The Descendants / Director: Alexander Payne

Lauded as Clooney’s greatest outing, this flick definitely runs him through a lot. Death, post-mortem adultery, dumb kids, dumber adults—the guy handles everything with a gentle, ever-professional ease as only Clooney can. But, while I’d applaud his performance, I’m not sure I’d herald DESCENDANTS as his performance-of-a-lifetime, simply because it doesn’t set him too far away from his comfort zone…a comfort zone that he always seems much too comfortable in. Go Albert Brooks on this guy, give him a heavy villain role, something we can sink our teeth into. Again, I don’t want to detract from his performance, but it’s much more interesting to see him doing something different, ala OH BROTHER WHERE ART THOU for instance.

Anyway, when watching DESCENDANTS, I couldn’t help but keep comparing to SIDEWAYS, Payne’s former, and, well, better film. Now, SIDEWAYS came to me at the perfect time, and holds a special place in my film reserves, so, I may be a bit biased here, but come on— the mere absence of voice-over narration in SIDEWAYS merits its superiority. I’m not sure why Payne took to a more conventional structure here for his new film. The opening narration is blatant forced exposition, and doesn’t fit the format of the film. Why is Clooney’s character talking to us? Why does he just stop a third of the way in? Why doesn’t he wrap it up in the end? All the information we were given in this narration could have easily be shown to us in a much more creative way, as Payne has masterfully demonstrated in the goofy antics of Giamatti and Haden Church in SIDEWAYS. Payne’s choices along the way as the narration dies off are all pretty great, and show that he knows what he’s doing behind the lens, but, man, did that narration anger me. And it’s not that I don’t want to hear George Clooney talk, because I could easily listen to that for hours.

Performances from the kids were solid, and Cloon can really hold a film together, but I’d say DESCENDANTS is getting a bit more praise than it deserves. All in all a good movie though.

Filminick: ★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆

It was breathtaking here in Rome this weekend. I cut a video together as fast as I could!

Tim and Eric’s Billion Dollar Movie / Directors: Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim 

The title is as ridiculous as the reality of this film: somehow, amid the contemporary cataclysm of goofy “dramedy” comedy, two underground Adult Swim absurdists were commissioned to make a real film, and given what seems to be complete, pseudo-psychotic-idiotic control. Financed by Will Ferrel’s Funny or Die Productions, I sense that this movie signals either the birth of a new comedy world order, or the first true sign of the December 2012 apocalypse.

Littered with masochistic erotism, poop jokes, penile-piercings, and old men, this film dares to defy conventional comedy standards and disrespect all that the medium has deemed funny. Hollywood is supremely twisted and shit on here, as Heidecker and Wareheim gather a crop of untrained, ill-tempered freaks for their cast, leave honorable actors with disgusting, despicable jobs, and refuse to waver at all from their hard-earned nightmare format.

Yes, it’s a feature length job, but everything about B$M stems from an episodic, mini-sketch aesthetic: there are deliberate breaks from the movie that harken back to their show’s canon; plot points that at once appear significant, then somehow become blurred and forgotten; and a slew of seemingly improvised “scenes,” as if the two writers simply jot down where they thought the movie should go, and made up the dialogue and conflicts on the run.

But that’s not to say this movie feels weak or lazy-minded. There’s something about Tim and Eric that has always appealed to a higher-sense of comedy in my mind, like under all the awkward glances and discomforting drivel, they’re mad geniuses, after a new world of joke-making that we have yet to fully realize. This film pushes forth yet another era of the evolution for the genre, as I bet we’ll move away from the Apatownian immature/sexual/heartbreaking days of Rom-Com, and into a more absurdist Andy Samberg/Adult Swim/Galifianakisian epoch.

Yes, most of the characters are pretty much unconvincing nonsense devices (but we do get a surprisingly stunning performance by some no-name Matt O’Toole, the janitor), the movie is incredibly brash and revolting, and the ending is probably disappointing— but what can I say, I’m a sucker for these guys, and you have to respect where they’ve come from and what they’re doing. 

Take their big fight scene for example: Eric, rising from a haunting poop-torture sequence, confronts Tim, all but naked with a strange vaginal thong apparatus on his crotch (perhaps an inward dildo?). They clash, and we’re taken on a violent chubby-man tour of the mall, calling on goofy 80s action tropes for choreography. But, somehow, in this completely ridiculous excuse for a final brawl, the two end up in a sort of angry naked ballet dance, as Eric spins Tim like a princess, slapping his flab as he spins around. Why? This degeneration of what should be a critical moment for the two characters is a clear middle finger to the dumb physical buffoonery that we keep seeing in movies like STEP BROTHERS or SUPERBAD. They just don’t give a shit about anything, and that’s what I love about them.

People have compared B$M to a modern day AIRPLANE or NAKED GUN, and the connection is definitely solid, for I’m certain that once this flick hits theaters, the critics will either denounce it as complete rubbish, or post it up as a bonafide comedy classic. 

I’ll be quoting it for years.

Shriminick: ★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

GO DOWNLOAD THE FILM ON ITUNES!

The New World / Director: Terrence Malick

Yes, it’s a classic. 2005 was a mere seven years ago, but this is the sort of film that transcends time, era, circumstance— Malick’s films are straight-to-cinema-heaven releases. The director makes me wonder about past masters and their films’ critical receptions. Was Fellini’s 8 1/2 instantly recognized as a masterpiece? Or how about the now-renowned CITIZEN KANE, and Orson Welles?

Regardless, THE NEW WORLD is a certified revelation. What makes me qualified to critique such an awe-inspiring movie? The cinematography, as always, is splendid, contrasting the joyous winds of nature with the bitter cold of Anglo-American colonialism. Colin Farrel is subtle yet riveting, and Q’orianka Kilcher, a now seemingly work-less actress, is utterly divine, rivaling any gaudy Hollywood Diva in beauty, and transcending them effortlessly in grace.

But is this all Malick’s doing? Is he behind their performances, bringing along some sort of Directorial Voodoo that none of us know about? I’m not sure if we could even pin-point a bad performance in a Malick movie, because with such narrative uncertainty comes a certain absence of solidity, of critical substance. Regardless, the cinematic experience is deeply moving, and if that doesn’t mean a good movie, than I don’t know what does.

Compared to his all-encompassing recent work, THE TREE OF LIFE, THE NEW WORLD seems like a strictly narrative-driven film. While the recent swirls around vague topics of Creationism and death (Malick favorites), WORLD focuses more on a very conventional, over-used storyline, hardly straying to deal with larger subjects directly. That’s not to say this film doesn’t address grand philosophical vibes, but such a clean-cut storyline seems almost foreign to the filmmaker’s oeuvre.

And yet, we as the audience just don’t complain. It’s not an issue for us, because he handles it so gracefully, so carefully, honoring the legend, not seeking to out-do other users of the story (POCAHONTAS, DANCES WITH WOLVES, etc). So, yes, I’m drawing a line between THE NEW WORLD and AVATAR. We don’t need naked 3D aliens and grandiose space battles to understand such a simple, beauteous tale. 

With his recent burst of creativity (look at all the Malick movies coming out) the mysterious director may just rise to the almighty throne of American cinematic canon— heck, I worship him already.

Filminick: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

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Crazy, Stupid, Love. / Director: Dan Fogelman

This movie has balls. Casting the stellar Ryan Gosling against funny-man Steve Carrell was quite a risk, Josh Groban plays a bit part, we’ve got a 17 year old in love with a 40 year old, and there’s nudie pictures involved. Fogelman attempted to show us the very non-Hollywood side of romance— the shitty, unpredictable but often depressing end of it, full of divorce, heart break, and man-slapping. But it all seems to work. And, billed as a pseudo-chick-flick, CRAZY STUPID LOVE supremely passes expectations. It all works out as a modern day Shakespearean farce, tempting us with a tragic aesthetic, which is so respectable and classy in light of the jumpy-jolly popcorn love stories like NEW YEARS EVE, or anything by Nicholas Sparks. 

That review is for the first 100 minutes of the movie. It all comes to a boiling point, putting the cast of characters into one goofy man-pile, and ends on a sad note. That ending was perfect. It encapsulated the thesis of the film: that love is crazy, and, well, stupid. But then the film continues! It goes on for 18 more cringing, agonizing minutes, with a storybook finale, as Carrell’s protagonist uncharacteristically stands in front of an entire audience of people and vomits out a shitty DEAR JOHN speech about first love and soul mates and whatever. Horrendous. I had to hide my eyes. 

This film deserves respect. It’s actually very entertaining, and harkens back to an earlier style of comedy writing (perhaps the earliest). I imagine some producer took a big shit on the screenplay’s real ending, demanding that we have a superficial happiness to take away from the theatre. And, also, the conclusion seems to promote child pornography…

Filminick: ★ ★ ☆ ☆ ☆

Rise of the Planet of the Apes / Director Rupert Wyatt

Coming from a guy who’s never seen more than a few seconds of the PLANET OF THE APES quadrilogy/quintilogy/reboot-city, I found RISE to be a formidable prequel to an old Hollywood standby. I recognized a few call-backs to the franchise, which I’m sure the fanboys really appreciated. But director Wyatt makes it clear from the opening jungle-capture scene that this is a strictly modern entry into the beloved franchise. It’s mean, raw, and psychoanalytic. We’re not sure who to root for, and the concept of keeping such intellectual creatures as zoo-attractions becomes something of a study on Darwinism, and our role in nature as a whole. We have an abundant use of technology, both in the narrative and the filmmaking process, and I can confidently say that to this day, I’ve never witnessed such an elegant, refined use of motion capture technology. The idea of literally injecting a human’s persona into an ape’s form captures the heart of the film, and creates for a mystifying on-screen creature. Andy Serkis is a revelation as Caesar, and if the Academy honors him as a Supporting Actor, Wyatt will have ushered in a brand new era of filmmaking—an era that welcomes the marriage of computers and actors, an era that, I daresay, may foreshadow the end of live-action acting as we know it.

The humans are pretty-okay. James Franco’s fine, Frieda Pinto’s a cute one. We get that Draco Malfoy (Tom Felton) is an asshole (but why is he so arbitrarily mean to the apes?), and even the villain seems to have a plausible motivation. The only thing is, I just can’t believe Lithgow has Alzheimers. I got the same feeling when I saw the dad from STEP BROTHERS (Richard Jenkins) as the disabled father in the abhorrent DEAR JOHN (it was an in-flight movie, alright?). There’s something about seeing old men portraying mentally-challenged fathers that’s extremely hit or miss with me. Lithgow is a wisecracking smart-alec, this role was just too far from his wheelhouse.

I hope this doesn’t become a mega-million-3D-AVATAR-hulabaloo prequel franchise and completely lose all it’s dignity, but with success and the propulsion from a long-standing fanbase, I’m sure producers are eager to get their sweaty hands all over Andy Serkis and his ape-brethren again.

Filminick: ★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆

I think the Reservoir Dogs one is my favorite example on this list…

brightwalldarkroom:

by Andrew Root

Film scores and soundtracks can be cynically derided as telling the audience what to feel; a cheap shortcut to poignancy or a false sense of excitement. It’s kind of an unjust argument. The music is meant to enhance and support the emotion of a scene. Simply put, that’s its job….

Taxi Driver / Director: Martin Scorcese

A film that seems as relevant today as it was in the 70s, post-Vietnam. TAXI DRIVER, though centered around the asshole of America’s greatest city, is astounding beautiful. At times I paused the screen, just to take a look at the brilliant use of color and light textures. Scorcese takes the big apple and douses it with an ectoplasm of blurred oils, painting every shot out like a water-color. The framing, the use of depth, everything seems meticulously worked here, an artistic feat worthy of its own exhibit at a museum or something. Scorcese surmounts Woody Allen’s MANHATTAN too (which seems to be cited as the prettiest New York movie), simply out-beautifying him, with his use of colors, as the Woody’s film is just dark and shadowed chromatone.

And what can be said of De Niro? Young, gentle, exuding shades of Brando, but with a modern flair. His work in TAXI DRIVER, too me, beats the insanity of what he did with RAGING BULL. Sure, his dedication to RAGING BULL was something noteworthy, but the pure heroism of Travis Bickle is so elegantly portrayed, everything about the character seems true and honest, yet he’s still able to address that twisted dementia that invades Jake La Motta in BULL as well. It angers me that De Niro is wasting his time with Ben Stiller and Jason Statham these days, as he is clearly one of the greatest living actors of our time, literally getting paid to just do his “De Niro face” and be scary for kicks.

Though Scorcese’s film abides by the film noir aesthetics, seeping itself deep into the underbelly of human ineptitude, spitting us out into a seemingly ill fate, the movie denies itself in the end, and churns a sort of happy ending. This blindsided me, as I was expecting to watch Bickle die, and the credits roll along that beautiful crane shot drawing away from the crime scene. What has Scorcese done here? Has he shown that there is hope for New York City? Travis, the unwavering moral vigilante, is honored, and even gets the girl, in the end (sort of). This turns the film on its head, for the entire narrative leads toward a character becoming ruined by the temptations of social injustice that surround him. Yet, what are we expected to believe, as the final shot of Travis is sped up and distorted, much in the same manner as the brutal shooting scene from the finale?

A batch of young stars dishing out some of their greatest performances. Scorcese oughta get De Niro back on the job and give us another New York story. With all this Occupy unrest, it’d do the city some good.

Filminick: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★