The Wife, a most unconventional tale

 The Wife was one of the most surprising movies I have ever seen. Glenn Close was giving us everything and nothing with her eyes, revealing but not revealing her inner feelings, taking us on a little roller coaster ride of suspense just by grabbing our attention with her eyes and her face. Not something you see every day. I don't have a label called #NotSomethingYouSeeEveryDay but maybe I should - it doesn't sound strong enough to describe the revelation of this film.

It's not so much that it's a movie for feminists, although in a way yes it is obviously so. That's not the true power of the movie as much as the deep intimacy between the viewer and characters. Both of the two main characters are complicated --their marriage itself is what we as viewers learn about and internalize and care about and have mixed feelings about. It's not just a psychological movie, however. There are actual acts taken and choices made. The choices are unconventional and maybe even unwise, but nevertheless we as viewers are compelled to empathize.

I think that viewers/readers/watchers/listeners (the audience) being compelled to empathize with characters is an important thing for art, Capital A Art, to do - perhaps that sounds too lofty. It's important however for us never to lose sight of the difference between art and entertainment.

This film moved me, and I am continuing to think about it and will think about it endlessly.

The Paperboy

The Paperboy is an attempt at a southern gothic, basically. It is rich with dripping moss and cicadas, humid days and bloody murder. Those moments in which you most feel you are really in the south, you are really luxuriating in heat and grit, are its best moments. You get the dialogue, by instinct, rather than by clarity of diction. That's exactly how it is in the south. I love the way the young white boy and the young black maid who works for his father are friends. This is Faulknerian; this is classic. I love the way Matthew McConaughey sits in a grubby room and sweats. He glimmers and still keeps his roughness. I don't know why he always brings the south to life in so many movies. The scenes where he's holed up in his home-made "office" are so gritty they seem to be filmed behind a lens that's been covered in a thick layer of dirt. There are old, rickety oscillating fans and low, dusty lawn chairs.

Then there's the swamp - plenty of swamp - and you can certainly imagine what it's like to have your two choices be getting your throat slit or swimming with crocodiles.

John Cusack plays the murderer. He's absolutely unsettling in this movie and barely recognizable. His face is transformed from the sweet charming boy we all know into someone whose bloodlust eminates from his eyes and open mouth as he stares bluntly, dumbly, his cheeks ragged and his hair hanging down in stiff, greasy pieces.

All of this works well, and makes the movie fun to watch, but it has a shallowness problem. There's a false note in the way Nicole Kidman stumbles on the set and takes over the plot. Sure, she's got some brave moves here, as Ebert pointed out - but we're watching her brave acting rather than believing her character. She takes so much screen time for the majority of the movie; she motivates the plot (no murderer-freeing without her there) and she motivates the actions of the two hero brothers (no victim-rescuing without her there). However, aside from the fact that Nicole can still truss up as a sexy whore, what do we learn from her appearance? There's a lot of potential. She's a dumb-ish lower-class woman seeking a man; she also has a propensity to be attracted to prison inmates. In the very beginning of the story, her romance with Cusack's character, consisting only of letters they wrote each other, reminded me of the beautiful book The Executioner's Song which is motivated also by just such a romance. This could be a real story; she could be a real character. What is it about her that makes her want a convicted murderer for a mate? Why does she want him out of prison so badly?

We'll never know because all she does in the film is spout sex and then be victimized; it's truly a wasted performance by Kidman -- bravery and all.

Albert Nobbs (and Young Adult, accidentally)

I'm thinking right now about movies that misidentify themselves. Is that a word? Movies that seem to believe they are something other than what they actually are. One example of this, from recent memory, is a movie called Young Adult. It was billed as a comedy, and the trailers made it seem like a typical fluffy romance -- a chick flick. Even though there were one or two scenes that made this implication possible, the overarching vibe of the film was very dark, featuring a main character whose depressive immaturity and complicated web of neuroses is extremely difficult to watch. She may be beautiful, but she's not beautiful on the inside, and that may be one of the misleading elements. We're not accustomed to seeing someone as beautiful as Charlize Theron acting in a way that's viscerally disgusting, at least not without her first putting on a lot of "ugly person" makeup and altering her appearance like she did in Monster. In "Young Adult" she's simply disgusting because of her neuroses. The way she pulls at her hair, for instance, plucking out a bald spot on the back of her head compulsively. Her drunkenness, how pathetically unaware she is of how pathetic she is, her false sense of pride as she piles on layers of makeup like sludge to hide her age. It's so obvious that she is 100% phony. It's miserable to watch. I sat in the theater, cringing throughout.

People told me afterward, "Didn't you think that was a really profound portrayal of a woman who hasn't outgrown the self-image she had as a teenager?" Well, yes. "But!" I yelled. "It was supposed to be a romantic comedy! Or heck, just a comedy at least! It wasn't funny at all!"

Now, that was an extreme case of bad marketing. However, I was shocked not only by how misleading the marketing for the film was, but also by its expectations for itself. Did it really expect to win an Oscar? Did it really expect to be successful as a "comedy" in the Golden Globes? Did it not understand that it was a film destined to be loveable only by the fringe, a film dealing with heavy, heavy territory that not many people would be willing to traverse? Unfortunately for Charlize, because she is such a high-caliber actor and this performance was so exquisite, the film will never get the attention it deserves. Why did it not stand up and say what it truly was? Something like a psychological horror film. If I were in the editing room, I would cut out all the supposedly-comedic or supposedly-romantic "borderline" scenes and emphasize all the ones involving makeup or vomit. After all, "Young Adult" in fact has more in common with "Black Swan" -- which did win an Oscar -- than it does with "Notting Hill."

So. Mis-identified movies. I was thinking about this because of the movie I just watched yesterday: Albert Nobbs. What a totally confused movie this is. On one hand, it thinks it's a period piece. On the other hand, the period is completely irrelevant. Also, there's a lot of references to other movies about class struggles and the plight of the poor. While the viewers are sitting there figuring out that this is no Jane Austen movie, they're left wondering why it's important that the primary characters are working class.

Too much is happening all at once: You've got a woman disguised as a man, and it's not at all clear why she is doing this. Not for a long, long time. You've also got a bunch of working class people, in a time where clearly it's difficult to find work -- but the socioeconomic conditions are never clearly explained. Yes, Albert is saving up "his" money in order to gain independence. But what does that have to do with the decision to pass as a man? You might start to think that passing as a man was something Albert chose to do in order to make money. But then, why would "he" have to do this for so long? Early in the film he makes us aware that he will be well enough off in six months to buy his own tobacco shop. That's his plan. But he's not a young man. Couldn't he have done this a long time ago? Besides, couldn't he have taken a more traditional route as a woman? It's completely unclear what the class struggle has to do with the gender struggle.

And then to confuse matters even more: Suddenly there is another woman posing as a man. What are the chances? And this woman is married (to a woman). Suddenly, it's apparently the central plot point that Albert wants to be married, too. This is now his grand pursuit. He sees they have a successful marriage and he wants one, too. Why? We spend a lot of time in the film with Albert "courting" a young working maid. A lot of his precious saved-up money is wasted on her, buying her hats, chocolate and whisky. But why? Does this movie now think that it is, in fact, a Jane Austen novel with a twist? Is it going to become a lesbian romance?

No. Finally, Albert confesses his story. It turns out that Albert Nobbs was actually gang-raped when she was a young girl of fourteen. My, how disturbing it is to see her put on a dress for the first time after some forty-odd years of living as a man and, having confessed her horrible rape story, in a state of exhilerated emotional release, run wildly on the beach. She looks like an old man in drag, and she looks also like someone with severe mental derangement. Is there pity for her? Of course there is. Gang rape?! Is there anything more horrible in all the world? It's deeply disturbing. Your "aha" moment, the big reveal. Albert is a victim of a serious trauma, and Albert is mentally ill.

But, as a viewer, by this time aren't you completely angry with the movie? Aren't you completely disappointed that nothing that's happened so far really matters at all? Think about it. Socioeconomic struggle? Not relevant. Long courtship with pretty young maid? Not relevant. Life in 19th century Ireland? Completely irrelevant. The only thing that matters, in fact, is passing as a man because she could no longer stomach the identity of a woman -- She could no longer live with the idea of sex, or play the part of demure feminine girl seeking a husband. This movie turns out to be something utterly, utterly off the charts un-mainstream. I have rarely seen something so horrible. When the revelation hits you, and you realize what you're watching, you instantly want your money back. Figuratively speaking.

What was Glenn Close thinking, anyway? We know she likes a little crazy, and does it well (I'm thinking "Dangerous Liaisons" and "Fatal Attraction" now). But "Albert Nobbs" has a multi-layered identity crisis, thinking of itself as some kind of cross between "Emma," "Yentl," and "Boys Don't Cry," but with none of the payoff of any of those films. I won't even mention how badly it ends for poor Albert. Oops. Well, you weren't going to see it anyway.

Congratulations "Albert Nobbs," you are now officially the worst movie I've ever seen, bumping "Edward Scissorhands" out of the bottom spot.

The Aviator

Last night, I re-lived the bliss of watching the movie that I long ago decided was my all-time favorite movie: The Aviator, with the stunning Leonardo DiCaprio.

It became my favorite movie the minute I walked out of the theater having seen it for the first time. Ever since then, whenever I want someone to get to know me, or whenever I'm in the middle of a deep conversation with a new close friend, I tend to somehow work in an opportunity to quote DiCaprio, as Howard Hughes, repeating: "The way of the future. The way of the future. The way of the future. The way of the future."

If the person I am speaking to finds this funny, then s/he will be able to understand me. If not, then probably not. It's very simple.

What does it say about me, that my "ALL-TIME FAVORITE MOVIE" is The Aviator? Well, I begin to answer this by first pointing you toward my previous favorite movie, before I had seen The Aviator. It was: The English Patient.

For this, the very first blog post in a series where I discuss my favorite movies, we'll have a perfect introduction by comparing The Aviator and The English Patient. Both of these movies have a tragic hero. That is crucial. Both of these movies have a flawed tragic hero, reminiscent of ancient Greek literature. Both of these movies tend toward the romantic, in style, philosophy and substance. Both of these movies are absolutely, breathtakingly gorgeous to watch -- Both movies fill the screen with huge, lucid portraits of landscapes, skies, architecture and masterpieces of human engineering. Both of these movies are masterpieces of cinematography.

Both of these movies have an extremely handsome male lead. Both of these movies have a quirky, unusual, melodramatic, introspective, fearful and socially awkward male character as the lead. And the things he must do! to make us love him. In both cases.

Both of these movies have Drama, with a capital D. Some would argue that both of these movies are overly dramatic and overly romantic -- that they veer so far from realism that they are unbearable. In their very unbearableness, they are both beautiful. Whether it is an apocalyptic small plane crash where the roofs of Los Angeles are torn in two and burst aflame, or a poetic dialogue between two lovers trapped in a dark car while a desert sandstorm gusts around them, the scenes in these movies will echo eternally in the walls of your imagination. They will not let you go.

Isn't the height of good Drama just fundamentally defined by how readily you are taken away from the mundane and lifted up into an experience that challenges your imagination? Your mind must burn new neural territory in order to accomodate how alive this makes you feel, and in order to burnish words for the new aesthetic you have been given.

So -- that's a nice introduction, isn't it? But let's talk just a little bit about why The Aviator is better than The English Patient.

First of all, The English Patient has a weaker plot. It relies on the adaptation of a book; the adaptation was much better than the book, (yes, I read it) --it kept the romantic magic the author intended. It just didn't translate in terms of the action into a movie. The action becomes, in the movie, a story of a love affair and a cuckolded husband, set against a backdrop of a war. The war becomes the most important character, and the moral message of "War is Evil" does not roll out lightly. No, it thunders down. The war/Evil character is primarily responsible for what befalls everyone in the movie. The burns on the patient; the bombing of loved ones; the missing thumbs; even the fatal union of the lovers is shaped by war. The war/Evil is so obviously the lowest, most morally wrong of all the wrongs that could be -- so much so that the affair, and the harm it does to the cuckolded husband, become forgivable and seem less wrong. They are let off the hook completely.

Which, in turn, (deeply analyzing the plot at this point, so follow along with me), almost destroys the weight of the problem for the two lovers. You may think that the lovers are driving the plot, but you see, they're not really. How could it be so important for them to stay apart, given what's going on with the war? --The plot is weak. Upon repeated viewings it becomes tiresome.

Ralph Fiennes is damned good and Kristin Scott Thomas earned my lifelong admiration. I have never been able to forget the charm of Naveen Andrews. I love the movie still, and I'll keep it on my favorites list. But it definitely got knocked down several bars as time went on and I saw more movies.

The Aviator is breathless and literally, awesome. The planes alone -- the engineering -- make the film worth watching. Right from the start you are treated to triumphant scenes. Hughes informs his new CFO that he's standing looking at the "largest private airforce in the entire world." So right away you get the scope of it. The planes swoop and duck, and sometimes you get this amazing angle as if you were in one of the planes yourself! Cate Blanchett steps in to play Katharine Hepburn, and you feel that as a movie viewer you have suddenly gone to Heaven without having died. DiCaprio makes you know Hughes, makes you know not only Hughes' temper and stridency, passion and vulnerability, but also his shyness, his nightmares, and his inner ego. I have never in all my life felt like I could live inside another human's brain as much as DiCaprio allowed me permission to live inside Hughes'. And I relate to Hughes. I relate to him because anyone with a big heart would have to relate to him. We've all been that vulnerable at some point. We've all wished we were that powerful.

Plot, as far as it goes, in this movie takes on one of my criteria for "HIGHLY SUCCESSFUL DIRECTING;" which is to say, it is subtle and nuanced. I can't even sum up the plot in a few sentences. I might be able to say that it is a biopic of Howard Hughes, which is vague enough not to touch the plot question, but avoid it altogether! Or, I might be able to sum up the plot in a few paragraphs. That's the range. For example, I might write a paragraph about each of these questions: is it a movie about competing airlines? Is it a movie about United States history? Is it about obsessive-compulsive disorder? Is it a love story? Is it about Hollywood? Is it about money and greed, power and fame? Holy shit, buddy: it's about all of those things and more. This movie is, in short, epic. It's epic because it's directed by Martin Scorsese. He has a knack for making things larger than life, nuanced, and unforgettable. I'll write more on the perfect partnership of Scorsese and DiCaprio soon, when I discuss another fave, The Gangs of New York.

There are so many scenes in this movie that I could rave about. I don't know what excited me more: the sweeping interior of a Hollywood lounge, the plane crash scene mentioned above, the lights of nighttime LA as Cate and Leo glide above it in a gentle airplane motion (that you as the viewer can actually feel, like you're back in childhood riding the Peter Plan flight ride at Disneyland), or the horror of the dank red theater in which Hughes slides into craziness, growing wolflike and repeating his instructions for milk delivery into the void. This movie is SO big in my imagination. It takes me to SO many different places, unreal places, vivid dreamscapes. It satisfies me intellectually, too -- when Hughes takes the microphone into his overscrubbed fingers and charges Senator Brewster with corruption, this is quite a bit more than a history lesson. The movie is political, and DiCaprio is at his best in those scenes.

Shall I go on? On a personal note, the scene when Hughes burns all of his clothing after Hepburn walks out on him will always move my heart. On a technical note, the scene where Hughes is barraged by cameras for the debut of his movie, and bulbs are smoking, popping and exploding all around him, is the best piece of cinematography that I have ever witnessed.

If you don't believe me, watch it again.

So we have powerful acting, (of the highest caliber -- the kind that makes you intimate with the characters), nuanced direction, action-packed and complex screenwriting, layered and intellectual plotlines, unforgettable cinematography, and stellar stylistic design from head to toe. It has the best ending to a film that I can possibly imagine, with one the most ironic and memorable lines of dialogue for its concluding sequence.

One last thing: The Aviator bears watching again. And again. And again.

This weekend: "Another Happy Day" and "J. Edgar"

I have two movies to write about from my weekend. Warning: Both of them were dark, sad movies. However, I don't regret the viewing experience in either case.

First, I watched Another Happy Day. What you might have guessed already is that the title is ironic. Yes! It is! The film is about one of the most neurotic families that ever lived, and the misery that naturally follows the people who participate in any event having to do with that family. In this case, the event is a wedding. The main character, Lynn, is played by the (maybe actually neurotic) Ellen Barkin. With all due respect to female actors everywhere, I must ask: Ellen, did you have to pout so much? Her mouth is in a seemingly permanent shape of downward protrusion, as if she had just tasted something hideous! (Of course, there's also the possibility it's her Botox.) She is not pretty, and not "hot," as one of her teenage sons suggests. Both of her sons seem to be a little in love with her, but no one knows why. She's not likeable in any way. She's a whiny, narcissistic, fragile, bitchy, anxious person. From the very first scene, we see her yelling needlessly at her (other) teenage son. It's quickly clear that Lynn can't handle stress, family events (such as the wedding they're driving to), her sons, or even driving her car -- Lynn can't handle anything, basically.

We learn that Lynn has been physically abused by her husband, forced to separate her two (other) children from that marriage, give up her eldest son and protect her daughter from complete psychic breakdown after the violence she witnessed. Lynn has four children altogether: the daughter, Alice, has been slowly mutilating her body with a straight razor, thanks to her abusive father. The younger two sons (teenagers) come from Lynn's second marriage.

We also see that Lynn has a cold mother, two stupid loudmouth sisters, a teenage son who's on the autism spectrum and another teenage son who's addicted to opiates. Lynn has a lot to deal with, but she can't handle it at all.

The family, as presented to us, is obnoxious. The mother, beautifully cold and brazen Ellen Burstyn, has sided with the ex-husband, Paul, despite his abuse. She even flirts with him over the telephone! She tells her daughter that she's just inviting trouble and wonders "why can't we just have a good time?" Paul himself, played by the rarely mis-cast Thomas Haden Church, is little more than an idiot brute. He behaves as if he doesn't remember his own sins, and we're inclined to think he doesn't. Or doesn't get it. (Is he a brute who has been hit over the head one too many times?) Lynn's father, an old man with heart problems and other ill-defined health troubles, is usually medicated or asleep, unless he's having a heart attack in the middle of the night (apparently a regular occurence). Lynn's sisters do little more than sit around gossiping, guffawing and dressing up toy dogs. Another family twist: Lynn has to fight for the right to be called "mother" to her eldest son (whom she was forced to leave with her ex). Paul comes with a second wife, Patty, played by Demi Moore. This really might be Demi Moore's best performance, as she has never been as hateworthy nor as authentic as she is here, playing a grown-up-stripper stepmom with territorial poison to spew in the face of her husband's fragile ex-wife. "I'm the one who tucked him in at night," she says. "I'm the one." (She, too, has apparently forgotten that her husband forced Lynn to leave her son.)

So of course, Lynn runs around from one disastrous, devastating interaction to another, and we're all just waiting to see if she'll survive the wedding without her son overdosing or her daughter committing suicide or her ex-husband bullying her again.

Sounds awful, right? So why do I say this movie is worth watching? Because there are some tricky nuances that will surprise you. Here is one example: you don't think Lynn is really to blame for anything that happens to her, at first, (although Lynn is frightfully annoying, she is still a victim!) until the scene where you finally get her mother's perspective. Dear Ellen Burstyn, you are a genius. The scene is the kitchen table after midnight, where Lynn stumbles upon her mother sitting in the darkness. She tells her daughter "No" when Lynn asks "Mom can I talk to you?"

Lynn flinches.

"No. You have never had the decency or the respect to know when to keep things private!" Doris (Burstyn) says. [This, after an afternoon of Lynn describing Paul's abuse in detail, to a room filled with people.]

"I'm just trying to make things better," Lynn (Barkin) says (pouting, as usual).

"Better for who? Better for me? Unable to sleep, exhausted, and unable to sleep in the middle of the night? How are you going to make things better for me?"

Doris (Burstyn) then proceeds to share with her daughter what it's really like
having her husband disappear before her eyes, falling into old age, isolated, frightened, expecting at any moment to be widowed. The intense loneliness of her life, accumulated, now Lynn must bear witness to. She is not just "Lynn's mother," but a woman with her own pain. A pain that she never, ever, shares with anyone else. Doris has been holding herself together precisely because everyone else in the family spews poison at each other all day long. It is quite truly the most heart-wrenching scene in the entire film. A film filled with heart-wrenching. Doris, the cold matriarch, turns out to have every reason to be insensitive to her daughter. Within just a few seconds the entire movie is turned on its head. The idea of a necessary insensitivity is just one example of the remarkable ways characters reveal themselves in human terms.

There are many gorgeous performances in this film. Burstyn's is best, but there's also the young addict portrayed by Ezra Miller, and Demi Moore as mentioned. All these messed-up humans are truly gorgeous to observe, once you adjust your eyes to the darkness. It's a sad story, and dark, but for anyone who knows what a neurotic family is like, this is a necessary film. It's necessary to show how truly black that bottomless pit of pain can be. It's necessary to show, also, how human are the human beings who live in it.

Second, I watched J. Edgar this weekend. By contrast to the above characters, J. Edgar is not permitting himself to be human at all. Apparently he denies himself his sexuality, even in the privacy of his own bedroom. He is unmoved by criticism or by other humans' ideas of what he should be. He is motivated, robotically, by his mother's perception of him and by his own quest for power. This is the story of a chronically repressed person, with a nastiness layered on top like a thick skin. Only it's not a thick skin. If it were self-defense, we might sympathize. No. He's only nasty because of how unhappy he is.

I didn't like the movie very much. Two things I liked. One: Naomi Watts as the devoted Ms. Gandy, Hoover's secretary for life. She is sweet, expressively silent, and offers up her own face as the window into Edgar's soul (since his own cannot express it). Two: the art direction. The juxtaposition of Edgar and Clyde at the races in the 1920s and then again in the 1960s, for instance. There are a thousand clever transitions between past and more recent past. Edgar's desk, office, and private rooms are symphonic in their carriage of the movie's mood and the main character's dark personality. You feel as though you have lived in Hoover's actual life for a little while.

Of course, Leonardo DiCaprio is always good to watch. One knows, "anything with this actor's going to be good," is not a believable statement. But I love him, anyway. He's commanding. J. Edgar Hoover only wished he were as commanding as DiCaprio actually is.

The High Cost of Living

This film was absolutely beautiful, both inside and out. I was really moved. It reminds me of the way I felt the first time I watched Laura Linney, in You Can Count on Me, except this was a better film. That feeling of getting to know and care about people so deeply in only 1 1/2 hours -- that feeling of understanding the world of the characters almost as if they were real people; your world and theirs become one; you become enclosed together in sensation -- it was that, plus, it was a REALLY engaging story of an ethical dilemma. So many times the movie critics go on and on about "a real human story," or a character facing "tough choices," but the movie itself won't live up to the description. In The High Cost of Living, Zach Braff is so skilled that his character's ethical dilemma becomes your own. I also think the title of the movie is completely fitting. What does it cost to be a human being? What kind of pain or sacrifice is required to connect (truly) to other human beings around us?

That's what it's about. (Not only death, which the title suggests, although yes, there is a death in the film. But I think the title means more and the film carries more meaning.)

Including this one, I have now seen Zach Braff in two very touching movies. The first one was Garden State, which many of us of a certain generation could relate to. The typical sort of Generation X movie. (I mean my generation, otherwise known as "those who grew up in the 1980s" - a group of us born mostly between the mid 60s and the late 70s - a group of which I was on the tail end - also considered the generation that followed the baby boomers.) It was filmed almost 10 years ago. Zach Braff was a lot younger then, as was I. He did an excellent job portraying a young man in his 20s who is smart, handsome, capable, and yet rather lost. That word, "lost," describes how a lot of us felt in our 20s, and maybe beyond... Walking around, almost silently, the character of Andrew carried an inner burden and an inner universe of feeling, but did not know what to do with it. Where to put it. There seemed to be no place for it in the post-1970s superficiality that denied us the passion of our birthright. "Garden State" was also about human connection, about how to strip life down to its tiniest and most essential details, and how actually to share those with another person (!). It was a love story, despite appearances (there were a few standard tropes in there that made several people shout 'bildungsroman!' like a knee-jerk reaction).

But getting into his late 30s now, Zach Braff is a grown-up man. He's different; he seems to own himself. He's got facial hair and looks mature. And he's gotten even more skilled as an actor. He brings a gentle roughness to the character of Henry ("High Cost of Living"), lets us know that Henry is not a bad guy, not a scary guy, even though he's a drug dealer and clearly walks on the wrong side of the tracks. Braff also lets us know, subtly, that Henry is a lonely person. He's not out there advertising his loneliness; he's not desperate, but he sure could use a friend (someone who's not strung out). He's actually quite...normal...almost, except for the drug-dealing lifestyle. What went wrong with Henry? We won't know exactly, but Braff will let us know that it wasn't irreversible. In Henry's encounter with an upper-class, quite lovely, pregnant housewife named Nathalie (in French-speaking Montreal) we begin to see his real soul emerging. Is it too much? Some of the critics have laid into the sensitivity of this movie.

There are some potentially risky elements that might weaken the impact were they not so beautiful. Montreal as location suggests internationalism and cultures colliding, because Henry is "American" (i.e., from the United States) and these people speak French. There is also the class conflict between the couple, (Nathalie and her husband), who are enchantingly well-off and reside in a very good neighborhood, and Henry, dweller of the urban jungle, selling drugs on the street and in ratty back bathrooms and in basements. You get the idea. So when Henry collides literally with Nathalie, and it changes his life, the movie says "now his real soul begins to emerge..." Is it too much?

For me, it struck just the right note, not only because I feel a generational kinship with the actor, but because of people we've lost, like David Foster Wallace, who believed that it was not possible to write real emotions simply and straightforwardly anymore, in this age of commercials. Or like Heath Ledger, whose blunt-edged emotions in "Brokeback Mountain" were a stunning sight to behold, like watching someone fall from a cliff. We need more of this. We need beauty and humanity, and beauty in humanity. Quite frankly. We just do.

And Zach Braff - who would seem from the outside to be not the right person for the job (he's so little-known as a serious independent film actor, and for years worked an awkward part in a lame television slapstick serial) - does it perfectly. This movie is beautiful, and he carries the meaning of it just beautifully.

"Shame" vs. "A Dangerous Method"

I recently watched Michael Fassbender twice in a row; in one film, he portrayed Carl Jung, and in the other, a random man walking aimlessly through the world who has been accused (by the critics) of "sex addiction."

Do I need to tell you he was more fun as Carl Jung?

One thinks, when drawn to watch a movie like "Shame," that one is going to see something lusty. The title implies that Random Man (the audience has only one or two chances to notice that the character is named "Brandon") will do something shameful! A sex addict? What does it mean? Don't you think it means someone who has a lot of sex?

First of all, the term "sex addict" has been used by the critics, film reviewers, the official movie pundits... But... I saw no evidence for this in the film. Does owning pornography make you a "sex addict"? If it does, we live in a world full of sex addicts. Does sleeping with a stranger make you a "sex addict"? If it does... You get the idea. Really what the random man does is walk around, silently, or stare at people on trains, argue with his sister (who showed up unexpectedly), and then, occasionally, look at porn.

Second, what is this movie about? Is it about sex at all? Or is it about depression? Why don't we just call it "Depression." I don't think the guy has shame. What does he have to be ashamed about? There's an implication that he doesn't connect with women (one very awkward dinner date, nothing to do with sex) and that he doesn't enjoy his work (whatever his work is, it's only depicted as a nameless, purposeless, dull office), and that he has nothing to do but ride around on trains and stare morosely at pretty girls.

Third, when his sister shows up, we know absolutely nothing about her, other than the fact that she is depressed, too. Her close-up of singing "New York, New York" (in slow-motion, and off-key) in a bar does nothing to make us like her. She's got pouty lips, ugly hair in need of a good stylist, and she, even more than her brother, has something to be ashamed of: She has attempted suicide.

Nothing happens in "Shame" except watching two depressed people move aimlessly from one place to another. Oh, there is one sex scene.

(Worst movie ever? I would say so except Michael Fassbender is so good-looking.)

The one about Carl Jung, and his breaking away from his mentor Sigmund Freud, is actually quite thought-provoking, and Fassbender is endearing as a psycho-analyst who falls in love with one of his patients. Keira Knightely is extremely annoying, as always, so you will have to do your best to ignore her. But Carl Jung really came to life in Fassbender, not only because he makes the process of psycho-analysis seem like a worthy endeavour, but because the line between intellect and emotion is so blurry in his portrayal. His patient, evidently skilled and intellectual herself -- enough so to later become a rival analyst -- challenges his mind and his willpower. Jung seems human; he seems MALE -- just as much as he seems like a hero of academics everywhere.

We get the chance, in other words, to probe some of the ideas of psycho-analysis, such as dream analysis, and early attachment theory, alongside someone who is finding his own way in the world.... alongside a man, who dares to challenge his master, THE master. Jung has faults, and this endears us to him and demonstrates the embodiment of imperfect intelligence.

(P.S. It's also an excellent performance by Viggo Mortensen in the role of Freud.)

Another Year, Black Swan, Blue Valentine (contains spoilers)

OK, so here I am on January 17th, and I'm finally getting into the seasonal film rush. I'm a little behind, but then again so were the movies, many of which didn't come out until New Year's or shortly afterward. So much for being able to watch tons in December, during break, the way I used to.  Anyway. Let's get to it. I've seen three of this year's biggies so far.

Another Year was probably the best of the three. It was subtle, comic, moving, and it offered real intellectual food, if you know what I mean -- it asked questions and provided plenty to think about. It featured two people (one of whom the adorable Jim Broadbent) who were successful in life, in that way that doesn't require money or fame or anything superficial. True success, in the way that lights life up, requires self-contentment and a sense of home. A sense of place. Another Year showed us what the good stuff is. But it was interesting, not boring as you might think this kind of picture of contentment would be. The central couple, the happy couple, were surrounded by people who were not happy. In fact, they were surrounded by people who reminded me of me and nearly everyone I know: normal, i.e. fucked up in many ways.

The resulting tension was what made the film poignant and delicious and gave me plenty to think about. What was it about that couple that made them so happy? Was it their gardening? Is the lesson of the film simply that those who work in a garden, diligently maintaining it season after season and then enjoying the fruits of their labor, will be happier? Or was it their patience - their calm demeanor, the way they approached every emotional drama with great fortitude, as if radiating the vibe of "this too, shall pass"?

And how were we to feel about them (we, the audience)? Jealous? Annoyed? There were actually scenes where their moral superiority bordered on annoying. It was mildly irritating, (particularly when I as an audience member was so easily able to relate to one of the other characters, or at least partly, able to relate to little things like the tendency to say too much while drinking), but I was never irritated enough to lose my sense of respect. Overall, the film left me with a kind of respectful awe, a kind of mellow appreciation and reflection. It said to me something like: There is indeed such a thing as a happy life. And maybe gardening has something to do with that, but it's way more than that. There was a kind of maturity and graciousness, a higher-order mindset, that I saw in the film and wanted to emulate.

Of course, if I consider myself an artist, I might be more inclined to compare my life to that of the ballerina in the hypnotizing film Black Swan. Although I can't relate at all to the desire to self-mutilate or self-torture, at least not bodily, I do understand the mental struggle that comes along with the desire to create something beautiful. To create a work of art. There is a swelling passion in the heart of every artist that threatens to burst. It is the most important thing in the world, but also has the power to destroy you. Mostly because of pressure -- a pressure that you have chosen for yourself. A height you voluntarily strain to reach. In Black Swan, you get to feel what that pressure is like. You get to feel it bodily. The little glimpses of self-mutilation (even though you know they're imaginary) will make you curl your fingers and make your shoulders shudder. It's as if the heroine, seeing something in herself that is less than perfect, has a perpetual itch to scratch. And scratch she does--scratch, and tear, and cut, and nearly snap her fragile bones in half. It's a horror film, of course, and the joy of it is never quite knowing what's real and what's not. Is she really hurting herself? Or will she be beautiful in the end? And that is how it feels to approach art. You don't know if you are really doing it or not, but you feel more sensitive the closer you get. You can feel it in your nerve-endings.

After those two extremely rich and rewarding film experiences, I was very, very disappointed in Blue Valentine. Can't blame the actors -- Michelle Williams and Ryan Gosling acted their little butts off. (She's one for whom I would ordinarly say "anything with this actor's gonna be good.") They really gave it everything they had. Frame by frame, they were going for it. But they really didn't have much to work with. They should have. In theory. And maybe they thought they did -- On the surface this seems like the kind of movie that has a great purpose. They might have convinced themselves. They thought they were acting in a love story. I too thought this was going to be a love story, a deeply engaging and sad one.

There was no love in the thing. (Except maybe the love they had, as parents, for their little girl.) The idea was simple: you start with a marriage and you see a relationship falling apart. In order to get you to care, you will see flashbacks to show you how they were when they started out. A very simply designed script like this can be elegant. It doesn't take much.

The main problem here was not the falling-apart part, which was excellent, and with any kind of backstory I would have been crying my eyes out because the performances were so good. (My favorite part: Ryan Gosling's shoulders, his inadequate but determined strength as he tries to physically if not emotionally hold on to his wife, even as she's crying 'no no no no no no no.')

[A bit more on that: The actors were amazing. Seriously. The sweat they put into it. The resistance to each other. The fighting. The swirling around drunk in a last attempt at a date night. The obviousness with which they try but can no longer connect. Swish, swish, I'm drunk, you're drunk, let's try to connect even though all the muscles in our bodies are telling us we must resist.]

So obviously what was missing was the backstory. There were flashbacks, yes, but there was no "relationship" in the early phase of the relationship. The two meet, flirt, dance around on their first and apparently only date, and that's it. It's cute but does that make me believe they fell in love? That ONE scene? I want to scream "How can you take such a simple, elegant script premise and still manage to fuck it up by leaving out the obvious?"

Yup. That was it for backstory. After that, what happened to them? After their one date? Well, she gets pregnant of course. (It's unclear who the father is, but it doesn't really matter.) Let me state the obvious: *that* particular detail does not a love story make. Instead, it has the opposite effect. It made me feel that, (besides "whoa! this happened already, this pregnancy?"), indeed their relationship was doomed from the start. She never loved him. So of course she wasn't going to last being married to him for more than a few years, when after all, all he was to her in the beginning was an "I'll step in and take care of you" guy. That is a typical, even trite, scenario and doesn't move me at all.

I didn't cry, needless to say, when she said she had fallen out of love with him, because I didn't see any hint that she'd ever loved him in the first place. They got together because she was pregnant, and I'm supposed to care?

Well, it was disappointing. But at least I can say now that the relationship I am in has a pretty damn good chance of working out. At least it starts with love. You can't have a love story that doesn't start with love. Not even a sad one.

Brideshead Revisited

"Brideshead Revisited." I can only imagine how good the book must be. For a story so filled with longing, the movie could only hint at much of the complexity behind it. The cruelty inflicted on its two main characters -- a brother and a sister -- was mostly felt, and not seen. Their fear, the vulnerability in their eyes, might have been inspired by a man with a dagger hiding behind the curtain, and not a rigidly Catholic, tyrannical mother. Emma Thompson did have her moments.

She blew up the screen when she had the opportunity. Still, some will say it was not enough, that it was difficult to believe the Flyte siblings' upbringing was enough to bring them to such a state of misery. But the movie didn't have time to show everything. It had to give more time to the boy, Sebastian. We had to be interested in him especially, primarily to capture our attention and to begin the narrative - to bring the narrator into his world. We along with the narrator had to be entranced. Ben Whishaw, who is he? I've never seen him before. But he definitely got my attention! He made Sebastian so funny, and pathetic, so lovely, and fragile, so frightened and courageous -- What a performance.

I was told this was a snoozefest. It wasn't. The narrator, much like Nick Carraway in Gatsby, might be called boring I suppose. But he is irrelevant. He's an entry point. The story has something in common with Gatsby, actually. We want like the narrator to have an entry into the magical lives of the more "fortunate." Of course, the price of admission in this case is exposure to their suffering and self-loathing. We have to watch the beautiful princes and princesses fall down, one by one.

But on the way we can dance at dawn in their sculptured gardens, splash around in their sparkling fountains, sample their thousands of enchanted wines, and fall in love.

The story was rich, with characters you wanted to spend more time with, and whose history you would have liked to know more intimately. A perfect movie? No. But it makes you feel things. Desire, shame, and a creeping fear. You know something's horribly wrong, although you can't always say exactly what it is. So, not a perfect movie... A perfect story? Perhaps. It was alluded to. Now I can't wait to read the book.

Philadelphia - 15 years later

I saw the advertising on AMC for the 15-year anniversary of "Philadelphia," that modern-day classic starring Tom Hanks and Denzel Washington, which brought the dark persecution suffered by victims of AIDS into the broad daylight of everybody's lives. It sought to teach the common man, the ignorant man, that AIDS was not an illness anyone could catch, not transmitted through ordinary human contact, and that we should not treat AIDS patients like the lepers of biblical times. It actually did more than that -- it made people face the fact of discrimination against gays, in general, in a way that as far as I know, no other movie had done before. (Please correct me if I'm wrong.)

So I thought I'd watch it again. Interestingly, something has happened to me between 1993 and now. (Something relevant to my take on the film.) I've learned a little bit about the law. I worked in a law school, first, then later worked in several law firms, dated a couple of attorneys, and then worked in a big-city courthouse. I've also done a lot of reading: law reviews, legal history essays. It's an area you might say I'm familiar with. So when I saw this film, which is a courtroom drama by genre, I paid some attention to the presentation of the case. I became less interested in the emotional aspects of a dying man's fight against discrimination. In this context, it's a totally different movie.

If you look at it for what it was meant to be (see first paragraph) it has a big emotional impact. For sure. Here's Denzel Washington, shaking a man's hand and then stepping ten feet back after he learns that the man has AIDS. Here's Tom Hanks, trying to read in the public library, but they want to put him away in a private room as if he needs to be quarantined.

However, if you begin paying attention to the actual court case, it becomes an infuriatingly bad movie. If you are trying to follow the arguments being made, you see instantly that they don't work. For instance, the defense attorney, in her cross examination, asks Tom Hanks a series of questions about his sexual encounters in a gay movie theater. What's the relevance in a wrongful termination lawsuit? Objection! When an objection is raised she states that her line of questioning goes to credibility. So, I the viewer take this to mean that she is going to prove he's a liar -- isn't that what you would think? That he can't be trusted? His word is no good? Something along those lines? Yet, she never proves nor disproves anything about whether the man is credible. She never even raises that issue! It makes no sense whatsoever. All she's doing is asking him about his sex life. When did he contract AIDS? Was it in a movie theater? Was it when he had sex with a stranger? Yes, yes, yes, he says (he doesn't deny anything). So for the movie's theme, I get it. People are homophobic. People thought homosexuals deserved to get AIDS because of their "lifestyles." It was ugly, ignorant, prejudiced and wrong to think that way. No one deserves to get AIDS.

OK. Does this line of questioning have emotional impact? Yes. Does it even try to sound like a point is being made, in a legal argument? No. He doesn't lie. She doesn't say he lied. She doesn't show that he lied. She doesn't even try to find out whether he lied about anything. The issue isn't even addressed.

Here's an even more glaring problem. Suppose I am not paying attention to the arguments and I'm willing to ignore the fact that neither of the attorneys is making a case. I mean, what if I had never worked in a law firm or courthouse? I'm just the average viewer now, and I don't pay any attention to the arguments. (Although this would be difficult, considering the entire movie takes place in a courtroom.) Minimally, I as the viewer care about what happens to Tom Hanks. Don't you? All my heartstrings are being pulled. Clearly I want him to win the case; I am pulling for him. So -- how bad is it that, when the movie is over and he wins the case, I can't even tell you why or how he won it?!

Usually, in almost every courtroom drama you'll see, there's a moment when the case turns; something is revealed, either in evidence or in testimony that changes the case and turns it around, usually in favor of the protagonist. Anyone, any viewer, even one with no legal knowledge, can point to the moment. It's the drama of the movie, so it's supposed to work. In "Philadelphia," that moment is skipped over. There is no convincing argument made by either side. All we have is one emotional moment after another, followed by the win, which I guess they figured we were expecting -- so it didn't have to be convincing. What a let-down. Way to treat your viewers like children. "Yay! He won the case! We're happy now, because this is what we knew would happen and it takes away the sting of death at the end! Everybody applaud the success!" Give me a break. I want to know, please tell me (now that I've invested all these hours in this courtroom), how did he manage to win it?

Was it because the partners could see lesions on his face? (There's this gut-wrenching scene where Tom Hanks unbuttons his shirt to reveal the prominence of lesions, viewable by the entire jury.) But we knew all along they could see the lesions, so nothing was proven by that display. In the beginning, the point was conceded that his employers saw the lesions but didn't know what they were. So that wasn't a breakthrough in the case. How dumb do you think I am? You think I've already forgotten the first half hour of the movie?

What I expected was that, at some point in the movie, Denzel Washington was going to uncover some proof that the partners knew about the AIDS. They claimed they didn't know; he had to prove they did in order to prove wrongful termination. He never proved that. So, I was very, very disappointed. And even though I can say, as I did in the first paragraph, that this movie did amazing things for society, when it was released in the early 1990s, it truly had impact because it opened our eyes to persecution -- I can admit that, but I can't say it was a good movie. It just didn't really try. That was the saddest part. Many movies include a legal case, and they also have another agenda, and yet they manage with a little effort, to weave together a story that is reasonable as well as emotional. This one didn't even give us the chance to use our brains. It wanted our hearts and that was all it went after. It didn't even try to put the pieces together in a way that made sense. "Who cares if it doesn't make sense? It made you cry, didn't it?" I hate that.

Elegy

What a sad, sad movie. I love Ben Kingsley, I love his seriousness and his composure and his changeability and his intensity and his depth of feeling. I love his eyes and in this case, they were sad eyes. He can do anything with them; he can make them mean or cold or angry or hostile or threatening or intimidating or loving or gentle or sweet or intelligent or calculating or pensive or... I love Sir Ben Kingsley. What a fine, fine British actor he is. I loved him in "House of Sand and Fog" and "Schindler's List" and here again. What a treat.

I didn't love the movie, "Elegy," however; as much as I love a great romantic story, this one was just too damn sad. You've got to be prepared for some sadness with a title as obvious as "Elegy," but you don't need a somber piano score and a lot of extra tear-jerker dialogue when you've already got your heart out there on the line for doomed romance. Yeah.

Young at Heart

I watched this old movie, quite by accident. Though I rarely channel-surf, I hit upon this movie the other night and became hooked. I even recorded it; I have since watched it a couple more times. What was it, Doris Day's seductive voice? She has a way of speaking that is feminine and melodic, gentle, and yet commanding. Her voice goes into a whisper for effect and yet it can also rise up quite matter-of-factly when the need arises. Was it the time warp evoked by the trio of blonde hairdos, by the 1950s attire? (As the three sisters look up at once, smiling in perfect stylized synchronicity, not a hair out of place, all lip-glossed and golden, it reminds me of an Olympic sport... Were all the women in the 50s so perfectly put together? I think of Plath and how she suffered for it.)

No... These things moved me, but what really hooked me, I think, was Frank Sinatra. Honestly, his character cast a spell. Barney Sloan. The gaunt cheeks, the deep self-pity. Doris Day stood in contrast, as what Barney called "the gay-young-thing type." She was all sunshine and he was all gloom. Exactly as billed.

But more than that - The way they talked to each other - it evoked the most poignant aspects of a time when our culture was fundamentally different, when certainly women approached men a different way, and likely vice versa. Yet although men may have been said to have the "power," at least politically speaking, women had the real power when it came to romance. Laurie (Doris Day's character) was like the muse -- she provided the beauty, the inspiration, the magnetism which in turn provided Barney a reason to live. But I oversimplify. She was commanding, as I mentioned, and nurturing as well. A woman in charge of herself who could be "someone to watch over" him. (Yes. He sang that song in the film. She was watching.)

How is it achieved? I wonder. This balance of seduction, attraction, beauty, femininity, with strength, presence, confidence? And why do women now feel that if they intentionally make themselves attractive to men they'll lose respect, at least self-respect? Why do women now feel that to be powerful they have to be "ballsy" and hard -- stiff, unmoved, like Hillary Clinton? It was her downfall ultimately that she fought exactly this internal battle. Although I raged against that fact as a feminist, when I watch Doris Day I think maybe Hillary could've learned something from her. Am I crazy?

But in the movie, you wouldn't see all this without him. Man and woman truly complement each other here. That's the hook. Say all you want about Doris Day. It all boils down to Barney - Sinatra acting Barney - and the way he appreciates her.

There's a scene where he's in a bar, playing piano and singing ("Just One of Those Things"), and smoking his cigarette, feeling down on his luck, and the whole picture, which has since become cliche -- but at the time was not, so it's OK -- and Laurie walks in, and he's surprised to see her. "What are you doing here?" he asks. "I could ask you the same question," she says, "And a few more besides." He tells her about his latest round in the battle with the Fates. The latest bad card they have dealt him. He's in love with her and she's about to be married. Why, he asks, does she have to be so beautiful? If only her eyes were dull or her nose shiny...

As I said, she's perfectly put together, but it's his appreciation that really draws out the magic; it's his pain that makes this scene romantic. He wants her. Sinatra's able, somehow, to make us feel this quality of wanting. Throughout the movie, with his stance, his face, his voice (of course), we see a man wanting. A man needing. And he's no less masculine for it!

She's totally in charge of herself, even when he seems to stop feeling sorry for himself, when he stands up and says he's going to fight for her. Even when she starts to cry, because she feels so deeply for him. She might seem to be acting like the weepy female, but she's acting conscientiously like a woman who's careful with a man's ego. So she allows him to say "Go." And after a pause. "Go!"

Maybe this is the romantic movie I've been looking for. It's not one or the other of them, but man and woman together, as I said before, in perfect complement.

Youth Without Youth (and Funny Games, briefly)

Francis Ford Coppola is a name we all respect. Why? Because of "The Godfather. "

Last night I watched "Youth Without Youth" which was billed as Coppola's comeback film. I didn't say it; some high-falutin' film critic did. Or more accurately, several high-falutin' critics. You know, the professionals. They build 'em up, they knock 'em down. That's what they did in this case. Told us he was a master, told us this was the master's comeback, then told us the master's comeback was crap. What happened to the respect? the adulation? Hmmmm?
What I want to know is, why didn't they like the film? I suspect it's because they raised their collective expectations too high. Waaaaay too high.

Anyway, I liked the film. Sure, it has some extraneous and confusing stuff in it. But on the whole, it was a beauty. Here you have two characters. One is an old man, who represents age [read: time passing] and wisdom [read: benefit of time passing]. One is a young woman, who represents beauty and youth [the opposite of age, of time, of wisdom]. Yes, they are symbolic characters.

The old man (Tim Roth) participates in a miracle. His youth is restored to him. He is able to gain time, in other words. When you're 70 you don't think you have that much time left. If you were suddenly made 35 again, you've gained exactly 35 years (wow, I can do math). Why would this happen?

The reason he gains the time is because he's overly ambitious. He wants to learn the whole of human knowledge. He's writing a book that can never be finished. He's a student of languages but hasn't got time to learn all the languages of all the periods of history. Until!

Enter the second character, Young-Girl-Youth-and-Beauty. She participates in a miracle too. She is able to channel the languages of all time, and hopefully can take Old-Man back far enough in time so that he can discover all of human knowledge. Problem is, while he remains young, she enters into a rapid aging process because of channeling all that ancient history. He had to get younger to have more time to write the book. She had to get older to feel the weight of ancient time. It's all very beautiful and poetic, magical and metaphorical. You must see this coming: Old-Man falls in love with Young-Girl and he has a choice to make.

Let her turn into a 25-year-old with wrinkles? Let her descend into death long before her time, for the sake of knowledge? Or... leave her and restore her youth and beauty. Abandon knowledge and wisdom (and love! which is evidently the fruit of wisdom). Abandon the value of expanding time, embrace the value of the finite, accept that life is short for a reason.

I found it beautiful. We didn't need Hitler's goons chasing Old-Man down with a gun. That part was a little ridiculous and quite unnecessary. There were some other tossed-in scenes that may have added to the confusion some of the critics apparently felt. (Even Almighty Ebert used the word "confusing!" It's less confusing than "Inland Empire," man.) But it was still very powerful. I can forgive Coppola these little mistakes. He's only human, after all.

Tim Roth, coincidentally, has been on my screen a lot recently. I also watched "Funny Games" the other day. It's a thriller - no one would dispute the label in this case - and a dark one. Ask yourself: Do you want to watch Tim Roth and Naomi Watts be tortured? That's all it is. The end was surprising, but not in a good way. All I can say is, this was a ride I really wanted off of. But I am starting to understand Tim Roth. I used to think of him as simply a Tarantino man, for obvious reasons ("Pulp Fiction," "Reservoir Dogs"). Now I'm understanding that Roth'll take anything that might be unnerving -- he's simply confrontational, as an actor. He must be a very interesting person to talk to.

Twelve Angry Men

"Twelve Angry Men" does exactly what it's supposed to do. An amazing feat for a movie, I say. So often we start out with high expectations and we're disappointed. We balk at a movie that claims it will provide us with a profound experience.

Here, You start out with one juror who believes the boy is innocent and you know he's supposed to convince all the other jurors. They are ready to send the boy to the electric chair. It's the proverbial lone juror. Ay ay ay.

So you know the situation immediately. You know what is supposed to happen. You know that, by the end, all the jurors will be persuaded to change their minds. You know too that, this will have implications beyond the personal, beyond the political. It will teach us something about the quality of humanity.

However, it seems impossible! Both for Henry Fonda and for the movie. How can one man persuade all these other men (who are not just angry, but sweaty, impatient, bullying, rude, and exhausted, who have people to see and places to go) to change their position on something so serious as a murder? This is an old-fashioned, deeply serious, moral movie. Yet how can one little movie teach us something truly profound about the humanity in all of us? Wow. Even as I write the words, it sounds like too much to take. "Give me a break!" I might say. Or "Don't give me that!" Sounds overbearing, over-profound, too much for this movie to shoulder.

Yet, it succeeds 100% and there isn't an overblown moment in the whole darn thing. It is one of those extremely rare things - the perfect movie.

Takes you for a ride, entertains you, lets you coast while it does all the work (another rare feat for a movie, at least these days), keeps you guessing, you're in suspense - you think you can predict it but you can't, keeps you emotionally involved - you actually care about each and every character! - and keeps you at the center of the issue, never leaves you bored or yawning, it makes you laugh, makes you think, makes you re-evaluate your own certainty about whether certainty is possible. Makes you re-evaluate what it means to be a human being, what is at the heart of all of us. And lets you do all this without getting irritated with yourself. What a treat.

Interiors and Cassandra's Dream

Looking at the poles of Woody Allen's career is unsettling. At least, it is for Woody Allen fans. "Annie Hall" is one of my all-time favorite movies (as it is for millions of people -- it's a classic), and "Hannah and Her Sisters" is a film I never get tired of watching! Even "Melinda and Melinda" was pretty entertaining. So what the heck happened with "Cassandra's Dream?" This is a pretty standard Allen theme (cf. "Crimes and Misdemeanors," or "Match Point") -- it's basically about murder and guilt (or the lack thereof). We're supposed to see characters so changed (or not) by what they've done that it forces us to reflect on the great existential meaning of life, and so on.... Yet Ian (Ewan McGregor) and Terry (Colin Farrell) are never really in our hearts to begin with, even before they take a life. Ian has absolutely no interesting qualities. So he likes a girl and wants to get away from it all. Big whoop. Who is he, as a person? Who is this Ian guy? His brother Terry's mildly more interesting but in a cliched way -- he's got a gambling problem. OK, and? They're such boring characters in fact, it doesn't seem surprising when they decide to commit murder. Why? Because they don't seem like real people. (And these are not totally untalented actors or anything. Witness Ewan McGregor in "Young Adam!" Or "Trainspotting.") So it doesn't seem like that big a deal what these two guys are doing -- I'm sitting there thinking, just another variation on the standard, but noticeably this time it doesn't call into question any existential truths, nor make me think about the value of life. Could it be that I'm just getting tired of Woody Allen? Have I seen the same plot too many times? Or is it over for him, has he "lost it"? One looks for a career trajectory...

So I also watched "Interiors" - it's not like any of the others. It's not about romantic relationships and it's not about murder. It's one of his earliest films, deeply psychological, and not funny at all (I don't think there's a single moment of comedy in it). It's not about New York, and doesn't use any music. It's different. However. Turns out, I didn't like this film either. It was boring! It consisted of one dreary, weary, life-is-weighing-us-down moment after another... It's supposed to be about a family in crisis, but if I don't care about the characters (the family members), how can I care about the family? And each of the sisters was more boring than the next. I could've taken a snooze while the film was on, and opened my eyes and not missed a thing. Lots of dark, dark shots where you can't see what's going on, anyway.

Also, lots of unfinished business. Did one sister's husband rape (or molest) her sister? (I thought I saw that, but it was so dark I couldn't tell.) What happened there? And what about Michael (Sam Waterston)? He opens the movie; he seems to be an important character - he has a very revealing dialogue with the mother and apparently loves one of the sisters - but he disappears entirely in the final sequences. What happened to him? Where did he go?

So one is forced to ask oneself if Woody Allen was ever that good? Maybe "Annie Hall" was just a fluke? Maybe the only reason I love "Hannah and Her Sisters" is the music? (Count Basie and the like)? It's unsettling.

Charlie Wilson's War, The Jane Austen Book Club, My Summer of Love

What do these three movies have in common? The enchanting, daring Emily Blunt. I've become a great admirer of hers. The first time I saw her in a film - which I won't discuss right now - was actually something else, something called "Gideon's Daughter." That was beautiful, too, but I've decided that in this blog I'm going to write reactions to movies I've just seen. I won't start writing about all the movies I've seen in the past. It would be fun, but then I'd never get anything else done.

So let's talk about these three. In "Charlie Wilson's War," Emily Blunt has a very small appearance, but it's crucial. It happens so fast you almost don't realize it's happening. We've just barely been introduced to the character of Charlie Wilson (Tom Hanks); so far we've seen him in two settings: 1) Las Vegas and 2) his office. In his office we see women with big hair, cleavage and a mysterious efficiency belying their bimbo looks. So we've gotten a quick and dirty impression of who the man is and what he likes and the way he likes it. OK. Then there's a small scene in which Peter Gerety comes in as a Texas preacher demanding a defense for displaying a creche on secular land. He brings along his daughter Jane (Emily Blunt), for no apparent reason. Note she seems quiet, reserved, conservatively dressed - a good Christian girl. And she's just sitting there, waiting patiently while everyone runs around. Cut to the next scene. Jane is now in Charlie's suite, wearing only his shirt, sipping a cocktail. She continues to undress until she's wearing only underwear, and then we see her lounging on the sofa, her perfect long legs extended gracefully before us. She is a vision of seduction. Charlie, however, opts to take the phone call from Joanne Herring (Julia Roberts) instead of paying attention to Jane.

Why this transition in Jane? Why is she in her underwear? How did Charlie seduce the nice Christian girl? How did the nice Christian girl turn out to be so sexy? And why is Charlie not taking advantage of the situation? Why give Emily this short and seemingly meaningless appearance? The phone call has to be really important.

It is. It's the phone call that gets the whole plot moving. Joanne gets Charlie to go to Houston, then she gets him to go to Pakistan, then she gets him to go into Afghanistan, and the rest is history. So think of it! Think of how important this phone call has to be to get the movie rolling. And then, further think how attractive and seductive Emily Blunt has to be, in order to highlight the importance of the phone call - that Charlie should choose to ignore her and stay on the phone.

In "The Jane Austen Book Club," Emily Blunt plays a lonely, snobbish young French teacher named Prudie, unhappily married to a man who doesn't appreciate her. She's the odd woman out in the book club, having been invited on a whim by a stranger, while the other women know each other already. At the outset, Prudie's probably your least favorite of the women in the club, (Maria Bello is probably your favorite), unless you like lonely, prude-y, pale-faced women with dark hair and light eyes. At first we don't sympathize with her plight of being married to an unappreciative husband. (That is a worn-out cliche and the film suffers for it as well as others scattered throughout.) No, the only thing worth noticing about Prudie at the outset of the movie is that she is very pretty in an unopened-flower kind of way.

Then one of her students forms a crush on her, and this blurs her sharp borderlines for a minute, and then her aging-hippie mother shows up with some marijuana and this too, creates a mess in Prudie's life and she begins to be more interesting. At some point in Prudie's gradual mellowing, when she begins talking to the book club members, we find out she has never even been to France. She cries, "A French teacher who has never been to France!" (or something like that). Ah, no wonder she was so upset her hubby wouldn't take her abroad.

I won't tell you how, in a climactic moment, Prudie unfolds, but I will say that it takes a really good actress to achieve the scope of change her character has to come through in a limited number of scenes. (And she's taking turns with Maria Bello and Kathy Baker and Amy Brenneman and others, almost competing with them for attention in a badly-constructed movie.) In an otherwise lame movie, Emily Blunt takes us from uninterested to curious to hooked - and admiring. Once again.

And if you really want an exciting performance from Emily Blunt please see "My Summer of Love," an exceptionally daring film about two British girls who try each other on for size. One is poor and orphaned and being raised by an ex-con-turned-preacher brother. That's Mona (Nathalie Press) whose accent tells us everything we need to know about her. The other girl is Tamsin (Emily Blunt) whose accent is very refined. Tamsin rides in on, literally, a white horse to save Mona from her brother, poverty, and boredom above all. She says in effect, 'Mona, you're a wild one, but come into my mansion and try on some beautiful dresses. Try on my life for a summer. See if you don't come out feeling beautiful.'

Tamsin is a self-described "fantasist" and she sure can weave a tale, whether it's a ghost story or a love story. She does tell Mona these and other stories quite convincingly, sipping red wine and making the viewer feel haunted or bewitched, right along with Mona. There's even one tall tale about Edith Piaf, and her alleged crimes of passion (I will admit, adding the gorgeous French voice belting out "La Foule" in the scene does provide support for Tamsin's spell-casting over Mona). What crime of passion will Mona commit at the end of all this, we wonder.

The Paper Chase

I used to like this movie, when I saw it the first time. Cute flick about a cute boy who's on his way to becoming a lawyer. Lots of good classroom scenes.

I don't know what I thought it was "about," except there's a guy struggling in law school (Harvard no less) and he's got a sorta-romantic subplot which is sorta interesting.

Recently I watched it again and I decided, it's political. And I don't like the political statement it makes. And furthermore! I don't think it makes any sense. Like many liberal "statements" this one is corny and rings false. Do you really think that a Harvard law student wouldn't care about his grades at the end of the year? Just because his teacher didn't know his name?

Throughout the movie there's this repeated mantra - "It's all about the grades." Then there's a scene where the pretty, but frankly boring, romantic interest tells the boy that he's on a paper chase (note the lack of subtlety). She compares attaining a law degree to attaining a driver's license and an insurance policy. Hm. Let's think about that.

And the boy, struggling through law school -- Harvard law school -- is supposed to swallow that and decide (in a sudden moment of gushing realization when his teacher doesn't remember his name) that suddenly his grades don't matter? He actually makes a paper airplane out of them and sends them out flying over the ocean. It doesn't come any cornier than this.

Great performance by John Houseman, though.

Things We Lost in the Fire

I expected to be depressed by this movie. I heard it was about a heroin addict, so naturally, I assumed it would be a downer. Imagine my surprise to discover what an uplifting movie it actually is! And it gets better: This film celebrated my favorite quality (if one can be said to have such a thing as a 'favorite quality' without being accused of vagueness). That is, subtlety. It's my favorite quality in people and in acting and in filmmaking. It's my favorite quality in flavor and in flirtation and in intelligent conversation. It's my favorite quality.

Anyway, subtlety. Let me give you some examples.

Subtlety in camerawork: A lingering closeup on one - just one - of Halle Berry's eyes. The mark of tears, but no tears, on the side of her face. When she goes to the sink then, to wash her face, we see the water softly splashing as she washes her hands. (Subtle substitute for image of crying, you see.)

Subtlety in character development: Benicio del Toro plays the part of Jerry, the long-time friend of a man who's just died. Jerry shows up at the funeral and it's clear that no one knows who he is. (Well, even before the wife - Halle Berry - called him, people were asking "who's Jerry.") Jerry is alone at the funeral, wandering, sort of lost, smoking one cigarette with another behind his ear. We, the viewers, already know that he's an addict, and that the friendship was kept hidden for a reason. Thing is we don't know how Jerry feels about it. He seems sad, but how close were they, really? We're wondering. We're watching Jerry for a few good minutes and we want to like him, but we're not sure if we can. Then, he approaches the two kids on the swing. And slowly, he begins revealing himself to them. He lets them know that he knows stories about them. Something about a burn or a birthmark or a fear one of them has.

We, the viewers, can see then that he was a good friend of the dead man, a confidant. We realize that Jerry can be taken seriously. This is the superficial work of the scene. What's the subtlety, you're wondering? Consider: Jerry reveals himself only to the kids.

There isn't much in the way of "plot," and I understand why critics panned the film.

You may be curious about thematic subtlety (as I often am); i.e. "What's the point of this movie?" It's often hard to figure out when you've got mostly mood to go on, and some subtle writing.

I'll tell you. There is only one major plot point in the film - several small ones, of course, and plenty of beautiful camerawork and character development to keep you going, but only one major plot point. The key to theme is in that plot point. If you can figure out why it happens - What do Audrey and Jerry have in common? - then you've got it and everything that was subtle becomes obvious, all of a sudden. All of a beautiful sudden.

The question is, Can mood, subtle camerawork, and subtle character development keep you going until you get to this point? For me, they can.