Child’s Play (1988) [Chucky’s 20th Birthday Edition] – DVD|Blu-ray Disc + Chucky: The Killer DVD Collection

October 1, 2012Posted in1980s, 1990s, 2000s, Authors: Bill Chambers, Authors: Ian Pugh, Blu-ray Disc, Canada, Comedy, DVD, Horror, Romania, Satire, Thriller, UK

CHILD'S PLAY
***/****
DVD – Image A- Sound A- Extras B+
BD – Image A Sound A Extras B+
starring Catherine Hicks, Chris Sarandon, Alex Vincent, Brad Dourif
screenplay by Don Mancini and John Lafia and Tom Holland
directed by Tom Holland

CHILD'S PLAY 2 (1990)
**/**** Image C+ Sound A-
starring Alex Vincent, Jenny Agutter, Gerrit Graham, Brad Dourif
screenplay by Don Mancini
directed by John Lafia

CHILD'S PLAY 3 (1991)
*/**** Image B- Sound A-
starring Justin Whalin, Perrey Reeves, Jeremy Sylvers, Brad Dourif
screenplay by Don Mancini
directed by Jack Bender

BRIDE OF CHUCKY (1998)
**/**** Image B Sound B Extras C
starring Jennifer Tilly, Brad Dourif, Katherine Heigl, Nick Stabile
screenplay by Don Mancini
directed by Ronny Yu

SEED OF CHUCKY (2004)
*/**** Image A- Sound B Extras C-
starring Jennifer Tilly, Brad Dourif, Billy Boyd, Redman
written and directed by Don Mancini

Childsplaycap

by Ian Pugh SPOILER WARNING IN EFFECT. Twenty years and four sequels later, it's obviously pointless to try to conceal that Child's Play is about a serial killer (Brad Dourif) who transfers his soul into an innocuous doll, but watching it today–more than a decade after it thoroughly traumatized me as an impressionable preteen–I was surprised to learn that the film itself didn't do much to hide that fact from the start. Oh, sure, when you first approach Child's Play, you're ostensibly supposed to wonder whether little Andy Barclay (Alex Vincent) is responsible for the murders peppered throughout, despite his loud protestations that Chucky did it. But no, it never really tries to pretend that these horrible acts are being committed by anyone other than that godawful doll. In taking that perspective, Child's Play preys upon the irrational fears we all harbour–that sting of dread we get at the sight of an unintentionally unsettling toy, immediately wished away by safe, immutable reason: that's impossible–a doll can't hurt you.

Beyond the Black Rainbow (2012) – Blu-ray Disc

September 19, 2012Posted in2012, Authors: Angelo Muredda, Authors: Bill Chambers, Blu-ray Disc, Canada, Esoterica, Horror, Sci-Fi, Thriller

***/**** Image A Sound A Extras F
starring Michael Rogers, Eva Allan, Scott Hylands
screenplay by Panos Cosmatos, inspired by the book Be Your Self by Mercurio Arboria
directed by Panos Cosmatos


Beyond4click any image to enlarge

by Angelo Muredda Panos Cosmatos claims he wasn't allowed to watch R-rated movies as a kid and had to make do with the lurid box covers he saw on video store shelves. Rising above those less-than-ideal conditions, the first-time helmer and son of famed Cobra and Rambo: First Blood Part II director George P. Cosmatos makes an auspicious debut with Beyond the Black Rainbow. As befits its retro title, this is a bravura pulp homage that recreates the feeling of a preteen creeping down the hall to catch a sidelong glance of the bygone genre cinema pulsing out of the living-room TV and painting the walls orange. Still, it's best approached not as a found object from that time, but as a mood piece–a sustained exercise in atmospheric nostalgia for what LCD Soundsystem eloquently called the "unremembered '80s."

TIFF ’12: The Paperboy + At Any Price

September 18, 2012Posted in2012, Authors: Bill Chambers, Crime, Drama, Film Festivals, Mystery, Sports, Thriller, TIFF

PaperboyTHE PAPERBOY
*/****
directed by Lee Daniels

AT ANY PRICE
*/****
directed by Ramin Bahrani

by Bill Chambers The great Pete Dexter writes tersely about criminal perversity in the southern United States; the problem in adapting him to the cinema is that without his hardboiled prose, which lends everything he writes the whiff of reportage (a newspaperman originally, he turned to novels after drug dealers beat him nearly to death over one of his columns), the psychosexual situations he describes threaten to collapse into camp. Because of this, Dexter and Precious/Shadowboxer auteur Lee Daniels sounded like a match made in Hell to me, but the blunt force of Daniels's shamelessness proves strangely compatible with Dexter's writing in The Paperboy, based on the latter's 1995 best-seller. If only he could direct! Daniels is like a less bourgeois Henry Jaglom, cutting between a panoply of indifferently-composed shots like a frog on a griddle with little feeling for either spatial or character dynamics.

TIFF ’12: Argo

September 7, 2012Posted in2012, Action, Authors: Bill Chambers, Best Picture (Academy Awards), Comedy, Drama, Film Festivals, Thriller, TIFF

Argo***½/****
directed by Ben Affleck

by Bill Chambers Ben Affleck's films as a director are no longer surprisingly good–they're expectedly good. The surprise of his latest, Argo, is twofold: first, put a beard on Affleck and suddenly he's an actor of gravitas; second, that this directing detour his career took may have been born of not just self-preservation, but real movie love. You can see it in his hoarding of genre staples for one-scene (Adrienne Barbeau) and in some cases one-line (Michael Parks) roles, but more importantly, you can see it in the gentle Hollywood satire Argo briefly–perhaps too briefly–becomes. Set in 1979, the picture is suffused with a passion for filmmaking, if also a tinge of wistfulness for that bygone era in filmmaking. Though it may be period-authentic when Affleck shows the Hollywood sign in a state of disrepair, I think it's meant as commentary on the present. Argo is the second Warner release this year to revert to the golden-age Saul Bass logo–it fits better here.

Brainstorm (1983) – Blu-ray Disc

September 5, 2012Posted in1980s, 2012, Authors: Bryant Frazer, Blu-ray Disc, Sci-Fi, Thriller

Brainstorm1small

***/**** Image C+ Sound B Extras F
starring Christopher Walken, Natalie Wood, Louise Fletcher, Cliff Robertson
screenplay by Robert Stitzel and Philip Frank Messina
directed by Douglas Trumbull

by Bryant Frazer Brainstorm will always have a reputation–among those who are familiar with it at all–as a film maudit. Casual film buffs know it as the sci-fi picture Natalie Wood was shooting when she drowned at the age of 43, under circumstances that remain clouded by mystery. Some of them know that it was one of only two narrative features (Silent Running being the other) directed by special-effects genius Douglas Trumbull, whose work on 2001: A Space Odyssey, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and Blade Runner is the stuff of legend. Real movie nerds remember that Brainstorm was intended by its director to be one of those landmarks that forever changes the future of film–like The Jazz Singer debuting synch sound, Becky Sharp employing three-strip Technicolor, or The Robe introducing CinemaScope. As a movie partly about the afterlife, it is a weird kind of eulogy to Natalie Wood, yes, but it also memorializes Trumbull’s enduring dream of a new breed of cinema that would make moving images more likelife, and more mind-expanding, than any photographic process that had come before.

Unstoppable (2010) – Blu-ray + Digital Copy

August 27, 2012Posted in2000s, 2010, 2012, Action, Authors: Walter Chaw, Blu-ray Disc, Directors: Tony Scott, Thriller

**½/**** Image A Sound A- Extras B
starring Denzel Washington, Chris Pine, Rosario Dawson, Ethan Suplee
screenplay by Mark Bomback
directed by Tony Scott

by Walter Chaw It's strange to be writing this review a couple of days after Tony Scott ended his life by walking off a bridge in California–an event that inspired me to revisit my favourite of his films (Enemy of the State and Déjà Vu) and one that spurred me, too, to finally give Scott's Unstoppable another look after finding I had little use for it upon initial release. I have an aversion to Scott's movies in general; I don't have the muscle or sensitivity to distinguish between them and other stuttering, grandiloquent pictures that have resulted in things like Michael Bay. Believe me, the temptation is high to present a critical re-evaluation of his work immediately upon his passing. Positioning oneself as the guy who knew that Chris Farley was John Belushi is one of those vantages every critic wishes he had, if only for the brief respite from charges of elitism it might bring. But listen, The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3, Domino, Spy Game, The Fan, Days of Thunder, and Beverly Hills Cop 2–there's really no defense for any of it. And when I say that I like stuff like The Hunger, True Romance, The Last Boy Scout, or even Scott's Jim Harrison adaptation Revenge, I'm not saying I love them. Tony Scott's an auteur, sure–proof that "auteur" doesn't by itself confer a positive or a pejorative connotation. I'll give him this, though: He shot a Tarantino script as a remake of Badlands and produced a sneaky sequel to The Conversation, so, yeah, I'll miss the bastard, too.

Grosse Pointe Blank (1997) [15th Anniversary Edition] + High Fidelity (2000) – Blu-ray Discs

August 26, 2012Posted in1990s, 2000s, 2012, Action, Authors: Jefferson Robbins, Blu-ray Disc, Comedy, Crime, Music, Romance, Thriller, UK

Grossepointe2

GROSSE POINTE BLANK
***½/**** Image C+ Sound B+ Extras D
starring John Cusack, Minnie Driver, Alan Arkin, Dan Aykroyd
screenplay by Tom Jankiewicz and D.V. DeVincentis & Steve Pink & John Cusack
directed by George Armitage

HIGH FIDELITY
***½/**** Image B+ Sound B Extras C
starring John Cusack, Jack Black, Lisa Bonet, Joelle Carter
screenplay by D.V. DeVincentis & Steve Pink & John Cusack and Scott Rosenberg, based on the novel by Nick Hornby
directed by Stephen Frears

by Jefferson Robbins John Cusack spent much of the 1990s stubbornly trying to dodge his high-school reunion. Barely present in Sixteen Candles, he nevertheless may have suffered a bit of the curse that pursued John Hughes’s other players: We wouldn’t let them grow up for quite a while, and careers were hampered. Cusack navigated this impasse better than most, netting late-’80s leads both romantic (Say Anything…) and dramatic (The Grifters) that unpack and showcase his mature dimensions. Cusack has, if it’s not too oxymoronic, a vulnerable edge–his characters are deeply attuned to others, but only out of self-defense. Lloyd Dobler, Roy Dillon, and, in the two films under discussion, Martin Blank and Rob Gordon constantly assess input to learn how the prevailing emotional currents of a scene affect them, not others. “You think I’m a dick,” Lloyd determines when Diane (Ione Skye) gives him a Pen of Friendship as a parting gift. His feelings, dependent on hers, are paramount. Cusack’s heroes are sensitive but far from selfless, yet the actor somehow convinces us otherwise.

Premium Rush (2012)

August 23, 2012Posted in2012, Action, Adventure, Authors: Angelo Muredda, Theatrical, Thriller

***/****
starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Michael Shannon, Dania Ramirez, Jamie Chung
screenplay by David Koepp & John Kamps
directed by David Koepp


Premiumrush

by Angelo Muredda Those who had hoped Joseph Gordon-Levitt's presence in The Dark
Knight Rises signalled some kind of Tim Drake extravaganza only to make do
with his dour Robin surrogate John Blake ought to perk up, for Premium Rush
is here. David Koepp's unabashedly silly, good-natured courier thriller is
curiously light on thrills, its daytime climax of a bike race in the park about
as low-stakes as Harvey Keitel's hot pursuit of a pickpocket simian in Monkey
Trouble. What it lacks in dramatic heft, though, it more than makes up for
in its fleetness and tight grasp on cartoon physics, as well as its smart use
of Michael Shannon as an unstable roadblock and Gordon-Levitt as just the blunt
instrument to push past him, a chiselled boy wonder who knows his way around a
fixie, i.e., the lightweight single-gear bike to which he's practically glued.

Compliance (2012)

August 23, 2012Posted in2012, Authors: Walter Chaw, Theatrical, Thriller

***/****
starring Ann Dowd, Dreama Walker, Pat Healy, Bill Camp
written and directed by Craig Zobel


Compliance

by Walter Chaw Craig Zobel's Compliance comes with a payload of controversy
trailing from a notorious Sundance screening where various audience members
registered their displeasure in a post-film Q&A–going so far, if reports
are to be trusted, as to sexually harass lead actress Dreama Walker in one of
the more ironic attempts at defending her honour. I've said it before (and
it's only gotten worse), I prefer to watch a movie with a mainstream,
middlebrow audience than with any festival audience under any circumstance.
Sure, they applaud Michael Bay movies, but at least they don't act like their
shit don't stink. Thinking back, there's the example of Sundance's old-lady
reaction to Lucky McKee's The Woman, a movie that, upon closer inspection,
reveals itself as shocking in neither its execution nor its conception–it's
just not that controversial, and its backlash demonstrates the kind of knee-jerk
liberalism that venerates easy stuff like Rabbit-Proof Fence. If you
declare yourself a feminist outraged by a film that is so clearly also feminist, you identify yourself as a fucking moron and an asshole to boot. Sundance
confirms the middlebrow; it celebrates uncomplicated messages
wrapped in indie-glamour. When was the last time Sundance pushed
something like, say, Valhalla Rising, or Synecdoche, New York?
Something difficult, something remarkable, something festivals like it are
supposed to champion? Or is the modus for the festival meaningless garbage that
congratulates its audience for making easy connections like Beasts of the
Southern Wild and anything starring John Hawkes. Fish Tank? Winter's
Bone? So Compliance, which would never be mistaken for something
transcendent and enduring, is actually more interesting than it first appears not only for a couple of the decisions it makes, but also for the degree to which its
audience is pulled into identification with the picture's bland torturers. It's
a Milgram Experiment for the viewer.

The Island of Dr. Moreau (1996) [Unrated Director’s Cut] – Blu-ray Disc

August 19, 2012Posted in1990s, 2012, Adventure, Authors: Walter Chaw, Blu-ray Disc, Directors: John Frankenheimer, Horror, Satire, Sci-Fi, Thriller

**½/**** Image B Sound B+ Extras F
starring Marlon Brando, Val Kilmer, David Thewlis, Fairuza Balk
screenplay by Richard Stanley and Ron Hutchinson
directed by John Frankenheimer

Islandofdrmoreaucap1click any image to enlarge

by Walter Chaw This is a tough one. As an avowed if guarded fan of director John Frankenheimer, his involvement with The Island of Dr. Moreau is something like a gobsmacker. Sure, he'd ventured into genre before with the ridiculous Prophecy, while, arguably, his two best films–The Manchurian Candidate and Seconds, his masterpiece–are genre pieces, too. But I think at the time, bringing in Frankenheimer three days into a troubled shoot to replace that assclown Richard Stanley was more an act of expediency than of ingenuity. If New Line thought they were getting a closer, they were right; if they thought they were getting someone who could corral the downward-spiralling Val Kilmer, they were less right ("Will Rogers never met Val Kilmer," Frankenheimer famously said). What they probably weren't expecting was that Frankenheimer would turn in something that, though critically-savaged at the time, had some legs. No, The Island of Dr. Moreau isn't a whole, falling apart as it does in the last half-hour or so, but it is the sort of movie that hints at larger issues and boasts enough indelible moments to deserve another look. Truth is, only movies this odd and discomfiting earn this amount of misdirected ire. It's not to say there's not a lot wrong with the film, but rather to suggest that the chief criticisms of it being strange and "a mess" aren't among them.

Dexter: The Sixth Season (2011) – Blu-ray Disc

August 15, 2012Posted in2011, 2012, Authors: Bill Chambers, Blu-ray Disc, Crime, Drama, Horror, Television, Thriller

Image A Sound A+ Extras D+
"Those Kinds of Things," "Once Upon a Time…," "Smokey and the Bandit," "A Horse of a Different Color," "The Angel of Death," "Just Let Go," "Nebraska," "Sin of Omission," "Get Gellar," "Ricochet Rabbit," "Talk to the Hand," "This Is the Way the World Ends"

Dexters6cap1

by Bill Chambers LIGHT SPOILER WARNING IN EFFECT. My favourite episode of "The Incredible Hulk" is the two-hour premiere of the second season, "Married." One of the unfortunately-few instalments written and directed by series creator Kenneth Johnson (a genuine pulp talent), it sees David Banner falling in love with the terminally-ill shrink (Mariette Hartley won an Emmy for the role) helping him contain the Hulk, a hypnotic process that involves David visualizing the Hulk trapped in a giant birdcage in the middle of a pristine desert–a tableau that clearly inspired the dream vistas at the outset of Tarsem's The Cell. Kindred spirits, they eventually marry, but although unleashing the Hulk protects her from harm when external forces threaten her life, it can't save her from the Grim Reaper. "Married" ends on an unusually hopeless note as a young boy who befriended the doctor informs David he's going to devise a cure for her disease when he grows up and David more or less tells the boy he's deluded. One of the most devastating pieces of genre television ever produced, it really could've been the series finale. Unfortunately, the show continued long enough to lapse into self-parody and longer still. Much like "Dexter"–though come to think of it, that happened about halfway through the pilot.

Lethal Weapon Collection – Blu-ray Disc

August 12, 2012Posted in1980s, 1990s, 2012, Action, Authors: Walter Chaw, Blu-ray Disc, Christmas, Comedy, Thriller, ZERO STARS

Lethalweapon2cap

LETHAL WEAPON (1987)
**/**** Image B- Sound B Extras D
starring Mel Gibson, Danny Glover, Gary Busey, Tom Atkins
screenplay by Shane Black
directed by Richard Donner

LETHAL WEAPON 2 (1989)
**½/**** Image B Sound B Extras D
starring Mel Gibson, Danny Glover, Joe Pesci, Joss Ackland
screenplay by Jeffrey Boam
directed by Richard Donner

LETHAL WEAPON 3 (1992)
ZERO STARS/**** Image B+ Sound B Extras D
starring Mel Gibson, Danny Glover, Joe Pesci, Rene Russo
screenplay by Jeffrey Boam and Jeffrey Boam (sic) & Robert Mark Kamen
directed by Richard Donner

LETHAL WEAPON 4 (1998)
*/**** Image A Sound B+ Extras D
starring Mel Gibson, Danny Glover, Joe Pesci, Rene Russo
screenplay by Channing Gibson
directed by Richard Donner

by Walter Chaw It’s tough to convey exactly how fresh Lethal Weapon seemed in 1987. The leap that Woody Boyd’s girlfriend–half-naked in frilly bloomers–takes off a high-rise in the early going, the character of unstable police sergeant Martin Riggs (Mel Gibson, before we knew he wasn’t acting), even the buddying up of Riggs with “too old for this shit” partner Murtaugh (Danny Glover), were smart and groundbreaking. I must’ve watched this movie thirty times in those halcyon days when VHS made stuff like this and porn middle-class pursuits to be pursued in private. Lethal Weapon holds for me, still, this gritty, dirty allure: sexy, violent, nihilistic–like the first time a kid truly reads the Old Testament.

Outland (1981) – Blu-ray Disc

August 6, 2012Posted in1980s, 2012, Action, Authors: Jefferson Robbins, Blu-ray Disc, Crime, Sci-Fi, Thriller, UK, Western

Outlandcap1

***/**** Image A Sound B+ Extras B-
starring Sean Connery, Peter Boyle, Frances Sternhagen, James B. Sikking
written and directed by Peter Hyams

by Jefferson Robbins Has anybody looked at Alan “Laddie” Ladd Jr. as an auteur of U.S. film’s late-’70s/early-’80s science-fiction renaissance? By definition, the auteur theory addresses directors, but producer-execs are inevitably part of a film’s genome–at their worst, barriers to a film’s artistic ambitions, at their best, enablers of daring visions, and often rescuers or champions of interesting failures. Ladd, of course, famously midwifed and defended Star Wars (later Star Wars: Episode IV- A New Hope) while he was president of Fox, and the studio went on to shepherd Alien to theatres during his tenure.1 His production firm, The Ladd Company, sent forth Blade Runner, the first film to put a Philip K. Dick concept on the screen in addition to being very much its own, deeply influential beast. Some unifiers among these films include introductory crawls or intertitles, situating the audience in a far future or faraway galaxy; grimy or rusty milieux, painting the SF frontier as a sumptuous scrap pile; deep attention to class, with starcraft piloted by hardworking space jockeys in trucker caps; and, as it was pointed out to me on Facebook the other day, a reliance on established fantasy/SF artists (H.R. Giger, Ron Cobb, Moebius) to carry out much of the production design. Building a world costs money, and Ladd signed the checks.2

Priest (2011) [Unrated] – Blu-ray Disc

August 1, 2012Posted in2011, Action, Adventure, Authors: Bill Chambers, Authors: Walter Chaw, Blu-ray Disc, Fantasy, Horror, Sci-Fi, Thriller, Vampire

***/**** Image A Sound A Extras B
starring Paul Bettany, Karl Urban, Cam Gigandet, Christopher Plummer
screenplay by Cory Goodman, based on the graphic novel series by Min-Woo Hyung
directed by Scott Stewart

by Walter Chaw I'm completely unfamiliar with the Min-Woo Hyong graphic novels on which visual-effects guy Scott Stewart's Priest is based, and the biggest surprise of the picture isn't that the guy who did the abominable Legion managed to make something so watchable, but that Priest made me want to track down Hyong's work. Before seeing this movie, I just sort of assumed that the comic was another weird west thing along the lines of Vertigo's Preacher; after, I'm led to believe that it's a canny little mélange of cyberpunk, weird west, and horror comics, with some solid Ghost in the Shell manga tossed into the mix. There's not a minute of the film, mind, that's without a clear antecedent–not one second that passes without a namecheck of not only stuff like Blade Runner (on the "Final Cut" of which Stewart served as an uncredited techie during his time at ILM) and, most obviously, Alien/Aliens, but also The Searchers as tortured, titular Priest (Paul Bettany) declares that if his vamp-abducted niece Lucy (Lily Collins) becomes infected, it would be his pleasure (?) to dispatch her.

The Rite (2011) – Blu-ray + DVD + Digital Copy

August 1, 2012Posted in2011, Authors: Walter Chaw, Blu-ray Disc, DVD, Horror, Hungary, Italy, Mystery, Thriller

**/**** Image A Sound A+ Extras D
starring Anthony Hopkins, Colin O'Donoghue, Alice Braga, Rutger Hauer
screenplay by Michael Petroni, suggested by the book by Matt Baglio
directed by Mikael Håfström

by Walter Chaw Though it's not particularly surprising that The Rite isn't scary or innovative, it is a bit of a surprise that The Rite doesn't completely suck. It's not good, but there's some ambition in its tale of a tortured seminarian. Michael (Colin O'Donoghue) is dealing with his odd childhood at the knee of his dad, a widower and overzealous mortician (Rutger Hauer), as well as a crisis of faith handily addressed by the traumatic, traffic-related death of an innocent whom God, the picture suggests, throws in front of a truck to get Michael to reconsider leaving the priesthood. In the same stroke, God cripples Michael's mentor, Father Matthew (Toby Jones), leading one to revisit Arthur C. Clarke's "The Star" for a dose of non-Scriptural skepticism and rage if one were so inclined. No matter, as Michael, because of his lack of squeamishness, is packed off to The Vatican to attend a modern exorcism school. Which is also something of a surprise, I guess–that said exorcism school really exists and is alive and well, well into the 21st century. Although that surprise is ameliorated a little by the fact that Catholicism also still believes in a literal transubstantiation of the host. Small wonder that Catholicism is my favourite Christian sect.

Blood Work (2002) – Blu-ray Disc

July 8, 2012Posted in2000s, 2012, Action, Authors: Bill Chambers, Authors: Walter Chaw, Blu-ray Disc, Clint Eastwood, Crime, Drama, Mystery, Thriller

**/**** Image A Sound A- Extras C-
starring Clint Eastwood, Wanda De Jesús, Jeff Daniels, Anjelica Huston
screenplay by Brian Helgeland, based on the novel by Michael Connelly
directed by Clint Eastwood

Bloodworkcap

by Walter Chaw You can figure out the pivotal clue in Blood Work if not by the title alone–which gives altogether too much away–then surely come the thirty-minute mark. You can deduce the identity of the murderer as soon as he saunters on screen, and you can predict the love story almost before it happens just by dint of the kind of movie that Blood Work is. The only thing you can't figure out is why Clint Eastwood, who sometimes makes interesting movies like Bird, A Perfect World, White Hunter, Black Heart, and Unforgiven, almost as often makes boring, predictable, prosaic movies like The Rookie (1990), Absolute Power, True Crime, and now Blood Work.

Savages (2012)

July 5, 2012Posted in2012, Action, Authors: Walter Chaw, Crime, Drama, Theatrical, Thriller

*/****
starring Blake Lively, Taylor Kitsch, Aaron Johnson, John Travolta
screenplay by Shane Salerno & Don Winslow & Oliver Stone, based on the novel by Winslow
directed by Oliver Stone 

Savages

by Walter Chaw Another disgusting piece of crap that Oliver Stone makes watchable and even fitfully interesting, Savages sees Stone returning to ground he already plowed in Salvador, his screenplay for Scarface, and arguably his best film in hindsight, the filthy U-Turn. One possible excuse for its foulness, in an ocean of possible excuses, is a cast headlined by Taylor Kitsch, the new Paul Walker; Aaron Johnson, the new Skeet Ulrich; and Blake Lively, the new…I don't know, Bridget Fonda? Another possible explanation is a godawful script by Don Winslow (author of the novel upon which the film is based), Shane Salerno, and Stone hissownself that opens with a ridiculously bad voiceover tease and ends with same, sandwiching in between a tale of blissed-out California marijuana kingpins Chon (Kitsch) and Ben (Johnson) vs. the Mexican cartel, led by Lado (the always amazing Benicio Del Toro) and Elena (Salma Hayek). Sound awful? It's awful. And it would have been even without an embarrassing John Travolta, wheedling and whinging through an entire performance as a corrupt DEA agent. With him, however, Savages at least has the benefit of occasionally elevating from entirely-useless to sometimes-whimsical camp artifact.

Deliverance (1972) [Deluxe Edition] – DVD/(DigiBook) – Blu-ray Disc

June 27, 2012Posted in****/****, 1970s, 2012, Adventure, Authors: Bill Chambers, Authors: Walter Chaw, Blu-ray Disc, Drama, DVD, FFC Must-Own, Thriller

****/****
DVD – Image B Sound C Extras B
BD – Image A- Sound A- Extras B+
starring Jon Voight, Burt Reynolds, Ned Beatty, Ronny Cox
screenplay by James Dickey, based on his novel
directed by John Boorman

by Walter Chaw Deliverance is mesmerizing. Emerging fully formed from the rich, black loam of the best period of filmmaking definitely in the United States and possibly in the history of cinema, it pistons its roots unerringly into the darkest corners of our species’ memory. In the second-most memorable moment of the film (the one where kind-hearted city-slicker Drew (Ronny Cox) eases into a guitar/banjo duel with a local kid (Billy Redden)), Boorman dangles the possibility that there could be civility between the spoilers and the spoiled before retracting it for the remainder of the picture’s running time. If Boorman is our pre-eminent keeper of the Arthurian legend, it’s useful to wonder in this particular quest undertaken what are the dark spirits of the wood, and what is the grail? The final image of the piece, after all, suggests a corruption of the Excalibur iconography offered from some fathomless underneath. The essential Western phallus is perverted in Deliverance into the promise that the primal will never be repressed for long.

The Woman in the Fifth (2012)

June 13, 2012Posted in2012, Authors: Angelo Muredda, Drama, France, Mystery, Poland, Theatrical, Thriller, UK

La femme du Vème
*½/****
starring Ethan Hawke, Kristin Scott Thomas, Joanna Kulig, Samir Guesmi
screenplay by Pawel Pawlikowski, based on Douglas Kennedy's novel
directed by Pawel Pawlikowski

Womaninthefifth

by Angelo Muredda Midway through Pawel Pawlikowski's The Woman in the Fifth, Romanian femme fatale Margit (Kristin Scott Thomas) tells glum American writer Tom (Ethan Hawke) not to worry about his writer's block. "You have the makings of a serious work now," she reassures him: "A broken life, down-and-out in Paris." Intended as a key to the film, a hint that we aren't watching real events at all but rather their translation into an American's grim European masterwork, this exchange does nothing so much as outline the limits of Pawlikowski's imagination. His first feature since 2004's unsettling My Summer of Love, this is an odd misstep, the kind of bad movie that can only be made with the purest of intentions. I don't doubt that Pawlikowski, working from a thriller by American writer Douglas Kennedy, believes in this idea that good novels are born of wretched experiences–that being a disgraced literature professor and stalled artist shaking down phantoms in run-down Paris gives you a direct line to authenticity. But it's the sort of half-baked conceit that defines countless shallow genre texts shooting for arthouse credibility, the hallmark of a Secret Window knockoff that begs to be taken as seriously as a good Paul Auster novel.