2005: A politically Charged Summer Movie Season

Considering the political commentary in both the Star Wars film and Spielberg's potent War of the Wrolds, George A. Romero's Land of the Dead fits right in to your local multiplex. As with every Romero zombie film, this is an allegorical film. Instead of spoofing consumerism, or commenting on the dangers of racism or the generation gap, Land takes aim at the current president and the current political climate. The film has too much subtext to be scary as text, the zombies don't scare or shock - but Romero does not disappoint gore fans. It you want to see bodies torn to shreads while mocking W. this is the film for you.

The film doesn't quite compare to 28 Days Later, Shaun of the Dead, or even the remake of Dawn of the Dead, but Those films would not exist without Romero's work in the genre, and Land of the Dead certainly "works" in the ways in is intended to. Seeing a genre master be given a budget worthy of his talent is always nice, and for thatreason alone I'm happy this film exists.

War of the Worlds

I am not a Steven Spielberg fan. He has an uncanny ability to put together sequences, but for well over two decades now he has almost always shown an inability to keep an interesting story going consistently during the length of an entire film. That said, War of the Worlds, is arguably his best film since the first Raiders sequel (excepting Schindler's List which stands so far outside of his other work thematically).

It is not perfect and I have a big misgiving. When the blackout occurred a few years ago I was stuck in downtown Ann Arbor with my three year-old daughter. We got on the bus we normally took to get to our car where a bus driver informed us, "They've taken out the whole east coast." I remember the feelings of dread and terror I felt until we finished the walk to our car and I heard the real news (turns out the "They" the bus driver meant was Enron). The first thing the aliens do in this film is knock out all the electricity. This all hit too close to home and I was unsettled and stayed that way for the rest of the film. This was partly because of the memories it triggered in me and partly because of Spielberg's exquisite craft. This is first-rate filmmaking. And I'm not talking about special effects (although those are truly state-of-the-art they are so good that you quickly ignore them and accept that the aliens are really there), I'm talking about editing, framing, and cinematography. I'm not sure I'm ready for the war on terror to be used as a backdrop for an escapist summer thrill ride - but based on some of the thuddingly obvious subtext I think Spielberg is taking this film pretty seriously.

Spielberg's biggest topic, the one he is too afraid to address directly, is divorce. The opening fifteen minutes of this film get closer to dealing directly with the fallout of divorce than anything else he has done. It will be a major loss if a talent as outsized as this is not applied to material along the lines of Shoot the Moon before it shuffles off this mortal coil.

This is not a pleasant filmgoing experience, there are almost no moments of levity. This film intends to put you through the wringer and it does it. Is that art? Not so much, but it is craftsmanship of the highest order. To put it quickly and simply, War of the Worlds is the first time Spielberg has come close to matching the power of Jaws.

Jokers Don't Cry

With all the internet talk about who Christopher Nolan will cast as The Joker, I'm asking for help spreading this fabricated gossip:

A fair amount of U.K. Batman websites were abuzz this week with rumours that two-time Oscar winner Hilary Swank has been approached to play the part of the Joker in Christopher Nolan's eagerly anticipated sequel to Batman Begins. Apparently at a London screening, Nolan was overheard talking to Morgan Freeman who plays research scientist Lucius Fox in the film. Nolan asked if Freeman could contact the Million Dollar Baby and set-up a meeting. "I figure we can bring some unexpected sexual tension to the part, and with her features, especially her mouth, we can save a fortune on make-up and prosthetics."

Elizabethtown trailer/music video/extended preview

With thanks to Jeremy for the link and a shout out to my new friend Jared (the youngest Cameron Crowe enthusiast I know) here is the first lengthy preview of Elizabethtown. It's long so it may take a few minutes for it to download.

Hear the Geek Speak!

For the last eight years I have had the pleasure of appearing on Ann Arbor radio with Lucy Ann Lance to talk about movies. Her current station, WAAM 1600AM,has just started streaming live on-line. That means you can hear me if you go to this site and click accordingly. I am on every Monday morning at 8:35 and am often also on for a few minutes at the beginning of the 8 o'clock hour.

Batman Begins

Amazing things can happen when you hire real actors to appear in action films. They invest characters that are sometimes underdrawn into full-bodied people. Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins ups the ante but not only hiring first-rate actors but actually giving them something to play. This is a solidly written and directed film that, although it can't quite transcend the superhero comic-book origin story formula/genre, does offer a first-rate entry in the form. In his short career Christopher Nolan has shows a gift for working with actors and a solid sense of story structure. These two abilities make him a credible threat to make a great film in any genre.

There is much to admire in Batman Begins but I want to focus on the actors, especially Michael Caine. Claude Rains is for me the epitome of the supporting actor. See his work in Casablanca and Now, Voyager in order to understand what the phrase "supporting actor" means. Michael Caine delivers the kind of performance that would make Claude Rains proud. He never overshadows the proceedings, but he claims his physical space, his moral and emotional presence, and provides humor all without overshadowing the rock solid Christian Bale. Caine doesn't steal the scenes, he elevates them. Morgan Freeman, the best smile in Hollywood, is allowed to play his every scene with that fantastic twinkle in his eye. Cillian Murphy looks like a bad guy who has stepped right out of the pages of a DC Comic. Tom Wilkinson's menace is palpable. Gary Oldman is a credible honest cop who knows of the corruption around him, and is affected but not broken by it (I hope he gets the kind of scenes in the sequel that Caine got in this film). Liam Neeson's intensity in the opening passages grounds the film in its dark emotional landscape. Nolan marshals all of this remarkable talent and puts it in service of a story that, while not exactly groundbreaking or new, does offer the chance for a quality summer moviegoing experience.

I hope Nolan doesn't continue making these films at the expense of others he may have in his head, but if Nolan can come back to this material every three or four years that should allow him to make whatever he wants in the intervening time. And a final cautionary tale for Nolan and Bale. Your Batman comes sixteen years after Tim Burton and Michael Keaton's Batman. The same summer your film opens Burton is offering a second screen adaptation of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Keaton is co-starring in Herbie: Fully Loaded.

Cinderella Man

Cinderella Man probably isn't Ron Howard's best film, but it might be his most quintessential one. A man whose talents have always laid in getting audiences to like and root for characters, Howard uses every weapon - acting, casting, lighting, editing art direction, music - at a filmmaker's disposal to win viewers over. He won more than half the battle to make Braddock likable as soon as he cast Russell Crowe. Braddock offers the kind of role he does better than anybody - a man with a maelstrom of emotions swelling under the surface who, when given the opportunity, is able to exorcise those feelings in physical activity. He allows Braddock to lose much of his dignity without making him pathetic. Howard's ability to get good performances, his judicious lack of a saccharine score, and the detailed but never showy period details add up to a very Howardesque quality that might be called melodramatic realism. There are almost always interesting supporting performances in Howard's films and Cinderella Man is no exception. Paul Giamatti, an actor simply unable to do anything out-of-character no matter what the character is, serves up yet another award-caliber performance. Set in a world that would not seem to reward intelligence, Giamatti's character thrives on that very attribute. He knows how to manipulate those around him, but never does so in a harmful way. His scenes with ace character actor Bruce McGill are textbook examples of great no-frills acting. The film has moments where it overreaches for the melodrama, and the drive of the film stalls slightly during the extended third act where the audience is left waiting for too long for the final fight to start, but Cinderella Man is at its heart an old-fashioned crowd-pleasing entertainment made and performed without cynicism.

Another Good Piece in Slate

While I often disagree with Charles Taylor, he has this outstanding piece on The Bad News Bears, one of the most underrated films of the seventies, at Slate today.

"He's taught me a lot about creative compromise," Spielberg once said of Lucas, with a straight face.

Great piece in Slate on the relationship between Spielberg and Lucas.

The Adventures of Shark Boy and Lava Girl in 3-D

The Adventures of Shark Boy and Lava Girl in 3-D opens with a shot that may make fans of 3-D films let out an involuntary “Wow!” The image of ocean water moving right in front of the viewer comes as close to life-like as any 3-D film has managed. The movie makes good on that promise for the first five minutes as the narrator explains the history of the title characters. There is a perfect blend of humor and cutsiness during this sequence that matches the very best moments of Robert Rodriguez’s Spy Kids franchise. Sadly the film loses its way very quickly after that opening. The day-to-day existence of the hero is so downbeat, with his quarreling parents and the constant cruel harassment of his classmate, it wipes away any feeling of whimsy. Hopes rise when the film moves back into the 3-D fantasy world of Shark Boy and Lava Girl, but before long the narrative drive goes out of the film. The roadblocks on their path become more and more arbitrary, and one quickly senses that they exist for no reason other than to create more 3-D effects. The novelty of these effects wears off fairly quickly. There is lip service paid to the idea of the power of dreams, but because Rodriguez has failed at a basic storytelling level those themes never resonate (unlike his seamlessly integrated message about the importance of family in the first Spy Kids film). Shark Boy and Lava Girl might have had a fighting chance to overcome its faults if there were engaging actors, but Rodriguez’s usual casting acumen is nowhere to be found. All the performers, both the child and adult actors, come of wooden and very much two-dimensional. As the closing credits roll a 3-D fan is again likely to let out an involuntary “wow,” but this time out of sadness for a wasted opportunity.

Madagascar

Dreamworks animated films fall into one of two categories. Either they are overly serious, stultifying bores like Prince of Egypt and Spirit Stallion of the Cimarron or they are overly frenetic incessant in-your-face supposed-family friendly fare like the Shrek films and the truly horrible Shark Tale. Madagascar offers a few quiet moments that allow actually characters to develop, but it still is firmly entrenched in the ritalin-needed school of Dreamworks style. There are throwaway pop-culture jokes that are there for no reason other then to make adults recognize them, and there are montages where you just want to slap the screen to get it to calm down. That said, the film almost gets by on two interesting performances. Chris Rock manages some interesting work as Marty the zebra, showing a depth he's never revealed in his live-action work. However the real star of the show is Sacha Baron Cohen (Ali G). He gives the kind of performance that will keep an actor employed in animated films for a very long time. He's almost enough to recommend the film. Had the movie followed through on the interesting thematic issues it raises it might have been able to keep company with the Pixar films, but instead it settles for more frantic schtick.

Shameless Self-Promotion

I have a piece on the new Star Wars trilogy that has been published at Popmatters. Feedback is encouraged. Thank you all for your time.

Britney Spears Is Prophetic

It turns out she was right, people really can't handle her truth.

Perhaps there is a fine distintion between "can't handle" and "have no interest in"

Religion and Film

Sharon Waxman has an interesting piece in The New York Times that wonders if Paramount might be dragging their feet about starting Mission Impossible III in part becuase of Tom Cruise's public behavior over the last month.

Best sentence in the piece:
"And in an interview with the German magazine Der Spiegel in April, Mr. Cruise got into a heated exchange with an interviewer who called Scientology a pseudo-science after the star said he had personally "helped hundreds of people get off drugs." Mr. Spielberg was present at the interview and found himself defending Mr. Cruise's dedication to Scientology by comparing it to his work for his Shoah Foundation, which promotes education about the Holocaust. A DreamWorks executive called the exchange unfortunate."

You can read the full pieve here for free although you do have to register.

What Happens to Oscar Winners?

Kevin Spacey has played Bobby Darin and one of "The Usual Suspects." Now the actor-director will take on the role of mentor to showbiz interns in "Going Hollywood," a new eight-part TLC reality series.

The series, slated to premiere this fall, promises to go beyond the velvet rope and document the business of being an A-list celebrity. "The Hollywood featured in `Going Hollywood' is a place few have seen, and is a refreshing take on what we all believe constitutes `celebrity,'" David Abraham, TLC executive vice president and general manager, said in a statement Tuesday. "Beyond the glamorous premieres and jet-set travel is a world where grit, ambition and, above all, hard work, are the stuff that dreams are made of." Spacey will be joined by producer Robert Evans and rapper-actor Method Man. During each hour-long episode, the interns will be featured working for Spacey's Trigger Street Productions, The Robert Evans Co. and Method Man Enterprises.

Thanks Tom for the forward