Monday, March 24, 2008

The Black Dahlia (2006)

Another movie which garnered a "what?" It's like it was "convoluted plots that couldn't possibly add up to that conclusion" movie night on HBO. My two comments on this one: 1. the pieces of the plot do not earn that ending (nor do I think it possible in an actual way in terms of what the movie tells us); 2. it's like the main theme of the movie is "how many women can Josh Hartnett sleep with who will screw him over immediately and how many times will he return to sleep with them again and again because he's actually a complete moron when he's supposed to be a somewhat intelligent police officer who breaks the murder case." Again. Don't bother.

Smokin' Aces (2006)

What?

I can't even give you a plot summary. Lots of things happen involving the following actors: Ryan Reynolds, Ray Liotta, Wayne Newton, Jeremy Piven, Ben Affleck, Andy Garcia, Common, Alicia Keys, Taraji P. Henson, Jason Bateman, Matthew Fox . . . . and those are just the ones that have names I know off hand. And, they're all main characters, not that that phrase has much meaning here. Loosely, lots of these people are trying to execute a hit on Jeremy Piven, some are FBI, some are wackos, some are professional hit-persons. Regardless, it's a convoluted mess that does not, by any stretch of the imagination, add up to the bizarre twist at the end.

Really, don't bother watching this--it was a complete waste of my time even when I was desperately looking to waste my time.

Saturday, March 22, 2008

The Terror Dream: Fear and Fantasy in Post-9/11 America by Susan Faludi (2007)

I just realized I also failed to mention that I'd read a book. A whole book. Of non-fiction no less.

It's a fairly quick easy read for non-fiction of the critical gender theory sort. We're not talking Judith Butler by any stretch of the imagination. The book is broken into halves. The first is a very interesting look at post-9/11 media: it's exclusion of female voices, it's placement of women back in the home, it's villainization of feminism, it's applause for the return of the "manly" man, it's insistence that men be heroes and women victims, men virile family protectors and women silent homemakers. This gets incredibly interesting when Faludi exposes some out and out lies manufactured by the media. The whole Jessica Lynch story, for example. The second half is an exploration of the origins of this gender myth and why we employed it post-9/11. She traces it back to captivity narratives in early America. All of this is interesting but I think she loses sight of the goal of the book in the second half. While it is of incredible importance to explain the origins of such a myth, she barely mentions 9/11 in the second half--calling it to the forefront only in an introductory or closing paragraph of a chapter--so quite a bit of it seems tangential.

Regardless, worth a read if you have reason or are just a bit curious.

Lust, Caution (2007)

Hmmm. This one is different than I assumed from the previews. I thought it would be a sexy, intrigue based mystery set in the gorgeously costumed 1930s. It is gorgeously costumed at points. It is not a mystery, it contains little intrigue, and, while it boasts a NC-17 rating, it is not sexy.

A group of college students, unable to participate actively in the resistance movement against the Japanese invasion of China, they form a theater group that turns into a group with intentions to assassinate a Chinese man who has gone over to the Japanese and sniffs out resistance movements in order to squash them. The man character, Wong Chia Chi, and a male student pretend to be a wealthy couple in order to infiltrate the man's social life. They succeed to a point and she is left to become his mistress. To tell any more would give away some crucial plot turns.

But it is a good story with interesting moral problems embedded. I think one of Ang Lee's best even if it is a little hard to watch.

No Man's Land (2001)

Ugh. This one is from the list. It's been sitting on the tv stand since I moved to LA. I should have left it sitting there or returned it to Netflix without watching it. I'm guessing the book says to watch it because it's the only (or one of a few at most) movie to depict the Serbian-Bosnian conflict. This movie, however, does not do so in an interesting, engaging, enlightening, or inspiring fashion.

It's basically the story of three soldiers: a Serbian and Bosnian who have been trapped in a trench in the middle field of the whole war situation (the Bosnian seeking refuge after becoming lost and the Serbian trapped after being sent to kill the first); the third is a Bosnian who was presumed dead and placed upon a particularly nasty mine but, lo and behold, he's not dead and now he can't move or he will be. The UN gets "involved" and, well, major plot spoiler: Bosnian #1 kills the Serbian after some thrilling "you started the war no you started the war" dialogue, a UN guy kills the Bosnian for killing the Serbian, and the other Bosnian can't be moved because the mine can't be defused--so the UN pretends to save him but leaves him laying in the trench. Then the movie ends.

I am NOT a fan of movies that are all about political situations but refuse to sides, refuse to make a comment other than "yeah, this sucks and there's nothing to be done about it because they're just going to kill each other anyway so we might as well leave the whole situation laying on a mine so that it will eventually blow itself to bits killing itself and anyone within a large radius." Have some balls, pick a side.

Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day (2008)

Ooooh, I'm a little behind on my posting. Joel and I watched this one the other weekend. It's super cute and pretty and all you want in a funny, light, Depression-era comedy. The clothes are pretty, the settings are lovely, the actors (Amy Adams, Frances McDormand, Ciaran Hinds, Shirley Henderson, and Lee Pace, especially) all do a fantastic job, and the love stories are satisfying. Definitely worth watching, soon.

Monday, March 10, 2008

Bank Job (2008)

Strangely, this was actually a pretty good movie. It's a standard bank heist storyline with black power/racism, royal sex scandal, and old love affair subplots that actually all work together. Jason Statham does a good job as does everyone else (including Stephen Campbell Moore who never gets any press but pops up in all sorts of movies). A few things could have gone more smoothly and/or quickly and a few things felt a little extraneous but all in all its entertaining.



The whole time I was watching it, though, I was trying to figure out the old old movie that revolves around a bank heist in which the robbers take over a luggage store and drill through the basement to get into the vault of the bank (the same method of robbery used in Bank Job). While the latter is based on a real robbery, the earlier movie seems too similar to be unimportant as an influence . . . .

Ah ha! I just found it. The old movie is Larceny, Inc. from 1942.

Tuesday, March 4, 2008

Vantage Point (2008) (nat)

I'm convinced that this movie was slated to come out much earlier than it did, was pulled back because it had bad early reviews, and has been sent back out now in Oscar dump season. Joel thinks I'm wrong and that the whole thing was it's original marketing campaign. Anyway, we saw this one last night--chosen out of a slim line-up (this, Boleyn Girl, and Semi-Pro--oh the choices . . . we went with the only one playing late enough to accommodate dinner).

I don't advise seeing it.

First, it's very poorly acted. All (and I do mean ALL) of the actors either overacted (I'm looking at you Dennis Quaid and Forest Whitaker) or didn't bother at all (hello, Sigourney Weaver).

Second, the imposed narrative structure is trite, useless, and annoying. We get the beginning of the story from an omniscient view, then we get 3 p.o.v.'s, and then we go back to the omniscient (sort-of). So, I'm just going to go ahead and give away whatever I want because, really, don't see this.

The frame info is that the world leaders have gathered in Spain for an anti-terrorism summit. I think some sort of treaty is to be signed.

The first p.o.v. is Dennis Quaid's--the just back on the job after having saved the President from being shot 6 months ago Secret Service agent. He's jittery and has only gotten the job because Matthew Fox put in a good word. So we go through his story (oh my god! he saw something on the news footage but we're not told what! suspense. except not so much) and all of the excitement with two shots hitting the body double president, a bomb going off at a hotel and the podium blowing up and then the film shows the whole thing rewinding and we get a clock. Trite.

Then we get a Spanish police officer's p.o.v.--which involves interaction with potential bad guys and a chase scene--oh boy! Then it rewinds again. Hello clock--as if the rewinding didn't tell us we were going back in time. The narrative certainly isn't precise enough to warrant telling us what time it is.

Then we get Forest Whitaker's lost American on the verge of divorce (maybe, maybe already divorced, who knows) whose ooooh and aaaaahing at the architecture with his camera proves helpful to Quaid but we're not told how! Suspense. Except again, not at all. Then it rewinds. Clock.

Then we get the President's version which strangely portrays him as a helpless child being pushed around. Then it rewinds. Clock.

We've now seen the podium blow up 10 times. TEN TIMES!

Then they show the "terrorists" p.o.v.--yep, all 4 or so of them get the same narrative that then diffuses into the omnipresent version again. (Can we say condescending and patronizing?) In this last version, we get that the two in-charge terrorists have one guy's brother held hostage (we don't know who he is or how they got him) so that the guy will help kidnap the President. We also find out that Matthew Fox has gone all rogue Secret Service agent on us--we don't know why--we get the stupidly delivered, even more stupidly written lines: "Thank God this double life is almost over!" and "You can't stop them. No one can stop it. No one can stop this war." And then he dies. The who, what, and which war are not given.

Meanwhile, the Spanish cop has been shot by the guy looking for his hostage brother who has already been killed (we don't know why the guy thinks the Spanish cop was involved or why the Spanish cop was going to the same place as the guy), the two (supposed) terrorists have succeeded in getting the President (but we don't know why or what they plan to do with him) but have now crashed the ambulance they were driving in order to avoid hitting a child who is in the middle of the road yelling for her mother while both Dennis Quaid and Forest Whitaker rush toward her to save her--even terrorists who have kidnapped the President swerve to avoid children (maybe this one should be dedicated to the children, our future, the only real anti-terrorist weapon we have). One terrorist is dead, the child is reunited with her mother thanks to Forest who then talks on the phone to his own son. Dennis finds the President and kills the second terrorist, and they fly off in Air Force One.

The people involved also can't count. We're supposed to get 8 p.o.v.'s. We really only get 3: Dennis Quaid's, the Spanish cop, and Forest Whitaker. The beginning is omni, the 4 terrorists are all slumped in together with bits that are omni so that just has to count as omni or bad p.o.v. shifting.

If that sounds exciting, it's not. The movie was only 90 minutes long and spent at least half of that time showing us things we already knew and yet failed to tell us:
1. Who the terrorists are.
2. If they are even terrorists.
3. Who the terrorists work for.
4. What the larger goal of the terrorists is. (what are they going to do with the US President).
5. Why Matthew Fox has signed on with the terrorists.
6. Why the President is such a lame duck to his handlers.
7. Why the handler (I don't know who he really is) wants the President to blow up Morocco without any real provocation.
8. Whether the handler has ulterior motives (his facial expressions would indicate such but maybe it's just overacting).
9. Whether the terrorists have connections to Morocco.
10. Any sort of point, really.

Really. Don't see it. Go see a good movie again if you just have to go to the theater.

Saturday, March 1, 2008

Be Kind, Rewind (2008)

I want Mos Def to be my friend. Is that really too much to ask?

This movie isn't brilliant. It won't blow your mind or make you laugh uncontrollably. But it also won't make you want to poke your eyes out and then hide under the bed with the dust bunnies because you can no longer bear people because you're seeing ANOTHER misanthropic Oscar worthy movie--just hypothetically, there are no dust bunnies under the bed (monsters, more likely).

Anyway, it's actually a cute movie. The "sweded" films are funny and some are clever. Jack Black is, well, Jack Black (his "camouflage" idea is probably one of the best things about the movie). And Mos Def and Danny Glover are fun, too. I think, though, that the previews don't really do the film much justice because, while the "sweded" films are important to the plot, they're sort of a jumping off point for a much better story about the mass-market brothel film-making has become and a sweet small-town story.

There are problems. Some of the pacing is a little slow and then there's the ending. I know I'm the naysayer of all endings, but, really, I just want every movie to have one (at least). I'm not a fan of this en vogue no ending ending. Tie up your loose ends people!

So, in this Oscar dump season, it's worth a watch just to get to go to the theater again.

From Dusk Till Dawn (1996)

I'd forgotten that I watched this with Joel a month (?) or so ago. It's fine. It's not spectacular but it's fun kitschy.