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****/**** Image B+ Sound A Extras A starring Robert Pattinson, Juliette Binoche, Sarah Gadon, Paul Giamatti screenplay by David Cronenberg, based on the novel by Don DeLillo directed by David Cronenberg
by Walter Chaw David Cronenberg’s North by Northwest, his adaptation of Don DeLillo’s Cosmopolis functions as a difficult, arctic précis of the Canadian filmmaker’s career-long obsession with the insectile nature of, and indulgence in, hunger. Cronenberg’s proclivity for parasites, after all, is essentially the admiration of creatures defined by their hunger. His latest is Eric Packer (Robert Pattinson), a voracious sexual predator who lives in the dark cocoon of his stretch limo as it inches its way across Midtown to a barbershop that would be more at home in the bucolic small town of A History of Violence than in the metal canyons of Manhattan. Its existence, like a little diner along the way, like a bookshop with paper- and leather-lined walls, is further evidence of infestation–pockets of disease on the glistening skin and sterile surfaces of industry. No wonder the filthy rabble protesting in Gotham’s streets have as their unifying symbol the rats that are the true inheritors of man’s work. Cronenberg recalls his own Crash in these ideas–and not just in his desire to adapt literary properties considered unadaptable. He recalls his Naked Lunch in the idea that language is a neurological contagion, and he recalls most of all both his Videodrome (in his identification of screens with every intercourse) and his eXistenZ (in the erasure of any meaningful line between our interiors and exteriors). Cosmopolis is dense and multifarious–the absolute pinnacle of pretentious, too, in its desire to explain not only its creator, but all of the world at this moment in time in our age of missing information.
****/**** Image A Sound A- Extras B starring Jack Lemmon, Shirley MacLaine, Fred MacMurray, Ray Walston screenplay by Billy Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond directed by Billy Wilder
by Walter Chaw The older I get, the better I understand Billy Wilder. And the better I understand Billy Wilder, his weariness and acerbic sense of humour, the more I feel comfortable saying, with that complicated mix of affection and fair warning that I think indicates his work as well, that his movies are assholes and mean it. Billy Wilder, the ten-cents-a-dance Austrian gigolo, the roommate of Peter Lorre who learned English by listening to Dodgers games on the radio, the admirer of Ernst Lubistch. The guy who demanded he be allowed to direct his own screenplays and so made a legendary hyphenate debut with Double Indemnity. The writing partner of both Charles Brackett and I.A.L. Diamond, the man who made whores of Audrey Hepburn and Marilyn Monroe and Shirley MacLaine, because nothing could ever be as simple, as innocent, as it appeared at first glance. The guy who lost family in Nazi concentration camps, who came up with the best closing line in movie history, which was “nobody’s perfect.” Maybe the last line of The Apartment–“Shut up and deal”–is a close second. Narrative context tells us the line refers to a card game; the Wilder context suggests a certain way of looking at the world: coping, acceptance, fatalism. Would you believe The Apartment is actually one of Wilder’s optimistic films? Optimistic because the way it views the world is through a scrim of absolute cynicism–and despite it, despite all the towers falling down, there’s the possibility of love, sweet and simple, between Ms. Kubelik and Mr. Baxter.
by Walter Chaw I wish To the Wonder had been released this year–Take Shelter, too. The one because I love Terrence Malick and I’m excited that he’s working so much, the other because I fear that Take Shelter is the last time Michael Shannon will anchor a picture without being instantly Christopher Walken-ized. It’s his The Dead Zone, and he’s amazing in a movie that takes big risks and pays off in a meaningful way; if he were to star in it now, I think it would be mistaken for camp. I also wish I’d seen Margaret in time for my 2011 list. Alas, local publicity has never been terribly interested in my participation. Nevertheless, thanks mostly to Netflix and FYC screeners, I saw a great many great films this year.
***½/**** Image A+ Sound A Extras A starring Charlton Heston, Jack Hawkins, Haya Harareet, Stephen Boyd screenplay by Karl Tunberg, based on the novel by Lew Wallace directed by William Wyler
Editor’s Note: Warner has just reissued Ben-Hur on Blu-ray minus the third disc and material bonuses of the box set, although this release does include the commentary and isolated music score. Technical specs remain unchanged.
by Jefferson Robbins Charlton Heston’s Judah Ben-Hur is a Jew in a Roman world, but his emotional journey is all Greek. It’s 26 AD, and Judah’s bond of friendship, his philia, with Roman noble Messala (Stephen Boyd), is sorely tested. When this bond breaks and Judah’s entire family suffers under the Roman version of justice, his romantic love, eros, for his servant’s daughter, Esther (Haya Harareet), is smothered by hate and vengefulness. What is left him? Only a really bitchin’ chariot race–the paramount action-chase scene in movie history, not matched for twenty years (see below) and still never bettered–and the hope of agape, the love and yearning between Man and God. This faithful but frustrated son of the Torah must learn that path through brushing contact with the new rabbi in town: a humble carpenter’s son, bound for glory on the Hill of Skulls.
![Ben-Hur (1959) [Fiftieth Anniversary Limited Edition] – Blu-ray Disc|[Fiftieth Anniversary] Blu-ray Disc](https://i0.wp.com/filmfreakcentral.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/benhur.jpg?fit=1024%2C372&ssl=1)