What We Talk About When We Talk About Like: FFC Interviews Lynn Shelton

July 9, 2009Posted in2000s, 2009, Authors: Jefferson Robbins, Interviews

LsheltoninterviewtitleHumpday director Lynn Shelton wants her men get to know each other better

July 10, 2009|It's mere coincidence, filmmaker Lynn Shelton will tell you, that her last two movies plumb the phenomenon of men reaching a make-or-break point in their friendships. Coincidence also, one assumes, that both films feature these bosom bros sprawled out across the same bed after the climax. The soft-spoken exploration Shelton began in My Effortless Brilliance (2008) finds a comedic payoff in Humpday, her third feature, which won a special jury prize at Sundance. In June, the film came to the Seattle International Film Festival for its first screening in Shelton's native city and base of operations–where it proceeded to win none of SIFF's upper-echelon awards, netting low runner-up status in the categories of best film and best actor (for Mark Duplass) and a second-place showing for Shelton as best director (with first-place going to The Hurt Locker's Kathryn Bigelow). Symptoms of a hometown backlash? Still, her flick had already outpaced many of its SIFF fellows in the race for distribution and strong word-of-mouth.

The Deep (1977) – Blu-ray Disc

July 8, 2009Posted in1970s, Adventure, Authors: Bryant Frazer, Blu-ray Disc

**/**** Image B+ Sound B Extras B
starring Robert Shaw, Jacqueline Bisset, Nick Nolte, Eli Wallach
screenplay by Peter Benchley and Tracy Keenan Wynn, based on Benchley's novel
directed by Peter Yates

Deepcap

by Bryant Frazer English cinematographer Christopher Challis got his start working on newsreels and travelogues before getting a gig with Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger's production company, The Archers. There, he worked on a team with the great Jack Cardiff before serving as the DP on The Tales of Hoffmann, a lush Technicolor envisioning of the Jacques Offenbach opera. While Challis isn't among the best-known directors of photography, his technical facility kept him in demand for the next 40 years. He shot films for Stanley Donen, Carol Reed, and Blake Edwards, but there may have been no movie where his sense of colour and light was more critical than on The Deep. Rushed into production at Columbia Pictures to capitalize on the success of Jaws, another seafaring adventure based on a Peter Benchley novel, The Deep has a humdrum story, generally uncommitted performances, and a phoney Moray eel (nicknamed "Percy" on set) that gives the much-maligned mechanical shark "Bruce" from Jaws a run for its money in the department of unconvincing animal attacks. Yet the quality of the imagery is something else.

ZPG (1972) – DVD

July 7, 2009Posted in1970s, Authors: Travis Mackenzie Hoover, DVD, Sci-Fi, Thriller

Z.P.G.
*½/**** Image A- Sound B+
starring Oliver Reed, Geraldine Chaplin, Don Gordon, Diane Cilento
screenplay by Max Ehrlich and Frank De Felitta
directed by Michael Campus

by Travis Mackenzie Hoover The plot of Z.P.G. (stands for “Zero Population Growth”) inevitably recalls that other ’70s overpopulation romp, Soylent Green. True to disaster-dystopian form, both films deal with the perils of social overmanagement in facing the food shortages and overcrowding of the then-topical population bomb. But where Soylent Green is acid, balls-out, and harmonious in its venting of incoherent grievances, Z.P.G. is too serious and lackadaisical to impress as anything other than a standard catalogue title. It seems aware of the conventions of social science-fiction but has no real use for them; stumbling through the plot like its anesthetized heroine, it doesn’t so much illustrate points as have points illustrated for it through genre memory. One doesn’t expect lucid analysis from apocalyptic potboilers–I still have no idea what was achieved by Soylent Green‘s gleefully masochistic cynicism–but one does expect an interest in the fear that society is sliding off the rails and we’re all gonna die. Alas, director Michael Campus is so incapable of wringing the slightest interest out of his premise that the way his world ends is not with a bang, but with a shrug.

In Treatment [Season One] (2008) + Tell Me You Love Me: The Complete First Season (2007) – DVDs

July 6, 2009Posted in2000s, 2008, 2009, Authors: Walter Chaw, Drama, DVD, Television

Image B Sound B Extras B ("Tell Me You Love Me")

by Walter Chaw It's a show about the traditional mode of psychoanalysis–a nine-week, five days-a-week series detailing shrink Paul (Gabriel Byrne) and four patients, culminating each "Friday" in Paul's own session with former mentor Gina (Dianne Wiest). It's based on a popular Israeli drama that was the brainchild of such filmmaking talents as Eran Kolarin and Nir Bergman. And though it begins stilted and ends badly, its thick mid-section is the enabler of our obsessive, maybe ugly, voyeuristic impulses, gratifying the viewer with the sensation that, for all the dense verbal webs spun in these little progressive one-acts, the real expert is the viewer. "In Treatment" clarifies the role of the observer in this media, how the active participant is always involved in an anthropological exercise deconstructing the characters' motives and actions–and how that critical facility, eternally underused, is occasionally gratified by material that's not quite smarter than you, but appears to be.

Whatever Works (2009)

July 2, 2009Posted in2000s, 2009, Authors: Ian Pugh, Comedy, Drama, France, Romance, Theatrical

**/****
starring Ed Begley, Jr., Patricia Clarkson, Larry David, Conleth Hill
written and directed by Woody Allen

Whateverworksby Ian Pugh Whatever Works, Woody Allen's latest stinker, at least has the advantage of starting a conversation about who Allen is and what he stands for at this stage in the game. Dusting off a decades-old script that apparently underwent very minor revisions, the director makes his first attempt to flummox you by evidently declaring himself too old/inappropriate for the role of an aging, neurotic, egomaniacal ephebophile. There's no longer any currency in saying that Allen makes movies for himself in the most literal sense, and I've always considered the man to be the best purveyor of his own shtick–considering how transparent his writing is to that end, why bother settling for pale imitations? What prevents a total dismissal of his latest proxy is the notion that Allen might actually be right in this instance, as his own stammering delivery lacks the acidic edge required for Boris Yellnikoff (Larry David), a nuclear physicist and self-proclaimed genius with contempt for everything and everyone around him. When the film does work, in fact, it's because David is so quick and sharp with his insults ("simpleton," "inchworm," "moron"). (The part was apparently written with Zero Mostel in mind, and he would have been perfect for it.) But then, everything else about the character harks back to the old standbys that, seemingly, would make Allen ideally cast: the obsession with suicide and death, the rambling nihilist diatribes about man's inhumanity to man, the intoxication with New York culture–all wrapped up in a relentlessly meta package that finds Boris's friends whispering with consternation as he casually breaks the fourth wall to tell us things we already know.

Two Evil Eyes (1990) – Blu-ray Disc

July 2, 2009Posted in1990s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Blu-ray Disc, Blue Underground, Directors: Dario Argento, Directors: George A. Romero, Horror

*/**** Image B+ Sound B Extras B-
starring Harvey Keitel, Adrienne Barbeau, Ramy Zada, Sally Kirkland
screenplay by George Romero and Dario Argento & Franco Ferrini
directed by George Romero and Dario Argento

by Walter Chaw George Romero's Dawn of the Dead is a groundbreaking satire of our consumerist state, says the party line, the first film to be shot in that new phenomenon of a shopping mall and full of cogent commentary on how capitalism has become at once a Skinner box and religion instead of merely an organizing principle. That it's also deadening and sophomoric–or that it's dated in a way that Night and Day haven't, or that it's just not very scary, or tense, or, at the end of the day, deep–is seldom mentioned. Still, and despite the failure of Land of the Dead, there's Night of, Day of, and Diary of to confirm that Romero's zombie flicks are worthy genre pieces alight with insight into social issues.

Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs (2009)

June 30, 2009Posted in2000s, 2009, Adventure, Animation, Australia, Authors: Walter Chaw, Comedy, Family, Theatrical, UK

*/****
screenplay by Michael Berg, Peter Ackerman, Yoni Brenner
directed by Carlos Saldanha

Iceage3by Walter Chaw It's not entirely accurate to say that I've hated the Ice Age movies. They're not, after all, the Land Before Time series, the post-classic Disney output just prior to the Pixar revolution, or, heaven forefend, the Shrek trilogy. No, better to say that the Ice Age franchise is at worst merely the quintessence of inconsequence: they're films so bereft of wit and vigour that their biggest crime isn't the constant shit and hit routines, nor the predictable parade of unearned sentimentality, but rather that they're as inert as the right side of the Periodic Table. The message in Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs (hereafter Ice Age 3)–that no matter what our heroes look like on the outside (two mammoths, two opossums, a giant sloth, a sabre-toothed tiger), on the inside, they're members of one tribe–is the same as in the first two instalments, and by this time, its constant mantric recitation begins to take on the air of unaware self-parody. Of course, despite its incessant championing of a non-traditional family unit, like Shrek, it still has a mammoth (Manny (voiced by Ray Romano)) marry a mammoth (Ellie (Queen Latifah)), leaving cross-species miscegenation, unlike the otherwise execrable Madagascar sequel, to the actors voicing them. What I wouldn't give for the same premise in live-action with Romano married to Latifah, the latter morbidly knocked-up and royally pissed-off.

Public Enemies (2009)

June 30, 2009Posted in2000s, 2009, Action, Authors: Walter Chaw, Biopic, Crime, Directors: Michael Mann, Drama, Gangster, Japan, Theatrical

**/****
starring Johnny Depp, Christian Bale, Marion Cotillard, Billy Crudup
screenplay by Ronan Bennett and Michael Mann & Ann Biderman
directed by Michael Mann

Publicenemiesby Walter Chaw It's possible that Johnny Depp in a zoot suit, firing a Tommy gun from the running board of a vintage Ford, is so distractingly perfect an image that all other considerations are shunted to the soft shoulder–possible for the audience to only realize afterwards that there was nothing much of substance revealed about John Dillinger in Michael Mann's gorgeous Public Enemies. (Possible for Mann, too, who in the process of creating another of his odes to masculinity and bloodshed, accidentally crafted this pedestal upon which to worship the cult of iconic stardom.) Maybe no accident at all, as the movie closest to this one is Terrence Malick's Badlands–right down to a scene amongst law-enforcement officials in which our Johnny is treated like a Hollywood demiurge of a street-thug bank robber. And if Mann is trying to craft a film along similarly fetishistic, Americana-informed lines, then the media is the massage as they say. Aside from that, somewhere down the road from today, we may look back and wonder about the sudden proliferation late in this decade of films centred on Robin Hoods literal and allegorical, robbing from a broken system of fiscal governance to give to (or, at least, not directly take from) the common guy. From our current vantage, though, what we see is the biggest movie star on the planet playing the most famous and admired "public enemy" of the outlaw era, 1931-1935 edition. While there are intimations now and again of darker contextual rumblings, they don't feel convicted; and in the end, there's left just a collection of beautiful pictures as inert as a coffee-table book.

Passengers (2008) – Blu-ray Disc

June 30, 2009Posted in2000s, 2008, 2009, Authors: Bryant Frazer, Blu-ray Disc, Drama, Mystery, Thriller

*/**** Image B Sound B Extras B-
starring Anne Hathaway, Patrick Wilson, David Morse, Dianne Wiest
screenplay by Ronnie Christensen
directed by Rodrigo Garcia

by Bryant Frazer Even if you haven't read the jacket promo copy, you'll suspect Passengers is up to some kind of supernatural wish-fulfillment from its first few minutes, as a slumbering Anne Hathaway is awakened on a rainy night by a phone call from a colleague who tells her something terrible has happened requiring her presence at a nearby hospital. It's not just that Hathaway plays Dr. Claire Summers, a therapist charged with helping a group of plane-crash survivors cope with their near-death experiences and the accompanying trauma–it's that the chilly, insistently otherworldly production design strongly implies something strange (but comforting, very comforting) is going on, too. Early hints that Claire's flirty, devil-may-care patient, Eric Clark (Patrick Wilson), has gained psychic powers, or that the other survivors are being eliminated, one by one, by a nefarious airline bent on protecting shareholder value, turn out to be red herrings as Passengers works its way to a hoary final-reel revelation that would have felt tired a decade ago.

Spaceballs (1987) [Collector’s Edition] – DVD|Blu-ray Disc

June 28, 2009Posted in1980s, Adventure, Authors: Bill Chambers, Blu-ray Disc, Comedy, DVD, Satire, Sci-Fi

**/****
DVD – Image A- Sound A- Extras B+
BD – Image A- Sound A Extras B+
starring Mel Brooks, John Candy, Rick Moranis, Bill Pullman
screenplay by Mel Brooks & Thomas Meehan & Ronny Graham
directed by Mel Brooks

Spaceballscapby Bill Chambers Neither the audacity of Mel Brooks's perpetually relevant Blazing Saddles nor the movie-love that manifested itself in his uncanny genre parodies Young Frankenstein and High Anxiety inhabit Brooks's Spaceballs, a spoof tailored to the undiscriminating palate of preteens and people who can't resist a joke at the expense of Star Wars hobbyists. It is, in other words, Brooks's very own Return of the Jedi, and although it's being reissued in a Collector's Edition DVD to capitalize on the release of Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith, it's not really in a position to take the piss out of the new Star Wars trilogy. In fact, the most interesting thing about Spaceballs circa 2005 is that what was once spectacularly stale–by the time it came out, the first wave of Star Wars mania had passed–now elicits nostalgia for a Star Wars saga that was so classical and (visually / narratively / allegorically) uncluttered as to lend itself to burlesque. Because nothing in the current "episodes" has a prayer of becoming an institution, a contemporary Spaceballs would just be a succession of insults–you can't mock Jar Jar Binks with any affection.

Roxanne (1987) – Blu-ray Disc

June 24, 2009Posted in1980s, Authors: Walter Chaw, Blu-ray Disc, Canada, Comedy, Romance

*½/**** Image A- Sound A-
starring Steve Martin, Daryl Hannah, Shelley Duvall, Rick Rossovich
screenplay by Steve Martin, based on the play “Cyrano de Bergerac” by Edmond Rostand
directed by Fred Schepisi

by Walter Chaw After The Devil’s Playground and The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith–both appearing in the middle of the Australian New Wave–the conventional wisdom was that Fred Schepisi was someone to watch. Then Hollywood called and he did what fellow ‘wavers Peter Weir and Phillip Noyce did, punching the timecard on shit like Patriot Games, Sliver, and Dead Poets Society. A re-telling of Cyrano de Bergerac, Edmund Rostand’s play about a proboscis-challenged swordsman armed with the Blarney (in spades), Schepisi’s noxious Roxanne stars a downhill-sliding Steve Martin and a Daryl Hannah who didn’t yet know that Blade Runner and Splash would be the only things anyone would know her for until a career resurrection of sorts some 15 years later with Kill Bill. I used to love this film. Time has been unkind.

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009)

June 24, 2009Posted in2000s, 2009, Action, Adventure, Authors: Walter Chaw, Directors: Michael Bay, Revenge, Spielberg, Theatrical, ZERO STARS

ZERO STARS/****
starring Shia LaBeouf, Megan Fox, Josh Duhamel, John Turturro
screenplay by Ehren Kruger & Roberto Orci & Alex Kurtzman
directed by Michael Bay

by Walter Chaw Transformers2The worst summer in recent memory continues as Michael Bay brings his slow push-ins and Lazy Susan dolly shots back to the cineplex with Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (hereafter Transformers 2), the ugliest, most hateful, most simple-minded and incomprehensible assault on art and decency since the last Michael Bay movie. It’s bad (that goes without saying), and it’s possible that even its fans will have the brute sense to recognize that it’s bad–but it’s bad in such a way that defies easy description. It’s so bad, it’s exasperating. The action, as you’d expect, is impossible to follow, with long stretches cascading in on one another without the slightest notion of who’s winning, where, and to what end. But that’s not why it’s bad. It suggests that the evil robots have perfected Terminator technology in the manufacture of a gorgeous slut-bot (Isabel Lucas), who, before trying to kill the returning Sam (Shia LaBeouf) with her go-go-gadget tongue, is humiliated by having heroic Autobot Bumblebee money-shot robot semen all over her face. But that’s not why it’s bad, either. Ridiculously poor filmmaking and Bay’s wearying misogyny aren’t “bad,” per se, so much as they’re the tools of his auteur canon, of his absolute gold-standard grasp of what it is that prepubescent boys are into and his desire to, as fast as he can, create undercover hardcore porn to gratify those desires. What else to make of the weird girl issues–the entire co-ed Michael Bay U campus populated with hot bimbo chattel, Bay’s camera leering obligingly? It’s tough to make someone feel sorry for Megan Fox, yet the extent to which she’s objectified in this flick has you looking for track marks, smeared mascara, and other evidence of bus-stop porn-star exploitation.

Taken (2008) [2-Disc Extended Cut] – Blu-ray Disc

June 21, 2009Posted in2000s, 2008, 2009, Action, Authors: Ian Pugh, Blu-ray Disc, France, Thriller

***/**** Image A- Sound A Extras B
starring Liam Neeson, Maggie Grace, Leland Orser, Famke Janssen
screenplay by Luc Besson & Robert Mark Kamen
directed by Pierre Morel

by Ian Pugh Director Pierre Morel's last film was that cookie-cutter nonsense District B13, while co-writers Luc Besson and Robert Mark Kamen have in recent times mainly presided over the Transporter series. So what surprises most about the trio's Taken is that, given its pedigree of orgiastic excess, every single one of its attributes is delivered in quantities that are just enough. All of its action sequences are just tightly edited enough to be exciting without becoming hyperactive; all of its characters are just developed enough to warrant analysis without interfering with the thrills; and its screaming misanthropy is just equal-opportunity enough to not feel like xenophobia. There's certainly a pathetic loneliness to ex-Black Ops agent Bryan Mills (Liam Neeson), still taking ersatz family photos with a disposable camera and struggling to direct the attention of his teenaged daughter Kim (25-year-old Maggie Grace, in a borderline grotesque woman-child performance) away from the rich asshole (Xander Berkeley) now married to his ex-wife (Famke Janssen). But when Kim is kidnapped by sex traffickers in Paris, it's a chance to utilize his training and indulge in wish-fulfillment of the most literal variety. Blowing past government procedure and busting up prostitution rings run by the upper class, Bryan's search eventually culminates in a violent showdown with a Middle Eastern sheikh.

Year One (2009)

June 19, 2009Posted in2000s, 2009, Authors: Ian Pugh, Comedy, Satire, Theatrical

½/****
starring Jack Black, Michael Cera, Oliver Platt, Hank Azaria
screenplay by Harold Ramis & Gene Stupnitsky & Lee Eisenberg
directed by Harold Ramis

Yearoneby Ian Pugh Maintaining relevance is a bitch, ain't it? Just ask Harold Ramis. His sequel Analyze That marked the point at which Robert De Niro lost his self-parody cred; seven decades' worth of film noir had beaten him to the punch at everything he had to say in The Ice Harvest; and the ball is only now starting to roll on that third Ghostbusters movie that's been unwarranted for the better part of fifteen years besides. But, having found a friend in Judd Apatow, Ramis finally has the means of making a movie for the here and now and gathering together an ensemble cast composed of all those funny guys the kids seem to like these days. Unfortunately, with cinematic trends as fickle as they are, most of these ultra-popular comedians already passed their expiration dates a minimum of two years ago–and, to the surprise of absolutely no one, Year One ends up being another rotten egg in what is thus far the weakest summer for movies in recent memory. As cavemen, Jack Black is still the wild-eyed idiot and Michael Cera still the stuttering virgin; Forrest Gump'ing their way through the Old Testament, they cross paths with Cain (David Cross) and Abel (Paul Rudd) as well as that other famous pair, Abraham (Hank Azaria) and Isaac (Christopher Mintz-Plasse, reprising McLovin as anticipated). Rest assured that, if the film really wanted to jump around the Book of Genesis, it probably would have featured Jonah Hill as Esau and Will Ferrell as Jacob, doing whatever it is they do anymore without deviating from what you know about them. You pays your money and gets what you expects, and that's precisely what's so deadly about Year One.

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966) [2-Disc DVD Collector’s Set – Special Edition] – DVD|Blu-ray Disc

June 18, 2009Posted in1960s, Action, Adventure, Authors: Bill Chambers, Authors: Travis Mackenzie Hoover, Blu-ray Disc, Clint Eastwood, DVD, Italy, Spain, West Germany, Western

Il buono, il brutto, il cattivo (Extended English-language Version)
***/****
DVD – Image A- Sound A- Extras A
BD – Image B+ Sound A Extras A
starring Clint Eastwood, Lee Van Cleef, Eli Wallach, Aldo Giuffrè
screenplay by Age & Scarpelli & Luciano Vincenzoni & Sergio Leone
directed by Sergio Leone

Goodthebadandtheuglycapby Travis Mackenzie Hoover Perhaps it had been too long between screenings, or perhaps my mind had been playing tricks on me, but my most recent viewing The Good, the Bad and the Ugly wasn't as good as the others. There was still much to admire: the wild structure, which doesn't properly introduce its MacGuffin until about half an hour in; the hilariously cavalier attitude towards human decency; the raw-meat attitude towards bodies and faces; and, of course, the idea of Eli Wallach playing a Mexican, which is always appealing. But all of this seems somehow only fitfully successful now, the film's conceptual high points surrounded by the same arid desert that nearly finishes off two out of three of the protagonists. Perhaps I should chalk it up to the distance of memory–even downgraded, the experience has something bizarre for just about everybody, whether their memories will be kind to it or not.

Easy Virtue (2008)

June 16, 2009Posted in2000s, 2008, 2009, Authors: Walter Chaw, Canada, Comedy, Romance, Theatrical, UK

***½/****
starring Jessica Biel, Colin Firth, Kristin Scott Thomas, Ben Barnes
screenplay by Stephan Elliott & Sheridan Jobbins, based on the play by Noël Coward
directed by Stephan Elliott

by Walter Chaw At first glance, it would seem that Stephan Elliott’s pictures follow no conventional line. Start with 1993’s Frauds, starring Hugo Weaving and (yes, that) Phil Collins, then proceed to Elliott’s landmark The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. Then it’s on to that film’s tonal antidote (think an Outback Woman in the Dunes with Rogers & Hammerstein interludes), Welcome to Woop Woop; a Hollywood sojourn (the criminally-underestimated serial killer/FBI procedural Eye of the Beholder); and finally, one near-fatal ski accident later, an oddly appropriate return to form in the Noël Coward adaptation Easy Virtue. These movies are almost Billy Wilder-ian in their variety–literally, in that Elliott seems above all keenly attuned to the comic opportunity–the Lubitsch, if you will–in relational dynamics, but also in that he begins with something like a thriller, goes to camp, goes to camp thriller, returns to thriller, and now does something almost entirely genre-peculiar. It’s a vertiginous enough trajectory that for the first half-hour of Easy Virtue, I’d forgotten I was watching a Stephan Elliott film–that the fact that Elliott directed it was indeed the only reason I was interested in seeing Jessica Biel spar with Kristin Scott Thomas on a sprawling English estate in the 1920s.

Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991) [Extended Version] – Blu-ray Disc + Waterworld (1995) [2-Disc Extended Edition] – DVD

June 15, 2009Posted in1990s, Action, Adventure, Authors: Walter Chaw, Blu-ray Disc, Drama, DVD, Romance, Sci-Fi, UK

ROBIN HOOD: PRINCE OF THIEVES
½*/**** Image C Sound B Extras B
starring Kevin Costner, Morgan Freeman, Christian Slater, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio
screenplay by Pen Densham & John Watson
directed by Kevin Reynolds

WATERWORLD
***/**** Image B Sound B
starring Kevin Costner, Dennis Hopper, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Tina Majorino
screenplay by Peter Rader and David Twohy
directed by Kevin Reynolds

by Walter Chaw In the “careful what you wish for” sweepstakes, here’s Kevin Costner, fresh off an Oscar victory for his naïve idyll Dances with Wolves, spending his hard-won Hollywood currency indulging best buddy Kevin Reynolds in a trilogy of pictures (Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, Rapa Nui, Waterworld) he produced for the express purpose of giving Reynolds more than enough rope. If you’re in the sport of charting the positively Greek decline of the late-’80s box-office king, mark 1991 as Exhibit A, as his sad attempt at an English accent for Robin of Loxley was notoriously overdubbed in post-production after being deemed the stuff of legend in initial cuts. Aside from providing schadenfreudians endless fodder, it was the first real evidence that the Golden Boy’s tragic flaw was the belief that his charm was based on something other than Gary Cooper’s mantle of Everybody’s All-American Doofus.

Friday the 13th (2009) [Killer Cut – Digital Copy Special Edition] – Blu-ray Disc

June 15, 2009Posted in2000s, 2009, Authors: Bill Chambers, Authors: Ian Pugh, Blu-ray Disc, Horror, Mystery, Thriller

*/**** Image C+ Sound A- Extras C
starring Jared Padalecki, Danielle Panabaker, Amanda Righetti, Travis van Winkle
screenplay by Damian Shannon & Mark Swift, based on characters created by Victor Miller
directed by Marcus Nispel

by Ian Pugh SPOILER WARNING IN EFFECT. It's both surprising and disappointing that, after ten Friday the 13th films (or rather, ten Jason films), it took a crossover with Freddy Krueger to coax genuine pathos out of a hulking man-child who refused to die until he could sufficiently please Mommy. So it was to my great pleasure and delight that Marcus Nispel seemed poised to exploit that potential and separate it from its less savoury aspects. (He even starts things off with a pinch of disdain for the '80s nostalgia that brought this project to life, with the victims-to-be making weightless references to Blue Velvet and rocking out to Night Ranger.) Ironically enough, though, the remake reduces this worn-out scenario to something less complex. Using the bare essentials of the original film and its first sequel as backstory–a headless mother, oblivious campers in search of weed, and a backwoods monstrosity with a bag over his head–the amazing pre-title sequence implies that Jason Voorhees (Derek Mears) is most effective as a rumour whispered around the campfire, specifically designed to keep you awake at night. Might be heresy to say it, but in this opening salvo, Nispel's Jason promises to become a presence of terror equal to his immediate antecedent, John Carpenter's trend-setting Michael Myers. He's not an amorphous bogeyman ready to leap from the shadows, but a piece of teenage folklore that by all rights shouldn't exist, brought to murderous life by overactive imaginations.

Seattle International Film Festival ’09: Hachiko: A Dog’s Story

June 14, 2009Posted in2000s, 2009, Authors: Jefferson Robbins, Biopic, Drama, Family, Film Festivals, UK, ZERO STARS
Hachi: A Dog's TaleZERO STARS/****starring Richard Gere, Joan Allen, Sarah Roemer, Jason Alexanderscreenplay by Stephen P. Lindseydirected by Lasse Hallström by Jefferson Robbins SPOILER WARNING IN EFFECT. It's better than Marley & Me, but so's a Tasering. At least the title alerts you up front to the presence of a dog in this Lasse Hallström movie--the latest Japanaptation, after Shall We Dance, to star serial sentimentalist Richard Gere. As a lifelong mutt owner, I'm unimpressed by stories of fierce canine loyalty and homing instinct. The dog hears your train coming and runs to meet you? That's because he knows you're…

The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 (2009)

June 12, 2009Posted in2000s, 2009, Action, Authors: Walter Chaw, Crime, Directors: Tony Scott, Theatrical, Thriller, UK, ZERO STARS

ZERO STARS/****
starring Denzel Washington, John Travolta, John Turturro, James Gandolfini
screenplay by Brian Helgeland, based on the novel by John Godey
directed by Tony Scott

Takingofpelham09by Walter Chaw It's amazing that a film that takes place on a metal tube in a dank tunnel should have no trace of come in it. Less amazing when one considers that it's Tony Scott at the helm of this redux–the same Tony Scott who arguably reached the zenith of his potential with his vampire-erotica cult debut The Hunger, whose best film is the result of a superior screenplay by Quentin Tarantino (True Romance), and whose main claim to fame may be that he's behind one of the most homoerotic sequences ever captured on film in his gay amusement park Top Gun. Scott's The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 (hereafter Pelham) is packed to the gills with meaningless, hyperactive visual gawping every bit as bad here as it is in his unwatchable Domino, so frantic that it has the opposite effect oPublishn the audience by rendering itself static and boring. (There's a lot going on in a screen full of snow, too, but all it does is put you to sleep.) The picture reunites Scott with his go-to leading man Denzel Washington, whose Garber, an MTA operator fallen under suspicion of taking a bribe, replaces Walter Matthau's weary, hangdog transit cop from the Joseph Sargent original. When ridiculous goon Ryder (John Travolta) hijacks the titular subway car with a pack of the usual suspects (including Luis Guzmán, of course), it's up to smooth-talking every-dude Garber to cover up the deficiencies of hostage negotiator Camonetti (John Turturro), the gasbag Mayor (James Gandolfini), and all the bumblefuck NYPD who manage to accidentally snipe one of the bad guys, crash a car racing through Manhattan, and decorate a couple of baddies with a good twenty clips of ammunition in the middle of Uptown. It also, as a way to give the film a contemporary slant against which the terminally un-hip Scott is well over-matched, demonizes Wall Street by having its chief baddie be a former securities trader who hatches a plan to fuck the stock market by making New Yorkers afraid that his plot is a terrorist attack. Pelham is, in other words, rather tasteless in addition to being awful.