AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH (A Movie Review)
At the beginning of the film, Al Gore says that a 6th grade classmate of his asked the teacher if Africa and South America were ever joined since they look like they fit. Gore tells us that the teacher said no, but he doesn’t blame the teacher because the scientific community didn’t believe in Pangaea at the time. So near the end of the film when he says that the scientific community is unanimous in their belief that man is the cause of global warming, what are we to take from that as an audience? Has collective wisdom suddenly become infallible?
But this is not just a film about global warming. It’s a film about how a man finds a cause to redeem himself. You see, Al Gore is no demigod as he was led to believe. Things do not always go his way. There was nothing he could do to prevent the lung cancer death of his beloved sister (his protector). He was not able to stop his son from being hit by an automobile in a near fatal accident. And he couldn’t win the 2000 election despite a great economy that should have made it easy.
He does not much dwell on his down-to-earth wife or the children unstriken. He doesn’t see the fortune he was born into that allowed him an Ivy League education and a ready-made career in politics. He feels that the great things, the important things have always eluded him and you can tell he feels like a failure. We already know these biographical details of Gore’s life, but he presents them again in this movie to explain what led him to this great cause.
These problems are not unique to Al Gore. Baby Boomers have spent 40 odd years since the tumultuous 1960s trying to make sense out of their lives. His is the generation that questioned the collective wisdom of our forefathers and found greater meaning in the secular religion of social justice. Social justice did not end the human problems that have been with us since time immemorial, but marching felt good. Forget the details, the process gave meaning. And the best thing of all is that you don’t have to achieve results to be victorious. We can celebrate the gains made in the 1960s and still turn around and say there is so much more to do. Win/Win.
And unlike a dead sister, an injured child or a lost election, the disaster about to befall the earth is nebulous in the specifics so he cannot possible be defeated. The world is either destroyed (our fault) or saved (his victory). It’s a moral issue, you see. It’s unethical to destroy the world, don’t you know.
He takes issue with a person who worked in the Bush Administration who changed a global warming study done by the EPA. This gentleman worked for the oil industry before working in Washington. When he was made to resign for making the changes and he again went to work for the oil industry. The oil industry, you see, is in the business of burning as much carbon as possible, because that’s how they make their money. And people who make their money in a particular way see the world in a way that helps them make that money. Gore thus presents profiteers as the enemies of enlightenment, but he fails to understand the implications of that charge.
If the side that makes money is against these findings, and scientists have to feed their children too, then there shouldn’t be any money available for the kind of research that comes to conclusions opposite of the money. Therefore, you have to conclude that there is money on both sides of the issue.
So imagine you are a scientist who takes a grant from some organization and you come back and say, look there is contradictory evidence and I can’t say one way or the other. Do you imagine that you will get a second grant? How will you feed your children? No, you say there is evidence that points in whatever direction that gets you the second grant. It’s easy to do, because a large study will have evidence that points in every which direction, the key is the analysis of that data can go in any direction. Your job as the researcher is to have your numbers on one side that no one understands and your conclusions on the others that follow the prescribed direction. Money gained from profit or research spends just the same. And what if your conclusions are wrong? I mean hey we’re on the safe side, right. It doesn’t hurt to burn less coal. No harm.
That may sound cynical, but the cynicism is on the other side. If the proponents of any argument want to point to profit as motive behind their adversaries findings then it is only logical that the side leveling the charge be looked at in context of the money made from their propositions. Al Gore is not in this to make money, he has his money. He can laugh at a Bush cartoon that balances gold bars and the earth, because he has enough gold bars. But the people who are doing the research that he cherry picks have just as much of a financial stake in their findings as do the greedy capitalists that Gore disparages.
Take a guy like Michael Crichton, Harvard M.D. and popular writer of fiction and nonfiction. Like Gore, Crichton has his gold bars too and it makes not a difference to him financially one way or the other and yet he for some reason falls on the side of profiteers. What would Gore attribute Crichton’s motives? It couldn’t be that someone disagrees with the Vice President after seeing the data, because Gore already explained that no one anywhere does. Only money or ignorance blinds an eye to such an inconvenient truth.
At one point, Gore says you have to forget politics because it’s better to do the right thing than win elections. And yet, where was VP Gore when it was time to push the Kyoto treaty through the senate in the 1990s? Could it be that Kyoto might have hurt the American economy enough to cost him the 2000 election? And what do we make of the Chinese government that regulates search engines and the Internet that doesn’t mind Al Gore speaking in front of their people. His message doesn’t pose any threat to totalitarianism, we can assume. The Chinese will mow down their own citizenry to quell free elections, but Al Gore’s words are sweet music. What Gore does not mention is that China is exempt from Kyoto and if Gore disagreed with that he wouldn’t be speaking in China. It’s a moral issue in America, but why go and knock the Chinese when one bad word would lose you a billion clapping people.
After defeat in the 1860 election, Stephen Douglas volunteered himself to Abraham Lincoln to help prevent the Civil War. After Wendell Wilke lost the 1940 election he joined FDR in ending isolationism and supported lend lease among other things. So when America was attacked by Islamic terrorists, Al Gore produced a movie in which he explains that those who intend to kill us are merely a sideshow compared to the real war we have with the climate. That is an inconvenient truth if you’re riding the coattails of a dot com boom and would hate to see the economy tank due to economic restrictions. It’s not so inconvenient after you lose that election.
This is a film and movement born of narcissism. We were wrong in voting for Bush. He’s fighting the wrong war. Gore even quotes Winston Churchill predicting the Nazi menace, but fails to see the parallels to extreme Islam. The Churchill quotes are used to boost his crusade against the enemy in the mirror. Luckily he loves the world enough to save it even though he was kicked to the curb. We need to stop listening to that jackass in the White House and start fighting the combustion engine.
It’s not a coincidence that he cares not to fight radical Islam and their threats to Western culture, because he decided way back in the 1960s that Western culture wasn’t worth defending. It can come and go as far as he’s concerned, just as long as the sunset is pretty and bunny rabbits are jumping.
The title accuses us of ignoring inconvenient truths, but Gore too ignores the things that do not adhere to his world view. Rather than answer the critics point by point, he disparages their motives. When he can’t paint someone like Michael Crichton as an opportunist he just ignores their existence. He would accuse Bush and war leaders as simplistic boobs who do not know the nuances between sectarian and secular Muslims, but he offers no room for nuance and gray area when it comes to his beliefs. His presentation is as black and white as a Pentecostal preacher warning of Sodom and Gomorrah.
It’s not enough for Gore to present a solid argument, answer the critics and begin a dialog on what can be done to make the world better. The movie is lecture version of Rambo pointing to charts explaining the treachery of the Vietcong and how they must be overcome. It’s just the format that people on his side of the aisle jump to label simplistic and simple-minded.
What’s most unexpected is that Gore does not see how his feelings of powerless over his sister, his son, and the 2000 election have predisposed him to find a proactive cause like saving the world. He sees his crisis of the mind as a virtue that freed him to champion a great cause, instead of a hindrance to a rational and objective view of the world. He doesn’t seem to understand that his pre-disposition is the opposite of objective science. Like the researchers who get their grant money through uncovering a crisis, Gore’s redemption would only be through saving the world.
Like most doomsayers that never get their comeuppance, Gore will be praised for his altruism, ignored for his personal environmental behavior, and seen as well-meaning when his predictions of doomsday do not materialize. This movie will be a document of how much he cared, nothing less.
AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH is an astonishing look into the soul of a man who came of age in the 1960s and forty years later is still trying to reconcile the meaning of his own life. And with knowledge of 2000 years of world literature to fall back on, the best he could present is this simple CHICKEN LITTLE story. If Bush were one to present his midlife crisis in cinema, I would expect at least the equivalent of a Tom Wolfe novel.
Friday, April 20, 2007
Sunday, April 08, 2007
CIRQUE Du SOLEIL’S LOVE (A Stage Show Review)
The average person is well-familiar with Beatles music and that creates a sort of built-in audience. Their catalog is big enough that a lot of interesting subjects can be explored in the storytelling. Most important is the amount of life-affirming music to choose from. McCartney is a master of using that catalog to create a great concert experience.
LOVE begins with BECAUSE from ABBEY ROAD, a somber song no doubt, but made disjointed here by a mix that goes dead silent in between lines. On stage we see somber pageantry. Thankfully it then picks up with GET BACK, but it never sustains any kind of uplifting mood. On stage, a big thing is made of the Liverpool bombings during World War II that coincided with the band member’s birth. The stage is made to look like buildings and rooftops and the staging shows the whole thing being blown to smithereens.
The fun of the Beatles crazy or downbeat music is that those tunes are sandwiched between songs with other temperaments. Here we get nothing but long stretches of one depressing tune on top of the other. Glass onion, Eleanor Rigby, Julia, I am the Walrus back to back to back to back pretty near the beginning of the show. You don’t know how welcome DRIVE MY CAR became after that lineup. A short portion of THE WORD made it next and it was too short-lived. If you’re going to call the show LOVE, the song THE WORD is a great choice for a sequence, because it’s not overplayed and yet has a great catchy sound. They might get 30 seconds out of it here.
The most brutal part of the show was an attempted comedy bit using the song BLACKBIRD. Four people fly into the stage dressed as blackbirds and a Frenchy guy recites the song like a poem as the birds struggle to fly. It was a pathetic attempt at humor and a poor choice of material.
Later in the show the whimsical LADY MADONNA and OCTOPUS’S GARDEN get some time on stage. Four George Harrison numbers, SOMETHING, HERE COMES THE SUN, WHILE MY GUITAR GENTLY WEEPS, and WITHIN YOU WITHOUT YOU are featured pretty prominently I suppose to make quota.
The one really truly great sequence is the choreography that accompanies A DAY IN THE LIFE. That piece was inspired in a way that nothing else in the show can match.
The stunts are ho-hum especially compared to La Nuba at Disney. The big stunt near the end was cancelled due to safety net issues so I may have missed the most exciting thing. While they were trying to fix the problem, the video screens showed us the cartoon rendition of Yellow Submarine as the song played. The only other stunt sequence was a rollerblading part that was a re-tread of every other rollerblading number you’ve seen.
The first time I saw Cirque du Soleil at Disney I said wow. When I saw the same show the second time I thought it was decently done. When I went back a third time I could barely stay awake. This was far less exciting and the musical selection was mostly disappointing. As a big Beatles fan I can appreciate the more obscure songs, but I can’t forgive the mood they chose. How this show could have used GOOD DAY SUNSHINE, GOT TO GET YOU INTO MY LIFE, GETTING BETTER, and WE CAN WORK IT OUT to offset the negativity.
Trade thrills for gloomy pageantry and upbeat music for downbeat music and you have a synopsis of LOVE at the Mirage, a missed opportunity to say the least. I should have seen PENN AND TELLER instead.
The average person is well-familiar with Beatles music and that creates a sort of built-in audience. Their catalog is big enough that a lot of interesting subjects can be explored in the storytelling. Most important is the amount of life-affirming music to choose from. McCartney is a master of using that catalog to create a great concert experience.
LOVE begins with BECAUSE from ABBEY ROAD, a somber song no doubt, but made disjointed here by a mix that goes dead silent in between lines. On stage we see somber pageantry. Thankfully it then picks up with GET BACK, but it never sustains any kind of uplifting mood. On stage, a big thing is made of the Liverpool bombings during World War II that coincided with the band member’s birth. The stage is made to look like buildings and rooftops and the staging shows the whole thing being blown to smithereens.
The fun of the Beatles crazy or downbeat music is that those tunes are sandwiched between songs with other temperaments. Here we get nothing but long stretches of one depressing tune on top of the other. Glass onion, Eleanor Rigby, Julia, I am the Walrus back to back to back to back pretty near the beginning of the show. You don’t know how welcome DRIVE MY CAR became after that lineup. A short portion of THE WORD made it next and it was too short-lived. If you’re going to call the show LOVE, the song THE WORD is a great choice for a sequence, because it’s not overplayed and yet has a great catchy sound. They might get 30 seconds out of it here.
The most brutal part of the show was an attempted comedy bit using the song BLACKBIRD. Four people fly into the stage dressed as blackbirds and a Frenchy guy recites the song like a poem as the birds struggle to fly. It was a pathetic attempt at humor and a poor choice of material.
Later in the show the whimsical LADY MADONNA and OCTOPUS’S GARDEN get some time on stage. Four George Harrison numbers, SOMETHING, HERE COMES THE SUN, WHILE MY GUITAR GENTLY WEEPS, and WITHIN YOU WITHOUT YOU are featured pretty prominently I suppose to make quota.
The one really truly great sequence is the choreography that accompanies A DAY IN THE LIFE. That piece was inspired in a way that nothing else in the show can match.
The stunts are ho-hum especially compared to La Nuba at Disney. The big stunt near the end was cancelled due to safety net issues so I may have missed the most exciting thing. While they were trying to fix the problem, the video screens showed us the cartoon rendition of Yellow Submarine as the song played. The only other stunt sequence was a rollerblading part that was a re-tread of every other rollerblading number you’ve seen.
The first time I saw Cirque du Soleil at Disney I said wow. When I saw the same show the second time I thought it was decently done. When I went back a third time I could barely stay awake. This was far less exciting and the musical selection was mostly disappointing. As a big Beatles fan I can appreciate the more obscure songs, but I can’t forgive the mood they chose. How this show could have used GOOD DAY SUNSHINE, GOT TO GET YOU INTO MY LIFE, GETTING BETTER, and WE CAN WORK IT OUT to offset the negativity.
Trade thrills for gloomy pageantry and upbeat music for downbeat music and you have a synopsis of LOVE at the Mirage, a missed opportunity to say the least. I should have seen PENN AND TELLER instead.
FEB/MARCH 2007 MOVIE REVIEWS
*** Superior Film
** Solid Effort
* Same ole
# Sleep Aid
***DOWNFALL (2004) – The last days of Hitler down in the bunker with chums like Goebbels hanging around to the bitter end. It’s told partially through the eyes of the young lady who comes to work as a secretary for the lunatic in 1942. Her memoir is part of the source material. It gives you an opportunity to root that she’ll get the hell out in time while we hear sober Nazis plead with Hitler to surrender to the Americans before the Russians take over the city. DOWNFALL is to the bunker what DAS BOOT is to the submarine, compelling despite being told from the viewpoint of our sworn enemies. If you see only the occasional foreign film, put this one at the top of the list.
**THE WORLD’S FASTEST INDIAN (2005) – Sweet film with Anthony Hopkins as amateur mechanic from New Zealand that dreams of taking his modified Indian Motorcycle to race in the Great Salt Flats. Inspiring and while it’s doesn’t blow you away, it leaves you with a good feeling.
*WINTER KILLS (1979) – From the Richard Condon novel (Manchurian Candidate), this black comedy about younger brother (Jeff Bridges) of JFK like President and the circumstances surrounding his assassination begins in all sincerity and then becomes increasingly absurd up to the climax. John Huston plays the father and a lot of cameos are sprinkled throughout. Had it maintained more subtlety and provided its surprises more believably, it could have been a minor classic. Instead, it’s so in your face by the end that I turned on it.
*THE AMERICANIZATION OF EMILY (1964) – James Garner stars as that charming con man that he does best. Julie Andrews in only her second role shows the kind of range and career she could have had if Mary Poppins and the Sound of Music hadn’t defined her. Garner plays scrounging junior officer in England during World War II, who manages to stay out of the fighting by being invaluable to his General. Andrews plays the dame that hates his open cowardice but somewhat likes the idea that he won’t be heroically killed like her late husband. It’s scripted by Paddy Chayefsky, so you get comedy wrapped around some legitimately serious issues. James Couburn shows up as Garner’s best friend. Not really worth seeking out, but it won’t sting if you happen across it.
*MY ARCHITECT (2003) – Documentary by the illegitimate son of noted architect Louis Kahn who dropped dead in New York’s Penn Station just around the time he was becoming known in design circles. The son, Nathanial, grows up and goes on a journey to learn about his father, his father’s other children, and the legacy that he left. Kahn had three separate families although he never actually left his wife. What’s interesting is how none of his scorned women blame him for anything. It’s something about the genius they all saw in him that allowed them to forgive him any transgression. The architecture itself is only somewhat interesting as Kahn seemed to get by on his personality more than anything else. Louis sort of comes off as a heel rather than hero so past Nathaniel’s own reckoning you don’t really feel any satisfaction.
**KNIFE IN THE WATER (1962) – Roman Polanski’s gained international attention with this his first full-length film. A husband and wife are heading to a weekend on their boat when they pick up a young hitchhiker. The psychological games between the husband and hitchhiker make up most of the film from there, with the wife providing the sexual tension. The film really keeps you wondering how much the competition will escalate and it never crosses the line of believability although much of the shenanigans seem petty. I wonder how Polanski made such a movie under Polish communism and what would a person in 1962 Poland do for a living to own a nice sailboat. The confines of that boat help create a really interesting tension that makes the movie worthwhile even if the plot is almost nil.
**Z (1969) – Nominated for Best Picture in 1969, this movie is loosely based on a Greek political assassination in the mid 60s that brought down a noted progressive politician. Yves Montand stars as the quiet yet charismatic leftist that gets knocked off early on so that the mystery of his downfall can unravel. The movie, shocking at the time I’m told, reveals how the right-wing government was complicit in the great man’s death. After seeing Oliver Stone’s JFK, this seems like kindergarten. I have to think that the politics are largely responsible for the reputation of this movie, although it’s put together decently enough to be compelling. It makes me wonder though what’s the best movie ever made that shows the overthrow or assassination of a beloved right-wing figure?
**FUNERAL IN BERLIN (1966) – The second movie in the Harry Palmer series is a solid follow-up to IPCRESS FILE. Michael Caine is recruited to East Germany where he is to help a defecting Russian general. Despite his superior’s excitement over this opportunity, Caine doesn’t buy the General’s story and tries to figure out what’s really at work here. The movie also tells us more about Palmer’s origins as an agent and introduces to us an old friend of his. Caine is charming as the hero and either of these first two movies are worth seeing.
# ROOM 666 (1984) – Wim Wenders “documentary” shot at the Cannes film festival where noted directors of the day, Spielberg, Godard, Herzog expound in front of the camera about the future of film and their hopes for the medium. A good enough idea, but the subjects are mostly rambling and not terribly insightful. Thankfully shorter than an hour, but still a labor to get through.
**LA MOUSTACHE (2005) – Interesting French film starring Vincent Lindon who decides to shave his moustache and is surprised that no one notices. An American film with this premise would be about how the world was conspiring against our hero. The charm of European movies is how it’s never automatic. Maybe our hero is right, maybe our hero is crazy. The shame of this movie is that the question never really gets answered and reality itself becomes open for interpretation. I don’t mind ambiguousness if you can make me 90% sure I know what happened and can suppose the rest. Here, the whole thing becomes so dream-like that any interpretation is possible. That’s the only minus.
*THIS FILM IS NOT YET RATED (2005) – Documentary about the MPAA and the subjective rating system. It succeeds when it compares movies and talks to directors about their problems. The history of the system and process is little-known and worth exploring. But there just isn’t enough material to make a whole movie about that, so the filmmakers decide to stake out and learn the identities of the secret MPAA board. The detective game could have been riveting, but it plays instead as a half-ass cable reality show. It gets worse when the movie becomes a soapbox for people to whine that sex is purged while violence flourishes. The system is not perfect but what system is? At least it’s a market response to film content instead of a government one. But, wait . . . the endless cries of censorship culminate in a guy saying he wishes that the government controlled movies because government censorship could be litigated in a court of law while the MPAA cannot be touched. So it’s better to allow real censorship with the hopes of lawsuits than a market solution that might close the question. Theatre owners like the current system because it loosened the content of movies while shielding them from angry parents. And since most movies are watched on DVD and most never have a theatrical playing, this whole exercise was kind of pointless. The unrated DVD is a big market and makes a lot of people watch the movie twice. A film about real censorship in world cinema would have been more poignant instead of this cry-baby piece.
*HOLIDAY (2006) – Kate Winslet, Cameron Diaz, Jack Black and Jude Law in this romantic comedy that benefits for its lack of the Frat Pack and Jennifer Aniston. Winslet trades her English Country home with Cameron Diaz and her Hollywood mansion for two weeks during the holidays and they both might meet-cute and fall in love with the male leads. The film deserves an honorable mention simply because Eli Wallach gets a pretty juicy supporting role and shines throughout. Also, get this, his character is a retired Hollywood screenwriter who is going to accept an award and they never once mention that he was blacklisted. Movies from 1975 on had hereto convinced me that every 1950s screenwriter had been blacklisted and I am almost incredulous to learn that one guy made it through the whole decade in tact. I can only guess that Wallach had that tragedy removed from the script because the typewriter would have no doubt included it even beyond the wishes of the scenarist.
*16 BLOCKS (2006) – Standard police fare with Willis as the believable alkie cop trying to protect a witness who is to testify against crooked cops. David Morse supports as the calm heavy that he seems born to play. Mos Def (that’s a person’s name?) is the annoying chatterbox witness that would have gained more sympathy by shutting up which thankfully he does as the movie wears on. Decent but a little overrated maybe due to Richard Donner’s participation or simply the conflict of bad cops that critics seem to believe more so than honest ones.
*INFAMOUS (2006) – The second Capote bio-drama that promised to be more about his entire life but in reality treads the same exact Kansas ground as CAPOTE (2005). It does spend more time in the trendy Manhatten circles with plenty of cameos by socialites, but it’s otherwise unsurprising. Toby Jones benefits from his diminutive presence versus the larger Phillip Seymore Hoffman, but other than the solid impersonation, Jones doesn’t get the emotional moments as well as Hoffman does. The movie also makes a mistake in casting Daniel Craig as Perry Smith. Craig is too powerful and masculine for Capote to overcome, whereas earlier portrayals of the character by Robert Blake (IN COLD BLOOD) and Clifton Collins (CAPOTE) were almost childlike. The issues here are more superficial and the stakes don’t seem as high. There is a funny bit about Capote claiming to have beaten Bogart at arm wrestling so that the whole town then tries to beat Capote.
*DARLING (1965) the movie that put Julie Christie on the map would seem prime for a remake with so few great female parts, except that Christie’s promiscuity that made the original interesting and controversial is very tame in relation to the average celebrity’s real life experiences. The movie mostly demonstrates what use to be outrageous and how flippant characters would eventually get their comeuppance. Today, the character would just seem to be an example of a valid lifestyle choice that you dare not criticize.
**ROCKY BALBOA (2006) – Spending your career cashing in on cartoon action movies doesn’t get you much respect in Hollywood, especially when you aren’t overtly leftwing. Once in a while Sylvester Stallone would show up in a character part like Cop Land and be quite convincing, but he only really gets to act when he writes his own material. This last Rocky film is surprising especially after his last abortive attempt at re-defining the franchise. Rocky V was so terrible that it could very well have been his burial. ROCKY BALBOA is not by any means great in the conventional sense, but it has such an understated honesty that it’s one of the most enjoyable surprises out of Hollywood in a long time. In the past, Rocky has used boxing to fight bullies and even the cold war, but here his heart as a fighter is used for his own redemption. If you liked any of the Rocky movies you should appreciate if not really enjoy this one.
*DaVINCI CODE (2006) – The most interesting thing about this story is how popular it is. A hardcover best seller for three years is rare and then followed by a movie that grosses $200 million makes DaVINCI CODE something like a modern day GONE WITH THE WIND. I haven’t read the book and I skipped the movie in the theatre, but this franchise is just too much a part of the zeitgeist to ignore forever. I don’t know where the book and movie vary, but a scene in the second half of the movie demonstrates why I think it’s so popular. When trying to decode an Isaac Newton puzzle, Tom Hanks realizes the answer is APPLE. It’s not Newton’s laws of motion or thermodynamics or calculus that you have to know to understand the mystery, but the thing you learned about Newton in 4th grade. The same goes for the DaVinci references in the Mona Lisa and the Last Supper. You don’t have to know anything about DaVinci or Newton other than the most superficial or famous icons of their existence. The movie takes cultural and historic things that you are so familiar with that it makes you feel smart. And I think it’s that play to personal vanity that separates it from simple potboiler to international sensation. Umberto Eco used the Templars as the Center of his early 1990s novel, FOCULT’S PENDULUM without anywhere near the success. And it’s not like Eco wasn’t a bestselling author, he wrote the popular NAME OF THE ROSE. But FP takes a great deal more analysis and brainpower to get through. I have had a copy sitting here for years that I have yet to crack. A friend told me that Dan Brown is the Grisham version of Eco and although I haven’t read Grisham either, the comparison seems apt. I think the movie is probably the best way to catch up on the hoopla without the time investment. Still they could have done us a favor and made it 30 minutes shorter.
*A GOOD YEAR (2006) – This movie is much more of a comedy and a slapstick one than I would have expected. I saw it a week ago and it’s already mostly forgotten. A familiar story with venal Crowe returning to the place of his childhood to remember his better upbringing and the lessons he forgot. Albert Finney is the kind uncle shown in flashback As you’d expect, Crowe’s change of heart is rewarded with the love of a fetching French woman. The title is confusing unless the book was significantly different. The whole story takes place in a week or so.
*HOLLYWOODLAND (2006) – Detective Adrien Brody looks into the death of actor George Reeves AKA TV’s Superman. Ben Affleck is decent as Reeves in flashback as is Diane Lane and Bob Hoskins. It doesn’t really go anywhere and there isn’t much payoff, but they do a good job of recreating that period.
**THE PRESTIGE (2006) – Another worthwhile Chris Nolan effort pits Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale as rival magicians in Victorian England. Both are excellent as is Michael Caine as the mentor to both. Based on the acclaimed 1990s novel that even incorporates David Bowie as Nikola Tesla into the plotline. The Prestige is interesting for the story twists, approach and style. On the special features, Nolan sounds very much British while his screenwriter brother, Jonathan, sounds like an American. It turns out that their father is British and their mother is American and they grew up In Chicago which explains the Batman locale.
*MARIE ANTIONETTE (2006) – Sophia Coppola’s third film is probably her least interesting. Kirsten Dunst is affable enough as the Queen we’re all taught to hate, but the movie is slow going with King Jason Schwartzman a dolt who doesn’t seem interested in his arranged marriage. You could almost hear the incredulous screams from fraternity houses as he turned down her advances. The movie also suffers in my opinion from Coppola’s choice of modern musical montages in place of a classical score.
*INVINCIBLE (2006) – Typically inspiring and mostly predictable story of everyman Philadelphia native who succeeds in his long shot tryout with the Eagles. You root for Wahlberg all the way. Another member of the recent Disney subgenre of underdog sports stories like MIRACLE and THE ROOKIE.
*** Superior Film
** Solid Effort
* Same ole
# Sleep Aid
***DOWNFALL (2004) – The last days of Hitler down in the bunker with chums like Goebbels hanging around to the bitter end. It’s told partially through the eyes of the young lady who comes to work as a secretary for the lunatic in 1942. Her memoir is part of the source material. It gives you an opportunity to root that she’ll get the hell out in time while we hear sober Nazis plead with Hitler to surrender to the Americans before the Russians take over the city. DOWNFALL is to the bunker what DAS BOOT is to the submarine, compelling despite being told from the viewpoint of our sworn enemies. If you see only the occasional foreign film, put this one at the top of the list.
**THE WORLD’S FASTEST INDIAN (2005) – Sweet film with Anthony Hopkins as amateur mechanic from New Zealand that dreams of taking his modified Indian Motorcycle to race in the Great Salt Flats. Inspiring and while it’s doesn’t blow you away, it leaves you with a good feeling.
*WINTER KILLS (1979) – From the Richard Condon novel (Manchurian Candidate), this black comedy about younger brother (Jeff Bridges) of JFK like President and the circumstances surrounding his assassination begins in all sincerity and then becomes increasingly absurd up to the climax. John Huston plays the father and a lot of cameos are sprinkled throughout. Had it maintained more subtlety and provided its surprises more believably, it could have been a minor classic. Instead, it’s so in your face by the end that I turned on it.
*THE AMERICANIZATION OF EMILY (1964) – James Garner stars as that charming con man that he does best. Julie Andrews in only her second role shows the kind of range and career she could have had if Mary Poppins and the Sound of Music hadn’t defined her. Garner plays scrounging junior officer in England during World War II, who manages to stay out of the fighting by being invaluable to his General. Andrews plays the dame that hates his open cowardice but somewhat likes the idea that he won’t be heroically killed like her late husband. It’s scripted by Paddy Chayefsky, so you get comedy wrapped around some legitimately serious issues. James Couburn shows up as Garner’s best friend. Not really worth seeking out, but it won’t sting if you happen across it.
*MY ARCHITECT (2003) – Documentary by the illegitimate son of noted architect Louis Kahn who dropped dead in New York’s Penn Station just around the time he was becoming known in design circles. The son, Nathanial, grows up and goes on a journey to learn about his father, his father’s other children, and the legacy that he left. Kahn had three separate families although he never actually left his wife. What’s interesting is how none of his scorned women blame him for anything. It’s something about the genius they all saw in him that allowed them to forgive him any transgression. The architecture itself is only somewhat interesting as Kahn seemed to get by on his personality more than anything else. Louis sort of comes off as a heel rather than hero so past Nathaniel’s own reckoning you don’t really feel any satisfaction.
**KNIFE IN THE WATER (1962) – Roman Polanski’s gained international attention with this his first full-length film. A husband and wife are heading to a weekend on their boat when they pick up a young hitchhiker. The psychological games between the husband and hitchhiker make up most of the film from there, with the wife providing the sexual tension. The film really keeps you wondering how much the competition will escalate and it never crosses the line of believability although much of the shenanigans seem petty. I wonder how Polanski made such a movie under Polish communism and what would a person in 1962 Poland do for a living to own a nice sailboat. The confines of that boat help create a really interesting tension that makes the movie worthwhile even if the plot is almost nil.
**Z (1969) – Nominated for Best Picture in 1969, this movie is loosely based on a Greek political assassination in the mid 60s that brought down a noted progressive politician. Yves Montand stars as the quiet yet charismatic leftist that gets knocked off early on so that the mystery of his downfall can unravel. The movie, shocking at the time I’m told, reveals how the right-wing government was complicit in the great man’s death. After seeing Oliver Stone’s JFK, this seems like kindergarten. I have to think that the politics are largely responsible for the reputation of this movie, although it’s put together decently enough to be compelling. It makes me wonder though what’s the best movie ever made that shows the overthrow or assassination of a beloved right-wing figure?
**FUNERAL IN BERLIN (1966) – The second movie in the Harry Palmer series is a solid follow-up to IPCRESS FILE. Michael Caine is recruited to East Germany where he is to help a defecting Russian general. Despite his superior’s excitement over this opportunity, Caine doesn’t buy the General’s story and tries to figure out what’s really at work here. The movie also tells us more about Palmer’s origins as an agent and introduces to us an old friend of his. Caine is charming as the hero and either of these first two movies are worth seeing.
# ROOM 666 (1984) – Wim Wenders “documentary” shot at the Cannes film festival where noted directors of the day, Spielberg, Godard, Herzog expound in front of the camera about the future of film and their hopes for the medium. A good enough idea, but the subjects are mostly rambling and not terribly insightful. Thankfully shorter than an hour, but still a labor to get through.
**LA MOUSTACHE (2005) – Interesting French film starring Vincent Lindon who decides to shave his moustache and is surprised that no one notices. An American film with this premise would be about how the world was conspiring against our hero. The charm of European movies is how it’s never automatic. Maybe our hero is right, maybe our hero is crazy. The shame of this movie is that the question never really gets answered and reality itself becomes open for interpretation. I don’t mind ambiguousness if you can make me 90% sure I know what happened and can suppose the rest. Here, the whole thing becomes so dream-like that any interpretation is possible. That’s the only minus.
*THIS FILM IS NOT YET RATED (2005) – Documentary about the MPAA and the subjective rating system. It succeeds when it compares movies and talks to directors about their problems. The history of the system and process is little-known and worth exploring. But there just isn’t enough material to make a whole movie about that, so the filmmakers decide to stake out and learn the identities of the secret MPAA board. The detective game could have been riveting, but it plays instead as a half-ass cable reality show. It gets worse when the movie becomes a soapbox for people to whine that sex is purged while violence flourishes. The system is not perfect but what system is? At least it’s a market response to film content instead of a government one. But, wait . . . the endless cries of censorship culminate in a guy saying he wishes that the government controlled movies because government censorship could be litigated in a court of law while the MPAA cannot be touched. So it’s better to allow real censorship with the hopes of lawsuits than a market solution that might close the question. Theatre owners like the current system because it loosened the content of movies while shielding them from angry parents. And since most movies are watched on DVD and most never have a theatrical playing, this whole exercise was kind of pointless. The unrated DVD is a big market and makes a lot of people watch the movie twice. A film about real censorship in world cinema would have been more poignant instead of this cry-baby piece.
*HOLIDAY (2006) – Kate Winslet, Cameron Diaz, Jack Black and Jude Law in this romantic comedy that benefits for its lack of the Frat Pack and Jennifer Aniston. Winslet trades her English Country home with Cameron Diaz and her Hollywood mansion for two weeks during the holidays and they both might meet-cute and fall in love with the male leads. The film deserves an honorable mention simply because Eli Wallach gets a pretty juicy supporting role and shines throughout. Also, get this, his character is a retired Hollywood screenwriter who is going to accept an award and they never once mention that he was blacklisted. Movies from 1975 on had hereto convinced me that every 1950s screenwriter had been blacklisted and I am almost incredulous to learn that one guy made it through the whole decade in tact. I can only guess that Wallach had that tragedy removed from the script because the typewriter would have no doubt included it even beyond the wishes of the scenarist.
*16 BLOCKS (2006) – Standard police fare with Willis as the believable alkie cop trying to protect a witness who is to testify against crooked cops. David Morse supports as the calm heavy that he seems born to play. Mos Def (that’s a person’s name?) is the annoying chatterbox witness that would have gained more sympathy by shutting up which thankfully he does as the movie wears on. Decent but a little overrated maybe due to Richard Donner’s participation or simply the conflict of bad cops that critics seem to believe more so than honest ones.
*INFAMOUS (2006) – The second Capote bio-drama that promised to be more about his entire life but in reality treads the same exact Kansas ground as CAPOTE (2005). It does spend more time in the trendy Manhatten circles with plenty of cameos by socialites, but it’s otherwise unsurprising. Toby Jones benefits from his diminutive presence versus the larger Phillip Seymore Hoffman, but other than the solid impersonation, Jones doesn’t get the emotional moments as well as Hoffman does. The movie also makes a mistake in casting Daniel Craig as Perry Smith. Craig is too powerful and masculine for Capote to overcome, whereas earlier portrayals of the character by Robert Blake (IN COLD BLOOD) and Clifton Collins (CAPOTE) were almost childlike. The issues here are more superficial and the stakes don’t seem as high. There is a funny bit about Capote claiming to have beaten Bogart at arm wrestling so that the whole town then tries to beat Capote.
*DARLING (1965) the movie that put Julie Christie on the map would seem prime for a remake with so few great female parts, except that Christie’s promiscuity that made the original interesting and controversial is very tame in relation to the average celebrity’s real life experiences. The movie mostly demonstrates what use to be outrageous and how flippant characters would eventually get their comeuppance. Today, the character would just seem to be an example of a valid lifestyle choice that you dare not criticize.
**ROCKY BALBOA (2006) – Spending your career cashing in on cartoon action movies doesn’t get you much respect in Hollywood, especially when you aren’t overtly leftwing. Once in a while Sylvester Stallone would show up in a character part like Cop Land and be quite convincing, but he only really gets to act when he writes his own material. This last Rocky film is surprising especially after his last abortive attempt at re-defining the franchise. Rocky V was so terrible that it could very well have been his burial. ROCKY BALBOA is not by any means great in the conventional sense, but it has such an understated honesty that it’s one of the most enjoyable surprises out of Hollywood in a long time. In the past, Rocky has used boxing to fight bullies and even the cold war, but here his heart as a fighter is used for his own redemption. If you liked any of the Rocky movies you should appreciate if not really enjoy this one.
*DaVINCI CODE (2006) – The most interesting thing about this story is how popular it is. A hardcover best seller for three years is rare and then followed by a movie that grosses $200 million makes DaVINCI CODE something like a modern day GONE WITH THE WIND. I haven’t read the book and I skipped the movie in the theatre, but this franchise is just too much a part of the zeitgeist to ignore forever. I don’t know where the book and movie vary, but a scene in the second half of the movie demonstrates why I think it’s so popular. When trying to decode an Isaac Newton puzzle, Tom Hanks realizes the answer is APPLE. It’s not Newton’s laws of motion or thermodynamics or calculus that you have to know to understand the mystery, but the thing you learned about Newton in 4th grade. The same goes for the DaVinci references in the Mona Lisa and the Last Supper. You don’t have to know anything about DaVinci or Newton other than the most superficial or famous icons of their existence. The movie takes cultural and historic things that you are so familiar with that it makes you feel smart. And I think it’s that play to personal vanity that separates it from simple potboiler to international sensation. Umberto Eco used the Templars as the Center of his early 1990s novel, FOCULT’S PENDULUM without anywhere near the success. And it’s not like Eco wasn’t a bestselling author, he wrote the popular NAME OF THE ROSE. But FP takes a great deal more analysis and brainpower to get through. I have had a copy sitting here for years that I have yet to crack. A friend told me that Dan Brown is the Grisham version of Eco and although I haven’t read Grisham either, the comparison seems apt. I think the movie is probably the best way to catch up on the hoopla without the time investment. Still they could have done us a favor and made it 30 minutes shorter.
*A GOOD YEAR (2006) – This movie is much more of a comedy and a slapstick one than I would have expected. I saw it a week ago and it’s already mostly forgotten. A familiar story with venal Crowe returning to the place of his childhood to remember his better upbringing and the lessons he forgot. Albert Finney is the kind uncle shown in flashback As you’d expect, Crowe’s change of heart is rewarded with the love of a fetching French woman. The title is confusing unless the book was significantly different. The whole story takes place in a week or so.
*HOLLYWOODLAND (2006) – Detective Adrien Brody looks into the death of actor George Reeves AKA TV’s Superman. Ben Affleck is decent as Reeves in flashback as is Diane Lane and Bob Hoskins. It doesn’t really go anywhere and there isn’t much payoff, but they do a good job of recreating that period.
**THE PRESTIGE (2006) – Another worthwhile Chris Nolan effort pits Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale as rival magicians in Victorian England. Both are excellent as is Michael Caine as the mentor to both. Based on the acclaimed 1990s novel that even incorporates David Bowie as Nikola Tesla into the plotline. The Prestige is interesting for the story twists, approach and style. On the special features, Nolan sounds very much British while his screenwriter brother, Jonathan, sounds like an American. It turns out that their father is British and their mother is American and they grew up In Chicago which explains the Batman locale.
*MARIE ANTIONETTE (2006) – Sophia Coppola’s third film is probably her least interesting. Kirsten Dunst is affable enough as the Queen we’re all taught to hate, but the movie is slow going with King Jason Schwartzman a dolt who doesn’t seem interested in his arranged marriage. You could almost hear the incredulous screams from fraternity houses as he turned down her advances. The movie also suffers in my opinion from Coppola’s choice of modern musical montages in place of a classical score.
*INVINCIBLE (2006) – Typically inspiring and mostly predictable story of everyman Philadelphia native who succeeds in his long shot tryout with the Eagles. You root for Wahlberg all the way. Another member of the recent Disney subgenre of underdog sports stories like MIRACLE and THE ROOKIE.
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