, and when he eventually breaks it, it’s a great mixture of comedy and pathos. Carell is known as a talented comedian, and he’s funny here, but there’s a depth to his work that suggests a fine capacity for drama. Arkin’s completely carefree performance is good, too.

I spend so much time describing the actors’ work because it is so important in a film such as this. So many family comedies fail due to the lack of chemistry between the players; if even one character doesn’t work, a true family dynamic cannot be felt. I applaud these guys for getting it right. If there is a weak link here, it’s Kinnear, but only because he is just okay where everyone else is very good or excellent.

A point I would like to make is that by presenting such an awful, grotesque spectacle as the Little Miss Sunshine pageant we are shown, Dayton and Faris are contributing to the whole horrific concept. The girls that play these brief singing, dancing and smiling roles were probably cast by requesting cute little girls from talent agencies – some of whom, I’m sure, have been press-ganged into such an early career by their parents. I guess you have to undermine such things from within – there’s no other way they could have done it, really. Still, it’s the sort of thing I notice.

We’re all fucked up, and that’s okay. Not a particularly profound or new message, but while Little Miss Sunshine doesn’t break any new ground, it manages to be entertaining and absorbing for its duration. It has flaws and missteps – scenes that we would’ve been better off without, obvious plot devices – but I’m willing to forgive those of a film that practically has me up out of my seat cheering at a group of people performing cathartic dance steps. Many critics have called it ‘quirky‘, but I say it is those other ridiculous, unbelievable family comedies that are quirky; this one has a beating heart, an awareness of how we actually treat each other.

’25th Hour’ (2002) (C)

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IMDb / Ebert / Bisley
Written by David Benioff, based on his novel
Directed by Spike Lee

Again and again and again, directors insist that the American Dream doesn’t really exist. It is just that, a dream, unattainable for 99% of the population, yet still they strive, hoping for success they will never achieve. With 25th Hour, Spike Lee gives us his typically proselytizing insight into this idea – a mixture of racial intolerance, a drug dealer’s downfall, racial intolerance, the World Trade Center, and racial intolerance. There are flashes of excellence, moments of superb realism, but they are always quickly flushed away by Lee’s desire to preach, or his reliance on filming things in an unnecessarily over the top way.

Virtually all the characters in the film are, in some way or another, pathetic. Edward Norton’s Monty is a dealer, about to go inside for seven years, giddy with remorse for wasting such a large portion of his life. Philip Seymour Hoffman’s schoolteacher lusts after one of his students (played by Anna Paquin as a slutty motormouth – where will she end up?), and looks horribly out of place in a club with his baseball cap and nerdy glasses. Barry Pepper’s investment banker is a success in his professional life, and presumably also a success with women, but one gets the feeling that some kind of moral satisfaction is missing from his life, and he knows it. Of the three friends, he is closest to the so-called dream because he has worked to get to a certain place professionally and has made it, but he realises that his position is such that he will never be truly happy with his lot.

Then there’s Monty’s dad (played by Brian Cox), an Irish immigrant who owns a bar and misses his wife (and will soon miss his son). He is happy, and has done all he can to give himself a good quality of life, but the fact remains that his son chose a life of crime and is now going to be punished for it. So now we have a good, honest man who, through no fault of his own, has hardship thrust upon him. You can do most things right, and then have the rug pulled out from underneath you. At the film’s end, in a particularly frustrating sequence, he tries to persuade Monty to run from the law and start a new life – a pathetic, hopeful dream that has absolutely no chance of coming true.

The one who bucks the trend is the improbably named Naturelle, played by Rosario Dawson with strength and grace. Throughout the course of the film, she is bombarded with accusations, yet she remains composed and true to her character, clearly feeling strong emotions but refusing to let them override the situation. Still, she’s losing her partner. One feels that she will wait for him, despite her youth and his shady past. But if that does happen, will their new life be a happy one? Monty appears to have changed, but what will he be like after seven years in the can?

All this is fine, but what bugs me is Lee’s approach. The actors fight so hard to offer subtle, detailed characterisations, especially Hoffman and Norton, but his direction frequently takes the focus away from them onto his flashy camerawork, or his political agenda. Can’t we have a Spike Lee film without big bad racial stereotypes being painted onto panes of glass then SMASHED with the Hammer of Equality? I’m sick of it. Yes, it’s awful that a lot of people still think this way, but the way he presents these stereotypes does more to promote them than it does to tear them down. I’d much rather he just ignored them and filled his films with people of different, mingling ethnicities. There’s a taste of that with Naturelle being Puerto Rican, but you quickly forget that after his slick montages of blacks, Sikhs, Arabs, Mexicans, Koreans… etc.

The American Dream angle only became apparent to me during Cox’s final speech. Up until then, it had been an interesting, if somewhat misguided look at redemption, friendship and companionship. The film was suddenly twisted into something much grander in scope, and consequently it became a much deeper failure. I loved some moments – listen closely to the banter between friends, it’s just like real people – but the moments I really, really hated were double that. I’ll check out some earlier Lee someday, but for now, I’m sick of his greedy directorial style and heavy-handed treatment of potentially interesting themes.

Borat (2006) (R)

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Full title: ‘Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan’
IMDb
Written by Sacha Baron Cohen & Anthony Hines & Peter Baynham & Dan Mazer
Directed by Larry Charles

Every last frame of Borat is designed to incense, to enrage, to get you off your feet and yelling abuse at the screen. To offend. It is expressly designed to piss you, the paying audience member, off; a shallow exercise in depravity and baseness, a shameless effort to perpetuate stereotypes that haven’t been a problem for 25 years or more. It makes a mockery of anything and everything we hold sacred.

Borat underhandedly takes the guise of a comedy. We see the ‘hero’, this one-joke fake whose very existence makes fun of an entire nation, as he travels across the United States from setup to unfunny, defamatory setup. Much has been made of the anti-Semitism in the film – the Jews did 9/11, the Jews will take your money, the Jews will kill you, and so on – but the film contains even greater shocks. Racism and homophobia are celebrated, churches are ridiculed. A bear is cruelly mistreated, as is a pet chicken.

The most outrageous section of the film is an extended sequence of full male nudity. I have never, in all my years reviewing films, come across anything as outrageous and purposeless as this sequence. A tip: it isn’t enough to simply show something like this for it to be funny. It needs to work in the context of the film. Not that this scene could ever be funny – it’s as provocatively poor a bit of comedy as you’ll see.

Clearly, Sacha Baron Cohen is not a student of classic British comedy – his work here bears no resemblance to the intelligence of Monty Python, Steptoe & Son or Blackadder, instead stooping to the present American trends of lowest-brow humour such as that espoused by the idiots on shows such as Jackass. It’s symptomatic of this worldwide trend away from smart comedy. There is no satire here, no trace of irony. We are shown gag after unfunny gag, thrown at us in the hope that something sticks. It isn’t the volume of jokes that matters, Mr. Baron Cohen, but the quality of them. Go back from whence you came, and don’t try this sort of thing again…

…NOT!