Tag Archive for 'capital times'

2008 comes to an end

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dano
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Compelled once again by Christmas deadlines to sum up the year in cinema, I have been thinking a lot about how some movies stay with you and some don’t, how some movies have got average reviews from me this year but have grown in my affections, and how there are some films you want to see again and some you’re not so bothered about - even when you admire them.

So I’m going to divide my year up in to the following categories: Keepers are films I want to own and live with. Films I can expect to watch once a year - or force upon guests when I discover they haven’t already been seen. Repeats are films I wouldn’t mind seeing again - renting or borrowing or stumbling across on tv. Enjoyed are films I enjoyed (obviously) and respected but am in no hurry to watch again.

No Country for Old Men posterThe “keepers” won’t come as any great surprise: The Coen’s No Country for Old Men and PT Anderson’s There Will Be Blood were both stone-cold American masterpieces. NCFOM just about shades it as film of the year but only because I haven’t yet watched TWBB a second time. Vincent Ward’s Rain of the Children was the best New Zealand film for a very long time, an emotional epic. Apollo doco In the Shadow of the Moon moved and inspired me and I want to give it a chance to continue to do so by keeping it in my house. Finally, two supremely satisfying music films: I could listen to Todd Haynes’ Dylan biopic I’m Not There. again and again, and watching it was was much funnier than I expected. Not minding the music of U2, I didn’t have a big hump to get over watching their 3D concert movie, but what a blast it was! Immersive and involving, it was the first truly great digital 3D experience. For the time being you can’t recreate the 3D experience at home so I hold out for a giant cinema screen of my own to watch it on.

Next layer down are the films I wouldn’t mind watching again, either because I suspect there are hidden pleasures to be revealed or because a second viewing will confirm or deny suspected greatness. Gritty Romanian masterpiece 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days has stayed with me since I saw it in March. Be Kind Rewind was rich enough (and good-hearted enough) to deserve another look. Martin McDonagh’s bizarre hitman fantasy In Bruges rocked along at such a decent clip I need to see it again to make sure I didn’t miss any of it’s eccentric pleasures. I liked and respected the Coen’s other 2008 entry Burn After Reading more than every other critic so a second viewing would be useful, if only to confirm that I appreciated it better than everyone else did… Or not.

Tropic Thunder posterIf I could just clip the Robert Downey Jr. bits from Tropic Thunder it would be a keeper, instead I look forward to seeing it again over Christmas. The same goes for the entire first act of WALL•E which I could watch over and over again. Sadly the film lost some of that magic when it got in to space (though it remains a stunning achievement all the same).

Into the “Enjoy” category: Of the documentaries released to cinemas this year, three stood out. The affectionate portrait of Auckland theatre-maker Warwick Broadhead, Rubbings From a Live Man, was moving and its strangeness was perfectly appropriate. Up the Yangtze showed us a China we couldn’t see via the Olympics juggernaut and Young at Heart is still playing and shouldn’t be missed.

The Edge of Heaven posterI made plenty of successful visits to the arthouse this year. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly was awesome; The Edge of Heaven quietly enthralling; Irina Palm was surprising. My review says I liked After the Wedding but I hardly remember a thing about it. Also getting the arthouse tick from me: The Counterfeiters, The Band’s Visit, the delightful hymn to tolerance Grow Your Own and the glossy romance The Painted Veil.

Worthy indies that gave me faith in the future of US cinema included Ben Affleck’s Boston-thriller Gone Baby Gone; Ryan Gosling in love with a sex toy (Lars and the Real Girl); twee little Juno; nasty (in a good way) Choke; heartwarming The Visitor and Frozen River (which was the best of the lot).

Space Chimps posterMainstream Hollywood wasn’t a complete waste of space this year (although the ghastly cynical rom-coms 27 Dresses and Made of Honour would have you believe otherwise). Ghost Town was the best romantic comedy of the year; The Dark Knight and Iron Man were entertaining enough; I got carried away by Mamma Mia and the showstopping performance by Meryl Streep; Taken was energetic Euro-pulp; Horton Hears a Who! and Madagascar 2 held up the kid-friendly end of the deal (plus a shout-out for the under-appreciated Space Chimps) and, of course, Babylon A.D. (just kidding, but I did enjoy it’s campy insanity).

Printed in Wellington’s Capital Times on Wednesday 31 December, 2008.

Note that I deliberately avoid choosing Festival-only films as directing people towards films they can’t easily see is just cruel.

Review: The Day the Earth Stood Still

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2 weeks, 2 days ago
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Finally, we have a week with only one new film in it: a chance for me to stretch my legs, extemporise, riff a little, get my hands dirty. Yeah, I’ve been looking forward to this, to prove I can be a real film critic and write erudite and cultured prose; place a film in its wider social, political and cultural context; discuss mise-en-scène and diegetic register, all the while providing a riveting (and undeniably “correct”) perspective on the film’s merits and qualities. Cool.

The Day the Earth Stood Still posterUnfortunately, the film that stands alone this week is the Keanu Reeves remake of the 1951 classic The Day the Earth Stood Still and frankly its hardly worth the bother. The original film was a pulp parable playing on the nuclear paranoia of “duck and cover” America: an alien lands in Central Park to tell us that he’s going to destroy the human race because we don’t deserve to live (we are warlike, brutal and selfish creatures you see, and the earth is too precious to be left in our care). But, the stern humanoid alien Klaatu softens on contact with a human child and realises that our capacity for change makes us worth persevering with. Naive but satisfying.

The new version keeps the guts of the story intact (ecological doom and homeland security make up the new paranoia) while overblowing everything else to giant size. Reeves deadpans his way through as Klaatu (sensibly staying well within the limits of his range) and he’s joined by the mid-market star power of Jennifer Connelly, “Mad Men”’s ‘Don Draper‘ himself (the unfortunately named Jon Hamm), Kathy Bates and a miscast John Cleese. Kid duty is done by Will Smith’s little boy Jaden who made such an impression in last year’s The Pursuit of Happyness.

I had high hopes for this, based on some evocative trailers, but the reality is a disappointment. The plotting is messy and inconclusive and the effects look murky and rushed. The whole thing looks like someone lost confidence half way through shooting, then decided to cut the budget in half and hope for the best.

Printed in Wellington’s Capital Times on Wednesday 17 December, 2008.

Review: Four Holidays, Quarantine and a couple more …

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3 weeks, 4 days ago
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Four Holidays posterDollar for dollar (if not lb for lb) Vince Vaughan is the biggest star in Hollywood. For every dollar invested in a Vaughan film he returns fourteen making him a better bet than Cruise, Pitt, Clooney or Roberts. It’s easy to see why he’s so popular - his easy-going everyman quality annoys fewer people than Carrey and choices like Dodgeball and Wedding Crashers are pretty safe. Even last year’s Fred Claus was a rare watchable Christmas film and this year he repeats the dose with Four Holidays (aka Four Christmases).

Vaughan, and co-star Reese Witherspoon, are DINKs (double-income-no-kids) who maintain their cool lifestyle by avoiding their respective families like the plague. When an unexpected airport closure reveals their plans to party in Fiji instead of feeding the third world, they are obliged to make four different visits on Christmas Day, forcing them to confront the weirdos, sadsacks and dingbats that make up their respective families.

I think I’m out of step with most other critics (not unusual and not a bad thing) but I enjoyed myself watching Four Holidays - Vaughan and Witherspoon actually make a believable couple and the supporting cast (including fine actors like Robert Duvall and Kristin Chenoweth along with country stars Dwight Yoakam and Tim McGraw) has plenty of energy.

Quarantine posterTen years ago, before he became the darling of the Hollywood Hedge Fund set, Vaughan’s career nearly stalled when he played Norman Bates in Gus Van Sant’s ill-advised frame-for-frame remake of Psycho. After the seeing the trailer for Quarantine, I was half expecting it to give a similar treatment to the Spanish shocker [REC] (which prompted messy evacuations earlier in the year) but happily it diverges enough to merit its own review.

A tv crew is following an LA fire department for the night when they are sent to an apartment building where mysterious screams are emanating from one of the flats. Soon after they arrive, the authorities shut the building down to prevent the rabies-like infection from spreading, leaving the residents, fire-fighters and the media to their own devices.

Stronger in character development but slightly weaker in shock value, Quarantine will be worth a look if you found you couldn’t read the subtitles in [REC] because you had your hands over your eyes.

High School Musical 3: Senior Year posterHigh School Musical 3: Senior Year is the first of the legendary Disney franchise to make it to the big screen but the formula hasn’t changed one bit. Well scrubbed High School kids in Albuquerque put on a show which might send one of them to Julliard. The music runs the full gamut of current pop music styles from Britney to the Backstreet Boys (without the spark of either) and the kids display a full range of emotions from A to B. HSM is betrayed by a lack of ambition married to relentless, obsessive, commitment to competence but, at almost two hours, I suspect it will be too long for most tween bladders to hold out.

Suddenly posterDepression is a challenging topic for film (the symptoms are un-cinematic and recovery often takes the form of baby steps which are difficult to dramatise) but Swedish drama Suddenly makes a decent fist of it. Nine months after the car he was driving crashed, taking the lives of his wife and youngest son, eye doctor Lasse (Michael Nyqvist) is falling apart. After what looks like a failed suicide attempt, his parents advise him to take his remaining son (sensitive 15 year old Jonas played by Anastasios Soulis) to his holiday house for the Summer to see if he can take one last chance to heal himself and the family.

Lasse throws himself into repairing the beaten up old rowboat while Jonas falls for the (entirely Swedish looking blonde) local black sheep Helena (Moa Gammel). Despite the apparent energy of the title, Suddenly takes its time getting anywhere but rewards perseverance.

Printed in Wellington’s Capital Times on Wednesday 10 December, 2008.

Notes on screening conditions: I’m stoked to report that Suddenly was the first film I’d seen in the Vogue Lounge at the Penthouse since my disappointing experience with Smart People back in August and, despite some print wear, the presentation was perfect. Well done Penthouse.

Review: The Visitor and American Teen

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The Visitor posterWhile the Bond 22 juggernaut threatens to crush everything in it’s path, a couple of plucky little indies try and offer a wholesome alternative (and stay out of harm’s way in the process). Thomas McCarthy’s The Visitor occupies similar thematic ground to his debut The Station Agent in 2004, but unfurls in altogether less whimsical fashion.

Richard Jenkins plays Walter Vale, a depressed economics professor, fumbling around for some remaining connection to his recently deceased wife (he’s learning to play her piano which is a strikingly futile pursuit for a man in his 50s). Against his wishes he is sent to New York to present a paper he hasn’t written to a conference he has no interest in and he reluctantly has to return to the old apartment he and his wife used to share. Only now it’s occupied by a young illegal immigrant couple who are as surprised to see him as he is to see them - they’ve been conned into thinking it was vacant.

With much apology they pack up and leave but when Vale realises they have nowhere else to go he calls them back to let them stay. And so begins a lovely relationship and a hugely rewarding film, a film that never settles for cliché when (with just a little bit of extra digging) it can find some truth. When laid back drummer Tarek (winningly played by Haaz Sleiman) is arrested and slapped in detention pending deportation, The Visitor effortlessly changes tone and Vale finds someone to care for (and about) once again. One of the films of the year.

American Teen posterAmerican Teen is nominally a documentary but could just as easily be filed in the horror section. An insincere little film about a cross-section of mid-Western American youth in the town of Warsaw, Indiana (a town which appears to have a value system as shallow as the gene pool that’s produced its next generation) American Teen initially provokes nothing so much as despair but eventually wrestles you into submission.

The five central characters are archetypes (the Geek, the Prom Queen, the Jock, the Heartthrob and the Rebel) that slowly emerge as real people despite enduring some tackily manipulative storytelling (not to mention some colossally bad parenting).

Of course, the pressures on these kids are all real - the pressure to be popular or successful, rather than simply be happy - but life wouldn’t have been nearly so complicated if they weren’t all wandering around with radio mics sharing every whispered secret with the world. Someone should have had a word with these kids about boundaries.

Printed in Wellington’s Capital Times on Wednesday 3 December, 2008.

Notes on screening conditions: American Teen was screened at the Paramount, in the big auditorium, and was pin sharp at the correct aspect ratio of 1.85:1. It looks like the Paramount’s problems with focus and brightness relate to ’scope only (and possibly only one of the two projectors).

Review: Quantum of Solace, The Savages and three more …

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1 month, 1 week ago
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Quantum of Solcae posterAfter destroying much of Venice in the climax to Casino Royale, Daniel Craig as 007 James Bond kicks off Quantum of Solace by having a damn good crack at beautiful renaissance Siena. Picking up almost immediately after he left off following the death of his beloved Vesper, Bond is charging around the world seeking answers and revenge (in no particular order).

Prior viewing of Casino Royale is pretty much mandatory in order to fully appreciate Eon EON & Craig’s textbook reinvention of the enigmatic, brutalised, middle-class orphan (with the public school scholarship education) who found a family in the Special Forces and a purpose in life ‘on her majesty’s secret service’. Thankfully Craig has discovered a little sense of humour in the interim but this isn’t a film with time for much reflection.

QoS improves on Casino Royale in a few areas - the production design is as good as any Bond since You Only Live Twice - but if it suffers at all it’s a seeming lack of anything significant at stake. I’m sure Connery or Moore might have turned their noses up at Bond risking life and limb to save the Bolivian water supply and, while played well enough by The Diving Bell and The Butterfly’s Mathieu Amalric, our villain is a little bland. I wonder whether Lloyd Morrison of Infratil ever dreamed that his profession of global infrastructure investor might one day see him ranked as a potential Bond villain.

The Savages posterRecent American indie films like Smart People and The Squid and The Whale have had an unfortunate tendency to indulge in some pretty snide anti-intellectualism at times and Tamara Jenkins’ second feature, The Savages, is sadly no exception. Philip Seymour Hoffman and Laura Linney play middle-aged siblings: he is a Theatre Arts Professor and she is a failed playwright. Of course, they’re self-involved and insensitive - both to each other and to their dying father (Philip Bosco) whose dementia requires constant care and attention.

They bicker over him, each other, their careers and their lost youth, eventually coming to a kind of reckoning that might look like happiness or contentment if you squint a little. Witty, poignant and played to the level you would expect from two of our top screen actors, The Savages would be a very fine film if only it hadn’t taken so many shortcuts.

Caramel posterFilms have been returning from the Festival in a flurry in recent weeks and the latest is Caramel, an easy-paced picture from Lebanon about several generations of Beirut women and their lives around a run-down beauty parlour. Stories about how hard it is to be a woman and how feckless and useless most men are never seem to get old and this is a decent enough example. Made with a genuine love for Beirut (and its many challenges) there are plenty of sly laughs on offer as it meanders its way through a sleepy hour and a half.

The Band's Visit posterMeanwhile, 300km away (and it pleases me to think simultaneously), an Egyptian Police Orchestra arrives in Israel to give a concert. Unfortunately, there is no one to meet them at the airport and an understandable pronunciation mixup sees them take the bus to the wrong dead-end town where they are stranded overnight in their bright blue Egyptian police uniforms. No one in sleepy Bet Atikva seems too pleased to see them and it looks like their leader, Tawfiq (Sasson Gabai) learnt his leadership skills from Captain Mainwaring from Dad’s Army.

The Band’s Visit is as dry as the Negev Desert they find themselves in, a character-driven masterpiece of understatement. Isn’t this what life is? A series of wrong turns rationalised after the fact, mostly for the best.

My Best Friend's Girl posterMy companion had very low expectations of My Best Friend’s Girl and, thus, was not too disappointed. I however, was expecting more and got less. So it goes. A misanthropic romantic comedy with enough foul language and sexual suggestion to earn an R rating, it’s a film that is strangely prudish about actually sexual situations.

Wooden stand-up comic Dane Cook plays The Tank, a professional bad date. His job is to go out with recently single women and be such poor company that these poor creatures will go running back to the boyfriends they just dumped.

What might have been a promising scenario is played out with such nastiness and venom that several moments are really uncomfortable to watch. My Best Friend’s Girl is lazy misogyny masquerading as a kind of racy free spirit and a quick glance at the credits reveals that of all the key creatives involved (including no less than eleven producers) none of them are women.

Printed in Wellington’s Capital Times on Wednesday 26 November, 2008.