John Turturro talks Woody Allen, Beauty, and Sex in 'Fading Gigolo'
Perhaps better known for his more accomplished performances in celebrated American indies (Barton Fink, The Big Lebowski), John Turturro has also made a career out of stepping behind the camera to direct. In this writer/director effort, Fading Gigolo, Turturro teams up with Woody Allen, whose acting in another director's works marks a rare event, as the pair team up here as a paid lover and his bumbly and neurotic "manager." Though if creepy thoughts start to rise in your mind at this point, I would assure you, this adult romantic comedy sidesteps any uncomfortable and awkward comedy, creating instead an intimate and heartfelt look about companionship, loneliness, and love, in the second half of our lives. Turturro, shaking everyone's hands at a roundtable interview before we started, effortlessly displayed class and charm, as
WHAT'S FASCINATING ABOUT THIS MOVIE IS THAT, IN BLACK AND WHITE, IT'S ABOUT PROSTITUTION. BUT YOU PORTRAY IT IN AN ENTIRELY DIFFERENT LIGHT, AND ACTUALLY FEELS LIKE YOUR CHARACTER, FIORAVANTE, IS REALLY HELPING THESE PEOPLE?
I mean, I kind of used the prostitution angle, and even the religious angle as a metaphor, because, why do people do those things? Why have people paid for sex for such a long time?, you know, it's been one of the oldest "jobs," in a way. A lot of actresses in the theater, in like the 1700's, 1800's- first of all, they weren't actresses, they were courtesans. Sarah Bernhardt was a courtesan. As a matter of fact, the intermissions were so long in the theater because sometimes people would see someone on stage, and then they'd have like, an encounter during the intermission. So, actors were not allowed to be buried, because they were considered the same thing, cause they were performers.
So I've always been interested in it, there's always been some fascinating films over the years, foreign films, American films, iconic performances from like Barbara Stanwyck, to Joan Crawford, to Elizabeth Taylor, to Nights of Cabiria, which is one of my favorite movies, something that interests me. I like Midnight Cowboy, obviously. So when I met with Woody, Woody and I were talking, and he and I thought we could be good together and I thought, "Wow, if we were in the sex business, that would be really interesting."
[Laughter]
And Woody was like, "Yeah, this could be perfect for us." I thought, "maybe we'd be good together, maybe we were getting into the business or getting out of it because of circumstances, but maybe it would be an unlikely pair. And then I started thinking about you know, if the guy, I have friends who are around my age, or younger or older, they still live by themselves, and they're alone. They're like a samurai type of existence, and I thought, well that would be interesting, especially if it's a guy who's very comfortable with women, who likes women. Cause there are lots of men who are even married, or whatever, but they don't really like women. They're not very comfortable working with them, or socializing with them. They're more of a guy's guy. And I thought, that's something, I'm comfortable with that situation, maybe because of my relationship with mother or with my wife, or the woman whose costume designs are in the film, we shared a workspace for years, you know we're really close friends, I have a lot of women close friends. And I thought well that could be interesting. And I also liked the idea of a guy who was a physical person, who could do things physically, you know, take something apart, take an engine apart, make a meal, work in a flower store, and he wasn't a salesman. So he was an unambitious person, which you don't see a lot of times in a movie. But very competent person, but lonely. And then, interacting with all of these women who are lonely for different reasons. And I thought, well that could be interesting.
And also the idea of beauty, of what people associate with being beautiful versus being sexy. And sexuality comes in all sizes and shapes, and hairdos and colors and whatever it is, but I thought, that's interesting, because sometimes you meet someone and they're not really at all beautiful, but they're very attractive, in some way. And I thought wow, that's interesting to explore if we light it right, and control the palette, an we make it palpable, like a rich painting is, or a rich photograph. And then you can feel, you can enter into this photograph, or this novella...I used a lot of Saul Leiter photographs, he was a fashion photographer, but he took these street photographs in the thirties and forties, interestingly enough he came from a Hasidic family, or an Orthodox family, but he processed it in this special dye-transfer, they're beautiful photographs of people's reflections in mirrors, anonymous people. That and I took the Italian still-life painter Mirandi, who does all these beautiful still lives, and I used that as kind of a color scheme and I thought, you want to go into this special world, like all the stripes, with the Hasidic community, which is true, it's echoed in Fioravante's character. So I tried to use things from real life, I did a lot of research with the streetwalking aspect, and also with the Hasidic, because I thought I needed one religion, either Muslim, or Catholic, usually its always about a nun.
Woody and I were talking, and he and I thought we could be good together and I thought, "Wow, if we were in the sex business, that would be really interesting."
But the whole idea of head covering, I really find fascinating. And I think when someone's head is covered, you know, there's this whole fear that if the woman's head is uncovered, she's going to run rampant, and it pervades through a lot of this world, today. And even in cultures that don't have that as much, maybe it's a different kind of culture, but there's a fear, that a woman being too free, or something. So I thought, wow, that would be really strong, if she's kind of a metaphor, for that. And in the course of that crazy idea, these two people meet and something occurs between them that is really big. Because, whatever age she (Avigal) is, she has six kids, but its like she's still eighteen years old, she's never been courted, she's never been looked at, she's never kind of opened up and said, "This is who I am," and someone saying "Wow, you're a fantastic person," she just was given. And it's a big part of life. And even Sharon's (Stone) character, she's kind of imprisoned in her rich world, but in a different way. Sofia's (Vergara) not, but you want to have a balance. So these are things that interested me, I'm interested in relationships, but the idea of how everyone can be lonely, even in you're in a relationship, sometimes people go outside of it for adventure or something else, and how that's an unceasing need throughout life, whatever age you are, you're this age now, but you could be seventy years from now, you could've lost someone, or whatever and you have to reinvent yourself, and you're still looking for someone to connect with, or to be in the dark with. That idea of two feet in the dark, that never stops. That's part of our life, you know, besides warmth and safety and food, it's a big part of our lives. And so I wanted to put this into an entertaining movie. And Woody encouraged me to really delve deeper, cause originally my idea was very broad and crazy- I had a lot of great ideas, but they weren't working in conjunction with one another.
WHAT WAS THE ORIGINAL IDEA FOR THE FILM?
Well the original idea was more like they were trying to get out, it was a little broader and more bawdy, and stuff like that. But one of the first original ideas, which I loved, that I held onto for a long time, was, and which I regretted never being able, but I just didn't have room for it, was, I had a character, because I knew Elaine Stritch, I worked on a play with her and I also directed her in Romance & Cigarettes, and she went to Catholic school. And I knew I wanted religion, cause I like anything about religion, because you can't have sex without religion...
[Laughter]
HOW MUCH OF YOURSELF IS IN YOUR CHARACTER?
Well you always use aspects of yourself, but there were aspects of other people that I drew on. And that's it, that's what you're doing in lots of characters when you're doing it. But certainly, feeling comfortable with women, I'm not an isolated person, and I'm not probably good as physically as he is, I'm good at certain things. But like I worked in that flower shop for like a week with all the ladies, and it was wonderful. It was like kind of heaven for me. I mean it was hard work, but I was learning how to make beautiful arrangements, re-pot orchids...so I've always liked when I've had female directors or female coaches, I've always felt more comfortable with that. Not that there isn't some people I haven't gotten along with. But that's the trick of it, you have to make something personal and also imaginative. I used to make up notebooks, like what I had in common with the character and what I didn't, and what I needed to work on. But there's a lot of me in the film across the board, not just in that person.
HOW DID YOU WORK WITH WOODY ALLEN ON THIS? I UNDERSTAND THAT IN THE DEVELOPMENT STAGES HE WOULD GIVE YOU NOTES...
He gave me brutal notes about things that he didn't think were believable, and then I would think about it, and he'd say, "I like this part, think about this, think about that," and I kept coming back. He said I could withstand his brutality, his brutal criticism. But he liked me enough, and I liked him enough to think about what he said. Someone else I would've said, "Forget it, I'm gonna go somewhere else." But I thought, this is an interesting situation, and in life, you always, once again, the idea of reinventing myself, you're always learning. You know, I'm still learning too. So maybe I could learn something from him. And I think he really admired that, and that's why he asked me to direct these plays in the middle of it, and then once we really got to know each other, you now, he's alive. So if you're too afraid, you can be respectful, but if you're too afraid, you can't really do anything. And he always liked the way I had written his character, that he always liked, but his voice is in my head. I have enough material that I could easily do a sequel.
Review: 'Only Lovers Left Alive'
It may seem like a while ago, but vampires used to be all the rage in pop culture moviedom. Though the Bellas and Edwards have had their (sparkly) moments in the sun, like a wildly forceful and momentous ocean wave that's finally crashed- the tide has since, slowly receded. Fortunately, in its wake, it has left behind a poignant and clever vampire flick from a celebrated rebel indie auteur that stands out like the meaningfully philosophic piece of movie prose that it is.
Writer/director Jim Jarmusch returns after 2009's The Limits of Control to deliver his neo-goth set vampire love story, Only Lovers Left Alive, which circumvents almost every typical convention seen in previous vampire love stories. A better perspective of these characters would be to describe them as simply, "undead," which they are, having survived for hundreds and thousands of years, living through all the Middles of Ages and Renais' of sance's. While our vampires here still shut away from sunlight and thirst for human blood, their interests and simulations come from their worldly knowledge of music, literature, and science, instead of blockbuster fueled teen-beat eye-googling. What Only Lovers offers, instead, is an intellectual mulling over of modern day society, by way of two sunglasses-wearing yet highly cultured creatures of the night.
Inspired loosely by the last book published by Mark Twain, The Diaries of Adam And Eve, this horror movie-done-chill wave is an ode to the duel fixings of cynicism and celebration perceived of civilization's entire history. As the five hundred-year-old Adam, Tom Hiddleston is a grunge rocker vampire laying low in his electric guitar covered home studio, moseying about only to further add to his cluttered collection of vintage musical hardware and retrieve A-grade human blood from one easily-bought Dr. Watson (Jeffrey Wright). Adam, with his long tangled mane of Robert Plant hair, feels the pains of what he sees is the downfall of culture, what with all of the middling and trouble that our modern day society dirties our hands with. Adam's defeated sense of acceptance of this, which Hiddleston oozes and synthesizes wonderfully here, gives his vampire a burdening weight that gives his vampire more substance and conflict than any we've seen before (and frankly, this character motivation makes a whole lot of sense, having once witnessed all of history's greatest brilliances and geniuses in action).
Though the intrinsic DNA in the movie won't appeal to most audiences, this is still one of Jarmusch's most accessible and conventional films to date and provides a window into his worldview while still keeping a healthy balance of art and entertainment.
Perhaps Jarmusch is allowing some of his own distasteful feelings on how today's non-high-brow culture rules things, to bleed in (a constant joke is Adam's calling of all Angeleno's "zombies,"), but to counter-balance Adam's depressions is the perfectly sprite intellectual-ista, Eve (Tilda Swinton). With her five thousand years of living over Adam's mere five hundred, she finds complete resolve and fulfillment in the endless consumptions of fine art and sciences, and easily maintains her positive outlook on life. So when a nearly-suicidal Adam (like I said, depressed) phones his centuries-old lover in her residing place of Tangiers, she immediately flies over to him, to reconnect, and to talk things out. Which they do. As stated previously, most of this movie is an outlet for both world views to just express themselves, which is played with steady yet slow-moving storytelling.
Viewers should know early on, especially those unfamiliar with a Jarmusch film- this movie is one to watch with patience. The director's off-beat pension for showcasing the alternative is captured wonderfully here, making this a welcome and fun addition to his body of work. The sly sensibilities of the writer/director are further evidenced here, with the vampires oh so casually referencing and comparing their time spent in the 1500's to now, as well as the nearly parodying effect of wearing their sunglasses indoors. In fact, "sly" would perhaps best illustrate the mental space from which Jarmusch is working from in large part here: though they are vampires, they don't hunt for their blood. Though they are lovers, they get their resolve from each other's emotional fulfillments rather than from wild and crazy bed rattling. Though they drink human blood, it is for sustainment only, as they both get their fixes from vials rather than unsuspecting humans. In a cheeky display, Eve impresses Adam with a homemade blood popsicle, and Adam points out fellow Detroit rocker Jack White's home, illustrating the comedic leanings that this post-modern flick simultaneously plays with.
Adding to the high-brow world that Adam and Eve live in is the wise, if not near the end of his life, Marlowe (John Hurt), whose centuries-old existence shows a life of grace and accomplishment (In this, Marlowe secretly wrote Shakespeare's finest works). Also accompanying and providing additional story lines are the young and impulsive sister to Eve, Ava (Mia Wasikowska, who gives another fresh performance from the many we've seen from the talented actress), and Adam's mortal go-to man Ian (Anton Yelchin) whose admiration for the reclusive rock star may bring him into a newly dangerous world.
Dark and swirly, as everything from the opening title sequence to the low-fi guitar-fuzzed soundtracking, to the nighttime photographing of Detroit and Tangiers, is, it all sets the stage for this tone poem of a movie. Though the intrinsic DNA in the movie won't appeal to most audiences, this is still one of Jarmusch's most accessible and conventional films to date and provides a window into his worldview while still keeping a healthy balance of art and entertainment. If you'd like a new perspective of the modern age or even vampires, allow a modern master and talented company to provide that singular and unique experience for you.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-TbxI_oRSKI
Tilda Swinton on 'Only Lovers Left Alive'
WHAT WAS YOUR FAVORITE THING ABOUT YOUR CHARACTER, EVE?
That she has this perspective, that she doesn't sweat the small, the medium, or the big stuff. That she's full of wonder, and she's always looking up. Which feels to me, pretty much the prerogative of people who lived that length of time. She knows what's worth what.
THIS IS YOUR THIRD TIME WORKING WITH JIM (JARMUSCH). DO YOU TWO HAVE A SHORTHAND WITH EACH OTHER WITH HOW HE DIRECTS YOU? ALSO, ABOUT THAT TITLE...
The title's kind of been floating around for years, someone made an album, or someone wrote a book...
THERE WAS A BOOK THAT THE ROLLING STONES OPTIONED-
Exactly! And they were going to make a film. Who was it that was going to make that film? Someone amazing. Yeah, I don't know. I've never asked Jim actually. But I remember when he first mentioned the project to me, the title was there, it was like a flake that was already on it. It just feels like its always been there, that title.
And as for (working with Jim) we talk all the time, whether we talk about anything that's pertinent to the making of the film I don't know. We're friends now, and part of the reason that I love to work with him is it means I get to hang out with my pal for longer than if I wasn't shooting with him. This one was another long gestation. It was seven or eight years since now and when he first rang me up and said, "Hey man, let's make a vampire movie." So that means a lot of many breakfasts when I was flying through New York saying "So where are we?" and many moments on the phone, and many conversations in dark corners about where we were going to go next, over the years.
When we came to shoot, the lovely thing about those long developments, is that when you come to shoot, it's just grace. You're so relieved to finally be putting it down, and you've also had that length of time to talk about it, and you don't really need to talk about it that much.
THE PHYSICALITY THAT YOU BRING TO THIS ROLE IS SO INCREDIBLE- JUST WATCHING YOU WALKING DOWN THE SREET IS PRETTY BADASS. WAS THERE ANY INSPIRATION THAT YOU DREW FROM TO MOVE LIKE A VAMPIRE?
We talked a lot about what it would be if you were that unsocialized, because they kind of lifted out of human society. And they are, very quickly we started to talk about them as lone wolves, so we talked about them as animals, only we're putting together the look also, we ended up filling those wigs with Yaks' hair and wolves' hair. And there's a heart beat in the film that comes up and down in the soundtrack that's actually a wolf's heart. So I thought a lot about wolves when we're were thinking how Eve would walk about. You know, if you're not in the pack, if you are alone at night, and you can take your time, you can pick your rhythm, and we knew that, I think which is always the case with Jim, not only is there, music is a very important life blood, but also the camera, the move, the feeling of movement, is always very important to him. In this one particularly, because of this passage through these two different wildernesses.
And we had the wonderful Yorick Le Saux who's this great cinematographer who I've worked with a couple of times before, and he's such a great dance partner, so walking alongside him was really kind of creamy.
This one was another long gestation. It was seven or eight years since now and when (Jim Jarmusch) first rang me up and said, "Hey man, let's make a vampire movie."
WHAT WAS THE ESSENCE, FOR YOU, OF EVE'S RELATIONSHIP WITH ADAM (TOM HIDDLESTON)?
One of the first bits of sand in the oyster for Jim, which he immediately told me about on that telephone call eight years ago, was this book by Mark Twain, The Diaries of Adam and Eve, which is so delightful, playful, fictional or maybe not, diaries of the original Adam and Eve, which spells out very clearly that this is an enormous love affair between two opposites. And that was the foundation that stuck for us, that they would be, in it for the long haul, but completely different. That I find really enticing, to show two people really loving each other, but not being like each other at all. So we talked a lot about that, and that was fun, because that feel's really human, playing with that.
And then we also, as you've noticed, we wanted it to be about a marriage in which they talk, as long relationships do. There's a sort of tradition of showing people coming together, and then, 'the end,' and you never see them actually living it out, living the ups and the downs, and talking it through, and chewing the cud, and we really spent a lot of time wanting to get that tone of two people who were family. You know, it's a long, long marriage, they are family, they are the same kind. And that's why they still dig each other even though they're so different, and he's so tricky to live with and she's such a space cadet. They have this communication thing going, and they really like talking about stuff. We really wanted to show that, it felt like it was something we hadn't necessarily seen before.
AS DISTINCTIVE AS YOUR RELATIONSHIP WITH TOM IS (AS ADAM), YOU HAVE AN EQUALLY POWERFUL, YET DISTINCTIVELY DIFFERENT RELATIONSHIP WITH JOHN HURT, AS MARLOWE. HOW DID THE TWO OF YOU GO ABOUT ESTABLISHING THAT CADENCE AND RHYTHM BETWEEN YOURSELVES? AND ALSO, WHAT WAS IN THAT BLOOD FROM THE FRENCH DOCTOR BECAUSE YOU LOOKED DAMN GOOD.
I've got some under here...
The relationship with Marlowe is a very precious part of the film for me. Honestly, partly because it felt very close to my own experience, having a very close relationship with, in particular I would say my life with John, whose disappearance from the building I had to witness also felt very kind of close. But him being, really a partner, a different kind of partner for her, he's her neighbor, he's her companion in a way that Adam isn't as quotidian as Marlowe is for Eve. It just felt completely alive and fresh, I just know that relationship inside-out, and John does too, and he was the perfect dance partner to play that out with, and he also feels like family...
We actually, funnily enough, last year, John and I made two films together, or rather not last year, the year before, this film and also Joon-ho Bong's film Snowpiercer, and so we spent the year together which was wonderful. And at the end of it we realized that we'd actually known each other for years and years and years without working together. So he feels like family, and so we just put that into the film. John was absolutely convinced that we were lovers once, which is in there let's say. [Laughter]
I'LL BE HONEST- I ACTUALLY FOUND MYSELF IDENTIFYING WITH ADAM'S CHARACTER MORE. FOR A VAMPIRE WHO'S BEEN AROUND FOR FOREVER, HE'S A BIT MORE CYNICALLY MINDED, MORE CRITICAL OF THE MODERN WORLD THAT HE LIVES IN, AS OPPOSED TO EVE, WHO CELEBRATES EACH TIME PERIOD SHE'S LIVED THROUGH WITH GREAT OPTIMISM. WHAT WAS IT LIKE TO PLAY SUCH A CHEERFUL VAMPIRE?
Well he's very young in a way, he has yet to learn. He's only five hundred years old, she's three thousand years old. [Laughter]. She's seen it all and she knows that survival is possible, and that survival is possible if one keeps one's eyes open and takes it all in. It's not like she's recommending turning one's space away, she talks about witnessing the Inquisitions, the Middle Ages, she's witnessed all the holocausts, and yet she's still seeing humanity and spirit and nature survive those things. So she knows that, as long as one keeps looking up, and as long as one keeps breathing, and keeps one's perspective, survival is possible. And when she says to him, when he gets down, she says to him, "Your immersion in your own despair is actually vanity, and that if you could just use your life on making the right sense of priorities, concentrate on nature, get your guidance from nature, which survives consistently," I mean particularly in a place like Detroit, to go to Detroit and to feel the way nature is taking over there, is a really positive thing. And kindness, friendship. And dancing! She's got her priorities right.
Review: 'Under the Skin'
There's a whole lot to love in director Jonathan Glazer's latest sci-fi/art film, Under the Skin. If you're a cinephile who loves raving about the brilliance of Stanley Kubrick and David Lynch, or enjoy seeing Scarlett Johannson grace the big screen (and baring all), and certainly all three, then this movie will provide you with plenty of cinematic nourishment to at least convince you that beautiful and daring films are still being made.
Glazer, a former music video director for bands like Radiohead and feature film director, including 2004's Birth starring Nicole Kidman, channels the aforementioned old masters in creating a darkly hypnotic meditation on the mundaneness and strangeness of the human condition. With aliens (or some "other" being). Photographically, compositionally, visually, the film is some of the most inspired and impressively shot frames of film that have been projected in years.
In terms of the film's story, however; it's going to take a motivated inner cine-spirit to keep your enthusiasm high throughout the film's runtime. Although viewers shouldn't dismiss the film's long spurts of silence- there's a whole lot of it, including the film's fantastic opening sequence, which moves into a Kubrick-ian stage-setting of Johansson's mystery and unnamed character clothing up (like Schwarzenegger's Terminator)- the film wishes itself against any semblance of a more accessible narrative storytelling and pacing. And so what we have here is a patiently moving, slowly creeping movie featuring an incredibly photographed yet largely mute Johansson.
Johansson here gives an incredibly restrained and erotically charged performance, and this role should further establish herself as a serious actor.
Without giving too much away, Under the Skin's story has much to do with just what exactly is under Johansson's mystery character- kind of. On a literal level, we know something is awry and not right with the leading lady, having just witnessed her newly transplanted self-roaming silently and curiously around the public spaces of Scotland (where the movie takes place). Johansson here gives an incredibly restrained and erotically charged performance, and this role should further establish herself as a serious actor. Although seeing the starlet, in a cropped black wig and piercing red lips, channels instant sex appeal, Glazer has his way with adding to it a touch of strangeness that denies an unrestricted lust onto her, even in scenes of seeing her in complete shadowy undress. Although that cinematic reading isn't available to the also unnamed and unsuspecting Scottish male victims in the movie, whom Johannson's character (can I start calling her The Woman?, Apologies to Glazer if this breaks any artistic meaning) drives alongside and brings back to her black-hole chamber of a flat, evoking the dream-like surrealism of an Eraserhead-era Lynch.
And so the story goes: The Woman experiences unfamiliar human events, watching the daily commuters shuffle along the streets, watching human interactions of a family at the beach and young people at the night club, and all the while, continuing to pick up the innocent yet lust-worthy males (IMDB's trivia page states that the men were not real actors, filmed with hidden cameras and only informed they were in a movie afterwards) that keep getting taken back to her spider's web of a flat. The film moves steadily, but these scenes envelope onto themselves constantly to convey the repetitions that Glazer shows as the low-brain activity Woman might experience them.
But- if you are eager and willing to dive deeper into this wildly imagined ride, there are also much deeper thematic takeaways on display. Just like under The Woman's skin, things aren't always as they appear to be. This theme extends from the (possible) literal example of The Woman, but more so about the metaphorical associations and acceptances that a modern-day society recognizes. A beautiful rose pricks the hand with its hidden thorns, and a delicious looking chocolate cake elicits a gag from The Woman. However subtle and artful, it should be acknowledged that Glazer is confronting these issues while lensing a strangely erotic and exotic world female. Don't expect to forget about this film after viewing either; Under the Skin will haunt you for days. Don't say we didn't warn you.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NoSWbyvdhHw
Review: 'The Unknown Known'
Donald Rumsfeld is no movie star. Which is not to say that he is not a celebrity, in his own right.
The famous (or infamous, as this just left of center documentary might appropriate), former secretary of defense under the W. Bush presidency, is no longer in the political spotlight, which, after watching The Unknown Known, could be gathered as something valued very greatly by the documentary's star subject. As time has progressed since the Bush presidency and its proclaimed War on Terror, actuality has seemed to distance itself from history. The Iraq Wars, of which Mr. Rumsfeld acted as the principal architect of, becomes a hazier image to recount, and its particulars have likewise blurred as the story becomes buried ever so quietly amidst today's 24-hour breaking news cycle. Which is why a documentary featuring a singular Rumsfeld, plopped in front of a vast and infinitely black backdrop to disclose to us for the first time, his political career and the controversial stories that were a part of it, would make for not only an entertaining experience but a truly informative and revealing one.
This kind of happens.
Director Errol Morris plays the interviewer himself (though not on camera) to his comfortably sitting subject, to explain to us The Unknown Knowns of his political career. If the title is slightly confusing, the documentary does a good job of defining it periodically. Ever the rational and composed man (to an eerie degree), Rumsfeld explains that (in politics) there are Known Knowns ("That is to say, we know things that we know"), Unknown Unknowns ("That is to say, there are things we don't know we don't know), and Unknown Knowns (...Ok the logic still fails me on this one..."That is to say, there are things we think we know that we don't"). Morris has stated that after meeting and talking to Mr. Rumsfeld, that he knows less about him and the Iraq War then he did before. It's not hard to sympathize with his sentiment, as the documentary, while engaging and notable for its attempts and small successes at curtain-pulling, plays like the story that Rumsfeld might have wanted you to hear, instead of Morris.
Part of Rumsfeld's insight and foresight as a calculative (or perhaps just organized) political figure was that he even kept these detailed snowflakes of his political action, perhaps to remind himself, perhaps to put on record his own version of history, or perhaps to create the world's strangest diary.
Morris sidesteps the conventional question and answer interview style by instead putting Rumsfeld in the hot seat, having him explain his "snowflakes"- the individually unique and enormous archive of typed letters, audio recordings, and other memos that he personally wrote/recorded during his almost fifty years in Congress, the White House, in business, and at the Pentagon. Part of Rumsfeld's insight and foresight as a calculative (or perhaps just organized) political figure was that he even kept these detailed snowflakes of his political action, perhaps to remind himself, perhaps to put on record his own version of history, or perhaps to create the world's strangest diary. With the actual date and time stamped accounts, Morris has Rumsfeld read and explain (not all of them- there are tens of thousands packed away in cardboard boxes. Think last scene of Raiders of the Lost Arc) a core group, focusing largely on the Iraq War memos.
While Morris is more properly (and appropriately) contextualized as a liberally leaning documentarian, his question-asking never comes across as overly spiteful or attacking- a welcome and professional stance to take. Though this might have more to do with Mr. Rumsfeld's own penchant for creatively exercising (spinning?) vocabulary and stories to best contextualize them, perhaps for his own benefit. The audience is walked through significant events such as September 11th, the decision to invade Iraq and Afghanistan, torture and Guantanamo Bay, and much more. The highlight of the documentary is that Rumsfeld himself sits down to explain these events, yes; but either he was never personally guilty of anything himself to which he might reveal any stunning omissions that this type of journalism would find out, or he just doesn't admit to any secret wrongdoings. In either case, I'm not sure he'd be the person you would want to play poker with.
So is this documentary even an effective and worthwhile one? I vote Aye. Morris moves the whole show along at an even and steady pace, and it's worth it just to gain the political perspective from one of the most important men whose political action helped lead to the Iraq Wars. The biggest takeaway, in fact, ends up being not one of hearing a juicy tell-all about our recent checkered political past, but of a subtle character study, of how this man rose to power and prominence in one our country's most uncertain of times. So if you finish the viewing feeling frustrated that you didn't get the full peek behind the curtain, (or if that title still doesn't make any sense to you), then for some reason I think a small and satisfactory smile would purse Rumsfeld's lips. For when Morris lobs his final question, perhaps frustratedly, or defeatedly, "Why did you agree to sit down with me?", Rumsfeld's pause, and then- "I don't know," should give you an insight into the mystery of how this man chooses to tell his story.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J-NSyMTpkYI
Review: 'Dom Hemingway'
Dom Hemingway begins with a naked Jude Law receiving an oral sort of treatment just out of screen and shouting directing at the camera about how great his manhood is. This boastful monologuing is captured in a single take and goes on for quite some time. It's sort of funny, sort of the actor laying it all on a bit too thick as the title character, an overweight and past his prime safecracker who's just sprung from doing time in the big house.
This first scene is about as representative of how the rest of the movie is.
As the Cockney, brash, rebellious yet cool hooligan Dom Hemingway, Law gets to sink his teeth into a deliciously devilish character. Even going so far as gaining thirty pounds for the role to become the aged, stein-slamming huckster, the role gives the actor the entire sandbox to send up this mad Brit in. We see it all: Hemingway foaming at the mouth and beating the pulp out of a wrongdoer, binge partying with women and blow like a better coifed Charlie Sheen, and even tapping into more vulnerable, emotional territory, confronting his estranged daughter Evelyn (Emilia Clarke) and sobbing at the grave of his late wife. Throughout, one gets the sense that the actor might have had a more fulfilling time breathing life into Dom then the audience has in watching a movie about him.
Dom Hemingway begins with a naked Jude Law receiving an oral sort of treatment just out of screen, and shouting directing at the camera about how great his manhood is.
That's because of the movie's barely-there storyline. While the whole thing is conceived and dressed up as one big character study (or something less intellectual), there's not a whole lot to follow along with. After we see Dom in all his aforementioned glory and leaving prison, doing time for keeping his mouth shut for a more powerful man Mr. Fontaine (Demian Bichir), he joins up with his slightly wiser criminal comrade Dickie Black (Richard E. Grant) and the two go from there. An obliterating party bender leads to Dom getting crossed, and moping and sermonizing on misfortune and the universe's karmic backlash put on him for nearly the rest of the movie. It's not all for not, however; Dom reconnects with his daughter Evelyn and meets a new family member, giving Law a good chunk of dramatic and serious-face screen time. Also tacked on late-in-the-game is a storyline of Dom trying to crack a safe for a once-rival gangster Lestor (Jumayn Hunter), which is introduced, watched, and then abandoned, all the same.
This Jude Law-starrer ends up exciting only in fleeting moments. Writer/director Richard Shepard uses most of the colors in the crayon box to concoct a story that's equal parts brash-comedy, dramatic and tension-filled romping, and emotionally cathartic enlightenment. That, with all of Dom's talk of "luck" on a large scale level, makes for a real grab bag of biography for our wild pal Dom and his crazy life. The decision to introduce us to Dom as he springs free from prison, well past the height of his career and most youthful bravado, is a choice that might have been made so that the audience could imaginatively fill in his must be unbelievable back story. But making the audience do all that work is a move doesn't stick- we know that Dom is a wicked and funny (and wickedly funny) safecracker, but that's about it. The story here isn't about Dom and how he came to be; it's about a middle-aged Dom and how he chooses to move forward with his, now sad, life. Inevitably, all roads lead to a Dom left with nothing, no money, no family, no purpose, but as we realize we don't know much about him at all (except for that he's Jude Law, and therefore, a sympathetic character), there's not a whole lot of investment to be made in the whole charade. While there's good fun in being along for the ride, sitting shotgun for all of Dom's beer drinking and the mayhem that ensues, the experience leaving the theater is that of waking up the next morning, wondering if the hangover was ultimately worth it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u1izaIH269E
Review: 'The Raid 2'
If all action film fans need from their movies is a serviceable enough story and a healthy (read: unhealthy) amount of action scenes, then The Raid 2 will meet all of those requirements and more. The "and more," here, is an eye-popping number of incredibly choreographed and directed action sequences that simultaneously glue your eyes to the flying fists onscreen, as well as all but force you to look away from the pain that's felt from the audience seats. For a movie so, fun, it would be off-base to lament how during the entire two and a half hours, the movie moves in a repetitive fashion, alternating between slow burning and serious dialogue scenes and manic martial arts stunts. The Raid 2, for being a guilty pleasure head smasher, is nearly incredible in terms of its huge scale and overall execution.
This sequel, the follow-up to 2011's The Raid: Redemption, takes off from the previous film's end (two hours, to be exact), as we once again follow the deadly-when-cornered Rama (Iko Uwai), who learns that in order to ensure the safety of his wife and infant child, must reinvent himself as an undercover cop to expose a corrupted crime syndicate between police and local crime boss Bangun (Tio Pakusodewu). Uwai as Rama is just so good in these Raid movies, and his casting is no accident. A trained martial artists since the age of 10 and a 2005 National Champion in the Silat Demonstration category, Uwai was discovered by the film's Welsh-born writer/director himself, Gareth Evans, when he visited Iko's Silat school for a documentary in 2007, and ended up asking him to quit his daytime job as a driver in a telecommunications company to star in his production company's movies. This film critic is glad that the chips have landed as such, as the low top Converse-wearing Iko in this film is simply arresting to watch, decimating his opponents in action sequences that seem to go on for tens of minutes without rest.
The Raid 2 seems to be that rare film that, due to logistical shooting and budgetary issues, surpasses its original in terms of both scale and entertainment factor.
According to Raid 2's IMDB trivia page, the sequel's story was written before Redemption, but when funding fell through, director Evans decided to shoot a film with a lower budget, which would become the first film in the Raid series. And the jump in budget shows. If this reviewer had to guess, I'd say that each fight scene consisted of more than forty stuntmen, give or take, and lasted at least ten minutes long, sometimes optimizing whirling and impeccably timed single takes reminiscent of a much less stylized 300 for further impress. An early mud-drenched prison yard scramble nearly had me second guessing my choice in second row viewing; a truly incredible car chase (after which, roads had to be cleaned from 6am to 6pm) had me mouth agape and wondering how long it would be before Hollywood came knocking at the filmmaker's door asking for the secrets; and the final fight scene, with a pulverized Rama advancing through four different rooms to one of the most EP-ic mano-a-mano showdowns I've seen in a movie, left me all but drained of energy and senses (imagine how Iko must have felt). Needless to say, all of the other fight scenes were just as hilariously engrossing.
Though the story itself isn't one of equally inspired nature, as Bangun's less than trustworthy son Ucok (Arifin Putra) rises to power within the inner circle and threatens to break the peace amongst the other crime families, resulting in war, it is still all constructed neatly, albeit familiar. The dialogue and expository scenes, even if most end up in simple shot-reverse-shots between characters, extend to include scenes with smooth pans and creatively composed wide shots with artfully designed sets, adding a welcome aesthetic and deeper dimension to help hold the movie together.
As it usually goes, the sequel never, or rarely, holds up to the original, as the elements that made the first so unique and beloved are typically rehashed to no end. However, The Raid 2 seems to be that rare film that, due to logistical shooting and budgetary issues, surpasses the first film in terms of both scale and entertainment factor. If you have the stomach, or willpower, to watch hyper-violent action where limbs snap in every possible direction, The Raid 2 will show you just how good an action movie can be, for action movie's sake.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MG9uFX3uYq4
Review: 'Rob the Mob'
It would seem that rebel couples make the best criminal partners. Or rather, the most entertaining ones. Inspired or not by the real life gangsters Bonnie and Clyde, Rob the Mob tells a similar-enough story of two young lovers turned small-time crooks when they decide to steal from the kitties of the high-powered Italian Mafia families of 1991's Queens, New York.
Rob the Mob's hip, snappy title provides a good idea of what you should expect to get with this movie, as this crime-drama benefits from a regular dosage of sly attitude and charm from its leading gunslingers. As the real-life Mob mugging duo Thomas and Rosemarie Uva, Michael Pitt and Nina Arianda carve out a good piece of the crime couple cinematic landscape that has been all but missing from movies since we last saw the googley eyes of the wanted lovers in 1993's shockingly sharp, Quentin Tarantino penned True Romance.
The actors' chemistry is apparent in the film's first frames, when we see Tommy and Rosie's relationship, whose constant shouting matches-turned-make out sessions show the passion that leads them to attempt to (unsuccessfully) hold up a flower shop one Valentine's Day, landing him in the clink and her trying to make good with a telemarketing gig. Years later and fresh out of prison, the pair reconnect, and now face a grown-up life with bills to pay and groceries to buy, much to the dismay of both, but there's no killing their romance. A now cleaned up, all work and no play Rosie makes Tommy a dull boy, and so he finds himself stumbling into the landmark trial of Gambino-family boss John Gotti, where he spends his days soaking in testimonies galore that place in his head the knowledge that Mafia social clubs don't carry firearms, and plant in his head the idea to make use of that information, and rob them.
Much of the movie's heavy lifting is placed on Pitt and Arianda, and they are more than up to the task to step up. However, it's the mood, look, and tone, which captures the 90's-set New York inner city life in various and appealing locations, that director Raymond De Felitta (City Island) brings successfully to the big screen. Each scene, whether set in the boring cubicle office space, to Tommy and Rosie's furniture-less shared apartment or in the Mob's social clubs themselves, feels big and full of rich storytelling though the feeling retains its intimacy. Slightly oddball characters fill in some of these scenes, which add another jolt of punk humor.
Don't underestimate the talent on display here; if you do, they might just pull a fast one on you.
After a string of successful Mob heists, the activity gains the attention of FBI and Mob reporter Jerry Cardozo (Ray Romano), whose curiosity attracts him to covering their stories. On the other side of the moral tracks, the embarrassing hits make their way up the chain to Mob boss Big Al (Andy Garcia), whose initial, calm, reluctance to "take care of" the cocksure criminals is deemed a mistake, when Tommy and Rosie get their hands on an invaluable item that could bring the entire Mob community down.
The billings of Ray Romano as the sympathetic reporter, who champions their cause and story (getting so far as to profile the notorious duo), and Andy Garcia, as the measured and wise old crime boss, are worthy additions here. Even if Romano can't seem, or doesn't try, to break from his already made, New York casual-ness character, he is still a friendly face with the utmost of trustworthy of intentions for the audience to rely on for moral centering. The work of Andy Garcia, meanwhile, shows a bigger hunger and eagerness, however dialed back and restrained it is, to sink his teeth into another character of depth. Although we see familiar tropes of "family first"-ness in Big Al's character, going as far to say that "love" is the most important ingredient in his famous home-made Italian dish, Garcia brings with him a presence that does more than enough to get the audience imagining his colorful and dangerous background for him.
While it's plainly obvious to see all the talent and craftsmanship on display here in this modestly-sized crime-drama, the shortcomings stem from its overall less than polished packaging. What gives each scene an appeal of life and energy, through a combination of loose shooting style and reactive performances, also waters down its larger vision. There is a lot on display here, sure; even the supporting story of the passing of Tommy's late father at the hands of the Mafia allows even more human elements to be felt. But the emotions don't stick, and at the end of the day, it would be better for the movie's sake to decide which singular tone needs to be focused on in telling this story.
Ultimately, Rob the Mob, penned from scribe Jonathan Fernandez, has enough driving force in it, from the sum of all its parts (and in large part to Pitt and Arianda), to deem this a successful venture. Don't underestimate the talent on display here; if you do, they might just pull a fast one on you.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQR2sEdqBDk
Review: 'Art Machine'
If you're in the mood for an easy watching, just entertaining enough movie about the pains of artistic grief by way of existential angst, you might feel disappointed after watching the attemptedly-edgy yet uninspired Art Machine. Though a poignant story seems to exist underneath, the movie's much too formulaic and telegraphed story plays all too safe, for a movie about upsetting/transcending the conventional art world by upsetting the established order, no less.
Once a child prodigy painter, Declan's (Joseph Cross) life has lost all meaning. Especially living under the roof of his career controlling mother Prudence (Joey Laurence Adams), whose "prudish" character name is so painfully on-the-nose that it can't help but show as but one instance of the deliberate and mechanical storytelling on display here. The film introduces Declan, now grown up and without his previous critical and commercial success, in a rut of producing less than important or otherwise "good" art. Of course all things come to a head when he meets the manic pixie character, rebel guerilla artist Cassandra (Jessica Szohr) who, along with her fellow punk art collective do-badders, bring Declan in to let loose and join in the merry mischief within their law and art-world circumventing lifestyle. With a heaping of anarchic philosophy (and a touch of psychedelics), Declan stumbles into a new artistic world of inspiration, though with its dangerous and sprawling possibilities and a re-activation of previous mental disturbances, the troubled artist must decide whether his newfound artistic motivations are worth it.
With a heaping of anarchic philosophy (and a touch of psychedelics), Declan stumbles into a new artistic world of inspiration.
Art Machine ultimately goes to say that the "art world" (Brooklyn, NY being its backdrop) has gotten to a point of producing unchallenging and meaningless art, not unlike that of a rudimentary machine. While I would not go as far as to say that this film's detractors stem from a meaningless storyline, as it displays an intriguing premise about its contemporary questioning, the same defense can't be made that this outing has any sort of exceptional craftsmanship. We've seen the story of the sheltered, mama's boy of a millennial turn to dark times and mushrooms to achieve a higher functioning experience. We've seen the same goofy art click side-kicks with names like "Flash" and oppositely buttoned-up art studio sniffler "Serge," and here is where we remember that. Perhaps most evidently, even the "art" in the movie is doctored up as a means to an end that one can only guess the property department conjured up to simply qualify. Declan himself is presented as an artist whose work is supposed to speak for itself, but in this case, it all just screams "bad."
Though there might be one or two familiar faces in this low-budget clunker, the film itself doesn't have much in the way of entertainment. Unless your idea of a good time stems from watching the most watered down version of Fight Club meets art school, there's not a lot to fuss over.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5Ty06K7GIU
Review: 'At Middleton'
Whether college-aged kids or middle-aged adults, new discoveries can happen anytime. This sentiment is drawn out in an afternoon's worth of small scale adventures in the whimsical enough At Middleton. While the film intends to act as a quirky, fun, heart warming flick for older audiences, there is ultimately not enough bite taken out of life on display here that is worth applauding over.
While the film's setup, that of two spouses taking their own children on a college campus tour "at Middleton," only to their finding attractions in the other's perfectly charming and compatible opposites, and stowing away for an episodic series of quirky adventures, seems innocently entertaining, there are real problems with the mechanics of the storytelling. While a devout champion for independent filmmaking, I fear that I secretly desire watching the same movie with a bit more money pumped into it. Meaning to say, there are some real problems here that more developed stakes (joyriding two perfectly unattended bicycles around the campus isn't all too thrilling) could really help.
Though with its totally loose and freely shooting nature, first-time feature film director Adam Rodgers is able to capture fun and freed performances from its star actors. Veteran film actor Andy Garcia, as do-gooder George Hartman (a bow-tie wearing heart surgeon), though tied to a one-note simpleton of a character, uses his grounded and deadpan seriousness to good comic and likable effect, while further entertaining with moments of Buster Keaton-esque physical comedy, a new turn for the Academy Award Nominee. Vera Farmiga plays Edith Martin, a free spirit who coaxes the buttoned up George out of his shell while solidly serving as the film's instigator. The two then take in the day "at Middleton," getting into lighthearted mischief like sneaking into buildings and running from campus police.
It would be unfair to nitpick at a movie like this, whose aspirations are to entertain with broad strokes and general funny circumstances for easy watching audiences, and it should be commended for its achievement as a fine, feel good adult comedy made on a shoe-string budget.
At Middleton is the kind of movie reserved for middle-aged adults in need of a few easy laughs (clueless tour leader Justin "Dingleberry" (Nicholas Braun)'s name serves as a consistent Seinfeld-ian "Newman" joke) and telegraphed romantic prospects. In the opening scene, we see that George's son Conrad (Spencer Lofranco) is on the fence about the esteemed school while Edith's ever more precocious daughter Audrey (Taissa Farmiga, Vera's real-life younger sister), is blisteringly excited about her soon attending. While a story like this could focus on these kids and their new-to-life point of views, they are quite literally, ditched, as the movie trades in the children's follies to center on the story of their parents: two "perfectly happy," yet unhappily married people, who use the day to act on their impulses of risk taking and, deeper yet, finding a sense of completion, true love, with the other.
It would be unfair to nitpick at a movie like this, whose aspirations are to entertain with broad strokes and general funny circumstances for easy watching audiences, and it should be commended for its achievement as a fine, feel good adult comedy made on a shoe-string budget. But there are still problems in its story, which hold it back from achieving anything more. Why do the adults abandon the children, if not to learn anything poignant and significant that they can, at the end of the day, come back to teach to their kids, who they left on the family outing? In fact, there is no real happy ending here. When the tired likes of George and Edith, getting back into their cars at the end of a full day's worth of kindling a newfound love with one another, through various wacky shenanigans (including, unnecessarily, the enjoyment of a bong with undergrads near the end of the film, and perhaps even past the film's proper climax), they must acknowledge their own sense of dissatisfactions as they return to their unfulfilled lives. Somehow, audiences might not resonate with their disappointment that the day is finally over.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0oBkGzydFIw
Of Course Meryl Streep is a Volatile Wonder in 'August: Osage County'
The holiday season is typically a time for families to come together, to enjoy each other's company and time spent together.
A time when the mere act of being in the presence of each other signifies the love shared by all. One does not usually hear an outspoken daughter command her acerbic mother at mealtime to "Eat the fish, F**ker!" This is the case, and family, in August: Osage County.
From the Weinstein Company and director John Wells (Company Men) comes the story of one divided nuclear family, the Westons, reuniting after one devastating event, bringing them all back to their old childhood Midwestern home along with all of the bad blood stirred while living under the roof of the harsh matriarch of the family. As adapted from the stage, from Tracy Letts' Pulitzer Prize and five-time Tony Award-winning play (2008), the film runs rampant as a rich, dense, family drama, comprised of equally rich and dense dialogue of scenes shared between veteran, experienced actors.
As the pill addicted, volatile mother Violet Weston, Meryl Streep makes (yet another) incredible turn with one of her most evocative performances yet, an accolade and claim any movie reviewer would not make lightly. Streep as Violet drives the movie, like a high-performance car, shifting gears with the most subtle and refined moves and touches to the most manic and crazed, all maneuvered with the skill, intuition, and control of a seasoned professional who knows her track. Violet, in one minute ethereal and dazed from her cocktail of pills, turns on a dime to become a scathing and acid-tongued mother of three and sighing husband Beverly (Sam Shepard).
As a feature length film, the story is all in the chemistry of the acting.
With Violet as the hurricane of the family's epicenter, it's no stretch to see the rest of the characters so incredibly "screwed up" with such driving and believable conviction. Commanding the Weston troops is the eldest daughter, hard-nosed and dominating Barbara (Julia Roberts), whose frustrations with dealing with her mother extend to that of dealing with her failing marriage to husband Bill (Ewan McGregor). As a dense, dialogue-driven family drama of a film, whose DNA comes from the savvy stage play, it hangs its hat on its veteran actors and performances. From Streep and Roberts, their impassioned acting packages the whole film and sets the series of events on a rightful due course. Roberts returns to the screen at the top of her game. Accompanying the mother-daughter combo is a star-studded cast of impressive talent. Chris Cooper, Abigail Breslin, Juliette Lewis, Benedict Cumberbatch, and Dermot Mulroney fill out the cast, delivering dutiful performances that add good measure.
As a feature-length film, the story is all in the chemistry of the acting. There is a recognizable effort on director Wells Part to gently nurture and bring the rich stage play to life with an exciting film sense, a hearty challenge to be done. For all of its might, however, if you don't find yourself lauding over the actor-driven framework, there might not be much else for you to sink your teeth into.
AUGUST: OSAGE COUNTY (2014)
Starring Meryl Streep, Dermot Mulroney, Julia Roberts
Directed by John Wells
Written by Tracy Letts
Distributed by The Weinstein Company. 121 minutes.
Review: 'Her'
In this day and age, it wouldn't be a stretch to say that people love technology. That people are in love with technology. But why? Why does any person obsess over it, waiting for days outside of any Apple store to get their hands on the latest and greatest technological gadgetry? With his latest technology-obsessed love story Her, director Spike Jonze presents the story of a man (and culture) in love with technology for one simple reason: to connect.
For what you might already know, or not know, of the indie filmmaker Jonze, his palette of past movies has always leaned towards common thematic workings of totally absurd happenings occurring in very real worlds. Whether it's the finding of a portal leading into the head of actor John Malkovich (1999's Being John Malkovich) or discovering the novel-come-to life (2002's Adaptation), Jonze's style and storytelling has always been set in creating wonderfully warm and weird movies that, through all of the odd ball absurdities, speak to the human condition at the heart of it all.
The same commonality, thematically, is seen here. But where Malkovich and Adaptation were birthed from the wacky-meta head of the great screenwriter Charlie Kaufman, Jonze offers up his first feature as both writer and director. Where the previous film's operated in Kaufman's highbrow and lofty headspace, Jonze's more meek and gentle nature makes Her his most accessible, and emotionally yearning and vulnerable, films to date.
Her may end to stand as one of the most well received of Jonze's work, as well as any to be released this year, or any in recent times. The overall "problem," a civilization of cell-phone and computer-devoted individuals existing merely alongside rather than with each other is as cautionary a tale as it is an astute observation about where the Millennial generation is seen to be headed. Where Jonze shines in this depiction is of how he chooses to show this world. Where it might be easy enough to tell a production designer to create sets that are "dark" and "cold" so that the "flickering chance" of real "love" can more easily be contrasted against and seen, the world that has been created is one of pure lushness and impress. The cliché architectural coldness has been exchanged for a warm, impeccably designed world, where smooth corners and tailored pastel garb populates a high-rise infested city that still feels homey. With flourishes in its camerawork, the overall look and design in which its characters participate in is one of applaudable beauty.
The ambition that Jonze sets out to conquer, in writing, directing, and acting, is fully exacted in this philosophically-stirring yet, sure to be commercial/critical hit.
Though, unfortunately, not all of the characters get to see this mesmerizingly attractive world. Not in the literal sense, anyway. For one character, "Samantha" (Scarlett Johansson), the love interest in the film, is merely an Operating System. This poses a self-made problem for one lonesome soul, a simple man who stumbles into falling in love with the code of 1's and 0's. The man in question is Theodore Twombly (Joaquin Phoenix). Recently divorced from real life Catherine (Rooney Mara), Theodore spends his days as a hand written letter dictator (at the imaginary Beautiful Handwritten Letters), creating falsely authentic sentiments for real people. When Theodore learns of new OS's (as the operating systems are so casually referred to) that help organize your life, he decides to create one, selecting a "female" voice as a starting place. The ending place, however, results with him developing a real connection with Samantha, going so far as to fall in love with the also devoted and serving OS.
The magic in the film ultimately hangs on the believability and truthfulness felt for the characters and above premise. For all of the entertaining bells and whistles the "Spike Jonze love story" has, the real reason why this movie is simply a winner comes down to how well Theodore and the pocket-sized camera Samantha's relationship is captured onscreen. Phoenix, however off-putting his off-screen persona you find to be, still proves to be one of this generation's greatest actors. The simple (read: amazing) task of acting in a love story where nearly 90% (89.8%, for all you statisticians) of the film's effectiveness relies on the performances of constantly-rolling close-ups in the most emotionally compelling and driving scenes in the film, is one of the most fascinating acting endeavors seen this year. Phoenix steps into more popular leading man shoes, leaving behind both his drugged out turn "as himself" in 2010's negatively received I'm Still Here as well as the mentally-manic drinker Freddy Quell in last year's The Master, as a more relatable looking for love character, and to great effect.
In a further showing of acting hoop-leaping, the "performance" of Samantha herself by Johansson is already leaving audiences in a tizzy. As a replacement for the on-set voice of Samantha (Samantha Morton), who read/acted off-screen to Phoenix in the movie, Johansson stepped in to record over her voice in post-production, as a change in direction was decided by Jonze when editing the film. With a role, and film, that hangs so much on just the voice of the actress, arguably needing to act in even greater specificity to properly convey the sentiments in a solely auditory way, Johansson steps up to the plate big. When she vocally exhales at one point in one of her and Theodore's conversations, he asks why she did it. She responds that she thought it was just a cultural communicative quirk and way in which to respond to people, an insightful perception on Jonze's part. With her very feminine, very sexy, very warm rasp of a voice, Johansson creates a Samantha that we want to know, and listen to, and when her own character begins to evolve and transform in new and unexpected ways, we want to keep being there, keep loving, keep connecting with her, even when we ultimately can't.
The ambition that Jonze sets out to conquer, in writing, directing, and acting is fully exacted in this philosophically-stirring yet, sure to be commercial/critical hit. After the screening, it had me jumping right into the conversation of our culture's obsession with technology, what "love" even is, and who "people" even are. Her is a modern day masterpiece, romantic, comedic, and dramatic all at once, and all told at the most perfectly receptive and telling of times. At the very least, watching this film with a friend will make for a shared, communal experience, that at the very end, you might both share an exhale, and signify the uniqueness and specialness of how we still connect.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ne6p6MfLBxc
Review: 'Inside Llewyn Davis'
“If it was never new, and it never gets old, then it’s a folk song," says Llewyn Davis, after opening the movie with a smoky rendition of "Hang Me, Oh Hang Me."
By god, this film is an unapologetic folk song.
Brothers Joel and Ethan Coen may have just offered their most telling of films from their self-made canon with this 60's-set folk ballad, Inside Llewyn Davis. Like the all-too-important line as muttered above, the film's story isn't a new one. Heck, even the title is lifted from the 1963 folk record, Inside Dave Van Ronk, from an American folk singer who (more or less) inspired the film, and whose songs and a half benchmark the film, including the opening number's. The story doesn't offer any cleverness in its plot, which makes it one of the most clever films of the year. It doesn't set out to tell you some new "original" take of a wandering troubadour, even though it's one of the most original films of the year. Simply, you're going to get a film of self-packaged simplicity, and may even walk out of the theater thinking, "That's it?"
Yes. That's it.
The Brothers' latest writing/directing effort whittles out all the excess, whittles out all the frill, all the weight of story itself, making this film as simple and bare-bones as any of their film's have dared to be. It's enough of a self-aware statement to think that the Coen's, masters of storytelling, asked themselves here, what is 'story'? Is it something far-reaching, universally-spanning?, or is it about a vagabond who finds a cat?
Without tripping into postmodern territory, the absences of things here are what give the film its ultimate meaning. The film is comprised wholly of vignetted scenes, in which our hero Llewyn Davis (Oscar Isaac) yields his guitar all around the Greenwich Village, climbing in and out of apartment windows for a couch to sleep on while trying to scrape together royalties from his previous musical-duo act's record. After his partner jumps off the George Washington bridge, Davis is left as a one man band, a one-man world.
There is a sly irony here, so presently felt under the surface of it all. It's the story of a non-story.
Llewyn Davis himself is a man guarded, defensive, and just self-serving. It's not that he has ill-intentioned affections for anyone; it's just that his sense of self-lost makes it that much easier for those around him to be splattered with the mess he leaves wherever he goes. He's seen as selfish, but only through the guise of other characters' classifications. When the hate-harboring Jean (Carey Mulligan) blasts Davis for impregnating her and for his general lack of worldly care, its seen as just another instance of a comedically karmic world coming down hard on him. Isaac as Davis is warm, and plays the humor of each situation with his good senses, making his Davis a wholly watchable and sympathetic one.
Watching this film is both a visual and audible treat in the most cinematic of senses. The lensing, washed out colors, placing of the camera, and editing, are all masterful achievements, for a 'Cohen Brothers' film or any. Each element is married together in such a way that the singularly specific writing and directional cues are felt in every frame of the movie. There is a real language here, and it holds your hand to lead you through the picture in such a rewarding way. And of course, with another lovingly devised score with the aid of music man T. Bone Burnett (who put bluegrass music on the pop music market with 2000's O Brother, Where Art Thou? hit, "Man of Constant Sorrow"), its enough to sit back and see Llewyn Davis play a full length song with minimal coverage at any point in the movie.
Again, the absence of its story is what ultimately sets this one aside from any of the Cohens' others. Some will not care for this style, though I'd argue that this instance was flirted with in 2009's A Serious Man. Where we saw more colorful strides in that film's story of a man beholden to the universe's ultimate plans, we see that same theme even further matured, further experimented, and further rewarded here. Davis certainly stands out as a much welcomed return after 2009's so-so standard True Grit. Though it won't wet the appetite for 2007's sprawling Best Picture Winner fans No Country for Old Men, or even the aforementioned O Brother, Where Art Thou? In O Brother, the literary master work The Odyssey is the story's plot; In Davis, the literary master work Ulysses is the name of a cat.
Now about that cat.
The orange furball is such a lovable part of the film. It's certainly a must-include in all of the reviews that can accurately critique the movie. The cat that comes into his life sets the story in motion. It comes, and it goes, for Llewyn can't take care of any living thing, let alone himself. The cat plays as influential a role as does pop-loof Jim (Justin Timberlake) or mysterious curmudgeon Roland Turner (John Goodman). The feline's illusiveness, its penchant for slipping in and out of open windows, follows the journey, and for that matter, significance, of our own protagonist's.
There is a sly irony here, so presently felt under the surface of it all. It's the story of a non-story. A double sided coin that can be flipped deeming 'importance' or 'non-importance,' of 'never-new' and 'never old,' spun from any current or answer that blows in the wind. It's a coin that should be held onto and cherished for such emotional and thematic pondering and remembrance. Or, simply, spent to catch the next bus to nowhere.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXMuR-Nsylg
Review: 'Homefront'
Though I will now tread on the following cliché, there's certainly trouble here on the homefront. Both, in the plot of the new "Jason Statham movie," Homefront, as well as in the so-so mechanics of that movie itself. It's not that there's any offensively bad filmmaking going on here- the pegs of the family rivalry storyline all fit nicely in their holes, which makes for easy entertainment (if you call guns a-blazing warfare and smashing heads into cars easy entertainment.)
However, what the movie lacks in creativity are enough interesting pieces at work here. Screenwriter Sylvester Stallone, ever the subtle writer, pens an earnest enough father and daughter story at the heart of this Southern shoot-em-up. Though given points for crafting a story centered with real heart and believable character motivation, these moments of Phil and Maddy Broker (newcomer Izabela Vidovic) are as flagrant and obvious as Statham's fight scenes, which successfully utilize the star and excite the audience, making watching this action flick one of the more likable.
It's a muscle-y, gritty, action thriller, with a protective father and loving daughter story at the center.
Adding to the interesting things in this movie is the inclusion of both James Franco and Winona Ryder, playing their most impressionable southern white trash selves. Franco, as Morgan "Gator" Bodine (as hilariously conceived a villain name I've heard), plays the local badass who finds himself needing to scare off the newly-in-town badass Broker, and Ryder as Sheryl Marie Mott, his devoted girlfriend. What's interesting about Franco's antagonist here is that he might be the most reluctant bad guy ever, as we see that his appetite for destruction only comes out when his junkie sister Cassie Bodine Klum (played by a convincing and well-acted Kate Bosworth) asks him for favors, either selling her drugs or "scaring" off the Broker family after a run-in Maddy and Cassie's son had at school. Instead of hot and fiery, Gator comes off as a simple guy who's just plain inconvenienced to be a bad guy instead of thriving it it, which no doubt stems from Franco's signature apathetic showmanship. An interesting casting choice, the inclusion of Franco is just confusing and actually highlights the incredulity of the movie.
Statham plays well here (even if he doesn't play well with others). As Phil Broker, a former undercover field cop newly moved into a small town for his protection from a biker gang, you don't have to imagine how well trained in combat this normal civilian and father is. There is enough action and bad guys that come his way, with Gator's gang and the former bike gang, who both have an investment in the meth trafficking game that Broker disrupts. I would argue that the entire drug dealing storyline is unnecessary as if Stallone decided to front-load the story with even more cliché dealings, which, if left out of the movie, would have really strengthened the element of the rivalry.
Set on a big enough and visually interesting stage, with brutal action scenes and A-list Hollywood stars, Homefront works. It's a muscle-y, gritty, action thriller, with a protective father and loving daughter story at the center. But it's also a movie so obvious and heavy handed that the characters that get socked by Statham are sometimes not the only ones left groaning.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tjSOj8b804U
'White House Down' Blu-Ray DVD
Cinemacy is the site that keeps on giving! Rounding out our "Thanksgiv-away" series, we have one Blu-Ray DVD of White House Down (Channing Tatum, Jamie Foxx) to give away to one lucky fan. Here's how to enter:
1) Follow CINEMACY on twitter at @cinemacyspeaks, and
2) Answer the following question: If you lived in the White House, what one room would you make sure was in it? i.e. There is already a bowling alley in the basement!
3) Tag your answer with both @cinemacyspeaks and #cinemacy
All tweets must be sent by 6:59 p.m. on Friday, November 29th, 2013. One lucky person will be selected! And, go!
https://twitter.com/cinemacyspeaks/status/405176559029346304
OFFICIAL RULES
NO PURCHASE NECESSARY TO ENTER OR WIN: WHITE HOUSE DOWN_BLU-RAY giveaway. Contest is open to legal residents of the 50 U.S. states and Canada, age 18 or older at time of entry. Void outside the US and Canada where prohibited by law. Sweepstakes begins at 12:00 p.m. Pacific Standard Time (“PST”) on 11/26/2013 and ends at 6:59 p.m. (“PST”) on 11/29/2013. All entries must be made via Twitter. Winners must respond with their mailing address within 72 hours of being notified or an alternate winner will be selected. All federal, state and local regulations apply.