The Last Waltz….30 Days of Movies: Days 27- 30.

Since I’m so good at seeing thing through to their end (for reference, please see my discarded screenplays, graphic novels, novels, and diets), here is the rest of the “30 Days of Movies” posts thrown together like some sort of casserole:

Day 27: Favorite Villain -

Serenity (2005)

Chiwetel Ejiofor is calm, collected, and utterly conscienceless as The Operative. Ron Glass (as Shepherd Book)  describes the character of The Operative best as someone “who believes hard.” The Operative is a character that gives no thought as to why he has been given the task of killing a 16-year-old girl by the parliamentary government that RULES THE UNIVERSE, but he will stop at nothing to do it. Instead of just being cruelty manifest, the character is intelligent, cultured, sees the humor in the predicaments he finds himself in because of Nathan Fillion’s Mal. For me, the scene that tells me the depths of villainy that The Operative will stoop to is the destruction of Haven (and every other “safe port” that the crew of Serenity have used):

The Operative: I’m sorry. If your quarry goes to ground, leave no ground to go to. You should have taken my offer. Or did you think none of this was your fault?
Mal: I don’t murder children.
The Operative: I do. If I have to.
Mal: Why? Do you even know why they sent you?
The Operative: It’s not my place to ask. I believe in something greater than myself. A better world. A world without sin.
Mal: So me and mine gotta lay down and die… so you can live in your better world?
The Operative: I’m not going to live there. There’s no place for me there… any more than there is for you. Malcolm… I’m a monster.What I do is evil. I have no illusions about it, but it must be done.

What makes this villain different for me is that the character doesn’t go about doing evil for evil’s sake, like the Moor in Titus Andronicus, but he honestly believes that what he is doing is for the greater. This girl must die, and he must kill as many people as it takes to get to her, because it better for The Alliance.

Day 28 : Favorite Hero -

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984)

Indiana Jones could knock out Nazis with a right hook and had the brains to find lost artifacts of the ancient world. He unlocked the mysteries of the Ark. He found the Holy Grail. Indiana traveled the world and romanced beautiful women. He knew how to solve all the puzzles and how to swing from here to there with a whip (a whip? Really? In the ’40s?)

I probably didn’t spend as much time as a kid pretending to be Indiana Jones as I did Luke Skywalker, but as I’ve grown older I’ve seen that Luke is a bitch. Indiana Jones has brains, brawn, and the ability to woo exotic blondes.

My hero.

Day 29: First Movie I Remember -

Poster art by Andy Helms

Star Wars: Episode IV (1977)

Star Wars was the first of two great events that occurred in 1977. The second was my birth……………………………..shut up.

What I remember is barely being able to see the screen over the seats in front of me and watching Han Solo chase stormtroopers through the Death Star only to end up chased by them. That’s it. That’s my first memory ever. An early ’80s re-release?

Besides being the first movie I remember seeing as a kid, it is apparently the first movie I was ever taken to as a baby. According to my Mom, I cried because of all the explosions. I’m sure that was a pleasure for everyone around me. Yes, lady, please bring your screaming child into the movie theater. Way to go, Mom.

Day 30: Last Movie I Watched -

Brick (2005)

It’s like Memento, all over again. I liked this movie a lot, but had problems with the fact that its entire storytelling method was dependent on a gimmick. For Memento, the gimmick was the way the story was told forwards and backwards simultaneously. For Brick, the gimmick is way it wears its neo-noir influence on its sleeve, complete with dialog straight from old pulp novels. The Maltese Falcon and Veronica Mars had a baby named Brick,basically.

Brick is a modern noir set in a Southern California suburb. Joseph Gordan Levitt plays Brendan, an outsider who tries to solve the murder of his ex-girlfriend. Set in an unnamed SoCal High School, Brendan goes about solving this murder in the tradition of the hard-boiled mysteries of Raymond Chandler or Dashiell Hammett. Even down to the dialog, much of it including colloquialisms common in the old pulp novels and Bogart films.

The story is told in a very visually stylish way, with great attention to set and character design. While Lukas Haas plays a pretty pathetic Kingpin, living with his mother in the suburbs, he has a lamp in his van. A lamp. Just sittin’ there. Chilling. In his van. His lieutenant and henchmen are all wearing either head-to-toe white or black. In fact, all the characters seem to some kind of visual trademark; like Emily with her wristbands or the Pin with his black cloak and cane. The way Brendan had his hands in the pockets of his windbreaker, you can almost see him collars up, fist in a trench coat, stalking the dark alleyways of the city. The city itself seems to be awash in a constant greyness (which becomes most notable in a flashback scene where the sun lights the sky a bright, clear, blue) giving clue to the general unpleasantness (or shadiness) of the characters.

The director was obviously inspired by early noir, which was equally entertaining and frustrating. It’s clever to take all the conventions of a very difficult (difficult to do right, at least) genre and transplant it wholesale to a whole different time and place. Where this was frustrating for me was where I spent most of the movie attaching the characters to their archetypes from Falcon- Brendan is clearly Sam Spade, Laura is O’Shaughnessy,  The Pin is Gutman, Tug is Cairo, and (in a gender twist) Emily is Archer, the death that sets the plot in motion. When Richard Roundtree (“Shut yo mouth!” I’m just talking about Shaft) shows up as the Assistant Vice Principal, I immediately pegged him as the sympathetic police detective with a soft spot for our gumshoe hero. The detective who says things like, “I’ll give you a couple of days, but when the cops come around, and I have to give them someone to hang, I’m giving them you.” Some of the acting plays up the pulp influence, too, with Nora Zehetner doing her best to be Lauren Bacall as a teenager.

These are just minor gripes, however, and don’t detract from the overall quality of the movie. From beginning to end, the movie draws you into the shady underworld of High School drug dealings in a stylish way. The characters all play interesting pieces to the puzzle. I liked Brain (the informant) the best. Even if you do find yourself looking for their genre counterparts, the translation isn’t just admirable but pretty damn inspired. The visuals alone are worth the viewing. The cinematography captures a balance of mystery and Southern California suburbia (where there is a complete lack of mystery). Overall, highly recommended.

30 Days of Movies: Day 26 – Biggest Embarrassment

I think we can agree that my biggest embarrassment has been not keeping up with this blog. So much for getting it done in 30 days. I suppose I could just go back and change the title of each post to “30 Post About Movies”, but I think that would imply that I would stop at 30….oooooorrr I could just leave it and accept that I failed. Okay. Failure accepted. I will lump the remaining days into one blog later.

For now, however, I am required by this challenge to name off what movie I am most embarrassed to like. How this is different from my guilty pleasure, I don’t know. Since I already admitted to liking Starship Troopers (although completely without guilt) and Jason X, I’m going to go ahead and say that my favorite embarrassment would be ….

Spice World (1997)

At the risk of ruining any credibility as a true cinephile, I will very timidly defend this movie. I mean, it’s funny. It’s stupid and it knows it. It’s got a Kid In The Hall and Richard E. Grant from Withnail & I. It……

 

I don’t know.

I saw this movie only once . When it first came out into theaters (my roommate at the time was a huge Spice Girls fan [there's a whooooole story behind that,too]). I don’t think I even wanted to go. I’m pretty sure I was annoyed at being there, but it was free (we had a friend who worked at the theater and pretty much never had to pay to get in). So I watched it grudgingly. And loved it.

Now, usually, the only people who’ll agree with me that this movie isn’t shit are mid-20-something women. Which is not a bad demographic to have something in common with. Still, I find myself having to answer the expected questions about my taste in movies and sexuality anytime I mention that I like this movie to a male friend. I’m more offended that someone would think I have bad taste in movies than them thinking I was gay. Having not seen the movie in 12 years, I have no idea if I would still defend it after a re-viewing. But, then again, I do watch UHF about once a year, and this wasn’t much worse than that.

Oh God, maybe I do have shitty taste in movies.

 

30 Days of Movies: Day 25- Movie With The Most Beautiful Scenery

The New World (2005)

For a recent study of The New World, visit nonsite.org.

And for good measure, let’s not forget about Days of Heaven:

30 Days of Movies: Day 24- Movies With My Favorite Soundtrack

We’re going to leave film scores out of the equation this time.  This leaves Ennio Morricone out, as well as Bernard Herrmann and Elmer Bernstein. Maurice Jarre and Hans Zimmer have to take a seat, too. We’re talking strictly “pop” songs tonight.

Purple Rain (1984)

This post is dedicated to the double kick drums at 2:42 of “Darling Nikki”. Don’t even think of arguing with this. You can’t. Best movie soundtrack of all time. One small confession, however:Never seen the movie all the way through. Not once. I know this is heresy to admit in Minneapolis (this being The Purple One’s town and all), but I have heard this soundtrack a million times. My dad (of all people) kept a copy of the cassette in his car and gave it tons of playtime in between Huey Lewis and Billy Joel marathons. Is there a better beginning to an album than “Let’s Go Crazy”? No. A better closer than “Purple Rain”? Nope. Now I know that The Time made an appearance in the movie with a couple of songs (and both of their albums are pretty stellar, as well), but it’s the Prince & The Revolution LP that I’m talking about here.

On a side note: I remember a kid talking about this movie on the playground when it first came out. I thought he was such a badass because his parent let him see a movie with tits in it. I was still getting in trouble watching The Frog Prince on Shelley Duvall’s Fairy Tales. Something about references to God using frogs as a plague….no, I am not making that up.

Singles (1992)

This is still a good movie, I don’t care what anybody says. Sure, it felt like a blatant riff on a pop cultural “hot-thing-of-the-moment” (the Seattle “Grunge” explosion) even when it first came out. Still, the writing is pretty solid and the characters are likable. The soundtrack is a time capsule, with Pearl Jam (who had several members in the movie as part of Matt Dillon’s band), Mudhoney, Alice in Chains, and The Smashing Pumpkins. This was one of my favorite soundtracks when it came out and it still has my favorite Pearl Jam and Smashing Pumpkins songs. It also introduced me to the great Paul Westerberg.

Superfly (1972)

All bow down and worship Mr. Curtis Mayfield. Recently, I spent pretty much the last funds of the week on a vinyl copy of this. I jammed on it all night and goddamn if anything sounds as good as “Freddie’s Dead“. Aside from “Pusherman” that is. Real goddamn music here.

Honorable Mentions:

Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World (2010)

On here pretty much for the fact that when I read the comics, Clash at Demonhead sounded exactly like Metric in my head. And sure enough…the music of Clash at Demonhead was provided by Metric! Sex Bob-omb, however, sounded better in my head (like The Thermals) than in the movie. Oh well.

Magnolia (1999)

Aimee Mann’s “Save Me” is one of the most beautiful sad songs I’ve ever heard. Lyrically, it’s a punch to the soul.

And anytime anyone wants to sing Harry Nilsson is okay with me. Which is why we’ll end with:

Popeye (1980)

Shut up. It’s brilliant.

“Touch Your Hand To The Wall At Night” 30 Days of Movies: Day 23 – Movie That Inspires Me

A quick preface: Fugazi is my favorite band. Okay, let’s go.

Instrument (1999)

Instrument follows the typical rock-doc formula but, while using the rock-doc as its framework, creates something new and beautiful. The subject is D.C. post-hardcore godfathers Fugazi. It uses live performances cut with interviews with the band and others. Unlike the usual music documentary, however, the performances are quick (most songs are just the opening guitar riff quickly cut to the closing of the song) and the interviews are nontraditional (one favorite clip  has guitarists Ian Mackaye and Guy Picciotto being interviewed on a middle school morning show). The exceptions to the excerpted performances are the opening song (“Shut the Door“) and the closing song (“Glueman“). Both of these performances are long, the first done in one long & patient take.

Most of the interviews are simply reiterations of many of the beliefs and ethics that the band has held close to since its inception in the late ’80s. Anyone who has read an interview with the band will be familiar with the ideas here. Most of these interviews are from small punk shows or foreign music shows. No VH1 style headshot interviews here.There are also some black & white montages of the band traveling and performing through the U.S. or recording their Red Medicine LP. In another twist on the music-doc, instead of providing these shots with a background of the band’s best known songs or fan favorites, these moments are backed by demo recordings, or rough instrumentals tracks, taken from the band’s End Hits era.

What I find inspirational about this movie(and about the Punk Planet interview linked to above) is the way it shows how Fugazi decided early on what their goals were and what ethical lines they would not cross and how they have stuck to their ideals. They stayed independent in an industry where people are encouraged to seek more wealth, more fame, and more glory and integrity is often looked at as apostasy. They kept prices for shows and albums low, didn’t merchandise themselves with t-shirts and stickers, and continued to evolve their sound (sometimes alienating fans, as the documentary shows) from their beginning until they went on “indefinite hiatus”.

Click Here!

This isn’t an easy film to watch. There is no real narrative. There are no shocking revelations. All there is is proof that if you believe something and stand your ground, you can actually make a difference.

30 Days of Movies: Day 22 – Movies I Wish I Could Live In

There are positives and negatives to living a super world like Scott Pilgrim vs. The World or Superman.

Sure, the positive is you get to see someone fly and shoot lasers out of their eyes. Good for you. The negatives, however, are sure to be the supervillains who plot the demise of the heroes by blowing up the building you work in or the bridge that your work commute is on. And, because you’re not the hero or the villain, you will be one of the people trapped in a collapsing building.

This is why I am taking an absurdist route to today’s pick. First off, let’s just imagine this like the T.V. series Sliders, Quantum Leap, or Highway to Heaven where every week will put us in a new environment and a new adventure. Or like the comic book Resurrection Man, where the main character had a new power every month (because every time he died, he came back with a new power…and he died a whole lot). Or Scooby-Doo.

So, let’s jump into the wormhole of alternate universes and see where the swirling blue lights take us:

The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964)

What?! Why?! What the hell is wrong with you? (Shut up, Macho Voice in my head.) Because, wouldn’t it be nice to live in a world of such vibrant colors where everyone sang everything? In French? Well, it would be different, at least. Anyways, the chance to walk down the street with Catherine Deneuve on your arm is worth the price of admission alone.

Roger Rabbit poster by Tom Whalen for Alamo Drafthouse screening.

Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (1988)

Think of what a blast it would be to actually be able to intermingle with cartoon characters. Unfortunately, I think this would bring out the sadist in a lot of people. Could you cut off a cartoon character’s head without it killing them? Maybe. Hey, let’s find out!

Henry & June (1990)

Sitting around Paris, drinking coffee & wine, conversing about the nature of art, AND having hot affairs with Uma Thurman and Maria de Medeiro?. Sounds like a pretty good life Fred Ward had for himself.(By the way, Fred Ward doesn’t exactly jump out as a name to be associated with “sexy”, but he makes a pretty good Henry Miller.)

Stranger Than Fiction (2006)

Maybe if I had somebody narrating my life, I could actually understand why I do some of the things that I do. Are they part of a larger context of my “character” or am I simply doing shit “just because?”Also, the opportunity to woo a tattooed Maggie Gyllenhaal…..

1960s French Film (1960s, duh)

Just imagine a jazzy film score by Mancini or something and we'll be all set.

Going back to Henry & June and Umbrellas of Cherbourg, it’d be pretty cool to hang around in a cafe all day and shoot the breeze with other Bohemians while dressed all snazzy. In shades, of course. And it would give me an excuse to like smoking again.

30 Days of Movies: Day 19 – Movie That Made Me Cry the Hardest

Since I’ve never used a Rockwell scale on my tears, I actually have no idea as to their relative hardness from one movie to the next. Maybe I should start capturing this hard data using charts and graphs.

Or.

Maybe I could just guestimate that some movies makes me more sad than other movies based on the way they touch personal experience? Sure. Let’s do that:

Everything is Illuminated (2005)

What personal experiences could a movie about a neurotic Jewish writer from America wandering the former Soviet Union with an interpreter who doesn’t really speak English and his blind driver of a grandfather grant some dude in Minnesota? It isn’t “Jonfen”‘s search for the lost town where his own grandfather fled from the Nazis and it’s final beautiful resolution. It’s instead in the pairing of the grandson and grandfather that I am caused “distress” (as Eugene Hutz’s character would say). My own grandfather and I weren’t just separated by a generation but by language and culture. He was a Colonel in the Army of El Salvador before becoming a Mover for Bekins in Los Angeles. I was a mix Latino/Anglo who was cuddled in the arms of American pop culture. When I was almost 18, my grandfather made a trip to El Salvador to see his mother before she passed away. I didn’t go. A trip to Central America, in a country that I didn’t speak the language without all the “benefits” of civilization? I was a selfish, stupid kid.

There is a moment in Everything is Illuminated when the grandson looks at his grandfather and sees a whole new person. He doesn’t even recognize this old man as the very same old man who smacked him up the head for hitting the dog, Sammy Davis Jr, Jr. It was close to my grandfather’s death, almost ten years ago, that brought that same sense of “who is this person I’ve known all my life?” It was a slow burn, the dawning realization that I owed everything that I had become to him, by virtue of the fact that he instilled values of strength, love of family, and (ultimately) a faith in what is right into his children.

This movie is a meditation on love, on family, and on the way that “the past casts a glow of understanding onto the present” ( ¹ ). I understand my family, and myself, much more when looking on the life of my grandfather.

The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

No major heartbreaking story here. I went through a pretty bad “breakup” in 2006. I got drunk and depressed. I watched this movie in the interim of our first goodbye and our last reunion.Two years later, I bought this in a used DVD bin for $5 after she moved out for the last time. It’s still sealed.

 

 

- (¹) – Scott, A.O. “A Journey Inspired by Family Becomes One of Forgiveness” New York Times, 2005 Sept 15. Web.

“Why-oh, why-oh,why-oh did I ever leave Ohio?” 30 Days of Movies: Day 18 – Guilty Pleasure.

Okay, here’s the thing about “guilty pleasures.” They’re meant to be things that you are embarrassed about liking, but that would imply I care what people think of my taste in movies. Since I don’t care, here’s three movies that I may have, surprisingly, been made fun of for liking (as much as I do…):

Jason X (2001)

There is nothing good about this movie. The dialogue is dumb. The action is dumb. The characters are dumb. The special effects are dumb. Dumb, dumb, dumb. I still love this movie. Especially the part where Jason kills two campers by beating one to death with the other. And Jason vs. the android? Genius Awful.

Last Chance Harvey (2008)

It’s another entry into “schlub cinema.” Sad sack Harvey (Dustin Hoffman) loses his job, goes to his daughter’s wedding to watch her get given away by her step-father, and finally realizes what a tool he’s been to everyone around him his whole life. He relentlessly pursues another sad sack (Emma Thompson) in a romance that feels increasingly desperate but ultimately all warm and fuzzy. The whole the whole thing feels like it was produced,written, and directed by a Hallmark card. “Saccharine” doesn’t do it justice.

I can’t get enough of it.

Back to the Beach (1987)

C’mon, it’s got Fishbone in it!

30 Days of Movies: Day 17 – Least Favorite Book Adaptation.

All The Pretty Horses (2000)

Book cover, because the movie sucked.

All the Pretty Horses was one of the most challenging reads I’ve made it through. I would get to page 100 and get lost or start reading something else. It took me about 4 attempts and then I broke through that page 100 barrier. It turned out to be an incredibly rewarding read and made me a life-long Cormac McCarthy fan (currently, Half-Price Books has the 2010 printings of the “Border Trilogy”[of which this is the first part] for just less than $20. Of course Barnes & Noble has a buy 2 get the 3rd free on DVDs, meaning it might be time to fill some holes in my Criterion Collection. Oh, and I’d like to eat more than ramen and leftovers this week….so no more books). When I heard that Billy Bob Thornton was making a movie out of it, I was excited and nervous. I like Sling Blade. I felt that if Thornton could bring the same level of intimate intensity to acting of the movie and expand his visual style to something grander it would be a great movie. I was unfamiliar with Terrence Malick at the time, but that was exactly the style I was hoping for.

I hadn’t been able to talk anyone into reading the book (especially after what I affectionately refer to as “The Italo Calvino Incident“), but I could probably talk people into going to see the movie. Now, if the movie sucked, I would be tarred & feathered (this is where I remind you that I worked in a record/video store and we were very much like the jerks in High Fidelity), but if it was a good movie, then I would…I don’t know, get a cookie or something.

The movie was horrible. It tried hard to capture the poetry of the book, but it came off as boring navel-gazing. The acting was pretty poor. The prison fight scene, a highlight of the book, was flat and without any sense of danger. The score was weak. Penelope Cruz and Matt Damon were too odd a fit for the romance they were supposed to share. Damon, in general, was a poor choice for the character of Cole. Too Bostonian, not enough Texan.

I recommend the book. Seriously, any McCarthy really. As far as good McCarthy movies: The Road was an excellent adaptation of his work as well as No Country For Old Men, but stay away from this movie.

As a side note, there has been rumors for years of adaptations of Blood Meridian and Cities of the Plain. I hope that when either of these finally arrive they do justice to McCarthy.

 

30 Days of Movies: Day 16 – Favorite Book Adaptation

So what exactly is the criteria for this? Is it a book that I believe was best translated from book to screen faithfully? Is it just what favorite movie of mine was a based on a book, even if the film product and the book product are almost completely unrelated? Do graphic novels count ? (I’m kidding. Of course they count.)In answer to these questions, lets just run down a whole lot book-to-movie adaptations that I love.

On the “faithful to source material” tip:

Requiem for a Dream (2000)

I read Hubert Selby Jr’s Requiem for a Dream when I was about 15. It has haunted me ever since. Especially that last hundred pages or so, where the dreams of each character come crashing down.  The level of despair experienced by each character doesn’t make for a feel good film. The infamous “ass-to-ass” scene disturbs a lot of my friends  and many of them call this movie “gross” or say “it made me feel yucky and I had to take a shower afterwards.” Fair enough.

When I first read the book, I was still heavily into the idea of being a filmmaker. I imagined how I would make this book into a movie and, when I finally saw Darren Aronofsky’s version, I was impressed by how close it was to how I saw it in my head. What helps to make this so faithful is Selby actually co-wrote the screenplay with Aronofsky. Even if specific moments aren’t true to the novel, the face smashing brutality is %100 intact.

Honorable Mentions to: Everything is Illuminated & The Commitments.

The award for “Not really much of an adaptation, more of just really taking the general idea and using the title” in a book adaptation goes to:

Starship Troopers (1997)

Robert Heinlein’s futuristic ode to militarism was turned into an over the top satire of the very themes Heinlein promotes. This movie is Terry Southern and Sam Peckinpah fathering a love child with  Leni Riefenstahl in space. This movie became even more funny during the buildup to Iraq War II, when pro-military propaganda was all over the airwaves. This movie has everything amped up to 11; the gore, the melodrama, the “heroics”. At the very least, Troopers has a sense of humor about itself: Doogie Howser and a couple of former cast members from Aaron Spelling dramas star in a movie about teens fighting giant bugs in space. The movie has Michael Ironside in it for God’s sake. Classic.

Honorable Mention to: Blade Runner

Now, in the category of Favorite Graphic Novel Adaptation:

Watchmen (2009)

Alan Moore may have poo-pooed about Hollywood laying its grubby little fingers on his masterpiece, but I’ve enjoyed it every time I see it. I mean, let’s be honest: it’s not a good movie. It lacks the source’s depth and scope. The acting is pretty wooden, even though that can be blamed on the original comics. Most comic book dialogue is meant to be read, not spoken out loud. The sex scene is too long, awkward, and ,for the love of all that is holy, why the Leonard Cohen version of “Hallelujah”? It may be the first version but it’s the least sexy.My biggest bitch against Watchmen is the way Issue #6 was changed. Instead of hacking away at a criminal like movie Rorschach, comic book Rorschach just chains the dude to the radiator and sets the whole house on fire. Rorschach says he watched from across the street and made sure no one came out. That was a far more chilling portrait of how far Rorschach had lost touch with his humanity as opposed to striking out in a rage. Just a minor thing, I know.

The movie makes use of our collective memories about history and cinema. Director Zack Snyder quote of Coppola’s using “Ride of the Valkyries” and the Comedian’s participation in the JFK specifically come to mind. One thing in particular that I’ll give the movie credit for improving on is the ending of the graphic novel. Instead of the comic’s psychic alien bomb (or whatever it’s supposed to be), the filmmakers take the characters and story to a much more logical conclusion.

Honorable Mentions: Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, V for Vendetta, Road to Perdition, Sin City, Persepolis.