Unlike a hostage video, the B99 actors didn't have to resort to blinking in Morse code. Instead they and the writers used the SNL trick of milking laughs out of the scripts' awfulness. "Charles why do you sound like a podcast?" was the funniest line in the episode, because a podcast exactly how the entire episode played. Someone needs to tell the showrunners that the quickest way to kill comedy is to make it serve a political ideology. Otherwise this season will be B99s last.
Reviews
23 Reviews
Cheaper by the Dozen
(2003)
Cheap as a Crummy Knockoff
4 January 2004
Two words: Visible Boom Mike. In at least 5 scenes. Porn movies have greater attention to production values than this piece of miserable dreck. Better pacing too. (And yes, that's 3 words. See one of the repeated, lame jokes in the movie.)
Admittedly, the original wasn't all that great. Recall the disgusting Planned Parenthood scene. (Overpopulation? Unwanted pregnancy? Faw! Feminists are simply repressed lesbians. The more rugrats the merrier!). This remake tries to update a reactionary formula with its own 21st Century version of patronizing "family values" and stupid sexism. Now, Dad actually tries his hand at childrearing and fails (mother knows best, of course), while Mom discovers that having a professional life is nothing compared to the joys of families. This is progress? And it's always so gratifying to watch Hollywood celebrities extol simple, honest rural folk whose moral superiority to big-city hypocrites makes one wonder why all of LA doesn't just move to Dubuque en masse.
I guess I should be grateful that this miserable bit of Hollywood insincerity is so ineptly executed. But what's with Steve Martin? In yet another performance that looks phoned in from another planet, in the latest of a string of unfunny comedies dating back to "Mixed Nuts," he practically invites musings such as, how many botox treatments has he undergone? And: is he now the go-to guy for terrible remakes of mediocre "classic" comedies (see the treacly "Father of the Bride")? Oh God: I see that he's up next in a remake of the Pink Panther.
Be afraid, be very afraid.
Admittedly, the original wasn't all that great. Recall the disgusting Planned Parenthood scene. (Overpopulation? Unwanted pregnancy? Faw! Feminists are simply repressed lesbians. The more rugrats the merrier!). This remake tries to update a reactionary formula with its own 21st Century version of patronizing "family values" and stupid sexism. Now, Dad actually tries his hand at childrearing and fails (mother knows best, of course), while Mom discovers that having a professional life is nothing compared to the joys of families. This is progress? And it's always so gratifying to watch Hollywood celebrities extol simple, honest rural folk whose moral superiority to big-city hypocrites makes one wonder why all of LA doesn't just move to Dubuque en masse.
I guess I should be grateful that this miserable bit of Hollywood insincerity is so ineptly executed. But what's with Steve Martin? In yet another performance that looks phoned in from another planet, in the latest of a string of unfunny comedies dating back to "Mixed Nuts," he practically invites musings such as, how many botox treatments has he undergone? And: is he now the go-to guy for terrible remakes of mediocre "classic" comedies (see the treacly "Father of the Bride")? Oh God: I see that he's up next in a remake of the Pink Panther.
Be afraid, be very afraid.
28 Days Later
(2002)
Imitation of Life
13 November 2003
This film, about a dwindling band of normals seek to survive in a world infested with rage-infected zombies, is well-executed, but can't hold a candle to the real thing. Turn on U.S. talk radio sometime and you'll see what I mean.
Snap! Snap!
15 July 2003
Just as she did in the first "Legally Blonde," Elle Woods encounters a world full of churlish elitists who disdain her seeming Barbie doll personality and wins them over through the sheer force of her implacable optimism and good will. Too bad the same can't be said of the stick-in-the-mud critics and IMDB users who have driven this silly, delightful movie into the ratings basement. Yo! Lighten up, girlfriends!
"Legally Blonde 2" traffics in broad humor (no pun intended. Seriously). Very broad humor. As such it's not for everybody, but in a world where a no-talent hack like Adam Sandler (and the more talented but wildly overrated Farelly brothers) can rake in millions and accolades (at least in the latter case) out of gross-out jokes about body fluids, surely there is room in our funny bones for a ditzy innocent like Elle Woods. True, broad humor is often the refuge of the cliche comic imagination, and a franchise that rests on an incarnation of Barbie risks falling into predictable jokes of the "dumb blonde" genre.
But the happy fact is that "Legally Blonde 2" keeps the material fresh even as it plows terrain made familiar by Judy Holliday, Marilyn Monroe, and Alicia Silverstone. It does so a) by having a lot of fun with the material and b) being blessed with the inexhaustibly delightful talents of Reese Witherspoon, whose perky, wall-to-wall smile practically lives a life of its own, and who delivers her lines with all the conviction that her character Elle would have brought to the role if she were playing it.
And although it would be a stretch to call Elle a feminist (except insofar as she is not ruled by anyone, let alone a man), neither is the film reactionary, unlike, say, cynical pseudo-feminist claptrap like Charlie's Angels. In fact, it's best just to leave any expectations of social uplift, political analysis, or emotional insights at home, just as one would for a pedicure, bubble bath, or slumber party. Girls just want to have fun. Sometimes that's all we all want, or need.
"Legally Blonde 2" traffics in broad humor (no pun intended. Seriously). Very broad humor. As such it's not for everybody, but in a world where a no-talent hack like Adam Sandler (and the more talented but wildly overrated Farelly brothers) can rake in millions and accolades (at least in the latter case) out of gross-out jokes about body fluids, surely there is room in our funny bones for a ditzy innocent like Elle Woods. True, broad humor is often the refuge of the cliche comic imagination, and a franchise that rests on an incarnation of Barbie risks falling into predictable jokes of the "dumb blonde" genre.
But the happy fact is that "Legally Blonde 2" keeps the material fresh even as it plows terrain made familiar by Judy Holliday, Marilyn Monroe, and Alicia Silverstone. It does so a) by having a lot of fun with the material and b) being blessed with the inexhaustibly delightful talents of Reese Witherspoon, whose perky, wall-to-wall smile practically lives a life of its own, and who delivers her lines with all the conviction that her character Elle would have brought to the role if she were playing it.
And although it would be a stretch to call Elle a feminist (except insofar as she is not ruled by anyone, let alone a man), neither is the film reactionary, unlike, say, cynical pseudo-feminist claptrap like Charlie's Angels. In fact, it's best just to leave any expectations of social uplift, political analysis, or emotional insights at home, just as one would for a pedicure, bubble bath, or slumber party. Girls just want to have fun. Sometimes that's all we all want, or need.
Catch Me If You Can
(2002)
A Con Story in More Ways Than One (Spoilers)
30 December 2002
Warning: Spoilers
To judge from the comments posted so far, few if any viewers have actually read the book on which this movie is based, which may explain the generally good reception. However, if you have read the book, as I have, you are in for a disconcerting experience, because roughly 75% of it has been altered, invented, and/or omitted in the transition to screenplay.
Yes, the movie merely says it's "inspired" by Abagnale's book, and we all know that movies have to punch up autobiograpical material in places to appeal to movie audiences. And 2 hours inevitably requires compressing (and discarding) a lot of material.
But the problem with "Catch Me" is that the alterations often don't make sense even from a movie point of view. For instance, early in the movie Abagnale uses a bogus check to "pay" a hooker. This scene comes out of nowhere, is played entirely for (minor) laughs, and is promptly forgotten. In the book, the event appears much later, and Abagnale makes clear that this broke his own personal code of only ripping off banks and similar institutions, not people, and was justified only because she came on to him under false pretenses. This interesting moral nuance is thus completely lost in the movie, rendering the scene pointless.
Also, incomprehensibly, the movie fails to follow Abagnale on his European adventures, including his amazing "marketing" scam involving unsuspecting would-be "stews" (which is instead implausibly turned into a ruse to get past Hanratty at Miami Intl Airport). This story, which ends with his getting ratted out by a French former girlfriend and thrown in an appalling French prison, is far more dramatic, and cinematic, than the heavily abbreviated rendition of it in the movie.
Even more unsatisfiying is the omission of Abagnale's hilariously brazen escape from the Atlanta prison where he is initially transferred after being returns to the States, not to mention his first close brush with Hanratty, or his near-fatal slip-up involving a forged check with his real name on it. Why call a movie "Catch Me If You Can" if you are going to leave the book's most memorable escapes on the cutting room floor?
Spielberg's apparent decision to cut the book's heady mix of sex, cons and exotic locations in favor of a trite (and contrived) psychological subplot about Frank Jr.'s Oedipal problems, only succeeds in robbing the story of the precise reasons we go to see films about such a James Bond-like figure in the first place (the film's dashing title sequence hints at the movie that could have been). "Catch Me If You Can" was moreover an autobiography, not a work of fiction. What Spielberg gives us is an imitation of that autobiography. In short, the film is itself a con, and only a mildly good one at that. Looks like audiences are too fixated on the pin stripes (see the movie to get the reference) to care.
Yes, the movie merely says it's "inspired" by Abagnale's book, and we all know that movies have to punch up autobiograpical material in places to appeal to movie audiences. And 2 hours inevitably requires compressing (and discarding) a lot of material.
But the problem with "Catch Me" is that the alterations often don't make sense even from a movie point of view. For instance, early in the movie Abagnale uses a bogus check to "pay" a hooker. This scene comes out of nowhere, is played entirely for (minor) laughs, and is promptly forgotten. In the book, the event appears much later, and Abagnale makes clear that this broke his own personal code of only ripping off banks and similar institutions, not people, and was justified only because she came on to him under false pretenses. This interesting moral nuance is thus completely lost in the movie, rendering the scene pointless.
Also, incomprehensibly, the movie fails to follow Abagnale on his European adventures, including his amazing "marketing" scam involving unsuspecting would-be "stews" (which is instead implausibly turned into a ruse to get past Hanratty at Miami Intl Airport). This story, which ends with his getting ratted out by a French former girlfriend and thrown in an appalling French prison, is far more dramatic, and cinematic, than the heavily abbreviated rendition of it in the movie.
Even more unsatisfiying is the omission of Abagnale's hilariously brazen escape from the Atlanta prison where he is initially transferred after being returns to the States, not to mention his first close brush with Hanratty, or his near-fatal slip-up involving a forged check with his real name on it. Why call a movie "Catch Me If You Can" if you are going to leave the book's most memorable escapes on the cutting room floor?
Spielberg's apparent decision to cut the book's heady mix of sex, cons and exotic locations in favor of a trite (and contrived) psychological subplot about Frank Jr.'s Oedipal problems, only succeeds in robbing the story of the precise reasons we go to see films about such a James Bond-like figure in the first place (the film's dashing title sequence hints at the movie that could have been). "Catch Me If You Can" was moreover an autobiography, not a work of fiction. What Spielberg gives us is an imitation of that autobiography. In short, the film is itself a con, and only a mildly good one at that. Looks like audiences are too fixated on the pin stripes (see the movie to get the reference) to care.
Easily One of the Worst Movies I Have Seen
17 May 2002
"Attack of the Clones" is just dreadful on almost every level: plodding plot, leaden acting, cardboard dialog, clumsy editing, painfully trite themes, unfunny stabs at humor--even the vaunted action sequences, hyperkinetic though they are, have zero emotional involvement.
And why should they? As Frank de Caro put it on The Daily Show last night, Yoda has more personality than any of the living breathing characters on the screen. Hell, the clones themselves are more interesting.
The advance screening I saw yesterday had the audience howling in derision at the serious parts and groaning at the funny bits. I actually had to avert my eyes, such was embarrassment at the thought of having to sit through this.
With the one-two punch of The Phantom Menace and, now Attack of the Clones, George Lucas stands revealed as the P.T Barnum of cinema, turning out cynical, overhyped dreck for uncritical consumption by the brainwashed booboisie. If this movie makes big money, Lucas should title his next installment, "Return to the Egress." Barnum would have enjoyed the in-joke.
And why should they? As Frank de Caro put it on The Daily Show last night, Yoda has more personality than any of the living breathing characters on the screen. Hell, the clones themselves are more interesting.
The advance screening I saw yesterday had the audience howling in derision at the serious parts and groaning at the funny bits. I actually had to avert my eyes, such was embarrassment at the thought of having to sit through this.
With the one-two punch of The Phantom Menace and, now Attack of the Clones, George Lucas stands revealed as the P.T Barnum of cinema, turning out cynical, overhyped dreck for uncritical consumption by the brainwashed booboisie. If this movie makes big money, Lucas should title his next installment, "Return to the Egress." Barnum would have enjoyed the in-joke.
The Lost Son
(1999)
Dirty Harry Lives (Spoilers)
13 January 2002
Warning: Spoilers
This forgettable bit of vigilantist drivel takes the hot-button topic du jour--child porn--and uses it to flog the audience's basest emotions. There is nothing in this film--nothing--that we haven't seen before: the PI running from his past, the corrupt cop, slimy bad guys, wide-eyed innocent naifs, etc., etc. They even recycle Ciaran Hinds role as the pedarast cop in Prime Suspect 3--a far, far better treatment of the same subject matter.
All in all, proof that foreign films can be just as cyniccally manipulative as the most meretricious Hollywood dreck.
All in all, proof that foreign films can be just as cyniccally manipulative as the most meretricious Hollywood dreck.
An epic worthy of the label
20 December 2001
A magnificent piece of film that works on all levels: dramatically, thematically, visually, musically, the works. It blows Harry Potter into the middle of next week.
Even if only one a visual level, LOTR works because of the utter verisimilitude that its New Zealand locations and scrupulous attention to detail help sustain. Unlike Harry Potter, there is hardly a whiff of the studio set in the entire film, and the special effects, though indispensible to the film, are carried off by and large understatedly. Yes, Virginia, it is possible for special effects to be a means, not an end in itself.
But what really makes the movie succeed is the complete immersion of the actors in their roles. There is none of the smirking, postmodern irony that afflicts actors in the typical post-Star Wars clones, the suggestion to the audience that we all know that this is just a special-effects-driven, rollicking good time, not meant to be taken seriously. These actors clearly believe in their roles, in the values of the book, and in each other, and the payoff for the audience is complete emotional absorption into the drama of their adventure.
The audience anticipation for the next two installments--which are already in the can--is going to be excruciating. I wouldn't be surprised if a mob stormed the vaults to get them released early.
This is one movie that can't be overhyped--though, as you can see, I'm trying.
Even if only one a visual level, LOTR works because of the utter verisimilitude that its New Zealand locations and scrupulous attention to detail help sustain. Unlike Harry Potter, there is hardly a whiff of the studio set in the entire film, and the special effects, though indispensible to the film, are carried off by and large understatedly. Yes, Virginia, it is possible for special effects to be a means, not an end in itself.
But what really makes the movie succeed is the complete immersion of the actors in their roles. There is none of the smirking, postmodern irony that afflicts actors in the typical post-Star Wars clones, the suggestion to the audience that we all know that this is just a special-effects-driven, rollicking good time, not meant to be taken seriously. These actors clearly believe in their roles, in the values of the book, and in each other, and the payoff for the audience is complete emotional absorption into the drama of their adventure.
The audience anticipation for the next two installments--which are already in the can--is going to be excruciating. I wouldn't be surprised if a mob stormed the vaults to get them released early.
This is one movie that can't be overhyped--though, as you can see, I'm trying.
A Knight's Tale
(2001)
The Middle Ages for Middle Agers
7 December 2001
What detractors seem to miss about this movie is its ironic fidelity to its subject matter. Contemporary sensibility assumes that the Middle Ages were one long unrelieved landscape of suffering, repression and despair, relieved, if you can call it that, only by religion. Much the opposite is the case, as fans of the bawdy Chaucer--a major figure in the movie--will attest. Lusty characters, over the top spectacle, good vs. evil morality plays, and a love of popular music were all very much a part of life in the Middle Ages. "A Knight's Tale" has the courage to take its subject matter on its own terms, conventional assumptions about it be damned. Along the way it provides a rollicking good time, and a few lumps in the throat for good measure. Plus, we middle agers get to re- experience music that, to young whippersnapper ears jaded by hip-hop and Brittney Spears, must indeed sound like it came from the same period as Chaucer, or the next one over.
The Cell
(2000)
Tortured Plot (Possible Spoilers)
27 December 2000
Warning: Spoilers
How many plot contrivances can one movie support to get to its central conceit? To get an idea, see "The Cell", where a child psychologist and an FBI agent mind meld with a serial killer in an effort to save his final victim:
1) There exists a lab in the middle of nowhere that is dedicated to psychiatry of the comatose. When the movie begins, it has one patient.
2) There is a no-longer-used third mind-meld apparatus at the lab.
3) Our serial killer has a thing for time delaying his victims' deaths, thereby building in the obligatory dramatic race against the clock without requiring his actual presence at the moment of death.
4) Our serial killer also has an extremely rare form of schizophrenia which one day will act suddenly to render him permanently comatose.
5) Our serial killer has his long-delayed, once-in-a-lifetime attack of this disorder minutes before he is seized by the FBI.
6) The FBI agent needs to go into the serial killer's mind to discover the crucial clue, which turns out to be an ordinary forensic detail that would have been discovered by any reasonably competent investigator not encumbered with having to resist being seduced by Jennifer Lopez in a serial killer's dreamworld.
If you can suspend your disbelief long enough to get around all that, you would also find being suspended by wires from hooks embedded in your back a "comforting" experience, just like our serial killer.
Memo to Mind-Meld Lab: if you want to make progress with your comatose child patient, stop sending Ms. Lopez into his pubescent subconscious. What's the incentive to be cured, when one's id is getting regular one-on-one visits from Jennifer Lopez in a skin-tight Mae West castoff designed by Salvador Dali? Talk about your recipe for malingering....
1) There exists a lab in the middle of nowhere that is dedicated to psychiatry of the comatose. When the movie begins, it has one patient.
2) There is a no-longer-used third mind-meld apparatus at the lab.
3) Our serial killer has a thing for time delaying his victims' deaths, thereby building in the obligatory dramatic race against the clock without requiring his actual presence at the moment of death.
4) Our serial killer also has an extremely rare form of schizophrenia which one day will act suddenly to render him permanently comatose.
5) Our serial killer has his long-delayed, once-in-a-lifetime attack of this disorder minutes before he is seized by the FBI.
6) The FBI agent needs to go into the serial killer's mind to discover the crucial clue, which turns out to be an ordinary forensic detail that would have been discovered by any reasonably competent investigator not encumbered with having to resist being seduced by Jennifer Lopez in a serial killer's dreamworld.
If you can suspend your disbelief long enough to get around all that, you would also find being suspended by wires from hooks embedded in your back a "comforting" experience, just like our serial killer.
Memo to Mind-Meld Lab: if you want to make progress with your comatose child patient, stop sending Ms. Lopez into his pubescent subconscious. What's the incentive to be cured, when one's id is getting regular one-on-one visits from Jennifer Lopez in a skin-tight Mae West castoff designed by Salvador Dali? Talk about your recipe for malingering....
The Exorcist
(1973)
A Pretentious Mess
8 October 2000
When I first saw this movie in 1973, I was scared and confused by it. I
was also 15. Seeing it again for the first time since then, I can say it
held up well in one respect: it's still confusing as hell.
The movie suggests at the outset that Evil is Afoot with a prolonged
sojourn to Iraq, where Max von Sydow's archeological crew has come
across some biblical knickknacks and ugly statues. One of these
knickknacks apparently has Great Significance, because von Sydow
spends a long time looking at it. Later on this tchotchke will inexplicably
turn up at the scene of a suspicious death. How did it get there? That's
the least of the unanswered questions that this movie leaves strewn all
over the screen like so much projectile vomit.
Meanwhile over in the good old USA, the daughter of Chris McNeil
(Ellen Burstyn), Regan, is acting strangely, and not just because Linda
Blair can't act. She has gone from the sweet, sensitive pubescent girl
with the drawing talent of a precocious 6 year old, to a foul-mouthed
masturbating demon. Sounds like puberty to me. But in this film,
nothing is as simple as it seems. Cue "Tubular Bells."
Along the way William Friedkin sets the tone of omnipresent menace by
suggesting that Reagan's possession is part of a Larger Pattern of
Things Falling Apart, pieces of which include antiwar protests, a rising
divorce rate, and gay film directors. William Friedkin, meet Bill Bennett
and Lynne Cheney; Bill, Lynne, William Friedkin.
The film strives for big statements about Evil and Faith, but doesn't
seem to have a clue what it's talking about. Why does the Devil pick
this nondescript preteen to toss around like a Cabbage Patch Doll?
Father Merrin tells the guilt-ridden Father Damien it's so that he can
convince us humans that we are nothing more than rutting animals. Oh,
I see. And all this time I thought it was Linda Blair's subsequent film
career that did that.
The film is not without its shocking moments (the most grisly, perhaps
ironically, being an excruciating spinal tap scene), but the payoff is so
brief, the buildup so tediously portentous, and the happy denouement
so absurdly improbable (why doesn't the Devil just hop back into
Regan?) that all we're left with are those nagging unanswered
questions, the biggest being, WHAT THE HELL IS LEE J. COBB
DOING IN THIS FILM?
was also 15. Seeing it again for the first time since then, I can say it
held up well in one respect: it's still confusing as hell.
The movie suggests at the outset that Evil is Afoot with a prolonged
sojourn to Iraq, where Max von Sydow's archeological crew has come
across some biblical knickknacks and ugly statues. One of these
knickknacks apparently has Great Significance, because von Sydow
spends a long time looking at it. Later on this tchotchke will inexplicably
turn up at the scene of a suspicious death. How did it get there? That's
the least of the unanswered questions that this movie leaves strewn all
over the screen like so much projectile vomit.
Meanwhile over in the good old USA, the daughter of Chris McNeil
(Ellen Burstyn), Regan, is acting strangely, and not just because Linda
Blair can't act. She has gone from the sweet, sensitive pubescent girl
with the drawing talent of a precocious 6 year old, to a foul-mouthed
masturbating demon. Sounds like puberty to me. But in this film,
nothing is as simple as it seems. Cue "Tubular Bells."
Along the way William Friedkin sets the tone of omnipresent menace by
suggesting that Reagan's possession is part of a Larger Pattern of
Things Falling Apart, pieces of which include antiwar protests, a rising
divorce rate, and gay film directors. William Friedkin, meet Bill Bennett
and Lynne Cheney; Bill, Lynne, William Friedkin.
The film strives for big statements about Evil and Faith, but doesn't
seem to have a clue what it's talking about. Why does the Devil pick
this nondescript preteen to toss around like a Cabbage Patch Doll?
Father Merrin tells the guilt-ridden Father Damien it's so that he can
convince us humans that we are nothing more than rutting animals. Oh,
I see. And all this time I thought it was Linda Blair's subsequent film
career that did that.
The film is not without its shocking moments (the most grisly, perhaps
ironically, being an excruciating spinal tap scene), but the payoff is so
brief, the buildup so tediously portentous, and the happy denouement
so absurdly improbable (why doesn't the Devil just hop back into
Regan?) that all we're left with are those nagging unanswered
questions, the biggest being, WHAT THE HELL IS LEE J. COBB
DOING IN THIS FILM?
Fallen
(1998)
The Violent Bore It Away (Spoilers)
27 September 2000
Warning: Spoilers
Given the current political rhetoric about nihilistic film violence, a film like "Fallen" should warm the cockles of the most dour fundie's shriveled heart. After all, this is a movie in which evil is a direct manifestation of demonic intervention in our affairs, and that we--at least some of us, anyway--are chosen by God to fight it. This isn't nihilistic violence; it's godly violence!
And that's the problem. At least with nihilistic violence you know where you stand. Bad is bad, and good is, well, badder than bad. And because it's badder than bad, good wins in the end. Very simple.
With Fallen, however, the eternal verities are upended. Bad people aren't really bad; they are just possessed by bad spirits. (Guns don't kill people; people possessed by fallen angels do.) Good people are so good they are either boring--Denzel Washington's John Hobbes--or virginal (Embedth Davidtz). For the good guy to win, he can't just kick ass. That would be Bad. No, the good guy has to lose, and in losing, win, just like Christ, who according to Christian doctrine prevailed over evil by dying on the cross and taking on in so doing the sins of the world.
But here's the wrinkle, and the problem with Fallen. If Evil in "Fallen" preys on humanity, rather than residing in it, then human morality is irrelevant, as free will becomes a joke. We are just the playthings of celestial beings, and have no real responsibility for our actions. So there's really nobody to root against.
Moreover, if the Evil One is vanquished, then we are at the end of history. Since that is clearly not the case, the film is obliged to let evil win, undercutting the entire christocentric allegory of the film. Talk about your basic bummer.
Give me Bruce Willis kicking terrorist ass any day.
And that's the problem. At least with nihilistic violence you know where you stand. Bad is bad, and good is, well, badder than bad. And because it's badder than bad, good wins in the end. Very simple.
With Fallen, however, the eternal verities are upended. Bad people aren't really bad; they are just possessed by bad spirits. (Guns don't kill people; people possessed by fallen angels do.) Good people are so good they are either boring--Denzel Washington's John Hobbes--or virginal (Embedth Davidtz). For the good guy to win, he can't just kick ass. That would be Bad. No, the good guy has to lose, and in losing, win, just like Christ, who according to Christian doctrine prevailed over evil by dying on the cross and taking on in so doing the sins of the world.
But here's the wrinkle, and the problem with Fallen. If Evil in "Fallen" preys on humanity, rather than residing in it, then human morality is irrelevant, as free will becomes a joke. We are just the playthings of celestial beings, and have no real responsibility for our actions. So there's really nobody to root against.
Moreover, if the Evil One is vanquished, then we are at the end of history. Since that is clearly not the case, the film is obliged to let evil win, undercutting the entire christocentric allegory of the film. Talk about your basic bummer.
Give me Bruce Willis kicking terrorist ass any day.
Almost Famous
(2000)
Almost Interesting
25 September 2000
When you have a cast that includes the dependable Phillip Seymour Hoffman (as the celebrated film critic Lester Bangs) and Frances McDormand, you are off to a good start. Throw in a promising plot about a young teen who lucks into his fantasy as an on-the-road rock critic during the heyday of sex, drugs, and rock'n'roll, and things look even better. Make that plot autobiographical and have it directed by the subject, Cameron Crowe, and you have to wonder, what can go wrong?
Well, quite a bit actually.
First, the main characters are uninteresting and cliched. As Russell, lead singer for a Spinal Tap-esque band, "Stillwater," Billy Crudup exudes sex appeal but little else. He's basically a stick-figure rocker with an ego the size of Kansas and an arrested case of sexual development. Kate Hudson, as his groupie girlfriend Penny Lane, is an updated version of the hooker with the heart of gold; she looks like Jodie Foster's character in Taxi Driver, only with a better wardrobe. Finally, Patrick Fugit, as the Cameron Crowe standin William Miller, is perfect so long as he is required merely to stand around with a "wow-I-can't-believe-I'm-with-a-rock-band" look on his face; when he is required to do more, however--when he has to make a profession of love, for example--he's a flop. His delivery has all the awkwardness of the callow youth he portrays, but none of the emotional conviction. It just comes across as bad acting.
Second, the environment is dishonestly portrayed. Even though Hoffman's Lester Bangs repeatedly admonishes little William to be "merciless" in his journalism and to resist the seductions of life on the road, the film itself is pretty much a big wet kiss for a period that Bangs himself saw as the nadir of rock music. Drugs are shown, but they are largely soft; cocaine and heroin are nowhere to be found. The few episodes of drug abuse are hardly as shocking as anything one has seen at a typical suburban kegger. Even the music is dreadful, including the soundtrack. If Lester Bangs knew he was going to be portrayed posthumously in a movie that apotheosized Elton John music without irony, he would have p***ed on young Cameron's head and kicked him out on his sorry butt.
The bigger dishonesty is in the movie's stance towards its subject. While the plot pretends to be about "keeping it real" and staying true to yourself, the movie is little more than an ego trip for Cameron Crowe. This is Portrait of the Artist as a Celebrity Wannabe. He wants our jealousy, not our respect or admiration. At one point the Penny Lane character states, without irony, that she hangs with rock bands (even a mediocre one like Stillwater) because celebrities are more interesting than ordinary people. Little in the movie suggests that Crowe feels any differently; after all, it ends happily with his alter ego embarking on his career as a rock critic. Yet if any acquaintance with Leno, Letterman or your random Rolling Stone interview didn't disabuse one of this idea a long time ago, this movie should, as the characters have absolutely nothing memorable to say. "What do you like about music?" William asks Russell in the movie's penultimate line. "Well, everything, for starters..." replies Russell, as the movie fades out.
Wow, man. Heavy.
Well, quite a bit actually.
First, the main characters are uninteresting and cliched. As Russell, lead singer for a Spinal Tap-esque band, "Stillwater," Billy Crudup exudes sex appeal but little else. He's basically a stick-figure rocker with an ego the size of Kansas and an arrested case of sexual development. Kate Hudson, as his groupie girlfriend Penny Lane, is an updated version of the hooker with the heart of gold; she looks like Jodie Foster's character in Taxi Driver, only with a better wardrobe. Finally, Patrick Fugit, as the Cameron Crowe standin William Miller, is perfect so long as he is required merely to stand around with a "wow-I-can't-believe-I'm-with-a-rock-band" look on his face; when he is required to do more, however--when he has to make a profession of love, for example--he's a flop. His delivery has all the awkwardness of the callow youth he portrays, but none of the emotional conviction. It just comes across as bad acting.
Second, the environment is dishonestly portrayed. Even though Hoffman's Lester Bangs repeatedly admonishes little William to be "merciless" in his journalism and to resist the seductions of life on the road, the film itself is pretty much a big wet kiss for a period that Bangs himself saw as the nadir of rock music. Drugs are shown, but they are largely soft; cocaine and heroin are nowhere to be found. The few episodes of drug abuse are hardly as shocking as anything one has seen at a typical suburban kegger. Even the music is dreadful, including the soundtrack. If Lester Bangs knew he was going to be portrayed posthumously in a movie that apotheosized Elton John music without irony, he would have p***ed on young Cameron's head and kicked him out on his sorry butt.
The bigger dishonesty is in the movie's stance towards its subject. While the plot pretends to be about "keeping it real" and staying true to yourself, the movie is little more than an ego trip for Cameron Crowe. This is Portrait of the Artist as a Celebrity Wannabe. He wants our jealousy, not our respect or admiration. At one point the Penny Lane character states, without irony, that she hangs with rock bands (even a mediocre one like Stillwater) because celebrities are more interesting than ordinary people. Little in the movie suggests that Crowe feels any differently; after all, it ends happily with his alter ego embarking on his career as a rock critic. Yet if any acquaintance with Leno, Letterman or your random Rolling Stone interview didn't disabuse one of this idea a long time ago, this movie should, as the characters have absolutely nothing memorable to say. "What do you like about music?" William asks Russell in the movie's penultimate line. "Well, everything, for starters..." replies Russell, as the movie fades out.
Wow, man. Heavy.
The Talented Mr. Ripley
(1999)
Icy near-perfection (possible spoilers)
25 September 2000
Warning: Spoilers
As expertly played by Matt Damon, Tom Ripley is perpetually on the outside looking in: as a theatre janitor envying the lives of the actors he sees onstage; as the plebeian hired pianist at the upper-class Manhattan soiree; as the desperate hanger-on among the idle rich US expatriate community in Italy. He is, in short, class-driven like so many Americans in our "classless" society. Unlike most of the rest of us, however, his class envy drives him to serial murder. Why?In a famous exchange, F. Scott Fitzgerald once remarked to Hemingway, "The Rich are different from you and me." To which Hemingway tartly replied, "Yes. They have more money."The Talented Mr. Ripley puts this argument to the test. Certainly the plot suggests, and Tom Ripley desperately hopes, that Hemingway is correct, that being Rich is simply a matter of trappings and appurtenances. Indeed, the entire plot springs from the erroneous class signal given off by Tom's borrowed Princeton jacket. But this is the tragedy of Tom. Despite his chameleonic ability to take on the protective coloration of his surroundings, his non-U origins keep giving him away, most infuriatingly, to the smug, class-conscious playboy Fredo (the ever-enjoyable Phillip Seymour Hoffman). In another person--hopefully most of us--that would be a matter of embarrassment, even humiliation. But for Tom, it's an incitement to homicidal rage.Why? In part because although Tom is trapped by the social and sexual mores of his world, he sees through them quite clearly, yet he cannot do anything about it. Indeed, everyone in this movie is unhappy in varying degrees, and the root is a disconnect between social roles and individual character. The homoerotic sublplot is revealing: Tom, a closeted gay man, thinks that his playboy friend Dickie Greenleaf is in the closet, and the movie suggests obliquely that he is right. Aside from a the erotically charged bathtub scene (where Tom & Dickie play a symbolically charged game of chess while Tom tries to draw Dickie out of his unconscious closet), the movie shows DIckie as a compulsive philanderer who only shows physical interest in girlfriend Marge (the luscious Gwyneth Paltrow) when necessary to pacify her lonely restiveness. You don't have to be Sigmund Freud to figure out the eponymously named Dickie. Yet when Tom truthfully tells Dickie that he has never lied to him, and asks him to confront his homoerotic feelings for Tom, Dickie not only rebuffs him, he emotionally destroys him. For Tom, whose sense of self is entirely measured by his reflection in the eyes of others, this is a lethal attack that justifies deadly force in self-defence. This is the other part of the explanation for Tom's dramatic arc. Like his fellow narcissistic closet-case, Norman Bates, Tom lacks any kind of center. It is no coincidence that a movie preoccupied with Tom's character gives us NO clue as to his background or upbinging. He is in fact a psychological cipher whose very lack of self ironically manifests itself as self-loathing. And this self-loathing, when awakened by Dickie, drives him to take on the identity of his tormentor. In both cases this is only a temporary solution, however, because the basic problems remain unsolved.It's to this movie's credit, however, that it resists reductionistic explanations for Tom. Centrally, the movie is explicitly ambiguous about Tom's consciousness of his own emerging pathology: although he only kills Dickie after extended provocation, and takes his identity as an almost afterthought, earlier in the movie he is seen practicing Italian while spying on dickie through binoculars. As we see Dickie for the first time, Tom rehearses the symbolic line: "This is my face."The dialectic of appearance vs. essence, of social roles vs individual desire, of guilt vs. revenge pulsates throughout the movie and is in part what drives its clockwork-like plot twists--a clockwork plot that in many ways reflects the grinding oppressivenss of the world the characters inhabit. In a culture where movies pander to its American audience's sentimental ideas about classlessness, sexual liberation, and upward mobility, The Talented Mr. Ripley is a witty, intelligent, and icily cold splash of cold water in the face. It deserves wide appreciation.
Papillon
(1973)
Wrong Metaphor
20 July 2000
Henri Charriere may have acquired his nickname from his tattoo, but as a symbol for this movie it's all wrong. I have no idea what the real Charriere is like, but, at least as portrayed by Steve McQueen, he comes across less as a butterfly--a spirited, carefree creature--and more as a naked mole-rat, those inscrutable little cold-blooded mammals whose entire existence is devoted to blindly gnawing though dirt. But a movie titled "Naked Mole-Rat" is unlikely to pack them in, so why complain?
The fact is, this is a sloppily constructed, overlong, not terribly well-acted movie. The painfully obvious image of the frogman assisting McQueen/Papillon's raft at the movie's final scene (and listed in the "goofs" section of this site) is exceeded in its amateurishness only by the sudden intrusion of a narrator into the movie's epilogue a few seconds later. Along the way there are lapses of plot continuity, failures of motive, and unexplained incongruities (convicts get beheaded in the penal colony for far less violent offenses than Papillon repeatedly commits during one of his escapes but for some reason neither he nor his co-conspirators ever sees the guillotine), as well as tedious dead spots througout. The moviemakers' idea of conveying the tedium of solitary confinement, apparently, is to depict it in real-time.
McQueen was better as a prisoner in "The Great Escape." Hoffman was a better gimp in "Midnight Cowboy." And those two movies together are probably shorter than this. Do yourself a favor and watch those instead.
The fact is, this is a sloppily constructed, overlong, not terribly well-acted movie. The painfully obvious image of the frogman assisting McQueen/Papillon's raft at the movie's final scene (and listed in the "goofs" section of this site) is exceeded in its amateurishness only by the sudden intrusion of a narrator into the movie's epilogue a few seconds later. Along the way there are lapses of plot continuity, failures of motive, and unexplained incongruities (convicts get beheaded in the penal colony for far less violent offenses than Papillon repeatedly commits during one of his escapes but for some reason neither he nor his co-conspirators ever sees the guillotine), as well as tedious dead spots througout. The moviemakers' idea of conveying the tedium of solitary confinement, apparently, is to depict it in real-time.
McQueen was better as a prisoner in "The Great Escape." Hoffman was a better gimp in "Midnight Cowboy." And those two movies together are probably shorter than this. Do yourself a favor and watch those instead.
American History X
(1998)
Powerful, but flinching
11 June 2000
Well before "American History X," back around 1990, I heard a real-life Derek Vinyard interviewed on radio. This articulate, former white supremacist had, like Derek, come to reject his racist beliefs, and like Derek he had devoted his life to trying to make amends for his past by addressing youth and other at-risk groups. Unlike Derek, however, his analysis did not stop with platitudes about hate being bad, or even denunciations of white supremacist corruption and hypocrisy, as Derek comes to espouse. He contextualized his former life.
When his fellow supremacists went out recruiting, he said, they did not go straight to overt racialist appeals. Instead they took advantage of the demagogic spadework begun by Pat Buchanan, Newt Gingrich and their ilk, and played the coded race cards of "affirmative action", "quotas," "busing" and "urban crime." He and his fellow supremacists knew exactly what the subtext of this rhetoric was, and they frankly appreciated the help given them by their "respectable" allies in Washington and the media.
It's too bad that this movie did not have the guts to make a similar connection with the larger political framework that Derek's prototype saw so readily. True, we do get a scene in which Derek's father fulminates in barely coded terms about affirmative action, and the anti-hate pseudo-strategy of film's token hapless liberal (well played by Elliott Gould) consists solely of a knee-jerk PC censorship reflex (ignoring the famous dictum about sunlight being the best disinfectant).
But these glimpses into the larger sustaining milieu of white racism fall well short of helping audiences confront the continuum between overt racism and the "respectable" politicial rheteoric that feeds it. Instead, it is suggested through Derek's brother Danny that nice communities like Venice Beach just decayed passively as gangs moved in. Is it too much to expect some passing mention of decades of malign political neglect of our urban centers? Of a deliberate, decades-long widening of the gap between rich and poor, with the predictable (and frankly, intended) effect of pitting economically insecure lower-class whites and blacks against one another in a struggle for shrinking slices of the economic pie? Of the concomitant shredding of the social safety net?
I don't think so. Other movies have explored the class-based terrain of race hate in a gripping fashion; "Blood in the Face" comes to mind. It's necessary, but not enough, to show us the redemptive power of forgiveness, as "American History X" does. (In an inspired symbolic moment of levity, Derek first breaks through his prejudices as his black prison co-worker, mimicking sex between two lovers who have just had a spat, pants orgiastically, "I forgive you, baby! I forgive you!!!") If change is going to come about, it must begin with making audiences feel uncomfortable with their own unexamined assumptions and prejudices. And that, by and large, this movie fails to do.
Nonetheless I share the general critical consensus that the performances in the film are first-rate, and the story expertly told. The elegiac score adds an affecting emotional dimension to the movie as well, perhaps suggesting, where the movie otherwise cops out, the sense of America's promise lost. And the film's tragic ending, while unconvincing to some, demonstrates the realization that our actions can have far-reaching repercussions beyond our control. On a purely dramatic level, the movie succeeds.
However, AHX failure of nerve only helps guarantee that we have not seen the end of any further need for films like it in the future. And that's the real tragedy.
When his fellow supremacists went out recruiting, he said, they did not go straight to overt racialist appeals. Instead they took advantage of the demagogic spadework begun by Pat Buchanan, Newt Gingrich and their ilk, and played the coded race cards of "affirmative action", "quotas," "busing" and "urban crime." He and his fellow supremacists knew exactly what the subtext of this rhetoric was, and they frankly appreciated the help given them by their "respectable" allies in Washington and the media.
It's too bad that this movie did not have the guts to make a similar connection with the larger political framework that Derek's prototype saw so readily. True, we do get a scene in which Derek's father fulminates in barely coded terms about affirmative action, and the anti-hate pseudo-strategy of film's token hapless liberal (well played by Elliott Gould) consists solely of a knee-jerk PC censorship reflex (ignoring the famous dictum about sunlight being the best disinfectant).
But these glimpses into the larger sustaining milieu of white racism fall well short of helping audiences confront the continuum between overt racism and the "respectable" politicial rheteoric that feeds it. Instead, it is suggested through Derek's brother Danny that nice communities like Venice Beach just decayed passively as gangs moved in. Is it too much to expect some passing mention of decades of malign political neglect of our urban centers? Of a deliberate, decades-long widening of the gap between rich and poor, with the predictable (and frankly, intended) effect of pitting economically insecure lower-class whites and blacks against one another in a struggle for shrinking slices of the economic pie? Of the concomitant shredding of the social safety net?
I don't think so. Other movies have explored the class-based terrain of race hate in a gripping fashion; "Blood in the Face" comes to mind. It's necessary, but not enough, to show us the redemptive power of forgiveness, as "American History X" does. (In an inspired symbolic moment of levity, Derek first breaks through his prejudices as his black prison co-worker, mimicking sex between two lovers who have just had a spat, pants orgiastically, "I forgive you, baby! I forgive you!!!") If change is going to come about, it must begin with making audiences feel uncomfortable with their own unexamined assumptions and prejudices. And that, by and large, this movie fails to do.
Nonetheless I share the general critical consensus that the performances in the film are first-rate, and the story expertly told. The elegiac score adds an affecting emotional dimension to the movie as well, perhaps suggesting, where the movie otherwise cops out, the sense of America's promise lost. And the film's tragic ending, while unconvincing to some, demonstrates the realization that our actions can have far-reaching repercussions beyond our control. On a purely dramatic level, the movie succeeds.
However, AHX failure of nerve only helps guarantee that we have not seen the end of any further need for films like it in the future. And that's the real tragedy.
Welcome to Woop Woop
(1997)
Woop Woop: So-So
6 June 2000
I was never a fan of Priscilla Queen of the Desert, finding it far too in love with itself to enjoy as a whimsical comedy and not serious enough to generate empathy for the characters. I moreover didn't know Woop Woop's common heritage with Priscilla (though it takes all of about 10 minutes to guess it). So it was without any heightened expectations that I sat down to watch the flick. It wasn't a waste of an hour and 45 minutes, but it wasn't exactly the most memorable afternoon I spent either. Frankly I didn't think it compared unfavorably to Priscilla, but that's not a big compliment.
Basically, all the same problems that plagued Priscilla infect Woop Woop too: an overlong, meandering plot; thinly drawn characters, the assertion of camp as both aesthetic and anesthetic, and a general infantilism of vision. Apparently Cannes agrees with the first assessment, because the director cut the film drastically after its screening. As for the obsession with camp, maybe it's just a gay thing, but I don't think camp works when it's a primary aesthetic mode. For example, Woop Woop shows us the
denizens camping it up to camp classics like The Sound of Music, which is fine; but the thing that allows a film like SOM to play as camp is that it wasn't filmed that way.
Woop Woop, by contrast, like Priscilla before it, puts the camp right into the film from the outset. This leaves us nothing of our own to add. Instead, the characters largely appear to be mugging for the camera. Over time, this grows wearying.
This is not to say the movie is without its moments. The Australian outback is filmed spectacularly, and the actors do a good job with th limited roles they are given. But if it's outlandish Aussie antics you are after, check out any of the "Mad Max" films. You will get a bona fide camp experience to boot.
Basically, all the same problems that plagued Priscilla infect Woop Woop too: an overlong, meandering plot; thinly drawn characters, the assertion of camp as both aesthetic and anesthetic, and a general infantilism of vision. Apparently Cannes agrees with the first assessment, because the director cut the film drastically after its screening. As for the obsession with camp, maybe it's just a gay thing, but I don't think camp works when it's a primary aesthetic mode. For example, Woop Woop shows us the
denizens camping it up to camp classics like The Sound of Music, which is fine; but the thing that allows a film like SOM to play as camp is that it wasn't filmed that way.
Woop Woop, by contrast, like Priscilla before it, puts the camp right into the film from the outset. This leaves us nothing of our own to add. Instead, the characters largely appear to be mugging for the camera. Over time, this grows wearying.
This is not to say the movie is without its moments. The Australian outback is filmed spectacularly, and the actors do a good job with th limited roles they are given. But if it's outlandish Aussie antics you are after, check out any of the "Mad Max" films. You will get a bona fide camp experience to boot.
American Beauty
(1999)
True and Original
25 May 2000
...Unfortunately, as a critic once noted about the book under his review, the true parts aren't original, and the original parts aren't true.
Let's start with the true parts. As most know by now, American Beauty follows the tragicomic trajectory of an unhappily married middle-aged bourgeois, whose attempt to escape the drabness of middle-class life through a passionate infatuation with another only succeeds in destroying the lives of all involved. Sound familiar? It should: Flaubert dealt with it 150 years ago, in "Madame Bovary."
But it's not necessary to go back that far. Critiques of American middle-class culture are about as plentiful as McDonald's in Riverside: take Ginsberg's "Howl," Heller's underappreciated "Something Happened," and almost anything by Updike, Roth, or Cheever, for starters. In film, one doesn't have to look farther than Billy Wilder's "The Apartment" (literally, in my case: it's on TV as I type this). Anyone recall "The Graduate"? ""I have one word for you: plastics" was pithier and more penetrating about American mass culture than anything in this movie. "I've Heard the Mermaids Singing" mined the theme of the misfit artist well before this, and much more affectingly. The related theme of "sane" American society as a lunatic asylum, and the "lunatics" as rebellious artists, goes directly back to R. D. Lang, and finds much better realization in that counterculture staple, "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" than it does here. ("Beauty"'s subplot deals with the relationship between a next-door neighbor boy, who, we learn, has recently been released from a mental ward.) And let's not even talk about the Freudian cliche of the homophobic military mentality, and its inexorable, violent desublimation.
Even on smaller levels of detail, "American Beauty" says very little that hasn't been said before. The dead narrator device was done first, again, by Billy Wilder, this time in "Sunset Boulevard." Visually, director Sam Mendes likes to film the family scenes as statically as possible, typically relying on symmetrical compositions and austere interior shots to get across the sterility of Lester Burnham's existence. We've been here before. too--in "Ordinary People." (Mary Tyler Moore did Carolyn Burnham better in that film, incidentally, than the competently done, but two-dimensional portrayal given her by Annette Benning in this one.) The level of plagiarism is so thoroughgoing in fact that when the sensitive artist character is shown videotaping a dead bird (because, he explains, it radiates divinity), those who know the history of photography will recognize it as an Edward Weston subject, circa 1954.
In other contexts these kinds of second-hand themes and imagery might be inoffensive, even hip in an allusive, post-modern way. But the one thing that "American Beauty" insists upon is the importance of purity of individual artistic vision, as exemplified in the person of Ricky Fitts, the sensitive boy-next-door artist figure, who obsessively videotapes the things that appeal to him. Why, then, does the film rely so shamelessly on the ideas and images of others?
Perhaps the answer is that, when the film does reach for originality, it utterly fails to convince. Partly this is due to a failure of nerve. Unlike the anti-bourgeois, bohemian critiques of the 50s and 60s, whose contempt for middle-class values was unsullied by self-interest, "American Beauty" needs those very middle-class filmgoers, desperately. Otherwise, how is the studio going to make back the production costs? Thus, the film shifts the locus of the cultural rot from the ticket-buying, middle-class many, to the well-hated few: the SUV-driving yuppie. Everyone hates yuppies--especially the securely rich, such as Hollywood filmmakers. That's because no one really IS a yuppie--at least, in their own minds. So the film safely critiques a world that no one is likely to recognize that they belong to.
Yet, strangely, the yuppie class signals are still all wrong. We learn in passing that Lester Burnham makes a very unyuppie salary of $60K a year, at virtually the same desk job that Jack Lemmon had in "The Apartment"; and his wife is an unsuccessful real estate agent. How they support the trappings of an upper-middle class lifestyle is never explained.
The critique of yuppie materialism is also meretricious. When Lester rails at his wife for fetishizing their Italian sofa--screaming, "It's just a thing, Carolyn! It's...just...a...thing"--one wishes that Carolyn had gone outside to Lester's freshly purchased vintage convertible and keyed the finish, just to put his newfound "antimaterial values" to the test. But that would complicate things unduly.
That the film's anti-yuppie pose is just that, is belied by its passing depiction of the neighborhood's openly gay couple. Alone among the film's characters they are depicted unironically as well-adjusted and outgoing--yet they inhabit the same sterile yuppie world as the Burnhams and the Fitts. How is that? One of two conclusions presents itself: either the film is equating the sterility of yuppie life with the sexual sterility of homosexuality (hardly likely, given the film's heavyhanded critique of homophobia), or the film is pulling its punches when it comes to the film's one PC minority. Neither reflects very flatteringly on the film.
The film also tries to extend the metaphor of artist as rebel individualist by making Ricky Fitts not just a dope smoker (a standard trope of any Tom Robbins novel), but a dope dealer, and a highly successful one at that. Show of hands: how many of us pro-inhaling Clinton voters have ever known a virtuous, artistic dope dealer? I didn't think so. Yet Ricky isn't the only one who's virtuous--he seems to have only stolid, trustworthy clients and suppliers as well. Maybe this neighborhood isn't so bad--or so typical--after all?
"American Beauty" is expertly acted, beautifully filmed, and tightly plotted, with little surprises in all the right places and expensive production values wall to wall. In other words, it's much like the empty yuppie landscape it critiques. And it made scads of money at the box office. That perhaps, is the most telling critique of all.
Let's start with the true parts. As most know by now, American Beauty follows the tragicomic trajectory of an unhappily married middle-aged bourgeois, whose attempt to escape the drabness of middle-class life through a passionate infatuation with another only succeeds in destroying the lives of all involved. Sound familiar? It should: Flaubert dealt with it 150 years ago, in "Madame Bovary."
But it's not necessary to go back that far. Critiques of American middle-class culture are about as plentiful as McDonald's in Riverside: take Ginsberg's "Howl," Heller's underappreciated "Something Happened," and almost anything by Updike, Roth, or Cheever, for starters. In film, one doesn't have to look farther than Billy Wilder's "The Apartment" (literally, in my case: it's on TV as I type this). Anyone recall "The Graduate"? ""I have one word for you: plastics" was pithier and more penetrating about American mass culture than anything in this movie. "I've Heard the Mermaids Singing" mined the theme of the misfit artist well before this, and much more affectingly. The related theme of "sane" American society as a lunatic asylum, and the "lunatics" as rebellious artists, goes directly back to R. D. Lang, and finds much better realization in that counterculture staple, "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" than it does here. ("Beauty"'s subplot deals with the relationship between a next-door neighbor boy, who, we learn, has recently been released from a mental ward.) And let's not even talk about the Freudian cliche of the homophobic military mentality, and its inexorable, violent desublimation.
Even on smaller levels of detail, "American Beauty" says very little that hasn't been said before. The dead narrator device was done first, again, by Billy Wilder, this time in "Sunset Boulevard." Visually, director Sam Mendes likes to film the family scenes as statically as possible, typically relying on symmetrical compositions and austere interior shots to get across the sterility of Lester Burnham's existence. We've been here before. too--in "Ordinary People." (Mary Tyler Moore did Carolyn Burnham better in that film, incidentally, than the competently done, but two-dimensional portrayal given her by Annette Benning in this one.) The level of plagiarism is so thoroughgoing in fact that when the sensitive artist character is shown videotaping a dead bird (because, he explains, it radiates divinity), those who know the history of photography will recognize it as an Edward Weston subject, circa 1954.
In other contexts these kinds of second-hand themes and imagery might be inoffensive, even hip in an allusive, post-modern way. But the one thing that "American Beauty" insists upon is the importance of purity of individual artistic vision, as exemplified in the person of Ricky Fitts, the sensitive boy-next-door artist figure, who obsessively videotapes the things that appeal to him. Why, then, does the film rely so shamelessly on the ideas and images of others?
Perhaps the answer is that, when the film does reach for originality, it utterly fails to convince. Partly this is due to a failure of nerve. Unlike the anti-bourgeois, bohemian critiques of the 50s and 60s, whose contempt for middle-class values was unsullied by self-interest, "American Beauty" needs those very middle-class filmgoers, desperately. Otherwise, how is the studio going to make back the production costs? Thus, the film shifts the locus of the cultural rot from the ticket-buying, middle-class many, to the well-hated few: the SUV-driving yuppie. Everyone hates yuppies--especially the securely rich, such as Hollywood filmmakers. That's because no one really IS a yuppie--at least, in their own minds. So the film safely critiques a world that no one is likely to recognize that they belong to.
Yet, strangely, the yuppie class signals are still all wrong. We learn in passing that Lester Burnham makes a very unyuppie salary of $60K a year, at virtually the same desk job that Jack Lemmon had in "The Apartment"; and his wife is an unsuccessful real estate agent. How they support the trappings of an upper-middle class lifestyle is never explained.
The critique of yuppie materialism is also meretricious. When Lester rails at his wife for fetishizing their Italian sofa--screaming, "It's just a thing, Carolyn! It's...just...a...thing"--one wishes that Carolyn had gone outside to Lester's freshly purchased vintage convertible and keyed the finish, just to put his newfound "antimaterial values" to the test. But that would complicate things unduly.
That the film's anti-yuppie pose is just that, is belied by its passing depiction of the neighborhood's openly gay couple. Alone among the film's characters they are depicted unironically as well-adjusted and outgoing--yet they inhabit the same sterile yuppie world as the Burnhams and the Fitts. How is that? One of two conclusions presents itself: either the film is equating the sterility of yuppie life with the sexual sterility of homosexuality (hardly likely, given the film's heavyhanded critique of homophobia), or the film is pulling its punches when it comes to the film's one PC minority. Neither reflects very flatteringly on the film.
The film also tries to extend the metaphor of artist as rebel individualist by making Ricky Fitts not just a dope smoker (a standard trope of any Tom Robbins novel), but a dope dealer, and a highly successful one at that. Show of hands: how many of us pro-inhaling Clinton voters have ever known a virtuous, artistic dope dealer? I didn't think so. Yet Ricky isn't the only one who's virtuous--he seems to have only stolid, trustworthy clients and suppliers as well. Maybe this neighborhood isn't so bad--or so typical--after all?
"American Beauty" is expertly acted, beautifully filmed, and tightly plotted, with little surprises in all the right places and expensive production values wall to wall. In other words, it's much like the empty yuppie landscape it critiques. And it made scads of money at the box office. That perhaps, is the most telling critique of all.
The Filth and the Fury
(2000)
A tale told by no idiots, signifying plenty
5 May 2000
If nothing else, this is the only Sex Pistols film (there are now at least 3) to make explicit and in-depth reference to the band members' working class roots, and the way that experience informed their project. This alone makes the film worth seeing, as it explodes the myth, fostered no doubt by their PT Barnum manager, Malcolm McLaren, that the whole project was an exercise in cynical nihilism and money grubbing. As the band members tell it, nothing could have been further from the truth. I believe them.
The film is cobbled together in large part from 2 previous Sex Pistols documentaries, "Rock 'n' Roll Swindle," (a McLaren project also directed, ironically enough, by F&F director Julie Temple) and "D.O.A," plus clips from BBS television and elsewhere that try to locate the Pistols in the political and social climate that spawned them. This effort, to give the Pistols a historical context, is by far the most valuable part of the film for those trying to understand how a bunch of working class stiffs, who could barely play their instruments, and who only released one album, could set off an explosion that reverberates in the music world--if increasingly faintly--even today.
Best part of the film: footage from their last, secret gig at a palace in a working class district (they had been banned from appearing anywhere in England) before embarking on their ill-fated US tour. It consists of two performance on Christmas Day, benefiting the families of striking local firefighters, who had been out of work for many months. The attendees consist of the local lads and lasses, none of whom are "punk" in any apparent sense of the term.
Before the Pistols performed, everyone eats Sex Pistols cake and ice cream; "Never Mind the Bollocks" shirts are stretched over the pubescent bodies of every bobby soxer. Then, after a thank you from the emcee, the Pistols launch into the searing "Bodies," its sarcastic refrain sung from the point of view of an aborted fetus ("I'm not an animal!/I'm an abortion..."). All the boppers dance like it's a sock hop, with the difference that everyone gleefully throws leftover desserts at one another. Steve Jones is shown playing guitar with his face covered in cake icing, beaming. In his reminiscence about the gig, Rotten grows wistful, saying it was easily their best memory as a band, and the last good one before it all fell apart.
I never knew the guys were such sentimentalists.
It's hard to believe that there once was a time when rock music could actually matter, when it was possible to actually escape the commodified rebellion that now sells Budweiser, Nike, and SUVs, when it was possible, however briefly to scare the pants of the political establishment. Young pop music lovers who swallow the meretricious rebellion of rap or grunge--whose self-important lyrics and idiotically monotonous rhythms make their authors rich off the weekly allowances of white middle class kids whose idea of rebellion is big loud subwoofers in the Corolla Daddy bought them for their 16th birthday--might profit from getting a glimpse of the Real Thing.
The rest of us, who were lucky enough to have been there when history was made, and who can still recall the opening chords of "Anarchy in the UK" blasting all traces of "More Than a Feeling" and "Take It Easy" out of our speakers cabinets and into the first circle of music Hell where they always belonged, can enjoy the film for what it teaches us about the power of ordinary, thoroughly obnoxious people to make their own history, and ours.
Another thing I learned from the film: if Tom Cruise were a junkie, he would look just like Sid Vicious.
The film is cobbled together in large part from 2 previous Sex Pistols documentaries, "Rock 'n' Roll Swindle," (a McLaren project also directed, ironically enough, by F&F director Julie Temple) and "D.O.A," plus clips from BBS television and elsewhere that try to locate the Pistols in the political and social climate that spawned them. This effort, to give the Pistols a historical context, is by far the most valuable part of the film for those trying to understand how a bunch of working class stiffs, who could barely play their instruments, and who only released one album, could set off an explosion that reverberates in the music world--if increasingly faintly--even today.
Best part of the film: footage from their last, secret gig at a palace in a working class district (they had been banned from appearing anywhere in England) before embarking on their ill-fated US tour. It consists of two performance on Christmas Day, benefiting the families of striking local firefighters, who had been out of work for many months. The attendees consist of the local lads and lasses, none of whom are "punk" in any apparent sense of the term.
Before the Pistols performed, everyone eats Sex Pistols cake and ice cream; "Never Mind the Bollocks" shirts are stretched over the pubescent bodies of every bobby soxer. Then, after a thank you from the emcee, the Pistols launch into the searing "Bodies," its sarcastic refrain sung from the point of view of an aborted fetus ("I'm not an animal!/I'm an abortion..."). All the boppers dance like it's a sock hop, with the difference that everyone gleefully throws leftover desserts at one another. Steve Jones is shown playing guitar with his face covered in cake icing, beaming. In his reminiscence about the gig, Rotten grows wistful, saying it was easily their best memory as a band, and the last good one before it all fell apart.
I never knew the guys were such sentimentalists.
It's hard to believe that there once was a time when rock music could actually matter, when it was possible to actually escape the commodified rebellion that now sells Budweiser, Nike, and SUVs, when it was possible, however briefly to scare the pants of the political establishment. Young pop music lovers who swallow the meretricious rebellion of rap or grunge--whose self-important lyrics and idiotically monotonous rhythms make their authors rich off the weekly allowances of white middle class kids whose idea of rebellion is big loud subwoofers in the Corolla Daddy bought them for their 16th birthday--might profit from getting a glimpse of the Real Thing.
The rest of us, who were lucky enough to have been there when history was made, and who can still recall the opening chords of "Anarchy in the UK" blasting all traces of "More Than a Feeling" and "Take It Easy" out of our speakers cabinets and into the first circle of music Hell where they always belonged, can enjoy the film for what it teaches us about the power of ordinary, thoroughly obnoxious people to make their own history, and ours.
Another thing I learned from the film: if Tom Cruise were a junkie, he would look just like Sid Vicious.
A truly subversive movie
28 March 2000
I was not a fan of South Park before I saw BL&U, nor was I a fan of movie musicals. Well, I'm still not a fan of musicals, but I'm a fan of *this* musical, and am grateful to Parker and Stone for demonstrating that it's still possible to make a great movie on one's own terms.
For this movie, unlike the usual feature-length adaptation of a pop culture phenomenon, not only lives up to its pedigree, it wildly exceeds it. Yes, the movie does recycle many of the show's jokes, but it does so in new yet relevant contexts that keep the material funny if you are familiar with the South Park world. If you aren't familiar with that world (as I wasn't before seeing the movie), the gags are simultaneously accessible yet often subtle.
Subtle? Yes, many of the gags are. Indeed, one of the pleasures of owning a copy of the movie is having the ability to review the movie, in slo-mo if necessary, and discover throwaway sight gags that one has missed in the delirium of watching this anarchic satire the first time through. (And if you have the DVD, you can add subtitles to catch many of the songs' often elusive lyrics.)
Then there's the music. What is it about movie musicals that attracts great satiric minds? Not since Pynchon's "Gravity's Rainbow" has a work of art so subversively exploited the conventions of the movie musical as South Park. From the droll opening strains of Mountain Town, to the Disneyesque "Up There," to the Les Miserables spoof, "La Resistance," South Park simultaneously sends up the genre while paying homage to it, and still finds room to use the songs to score delicious points against its myriad targets.
One last thing: this movie is not cynical. Beneath the scatological humor, the cartoon violence, the scathing portrayals of Wynona Ryder et al, and the backdrop of adult xenophobia, sexual repression and political opportunism, is a sensibility that exalts childhood as an island of honesty and idealism, if also of id-like impulse and frequent selfishness. In this they share space on the shelf of great satires with "Candide," "Gulliver's Travels," "Tom Sawyer" and especially "Huckleberry Finn"--classics that, like BL&U, also exposed the hypocrisies of the adult world "through the eyes of a child."
Elvis Costello once sang, "I want to bite the hand that feeds me/I want to bite that hand so badly/I want to make them wish they'd never met me." That BLU was shut out at the Academy Awards (having only garnered a nomination for the relatively tame "Blame Canada", which lost, appropriately enough, to the execrable Phil Collins) only vindicates the film's take-no-prisoners send-up of nearly everything that annoys in this suffociatingly focus-group-tested, PC-policed, cynically sentimental, violence-ridden, love-starved modern world. See this movie, and see the persistence of hope and possibility sparkling like a diamond amid the pop culture detritus of a quiet little red-necked, white-trash, strait-laced, mesuggeneh, US mountain town.
For this movie, unlike the usual feature-length adaptation of a pop culture phenomenon, not only lives up to its pedigree, it wildly exceeds it. Yes, the movie does recycle many of the show's jokes, but it does so in new yet relevant contexts that keep the material funny if you are familiar with the South Park world. If you aren't familiar with that world (as I wasn't before seeing the movie), the gags are simultaneously accessible yet often subtle.
Subtle? Yes, many of the gags are. Indeed, one of the pleasures of owning a copy of the movie is having the ability to review the movie, in slo-mo if necessary, and discover throwaway sight gags that one has missed in the delirium of watching this anarchic satire the first time through. (And if you have the DVD, you can add subtitles to catch many of the songs' often elusive lyrics.)
Then there's the music. What is it about movie musicals that attracts great satiric minds? Not since Pynchon's "Gravity's Rainbow" has a work of art so subversively exploited the conventions of the movie musical as South Park. From the droll opening strains of Mountain Town, to the Disneyesque "Up There," to the Les Miserables spoof, "La Resistance," South Park simultaneously sends up the genre while paying homage to it, and still finds room to use the songs to score delicious points against its myriad targets.
One last thing: this movie is not cynical. Beneath the scatological humor, the cartoon violence, the scathing portrayals of Wynona Ryder et al, and the backdrop of adult xenophobia, sexual repression and political opportunism, is a sensibility that exalts childhood as an island of honesty and idealism, if also of id-like impulse and frequent selfishness. In this they share space on the shelf of great satires with "Candide," "Gulliver's Travels," "Tom Sawyer" and especially "Huckleberry Finn"--classics that, like BL&U, also exposed the hypocrisies of the adult world "through the eyes of a child."
Elvis Costello once sang, "I want to bite the hand that feeds me/I want to bite that hand so badly/I want to make them wish they'd never met me." That BLU was shut out at the Academy Awards (having only garnered a nomination for the relatively tame "Blame Canada", which lost, appropriately enough, to the execrable Phil Collins) only vindicates the film's take-no-prisoners send-up of nearly everything that annoys in this suffociatingly focus-group-tested, PC-policed, cynically sentimental, violence-ridden, love-starved modern world. See this movie, and see the persistence of hope and possibility sparkling like a diamond amid the pop culture detritus of a quiet little red-necked, white-trash, strait-laced, mesuggeneh, US mountain town.
Snow Day
(2000)
Gag-Driven, Plotless Pabulum
13 February 2000
"Snow Day" is a lightweight piece of celluloid designed mainly to separate a child's parent from his money as efficiently as possible. To its credit, it does this admirably, to judge from the appreciative, prepubsecent audience my 5-year-old saw this with. But if you want a children's movie that is any more than the sum of its marketing campaign (advertised nonstop on co-producer Nikelodeon for the last 4 months), see... practically anything else. On the other hand, if you want a demographically ecumenical selection of fart jokes, predictable slapstick, and hackneyed sentimentality, this is the movie for you.
Overnight Delivery
(1998 Video)
Three Words
8 February 2000
"The Sure Thing." Three more words: not as funny. But Reese Witherspoon is always fun to watch. Too bad the movie is more about the cleverness of the script than about establishing believable characters and narrative momentum. Paul Rudd basically reprises his likeable guy role from "Clueless" with Reese playing body double for Alicia Silverstone. Both are wasted.
The Sixth Sense
(1999)
Well-made, crowd-pleasing Hollywood product
8 January 2000
Look I enjoyed the movie, and the performances are extremely good (I understood in retrospect why the casting director got equal billing with the cast). But the movie is "Ghost" plus "Jacob's Ladder", minus the latter's paranoia. I would even bet that was how it was pitched to the producers. Good chick flick, with an Oscar-caliber performance from Haley Joel Osment, but let's not get carried away. This is Hollywood product
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