Elephant (2003) – DVD

May 3, 2004Posted in****/****, 2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Authors: Walter Chaw, Crime, Directors: Gus Van Sant, Drama, DVD, FFC Must-Own, Palme d'Or Winner, Teen, Thriller

****/**** Image A Sound A- Extras B-
starring Alex Frost, Eric Deulen, John Robinson, Elias McConnell
written and directed by Gus Van Sant

Mustownby Walter Chaw I live about five minutes from Columbine High School. In the year following the shootings, Littleton, a strange place already, got even stranger: a man killed himself in a crowded Burger King parking lot, a child was found in a dumpster behind a local strip mall, two kids were killed in a Subway, and so on. It was mass psychic fallout, and something that none of the inquiries into Columbine seem to address; in time, I'm sure, people will forget that there were aftershocks and tremors.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003) [New Line Platinum Series] – DVD

April 28, 2004Posted in2000s, Action, Authors: Walter Chaw, Crime, DVD, Horror

***/**** Image A+ Sound A+ Extras A+
starring Jessica Biel, Jonathan Tucker, Erica Leerhsen, Andrew Bryniarski
screenplay by Scott Kosar
directed by Marcus Nispel

Texaschainsawcap2003

by Walter Chaw With its low-angle compositions, gradual evolution of animalistic antagonists (from opossum to kid to crippled man to monster), discovery of a feral child, claustrophobic sets drenched in water, and neo-feminist slant, what Marcus Nispel’s The Texas Chainsaw Massacre resembles most is not Tobe Hooper’s 1974 masterpiece, but James Cameron’s 1986 masterpiece, Aliens. In structure and execution, in fact, even in visual style, Nispel’s picture recasts Aliens with its cannibalistic hillbilly clan the insectile “other” and tight tank-top sporting Jessica Biel as stand-in for Sigourney Weaver’s tight tank-top sporting über-mater. The problem with the comparison is that where Hooper’s original presented its nihilism in detached tableau (the first attack is a classic in savage hopelessness), Nispel’s remake sports the intimate camerawork favoured by Cameron-inspired action films, replacing the existential desolation of Hooper’s vision with more standard flight and fight sequences. As genre exercises go, despite a decent amount of sadistic gore, the picture is better spoken of as a thrilling, beautifully shot action film that only flirts around with social significance.

Young Adam (2003); Millennium Mambo (2001); Secret Things (2002)

April 23, 2004Posted in****/****, 2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Comedy, Crime, Drama, Esoterica, France, Romance, Taiwan, Theatrical, UK

YOUNG ADAM
**½/****
starring Ewan McGregor, Tilda Swinton, Peter Mullan, Emily Mortimer
screenplay by David Mackenzie, based on the novel by Alexander Trocchi
directed by David Mackenzie

Qian xi man po
****/****
starring Shu Qi, Jack Kao, Tuan Chun-hao, Chen Yi-Hsuan
screenplay by Chu T'ien-wen
directed by Hou Hsiao-hsien

Choses secrètes
***½/****
starring Coralie Revel, Sabrina Seyvecou, Roger Mirmont, Fabrice Deville
written and directed by Jean-Claude Brisseau

Youngadametcby Walter Chaw David Mackenzie's Young Adam opens with a shot from below of a duck paddling placidly along the surface of a lake that's replaced by a woman's corpse, then replaced by a filthy barge-worker and his mate fishing the cadaver out with a gaffing hook. Young Adam is a beautiful picture, really, its interiors sepia-tinged like a cameo photograph and its exteriors bleached and desperate, and as a film about surfaces, it marches to its own logic with the dyspeptic malaise, if not the consistent nihilistic poetry, of a Kiyoshi Kurosawa. Surfaces include skin, of course, and a scene where tattooed Les (Peter Mullan) washes his hired help Joe (Ewan McGregor) is as blandly erotic as a scene where Joe performs cunnilingus on Les's wife Ella (Tilda Swinton), an act that wins him the fried egg he was denied at breakfast. Consumption suggesting sustenance seeps into a scene where Joe covers his girlfriend, Cathie (Emily Mortimer), with custard, ketchup, and mustard before caning and raping her. Joe's furnace is unquenchable: as Biblical doppelganger, his carnal curiosity is constantly stoked by the invitation of moribund English housewives and widows–and his ire is only aroused when an appropriate mate choice threatens to free him from his fleshy fixations. Young Adam is about being trapped and listless, about the lost generation afflicted by a plague of ennui–paddling in a circle, floating between updrafts in the widening gyre.

The Punisher (2004)

April 20, 2004Posted in2000s, Action, Authors: Walter Chaw, Crime, Drama, Germany, Revenge, Romance, Superhero, Theatrical, Thriller

***/****
starring Tom Jane, John Travolta, Rebecca Romijn-Stamos, Laura Harring
screenplay by Michael France and Jonathan Hensleigh
directed by Jonathan Hensleigh

by Walter Chaw A barometer of our culture–an exploding western world balanced between listless fatalism on the one side and violent nihilism on the other (Elephant and Young Adam vs. Walking Tall, The Passion of the Christ, and Man on Fire)–at this exact moment in time, long-time blockbuster scribe Jonathan Hensleigh's hyphenate debut is his adaptation of Marvel Comics' vigilante title The Punisher. With the possible exception of Mel Gibson's ode to sadism, this is the year's most irredeemable picture thus far, but it's elevated by a bracing idea, an astonishingly courageous idea: that its hero and villain are equally reprehensible, and, by extension, that both of them do what they do because in their psychotic haze, the only thing they have to tie them to any kind of illusion of equilibrium is the dangerous idealization of their families. When a picture like this appears in the middle of a glut of vigilante flicks and in the middle of a society that may have been led into a predictably cruel and bloody war on the basis of a personal grudge, one forgiven by many for its specious association with a collective insult to our illusion of sanctuary, people should prick up their ears. While The Punisher may not be a particularly good film, it is a particularly important one.

Ripley’s Game (2002) – DVD

April 19, 2004Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Crime, Drama, DVD, FFC Must-Own, Italy, Mystery, Thriller, UK

**** Image A Sound A
starring John Malkovich, Dougray Scott, Ray Winstone, Lena Headey
screenplay by Charles McKeown and Liliana Cavani, based on the novel by Patricia Highsmith
directed by Liliana Cavani

Mustownby Walter Chaw When I heard that The Night Porter auteur Liliana Cavani was adapting one of Patricia Highsmith's Mr. Ripley novels, I knew to expect something more in line with René Clément's brilliant Purple Noon than Anthony Minghella's lavishly simpering The Talented Mr. Ripley. What I didn't anticipate was that this film, which never received any sort of domestic theatrical distribution before being summarily dropped, supplement-free, onto the home video market, would be one of the best of its year–indeed, of its kind. Ripley's Game is doomed to the "direct-to-video" label and an ignominious eternity buried in the Blockbuster shelves for the occasional stunned bemusement of the well traveled and the John Malkovich fetishist–it languishes there while over-masticated tripe like The Alamo finds its way to thousands of screens, its lingering impact to remind again that the slippery slope in Hollywood's distribution game just got steeper. Ripley's Game would have looked great on the big screen–and some genius robbed us of the opportunity to see it that way, thinking we'd prefer American Splendor or Along Came Polly.

Connie and Carla (2004) + Japanese Story (2003)

April 15, 2004Posted in2000s, Australia, Authors: Walter Chaw, Comedy, Crime, Drama, Music, Romance, Theatrical

CONNIE AND CARLA
*½/****
starring Nia Vardalos, Toni Collette, David Duchovny, Stephen Spinella
screenplay by Nia Vardalos
directed by Michael Lembeck

JAPANESE STORY
*/****
starring Toni Collette, Gotaro Tsunashima, Matthew Dyktynski, Lynette Curran
screenplay by Alison Tilson
directed by Sue Brooks

Conniejapaneseby Walter Chaw SPOILER WARNING IN EFFECT. Pity Toni Collette, her inability to land a lead role that might catapult her into the limelight bespeaking of either a general dearth of quality lead actress roles or an inability to choose her "breakthrough" projects carefully. The highlight of a lot of good movies (The Sixth Sense, Clockwatchers, About a Boy) and bad ones (Muriel's Wedding, Hotel Splendide), too, her latest chance to evolve beyond accomplished second fiddle has elicited a glorified supporting role in Nia Vardalos's latest bit of unwatchable crowd-pleasing garbage (Connie and Carla) and the ingenue part in an embarrassing bit of housewife Orientalism erotica that transplants the Yellow Peril of the American 1950s to a modern-day Outback setting (Japanese Story).

The Whole Ten Yards (2004)

April 9, 2004Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Comedy, Crime, Gangster, Theatrical, Thriller, ZERO STARS

ZERO STARS/****
starring Bruce Willis, Matthew Perry, Amanda Peet, Kevin Pollak
screenplay by George Gallo
directed by Howard Deutch

by Walter Chaw Oz (Matthew Perry, racing Ray Romano for title of television personality least suited for the big screen) is a dentist married to ex-moll Cynthia (Natasha Henstridge) and ex-hitman Jimmy (Bruce Willis) is married to ex-dental hygienist Jill (Amanda Peet). Oz is constantly mugging, falling down, running into things, and making funny faces, which leads me to believe that Oz might be afflicted by some toxic stew of epilepsy, Tourette’s Syndrome, and limited comic actor’s disease–the last of which the sort of thing that otherwise dull or homely children contract to get attention in class. Through a devastatingly disinteresting sequence of convoluted events, our whimsical quartet is menaced by Hungarian mobster Lazlo Gogolak (Kevin Pollak, in his fourth decade of needing a bullet to the head) and his dimwit son Strabo (Frank Collison)–resulting in a shootout and a desperate series of speeches that don’t do a thing to explain how Jimmy pretending to be a housewife in a David Lee Roth wig relates to stealing millions from the mob.

Reefer Madness (1938) [Special “Addiction”] – DVD

April 7, 2004Posted in1930s, Authors: Travis Mackenzie Hoover, Comedy, Crime, Drama, DVD, Esoterica

*/**** Image B (B&W) F (Colorized) Sound A- (DD) A (DTS) Extras D
starring Dorothy Short, Dave O'Brien, Thelma White, Carleton Young
screenplay by Arthur Hoerl
directed by Louis Gasnier

by Travis Mackenzie Hoover I don't really have much to say about Reefer Madness (original title: Tell Your Children) that hasn't been said a million times in a million hazy dorm rooms. Yes, the film is hysterical. Yes, it's inaccurate. Yes, it's stilted and clumsy and generally ridiculous. And still, I sat largely stone-faced throughout the entire film, barely snickering at some of its gaffes and performances. The truth is that while it has the ineptitude we look for in camp, it lacks a visionary quality that could elevate it to classic status–there is no virtuoso technical insanity in the manner of Ed Wood, no gorilla creature questioning its existence à la Robot Monster, no rending of the fabric of reality as only great bad filmmakers can. Though I imagine it improves after a few bong hits.

Black Sunday (1977) – DVD

April 6, 2004Posted in1970s, Adventure, Authors: Walter Chaw, Crime, Directors: John Frankenheimer, Drama, DVD, Espionage, Thriller

***/**** Image A Sound B
starring Robert Shaw, Bruce Dern, Marthe Keller, Fritz Weaver
screenplay by Ernest Lehman, Kenneth Ross and Ivan Moffat
directed by John Frankenheimer

by Walter Chaw Before Thomas Harris created a genius shrink-turned-serial murderer, he wrote the everything-old-is-new-again terrorist saga Black Sunday, managing to incorporate the Super Bowl into its tale of good intelligence saving the day. How novel. What's constant between this and Harris's Hannibal Lecter trilogy is his interest in broken heroes: the inversion of the man of action archetype that germinated in the Fifties Western tradition and flowered in the voodoo ego-nomics of the Reagan-mad Eighties, locating Black Sunday firmly in the deep well of Seventies cinema–filthy with ineffectual champions and astringent endings. But where Harris's novel understood its place in the bittersweet, paranoid zeitgeist, Black Sunday, with its all-star cast (Robert Shaw two years after Jaws, Bruce Dern at his peak, Marthe Keller a year removed from Marathon Man), megalomaniacal producer Robert Evans, and blockbuster aspirations, proves to be another Star Wars-style harbinger of the impending end of what was possibly the most amazing period in film in history.

Wild Things 2 (2004) – DVD

April 2, 2004Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Crime, Drama, DVD, Mystery, Thriller, ZERO STARS

ZERO STARS/**** Image A Sound A Extras D
starring Susan Ward, Leila Arcieri, Isaiah Washington, Tony Denison
screenplay by Ross Helford & Andy Hurst
directed by Jack Perez

by Walter Chaw Alligator swamps and high school, I get the comparison, but like the first film, Wild Things 2 is coy, smug, and not so much meta as a self-satisfied, misogynistic tease. Those looking for titillation will have to settle for a lot of slo-mo beach volleyball, multiple views of Susan Ward walking around slowly in such a way as to hide her alarming thighs, and a brief three-way featuring a body double for repulsive/hot (see also: Brittany Murphy) Leila Arcieri, who drops Arcieri down about two cup sizes while upping her pastiness by at least three Danes. Seriously here, how hard would it have been to find a couple of exhibitionistic starlets for a direct-to-video smut pic like Wild Things 2? The really disturbing thing about that is that Arcieri and Ward were apparently hired for their acting ability.

Wild Things (1998) [Unrated Edition] – DVD

March 30, 2004Posted in1990s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Crime, Drama, DVD, Mystery, Satire, Thriller

**/**** Image A- Sound A-
starring Kevin Bacon, Matt Dillon, Neve Campbell, Denise Richards
screenplay by Stephen Peters
directed by John McNaughton

by Bill Chambers I shepherded myself through puberty on a steady diet of Cinemax, and I’ve apologized for worse than this movie’s sins on behalf of director John McNaughton, whose Mad Dog and Glory almost sires a new genre: misogyny uplift. So I’ve always considered my indifference towards Wild Things to be something of an anomaly. A continuation of a theme that ran subtly through McNaughton’s powerful Normal Life, i.e., some inextricable link between carnal desire and pecuniary greed, Wild Things (originally titled Sex Crimes) opens with an aerial view of the ‘Glades that cleverly juxtaposes alligator-infested swampland with the grounds of a nearby high school. The implication is clear, but then again it’s too clear, and you can shut the movie off then and there without missing a beat.

Taking Lives (2004) [Widescreen Edition – Unrated Director’s Cut] – DVD|[Extended Cut] – Blu-ray Disc + Gia (1998) [Unrated] – DVD

March 19, 2004Posted in1990s, 2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Authors: Walter Chaw, Biopic, Blu-ray Disc, Crime, Drama, DVD, Mystery, Television, Thriller

TAKING LIVES
***/****
DVD – Image A- Sound A- Extras C+
BD – Image B+ Sound A Extras C+
starring Angelina Jolie, Ethan Hawke, Kiefer Sutherland, Gena Rowlands
screenplay by Jon Bokenkamp, based on the novel by Michael Pye
directed by D.J. Caruso

Takinglivesdvdcapby Walter Chaw The more cynical among us would note that the title might also refer to the time that movies exactly like Taking Lives have stolen from hapless audiences, but the fact of it is that if not for our mortal curiosity, we might have missed genuinely good mad-dog killer flicks like Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer, Manhunter, The Untold Story, and Se7en. On a reptile level, I think it behooves the herd to slow down at the scene of a gory end, the flock imprinting another’s messy mortal lesson as an explanation for our fascination with train wrecks and splatter flicks. But where a film like The Silence of the Lambs perversely reassures its captive audience that no matter the procreative ingenuity of a predator’s unslakeable bloodlust, there’s always a corn-fed, buttermilk-scrubbed farm girl there to put him away (and Taking Lives falls into this camp), there are films like granddaddy In Cold Blood (and great-grandpappy Psycho) that disdain the easy treatment of societal cancers. The one is appeasement and equivocation-bordering-on-exploitation, the other is always disquieting and sometimes even thought-provoking.

The Pink Panther Film Collection [6-Disc DVD Collector’s Set – Special Edition] – DVD

March 16, 2004Posted in1960s, 1970s, 1980s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Comedy, Crime, DVD, Mystery, Romance, UK

THE PINK PANTHER (1964)
*½/**** Image A+ Sound B+ Extras B
starring David Niven, Peter Sellers, Robert Wagner, Capucine
screenplay by Maurice Richlin and Blake Edwards
directed by Blake Edwards

A SHOT IN THE DARK (1964)
***/**** Image B+ Sound B+
starring Peter Sellers, Elke Sommer, George Sanders, Herbert Lom
screenplay by William Peter Blatty and Blake Edwards, based on the play by Harry Kurnitz
directed by Blake Edwards

THE PINK PANTHER STRIKES AGAIN (1976)
***½/**** Image A- Sound A-
starring Peter Sellers, Herbert Lom, Lesley-Anne Down, Burt Kwouk
screenplay by Frank Waldman, Blake Edwards
directed by Blake Edwards

REVENGE OF THE PINK PANTHER (1978)
*½/**** Image A Sound A-
starring Peter Sellers, Herbert Lom, Burt Kwouk, Dyan Cannon
screenplay by Ron Clark, Frank Waldman, Blake Edwards
directed by Blake Edwards

TRAIL OF THE PINK PANTHER (1982)
*/**** Image A Sound A-
starring Peter Sellers, David Niven, Herbert Lom, Joanna Lumley
screenplay by Frank Waldman, Tom Waldman, Blake Edwards, Geoffrey Edwards
directed by Blake Edwards

by Bill Chambers If you've never seen the one that started it all, then it will probably surprise you to learn that The Pink Panther is all but a pre-emptive strike against a possible franchise–practically the only thing about it that became canonical and conventional was the animated title sequence. (This upheld tradition of a cartoon beneath the opening credits formalized a cottage industry for James Bond distributor United Artists.) Series lynchpin Inspector Clouseau (Peter Sellers) isn't even the central figure; that would be Sir Charles Litton (David Niven), a playboy plotting to steal the coveted Pink Panther diamond by ingratiating himself with its owner, Dala (Once Upon a Time in the West's Claudia Cardinale), a pampered princess decompressing at a ski chalet in Cortina.

The Girl from Rio (1969) + Sadomania (1981) – DVDs

March 8, 2004Posted in1960s, 1980s, Action, Adventure, Authors: Walter Chaw, Blue Underground, Crime, Drama, DVD, Spain, Thriller, UK, West Germany, ZERO STARS

Die sieben Männer der Sumuru
*½/**** Image  A- Sound A- Extras A-
starring Shirley Eaton, Richard Wyler, George Sanders, Maria Rohm
screenplay by Peter Welbeck
directed by Jess Franco

Sadomania – Hölle der Lust
Hellhole Women
ZERO STARS/**** Image B+ Sound A- Extras A-
starring Ajita Wilson, Ursula Fellner, Robert Foster, Gina Jansen
screenplay by Jess Franco and Günter Ebert
directed by Jess Franco

by Walter Chaw Theoretically, I'm not opposed to the idea of the exploitation film. In the right hands, its disreputable ingredients of sex, violence, and "shocking" behaviour (the girl and the gun of Godardian legend) could be a thrilling camera subject and a springboard for lush stylistic excess. But for every Russ Meyer, Dario Argento, or Suzuki Seijun who knows his way around a camera, there are scores of Lucio Fulcis, Ruggero Deodatos, and Jess Francos who have no clue as to how to make a movie that hangs together. The latter of that unholy trio is a case in point: the current DVD release of two of his films is an occasion for seeing how far the exploitation formula can go wrong. Running the gamut from ridiculous (The Girl from Rio) to repellent (Sadomania), they lack any real stylistic brio to enliven their rote excesses and cheap perversions, succeeding only as possible subjects for Mystery Science Theatre 3000-style mockery.

Starsky & Hutch (2004)

March 5, 2004Posted in2000s, Action, Authors: Walter Chaw, Comedy, Crime, Theatrical

*/****
starring Ben Stiller, Owen Wilson, Snoop Dogg, Fred Williamson
screenplay by John O'Brien and Todd Phillips & Scot Armstrong
directed by Todd Phillips

Starskyandhutchby Walter Chaw The problems with Todd Phillips's lifeless and auto-consumptive Starsky & Hutch begin with a lack of imagination and end with a lack of pace. The one thing a comedy can't be is boring, and Starsky & Hutch is that in spades, banking far too much on the inherent hilarity of the '70s (its title declares "Bay City. The Seventies" like a plot outline and mission statement) while depending upon Owen Wilson and Ben Stiller to keep doing the same thing they've been doing for what's beginning to seem like decades. If I never see Stiller do a silly dance again, not to mention engage in a dance-off, it'll be too soon. Hope/Crosby for an age of lowered expectations, both are talented artists when they're not just cashing a paycheck. The danger is that a few more like Starsky & Hutch and The Royal Tenenbaums will begin to seem like a fluke.

Fight for Your Life (1977) – DVD

February 26, 2004Posted in1970s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Blue Underground, Crime, DVD, Thriller

*½/**** Image A Sound B Extras B+
starring William Sanderson, Robert Judd, Reginald Bythewood, Lela Small
screenplay by Straw Weisman
directed by Robert A. Endelson

by Bill Chambers The package containing Fight for Your Life drew me towards it the way a pie cooling on the windowsill draws fugitives from chain gangs. Something I hate about myself is my susceptibility to ironic temptation: Here was this DVD with one third of "Newhart"'s Larry, Darryl, and Darryl having a barechested brawl with a Famous Amos look-alike on the cover, and like a not-so-metaphorical rat to cheese, I had to spin it immediately. Further patronizing me was a pull quote from All Movie Guide declaring Fight for Your Life "the least politically correct movie ever seen in American theaters." Coupled with my foreknowledge of the film's ongoing ban in the United Kingdom, why, that's "I gots ta know" territory. The film was now in the challenging position of having to meet a set of lopsided expectations: If it turned out to be anything less than transcendent schlock, I'd feel cheated.

Out of Time (2003) [Special Edition] – DVD

February 24, 2004Posted in2000s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Crime, Drama, DVD, Mystery, Thriller

**½/**** Image B Sound B Extras B
starring Denzel Washington, Eva Mendes, Sanaa Lathan, Dean Cain
screenplay by Dave Collard
directed by Carl Franklin

by Walter Chaw If Carl Franklin were going to reunite with Denzel Washington, I wish he would've just made a follow-up to their exceptional adaptation of Walter Mosley's Devil in a Blue Dress–and while we're taking a stroll through fantasyland, I really wish that Franklin would make another film the equal of his astonishing One False Move. Not to say that Out of Time is a bad film (given the fatigue of the premise, it's a remarkably good film), just to say that it's only good enough to remind (unlike Franklin's excrescent High Crimes) of the kind of filmmaker that Franklin has been and, hope springing eternal, could be again. What translates well is a sense of breezy professionalism in a preposterous film put together so well that it gives the illusion of being entirely effortless and occasionally great. Out of Time reminds of the superior Confidence in the same way that Franklin reminds of James Foley: they're genuinely gifted neo-noir directors at the top of the game when they're at the top of their games, but too often given to undertaking projects of convenience. For Franklin, Out of Time is something like a return to form but more like a skilled director trying hard to find his way back to the true path.

They Drive by Night (1940) – DVD

February 18, 2004Posted in1940s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Crime, Drama, DVD, Thriller

**½/**** Image B+ Sound B+ Extras B
starring George Raft, Ann Sheridan, Ida Lupino, Humphrey Bogart
screenplay by Jerry Wald & Richard Macaulay
directed by Raoul Walsh

by Bill Chambers At first an earnest but cheerful portrait of two brothers trying to make ends meet as Depression-era truckers, Raoul Walsh’s They Drive By Night does a complete about-face in terms of tone about halfway through that’s almost guaranteed to cause intellectual whiplash. It might therefore be an effective salve to think of this sea change as analogous to our road-bound heroes’ plight, but it’s business as usual for both distributor Warner Bros. (here combining two disparate pieces of source material–A.I. Bezzerides’s novel The Long Haul and the 1935 Bette Davis vehicle Bordertown–simply to get mileage out of pre-owned properties) and Walsh, since Walsh seemed to gravitate towards cross-pollinated screenplays. (I’m thinking of his Pursued, a western that flirts haphazardly (yet rewardingly) with noir conventions, or his gangsters-go-camping yarn High Sierra (written by John Huston).) Nevertheless, the film’s U-turn is so radical that it arguably transforms They Drive By Night into one of the U.S. cinema’s earliest experiments in portmanteau–adequate absolution, really, for this borderline social-conscience picture’s zany mutation into a gothic melodrama.

Matchstick Men (2003) [Widescreen Edition] – DVD

February 15, 2004Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Authors: Walter Chaw, Comedy, Crime, Directors: Ridley Scott, Drama, DVD, Nicolas Cage

**/**** Image B+ Sound B+ Extras B+
starring Nicolas Cage, Sam Rockwell, Alison Lohman, Bruce McGill
screenplay by Nicholas Griffin & Ted Griffin, based on the novel by Eric Garcia
directed by Ridley Scott

by Walter Chaw The defining Nicolas Cage performance is still the one he delivered in Vampire’s Kiss, an indescribably strange film that saw the actor affecting some sort of Algonquin accent and, in the picture’s most memorable scene, screaming at his therapist while wearing an ill-fitting set of plastic fangs. For Ridley Scott’s highly anticipated take on the dead-on-its-feet big con formula Matchstick Men (one last score for the grizzled shyster, a young apprentice who’s not what he seems, an unexpected and unwise late partner in crime, a big twist telegraphed from the first frame, and so on), Cage seems to have resurrected his perversely hammy turn in that underseen camp classic: screaming at another therapist (Bruce Altman, always good), donning another disguise with an astonishing number of distracting tics and affectations, and ultimately accepting his fate with a sort of fatigued, fatalistic resignation.

Wonderland (2003) [Limited 2-Disc Edition] – DVD

February 9, 2004Posted in2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Authors: Walter Chaw, Canada, Crime, Documentary, Drama, DVD, Mystery, Thriller

WONDERLAND
*/**** Image A- Sound A Extras B
starring Val Kilmer, Lisa Kudrow, Kate Bosworth, Dylan McDermott
screenplay by James Cox & Captain Mauzner and Todd Samovitz & D. Loriston Scott
directed by James Cox

by Walter Chaw A collision of vérité with the sort of Requiem for a Dream grind-cut quick-edits that have produced some of the worst films of the last couple of years (case in point: Spun), Wonderland sets out to tell the true story of 1981's Wonderland Murders, which left four scumbags dead and porn king John Holmes–King Scumbag, as it were–implicated in the lead pipe nastiness. It's a regurgitation in so many ways of so many things: neo-Boogie Nights, neo-noir, neo-Val Kilmer's own strung-out performance in the superior The Salton Sea–and therein lies the problem, as Kilmer is altogether too likeable an anti-hero, typecast as the strung-out simpleton too good-looking to be at the bottom, too drunk on himself to be anywhere else. A section where the passage of time is represented by a montage of TV GUIDE listings provides the only spark in the midst of this spastic spectacle, demonstrating a knowledge of its cathode tube parentage as cannily as the use of Duran Duran's "Girls on Film" tune that defined the MTV-made hit, dancing on the edge of art and porn. It happens early, it raises hopes, and then Wonderland runs itself well past the point of caring.