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This film had a screening at last year's Chicago International Film Festival and I showed up at the theater a couple hours early thinking I'd have no problems scoring a ticket. Wrong. It was already sold out. I could have seen another film, I suppose, but after the horror of "L.A. France" (whoops! that's La France!) I did not want to risk seeing something I had not already cleared ahead of time with myself. And besides, I really wanted to see "In Search of a Midnight Kiss".
Now I'm really upset I didn't see it upon reading Andrew O'Heir's take on it for salon.com. Luckily, it hits Chicago theaters on August 22. Rest assured, I'll be there.
Thursday, July 31, 2008
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Inglorious Glory
In my review of Quentin Tarantino's "Death Proof" I made mention of the possibility that his next project would be his long-rumored WWII film "Inglorious Bastards". It's the one I've been hoping he would take a crack at and, apparently, according to Paige Newman's article on msnbc.com this is coming to fruition, and with a great deal of positive buzz surrounding the screenplay to accompany it.
The article also makes mention of "restoring" the Q.T. buzz. I'm not precisely sure when or where it was lost. Yes, "Death Proof" was a bit weak but, seriously, his 5 films prior to that were all fantastic and his last two - the "Kill Bill" films - were, I would argue strenuously, his finest. I don't think his buzz needs to be "restored" at all. I'm uber-excited for "Inglorious Bastards" and have total faith in the man, even if he cast, say, Jessica Simpson as Eva Braun and enlisted Brett Ratner as First Assistant Director.
The article also makes mention of "restoring" the Q.T. buzz. I'm not precisely sure when or where it was lost. Yes, "Death Proof" was a bit weak but, seriously, his 5 films prior to that were all fantastic and his last two - the "Kill Bill" films - were, I would argue strenuously, his finest. I don't think his buzz needs to be "restored" at all. I'm uber-excited for "Inglorious Bastards" and have total faith in the man, even if he cast, say, Jessica Simpson as Eva Braun and enlisted Brett Ratner as First Assistant Director.
Monday, July 28, 2008
A Digression: Out Lollapaloozaed
This weekend Grant Park in downtown Chicago will host its 4th Lollapalooza Music Festival since it went defunct and returned as a one weekend event in the Windy City back in 2005. But, as far as I'm concerned, the real Lollapalooza took place this past weekend at decidedly smaller Wicker Park for its 2008 summerfest. Yes, I've been-to-Lollapalooza been-to-Lollapalooza (two of them, in fact) and so I know of what I speak. It's not simply that at Wicker Park's festival my ticket cost $5 as opposed to $614 (only a slight exaggeration) and I was able to imbibe Berghoff Summer Solstice as opposed to rank Bud Light and have a blue cheese burger at a neighborhood dining establishment post-show rather than a $14, completely charred, flavorless hot dog but that I saw back-to-back shows that, I assure you, were far and away better than any two back-to-back shows you're going to get next week at Perry Farrell's gala.
My friend Dave and I turned out specifically for Syracuse band Ra Ra Riot, who I'd seen already earlier this year, but I'll come back to them. Prior to that show, however, a band with whom I was unfamiliar called Bishop Allen (a search today on the web tells me they are from Brooklyn by way of Boston) took the stage. Perhaps it was inevitable that I would love this quintet from the moment they sound-checked a glockenspiel. Why? If you don't know the man truly responsible for bringing the glockenspiel into the rock and roll arena let's just say he hails from New Jersey. Their first tune was more than a little Springsteen-esque, what with the vast, epic, cinematic lyrics and the la-la's in the chorus.
A lot of times when you see an unknown band you find yourself loving them at the start and then your fondness waning as each following song seems intent on repeating the formula of the initial one. Bishop Allen was the exact opposite. Their songs changed, but not wildly so. The one about the "click click click of the camera" would have hit #1 on the charts and stayed there for weeks if it had been released back when the Top 40 wasn't all crap. And as they closed their set with a song called, I think, "Dance With Me", I swear to God a cold breath of fresh air blew through right in front of the stage. It was a perfect, real-life moment of Hollywood symbolism.
But the best was yet to come. I first saw Ra Ra Riot at Schuba's in February and it was the best show I've seen so far this year. Comprised of a drummer, a bassist, guitarist, a violinist, a cellist, and the lead singer these guys are phenomenal. In reading about them afterwards I saw they don't like being compared to a certain band (up north of the border) I really want to compare them to and so I won't make the comparison. Anyway, they're a bit more punk than that band but they still have a desire for a unified orchestral sound rather than solos. They are a bit bombastic and quite earnest but in my world that's a significant compliment.
Their six minute anthem "Dying is Fine" (found on their EP and on their first full-length album set for release next month) is maybe the song most seminal of their style. It's a driving, luminous assault divided into three acts. The last act puts Rebecca Zellar's violin on full display and, to this point, it is the single most beautiful thing (music or otherwise) I've encountered this year. Seriously, listen to it and just focus on the violin, even when the entire band dives back in to rock out at the end. Concentrate on nothing else and you will be stirred to your core.
But what I really enjoyed the most about those two sets was the genuine affection each band seemed to have for one another. There was true joy in these performances, and that sometimes seems too rare an event. Bishop Allen's bassist grinning the whole time, the keyboardist/glockenspielist smiling after the frontman's amp blew out and he was forced to play another band member's guitar even as the guitar strap broke mid-song. A Ra Ra Riot show meanwhile is filled with band members exchanging constant smiles as they play, and singing along even if they don't have a microphone, and approximately 300 near collisions. Seriously, they all bound happily about the stage, swaying, grooving, the bassist gliding backwards with his eyes closed and about to run right into violinist who suddenly dips forward at the last second and the collision is averted. The guitarist lowers his head and sashays forward about to run right into the lead singer who abruptly leans to the right and they miss each other. This happens over and over and over and not a single accident ever occurs. They seem to know one another so well they run on loving instinct. It's a thrill to behold. And that quality, more than any other, brings to my mind The E Street Band and The Arcade Fire (damn it! I mentioned them!).
After Ra Ra Riot's set concluded I staggered to the metal fence off to the side and leaned up against it, sipping at my beer, trying to recover from the onslaught of awesomeness I just witnessed when who should come strolling past, carrying her purse and chatting on her cellphone, but Ms. Zellar, the aforementioned lovely, incredibly talented violinist. She paused for a split-second in front of me as I opened my mouth in a desperate attempt to say something witty like, "Great show." Instead I drooled a little bit. And then she continued past me.
I hope one day no members of Ra Ra Riot will be able to amble through the audience that's just seen their show unless accompanied swarms of security because, if there's justice in this world, they'll be huuuuuge. They deserve that sort of success, even if I lament it as I cough up $614 to see them at Lollapalooza '10.
My friend Dave and I turned out specifically for Syracuse band Ra Ra Riot, who I'd seen already earlier this year, but I'll come back to them. Prior to that show, however, a band with whom I was unfamiliar called Bishop Allen (a search today on the web tells me they are from Brooklyn by way of Boston) took the stage. Perhaps it was inevitable that I would love this quintet from the moment they sound-checked a glockenspiel. Why? If you don't know the man truly responsible for bringing the glockenspiel into the rock and roll arena let's just say he hails from New Jersey. Their first tune was more than a little Springsteen-esque, what with the vast, epic, cinematic lyrics and the la-la's in the chorus.
A lot of times when you see an unknown band you find yourself loving them at the start and then your fondness waning as each following song seems intent on repeating the formula of the initial one. Bishop Allen was the exact opposite. Their songs changed, but not wildly so. The one about the "click click click of the camera" would have hit #1 on the charts and stayed there for weeks if it had been released back when the Top 40 wasn't all crap. And as they closed their set with a song called, I think, "Dance With Me", I swear to God a cold breath of fresh air blew through right in front of the stage. It was a perfect, real-life moment of Hollywood symbolism.
But the best was yet to come. I first saw Ra Ra Riot at Schuba's in February and it was the best show I've seen so far this year. Comprised of a drummer, a bassist, guitarist, a violinist, a cellist, and the lead singer these guys are phenomenal. In reading about them afterwards I saw they don't like being compared to a certain band (up north of the border) I really want to compare them to and so I won't make the comparison. Anyway, they're a bit more punk than that band but they still have a desire for a unified orchestral sound rather than solos. They are a bit bombastic and quite earnest but in my world that's a significant compliment.
Their six minute anthem "Dying is Fine" (found on their EP and on their first full-length album set for release next month) is maybe the song most seminal of their style. It's a driving, luminous assault divided into three acts. The last act puts Rebecca Zellar's violin on full display and, to this point, it is the single most beautiful thing (music or otherwise) I've encountered this year. Seriously, listen to it and just focus on the violin, even when the entire band dives back in to rock out at the end. Concentrate on nothing else and you will be stirred to your core.
But what I really enjoyed the most about those two sets was the genuine affection each band seemed to have for one another. There was true joy in these performances, and that sometimes seems too rare an event. Bishop Allen's bassist grinning the whole time, the keyboardist/glockenspielist smiling after the frontman's amp blew out and he was forced to play another band member's guitar even as the guitar strap broke mid-song. A Ra Ra Riot show meanwhile is filled with band members exchanging constant smiles as they play, and singing along even if they don't have a microphone, and approximately 300 near collisions. Seriously, they all bound happily about the stage, swaying, grooving, the bassist gliding backwards with his eyes closed and about to run right into violinist who suddenly dips forward at the last second and the collision is averted. The guitarist lowers his head and sashays forward about to run right into the lead singer who abruptly leans to the right and they miss each other. This happens over and over and over and not a single accident ever occurs. They seem to know one another so well they run on loving instinct. It's a thrill to behold. And that quality, more than any other, brings to my mind The E Street Band and The Arcade Fire (damn it! I mentioned them!).
After Ra Ra Riot's set concluded I staggered to the metal fence off to the side and leaned up against it, sipping at my beer, trying to recover from the onslaught of awesomeness I just witnessed when who should come strolling past, carrying her purse and chatting on her cellphone, but Ms. Zellar, the aforementioned lovely, incredibly talented violinist. She paused for a split-second in front of me as I opened my mouth in a desperate attempt to say something witty like, "Great show." Instead I drooled a little bit. And then she continued past me.
I hope one day no members of Ra Ra Riot will be able to amble through the audience that's just seen their show unless accompanied swarms of security because, if there's justice in this world, they'll be huuuuuge. They deserve that sort of success, even if I lament it as I cough up $614 to see them at Lollapalooza '10.
Friday, July 25, 2008
In Memoriam
(The following editorial - posted here verbatim - was published yesterday in the Chicago Sun Times.)
The concept was too simple to work: Two guys on TV talking about the movies, expressing themselves in full sentences, even whole paragraphs, with a lot of spirited disagreement.
Add some film clips. Add a signature touch -- thumbs up or thumbs down. No snazzy special effects. No celebrity schmoozing. No shilling for Hollywood.
It was called "Siskel & Ebert" when it first aired on WTTW in Chicago in 1975, and it was called "At the Movies" across the country by the time Roger Ebert finally called it quits this week. It worked for 33 years for one reason above all -- it respected the intelligence of the viewer.
Movie lovers have lost a lovely guide. Ebert and Richard Roeper, our colleagues here at the Sun-Times, both bowed out of the show this week, and though the show will continue on with new hosts, it won't be the same. Which, to be honest, is a polite way of saying we doubt it will be as good.
As Sun-Times columnist Rob Feder wrote on Tuesday, Disney ABC Domestic Television plans to "dumb down and glam up" the show.
Ebert, Roeper and the late great Gene Siskel never dumbed it down, knowing that you weren't dumb and dumber.
The concept was too simple to work: Two guys on TV talking about the movies, expressing themselves in full sentences, even whole paragraphs, with a lot of spirited disagreement.
Add some film clips. Add a signature touch -- thumbs up or thumbs down. No snazzy special effects. No celebrity schmoozing. No shilling for Hollywood.
It was called "Siskel & Ebert" when it first aired on WTTW in Chicago in 1975, and it was called "At the Movies" across the country by the time Roger Ebert finally called it quits this week. It worked for 33 years for one reason above all -- it respected the intelligence of the viewer.
Movie lovers have lost a lovely guide. Ebert and Richard Roeper, our colleagues here at the Sun-Times, both bowed out of the show this week, and though the show will continue on with new hosts, it won't be the same. Which, to be honest, is a polite way of saying we doubt it will be as good.
As Sun-Times columnist Rob Feder wrote on Tuesday, Disney ABC Domestic Television plans to "dumb down and glam up" the show.
Ebert, Roeper and the late great Gene Siskel never dumbed it down, knowing that you weren't dumb and dumber.
Thursday, July 24, 2008
My Blueberry Nights
"I wonder how you'll remember me - as the girl who likes blueberry pie or as the girl with the broken heart?"
Yes, that is an actual line of dialogue uttered in Wong Kar Wei's "My Blueberry Nights". The question is which word pops into your head upon reading it. Do you think - my, that's cheesy. Or do you think - my, that's melodramatic. If it's cheesy than this film is probably not for you. But if it's melodramatic than by all means stash this one away in your netflix queue because "My Blueberry Nights", as far as I'm concerned, is full of melodrama, slathered in it, drowned it like....nope, I'm not gonna' do it. I was set to make a dessert-themed metaphor, something along the lines of "My Blueberry Nights" is slathered in melodrama the same as a sliver of blueberry pie awash in an aquaduct of whipped cream. But no, I won't stoop that low.
Pop-songstress Norah Jones makes her acting debut as Elizabeth, a woman who enters the world of Jude Law's Jeremy that is his New York City cafe to ask if he's seen her boyfriend with another woman. Apparently, he has. She gives him a set of keys and advises if her boyfriend returns to stuff them into his lying, cheating hands. It seems Jeremy has an entire jar set aside of keys people have left with a certain set of instructions, including - oh yes - a set of his own that allows for a story of his own lost love.
He definitely seems to be falling for her as they bond each night over blueberry pie, and perhaps she for him, but instead she heads out of town and winds up in Memphis as a waitress by day and a waitress by night. One of her customers at the bluesy bar she tends in the evenings is a severely depressed alcoholic with a good heart (David Straithairn) with a severely unfaithful wife (Rachel Weisz) and it seems they both have severe self-destructive tendencies and, of course, this will all come to a head on Elizabeth's watch.
Once that's all done Elizabeth heads further west and finds herself waitressing in an Arizona casino where a short-haired, twangy, sassy poker player (Natalie Portman) who also happens to possess a bitchin' car and a damaged relationship with her father offers Elizabeth one of those life-changing opportunities.
And Jeremy wiles away back in NYC, receiving postcards from Elizabeth, unsuccessfully trying to track her down via phone, and wondering if she'll ever return.
There isn't a lot of real depth to anyone's problems here, it's all just a big bunch of swooping, theatrical drama with sumptuous visuals, aside from the abudance of insipid slow-motion shots. I'm also afraid to report that Ms. Jones isn't much of an actress but the others, as we already know, are and they go for broke. Weisz's monologue when the camera finally stays still and lingers on her in closeup for several minutes is breathtaking and watching Jude Law here made me wish he'd do more roles like this one. He seems vibrant, alive, not just relegated to being one of People's 50 Most Beautiful People.
I like melodrama and sometimes wish our current cinematic landscape found more time for it and so I enjoyed the film quite a bit, though it probably would have been even more enjoyable if it had been made in the 50's when they really knew how to do melodrama. In fact, if I had a time machine I would go back to the 50's and rewrite this movie as an Elvis vehicle with Mr. Presley in the Norah Jones role and then switch all the key females to males and vice versa. Well, except for the Natalie Portman role since that one's got Ann Margaret written all over it.
Yes, that is an actual line of dialogue uttered in Wong Kar Wei's "My Blueberry Nights". The question is which word pops into your head upon reading it. Do you think - my, that's cheesy. Or do you think - my, that's melodramatic. If it's cheesy than this film is probably not for you. But if it's melodramatic than by all means stash this one away in your netflix queue because "My Blueberry Nights", as far as I'm concerned, is full of melodrama, slathered in it, drowned it like....nope, I'm not gonna' do it. I was set to make a dessert-themed metaphor, something along the lines of "My Blueberry Nights" is slathered in melodrama the same as a sliver of blueberry pie awash in an aquaduct of whipped cream. But no, I won't stoop that low.
Pop-songstress Norah Jones makes her acting debut as Elizabeth, a woman who enters the world of Jude Law's Jeremy that is his New York City cafe to ask if he's seen her boyfriend with another woman. Apparently, he has. She gives him a set of keys and advises if her boyfriend returns to stuff them into his lying, cheating hands. It seems Jeremy has an entire jar set aside of keys people have left with a certain set of instructions, including - oh yes - a set of his own that allows for a story of his own lost love.
He definitely seems to be falling for her as they bond each night over blueberry pie, and perhaps she for him, but instead she heads out of town and winds up in Memphis as a waitress by day and a waitress by night. One of her customers at the bluesy bar she tends in the evenings is a severely depressed alcoholic with a good heart (David Straithairn) with a severely unfaithful wife (Rachel Weisz) and it seems they both have severe self-destructive tendencies and, of course, this will all come to a head on Elizabeth's watch.
Once that's all done Elizabeth heads further west and finds herself waitressing in an Arizona casino where a short-haired, twangy, sassy poker player (Natalie Portman) who also happens to possess a bitchin' car and a damaged relationship with her father offers Elizabeth one of those life-changing opportunities.
And Jeremy wiles away back in NYC, receiving postcards from Elizabeth, unsuccessfully trying to track her down via phone, and wondering if she'll ever return.
There isn't a lot of real depth to anyone's problems here, it's all just a big bunch of swooping, theatrical drama with sumptuous visuals, aside from the abudance of insipid slow-motion shots. I'm also afraid to report that Ms. Jones isn't much of an actress but the others, as we already know, are and they go for broke. Weisz's monologue when the camera finally stays still and lingers on her in closeup for several minutes is breathtaking and watching Jude Law here made me wish he'd do more roles like this one. He seems vibrant, alive, not just relegated to being one of People's 50 Most Beautiful People.
I like melodrama and sometimes wish our current cinematic landscape found more time for it and so I enjoyed the film quite a bit, though it probably would have been even more enjoyable if it had been made in the 50's when they really knew how to do melodrama. In fact, if I had a time machine I would go back to the 50's and rewrite this movie as an Elvis vehicle with Mr. Presley in the Norah Jones role and then switch all the key females to males and vice versa. Well, except for the Natalie Portman role since that one's got Ann Margaret written all over it.
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Happy Anniversary!
Bust out the champaign! Put on your party hat! Dance a jig! Come on, loyal reader, don't tell me you haven't been counting it down just like me! You have. I know you have!
Yes, it's been exactly one year since Cinema Romantico proclaimed the illustrious Sienna Miller as its official Cinematic Crush! At that time I foresaw a "long and prosperous reign" and not a gosh darn thing has happened to change my mind! If anything, she's gone so far as to strengthen her grip on the crown! What, with the fake blood (sigh), her recent admittance of being too selfish to want kids (swoon) and taking on the role of an evil Maid Marian (oh, still my beating heart).
Wait, did I forget to mention the fact she smoked and drank scotch simultaneously in "Interview"? I did? Sorry about that! Well, in "Interview" she smoked and drank scotch simultaneously.
Whoops....fainted for a second. It's okay. I'm back now.
So how does Cinema Romantico plan to celebrate this most glorious of occassions? With a haiku, of course.
An Ode To Sienna
Certain English grace
what everyone thinks of you
matters not at all.
Cigarette dangling
drink me under the table
you curse poetry.
Your smile is so sweet
it's sweet like bitter red wine
pour me another.
Don't change I plead you
self destruction's fine with me
I'll write you a role.
If you don't like it
blow nicotine in my face
I'll piss off for you.
Yes, it's been exactly one year since Cinema Romantico proclaimed the illustrious Sienna Miller as its official Cinematic Crush! At that time I foresaw a "long and prosperous reign" and not a gosh darn thing has happened to change my mind! If anything, she's gone so far as to strengthen her grip on the crown! What, with the fake blood (sigh), her recent admittance of being too selfish to want kids (swoon) and taking on the role of an evil Maid Marian (oh, still my beating heart).
Wait, did I forget to mention the fact she smoked and drank scotch simultaneously in "Interview"? I did? Sorry about that! Well, in "Interview" she smoked and drank scotch simultaneously.
Whoops....fainted for a second. It's okay. I'm back now.
So how does Cinema Romantico plan to celebrate this most glorious of occassions? With a haiku, of course.
An Ode To Sienna
Certain English grace
what everyone thinks of you
matters not at all.
Cigarette dangling
drink me under the table
you curse poetry.
Your smile is so sweet
it's sweet like bitter red wine
pour me another.
Don't change I plead you
self destruction's fine with me
I'll write you a role.
If you don't like it
blow nicotine in my face
I'll piss off for you.
Monday, July 21, 2008
The Dark Knight
You're standing on a beach and you see a tidal wave form out in the ocean and it races at you and rears up, towering directly above you, ready to crash down and engulf you and everything around you, and so you scream and throw your hands over your head but then....nothing. So you look up and the tidal wave is still there, still hovering, and so you scream again and throw your hands up over your head but then....nothing. So you look up again and the tidal wave is still there, still hovering, and so you scream again and throw your hands up over your head but then....oh, you get the point. This is the best way I can think to summarize the experience of watching "The Dark Knight", Christopher Nolan's sequel to his 2005 "Batman Begins". The pace is so utterly, amazingly relentless it is almost agonizing. This isn't just a movie. It is a massive, sprawling novel with a movie screen as its canvas.
Batman (Christian Bale) continues to fight escalating crime in Gotham with loyal Police Lt. Jim Gordon (Gary Oldman) but is also under fire for spates of Batman copycats taking to the streets and is blamed for the death of city police officers. But both Batman and his alter ego, millionare Bruce Wayne, see the city's new hope emerge in the form of District Attorney Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart). Along with Bruce's old flame, Assistant D.A. Rachel Dawes (Maggie Gyllenhaal, replacing Katie Holmes), Dent shows a fearlessness in attacking the city's crime syndicate.
Enter The Joker (the late Heath Ledger). The camera pressing in on that smeared, frightening face you won't know whether to look away or sit transfixed in awe as he proposes to the crime syndicate a new way to eradicate their problem - simply, kill the Batman.
These opening passages are fascinating for their economy. There is a great deal Nolan needs to establish as the rollercoaster car we're on is speeing up that first hill but every bit of exposition is dramatized. Every scene has something else going beneath that top surface. Nolan never has someone just sit and talk when he can have them talking while holding a gun to a person's head or, say, dangling upside down from a skyscraper.
The action scenes follow the formula established in "Batman Begins" by never repeating themselves. They are always new, endlessly inventive, and the biggest of them all is shot almost entirely sans musical score and speaking only for myself, damn, do I love it when a movie does that.
The performances are uniformly outstanding. Everyone who was good in the first one is just as good the second time out. By the time Gyllenhaal is done saying her first line you will already recoginze her as being a vast upgrade of Katie Holmes. Eckhart fields the most fully-formed arc of all the characters and makes it a completely convincing transformation. And, ah yes, Ledger as The Joker. He's as good as advertised, and, dare I say, a bit Brando-esque, in so much as his performance is defined by mannerisms and physical tics (the licking of the lips, the slight hunch when he walks) and line readings full of halts and pauses that seem spontaneous but were no doubt very deliberate. It is fantastic supporting work precisely because it is supporting work. As crazy as The Joker is and as much as Ledger owns the screen when he's on it, he never overshadows the other characters or looks to steal scenes. He enhances the movie. He isn't the movie.
The movie is about heroes and villains but the line between the two is severely muddied, while weaving in not-so-veiled references to terrorism in our current world, the question of whether or not mankind will turn on itself in the bleakest of situations, and tragedy of Shakespearean proportions (don't think Julius Ceasar is referenced just for kicks and giggles).
The old adage in screenwriting is that at the conclusion of the 2nd Act you have a bit of Falling Action and then rev back up for what should be a quick but pointed 3rd Act. I'm not sure, but "The Dark Knight" might set the record for least amount of Falling Action. I think there was about a six-and-a-half seconds of it, and the 3rd Act is really just a 2nd Act redux. It keeps coming and coming, just like that tidal wave we discussed.
All this said, I wonder if perhaps it's all a bit much. There are no release valves, no moments to catch your breath. It's important to catch your breath. (My favorite part in "Batman Begins" was a catch-your-breath moment.) By the end you almost feel exhausted rather than stirred. Yet, I don't mean to imply "The Dark Knight" falls prey to typical sequel-itis. There's more, yes, rather than less, but it's not more explosions and more artificiality. Nolan has so much to say and so much to show. Maybe I liked "Batman Begins" a little more. But maybe "The Dark Knight" is more bold. And if the one criticism I can manage is that a film is too bold, well, is that really a complaint?
Batman (Christian Bale) continues to fight escalating crime in Gotham with loyal Police Lt. Jim Gordon (Gary Oldman) but is also under fire for spates of Batman copycats taking to the streets and is blamed for the death of city police officers. But both Batman and his alter ego, millionare Bruce Wayne, see the city's new hope emerge in the form of District Attorney Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart). Along with Bruce's old flame, Assistant D.A. Rachel Dawes (Maggie Gyllenhaal, replacing Katie Holmes), Dent shows a fearlessness in attacking the city's crime syndicate.
Enter The Joker (the late Heath Ledger). The camera pressing in on that smeared, frightening face you won't know whether to look away or sit transfixed in awe as he proposes to the crime syndicate a new way to eradicate their problem - simply, kill the Batman.
These opening passages are fascinating for their economy. There is a great deal Nolan needs to establish as the rollercoaster car we're on is speeing up that first hill but every bit of exposition is dramatized. Every scene has something else going beneath that top surface. Nolan never has someone just sit and talk when he can have them talking while holding a gun to a person's head or, say, dangling upside down from a skyscraper.
The action scenes follow the formula established in "Batman Begins" by never repeating themselves. They are always new, endlessly inventive, and the biggest of them all is shot almost entirely sans musical score and speaking only for myself, damn, do I love it when a movie does that.
The performances are uniformly outstanding. Everyone who was good in the first one is just as good the second time out. By the time Gyllenhaal is done saying her first line you will already recoginze her as being a vast upgrade of Katie Holmes. Eckhart fields the most fully-formed arc of all the characters and makes it a completely convincing transformation. And, ah yes, Ledger as The Joker. He's as good as advertised, and, dare I say, a bit Brando-esque, in so much as his performance is defined by mannerisms and physical tics (the licking of the lips, the slight hunch when he walks) and line readings full of halts and pauses that seem spontaneous but were no doubt very deliberate. It is fantastic supporting work precisely because it is supporting work. As crazy as The Joker is and as much as Ledger owns the screen when he's on it, he never overshadows the other characters or looks to steal scenes. He enhances the movie. He isn't the movie.
The movie is about heroes and villains but the line between the two is severely muddied, while weaving in not-so-veiled references to terrorism in our current world, the question of whether or not mankind will turn on itself in the bleakest of situations, and tragedy of Shakespearean proportions (don't think Julius Ceasar is referenced just for kicks and giggles).
The old adage in screenwriting is that at the conclusion of the 2nd Act you have a bit of Falling Action and then rev back up for what should be a quick but pointed 3rd Act. I'm not sure, but "The Dark Knight" might set the record for least amount of Falling Action. I think there was about a six-and-a-half seconds of it, and the 3rd Act is really just a 2nd Act redux. It keeps coming and coming, just like that tidal wave we discussed.
All this said, I wonder if perhaps it's all a bit much. There are no release valves, no moments to catch your breath. It's important to catch your breath. (My favorite part in "Batman Begins" was a catch-your-breath moment.) By the end you almost feel exhausted rather than stirred. Yet, I don't mean to imply "The Dark Knight" falls prey to typical sequel-itis. There's more, yes, rather than less, but it's not more explosions and more artificiality. Nolan has so much to say and so much to show. Maybe I liked "Batman Begins" a little more. But maybe "The Dark Knight" is more bold. And if the one criticism I can manage is that a film is too bold, well, is that really a complaint?
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Ignoring the Hype
"Titanic". "The Patriot". "Kill Bill Volume 1". "Gangs of New York". Since the advent of my movie snobbery these are the four films I have anticipated more than any others. "Titanic" because I saw the preview four months out and had never before been so blown away by a trailer. "The Patriot" because I'm a bit of a Revolutionary War buff and for us fans of the colonial uprising cinematic pickins are slim (ever seen "Revolution" with Al Pacino? For the love of God, don't) and this was only 4 years post-"Braveheart" and so I had implicit trust in Mel Gibson. "Kill Bill Volume 1" because ever since I'd seen "Pulp Fiction" and Mia Wallace I'd dreamt of a Tarantino film with Uma in the lead. "Gangs of New York" because it was Daniel Day Lewis's first film in 5 years, and with Scorsese, no less, and the first preview I saw where Leonardo DiCaprio introduces himself as "Amsterdam" and Day Lewis replies "I'm New York" made me go so ballistic I nearly stabbed myself in the heart.
Yet, despite the fact I'd hyped these movies in my head to mammoth proportions it did not impair my judgement when watching them. Not in any way, shape, or form. Believe it or don't, but it's true. My melodramatic eagerness did not factor into "Titanic" and "Kill Bill Volume 1" being awesome or "The Patriot" being atrocious or "Gangs of New York" being pretty good but not great. The films were already made, man. What had been done had been done long before opening night.
Perhaps I should back up.
"The Dark Knight", Christopher Nolan's follow-up to his brilliant "Batman Begins", hits theaters tomorrow and, as you may or may not know, the buzz is deafening. It's supposed to be more extraordinary than the original and talk abounds of a posthumous Oscar for Heath Ledger's turn as The Joker. The question than becomes this: Has it been built up too much?
Frankly, I don't think anything can be built up too much. I build up Nebraska's Football season in my head for 8 months each and every year and each and every year it never fails to disappoint (even if they go, say, 5-7 and give up 62 points to vile Colorado). I built up my first Springsteen concert for 15 years and, lo and behold, my solar system-sized expectations were exceeded.
I'm certainly very excited to see "The Dark Knight" but I doubt my anticipatory level is equal to that of many other people. However, I can't imagine their aniticipatory level is beyond mine for the quartet of films already mentioned. And that's why I'm here today to make a plea to all those about to plunk down their hard-earned money this weekend to watch the Caped Crusader.
When you settle into your seat locate the switch in your brain labeled Self Aware. Turn it off. You can do it. I do it all the time. I did it before the four films mentioned. Don't think about the movie you're about to see as you wait for it. Ignore what you've heard and what you've read. Don't think "I'm about to see a masterpiece" and don't think "This movie better show me how good it is". No, merely be glad you're there and you're going to see this movie you've been waiting for since Gary Oldman as Detective Gordon flipped over that playing card at the end of the first one to reveal the identity of you-know-who.
Base the movie on the movie itself and nothing else. Nothing anyone's said prior your viewing can affect the film's quality in your eyes. If you like it, you'll like it. If you don't, you won't. Yes, it's really that simple.
Let yourself go and let the movie be what it is and not what anyone else has said it is.
I wish you luck.
Yet, despite the fact I'd hyped these movies in my head to mammoth proportions it did not impair my judgement when watching them. Not in any way, shape, or form. Believe it or don't, but it's true. My melodramatic eagerness did not factor into "Titanic" and "Kill Bill Volume 1" being awesome or "The Patriot" being atrocious or "Gangs of New York" being pretty good but not great. The films were already made, man. What had been done had been done long before opening night.
Perhaps I should back up.
"The Dark Knight", Christopher Nolan's follow-up to his brilliant "Batman Begins", hits theaters tomorrow and, as you may or may not know, the buzz is deafening. It's supposed to be more extraordinary than the original and talk abounds of a posthumous Oscar for Heath Ledger's turn as The Joker. The question than becomes this: Has it been built up too much?
Frankly, I don't think anything can be built up too much. I build up Nebraska's Football season in my head for 8 months each and every year and each and every year it never fails to disappoint (even if they go, say, 5-7 and give up 62 points to vile Colorado). I built up my first Springsteen concert for 15 years and, lo and behold, my solar system-sized expectations were exceeded.
I'm certainly very excited to see "The Dark Knight" but I doubt my anticipatory level is equal to that of many other people. However, I can't imagine their aniticipatory level is beyond mine for the quartet of films already mentioned. And that's why I'm here today to make a plea to all those about to plunk down their hard-earned money this weekend to watch the Caped Crusader.
When you settle into your seat locate the switch in your brain labeled Self Aware. Turn it off. You can do it. I do it all the time. I did it before the four films mentioned. Don't think about the movie you're about to see as you wait for it. Ignore what you've heard and what you've read. Don't think "I'm about to see a masterpiece" and don't think "This movie better show me how good it is". No, merely be glad you're there and you're going to see this movie you've been waiting for since Gary Oldman as Detective Gordon flipped over that playing card at the end of the first one to reveal the identity of you-know-who.
Base the movie on the movie itself and nothing else. Nothing anyone's said prior your viewing can affect the film's quality in your eyes. If you like it, you'll like it. If you don't, you won't. Yes, it's really that simple.
Let yourself go and let the movie be what it is and not what anyone else has said it is.
I wish you luck.
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Outsourced
Currently in the midst of a one-week only run at the Siskel Center (translation: sorry, but you'll have to wait for the DVD) director John Jeffcoat's "Outsourced" is in possession of a wonderfully expository title. It takes all but one scene for fairly bland Todd Anderson (Josh Hamilton) to learn the call center he manages ("we sell kitsch to rednecks") is being outsourced to India. He is not fired, however. His boss asks him to go overseas and ensure the new center gets its average per call time down from fifteen minutes to six. "I'm not going to India," Todd says. Cut to the next scene and, guess what, he's in India.
Once there, cultures, of course, clash. Everyone calls Todd Mr. Toad despite his corrections. He eats his with his left hand and is promptly advised against this - "The left hand is considered unclean." His new employees wonder why Americans have interest in buying items such as cheeseheads.
One employee, as she must, stands out from the rest, Asha (Ayesha Dharker). She challenges Todd when others will not. He suggests they need to learn about America. She suggests he needs to learn about India. Will they fall for one another? Almost certainly, but how will the situation play itself out?
This is where "Outsourced" deviates from the usual course of this sort of film. Rather than suffering from Overly-Excitable-Puppy-Syndrome, as in a movie grabbing you by the arms, refusing to let go and screaming over and over "LOVE ME!" as it piles hi-jink on top of hi-jink and drowns its million-dollar making stars in way too many closeups, "Outsourced" is a much more low-key affair. You may recognize Josh Hamilton as Grover from the wonderous "Kicking and Screaming", the guy who's been to Prague but hasn't "been to Prague, been to Prague". His nature is identical to that of "Outsourced". Neither over-embellishes or makes grand, dramatic gestures when a mere half-grin will do.
There are a couple plot reversals, yes, as there must be (there's also a terrible, albeit brief, "chance" encounter with another American early in the film that should have been cut as its purpose is actually made more clear in the following scenes and without such forced dialogue), but they are not necessarily the ones you're expecting and they don't really muck up the characters' trajectory. The lives of Todd and Asha are ripe for a certain sort of tragedy to play out but "Outsourced" wisely sidesteps it.
On a 90 degree summer day in Chicago it can't get a lot better. It doesn't try too hard, doesn't pummel you, doesn't numb your brain more than it already is. It just wants to hum along at its own pace and make you smile and forget your troubles.
Most importantly, though, "Outsourced" functions as a fantastic case study of those anciently irritating cinematic comments. You know the sort, "That would never happen in real life", or "I didn't really buy that...." (fill in the blank). Well, I've served time in a call center. A lot of time. And I can tell you for an absolute fact no call center is lowering its per call time from 15 minutes to 6 minutes in three weeks. End of story.
And you know what? I couldn't have cared less.
Once there, cultures, of course, clash. Everyone calls Todd Mr. Toad despite his corrections. He eats his with his left hand and is promptly advised against this - "The left hand is considered unclean." His new employees wonder why Americans have interest in buying items such as cheeseheads.
One employee, as she must, stands out from the rest, Asha (Ayesha Dharker). She challenges Todd when others will not. He suggests they need to learn about America. She suggests he needs to learn about India. Will they fall for one another? Almost certainly, but how will the situation play itself out?
This is where "Outsourced" deviates from the usual course of this sort of film. Rather than suffering from Overly-Excitable-Puppy-Syndrome, as in a movie grabbing you by the arms, refusing to let go and screaming over and over "LOVE ME!" as it piles hi-jink on top of hi-jink and drowns its million-dollar making stars in way too many closeups, "Outsourced" is a much more low-key affair. You may recognize Josh Hamilton as Grover from the wonderous "Kicking and Screaming", the guy who's been to Prague but hasn't "been to Prague, been to Prague". His nature is identical to that of "Outsourced". Neither over-embellishes or makes grand, dramatic gestures when a mere half-grin will do.
There are a couple plot reversals, yes, as there must be (there's also a terrible, albeit brief, "chance" encounter with another American early in the film that should have been cut as its purpose is actually made more clear in the following scenes and without such forced dialogue), but they are not necessarily the ones you're expecting and they don't really muck up the characters' trajectory. The lives of Todd and Asha are ripe for a certain sort of tragedy to play out but "Outsourced" wisely sidesteps it.
On a 90 degree summer day in Chicago it can't get a lot better. It doesn't try too hard, doesn't pummel you, doesn't numb your brain more than it already is. It just wants to hum along at its own pace and make you smile and forget your troubles.
Most importantly, though, "Outsourced" functions as a fantastic case study of those anciently irritating cinematic comments. You know the sort, "That would never happen in real life", or "I didn't really buy that...." (fill in the blank). Well, I've served time in a call center. A lot of time. And I can tell you for an absolute fact no call center is lowering its per call time from 15 minutes to 6 minutes in three weeks. End of story.
And you know what? I couldn't have cared less.
Monday, July 14, 2008
The Wackness
I rememember the year 1994 fondly. A Springsteen-esque obsession with A Tribe Called Quest (the last great rap band) and a journey to Atlanta for a summer week to attend the National Lutheran Youth Convention and an autumn consumed by the intense drama of Nebraska's run to 13-0 and a National Championship. Yes, I remember it quite fondly. Apparently, however, there were kids near my age engaged in lives not mirroring my own in capacity. Or didn't they? Upon seeing writer/director Jonathan Levine's 1994-set tale "The Wackness" in which drugs, sex, and a whole lot more drugs play a central role someone like me may be quick to assume there are no similarities between my 1994 and the 1994 experienced by the clan of "The Wackness". But there's something here for everyone. I'll explain.
Luke Shapiro (Josh Peck, who I learned after seeing the movie also stars on a Nickelodeon kids show) lives in a New York City that has come under the (apparent) wrath of Giuliani with an unstable mother and father living in constant fear of eviction and is set to leave high school behind as the film opens. "Tomorrow I graduate," Luke says in voiceover, "and then I go to my safety school, and then I grow up, and then I die." Ah, life. The requisite graduation party passes quickly as Luke watches it from afar, showing him to be an outsider. He has no friends.
Well, he has one. This would be Dr. Jeff Squires (Ben Kingsley - whoops! My apologies! That would be Sir Ben Kingsley!). Squires is Luke's psychiatrist but, more importantly, his client. You see, Luke earns his money dealing drugs. He masquerades as an "ice seller", wheeling a cart containing healthy lumps of marijuana around the city and providing a weekly supply to Squires who, in turn, offers young Luke worldly advice. Perhaps, though, this isn't the best arrangement since Squires has got his own issues - namely, the aforementioned drug dependency and a marriage (to Famke Janssen) that is pretty much Dead Couple Walking.
Squires has a beguiling step-daughter named Stephanie (Olivia Thirlby) who graduated with Luke and, despite being a tad more popular, strikes up a friendship with Luke that may or may not lead to something more. And while Kingsley is certainly a riot in the let-it-all-loose role (he makes out with Mary Kate Olson of "Full House" fame who seems desperate in her limited screen time to let everyone know she's ACTING!!!!!) the real value of the film, I thought, was found in Luke's courtship of Stephanie. He may attain his drugs from a supplier (Method Man) who is guarded by men with automatic weapons but, really, Luke is just an unsure, awkward, self-conscious 18 year old.
I won't argue that Stephanie's character is pretty one-note, but I'll also argue that is Levine's primary point. A male this age who meets a vexing girl like Stephanie is bound to make her the answer to all the world's problems. He'll think he's in love even though, obviously, he's not. In his eyes, she's perfect, and she's still perfect even if she chooses to break his heart. There are no flaws to a person like Stephanie - not to Luke, anyway. And that's how we see her, from Luke's vantage point.
This is the third film I've seen Thirlby in since December, along with "Juno" and "Snow Angels", and she grows more sultry and seemingly more talented with each one. I defy all those who naysay woman with a fetish for smoking to tell me she could possibly be more intoxicating without a cigarette in the scene late at night on a sofa while watching TV. (Please mark my words right now - Thirlby is going to be a flat-out star.)
Luke and Stephanie talk in "mad" slang, "yo", and smoke joints, sure, but there is a tenderness and truth to this romance that is simply not found in most films of its ilk. It deals with love as a teenager in a very real, very poignant way. Their first kiss is so brilliantly handled in every way - right down to the brief interlude of fantasty at the end - it might just be the finest three minutes of cinema I've seen so far this year. And later when the two are on a beach, the eloquent cinematography matching their silhouettes against an almost other-wordly shimmering ocean in the background, discussing how Luke agonizes too much at a point in his life when he only needs to live and experience, well, you might find yourself thinking they sound like two kids trying to come across as adults and just sounding corny. Except than you remember at that age you too desperately wanted to come across as an adult, usually with corny results.
The film is by no means perfect and slips and slides a great deal in the third act with curiously flat payoffs. You have some idea from the get-go of where the storylines for both Luke and Squires are headed and that's okay if your movie has the heft of a tragedy, but "The Wackness" moves at more leisurely pace and finds its worth in the smaller moments and the patterns of everyday life. Even with a partial flameout at the finale, though, there is an awful lot to cherish in this movie, especially if you came of age during the mid-90's. And no, it doesn't matter if you didn't do drugs and didn't say "peace out" instead of goodbye.
It brings to mind a particular line rapped so gracefully by A Tribe Called Quest's Q-Tip that I used to listen to over and over on my discman way back in '94. "See, my s--- is universal if you got knowledge of dolo or delf or self". Despite its content, at its core "The Wackness" is pretty universal.
Luke Shapiro (Josh Peck, who I learned after seeing the movie also stars on a Nickelodeon kids show) lives in a New York City that has come under the (apparent) wrath of Giuliani with an unstable mother and father living in constant fear of eviction and is set to leave high school behind as the film opens. "Tomorrow I graduate," Luke says in voiceover, "and then I go to my safety school, and then I grow up, and then I die." Ah, life. The requisite graduation party passes quickly as Luke watches it from afar, showing him to be an outsider. He has no friends.
Well, he has one. This would be Dr. Jeff Squires (Ben Kingsley - whoops! My apologies! That would be Sir Ben Kingsley!). Squires is Luke's psychiatrist but, more importantly, his client. You see, Luke earns his money dealing drugs. He masquerades as an "ice seller", wheeling a cart containing healthy lumps of marijuana around the city and providing a weekly supply to Squires who, in turn, offers young Luke worldly advice. Perhaps, though, this isn't the best arrangement since Squires has got his own issues - namely, the aforementioned drug dependency and a marriage (to Famke Janssen) that is pretty much Dead Couple Walking.
Squires has a beguiling step-daughter named Stephanie (Olivia Thirlby) who graduated with Luke and, despite being a tad more popular, strikes up a friendship with Luke that may or may not lead to something more. And while Kingsley is certainly a riot in the let-it-all-loose role (he makes out with Mary Kate Olson of "Full House" fame who seems desperate in her limited screen time to let everyone know she's ACTING!!!!!) the real value of the film, I thought, was found in Luke's courtship of Stephanie. He may attain his drugs from a supplier (Method Man) who is guarded by men with automatic weapons but, really, Luke is just an unsure, awkward, self-conscious 18 year old.
I won't argue that Stephanie's character is pretty one-note, but I'll also argue that is Levine's primary point. A male this age who meets a vexing girl like Stephanie is bound to make her the answer to all the world's problems. He'll think he's in love even though, obviously, he's not. In his eyes, she's perfect, and she's still perfect even if she chooses to break his heart. There are no flaws to a person like Stephanie - not to Luke, anyway. And that's how we see her, from Luke's vantage point.
This is the third film I've seen Thirlby in since December, along with "Juno" and "Snow Angels", and she grows more sultry and seemingly more talented with each one. I defy all those who naysay woman with a fetish for smoking to tell me she could possibly be more intoxicating without a cigarette in the scene late at night on a sofa while watching TV. (Please mark my words right now - Thirlby is going to be a flat-out star.)
Luke and Stephanie talk in "mad" slang, "yo", and smoke joints, sure, but there is a tenderness and truth to this romance that is simply not found in most films of its ilk. It deals with love as a teenager in a very real, very poignant way. Their first kiss is so brilliantly handled in every way - right down to the brief interlude of fantasty at the end - it might just be the finest three minutes of cinema I've seen so far this year. And later when the two are on a beach, the eloquent cinematography matching their silhouettes against an almost other-wordly shimmering ocean in the background, discussing how Luke agonizes too much at a point in his life when he only needs to live and experience, well, you might find yourself thinking they sound like two kids trying to come across as adults and just sounding corny. Except than you remember at that age you too desperately wanted to come across as an adult, usually with corny results.
The film is by no means perfect and slips and slides a great deal in the third act with curiously flat payoffs. You have some idea from the get-go of where the storylines for both Luke and Squires are headed and that's okay if your movie has the heft of a tragedy, but "The Wackness" moves at more leisurely pace and finds its worth in the smaller moments and the patterns of everyday life. Even with a partial flameout at the finale, though, there is an awful lot to cherish in this movie, especially if you came of age during the mid-90's. And no, it doesn't matter if you didn't do drugs and didn't say "peace out" instead of goodbye.
It brings to mind a particular line rapped so gracefully by A Tribe Called Quest's Q-Tip that I used to listen to over and over on my discman way back in '94. "See, my s--- is universal if you got knowledge of dolo or delf or self". Despite its content, at its core "The Wackness" is pretty universal.
Friday, July 11, 2008
My Greatest Movie: The Last of the Mohicans
A kid between his freshman and sophmore years of high school returns from Waukee Video on a humid summer evening in central Iowa with a rented VHS tape in hand and strolls through the front door of his blue two story home on 3rd Street.
He situates himself in the darkened basement, places the tape in the video player on top of the TV and settles in to watch a film called "Last of the Mohicans".
He's someone who wouldn't be caught dead reading a James Fenimore Cooper novel. He is not keen on the outdoors and is frightened silly by guns. Big, sweeping gestures are not this person's style. He's a bit of Revolutionary War buff but does not take much interest in the war that preceded it, the French and Indian. Perhaps it's strange then that he is watching a movie based on a Fenimore Cooper novel that is primarily set outdoors and containing a whole lot of guns and even more big, sweeping gestures with the French and Indian War as a backdrop.
The movie starts. The Twentieth Century Fox logo but sans the theme that always accompanies it. The film has already begun its own soundtrack. It is so urgent, he thinks, there is nary a second of it to be wasted, not even with the studio fanfare. The title cards tell him the year is 1757 during the war for the possession of the North American continent and then it tells him that three men, the last of a vanishing tribe, are on the frontier west of the Hudson River. He really likes that. The setting is epic, the story is personal, and they will converge to show how the personal truly is epic.
He is introducted to the three men, Hawkeye (Daniel Day Lewis), Uncas (Eric Schweig), and Chingachcook (Russell Means), in the midst of a dramatic hunt for an elk. It's life & death. The whole movie is life & death, and right from the start.
He likes how the movie has no time to waste on small talk. Duncan (Steven Waddington) proposes to Cora (Madeleine Stowe) straight away in their first scene. Hawkeye defiantly challenges Duncan and Cora the first time they meet. And, man, does he like how Alice (Jodhi May) doesn't really say much at all, and he senses it's not because Alice doesn't have anything to say but because she prefers to observe and internalize.
He senses the shyness and awkwardness possessed by Alice are just like his. He senses the idealism in Colonel Munro (Maurice Roeves) and Jack Winthrop (Edward Blatchford) is much like his. He senses the passion and emotion possessed by Hawkeye and Cora are identical to his. He likes it when Cora says "the whole world's on fire" because he senses it speaks to the heart of what writer/director Michael Mann considers at stake in his film - namely, everything. Absolutely everything.
Hell, he can even sympathize with the bad guy, Magua (Wes Studi), since he's got some valid reasons for being so peeved. ("Magua's heart is twisted. He would make himself into what twisted him.")
The movie ends. He cannot move. He makes no sound, save for the sobbing that started around the time that Alice jumped off the cliff. He's enjoyed movies in the past. "Star Wars" made him happy and "Raiders of the Lost Ark" made him cheer and "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" made him laugh and "Glory" inspired him but this is more then simple enjoyment. He didn't know that movies could be like......this. His life's changed, he thinks, for better or worse. Probably worse. He's fairly certain the movie has seen his soul. All things around him are in focus, and not just the giant framed map of Lake Superior on the wall behind him.
As the closing credits roll down the screen he realizes he understands what a movie, and what art as a whole, is capable of being.
He will go on to graduate from high school in 1996. He will go to work at a movie theater. He will attend the University of Iowa in hopes of winding his way into the famed Writer's Workshop only to get irate with his useless pre-requisites, hide away in his dorm room writing, and eventually drop out. He do time at an ad agency and then a string of more offices that all blur together. He will move to Arizona and back to Iowa and to Chicago and make new friends and lose old friends and become obsessed with a smattering of women and live on his own and in a house with a pool and a mountain for a backyard view and sleep on a broken couch for three months and he'll have his appendix taken out and get saddled with a stomach illness and his parents will get divorced (for the very best) and his dad will get re-married to a wonderful woman and his sister will graduate from college and he'll take a road trip through the back roads of Maine with her and he'll fly to New York City with a friend for one day just to watch Bruce Springsteen live and he'll see a movie about a female boxer that's just as good as the one he's watching right now and he'll see a Nebraska Heisman Trophy winner in person and he'll sleep on a beach in San Diego and one day he'll travel to the very sites he's currently watching on the television across from him. But during the course of all that, and a whole lot more, one thing will remain resolute, one thing that he has realized in a moment of blinding, almost unfathomable clarity on on this humid summer evening in his basement.
He will be a writer.
He situates himself in the darkened basement, places the tape in the video player on top of the TV and settles in to watch a film called "Last of the Mohicans".
He's someone who wouldn't be caught dead reading a James Fenimore Cooper novel. He is not keen on the outdoors and is frightened silly by guns. Big, sweeping gestures are not this person's style. He's a bit of Revolutionary War buff but does not take much interest in the war that preceded it, the French and Indian. Perhaps it's strange then that he is watching a movie based on a Fenimore Cooper novel that is primarily set outdoors and containing a whole lot of guns and even more big, sweeping gestures with the French and Indian War as a backdrop.The movie starts. The Twentieth Century Fox logo but sans the theme that always accompanies it. The film has already begun its own soundtrack. It is so urgent, he thinks, there is nary a second of it to be wasted, not even with the studio fanfare. The title cards tell him the year is 1757 during the war for the possession of the North American continent and then it tells him that three men, the last of a vanishing tribe, are on the frontier west of the Hudson River. He really likes that. The setting is epic, the story is personal, and they will converge to show how the personal truly is epic.
He is introducted to the three men, Hawkeye (Daniel Day Lewis), Uncas (Eric Schweig), and Chingachcook (Russell Means), in the midst of a dramatic hunt for an elk. It's life & death. The whole movie is life & death, and right from the start.
He likes how the movie has no time to waste on small talk. Duncan (Steven Waddington) proposes to Cora (Madeleine Stowe) straight away in their first scene. Hawkeye defiantly challenges Duncan and Cora the first time they meet. And, man, does he like how Alice (Jodhi May) doesn't really say much at all, and he senses it's not because Alice doesn't have anything to say but because she prefers to observe and internalize.
He senses the shyness and awkwardness possessed by Alice are just like his. He senses the idealism in Colonel Munro (Maurice Roeves) and Jack Winthrop (Edward Blatchford) is much like his. He senses the passion and emotion possessed by Hawkeye and Cora are identical to his. He likes it when Cora says "the whole world's on fire" because he senses it speaks to the heart of what writer/director Michael Mann considers at stake in his film - namely, everything. Absolutely everything.Hell, he can even sympathize with the bad guy, Magua (Wes Studi), since he's got some valid reasons for being so peeved. ("Magua's heart is twisted. He would make himself into what twisted him.")
The movie ends. He cannot move. He makes no sound, save for the sobbing that started around the time that Alice jumped off the cliff. He's enjoyed movies in the past. "Star Wars" made him happy and "Raiders of the Lost Ark" made him cheer and "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" made him laugh and "Glory" inspired him but this is more then simple enjoyment. He didn't know that movies could be like......this. His life's changed, he thinks, for better or worse. Probably worse. He's fairly certain the movie has seen his soul. All things around him are in focus, and not just the giant framed map of Lake Superior on the wall behind him.
As the closing credits roll down the screen he realizes he understands what a movie, and what art as a whole, is capable of being.
He will go on to graduate from high school in 1996. He will go to work at a movie theater. He will attend the University of Iowa in hopes of winding his way into the famed Writer's Workshop only to get irate with his useless pre-requisites, hide away in his dorm room writing, and eventually drop out. He do time at an ad agency and then a string of more offices that all blur together. He will move to Arizona and back to Iowa and to Chicago and make new friends and lose old friends and become obsessed with a smattering of women and live on his own and in a house with a pool and a mountain for a backyard view and sleep on a broken couch for three months and he'll have his appendix taken out and get saddled with a stomach illness and his parents will get divorced (for the very best) and his dad will get re-married to a wonderful woman and his sister will graduate from college and he'll take a road trip through the back roads of Maine with her and he'll fly to New York City with a friend for one day just to watch Bruce Springsteen live and he'll see a movie about a female boxer that's just as good as the one he's watching right now and he'll see a Nebraska Heisman Trophy winner in person and he'll sleep on a beach in San Diego and one day he'll travel to the very sites he's currently watching on the television across from him. But during the course of all that, and a whole lot more, one thing will remain resolute, one thing that he has realized in a moment of blinding, almost unfathomable clarity on on this humid summer evening in his basement.
He will be a writer.
Thursday, July 10, 2008
One Man's Journey to Mohicanland: Photographic Evidence
In my nearly three years of blogging adventures I have neglected to post photos, mainly because 1.) I believe far too much in the power of the written word and 2.) What photos am I gonna' post? I'm not a big picture-takin' kinda' guy. But since this week is all about celebrating "Last of the Mohicans" I would be remorse in not at long last quenching your photographic thirst.
As mentioned I made a pilgrimmage to North Carolina (i.e. The Tar Heel State) two years ago to see the filming sites but the bounty of photos from said voyage have remained tucked away from the general public. Today that will be remedied. I offer up a few of the more memorable pictures I snapped and, yes, feel free to match them up with images from your "Last of the Mohicans" DVD (since you sure as hell better own one).
This would be the image that accompanies the film's opening credits (I would recommend playing your "Last of the Mohicans" soundtrack, which I just assume you own along with the DVD, as you look at it.)
Remember when the British troops and our heroines Cora and Alice are ambushed only to have "The Last of the Mohicans" swoop in and save the day? This is the road (which is actually a foot path) where it took place.
Our intrepid gang - Hawkeye, Uncas, Chingachcook, Cora, Alice, and ever-whiny Duncan - strode across these rocks. And yes, I strode across them several times in the same manner as Hawkeye.
The waterfall where we first glean Uncas's attraction for Alice.
This is Lake James (representing Lake George) where a life-size replica of Fort William Henry once stood but, of course, stands no longer. Much of the film was shot on this location. The island you see in the lake is the same island the camera picks up as we see cannonfire light up the night sky and that is seen in the background of the parlay between Colonel Munro and General Montcalm.
After the big action setpiece at the end of the 2nd act our heroes flee in canoes and this is the spot from where they push off. Interestingly, if you face the spot and turn 180 degrees you will see a parking lot. Musket smoke in the film cleverly conceals this fact.
The two canoes in which our heroes have fled dramatically go over this very waterfall as they escape their pursuers.
Chimney Rock Park, where the greatest 20 minutes in cinematic history was filmed. This picture was taken from the park's Skyline Trail. The waterfall you see is glimpsed several times in the film and is the one at the top of which Magua meets his deserved fate.
Chingachcook, Hawkeye and Cora emerge one-by-one from behind this rock to see, first, Uncas merge with the infinite and then Alice do likewise.
The place where Hawkeye, cradling a musket in each arm, shoots down two enemies at the same time. (Boo yah!)
The rock upon which Uncas meets his fate at the hands of Magua.
The Spot. As in, The Spot from where Alice jumps. My personal Mecca.
As mentioned I made a pilgrimmage to North Carolina (i.e. The Tar Heel State) two years ago to see the filming sites but the bounty of photos from said voyage have remained tucked away from the general public. Today that will be remedied. I offer up a few of the more memorable pictures I snapped and, yes, feel free to match them up with images from your "Last of the Mohicans" DVD (since you sure as hell better own one).
This would be the image that accompanies the film's opening credits (I would recommend playing your "Last of the Mohicans" soundtrack, which I just assume you own along with the DVD, as you look at it.)
Remember when the British troops and our heroines Cora and Alice are ambushed only to have "The Last of the Mohicans" swoop in and save the day? This is the road (which is actually a foot path) where it took place.
Our intrepid gang - Hawkeye, Uncas, Chingachcook, Cora, Alice, and ever-whiny Duncan - strode across these rocks. And yes, I strode across them several times in the same manner as Hawkeye.
The waterfall where we first glean Uncas's attraction for Alice.
This is Lake James (representing Lake George) where a life-size replica of Fort William Henry once stood but, of course, stands no longer. Much of the film was shot on this location. The island you see in the lake is the same island the camera picks up as we see cannonfire light up the night sky and that is seen in the background of the parlay between Colonel Munro and General Montcalm.
After the big action setpiece at the end of the 2nd act our heroes flee in canoes and this is the spot from where they push off. Interestingly, if you face the spot and turn 180 degrees you will see a parking lot. Musket smoke in the film cleverly conceals this fact.
The two canoes in which our heroes have fled dramatically go over this very waterfall as they escape their pursuers.
Chimney Rock Park, where the greatest 20 minutes in cinematic history was filmed. This picture was taken from the park's Skyline Trail. The waterfall you see is glimpsed several times in the film and is the one at the top of which Magua meets his deserved fate.
Chingachcook, Hawkeye and Cora emerge one-by-one from behind this rock to see, first, Uncas merge with the infinite and then Alice do likewise.
The place where Hawkeye, cradling a musket in each arm, shoots down two enemies at the same time. (Boo yah!)
The rock upon which Uncas meets his fate at the hands of Magua.
The Spot. As in, The Spot from where Alice jumps. My personal Mecca.
Wednesday, July 09, 2008
Someone Else's Argument For Last of the Mohicans
Charles Taylor wrote this review (re-posted here in its entirety) for salon.com and it remains to this day the finest piece I've come across written about my favorite movie. He is the only other person who seems to grasp precisely how integral Alice is to this story and why - despite her limited screen time - she is the most powerful, most important character by far. I get goosebumps when I read it. Enjoy.
Old Hollywood meets new Hollywood in Michael Mann's 1992 version of "The Last of the Mohicans." Based on both James Fenimore Cooper's novel and the screenplay for the 1936 film version (starring Randolph Scott as Cooper's noble savage Hawkeye) the movie is recognizably, even reassuringly, old-fashioned. Mann provides emotions in big, readily identifiable slabs -- heroism, cowardice, loyalty, revenge, love -- and assigns them to his characters as if he were handing out charades instructions. But Mann also employs an MTV slickness that's pure '90s. He conceives of the story as if it were a gigantic piece of mood music. The look of the movie's ravishing landscapes (shot by Dante Spinotti, with the forests of North Carolina and Pennsylvania standing in for New York state circa 1757) and the faces of the movie's ravishing actors (Daniel Day-Lewis and Madeleine Stowe) carry as much emotion as the story does. And Mann slathers Trevor Jones' score -- a synthesized, symphonic wash -- over everything. When Stowe's Cora swoons against Day-Lewis' Hawkeye in a besieged fort as the night sky glows with the fires of combat behind them and Jones' syrup swells on the soundtrack, you can giggle or you can surrender to the very real charisma of the two stars. Probably you'll do both. "The Last of the Mohicans" is a striking mixture of the ersatz and the genuine. In other words, it's vintage Hollywood. It's also a smashingly entertaining and satisfying adventure.
In his other movies, Mann's specialty has been a chic, chilly existential pulp angst that's as simplistic and inflated as his titles -- "Thief," "Manhunter," "Heat." But the adventure-book tone of "The Last of the Mohicans," which is set during the war between England and France for control of the American colonies, clears away all of the director's phony torment. "The Last of the Mohicans" makes you understand why adventure stories were once called romances. It's a date movie in the guise of an action movie. Hawkeye and Cora are like a colonial Tarzan and Jane: She's the white woman who ventures into the wilderness only to be saved by the European who has learned the ways of the natives, and with whom she finds love. That's a female fantasy perhaps even more than a male one. This noble wild man brings out the woman's passionate nature which has no outlet in the corsetted society she comes from. One look at Cora's priggish suitor (Steven Waddington, with his piggy snout), a Redcoat officer given to homilies about how respect and friendship are the basis for a successful union, and civilization doesn't seem like such a hot idea. The way Mann brings together Hawkeye and Cora after he rescues Cora from a band of marauding Hurons shows a witty grasp of movie glamor: You can tell they're a love match by the way Stowe's unpinned tresses match up with Day-Lewis'. Later the pair take temporary refuge in a cave behind a cascading waterfall, the torrents of water standing in for the lovers' emotions. This natural wonder seems to exist to provide a showcase for the stars' sexiness.
Mann shortchanges Stowe and Day-Lewis by allowing his atmospherics to do too much of the work, but romantic roles like these can get down to an actor's essence in ways that more complex parts can't. Stowe has never become as big a star as she should have. Cora is the definitive combination of Stowe's delicate, cameo-like beauty and her unflinching gutsiness. When Cora has to shoot a charging Indian, it's only the expression in Stowe's eyes that's tremulous; physically she's rock steady. Day-Lewis has some fine, subtle moments, as when he allows a ghost of a sardonic smirk to play around his mouth while listening to some idiocy from the British officers, but the heart of his performance is the deadly grace with which he jumps and whirls around as he dispatches opponents in the (breathlessly exciting) battle scenes, or the way he appears to have concentrated every ounce of his being as he runs through the woods. Day-Lewis never seems ridiculous in his long hair and buckskins, never seems to be slumming in this action role because the physicality of his performances has always been on a heroic scale. Like Olivier, he's one of those rare actors who can play a hero without having to resort to parody or apology.
Reducing Fenimore Cooper's turgid novel to a tale of big primal emotions gives the story more immediacy and passion than it ever had. Mann's conception doesn't allow for the lightly self-mocking humor of a swashbuckler. But his willingness to present the derring-do of adventure movies straight gives the picture the sweep and color of legend, as in the moment when the approach of a Huron war party is symbolized by the blurred glow of their torches passing beneath a waterfall.
There is one element that Mann's storybook romance can't contain, and that's Jodhi May's performance as Cora's younger sister Alice. May (she also played Barbara Hershey's daughter in "A World Apart") has almost no lines; possessing a face worthy of silent film, she doesn't need them. Alice spends much of the movie watching in paralyzed fear as her adventure into the colony outposts turns into a nightmare. May plays these scenes almost stock still, unblinking, as if Alice had turned into a movie camera as the images she sees are burned into her brain. With each new horror (which we see as she does, lightning fast and lingering at the same time), you sense Alice retreating further and further from the reality of what's before her. But she returns to possession of herself in a scene that both embraces and explodes Cooper's vision of the character as the pious young woman who will do anything to keep her virtue. May is terrifying in this moment, drawing out the seconds before Alice makes her final choice until they feel like an eternity. May turns the scene into Alice's revenge, payback for every atrocity her young eyes have been made to see, a promise to haunt the dreams of her tormentors. The scene cracks the movie open. Stowe and Day-Lewis may be its heroic/romantic soul. May is its avenging angel.
Old Hollywood meets new Hollywood in Michael Mann's 1992 version of "The Last of the Mohicans." Based on both James Fenimore Cooper's novel and the screenplay for the 1936 film version (starring Randolph Scott as Cooper's noble savage Hawkeye) the movie is recognizably, even reassuringly, old-fashioned. Mann provides emotions in big, readily identifiable slabs -- heroism, cowardice, loyalty, revenge, love -- and assigns them to his characters as if he were handing out charades instructions. But Mann also employs an MTV slickness that's pure '90s. He conceives of the story as if it were a gigantic piece of mood music. The look of the movie's ravishing landscapes (shot by Dante Spinotti, with the forests of North Carolina and Pennsylvania standing in for New York state circa 1757) and the faces of the movie's ravishing actors (Daniel Day-Lewis and Madeleine Stowe) carry as much emotion as the story does. And Mann slathers Trevor Jones' score -- a synthesized, symphonic wash -- over everything. When Stowe's Cora swoons against Day-Lewis' Hawkeye in a besieged fort as the night sky glows with the fires of combat behind them and Jones' syrup swells on the soundtrack, you can giggle or you can surrender to the very real charisma of the two stars. Probably you'll do both. "The Last of the Mohicans" is a striking mixture of the ersatz and the genuine. In other words, it's vintage Hollywood. It's also a smashingly entertaining and satisfying adventure.
In his other movies, Mann's specialty has been a chic, chilly existential pulp angst that's as simplistic and inflated as his titles -- "Thief," "Manhunter," "Heat." But the adventure-book tone of "The Last of the Mohicans," which is set during the war between England and France for control of the American colonies, clears away all of the director's phony torment. "The Last of the Mohicans" makes you understand why adventure stories were once called romances. It's a date movie in the guise of an action movie. Hawkeye and Cora are like a colonial Tarzan and Jane: She's the white woman who ventures into the wilderness only to be saved by the European who has learned the ways of the natives, and with whom she finds love. That's a female fantasy perhaps even more than a male one. This noble wild man brings out the woman's passionate nature which has no outlet in the corsetted society she comes from. One look at Cora's priggish suitor (Steven Waddington, with his piggy snout), a Redcoat officer given to homilies about how respect and friendship are the basis for a successful union, and civilization doesn't seem like such a hot idea. The way Mann brings together Hawkeye and Cora after he rescues Cora from a band of marauding Hurons shows a witty grasp of movie glamor: You can tell they're a love match by the way Stowe's unpinned tresses match up with Day-Lewis'. Later the pair take temporary refuge in a cave behind a cascading waterfall, the torrents of water standing in for the lovers' emotions. This natural wonder seems to exist to provide a showcase for the stars' sexiness.
Mann shortchanges Stowe and Day-Lewis by allowing his atmospherics to do too much of the work, but romantic roles like these can get down to an actor's essence in ways that more complex parts can't. Stowe has never become as big a star as she should have. Cora is the definitive combination of Stowe's delicate, cameo-like beauty and her unflinching gutsiness. When Cora has to shoot a charging Indian, it's only the expression in Stowe's eyes that's tremulous; physically she's rock steady. Day-Lewis has some fine, subtle moments, as when he allows a ghost of a sardonic smirk to play around his mouth while listening to some idiocy from the British officers, but the heart of his performance is the deadly grace with which he jumps and whirls around as he dispatches opponents in the (breathlessly exciting) battle scenes, or the way he appears to have concentrated every ounce of his being as he runs through the woods. Day-Lewis never seems ridiculous in his long hair and buckskins, never seems to be slumming in this action role because the physicality of his performances has always been on a heroic scale. Like Olivier, he's one of those rare actors who can play a hero without having to resort to parody or apology.
Reducing Fenimore Cooper's turgid novel to a tale of big primal emotions gives the story more immediacy and passion than it ever had. Mann's conception doesn't allow for the lightly self-mocking humor of a swashbuckler. But his willingness to present the derring-do of adventure movies straight gives the picture the sweep and color of legend, as in the moment when the approach of a Huron war party is symbolized by the blurred glow of their torches passing beneath a waterfall.
There is one element that Mann's storybook romance can't contain, and that's Jodhi May's performance as Cora's younger sister Alice. May (she also played Barbara Hershey's daughter in "A World Apart") has almost no lines; possessing a face worthy of silent film, she doesn't need them. Alice spends much of the movie watching in paralyzed fear as her adventure into the colony outposts turns into a nightmare. May plays these scenes almost stock still, unblinking, as if Alice had turned into a movie camera as the images she sees are burned into her brain. With each new horror (which we see as she does, lightning fast and lingering at the same time), you sense Alice retreating further and further from the reality of what's before her. But she returns to possession of herself in a scene that both embraces and explodes Cooper's vision of the character as the pious young woman who will do anything to keep her virtue. May is terrifying in this moment, drawing out the seconds before Alice makes her final choice until they feel like an eternity. May turns the scene into Alice's revenge, payback for every atrocity her young eyes have been made to see, a promise to haunt the dreams of her tormentors. The scene cracks the movie open. Stowe and Day-Lewis may be its heroic/romantic soul. May is its avenging angel.
Tuesday, July 08, 2008
Why the Tale of Alice Munro Is A Metaphor For Life
This was originally the prologue to a 36 page essay/diary I gave to a few people in 2006 after my journey to Mohicanland (which is to say the state of North Carolina wherein "Last of the Mohicans" was filmed) entitled, uh, One Man's Journey to Mohicanland. I long yearned to write about why Alice Munro's plight contained in said film was a perfect metaphor for all of life and in the wake of my journey finally did so. And today I offer it up to all. I hope you enjoy it.
My favorite character of all time in any movie ever made is undoubtedly Alice Munro (played by Jodhi May) of my all time favorite movie, "Last of the Mohicans". She is my favorite character because I find her storyline during the course of the movie to be - simply stated - a summation of the entire human existence. The obvious question would, of course, be how a character who appears onscreen for no more than about fifteen minutes make such a sizable statement regarding the human condition. Well, since you asked......
A little background before we start - Alice is the younger sister of Cora Munro, our headstrong heroine. They are both daughters of Colonel Munro, commander of Fort William Henry in the midst of The French and Indian War.
A.) Our introduction to Alice comes moments after British Major Duncan Heyward has proposed to Cora. Alice waltzes in, oblivious to the proposal, and Duncan stands to greet her. Alice confirms that they are set to march with Duncan's regiment to Fort William Henry the next day and asks him, "Have you seen the red man?" This, of course, is a reference to their Indian "friends". This is not meant to indicate racism on Alice's part but merely a naivete. And this scene as a whole symbolizes everyone's naivete in the early years of their lives. Notice how eager Alice is to set off on said march. "What an adventure," she says, unaware of all the potential danger.
We're all eager during our youth to get on with living and doing "what we want to do". We talk excitedly of being "adults". We want to press on with the adventure in the march of our own lives to reach our own variations of Fort William Henry. Ah, but we don't know what awaits us in the colonial forests of the real world, do we?
B.) The next time we encounter Alice is during the aforementioned march. The regiment's guide for this march is a supposed Mohawk Indian named Magua. But alas, Magua is our villain and leads them into an ambush. We see Alice thrown from her horse. We watch Alice watch a scalping. She is horrified.
This is the moment when we all enter the real world for the first time, only to find ourselves ambushed by those realities. Alice watching that scalping represents the first time reality smacks us upside the head and we realize just what we've gotten ourselves into.
C.) In the course of the ambush, our trio of heroes - Hawkeye, Uncas and Chingachcook - save the day. Once it has been saved, Uncas shoos away the horses Alice and Cora had been riding. "Stop it!" Alice cries. "We need them to get out!" But Uncas advises the horses are "too easy to track. Can be heard for miles." Notice the way Alice looks at him after he gives his explanation. It is the look of someone who is seeing and hearing something she never has.
Uncas becomes symbolic of that particular thing which saves each of our lives. Perhaps it's a person, or an occupation, or a hobby, or something else, who knows. Uncas is that which provides hope, allowing us to wake up every morning and save the day. We may not realize this at first (as Alice does not instantly recognize she loves Uncas) but we will.
D.) Our main characters trek through the wilderness where they encounter an Indian burial ground, a frontier cabin terrorized by a war party and a lovely waterfall wherein we gain our first hint of Uncas's attraction to Alice.
(Sidenote: At the waterfall take special note of how Alice treats this situation. Everyone else hikes right past this gorgeous display of gushing water and hikes up the rocky incline at its side. Chingachcook, Hawkeye, Duncan, Cora, they all do it. But Alice pauses to observe the waterfall to her left. She takes it in and then she climbs up. This is a moment for a writer to love. We writers are constantly taking time out to behold these things you other people ignore so much you don't even take them for granted. Go, Alice, go.)
At the conclusion of their dramatic expedition, the group ascends a ridge where Fort William Henry is waiting for them. As they scale this ridge, Duncan reassures Alice of the pleasures they will have at the fort and Alice excitedly declares how she cannot wait to see her father. But at the top of the ridge they look across the lake to find their destination under heavy attack from the French.
What we find here (in conjunction with the prior scenes) is the representation of that point in our lives when we have accepted some of our dreams have been dashed but still find resolve to seek out the dreams we have left. Or, to say it another way, much optimism has been stripped away but there is still defiance. Things had gone wrong but we are still determined to trek through the wilderness and reach our own personal Fort William Henry. But all that defiance and resolve wilts away when we come over that ridge and find our personal Fort William Henry under attack.
E.) Once inside the fort, Duncan tracks down Cora. He bursts into the room and Alice excuses herself by saying, "Talk to Duncan, Cora. I must manage. I cannot be an invalid schoolgirl." Oh, how this scene wrecks my heart. This is when we see that naive and hopeful shell that had been surrounding Alice begin to crack. That's how she views herself - as an invalid schoolgirl.
And don't we all reach the point when we realize we're invalid schoolgirls? Defiance turns to helplessness. We must accept who we are and decide if that's who we want to be.
F.) At the conclusion of the film, Alice and Cora - along with Duncan - find themselves prisoners of Magua, who drags them to his village to consult with the great Sachem - the leader of their Huron tribe. After much debate - and a heroic appearance by Hawkeye - the great Sachem decrees that Cora will burn in a fire for Magua's dead children but orders Magua to take Alice with him and keep her alive so Magua's heart is healed. (Cora isn't the point here, obviously, but her life is spared courtesy of a noble decision by Duncan.) It doesn't take much to guess that Magua is upset by this declaration as he and his war party haul Alice off to the "fire of the lakes". But Uncas has been watching all this from afar and goes after her.
Uncas fights his way through the first few Hurons of the war party and quickly comes face to face with Magua. Alice tries to go to Uncas but she is held back and therefore is forced to watch as Magua fatally wounds Uncas. Uncas steps back. He looks at Alice. She looks back. And this is when it all comes together. She realizes that for the first time in her entire existence as an "invalid schoolgirl" someone has appeared who cares completely and utterly for her. He has risked everything - including his life - for her. The single greatest thing to happen to Alice (ever! at any point!) has made itself known.
That's why, naturally, he dies. Literally seconds after figuring out how much he means to her, he's taken away. Magua finishes off poor Uncas and tosses his body over the side of the cliff.
But rather than continuing her march with the Hurons, Alice backs up to the edge of that very same cliff. She looks over the precipice and then back at Magua. Magua signals for her to come away from the ledge. But she doesn't. She stares at him, calmly and defiantly, and hurls herself off to meet the same fate as Uncas, side-by-side.
You may think this is depressing. You may think this is me being a bit morbid. How can someone committing suicide sum up the human existence? It's what Alice's choice represents, that's how. This is the first time in the whole movie that she has made a decision on her own. This is what SHE wants and this is what SHE'S choosing. It doesn't matter what Magua wants. Or what Cora (who witnesses Alice's leap) wants. Or what God wants. It's what ALICE wants. So that's what she does. She chooses life in death.
I wept the first time I saw this. I've wept on many subsequent viewings of this. It's the most beautiful moment in the history of art. It made me want to write movies and made me want to make movies. And it's why - contrary to what people feel the need to tell me all the damn time - Alice Munro is more than just a movie character.
To people who constantly make that claim allow me to say that I sincerely apologize for not knowing you had no soul.
My favorite character of all time in any movie ever made is undoubtedly Alice Munro (played by Jodhi May) of my all time favorite movie, "Last of the Mohicans". She is my favorite character because I find her storyline during the course of the movie to be - simply stated - a summation of the entire human existence. The obvious question would, of course, be how a character who appears onscreen for no more than about fifteen minutes make such a sizable statement regarding the human condition. Well, since you asked......
A little background before we start - Alice is the younger sister of Cora Munro, our headstrong heroine. They are both daughters of Colonel Munro, commander of Fort William Henry in the midst of The French and Indian War.
A.) Our introduction to Alice comes moments after British Major Duncan Heyward has proposed to Cora. Alice waltzes in, oblivious to the proposal, and Duncan stands to greet her. Alice confirms that they are set to march with Duncan's regiment to Fort William Henry the next day and asks him, "Have you seen the red man?" This, of course, is a reference to their Indian "friends". This is not meant to indicate racism on Alice's part but merely a naivete. And this scene as a whole symbolizes everyone's naivete in the early years of their lives. Notice how eager Alice is to set off on said march. "What an adventure," she says, unaware of all the potential danger.
We're all eager during our youth to get on with living and doing "what we want to do". We talk excitedly of being "adults". We want to press on with the adventure in the march of our own lives to reach our own variations of Fort William Henry. Ah, but we don't know what awaits us in the colonial forests of the real world, do we?
B.) The next time we encounter Alice is during the aforementioned march. The regiment's guide for this march is a supposed Mohawk Indian named Magua. But alas, Magua is our villain and leads them into an ambush. We see Alice thrown from her horse. We watch Alice watch a scalping. She is horrified.
This is the moment when we all enter the real world for the first time, only to find ourselves ambushed by those realities. Alice watching that scalping represents the first time reality smacks us upside the head and we realize just what we've gotten ourselves into.
C.) In the course of the ambush, our trio of heroes - Hawkeye, Uncas and Chingachcook - save the day. Once it has been saved, Uncas shoos away the horses Alice and Cora had been riding. "Stop it!" Alice cries. "We need them to get out!" But Uncas advises the horses are "too easy to track. Can be heard for miles." Notice the way Alice looks at him after he gives his explanation. It is the look of someone who is seeing and hearing something she never has.
Uncas becomes symbolic of that particular thing which saves each of our lives. Perhaps it's a person, or an occupation, or a hobby, or something else, who knows. Uncas is that which provides hope, allowing us to wake up every morning and save the day. We may not realize this at first (as Alice does not instantly recognize she loves Uncas) but we will.
D.) Our main characters trek through the wilderness where they encounter an Indian burial ground, a frontier cabin terrorized by a war party and a lovely waterfall wherein we gain our first hint of Uncas's attraction to Alice.
(Sidenote: At the waterfall take special note of how Alice treats this situation. Everyone else hikes right past this gorgeous display of gushing water and hikes up the rocky incline at its side. Chingachcook, Hawkeye, Duncan, Cora, they all do it. But Alice pauses to observe the waterfall to her left. She takes it in and then she climbs up. This is a moment for a writer to love. We writers are constantly taking time out to behold these things you other people ignore so much you don't even take them for granted. Go, Alice, go.)
At the conclusion of their dramatic expedition, the group ascends a ridge where Fort William Henry is waiting for them. As they scale this ridge, Duncan reassures Alice of the pleasures they will have at the fort and Alice excitedly declares how she cannot wait to see her father. But at the top of the ridge they look across the lake to find their destination under heavy attack from the French.
What we find here (in conjunction with the prior scenes) is the representation of that point in our lives when we have accepted some of our dreams have been dashed but still find resolve to seek out the dreams we have left. Or, to say it another way, much optimism has been stripped away but there is still defiance. Things had gone wrong but we are still determined to trek through the wilderness and reach our own personal Fort William Henry. But all that defiance and resolve wilts away when we come over that ridge and find our personal Fort William Henry under attack.
E.) Once inside the fort, Duncan tracks down Cora. He bursts into the room and Alice excuses herself by saying, "Talk to Duncan, Cora. I must manage. I cannot be an invalid schoolgirl." Oh, how this scene wrecks my heart. This is when we see that naive and hopeful shell that had been surrounding Alice begin to crack. That's how she views herself - as an invalid schoolgirl.
And don't we all reach the point when we realize we're invalid schoolgirls? Defiance turns to helplessness. We must accept who we are and decide if that's who we want to be.
F.) At the conclusion of the film, Alice and Cora - along with Duncan - find themselves prisoners of Magua, who drags them to his village to consult with the great Sachem - the leader of their Huron tribe. After much debate - and a heroic appearance by Hawkeye - the great Sachem decrees that Cora will burn in a fire for Magua's dead children but orders Magua to take Alice with him and keep her alive so Magua's heart is healed. (Cora isn't the point here, obviously, but her life is spared courtesy of a noble decision by Duncan.) It doesn't take much to guess that Magua is upset by this declaration as he and his war party haul Alice off to the "fire of the lakes". But Uncas has been watching all this from afar and goes after her.
Uncas fights his way through the first few Hurons of the war party and quickly comes face to face with Magua. Alice tries to go to Uncas but she is held back and therefore is forced to watch as Magua fatally wounds Uncas. Uncas steps back. He looks at Alice. She looks back. And this is when it all comes together. She realizes that for the first time in her entire existence as an "invalid schoolgirl" someone has appeared who cares completely and utterly for her. He has risked everything - including his life - for her. The single greatest thing to happen to Alice (ever! at any point!) has made itself known.
That's why, naturally, he dies. Literally seconds after figuring out how much he means to her, he's taken away. Magua finishes off poor Uncas and tosses his body over the side of the cliff.
But rather than continuing her march with the Hurons, Alice backs up to the edge of that very same cliff. She looks over the precipice and then back at Magua. Magua signals for her to come away from the ledge. But she doesn't. She stares at him, calmly and defiantly, and hurls herself off to meet the same fate as Uncas, side-by-side.
You may think this is depressing. You may think this is me being a bit morbid. How can someone committing suicide sum up the human existence? It's what Alice's choice represents, that's how. This is the first time in the whole movie that she has made a decision on her own. This is what SHE wants and this is what SHE'S choosing. It doesn't matter what Magua wants. Or what Cora (who witnesses Alice's leap) wants. Or what God wants. It's what ALICE wants. So that's what she does. She chooses life in death.
I wept the first time I saw this. I've wept on many subsequent viewings of this. It's the most beautiful moment in the history of art. It made me want to write movies and made me want to make movies. And it's why - contrary to what people feel the need to tell me all the damn time - Alice Munro is more than just a movie character.
To people who constantly make that claim allow me to say that I sincerely apologize for not knowing you had no soul.
Monday, July 07, 2008
A Mohican Themed Week
Miles: "How long have you been into wine?"
Maya: "I started to get serious about seven years ago."
Miles: "What was the bottle that did it?"
Maya: "Eighty-eight Sassicaia."
That is an exchange between Paul Giamatti and Virginia Madsen from wonderful wine-themed film "Sideways". It makes me smile to hear it not because I too love the Eighty-eight Sassicaia (the what?) but because it makes me think of how a similar exchange might unfold in my life.
"So, Nick, how long have you been into the film de cinema?"
"I started to get serious about fifteen years ago."
"What was the movie that did it?"
"Last of the Mohicans."
I don't recall the precise day I first watched it but I do remember it being sometime in July of 1993. Hence, the month set to descend upon us tomorrow is the 15th Anniversary of the first time I saw my very favorite movie. Yes, it's really been that long.
(Note: Recently Jim DeRogatis of the Chicago Sun Times, in the wake of the 15th Anniversary re-release of Liz Phair's landmark album "Exile in Guyville", chided the celebration by stating the truly important anniversaries are the 10th and 25th, not the 15th. Well, since this blog wasn't in existence during the 10th Anniversary of my first viewing of "Last of the Mohicans" and since I'll be - oh, God - 40 on the 25th Anniversary and therefore 1.) Married and possibly with a kid and/or kids and without time to write this blog or 2.) Selling my soul to write screenplays for a living in L.A. and without time to write this blog or 3.) Exactly where I am now with no changes whatsoever and too depressed to write this blog, well, I'm going to go ahead, Jim-boy, and celebrate the 15th Anniversary.)
Bruce Springsteen saw Elvis on The Ed Sullivan Show. Lucinda Williams heard "Highway 61 Revisited". Michael Mann, the writer/director of "Last of the Mohicans", saw "The Joyless Street". Daniel Day Lewis, the star of "Last of the Mohicans", saw, well, let him tell it: "....when 'Mean Streets' came out, I was 16, and you cannot imagine the effect it had on me, a young and slightly wayward guy from south V C London. It was like a light going on in my head. It was so influential for me as a young person."
Sixteen, he said! I was sixteen when I saw "Last of the Mohicans"! Do you see the parallels?! Do you appreciate the irony of this?!
You cannot imagine the effect "Last of the Mohicans" had on me, Daniel, a young and slightly wayward guy from Waukee, Iowa! It was a light going on in my head! It was so influential on me as a young person!
Neko Case had Bessie Griffin and The Gospel Pearls. But let her explain: "'Swing Down Sweet Chariot' (was) the most influential album of my life. It made me want to be a singer, and I thought it would surely make anyone else who heard it feel that way too. I'd never heard anything so passionate. It crushed the thin brittle strains of the 'Bringing in the Sheaves' of my memory under its thundering joyous wheels. There was nothing ironic or tacky about it. I didn't believe in God, and thought religion in general had no redeeming value, but those ladies convinced me I was too mortal to think that I could know for sure, no matter how punk rock I thought I was."
That! All of that! That's how I felt the first time after I saw "Last of the Mohicans"! I'd never seen anything so passionate! There was nothing ironic or tacky about it and it was the closest, at that point in my life, I'd come to seeing and knowing God.
Oh, but here I am using the words of others to try and explain how I feel and that's wrong. Dead wrong. I've got a whole lot to say on my favorite movie myself, though don't think I'm about to go and pour my guts out on this post. No, no, no, one post would not do, my friends. Thus, Cinema Romantico is declaring this to be Mohican Week! So strap yourself in and check back each day! I assure you, the fun's just beginning!
Maya: "I started to get serious about seven years ago."
Miles: "What was the bottle that did it?"
Maya: "Eighty-eight Sassicaia."
That is an exchange between Paul Giamatti and Virginia Madsen from wonderful wine-themed film "Sideways". It makes me smile to hear it not because I too love the Eighty-eight Sassicaia (the what?) but because it makes me think of how a similar exchange might unfold in my life.
"So, Nick, how long have you been into the film de cinema?"
"I started to get serious about fifteen years ago."
"What was the movie that did it?"
"Last of the Mohicans."
I don't recall the precise day I first watched it but I do remember it being sometime in July of 1993. Hence, the month set to descend upon us tomorrow is the 15th Anniversary of the first time I saw my very favorite movie. Yes, it's really been that long.
(Note: Recently Jim DeRogatis of the Chicago Sun Times, in the wake of the 15th Anniversary re-release of Liz Phair's landmark album "Exile in Guyville", chided the celebration by stating the truly important anniversaries are the 10th and 25th, not the 15th. Well, since this blog wasn't in existence during the 10th Anniversary of my first viewing of "Last of the Mohicans" and since I'll be - oh, God - 40 on the 25th Anniversary and therefore 1.) Married and possibly with a kid and/or kids and without time to write this blog or 2.) Selling my soul to write screenplays for a living in L.A. and without time to write this blog or 3.) Exactly where I am now with no changes whatsoever and too depressed to write this blog, well, I'm going to go ahead, Jim-boy, and celebrate the 15th Anniversary.)
Bruce Springsteen saw Elvis on The Ed Sullivan Show. Lucinda Williams heard "Highway 61 Revisited". Michael Mann, the writer/director of "Last of the Mohicans", saw "The Joyless Street". Daniel Day Lewis, the star of "Last of the Mohicans", saw, well, let him tell it: "....when 'Mean Streets' came out, I was 16, and you cannot imagine the effect it had on me, a young and slightly wayward guy from south V C London. It was like a light going on in my head. It was so influential for me as a young person."
Sixteen, he said! I was sixteen when I saw "Last of the Mohicans"! Do you see the parallels?! Do you appreciate the irony of this?!
You cannot imagine the effect "Last of the Mohicans" had on me, Daniel, a young and slightly wayward guy from Waukee, Iowa! It was a light going on in my head! It was so influential on me as a young person!
Neko Case had Bessie Griffin and The Gospel Pearls. But let her explain: "'Swing Down Sweet Chariot' (was) the most influential album of my life. It made me want to be a singer, and I thought it would surely make anyone else who heard it feel that way too. I'd never heard anything so passionate. It crushed the thin brittle strains of the 'Bringing in the Sheaves' of my memory under its thundering joyous wheels. There was nothing ironic or tacky about it. I didn't believe in God, and thought religion in general had no redeeming value, but those ladies convinced me I was too mortal to think that I could know for sure, no matter how punk rock I thought I was."
That! All of that! That's how I felt the first time after I saw "Last of the Mohicans"! I'd never seen anything so passionate! There was nothing ironic or tacky about it and it was the closest, at that point in my life, I'd come to seeing and knowing God.
Oh, but here I am using the words of others to try and explain how I feel and that's wrong. Dead wrong. I've got a whole lot to say on my favorite movie myself, though don't think I'm about to go and pour my guts out on this post. No, no, no, one post would not do, my friends. Thus, Cinema Romantico is declaring this to be Mohican Week! So strap yourself in and check back each day! I assure you, the fun's just beginning!
Wednesday, July 02, 2008
Before The Devil Knows You're Dead: The Opening Scene
In my original review back in January of the 2007 Sidney Lumet directed "Before The Devil Knows You're Dead" I wrote the following: "What makes a good beginning? Well, if you ask one of those studio moguls or producers who profess to know 'what the people want' they'll tell you something slam-bang, something in your face, something most likely with explosions. I would disagree. The finest beginnings should in some sort of way summarize everything that's ahead of us without giving anything away. In the best of the best beginnings it's a situation where it could function all on its own as a short film. 'Before the Devil Knows You're Dead' has one of the greatest beginnings I've ever witnessed."
After that I decided not to reveal even the slightest spoiler to you, my loyal readers, in regards to this wonderous opening. But that, of course, was six months ago. Circumstances have changed. It's been out on DVD for awhile. You've had your opportunity to see it. And I just re-watched it (on the heels of watching Woody Allen's latest blatant misfire "Cassandra's Dream" which explores the same themes as "Before the Devil Knows You're Dead" - I pondered blogging about the Woodman getting schooled on the court of screenwriting by first-timer Kelly Masterson but decided that would depress me too much) and, damn it, I want to talk about the opening 'cuz, Lord, I love it. So I'm going to. Therefore consider this your (immense) spoiler warning.
So, to make sure we're clear, a perfect movie beginning would include 1.) Foreshadowing of what is to come and 2.) An introduction of the film's theme while doing both of these things in such a way that it could function as a short film while still being a part of the film we're about to see.
Fade In.
The initial shot in "Before the Devil Knows You're Dead" is of Andy (Phillip Seymour Hoffman) and Gina (Marisa Tomei) on a bed without, shall we say, the benefit of clothing and engaged in acts not appropriate for toddlers to witness. All right, so if we're to sum up this image in a single word what word would we use? Euphoria.
The opening image represents Euphoria.
Next is an overhead shot of Andy and Gina, both in the frame, laying side by side in the bed, and both almost hysterical with laughter. Andy references the fact he thought they were an "old, married couple" and so we gather this is not something which happens often anymore in their relationship. There is more dialogue, Andy tells Gina to feel his heart and she does, and then she wonders, jokingly, if he will "make it to dinner?" More laughter. Still Europhic.
But then Andy says "I wish we could live like this all the time." Reality creeping in. And, as it does, music appears on the soundtrack for the first time, as if the previous moments were so perfect, so untainted, they did not require that accompaniment for any additional effect.
Gina replies to Andy, "Do we have enough money to live in Brazil for the rest of our lives?" The key in this line is her tone of voice. She says it in a way that is make-believe. She knows they don't, and he knows they don't, but she says it anyway, purely from a hypothetical standpoint. But Andy says to her, "I'll think about it." This line heralds the complete introduction of what?
Reality. It's no longer creeping in - it's there.
Gina, disappointed, rolls over and away from Andy. He asks her, "Where did you go?" She does not reply but we recognize she has gone back to the place where their relationship was prior to this Brazil trip.
He leans in close to her and whispers, twice, "Everything's wonderful." But it's not. He knows it. She knows it. And then she says, "I just don't feel like such a fuck-up when I'm here."
End Scene.
Whew.
So, is this a short film? Why, yes. Yes, it is. In four or five minutes we have gone through the entire spectrum of human emotion. Euphoria to sadness. It has a full arc, more full and satisfying than most feature-length films, mind you. While at the same time this trajectory mirrors the fashion in which the film plays out (when taken in a linear fashion, not in the jump-cut style the film employs). Euphoria in the planning of a perfect crime and that you will get rich quick when you absolutely need the money. Things go wrong but you think you can salvage it and, thus, make empty reassurances to yourself. Finally, unavoidable sadness at the end. Defeat. The film's entire narrative is essentially encapsulated in this beginning while it also sets up key events to come (like Andy and Gina's wanting to escape) and foreshadows (as in Andy's beating heart which turns up later) and establishes the theme - all the characters are fuck-ups and are desperate to feel like they're not.
This beginning is utterly remarkable. Woody Allen's opening to "Manhattan" (back when he had still "it") is a visual poem to his favorite city and while it establishes the prevalent romantic theme and could theoretically work as a short it does not foreshadow, stands outside of the movie to come and is also more of a technical exercise. "Last of the Mohicans" start does not stand outside the movie and foreshadows with three main characters on the hunt and then honoring the dead which parallels the conclusion but is this a short film? No. Likewise "Chinatown" belongs to the movie itself and foreshadows while establishing a theme but wouldn't work all alone. And none of these films manage to present us the arc to come.
Those are some of my favorite movies, folks, but I admit their openings pale in comparison to "Before the Devil Knows You're Dead". It's a How-To that should be taught in screenwriting courses all over the country but probably will never even get a passing mention. That fact is a Greek tragedy.
Much like the opening scene itself.
After that I decided not to reveal even the slightest spoiler to you, my loyal readers, in regards to this wonderous opening. But that, of course, was six months ago. Circumstances have changed. It's been out on DVD for awhile. You've had your opportunity to see it. And I just re-watched it (on the heels of watching Woody Allen's latest blatant misfire "Cassandra's Dream" which explores the same themes as "Before the Devil Knows You're Dead" - I pondered blogging about the Woodman getting schooled on the court of screenwriting by first-timer Kelly Masterson but decided that would depress me too much) and, damn it, I want to talk about the opening 'cuz, Lord, I love it. So I'm going to. Therefore consider this your (immense) spoiler warning.
So, to make sure we're clear, a perfect movie beginning would include 1.) Foreshadowing of what is to come and 2.) An introduction of the film's theme while doing both of these things in such a way that it could function as a short film while still being a part of the film we're about to see.
Fade In.
The initial shot in "Before the Devil Knows You're Dead" is of Andy (Phillip Seymour Hoffman) and Gina (Marisa Tomei) on a bed without, shall we say, the benefit of clothing and engaged in acts not appropriate for toddlers to witness. All right, so if we're to sum up this image in a single word what word would we use? Euphoria.
The opening image represents Euphoria.
Next is an overhead shot of Andy and Gina, both in the frame, laying side by side in the bed, and both almost hysterical with laughter. Andy references the fact he thought they were an "old, married couple" and so we gather this is not something which happens often anymore in their relationship. There is more dialogue, Andy tells Gina to feel his heart and she does, and then she wonders, jokingly, if he will "make it to dinner?" More laughter. Still Europhic.
But then Andy says "I wish we could live like this all the time." Reality creeping in. And, as it does, music appears on the soundtrack for the first time, as if the previous moments were so perfect, so untainted, they did not require that accompaniment for any additional effect.
Gina replies to Andy, "Do we have enough money to live in Brazil for the rest of our lives?" The key in this line is her tone of voice. She says it in a way that is make-believe. She knows they don't, and he knows they don't, but she says it anyway, purely from a hypothetical standpoint. But Andy says to her, "I'll think about it." This line heralds the complete introduction of what?
Reality. It's no longer creeping in - it's there.
Gina, disappointed, rolls over and away from Andy. He asks her, "Where did you go?" She does not reply but we recognize she has gone back to the place where their relationship was prior to this Brazil trip.
He leans in close to her and whispers, twice, "Everything's wonderful." But it's not. He knows it. She knows it. And then she says, "I just don't feel like such a fuck-up when I'm here."
End Scene.
Whew.
So, is this a short film? Why, yes. Yes, it is. In four or five minutes we have gone through the entire spectrum of human emotion. Euphoria to sadness. It has a full arc, more full and satisfying than most feature-length films, mind you. While at the same time this trajectory mirrors the fashion in which the film plays out (when taken in a linear fashion, not in the jump-cut style the film employs). Euphoria in the planning of a perfect crime and that you will get rich quick when you absolutely need the money. Things go wrong but you think you can salvage it and, thus, make empty reassurances to yourself. Finally, unavoidable sadness at the end. Defeat. The film's entire narrative is essentially encapsulated in this beginning while it also sets up key events to come (like Andy and Gina's wanting to escape) and foreshadows (as in Andy's beating heart which turns up later) and establishes the theme - all the characters are fuck-ups and are desperate to feel like they're not.
This beginning is utterly remarkable. Woody Allen's opening to "Manhattan" (back when he had still "it") is a visual poem to his favorite city and while it establishes the prevalent romantic theme and could theoretically work as a short it does not foreshadow, stands outside of the movie to come and is also more of a technical exercise. "Last of the Mohicans" start does not stand outside the movie and foreshadows with three main characters on the hunt and then honoring the dead which parallels the conclusion but is this a short film? No. Likewise "Chinatown" belongs to the movie itself and foreshadows while establishing a theme but wouldn't work all alone. And none of these films manage to present us the arc to come.
Those are some of my favorite movies, folks, but I admit their openings pale in comparison to "Before the Devil Knows You're Dead". It's a How-To that should be taught in screenwriting courses all over the country but probably will never even get a passing mention. That fact is a Greek tragedy.
Much like the opening scene itself.
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