The Taking of Pelham One Two Three

There are certain movies which I would classify as perfect. Now I realize that perfection isn’t actually possible in any art form, especially film, but sometimes there are those certain pictures which, when scrutinized over years of repeated viewing, prove to be bulletproof. One of the few films to fit this classification is Joseph Sargent’s The Taking of Pelham One Two Three.

The Taking of Pelham One Two Three is the story of the hijacking of a New York subway train by a group of mustachioed men who demand a hefty ransom in exchange for the lives of the hostages aboard. The negotiations take place between their leader Mr. Blue (Robert Shaw) and the always entertaining Walter Matthau as the tough, but measured Lt. Zach Garber. Shaw--who most of you will know as the grizzled shark hunting Quint in Jaws-- is an icily authentic villain, almost robotic in his resolve. He plays perfectly against Matthau’s humanistic and humorous hero. These two characters provide sturdy bookends to a film filled with a colorful cross-section of 1974 New Yorkers. The attention given to the melting pot makeup of the cast could possibly provide some measure of social commentary to the subtext of The Taking of Pelham One Tow Three, but I’ll just leave that to you. I find this movie satisfying enough as a perfectly plotted thriller.

Adapted by Peter Stone (Charade), from John Godey’s Novel; The Taking of Pelham One Two Three’s script is as airtight as an aluminum can. Every minute of this film works towards the end; whether it’s accelerating the action, crafting character, or slowly setting up the payoffs which surface in the last act. Many of these potentially mechanical moments are coupled with elements of unexpected humor or even shocking severity, which work to round out the rough edges of the plot and make the story natural and human. Beat for beat, this script is about as good as it gets.

The Taking of Pelham One Two Three is a breeze. It’s uncontrived, entertaining, and alive.  Do yourself a favor and check it out. It’s on Netflix Instant.  

HANNA

If you’ve been reading my blog entries of late you’ve probably noticed that I have a bit of an issue with timid filmmaking. I went on about it in my review of Duncan Jones’ inauspicious and gutless sci-fi failure Source Code, and have shown a tendency toward heaping praise on risky flicks like Dogtooth and Four Lions. Of course those independent, low budget films are of a different ilk from a movie like Source Code with its sizable price tag and lofty set of box-office expectations. When it comes to crafting a massive, studio funded, action oriented, release there exists a certain pressure to come through with a widely appealing crowd pleaser likely to show some financial returns. And as we all know, this is not an approach aligned with creating a climate ideal for any artistic adventurousness. Most of these pictures end up very much the same: bland, brainless, and ball-less.   

Hanna, the newest entry from Brit director Joe Wright, is a surprising exception to this rule. An ambitious globetrotting adventure tale, Hanna is an example of a film whose makers seem unafraid of pulling out all the stops for the sake of style and service to the story. It’s a sensory feast, packed with an excess of kinetic energy attained through the utilization of all the cinematic tools at a filmmaker’s disposal. There’s crafty camera work, a kitchen sink of editing technique, and an equal parts atmospheric and energetic score form The Chemical Brothers. There’s also an abundance of underlying intelligence; an element often elusive to the action genre.

Hanna opens in the bleak landscape of northern Denmark. Hanna (Sairse Ronan) is hunting elk. She is like a phantom, appearing and disappearing among the trees at will and easily striking down her prey with a homemade bow and arrow. When the wounded elk wanders off and falls to the snowy ground, Hanna coldly aims a Luger (at the deer and at the audience) and fires. She’s a stone killer.

Soon after we meet Hanna’s father Erik (Eric Bana) who we see is more drill sergeant than daddy. Eric spars with Hanna, trains her in multilingualism, and teaches her of the “world beyond” from the pages of an encyclopedia. When the subject of music comes up Hanna, unfamiliar with the concept, asks Eric what music is; but instead of humming a few bars or drumming his hands rhythmically, he turns the page and reads her the definition. It’s a cold, closed-off world where Hanna’s from. But as one would expect, this girl wants to see what she’s missing. So she flips the switch on a locator beacon and makes her presence known to the evil, witch-like CIA operative Marissa (Cate Blanchett), and the globe-trotting chase begins.

This inciting incident is a bit contrived and unbelievable, but I feel that it speaks to the overall thematic design of this film. Hanna is a children’s story about the death of childhood. Like a traditional fairy tale, the action is painted with a broad brush. With this in mind, one can disengage their reality detectors and go along for the ride. This isn’t a story told from an adult’s point of view.  It’s to be viewed through the eyes of a nubile world watcher. One of the things that makes the story of Hanna fresh is the ability of the filmmakers to not only create a technically proficient and lively action film, but to successfully meld that tricky genre with one that is no less difficult to pull off: the coming of age story. This balancing act is reliant on the filmmaker’s success in getting the audience to invest in the characters somewhere between the shootouts and chase scenes. In this case, they got a lot of help from their cast.

Much has been said about seventeen-year-old Saoirse Ronan’s acting abilities, and for damn good reason. She’s nothing less than a revelation. Ronan carries this massive action epic as naturally as Harrison Ford in his heyday. Her graceful style is so truthful that it gives this other-worldly character the nuance needed to make us believe every scene. The fact that Hanna is a super-soldier is incidental to the fact that she’s a very sheltered teenage girl wandering the world for the first time. The wide eyed wonder Hanna possesses is beautifully accompanied by her somewhat savvier friend Sophie (Jessica Barden). It’s in the scenes shared by these two characters where the bulk of humanity lies in the rather cold and calculative world of Hanna. The two young girls forge a real relationship which is sometimes touching, often humorous, and ultimately sad in its inevitable resolution. Hanna, being who she was made to be, can have no friends, no childhood, and no life as we know it.

The heartbreaking fact of Hanna’s destiny is made evident in the visual tapestry of the latter part of the film. After finally making her way to the rendezvous her father had set out for her, we find that it is a rundown, Grimm’s fairy tale-inspired theme park where she finds a small Hansel and Gretel like cabin inhabited by an odd and aged clownish character. When I first saw Hanna I actually found this segment to be a bit much. The fairy tale theme had been so prevalent throughout the film and I felt that the literal visualization of that element was a bit on the nose. But after a second (and third) viewing I came to see this motif as a manifestation of the girl’s lost childhood. When Hanna comes across a deer during the final standoff with Marissa she makes the same realization. She stops and stares at the deer and sees that she is back where she began. After everything Hanna has gone through in order to leave the forest, go out into the world, and try to become a human being; she is really just the hunter she was made to be. And when she coldly takes aim at a wounded Marissa (and again, at the audience) we see that she has accepted her fate.  

Wright’s choice to use such a visual metaphor as the theme park set-piece is one of the many things that makes Hanna such a refreshing and audacious departure from the bulk of today’s action adventure films. In this age of relatively naturalistic action like the Bourne films or the Daniel Craig Bonds, it’s nice to see someone unafraid of going back to the wellspring of fantastical cinematic possibilities without plummeting into the abyss of the ridiculous like the Transformers movies or some other such crap. Hanna isn’t a perfect movie, but its flaws are forgivable in light of its intelligence and adventurous attitude.

Check it out if you get the chance. As of now (May, 6) it’s still in theaters.

FOUR LIONS

IDIOTS UNDER THE INFLUENCE

Terrorism is one of those words that elicit a distinct reaction in everyone who hears it. It’s a hot button if there ever was one. I would dare say that when an American reads or hears the word “terrorist” images of falling towers, grainy videos of hooded hostage holding Muslims, and a certain long bearded, recently(?) deceased, trust-fund kid come straight to mind. These images have become so pervasive within the media that they overshadow and incidentally simplify any actual discourse on the true reason for terrorism and the people are who have been dubbed terrorists. This approach to the topic of terror has convinced us all of a fiction; terrorists are not people; they’re cartoon villains.

 Ironically, the responsibility for the defictionalization of the realities of the world often falls into the purview of the creative arts, especially in the fields of fiction and film. In the case of Christopher Morris’ directorial debut Four Lions, the task of casting a human light on the concept of terrorism rests on the shoulders of a straight-up, farcical comedy.

Four Lions is the story of three young Brits of Middle-Eastern decent (and one angry Islamic white boy) who have decided to become suicide bombers for the Mujahedeen. They do all of the things one would expect a radical Jihadist to do: they travel to Pakistan to attend training camp, they make explosives, and they videotape themselves claiming responsibility for the devastating bombings they’ve yet to commit. This would be some delicate subject matter to tackle if this film didn’t stay so true to its comedic tone, but this farcical approach softens this edgy content to a point where the filmmakers are able to enter into any situation they wish. We can easily enter into the inner working of the radical Muslim world as long as the Muslims behave in a manner reminiscent of the Marx Brothers or the idiots from Dumb and Dumber.  

Watching Four Lions is an odd and oftentimes confusing experience. It is a comedy about a very serious subject, and while you will find yourself laughing at the absurdity of these characters’ behavior only to realize what you are laughing at and find yourself considering the reality of it. Some may have trouble swallowing this somewhat contradictory approach, but I do think that the result succeeds in serving a higher purpose.   Morris and his collaborators aim for the laughs first, but they use the funny to lubricate the audience and force them to consider the reasons why one might be fooled into such extreme actions as declaring Jihad and blowing oneself up in a crowd of people. Their success in this endeavor is due in part to the careful crafting of characters that are just like you, or somebody you know, or somebody you used to be before you grew up and realized that inclusion in some group is not intrinsic to your identity or destiny. These guys are not treated like sick individuals or radical idealist, but like hip-hop wannabes or football fans. They are Jihad nerds. More like gamers or Trekies than soldiers.  It’s not they who create the climate of radicalism; they are just the ones who fall for the idea and get their buddies to do the same.

Everyone is susceptible to influence in one way or another. Often, those who influence are so influential because they are able to tap into the human instinct to want to belong. Sometimes it’s something relatively harmless like a music movement or fashion. Other times it’s something more severe. The characters in Four Lions don’t seem to be into this terrorist thing because they’re overtly religious but because it’s something for them to identify with. They only speak of the deeper beliefs that fuel what we think of as the motivation for Islamic martyrdom in passing, as catch phrases or prods for peer pressure.  The intellectual Islamic elitists who feed them these lines are not the ones blowing themselves up; they’re the ones getting the brainless sheep (like these characters) to do it. It’s no accident that one of the many bumbling incidents in this film involves the explosive destruction of a man and a sheep, as well as the inability to distinguish one from the other in the bloody aftermath. Morris and Co. are saying in no uncertain terms that the act of killing yourself along with a score of innocent bystanders  can be blamed as much on the influencer as the influenced, with the influenced being as much a victim as those victimized by the act itself. We are all susceptible to this kind of sway. Maybe you and I don’t blow up buildings, but many of the things we are convinced to do on a daily basis are equally destructive in subtler ways. This train of thought is the reaction that Morris and Co. are going for with Four Lions. That and a lot of laughs.     

I’ve heard it said before that comedy is the great humanizer. I would say that with Four Lions that is certainly the intention. It’s a film that successfully takes one of the more generalized and generic characters in our modern narrative-the ‘terrorist”-and turns him back into something real. It’s this realization that may make it easier to understand one of the things that’s so wrong with the world. Four Lions is a comedy with a higher purpose; a satire that lives up to the influential potential of cinema. And it’s damn funny.

Check it out now on Netflix Instant.    

SOURCE CODE

It isn’t exactly revelatory to say that we are in a cinematic era greatly lacking in originality. That irrefutable fact is thrown in our faces with every weekend’s slate of releases. There is a seemingly constant barrage of sequels, remakes, and reboots which make it almost impossible to find anything of substance and creativity in the movies of the moment. So when an even moderately interesting, original idea comes along with the full support of a major studio and helmed by a director of artistic repute, film fanatics like me take notice. We hope that, at the very least, the filmmakers succeed in taking this all-so- rare original concept (and that ample studio budget) and craft something which creatively matches the originality of the idea itself.  Source Code, the new film from sophomore sensation Duncan Jones is a prime example of that opportunity being utterly squandered.   

The concept for Source Code is actually quite compelling. It’s about a man who is placed in the body of another in order to solve the mystery of an already successful train bombing. Due to the physical constraints of this program he only has eight minutes to gather clues. Eight minutes which he must relive over and over until he can find the man who bombed the train and prevent another more devastating attack threatened to occur later in the day.  This is a scientifically intriguing concept, structured by fantastic physical and temporal restraints which promise a tense and possibly cerebral cinematic experience.  Source Code is a great pitch. I can see how it managed to swim through the sea of sequels and comic book crap and actually get a green light. This is the kind of material that can bridge the gap between sci-fi geeks and arthouse aficionados, adding up to big box office when the dust settles. Of course, this outcome is contingent upon the filmmaker’s ability to take the idea, craft it into a tight script, and execute the shoot. In my opinion, Source Code fails on all counts.

There are multiple, very specific reasons I could cite for Source Code’s failure. This piece could run a few thousand words if I decided to drop a laundry list on my limited readership. Instead, I’ll break it down to the core culprit for most of the movie’s shortcomings: a case of acute timidity.

 In other words; this movie has no balls.

This is not an inherent trait of director Duncan Jones; at least it wasn’t apparent in his directorial debut, Moon. Unlike that excellent existential sci-fi/comedy/thriller, Source Code completely lacks any element of risk or playfulness. At no point in SC do we feel like the filmmakers are having any fun. The camera is stiff, the editing workmanlike, and the art department seems to have been half asleep. The only people who seem to be enjoying themselves on this set are the actors. Their over-the-top performances combined with the decidedly underwhelming visual style turns this film into a farce.

The script isn’t immune from this condition either. With a story so ripe for various avenues of exploration, this one ends up taking the freeway every time. Each choice is easy and safe. Political correctness is rigidly adhered to, potential surprises entirely passed over, and complexity of plot avoided. Perhaps they thought the scientific elements of the core concept were so complicated that they chose to make the action (and resolution of the action) as simple minded as possible. The fact that the climax consists of the hero effortlessly unplugging a bomb from its detonator and apprehending the bomber without so much as a whimper of protest, is pathetically anticlimactic. I think enough has been written about the character resolutions that I shouldn’t have to go on about it here. I’ll just say that Source Code has one of the worst final five minutes in recent memory.   

Bottom line, Source Code is a wasted opportunity. It’s a rare original concept, with some promise, that actually made its way to a wide release, and the filmmakers blew it. In this time in Hollywood where repetitiveness and familiarity so often win out over creativity and originality, the chance to do something that stands out should be treated like a once in a lifetime chance at greatness. But greatness is something that was never achieved by playing it safe.

My Best Picture of 2010

A Biting Satire

                                             
For those of you who checked out my ten best picture nominees a while back, I’ve returned to declare a winner. It wasn’t an easy decision considering the field. After a thorough look back at the year I would actually have to say it was a pretty good one. A lot of you may disagree, and I can understand why. The high profile U.S. releases were far from stellar, resulting in a distinct shortage of memorable films and a bland and predictable Oscars. As is true with nearly every year, it was the foreign films which proved most interesting. Only this time around it wasn’t France, Italy, Sweden, or any of the other reliable movie making nations that delivered what I found to be the finest film of 2010.

This time around it was Greece. 

Giorgos Lanthimos’ Dogtooth is a deeply disturbing, darkly hilarious film which is slowly seeping into the cynical cinephile consciousness. Thanks to its Oscar nomination for best foreign language film and a convenient release to Netflix Instant View it has become quite a conversation piece for movie bloggers like myself. And with all the endless discussion, I’ve noticed that no one seems to agree on how to read this alternately complex and straight forward film. Dogtooth is a movie so rich with seditious subtext that it could easily be deciphered from a variety of angles. Many have already written scores of contradictory critiques on this film, with equal right to claim their take. In this author’s opinion, it doesn’t really matter. 

Dogtooth is a satire. A story form that is usually ripe for philosophical and sociological survey. But here we have an exception. These filmmakers don’t seem particularly interested in being prescriptive or specific when it comes to social commentary or soul searching. They seem decidedly more concerned with manufacturing an experience meant to imbue the viewer with a certain perspective; emulative of the ambiguous way we all see the world from day to day. Lanthimos’ expert direction guides the performers and crew into creating an experiential exercise; a more immersive cinematic experience, with the writers interjecting just enough allegorical content to give us all something to chew on.

Perhaps the most effective way Lanthimos (and his DP) go about creating this filmic interactivity is through the off-putting and oddly ambiguous placement of the camera. It seems as rare as uranium for a director these days to have an eye for using the camera as a story telling device. In this case, the effectiveness of the story is reliant on the ability of the viewer to relate directly to the characters, as well as their hermetic environment. For a film based on such an outrageous premise, there is a distinct verisimilitude. Dogtooth is a film so shrewdly shot that the zombie-like performances and otherwise unbelievable circumstances are visually translated into images that feel like they’re straight out of real life. The compositions are sometimes formal, sometimes passive, and from time to time downright hard to wrap your head around. Many of these shots feel like the wandering of the eye, and some of them even feel almost peripheral. All of this is done without flare. The camera set-ups are not accentuated by excessive movement or exaggerated design elements that speak to something outside of a living breathing world. Dogtooth is a thematically complex film, but in a way it’s actually quite understated.

It’s that simplicity that creates the contradictory motif which results in its deep subtextual richness. This film is set almost exclusively within a sprawling Grecian estate deep in the country. Only a few scenes take place outside the family’s home. But the small world in which the family dwells works to create a microcosm of society which conversely creates a scope of global scale.  

The entire visual design of the film contradicts its inherent cynicism. Save for a smattering of night scenes, the set is almost always soaked in sunlight. The atrocities committed are shown in the cold light of day as if to say that they are as common as washing the car or taking a swim. Everything is exposed, from the raw and cringe-inducing violence to the casually revealed private parts of each of the principle characters. Although almost everything that happens in this film is a perversion of commonly accepted human behavior; nobody lurks in the shadows. Nothing is hidden. And no one acts as if any of it is strange. To me, it is very reminiscent of the world we live in. Horrible things happen every day and we all accept them as normal because we’re told they’re normal. Reality is manipulated for us in much the same way that it is for the children of Dogtooth. Basically all of our understanding of the ways of the world is filtered through the fine mesh of the popular media.

The eldest daughter’s unauthorized viewing of a pair of videotapes (Jaws, Rocky IV) results in one of the funniest and most poignant sequences I’ve seen in ages. It’s this occurrence that causes the cracks that will eventually put a leak in that Plato’s cave. After watching the films, the girl immediately begins acting out scenes from each. She even acts out some of the iconic dance moves from Flashdance, though I’m almost certain that she has never seen that film. I like to think that the effect the video tapes has on the girl is a nod to the transcendent, Godardian sense of the revolutionary potential of cinema. (Cinema is truth, even if it is only Spielberg and Stallone.) More than that, however, is that her viewing of the films seems to create an imaginative spirit in her which resides outside of the mangled, misinformed mentality carefully constructed by her loathsome parents. As far as we know, her experience with any media prior to these movies consisted only of wildly mistranslated Sinatra listening parties and home movies. Once she is exposed to something outside of that controlled environment, her human nature starts to emerge.  This is just one of the many allegorical aspects of Dogtooth which only scratches the surface of what this film is about.

Dogtooth is about many things: parenting, despotism, the malicious manipulation of the media, the deconstruction of language and the resultant disconnection which results, etc. But the bottom line is that Dogtooth is most effective because is submerges us into a revelatory model of the world and forces us into a subjective point-of-view. This creates an infinitely nuanced subtext, limited only by the amount of viewers. Everyone who watches this film will read it as they see it.     

My Best Pictures of 2010

In the wake of this week’s utterly unsurprising Oscars, I thought it might be interesting to post my ten best pictures of the year, to be followed next week with a critical piece on the one I consider to be the “winner”. 

So, here are the nominees…in no particular order.

Winter’s Bone (Debra Granik)

 This thriller set in the bowels of rural Missouri has been lauded time and again for its skillful sense of setting and its perfect tonality. But what I find most impressive is its understated take on the detective genre. Ree Dolly (Jennifer Lawrence) is like a redneck Philip Marlowe, getting to the bottom of things by getting in over her head. The difference here is the very real sense of responsibility which drives her investigation and pays off with a stark and emotionally chilling climax.

Another Year (Mike Leigh)

Another brilliant character study from this veteran auteur. Mike Leigh deftly draws a dividing line between those who are in tune with life, and those who aren’t and forces them to cohabitate. Perfectly performed and subtly crafted, Another Year is the work of a true master on top of his game.

Scott Pilgrim vs. The World (Edgar Wright)

The most fun I had at the movies all year, SPVTW is quick witted, kinetic, and surprisingly mature for a youth romance/comic book action extravaganza. Wright offers us a visual feast with a self-reflexive flare that provides all of the elements of pleasure prevalent in pop cinema while simultaneously subverting them. That clever contradiction must have befuddled the marketing department at Universal because they completely dropped the ball. Nobody saw this thing in theaters. It’s a shame too. In a perfect world, Scott Pilgrim would’ve been the hit of the summer.  

Blue Valentine (Derek Cianfrance)

Blue Valentine is an obvious labor of love. It’s a film so intricately crafted, with performances realized to such authenticity that you feel more like you’ve experienced it than watched it. This is about as raw and unapologetic as a movie can get.

Dogtooth (Giorgos Lanthimos)

Nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards, Kynodontas (as it’s called in its native Greece) is twisted, perverse, jarringly violent, and hilarious in the darkest possible way.  This one is not for the faint of heart. It is truly shocking, both in its uncompromising content and its deeply subversive subtext.  It also has one of the most amazing dance numbers ever put to film. Available on Netflix Instant.

Animal Kingdom (David Michod)

This crime thriller out of Australia is one of the most tense and well acted movies I’ve seen in years. There’s no showy, “Oscar worthy” acting in this one. The subtle performances and pitch perfect pacing create a tense, authentic atmosphere that kept me nervous throughout.  

  

The Social Network (David Fincher)

Of the ten films nominated for best picture at this year’s Oscars, this one would have been my winner. It’s smart as hell and expertly crafted in every way.  Fincher has proven once again that he is a master of visual story craft and Sorkin has shown that he is more than just a great TV writer. His feature writing simply required the right director. 

True Grit (Joel and Ethan Coen)

I’ve written enough on this one already. If you haven’t read my previous entry on True Grit, scroll down and you'll see it.

Mother (Joon Ho-Bong)

This Korean import could have been a run-of-the-mill detective thriller but the odd, endearing performances and dark and twisting screenplay make this one of my favorites of the last year. 

Valhalla Rising (Nicolas Winding Refn)

This one wins the pure cinema award for 2010. It’s ballsy, spare, and pleasing to the eye. Valhalla Rising reminds us that a movie doesn’t have to be a complex intellectual affair. Sometimes a lot can be said by saying nothing at all.

So, there they are. Tune in next week to see which one gets the write-up.

Darren Aronofsky's Black Swan

I was living in St. Louis in 1998 when Darren Aronofsky’s Pi premiered at the Tivoli Theater in University City. It hit the screens with very little fanfare. I never saw a trailer, never read a review. I knew nothing more about this movie than what the blurb on the marquee and the lines down the block told me. For some reason people were going to see this movie in droves. After a couple of weeks of wondering why, I decided to pop in and check it out. I was floored.  Pi was gritty and original. An entirely unexpected arthouse hit.  It was immediately obvious that Darren Aronofsky was on his way.

In the years that followed, Aronofsky remained in the cinema spotlight either through the handful of movies he made, or through the multitude of ones that he didn’t. Few can compete with his contributions to the film geek rumor mill. For years there seemed to be constant speculation on the director’s involvement in everything from audacious pet projects to studio tent pole flicks. He was long pegged to be the director of choice for Warner Bros’ reboot of the Batman franchise, a job which eventually went to his comparable contemporary Christopher Nolan.  But through all of this conjecture, Aronofsky has managed to stay away from the superbudget Hollywood hype pics and has kept to more personal projects like Requiem for a Dream, The Wrestler, and the (overly?) ambitious The Fountain.

His latest film, Black Swan, fits perfectly within his catalog to date. It’s a relatively small, arthouse movie with the ambition to achieve the scope of an epic. This is the tricky balancing act that Aronofsky has been attempting for his entire career.  The success of this feat requires a certain set of cinematic tools, some of which Aronofsky possesses.

 Aronofsky is a master of visceral filmmaking. There are few, if any, active directors who are better able to convey to an audience the physical anguish of a character. His style is reminiscent of a literary concept first introduced to me at a reading by the author Chuck Palahniuk. He talked about a writing tool he utilizes called “On the Body” which he described as a way to use physical sensations like injuries and other ailments to induce the audience into an empathetic relationship with his characters.  Aronofsky seems to cinematically embrace this concept. He is highly adept at drawing the viewer into a somatic sympathy with the inhabitants of his films. In that context, Black Swan may be his best work.

On my first viewing of Black Swan, I found myself literally moved. It’s been a long time since a film made me, and the people around me, jump and cringe as much as this one. It reminded me of the early work of Roman Polanski in its ability to seduce the audience into actual physical involvement. That interactive quality lends itself beautifully to the sub-theme of physiological deterioration which pervades the entire picture. As each scene follows the last, it creates a compilation of visual and auditory body blows that work to drag the viewer down the spiral into which Nina (Natalie Portman) is sliding.  On that level, the film works.  But Black Swan isn’t just about a character’s physical degradation. It’s about a descent into madness. It’s about the psyche of a performer being torn apart as she delves into her darker self. To fully express this theme one must place the audience in the character’s mind. Make us understand what it means to actually step over the line of sanity and completely lose control. But is Aronofsky as adept at putting us in the head of the character as he is at putting us “on the body”?

On a second look, with all of the shock and awe of the initial screening washed away, Black Swan simply came up short. I spent this second viewing disinterested in the physical aspects of the character’s journey and instead spent it searching for the soul of the picture. I was completely unable to get a grasp on it. While it is a technically outstanding film, it is a mediocre story; unoriginal and tired. Thematically, it is a film we’ve all seen a thousand times before from De Palma’s Sisters to David Fincher’s Fight Club.   But the story of Black Swan fails not only in unoriginality of theme but in its unimaginative visual execution. Aronofsky often uses hackneyed imagery (repetitive mirror images, endless hallucinatory double-takes) to express Nina’s slip from sanity. Many of these basic tropes can be found in the multitude of straight to video horror flicks that are churned out on a weekly basis. Simply put, Black Swan lacks the story to match its package and with all its beautiful cinematography, textured sound design, and impressive performances it adds up to nothing more than a cheap thrill-ride in an arthouse disguise.  

This realization concerning Black Swan made me reconsider the whole of Aronofsky’s career.  Thinking back to the times I’ve rewatched his previous films, I remember how impactful they seemed at first, and how poorly they held up. Broken down to their bare elements I start to see that there just isn’t any truth in them. Aronofsky’s an illusionist, a master of misdirection. For the most part this isn’t a bad trait for a filmmaker to have but it does leave one susceptible to exposure once the illusion is washed away. When the bells-and-whistles echo out, the heart of an artist is revealed.  Aronofsky just doesn’t have the heart.  At the center of each of his films is a sensationalized and superficial perspective which comes across as inhuman and cold. Perhaps the only truly “human” film in his repertoire is his 2008 film The Wrestler, and one could argue that the depth of that film is entirely attributable to Mickey Rourke’s raw and empathetic  performance. Luckily for Aronofsky, good performers tend to tag along with prestigious directors, no matter how dubiously earned that prestige may be.

After more than a decade in the arthouse, Aronofsky has finally decided to stop sidestepping the studios and has signed on to direct next year’s The Wolverine, a massive tent pole Marvel Comics project which will reunite him with his The Fountain costar Hugh Jackman. It’ll be interesting to see how Aronofsky’s visceral style melds with the world of superhuman fight sequences and over the top CG effects. And Wolverine might be the perfect character for him to explore. He’s simple, archetypal, and in a constant state of pain. Aronofsky may be the perfect director for a project like this. Hollywood may be the perfect place for him after all.     

True Grit

Editor’s note:

Some of you may have read my previous blog entry where I stated, in a post script, my intentions to keep a strict critical distance from the subject of my reviews. Never mind that. I realized after some thought that any attempt to adhere to such a promise may prove limiting to my ability to write in a thorough and honest manner. One’s personal worldview, coupled with their previous experience with the art form, are necessary elements to their ability to write on the subject of film.

I hope the following post will demonstrate not only that how I intend to now completely contradict the idea of strict objectivity but also how willing I am to waffle and unashamedly edit myself after the fact. It’s a blog. I think it’s almost imperative to let myself come through in it. I also hope that what you are presumably about to read will demonstrate further the points I made the first installment of the Twice Seen blog.  

So, for those of you who read my previous post in its original form, the post script has been removed. And for those of you who never read it, I never wrote it.  

Thanks,

John

TRUE GRIT

I can’t remember the last time I was as excited about an upcoming film as I was when I heard that the Coen Brothers were making their version John Wayne’s Oscar winning classic True Grit. I grew up with “The Duke” and True Grit was a regular in the limited rotation of films I was allowed to watch as I grew to manhood in the bucolic abyss of rural Missouri. I must have watched that movie twenty times when I was a kid and I never got tired of it. It was second only to Rio Bravo on my list of Wayne Westerns and ranked pretty high among the few films I’d watched in my short and sheltered life.

Of course, that was my youth. And as you may have deduced from the paragraph above I was not exactly steeped in cinematic experience.  My family was quite religious, and the content of the television shows and movies we watched was closely monitored to say the least. There were very few modern movies that I was allowed to see, which was very frustrating for a kid of that time and with my interest in that line of entertainment. I can’t tell you how many times I had to stand aside and endure the endless reenactments and energetic praise of movies like Ghostbusters and Raiders of the Lost Ark without any point of reference. I could really only participate if the subject were Star Wars, but even that had its limitations. I’ll never forget that summer night in 1983when my folks came home from their parental preview of Return of the Jedi to tell me that I COULDN’T see it. Too scary they said. I was devastated. Perhaps if I would have seen ROTJ when I was nine I would have actually enjoyed it. I guess I’ll never know.

Being that we were such a wholesome household, classic films were the safest choice for rental.  When it came to keeping it clean you could always depend on the strict censorship of the old Hollywood studio system and their Production Code. If the movie was older than the MPAA rating system then it was deemed okay, otherwise it pretty much had had to be Rated G.  Truthfully, most of what we watched depended greatly on my dad and what he could stand to sit through. He preferred War Movies and Westerns so those made up much of my early film education. Of course, these violent, manly movies didn’t always go over well with my mom and sister. True Grit was an exception. With its female protagonist and classic western storyline, it held something for all of us.

Growing up a as a budding film buff, I didn’t really care what we watched. I devoured movies with the all the discretion of a starving goat. I would watch anything my parents would put on that 26” screen. The only movie we owned after we first got a VCR was a recorded-from-TV tape of Blake Edwards’ The Great Race. I literally watched that movie over 200 times and for those who’ve seen it, you now know how undiscerning I was. But I also watched a lot of Hitchcock, Hawks, and Ford and it was those names that made me think about the men behind the camera. By the age of twelve all I cared about was movies and who made them. And while classic cinema was a great way to get a grasp on the basics, it only offered so much for a growing boy who was so ravenous for more stimulating styles and content. My sensibilities drastically evolved, as did my parent’s approach to censoring the movies I watched. This heightened sophistication and freedom of choice occurred for me in the late 80s and early 90s. About the time Joel and Ethan Coen were really making a name for themselves in the film game.

Much of my understanding of cinema comes from the Coen Bros and their unique style of movie making. I’ve followed their career closely and I have felt for a long time that they are perhaps the most consistently original and technically proficient directors presently working in the industry. They have a firm handle on nearly every genre: from comedies like The Big Lebowski to existential thrillers like No Country for Old Men. Those films, along with the rest of their quality catalog earned them a fervent fan following, a few well earned Oscars, and have placed these Minnesota natives in the pantheon with the giants of Cinema history.

So when the Coens announced their first jaunt into the world of the traditional Western, people all over the film geek community immediately hit the roof. No one was more amped excited than me. I went out and bought the book. I followed every rumor and casting confirmation. I checked almost daily for screen caps and a possible release date. I geeked out. And why wouldn’t I? The Coen Brothers, two of my favorite filmmakers were making True Grit, one of my favorite childhood movies. What could be more ideal?

All of this, as you may have guessed, only set an impossible standard. The Coen Brother’s True Grit could never be what I hoped it would be. I should have known that it would fall victim to one of the most prevalent enemies of both objective critique and simple enjoyment:  overblown expectations.

Upon my initial viewing, I thought the Coen’s True Grit was just okay. I liked it to a certain extent and certainly found it to be a vast improvement over more recent, middling attempts at the traditional western such as James Mangold’s 3:10 To Yuma or Ed Harris’ Appaloosa. It was also a big step up from Henry Hathaway’s 1969 version which from a more seasoned perspective, plays like a top notch TV movie. But improvement was the least of what I expected form the Coen’s revision and with that cast and the talent behind the camera, was all but granted. I came to that 11 AM, opening day showing expecting to get blown away. That just didn’t happen. True Grit didn’t have the pop and luster I’ve come to expect from the Coens and their production team. Didn’t have the visual flair I hoped for. The performances often seemed stiff. I found it funny in parts but didn’t sense the rich pathos found in some of their most notable efforts. To me, the whole film felt plodding and awkward. I was disappointed to say the least. 

Of course, that was my first viewing, and while I spent the day moping about my earlier disappointment I realized rather quickly that I would have to give it another chance. I went back two days later on Christmas Eve, appropriately enough with my parents in tow. What I saw that day was an entirely different picture. From the opening frame, I knew that I had gotten it wrong.

What a beautiful shot: A point of light in soft focus through a haze of snowfall.  A piano eases into the sound track playing a familiar hymn. As we’re slowly brought into focus, we see a body lying lifeless beneath a pair of glowing gas lights. A voiceover begins, inviting us into the thoughts of our young protagonist. The whole scene was like a gentle embrace. I knew I was in good hands again and being put at ease, was ready to accept everything that came after. One mark of true cinema masters is their ability to pull you in and convince you thoroughly of their vision. This is largely a matter of tone. The tone set in the prologue of True Grit is pitch-perfect and it rings like a tuning fork through the entirety of the film that follows.

Now adjusted to a new point of view, I was immediately able to accept the context of True Grit. It is a marked departure from some of the Coen’s recent offerings like No Country for Old Men or the wildly underrated A Serious Man. Those films were layered with existential complexity and their visual style was appropriately more sophisticated. True Grit’s story is simple, so its style is simple. Shot with sparing subtlety by Roger Deakins and classically cut by the Coens themselves, it stands as a prime example of a work from artists with a keen contextual awareness. The camera movement is reserved and oftentimes barely noticeable. The transitions are traditional, with multiple dissolves and fade outs. The end of the first act even comes with a preparing-for-the-journey montage and a letter-to-mom voiceover. Old fashioned stuff to be sure, but this is an old fashioned movie, as it should be. The Coens are as committed to a visual style befitting the story as they are to the authenticity of the language.  This attention to detail and proper tone comes together to create a believable world for its cast of characters.  

 As far as the performances go, I was certainly most excited about Jeff Bridges. I could easily envision him as the grizzly Rooster Cogburn before I ever saw a frame of film. Bridges is a legend and he morphs so effortlessly into the surly old marshal that it’s almost anticlimactic. The truly impressive performances were those turned in by Matt Damon as the loquacious Texas Ranger LaBoeuf and the newcomer Hailie Steinfeld as the headstrong Mattie Ross.

One thing I felt upon my first viewing and still feel after a second is that Damon almost steals the show. As a character actor, this bonafide superstar continues to exhibit a capacity to transform himself into humorous and quirky characters while still injecting them with appropriately subtle hints of human depth. While this role serves a different purpose than his amazing and largely overlooked performance in last year’s The Informant!, it is equally impressive. Mostly comic in nature, it still contains a similar complexity.  The scene he shares with Steinfeld as he departs the camp is one of the more emotionally resonant of the film. His defeat is palpable, as is his respect and sympathy for the young girl. To that point in the story he had been a cartoon; a blowhard, physically and egotistically beaten to the cusp of slapstick. In the scene at the camp we see something different. LaBoeuf is actually the anchor of this misguided trio and Mattie must look to him as her last hope. But he doesn’t coddle to the girl. He offers her, and the audience, sober reality. The trail is cold. She should go back home to her mother. In that moment, I believe that the Ranger is the only truly responsible character in the whole film. Quite a transformation from the buffoon of a few scenes earlier.    

Hailie Steinfeld’s debut performance as Mattie Ross is definitely one for the books.  This young girl, with only a handful of shorts and TV gigs to her credit, brings a real intelligence and natural innocence to the role; something that was honestly lacking with Kim Darby’s portrayal in the original. Steinfeld’s Ross remains believably fearless and unphased throughout the film, with only a flash of girlishness breaking through with the occasional smile. She’s a little girl in the violent world of men and through simple strength of will manages to hold her own.  It’s not until she’s completed her mission and exacted revenge on the murderous Tom Chaney that that world catches up to her. It’s here that Steinfeld and the Coens allow the character to buckle and revert back to the little girl she truly is.

Snake-bitten and dying, Ross must be carried out of that wild country by the now paternal Cogburn. Through a series of simple, but effective POV shots, the directors show us Ross’ journey past the bodies of the vanquished villains, out of their violent world, and across the great distance that separates her from safety. As they ride across the snowy expanse the little girl starts to pour out through the cracks of the stern façade Ross and Steinfeld have maintained throughout the film. She begs for the life her horse, even at the expense of her own and wails against its mercy killing like a child unfettered by the reality of the situation. It has now become a simple matter of a girl and her horse. Another beautiful transformation.  

I won’t begrudge Steinfeld the credit for her fine performance, but the genius of it could be attributed to the Coen’s casting of this legitimate newcomer. Steinfeld and Ross are charged with a similar task: to enter an unknown world and hold their own. For an unseasoned teenage girl to be thrown in the mix with film legends like Jeff Bridges and the Coen Brothers is tantamount to a face-off with a gang of motley Wild West villains. Ross exhibits little fear in the face of danger and the same could be said for Steinfeld. Perhaps the effortlessness she exhibits in this role is due to fact that she must behave in the same fashion as the character she’s playing. But even if the success of this performance could be credited to the caginess of the Coens and their casting department there should be no lack of respect for the nubile young actress. She definitely stood up to the challenge.

I feel it’s appropriate that my review of True Grit is the first official entry to Twice Seen. My experience with this film should illustrate more succinctly the validity of the conceit for which I’ve based this blog. While I assure my few readers that every article written for this site will not speak directly to the concepts set out in the blog’s manifesto, I thought it would be a good idea to demonstrate these concepts through example, more than by mere conjecture. Our understanding of a film is largely contingent upon our understanding of the films that have come before it. Perhaps, this statement holds even more truth when considering a remake of a cherished classic by filmmakers so closely studied and admired. Sorry I doubted you Coen Brothers.

True Grit is an instance where a film failed only its inability to live up to an initial set of impossible expectations. In every other way it is an absolute success. Maybe now I should give Burn After Reading another look.

Upon a Second Reading: The Twice Seen Manifesto

 I doubt if it would be presumptuous of me to say that most moviegoers, casual or otherwise, are disenchanted with the world of film criticism. I count myself in their ranks, though I'm decidedly not of the former category. Casualness is not an approach this author often takes to movie watching, nor to the critical reading of a film. I feel confident when I say that many of the Metacritic mandated members of the critical community do not share my contemplative approach. 

One reason for this lack of contemplation is that many movie reviewers must take it upon themselves to voice an opinion on every film they see. A daunting task to be sure. I respect the sheer amount of effort required in writing an articulate article on the subject of three or more different films a week. The problem with this method is that it overworks the writer, and therefore diminishes the quality of the work. These critics see these films and churn out reviews based on a blur of screenings. In this critical climate, studied review devolves into an exercise in the pontification of the author's taste. An inevitable byproduct of a first impression.

Which brings me to the reason for the existence (and the name) of this blog.

The purpose of Twice Seen is to provide a meditative, studied approach to the art of cinematic critique. This will be accomplished by adhering to one simple rule: I (or anyone else in association with this blog) will never write a review on a film having only seen it once. 

I would make other declarations about the disparity between this blog and the slurry of other more prominent filmic writings but I feel it would be unnecessary. Simply sticking to the rule of basing my readings on second (or more) impressions, I feel, will largely eradicate many of the flaws inherent in the hurried world of movie review. I would, however, like to list a few traits that will be unique to this blog.

1) There will not be a review on every movie released. I do not think it is necessary to write on every damn thing that Hollywood slots in every weekend.

2) Many of the films deemed worthy of review will not be new releases. If I, or a visiting writer, have an interesting idea about a critical piece whether it concerns Birth of a Nation or Black Swan, we will write on it.

3) There will be spoilers. Another major gripe I have with movie critics concerns their treatment of "spoilers". Many writers literally structure their reviews upon the actual plot of the film. Obviously this reveals more than a reader should know prior to their own viewing. And it's just lazy writing. Conversely, many critics refuse to discuss elements of a film's plot which are necessary to a comprehensive presentation of their review. They waste so much energy writing (or talking) around certain aspects of the film that their reading of it takes a back seat to "spoiler panic". The reviews presented by Twice Seen WILL CONTAIN SPOILERS. However, they will NOT be synoptic relays of the films in discussion.

Lastly, I would like to make it clear that I do not consider myself more enlightened or more knowledgeable about cinema than many of the people who call themselves film critics. And I certainly don't consider myself to be a better writer. I don't question the intentions of (most of) these authors and I applaud the fact that they were passionate enough about movies to put in the work required to make a go of it in the business of film journalism. It's the business itself that I question, and the resultant critical method.

I'm sure that there are others out there who think the way I do, and there's probably something out in the blogosphere of a similar ilk to the idea I'm presenting. I hope there is. I'm not claiming an original idea or hoping to corner the market. I hope everyone who writes about film does so in a studied, contemplative way and that they are all willing to give a movie a second look and not let their shitty mood, or their inability to immediately grasp a movie's complexities dissuade them from appreciating what might be a wonderful work of art. I hope you, as readers, do the same.

Thanks

John Ingle

Twice Seen