Best War Doc

Restrepo (2010)
Directed by Sebastian Junger & Tim Hetherington

This is the kind of movie that should be shown on TV, on all of the major stations-- ABC, NBC, CBS, FOX. They showed Schindler's List unedited on TV at one point, why not this? This is perhaps the most powerful documentary on men at war that I have ever seen. It takes the veil of secrecy off of what transpires in Afghanistan and shoves it right into our faces. The camera never stops rolling as the viewer is taken through multiple firefights, while at the same time capturing the tedium and boredom of holding a position.
What was particularly powerful about this movie was not the war footage (which was shocking) but really, it was the way in which the two directors were able to capture the way in which men behave together. It showed them as they discuss life, communicate, and have an impromptu dance party. While that might strike someone as being relatively insignificant, it shows the audience what these soldiers are- they are kids. They are all 18-25 year olds. They should be at home with their friends trying to figure things out and yet they are bravely serving our country to fight a war that they may not agree with.
I cannot sing this movie's praises highly enough. While simple in concept, it packs a wallop. Go see it as soon as you can.

The Best Movie of the Year?

Winter's Bone (2010)
Directed by: Debra Granik
Written by: Debra Granik & Anne Rosellini
Starring: Jennifer Lawrence & John Hawkes

I hate to declare this already, but I may have seen the best movie of 2010. It is wonderfully acted, directed, and scripted. It is one of the first movies in a long time that has managed to be both thrilling and at the same take up the call of "social realism." Winter's Bone is truly one of the best American movies I have seen in a very long time. It is as close to the Italian Neo-Realist movement as any movie I have seen that has come from the United States.
Winter's Bone tells the story of Rhee Dolly, a 17 year old who is caring for her younger brother and sister. Her mother is catatonic and spends most of her days sitting on an Eazy-Boy in their house in rural Missouri. Rhee's father has been arrested for cooking crystal meth and in order to post bond, he put the house up as bond. If her father does not come to court, they will be evicted. So, Rhee sets out to find her father and save her house and family. What ensues can only be described as an odyssey through the bizarre and not often seen world of middle America.
I cannot sing this movie's praises enough. It is well shot, well-edited, and well-directed. And from what I can tell, it looks as if Jennifer Lawrence may be the first serious actress of her generation. Whether or not she continues on that path, remains to be seen. This is a movie that I hope is seen by as many people as possible.

An Update

I have not seen a movie I would recommend to anyone since Kapo. Hopefully a movie worth mentioning will be released sometime in the future in the movie theaters. Otherwise, I'll stick with my Netflix queue.

Nothing

There has been absolutely nothing worth writing about for a long time. The movies that are in the theater are crap. The movies I have been watching on video have been very little more than recycled crap. Sometimes the dearth of worthwhile movies is so discouraging that it hurts.

On the brighter side, I did re-watch "Dead Snow" a few days ago. It's blissfully stupid, self-aware, and violent as can be. At least it allowed me to turn my mind off for a while. That was something of note.

I hope that my having written this short entry with little more than dripping cynicism will not detract from the previous entry about one of the best movies I have seen in a very long time.

Horror

Kapo
Directed by Gillo Pontecorvo
Starring: Susan Strasberg

This is perhaps the most effective and affecting holocaust movie ever made. The argument about whether or not movies about the holocaust qualify as nothing more than objectifying and glamorizing one of the most horrifying episodes in human history is not one that I'd like to make in this piece, rather, I'd like to remark on how well made the movie is.
The movie tells the story of Edith, a French Jew who is taken to a concentration camp and forced to watch as the rest of her family is sent to die. She is a weak and very young girl, no more than thirteen or fourteen. She cannot manage the rigors of the camp, but through good fortune is able to change her identify. She goes from being a Jew, destined for the gas chamber, to a common criminal who has the possibility of becoming a Kapo. After she becomes one, she begins a relationship with one of the guards and becomes a terror to her fellow inmates. However, once Russian POW's arrive, the situation changes and we watch as Edith is given the possibility to redeem herself for her sins.
The character of Edith is beautifully played by Susan Strasberg. She manages to take us from innocence to a hardened member of the camp and back again. She shows tenderness and anger, it is truly a masterful performance.
The movie is wonderful, horrifying, and by far one of if not the best movie about the subject I have ever seen. It manages to disturb as much as Schindler's List does, without showing any blood on screen. It is a movie that should be seen by all and hopefully will become increasingly available in the future.

The Art World's Borat?

Exit Through the Gift Shop (2010)
Directed by: Banksy
Starring: Banksy, Shephard Fairey, Space Invader, & Thierry Guetta

I have absolutely no idea what to make of this movie. It is billed as some kind of mix of comedy and documentary, but a lot of made me think of Sacha Baron Cohen's movies like Borat and Bruno. Is this movie a fake? Is Mr. Brainwash a creation of Banksy so as to make some kind of a statement? I have absolutely no idea.
The movie tells the tale of Thierry Guetta, a French immigrant to LA who ostensibly stumbles into being the official videographer of the street artist movement. He ends up following around people like Space Invader, Banksy, and Shephard Fairey as he attempts to document their work. From here, the movie is the tale of what happens after Guetta gets his first taste of stardom. Guetta eventually becomes a pseudo artist, a man that does not create any of his own work and does insipid riffs on works by other artists.
I am torn on the veracity of this movie. While the story seems almost too bizarre not to be true, there were some very clear stabs at some notable artists and art patrons- and those make me believe the movie might be some kind of a hoax. The clearest stab of all is the discussion of Damien Hirst- where it is pointed out that he makes millions upon millions of dollars for his work and does not actually create any of it, he has a cadre of 100 people working on his ideas. A similar style is seen by Guetta (later calling himself Mr. Brainwash-- which would be such an apt name for satire it's almost astounding). The movie then pokes fun at Madonna and other such people who have since paid Mr. Brainwash for his derivative art. If this movie is not a hoax, then it's a movie designed specifically to destroy Mr. Brainwash's career. Either way- it's a well-made, interesting, and insightful look at the world of street art.
Did I like the movie? Yes. Do I think it's a hoax? I hope so.

How Odd

Kick-Ass (2010)
Director: Matthew Vaughn
Starring: Nicholas Cage, Aaron Johnson, Christopher Mintz-Plasse

I have to admire Matthew Vaughn in his desire and ability to do a number of different genres in an effective manner. This is rare in movies altogether, even rarer in modern Hollywood. In his career he has managed to do three movies that are starkly different in subject matter and tone: Layer Cake (2004), a gangster movie about British thugs, Stardust (2007) a fantasy film featuring Robert DeNiro in a dress, and now this comic-book gore-fest. Each have their own tone and style and this one is just as effectively put together as anything else he has ever made. The problem in writing this review of it is, I cannot exactly explain why the movie melds so well together.
At its core, Kick-Ass is nothing more than a comic book movie. It's about one person who decides to try to be a super hero and what he is able to do by simply standing up to evil. He encounters real super-hero types in the process and then graphic violence ensues. The movie is unabashedly gore-filled, crude, rude, and in your face. But somehow, the movie remains an almost child-like innocence. I have no idea how it does this. The movie is sort of sweet and has a sweet message, stand up against evil, get out of your skin, and be confident in yourself.
Oh yeah, it also has an eleven year old doing horrifically violent acts for a good hour of the movie. While this has offended some people, I don't really care what she does or says, because most of what she does in those instances is for shock-value.
Kick-Ass is a pretty good movie and an enjoyable movie-going experience overall. It's one of the few movies I've seen in the theater lately that has not made me want to gouge my eyes out from boredom. I wouldn't say it's something that is incredibly important to see in the theater, but it's definitely something worth watching.

Current Netflix Movies & Other Friday Thoughts

Here's what I have from Netflix right now:

Haxan: Withcraft Through the Ages (1922)
Pygmalion (1938)
Les Enfants Terribles (1950)

I did, however, see a movie in the theater last weekend (in fact, I saw TWO- but I'd rather not write a review of "The Losers"). A review of "Kick-Ass" will be coming shortly.

Lack of Interest

Nothing is out right now in the theater. In between an 11 year old causing controversy for hacking apart bad guys and a 3-D remake of Clash of the Titans, I'll be watching Netflix for a while longer. Or try "Treme" on HBO- it's fantastic.

I currently have : La Guerre est Finie, La Bataille du Rail, and Distant Journey from Netflix. Last week I watched "Angels in America" and "In Vanda's Room."

Angels in America
Directed by: Mike Nichols
Starring: Meryl Streep, Al Pacino, Emma Thompson, Patrick Wilson, Mary Louise Parker, Justin Kirk, and Jeffrey Wright

One of the most complex pieces of movie-making I have seen in a while, rife with symbolism and metaphor, it is as elegant a picture of the United States as I have ever seen. The movie is wonderfully written, although, clearly written for the stage by Tony Kushner. The writing is cerebral, witty, and just plain good. Combine the quality of writing with the actors that star in this piece and it becomes quite clear that all Nichols would have had to do is sit back and make sure everything is within the frame.

I really cannot come up with anything else to add to this. If you have six hours, watch this movie.

Italian Urban Malaise

Dillinger is Dead (1969)
Directed by: Marco Ferreri
Starring: Michel Piccoli, Anita Pallenberg, Annie Giradot

Marco Ferreri seemed quite fascinated with the notion of the gluttony that the people in the industrialized world exhibited on a day to day basis. And displaying it as brashly as possible seems to be his goal with his two most famous works: La Grande Bouffe (1973) and its precursor, Dillinger is Dead. Both are showing the lengths that people must go to in order to rid themselves of their existence, in Bouffe this is literal, while in Dillinger is metaphorical.
The movie tells the story of Glauco, a upper middle class chemist who returns home from work to find his wife sick in bed. He proceeds to cook himself a remarkably large gourmet meal, seduce his maid, and then shoot his wife. After doing all of these things he swims to a boat headed to Tahiti and finds employment as a chef.
While the story itself seems quite ludicrous even for something that is meant to work as metaphor, Ferreri somehow manages to make the story both compelling and at the same time quite difficult to watch. He employs techniques not used very often in movies today. His camera sits for what seems like hours, watching as Piccoli cooks his meal. The characters say very little and his character does not develop to any great effect. Ferreri seems to want to show the lengths that his character must go to in order to free himself from his existence. He is trapped and these great expressions of gluttony are the only way for him to proceed onward into his next existence.
While he is successful, the movie also plays to such a pretentious level that at times it is unwatchable. There are people that will sit and expound upon the details of this movie, but the movie lacks one thing : a soul. Movies, stories in general- they are about people. Even movies that intended to break the mold- something like Breathless (1959) still was a story about people. The characters change and grow, this is important to the viewer, we need someone to identify with- or at least something. However, the movie is so void of a center that it does not allow for the viewer to identify with Glauco, or anyone else in the movie for that matter. It is an interesting exercise in the medium. However, it fails with its primary goal- gaining interest from the audience.

The Dead Zone

The period between late January and May is really dead when it comes to movies. While all of the art-house contenders are being premiered in Cannes, we slog through a series of poorly constructed romantic comedies that were not palatable enough to release during the fall. So, as there has been zero that has come out in the theater that has interested me, expect a number of blog postings about movies that are readily available on DVD.

A Brief Spark

Major Dundee (1965)
Directed by: Sam Peckinpah
Starring: Charlton Heston, Richard Harris, James Coburn

There is only one instance in his entire body of work that I can think of a true hero that Peckinpah presented as the protagonist of his movie. In his movie, Straw Dogs (1974), Peckinpah establishes Dustin Hoffman’s character as a mild-mannered mathematics professor who has fled the United States. He may have spoken out against the Vietnam War, he may have said something improper within the confines of his university, we will never know. But what we do know is that he is focused on his work, a complicated man with a relatively short temper, but not a character who is dead-set on doing any kind of wrong. He is only forced to do violence when he is pushed to a breaking point. This is not the case in his other films, movies like The Wild Bunch (1969), The Ballad of Cable Hogue (1970), and The Getaway (1972) all feature protagonists who are not necessarily likeable, and in some cases are downright despicable. Peckinpah seems to play the older cinematic norms, pushing stories into other places where nothing is black and white and those that would normally be abhorred can also be loved. As opposed to a filmmaker like Sergio Leone, who did nothing but elevate the various motifs of the American western in his movies like Once Upon a Time in the West and The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, Peckinaph seeks to destroy all old motifs. This is the case with his first major film, Major Dundee.
There are no nice characters in this movie. Major Dundee (Heston) is not someone that you can identify with. Richard Harris’ character is not likeable either. In fact, the only person that seems to provide some kind of (incredibly important) moral compass is the sometime narrator, the Bugler. This character that provides commentary also provides relief and a sense of what little good is occurring in the movie.
As Major Dundee goes on his search for the Apache chief who massacred scores of Union Soldiers, he descends further and further into hell. The movie begins to recall Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian as the characters become increasingly driven by the desire to kill the Apache chief.
From here, however, the movie begins to meander. The focus of the movie is lost once the characters arrive in Mexico and begin to cause trouble with French soldiers. Heston and Harris spend half of the movie battling each other and the other half getting along as good as old friends. Heston has a half-baked romance with one woman and then runs around with more Mexican women. There is a great deal of tension between the Union and Confederate soldiers who are both serving in this search party. The movie becomes a half-baked deconstructive western that never really finds its bearing. Whether this was from studio interference or just being overzealous on Peckinpah’s part, I am unsure.
Major Dundee is a movie of great potential and some bright moments that in the end falls flat. It is a large, sprawling, ambitious western that does not quite accomplish what it sets out to do. While it is by no means a masterpiece, it is a clear hint as to what Peckinpah would become and the awe-inspiring work he would do four years later in The Wild Bunch.

TV (Finally) Killed Movies

The great battle between TV and movies has finally been won and not by the side that was expected. While during the 1950’s people feared that the advent of television and its increasing popularity would give way to the death of the movie theater, it took nearly sixty more years for it to finally begin to put the nails in the movies’ coffin.
Around 1950, television became a popular form of media in the United States. People were clambering around the television to watch programs each night, all the while movie studios became worried that their viewership would drop because of this new form of presentation. What followed were a number of gimmicks in hopes of attracting people away from their TV sets- things like wide screen movies, which first started popping up around 1953 with The Robe. What followed were other gimmicks like 3-D, Smell-O-Vision, etc. However, none of these gimmicks were really able to substitute for good storytelling.
Movies were lucky enough to have a relatively good period between 1965-1981, when there were interesting, smart, and challenging movies being made on all fronts, whether they were small art-house pieces about relationships or big Hollywood blockbusters like Star Wars and Jaws. These movies were actually spurred on by the failure of those epic movies, those extremely expensive blockbusters of the late 1950’s and early 1960’s.
However, since then, the movies have lost their souls. Rather than worrying about the quality of the product, the story being told, or the message within the movie, the movies have become so expensive that there is no room for exploration or taking chances. The reason for this failure of creating intellectually vigorous movies rests in two camps, as I see it. First, starting in the early 1980’s studio heads began to see that they could control the product that was being produced. Stronger studio heads began to dictate the product and took away the creative freedom many directors had enjoyed during the 1970’s, part of this had to do with the box-office success of the movies of the late 1970’s, movies like Star Wars and Jaws had made so much money for the studios that the heads decided their best bet would be to find more big movies like this that could make a huge amount of money into.
During the late 1980s’ and early 1990’s as movies like this became increasingly prominent, movies like Die Hard and Predator and other such action movies became increasingly lucrative for the studios. However, the star power of the actors in these movies also increased their power, as actors began to receive eight, ten, and eventually twenty million dollars for each movie they did. This only served to create increasingly bloated budgets as movies began to regularly cost one hundred million dollars. These movies cost so much money that there is no room for error, no room for any semblance of chance.
So how has TV killed movies? First, one should look at the growth of popularity of DVDs and other such media sources. DVD’s, ITunes, downloadable content, have all increased the access to various sorts of media that people have. You couple that with the large number of television channels, providing increasing number of options and the high saturation of cable in the United States, it leads to increased revenue opportunities. Combine the multiple ways in which people can make money from this content with the either pay-television or commercials found on television programs, it creates both an increasing stream of revenue for television shows and increases the potential budget and production values of these television shows.
A television show can run anywhere from 20 minutes an episode to 60 minutes, while a season can run anywhere from 10 to 22 episodes a season. On the low-end, this gives the writers, directors, and actors nearly two hundred minutes in which to create and explore stories and characters. For a pay television, hour-long, thirteen episode series they will have thirteen hours, or 780 minutes. Most movies run anywhere from 80-120 minutes, on the high end they will be somewhere in the neighborhood of 180 minutes. This space that TV shows are afforded both allows for increased character development but also is divided up in such away that it makes it easier for our ADD generation to swallow. An episode of even an hour is much easier for someone to watch than two or three hours of a movie.
By its having a broader framework within which to work, and because of its increasing profitability, television shows have begun to attract grade A talent and have grown by leaps and bounds when it comes to production value. Martin Scorsese has his first television show coming out this fall, Steven Spielberg has produced two mini-series, actors like Alec Baldwin, Glenn Close, and many others have found themselves on TV series. What was formerly the refuge of lesser actors has become the place in which much of visual media’s talent has fled. The canvas upon which to paint stories that in some cases have become novel-esque is almost astounding when one looks at a series or even a series of television as a whole.
As I stated previously, the quality of television has far exceeded the quality of 99.9% of the movies that are produced each year. One need only to look at The Wire, Mad Men, The Sopranos, Curb Your Enthusiasm, 30 Rock, Southpark, or mini-series like John Adams, Band of Brothers, or The Company to see how far the quality of television has come to exceed that which is on the silver screen.
Movies have become victims of their own success. The large amount of money that they are able to make also is their great weakness, making their need for assured success turn them into bland, banal, and uninteresting special-effects fests. Television, on the other hand, has become the place in which one can watch characters grow and change, we can come to know these characters better than we know ourselves, and watch as stories expand upon themselves and become something even better.
Television has finally succeeded in killing movies. It has done exactly what movie studios feared would happen in the 1950’s, yet, they were not alone in doing it. Movies had equal part in choking themselves, by using the very techniques they hoped would separate them from television. As I sit back and watch as movies become increasingly insipid, I can only hope that this slow death will lead to a rebirth similar to that of the late 1960’s- but I would not hold my breath waiting for it.

Not Another Bourne Flick

The Green Zone (2010)
Directed by: Paul Greengrass
Starring: Matt Damon, Brendan Gleeson,Greg Kinnear

The Green Zone looks and feels like the last two Bourne Identity movies. And why shouldn’t it? Matt Damon, the star of the series, is in the lead. Paul Greengrass, the master of cinema-verite violence is the man behind the camera. However, it is anything but The Bourne films. As opposed to the snappy, tight, well-written screenplay by Tony Gilroy, this movie seems to be nothing but one giant, mindless chase scene, with vague references to revisionist thought on the American invasion of Iraq. Brian Hegeland’s screenplay falls flat on all fronts; lacking any semblance of character development, plot development, or really any kind of thing in terms of a truly cohesive story. Many different auteurs have used genre pieces to make comments on various socio-political issues. However, in the case of The Green Zone, Greengrass’ effort is mediocre at best.
Judging by the topic and the style of this movie, it seems as if it should be a slam-dunk for Greengrass. The man who shot to prominence with Bloody Sunday, a pseudo-documentary about the infamous Irish massacre, and then shot into the stratosphere with The Bourne Supremacy, has shown the perfect amount of dexterity and showmanship in the past. He was able to take a potentially divisive story like United 93 and turn it into one of the most compelling movies of 2006.
The Green Zone cannot be saved by the intricately orchestrated action sequences or the interminable chase sequence at the end of the film. While the thirteen year old boy and me wanted to jump and cheer each time something blew up, I could not find myself really caring much about what was going on. Near the climax I found myself wondering, “why do I care that he’s being shot? “ or “why do I care about any of this at all?” Unfortunately, The Green Zone does not supply the viewer with any sort of revelations about the Iraq war, nor does it supply any kind of commentary on the conflict. In the end, it is nothing more than a trumped up action film that happens to be set in Iraq.

Art House Brazil

A Deriva (Adrift) (2009)
Directed by: Heitor Dhalia
Starring: Vincent Cassel, Camilla Belle, Debora Bloch


A Deriva is the latest in a slew of high-minded movies coming out of Brazil. What was once a nation that seemed to be identified with nothing but Chiquita Bananas and the samba, has produced one challenging and intelligent movie after another. Starting with Central Station (1998), followed by Behind the Sun (2001), and finally the infamous City of God, Brazil has become the powerhouse in Latin American cinema. These movies almost entirely focus on the poor and forgotten parts of Brazil, as if these directors were hoping to erase the image of shimmering beaches and women in bikinis and paint over it a mural of poverty, crime, and dilapidation. A Deriva strives to take a different angle from these movies; it attempts to show the trappings of upper class life during the end of the period of military dictatorship in Brazil. While it succeeds on some levels, the movie falls flat in others.
At its core, A Deriva is a tale of a family torn apart by marital infidelity by the patriarch of the family (Vincent Cassel). This infidelity is witnessed by the protagonist, the fifteen-year-old Fillipa, who is coming of age while the family spends a summer in the posh beach resort town of Buzios. What follows are a string of wonderful performances, an interesting and very adult look at what marital infidelity and marriage can mean, and one painfully flat performance by the object of the father’s affection.
The movie is held together by Vincent Cassel. There is no other way to phrase it. He is the beating heart of this movie and gives one of his best performances since La Haine (1995), a performance that is all the more spectacular realizing that he is speaking in his non-native Portuguese. The supporting cast gives admiral performances as well, Laura Neiva as Fillipa, Debora Bloch as Clarice the mother, and the other actors give good performances. However, when it comes to Angela, the young woman with whom the father is having an affair, the story falls flat. Camilla Belle spends most of the film walking around looking like the Carmen Miranda character from Looney Tunes cartoons. Rather than being a seductive figure, something that could attract as much scorn as she does during the course of the movie, she comes off as lost and silly. If not for the performances by Cassel and Bloch, the movie would fall apart the minute that Anglea is first seen by Fillipa. Thankfully, it does not.
Buzios is a beautiful beach town. It is a town infamous amongst the elite of Brazil for a reason and when Ricardo Della Rosa is a given a chance, he photographs the scenes beautifully. Unfortunately, the sections of the movie where he is not allowed to do so bring to mind a quote from Billy Wilder:“ Shoot a few scenes out of focus. I want to win the foreign film award.” Mr. Dhalia has written a very mature, very adult, very interesting screenplay about coming of age and witnessing a broken marriage. Better yet, he has the ability to look further into how two adults deal with and try to manage a marriage. Unfortunately, he tries too hard to let us know that he is doing that, throwing the camera around in random flashes of hand-held, out of focus blues and greens.
A Deriva is a terrific change from what has been the general fare to reach our shores from Brazil. It is well thought-out, well directed, and by and large well-acted. If only the director could have been comfortable enough with the film he produced to avoid the trappings of a less-confident director and left the camera where it belongs, on the story at hand.

Hooray. Another Noah Baumbach Film

Spring has come and Noah Baumbach has decided it is time to grace us with a new movie to correspond with the thawing of winter. Greenberg, is another in a slew of suspended animation- adult/child movies that have made Judd Apatow into an “auteur.” The difference between Mr. Apatow and Mr. Baumbach is that Apatow makes the movies with heart and genuine enthusiasm that seem to jump out of the screen. Meanwhile, Mr. Baumbach has been at work in what I am sure is a Greenwich Village apartment, slaving away at what he has deemed as an intellectually important film.
Mr. Baumbach has made five movies in his career, the progeny of two critics; he has poked, prodded, and strived to make “intellectual” independent movies. Instead, he has made movies that amount to nothing more than fluff, full of dialogue and stories that would be found in any college screenwriting course, featuring the always sophomoric topics of family dysfunction, suicide, and sexual dysfunction.
While he made a few movies under the radar during the early 1990’s, he came to prominence with The Squid and the Whale (2005), a loosely autobiographical film about a divorce. He followed this with another tale of family dysfunction with Margot at the Wedding (2007). These two movies were largely met with great reviews, a fact that mystifies me to this day. Both movies press the audience’s buttons and take the viewer to uncomfortable places, especially as they deal with the relationships of the characters. However, they offer no solution, ask no real questions, they just display each character as they go through relatively banal situations in upper-crust bohemia.
Baumbach strives to replicate the strained marriages of Bergman movies, while lacking the depth of soul to replicate the great director’s work. Making references to esoteric movies like The Mother and the Whore, or making snide jokes about masturbation does not constitute intellectualism nor does it constitute an intriguing or challenging movie. Doing the movie in the style of cinema-verite, only further turns the movies into some kind of hodge-podge of Cassavetes’ stories, while lacking the immediacy that his movies presented. Yet, people are charmed by these movies, critics regularly laud them, seduced by his snarky remarks and unlikeable characters.
All we can hope for now is that Baumbach will give us another work in collaboration with one of his regulars, Wes Anderson. Anderson, another critical darling, used to be an interesting filmmaker. He made movies like Bottle Rocket (1996), Rushmore (1998), and The Royal Tenenbaums (2001), all of which Anderson co-wrote with Owen Wilson. All of these movies managed to have a moral center, wonderfully comic moments, and good performances, while also asking interesting questions and presenting interesting answers to them. His matter of fact, almost un-emotional and detached style of having dialogue delivered by the actors worked. It was interesting, new, and still managed to bring the audience into the sphere of the movie.
Strangely, or not so strangely, when Anderson stopped writing with Wilson, and joined forces with Baumbach for The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004) the movies took a turn for the worse. All of a sudden the movies lost their style, their zip, and their panache. The characters that the audience formerly were able to identify with, empathize with, and enjoy for the duration of the movie were gone. Instead, a smarmy new form inhabited the screen, one without interest, without likable characters, without any sort of intellectual merit; they became flat boring stories about “exotic” places that lacked any kind of soul. This trend, while most heinously committed by The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, continued with their next collaboration, The Darjeeling Limited- another flat piece about brothers trying to find themselves in exotic India. This had a companion piece that was accessible from the Internet, a short film featuring Natalie Portman, that was almost unwatchable, entitled Hotel Chevalier. The short movie is about boring people living in the lap of luxury in Paris, who sit in bed discussing their relationship for fifteen minutes without any emotion. The conclusion is just as enthralling as the opening. For those that missed it, kudos to you.
The latest, a stop-motion adaptation of The Fantastic Mr. Fox, is just as bad as the others. The only thing that saves the movie is the stop-motion animation done by the same team that created Wallace and Gromit’s movies. If it were not for the animation of the movie, it would have been just as vapid and flat as any other creation by Anderson & Baumbach.
Noah Baumbach has decided to grace us with his presence and present another morally bereft, vapid, and insidious piece of filmmaking that should be relegated to college short film classes. The hole that John Cassavettes and Ingmar Bergman left for intellectually strident movies about troubled relationships has yet to be filled, no matter how entitled Mr. Baumbach seems to feel to attain that role.

The Ghost Writer

The Ghost Writer (2010)
Director: Roman Polanski
Starring: Ewan McGregor, Pierce Brosnan, Kim Cattrall

The Ghost Writer is without a doubt the best movie so far in 2010 and perhaps the best movie that Roman Polanski has done since Tess (1979). It is an adult, thinking-man’s thriller. It requires patience, it requires thought, and (God-forbid), it challenges the audience while watching a movie. It tells the tale of, well, a ghostwriter who has been hired to write the memoirs of a Prime Minister who was forced to leave office. As the ghostwriter becomes increasingly involved in the inner-workings of the Prime Minister’s life, everything is not as it seems, and could have dire consequences.
First- the movie is beautifully photographed. Absolutely gorgeous. It is almost so pretty that it distracts from the movie itself. Polanski has substituted the Northern Coast of Germany for Cape Cod, and cinematographer Pawel Edelman captures it in beautiful cobalt blues and grays.
Secondly- the performances are by and large fantastic. The usually stiff Pierce Brosnan is smarmy and stately as ex-Prime Minster Adam Lang, Ewan McGregor borders on being a Woody Allen-nebbish as the Ghost Writer, and Olivia Williams shows them all up as Ruth Lang, Brosnan’s wife. James Belushi and Timothy Hutton give delightful performances in what are no more than brief cameos, and Tom Wilkinson is sinister in a role that reminds me of some of Hitchcock’s best mystery men. The one low point is Kim Cattrall’s cardboard performance as Lang’s secretary/ mistress. She seems to not know where she is supposed to be or what accent she is supposed to be doing as she waffles between an American and British accent for most of the film.
The movie is, for the first time in a long time, something that is reminiscent of Hitchcock in its story, its intrigue, and its ability to build tension. It is the first time in a long time that I can remember actually tensing in my seat as the movie built speed toward its climax. I would rather not give away the ending, but it features one of the best reveals in recent cinema.
I highly recommend viewing The Ghost Writer, perhaps the best movie that is in the theaters during this dead zone between the Oscar season and the coming summer-blockbuster explosion-fest.

Top 10 Movies of 2009

In one of the worst years for movies in memory, I have somehow managed to pull together an all too-important top ten list.

Best of 2009

1. Linha de Passe

2. Un Prophete

3. Sin Nombre

4. The White Ribbon

5. Where the Wild Things Are

6. A Serious Man

7. The Baader Meinhof Complex

8. In the Loop

9. Sugar

10. Crude

Honorable Mention: The Cove, The Hangover, Broken Embraces, Up in the Air