rikb000 Reviews

All Over the Guy (2001)

Better conceptually than cinematically.

[7/10 · 25 October 2002]

All Over the Guy is a better movie for what it isn't than for what it is. What it is is a fairly standard romantic comedy. The dialogue is sometimes brilliant, but the plot lacks structure. There are at least three pointless montages backed with music far more poignant and less cliched than the actual images, and one can't help but conclude that they were concocted to fill out the script.

On the other hand, the handling of the central gay relationship in the movie is refreshingly free of gay stereotypes. Oh, there are plenty of romantic comedy stereotypes, but I can hardly overemphasize how important this was to me as a gay man in viewing the film. Finally, a movie about a gay relationship that doesn't include any disco music, not a single gay bar scene, no quirky nelly "girlfriend," and where blatant emotional disregard for one's sexual partners is actually seen as a problem rather than an ambivalently accepted community standard. Of course, the cynic in me says that it's just because the gay relationship was adapted from a straight relationship in the play, but at the risk of horrifying my peers, I'd say maybe more screenwriters should use that technique when writing gay relationships. All's I know is that the result was that the romance felt closer to my own experience, and consequently more sympathetic and more true than 99% of the tarted up, histrionically dramatic gay relationships in popular media.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000)

Simply Stunning

[10/10 · 31 August 2001]

This is quite simply one of the most impressive films I've seen in the last several years. I can't find a single flaw with any of it. The story is appealing on a very deep, mythological level, and the performances of all the principal players are touchingly authentic. I was especially impressed with Michelle Yeoh's delicate balancing of feminine and martial characteristics. Each character is fully developed; I can't remember any film that manages to give such rich insight into so many characters without losing focus. The plot is well-paced, the cinematography is breathtaking, and the sets and costumes are a delight to the eye. Of course, the martial arts sequences have received a lot of attention, and they *are* exciting, but with so much more to offer, pegging this movie as just another "martial arts movie" doesn't do it justice. It may well turn out to be the crowning achievement of Ang Lee's career.

Unbreakable (2000)

Another brilliant film by M. Knight Shyamalan

[8/10 · 28 August 2001]

M. Knight Shyamalan is clearly a director who thinks a great deal about every aspect of his films. He has an uncanny ability to translate the emotional tone of his scripts into the visual medium. But it is Shyamalan's sensitivity to the psychological realities of his characters that breathes life into his technical mastery. In Unbreakable, Shyamalan uses this particular gift to turn a slow and largely uneventful plot into a deep and genuinely moving story. Like its predecessor, The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable concerns the realm of the paranormal. David Dunn, played by Bruce Willis, falls asleep on a train and wakes up in the hospital to find that he's the only survivor of a devastating train wreck. As the movie progresses, the reasons for David's survival gradually take shape as a miraculous possibility -- that he is literally indestructible. It is a credit to the director's maturity that he is able to develop this incredible plot virtually without special effects, overt gimmicry or emotional manipulation. The plot is moved along more by character development than the usual Hollywood flash; some may find the movie painfully slow for just this reason. Ironically, perhaps, it is this kind of patient forbearance that occasionally interferes with the full development of Unbreakable's characters. For much of the first half of the film, I expected David Dunn to show some recognition of the enormity of surviving the train crash. Shyamalan has commented that he was reluctant to show too much of Dunn's emotions too soon, but I think in this case he creates a situation where the audience might have difficulty identifying with the film's central character until late into the plot. Willis' rather wooden performance only intensifies our sense of alienation from the character. To a certain extent, I think this is a clever device of the director -- to contrast the liabilities of David's emotional invulnerability with the gift of his physical invulnerability -- but it comes off at times as too heavy handed. Another minor crack in Unbreakable's otherwise excellent facade is its rather abrupt "twist" ending. As in The Sixth Sense, the surprise is unexpected and emotionally jarring. I was quite impressed with how Sixth Sense presented its own "twist" ending without seeming contrived or manipulative; Unbreakable fares less well in that regard. After a slow and purposeful buildup and emotionally satisfying climax, Unbreakable's ending seems jagged and unnecessary. Over all, I think Unbreakable is an excellent film by a director whose talent is unquestionable. Despite some minor flaws, it's well worth seeing.