 The best movie with the worst ending Director: James Mangold Writer: Michael Cooney Cinematographer: Phedon Papamichael Jr. Producer: Cathy Konrad by Jon Cvack I recall sitting in my friend’s girlfriend’s basement in high school when this preview played on TV. We had been shooting a short film at the time, involving four friends whose car broke down on a road trip and they’re hunted down by a killer. We shot around town in old barns, main street, and hoped to find an old motel comparable to Joy Ride (2001), and thus when this preview played, we were enamored. It looked like the exact type of film we’d need for inspiration; a collection of ten characters all trapped at a hotel as they’re killed one by one. I can’t recall whether we saw the film in theaters, but I do recall the utter thrill the first half of the film provided which was every bit as good and exciting as I hoped for. The neon light, the downpour, the dilapidated hotel in the middle of nowhere. There were cheesy moments, but the B-movie plot excused all that. And then, what I discovered was nearly exactly at the midpoint this last round, one of the characters, an alleged criminal, escapes the hotel, falls down into a drainage ditch to then hop up the other side and find himself back at the hotel. It made no sense. There could be no logical explanation and the first warning flag went up. In the end - spoiler - we learn that all we’ve been watching was a hallucination by a schizophrenic murderer on death row, and that all the characters we were watching were simply his various personalities. It’s the worst ending to an otherwise good movie I’ve ever seen. By far. And given that the film was inspired by Agatha Christie’s Ten Little Indians, you can’t help but wonder why in the world they decided to abandon a legitimate plot in favor of making it all a dream. It’ll go down as one of the biggest disappointments in thriller cinema. The film opens up Malcolm Rivers (Pruitt Taylor Vince) who’s on death row for a series of murders. When the defense finds a diary that wasn’t introduced in the trial, they call up Judge Taylor (Holmes Osborne) in the middle of a rainy night as Dr. Malick (Alfred Molina) hopes to persuade him to stay the execution due to Rivers being psychologically ill and unaware of what he’s doing.. The film cuts to the ten characters in rapid fashion, intercut in a fairly smart, non-linear order. All taking place during a down pour, they include a family of three George York (John C. McGinley) and his wife Alice (Leila Kenzle) and her child from a previous marriage Timmy (Bret Loehr). When they get a flat tire, George pulls over to the side of the road while George attempts to fix it, finding a high steel stuck in the tire. Alice heads to the backseat, knocking on the glass and comforting her son. She takes just a step back and is slammed by car. The film cuts back to Paris Nevada (Amanda Peet), a Las Vegas prostitute who’s gotten out of dodge. Introduced with the cheeseball Foo Foo Fighter’s “All My Life” (not the song itself so much as the pairing), she drives a old convertible, reaches into her side suitcase which explodes open from the wind, sending her clothes flying through the air while below we see wads of cash. We see that a high heel shoe had fallen out of the suitcase, now sitting on the road. The film cuts again to limo driver Edward Dakota (John Cusack) who’s driving the insufferable television diva Caroline Suzanne (Rebecca De Mornay). As Caroline complains about the downpour, the distracted Edward strikes Alice and slams on the breaks. Caroline demands they drive off, but he refuses, finding the body and taking it into the limo. There’s a bit of a time illogic - but given it’s all a fantasy, I guess it doesn’t matter - in that Paris then arrives to a flooded road, forced to turn back, meaning although she’s been driving for about three or four hours, she hasn’t gotten any further than the edge of town. She finds the rest in the road and they head to the local motel. The motel is allegedly managed by Larry Washington (John Hawkes) who knows Paris is a prostitute after recalling her ad in the back of some porn magazines; offering a one-dimensional animosity toward her, not even wanting her in the motel for whatever reason. Hawkes is talented enough to add the nuance missing from the script (though only by a hair) in that he seems to want to have sex with the woman, but can’t admit it, and the script doesn’t spend any time exploring this, making it feel superficial and gross. After all, Amanda Peet is incredibly attractive, and prostitute or no, I don’t think any man could possibly have this much bitterness and hate, especially after having nothing but nudey magazines to look at for who knows how long. A grating newlywed couple Lou (William Lee Scott) and Ginny (Clea DuVall) arrives. Lou’s a slimy douche who can’t keep his eyes off Paris, while Ginny is equally insufferably anxious, doing little beyond crying and whining nonstop. And finally, a police cruiser pulls up, with the alleged detective Samuel Rhoades (Ray Liotta) and a prisoner he’s transferring, Robert Maine (Jake Busey). Knowing they’re all trapped for the night, Samuel chains Robert to a toilet while the others tend to Alice. We learn that Edward is a former cop, assisting in John Cusack’s gentle way with Samuel’s investigation, encouraging him to keep calling on the radio, though we later find out Samuel has no intention of doing such a thing, as he too is a conman who killed the officer transferring them, kept Robert posed as the prisoner and has been pretending to be a cop. It’s when Caroline takes a phone call and ends up in the laundry room that Larry, Samuel, and Edward discover her decapitated body in the laundry room along with a hotel key - #1. Gradually, each of the patrons are butchered off, making some believe the killer is amongst them. One by one they go, each in increasingly incredulous ways, but it’s after seeing Robert escape to then head into the water trench and make his way back that we grasp that the story is not taking place in reality; bombing the narrative out and leading us to wonder how it could possibly resolve itself, and leaving one of two possibilities - it’s not real, or it is the byproduct of the motel having been built on some Native American burial grounds (or some such thing), and as the story goes on, as absurd as the latter point is, I’d take it willingly over the former. Each victim is accompanied by a hotel key, inching up toward the number ten. Some deaths such as Lou’s are fascinating; as Ginny breaks down in the bathroom and he pounds on the door, demanding to be let inside, then begging for his life. Ginny can’t tell the difference. Others are cheap, one as a throwback to Night of the Living Dead when Alice, Ginny, and the boy all get in the car next to the gas station which explodes. As the plot is no longer able to accommodate the absurdity and as each character is more or less accounted for at any particular moment, we realize there is no identifiable answer. The question looms larger and larger until it finally pops and we’re taken back to the Malcolm Rivers hearing who disappears and is replaced by Edward, completely confused over what’s going on. His psychiatrist holds up a mirror and he sees his actual Pruitt Taylor-self and freaks out, and the judge realizes how disturbed the man actually is. He stays the execution and instead transfers him to a new maximum security prison. We then cut to Paris - the one person who survived, who takes her money and buys an orange farm in Florida, living an idyllic life when she discovers the last key in the dirt. She looks to her left and there’s Timmy, holding a cultivator and stabbing her in the neck and the film cuts to him at the hotel, responsible for each of the murders and for just a second, I thought - maybe I had it wrong. Maybe Malcolm Rivers had actually killed all these people as a boy and was reliving the nightmare again and again as each of the victims. But then you spend three seconds more considering how this could possibly occur - how he could shove a baseball bat down a grown man’s throat; cut off a woman’s head; somehow trigger an explosive device in a car; or the fact that he didn’t push or drive the car that killed his step dad. It could’ve worked under other circumstances, but the commitment to such grand murders prevented it. In the end, the whole story was a fabrication; existing within the mind of a deranged schizophrenic murderer who’s lost the line between reality and fantasy. At best, he might have been witness to some grueling murders and is stuck reliving it in his mind. Given the inspiration from Agatha Christie’s novel, you can’t help but wonder if this shift to Malcolm Rivers was either a part of reshoots. Perhaps the original source material and various adaptations never abandoned reality for some type of psycho-fantasy. Maybe Timmy was indeed suppose to be the original killer and the perhaps test screenings failed the bullshit test and they scrambled for a better resolve. Rather than risking the less plausible, they took it straight out of reality altogether. The film is near perfect for the first half regarding pop-thriller cinema, providing that uncanny feeling of mystery and suspense, leaving you unsure whether it’s supernatural or actual. As with any great story - I’m left thinking of What Lies Beneath (2000) - the exercise is preserving that tension while wrapping it up appropriately. Neither Hitchcock, nor De Palma allowed such a simple and cheap explanation to topple their thrillers. It leaves you wanting a remake done right. Identity is perhaps the greatest movie with the worst ending in cinematic history. BELOW: Running on all cylinders at this point Like what you read? Support the site on Patreon Please report any spelling, grammar, or factual errors or corrections on the contact page
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 One of cinema's all greatest buddy cop duos Director: Michael Bay Writer: Ron Shelton and Jerry Stahl Cinematographer: Amir Mokri Producer: Jerry Bruckheimer by Jon Cvack As mentioned in my thoughts on Bad Boys, Michael Bay will one day be remembered as an artist; someone who reflected the MTV generation by having his films operate with the same lightning pace. After watching the film and praising it with friends I found the same criticism, literally some version of “It’s fun, but a terrible movie”. It’s a completely paradoxical statement - they had fun watching the movie while finding it bad. I can’t think of many films that fit the same description. Die Hard might be the only recent example of a film that’s made the transition from cheeseball action into high craft recognition. I’m confident Bad Boys II will make a similar leap. While Bad Boys showed a freshmen filmmaker learning his craft, Bad Boys II was Michael Bay four films into his career. Gone is the awkward coverage or cheap action tricks. Bay received nearly $150 million dollars to fully actualize one gigantic set-piece after another, fully capturing it in every beautiful way imaginable. What I think the critical crowd will one day realize is how gorgeous each and every shot is; no matter how few seconds - or frames - it lasts. The story opens up with Henry Rollins leading a swat team to attack a band of drug smugglers who are using coffins to exchange MDMA for money. Things move from 0-60 in seconds as we watch speed boats dropping coffins into the ocean intercut with the SWAT team getting suited up. They enter the swamps and land on a local KKK group, burning a cross. Two clansmen then remove their masks, revealing Marcus Burnett (Martin Lawrence) and Mike Lowery (Will Smith). They hoist up their guns, surrounded by over a dozen clansmen, including Michael Shannon as Floyd Poteet in one of his earliest roles. Marcus and Mike’s radio fails in calling in the SWAT team and things grow intense. Gunshots are fired and Henry Rollins leads the team in. Dozens of police storm in on boats as the clansmen scramble, complete with a burning cross in the middle. There’s a particular bird’s eye shot of the action; orange near the fire one side and blue on the other. It’s full of moving pieces and is a feast for the senses; it is cinema and money fully utilized. Amidst the chaos, Mike shoots Marcus in the ass to prevent a clansmen from killing him. So begins the buddy cop “gotta quit” trope. The characters lean into their tropes. Still living off his trust fund, Mike’s exchanged the Porsche for a Ferrari and an even more lush Miami penthouse. Marcus has gotten a modest house next to the water, having just installed a cheap above ground pool where he spends his days recovering from the bullet wound; culminating in Mike scaring the dog which is attached to the pool filter, busting the walls and causing Marcus to float away into the ocean. Again, Bay could have easily gone with a far simpler gag, opting instead for the maximum production value in demonstrating Marcus’ middle-class domesticity. It’s the kind of scene that any studio would cut knowing how much the cost and why Bay is in a league of his own. We then meet the film’s new character, Marcus’ sister Syd (Gabrielle Union) who we later discover is an undercover agent with the DEA, working on the same MDMA case. Her and Mike have been dating for a few months and Syd’s anxious to tell Marcus, but with Mike knowing Marcus’ disdain (or envy) for his player lifestyle, Mike is reluctant. We meet the boss of the film, Johnny Tapia (Jordi Mollà), who’s essentially the same character from the latter half of Blow (2001). He meets up with Syd and so the first act passes and we move into two hours of nearly nonstop action. We see an amazing car chase down the spiraling parking garage exit, leading to a chase across a bridge where a car carrier truck releases vehicles one by one. Made in 2003, I struggle to see the line between digital and practical effects, where at no point did I not fully believe Bay loaded up a carrier and had a Ferrari salom through them while driving over 70 mph. I know there’s a line somewhere. I just don't know where it is. Mike and Marcus soon discover that Tapian has been using dead bodies to store the drugs, resulting in a bizarre and ballsy scene in having them end up at a morgue where Marcus ends up in bed with a beautiful and busty dead woman as Tapian’s men round them up. It’s understandable that critics would shun this scene, but it’s so absurd and oddly sexual, which combined with Marcus and Mike at the peak of their ball-busting never crosses the line. Bay might be the first to create irony with a popcorn action movie. Somewhere around this point, Marcus learns of Mike and Syd's relationship and reacts exactly as anticipated. Combined with nearly half a dozen brushes with death in a matter of day, he soon tells Marcus he’s filing for a transfer in order to take a desk job. Mike chases him down and in a scene that Roger Ebert spent nearly 20% of his review disparaging, we get the classic moment of Marcus’ daughter’s date arriving, leading Marcus to accost him and for Mike to later pull out his gun, acting wasted on champagne, demanding the boy listen to the rules. It’s one of those odds scenes that has aged perfectly; often shared on reddit as a great scene, highlighting Will Smith and Martin Lawrence’s humor. There’s something so odd about how seriously critics took this moment. It seems at least somewhat bigoted. Two black men mess with another black man, again playing an ironic gangster role; all the more supported in that this was completely improvised and the daughter’s boyfriend had no idea what to expect. It was Will Smith and Martin Lawrence having fun and to spend so much time criticizing this moment seems like a dig at them as much as the filmmakers. Time has provided justice. During a botched raid on Tapia’s mansion, Mike and Marcus fail to know that Syd’s inside attempting to make the bust. She’s kidnapped and taken to Cuba and so Bay takes us to another absurd and fun final sequence as the pair recruit Henry Rollins and his gang of hyper buff SWAT members who sneak into the country and provide one of the best climatic shoot outs of any modern action movie, utilizing tunnels, bazookas, the Cuban military, and soon having them drive a Humvee through the mansion and then down a hill through the steal huts of the country’s poorest. It’s another scene where you’re left wondering how in the world they achieved it as they are actually driving this Humvee down a hill, crashing through endless amounts of steels huts which explode into hundreds of pieces. Yes, it’s certain that many people died in the scene (in the movie, that is), but again the movie is so ridiculous and it’s never shown, that the deductive logic never distracts you. Bay achieves the miraculous in having us believe the innocent never die. They soon end up outside of Guantanamo Bay, separated by a minefield. Tapian then arrives and we get a western standoff as everyone points guns at everyone else. Syd throws her pistol and a mine explodes, killing Tapian and we’re taken back to Marcus’s backyard where once again the pool explodes via runaway dog and Mike and Marcus are whisked away into the ocean. At nearly two and a half hours, Bay somehow makes time disappear. The movie is funny and fun and horrifying and gross and touching and sexy, taking you on a roller coaster of emotions, happening so fast that you never have the chance to get bored. Each shot is designed to pack as much in as it can, engaging us into each and every second. Pure action cinema is meant to be fun. The more fun it is, the better made. This is one of the finest action movies ever made. BELOW: A scene that really pissed off Ebert Like what you read? Support the site on Patreon Please report any spelling, grammar, or factual errors or corrections on the contact page  Could have used a better title, too Director: Sam Mendes Writer: Sam Mendes and Krysty Wilson-Cairns Cinematographer: Roger Deakins Producer: Sam Mendes, Pippa Harris, Jayne-Ann Tenggren, Callum McDougal, and Brian Oliver by Jon Cvack Gravity (2013) was the first movie that felt as though cinema had progressed into new territory, allowing cutting edge technology to combine with a tentpole plot. It was a movie that felt like a ride. The kind of experience that only a movie theater could provide. When I heard people disparaging the film, the first thing I asked was how they watched it. One friend said she hated it before admitting she saw it on an air =plane. Not to be confused with the transcendental feeling that great cinematic art can provide, films like Gravity and 1917 are those which fully maximize the movie-going experience. It is rocket fuel for a room that is filled with millions of dollars of audio-visual equipment. It’s how certain sequences from Interstellar (2014) or Ford vs. Ferrari (2019) or even Armageddon (1998) accomplished. People seem to forget how much better new movie theaters are even from just a few years ago with projection and sound alone. It’s why low attendance is such a shocking idea. We are at the apex of cinema going technology and even before covid, audiences were falling fast. 1917 is an odd film in that I haven’t even heard of the movie prior to its release, let alone that it’d be competitive in awards season or the technical mastery it contained. However, soon it leaked onto the internet that the movie was a series of long single takes. Not reading or wanting to know anything about the story, I had long figured the movie was your classic epic war film; taking place in the trenches of the First World War. Soon, I heard it consisted of essentially two seemingly long single takes; serving as both an exercise and another possible rare maximized cinematic experience. The story is as simple a war story as it gets. It takes place on the Western Front where the Germans have allegedly retreated after a series of blistering attacks. Separated from the other battalion across No Man’s Land and with the telephone lines cut, the English 1st battalion suspects a German ambush and order two young soldiers, Lance Corporal Will Schofield (George MacKay) and Lance Corporal Tom Blake (Dean-Charles Chapman), to take orders across No Man’s Land and cancel the attack. The opening frame is as simple as it gets; showing Blake in close up, sitting against a tree. He then stands, joined by Schofield. The camera pulls out, revealing a dozen soldiers as Blake and Schofield walk by before then entering into the trench and we soon realize that we’re about to pass over a hundred soldiers in a single take. We follow from behind until a piece of subtle action - people cutting them off, stopping to chat, etc. - allow the camera to reposition itself so we’re never stuck following the backs of their heads. For the most part, each long sequence is an attempt to change style and purpose. The first shot comes out strong, setting us for the sheer scope of the film. It made me excited for what’s to come; figuring if it was this good and fascinating from the opening minutes things only stood to evolve from there. The next sequence moves into the headquarters as General Erinmore (Colin Firth) gives them their orders and the camera moves around the tiny space, lingering on the other characters. It’s the weakest part of the film as it was both weird having such a powerhouse talent like Firth play someone that wouldn’t appear in the rest of the movie. There were also people talking all around me at the movie theater during this particular scene which kind of ruined the next ten minutes. Blake and Schofield make their way across No Man’s Land, cutting through the barbed wire where Schofield catches his hand, down through some trenches where they find a corpse where Schofield accidentally drops his cut hand into the rotting chest. I did find this an odd moment that was never revisited, as I would have bet money that Schofield was going to experience some infectious discomfort as the story went on, but instead it never comes up. They reach the German side of the line, finding the barracks completely abandoned and they head inside, finding rats crawling all over the space which soon trigger a trip wire, setting off a mine that causes the space to collapse and Schofield to be buried below a layer of rubble; his eyes blinded with dust. Blake leads him out, and they’re forced to jump over a mineshaft and I quickly realized that this film was not some grand war drama per the likes of Full Metal Jacket (1987) or Saving Private Ryan (1998), but rather an action-adventure movie-video game hybrid. As I mentioned in my thoughts on Robert Zemeckis’s A Christmas Carol (2009), the issue is that video games now look as good as many tentpole movies, which combined with their interactivity, makes the film fail by comparison. 1917 poses the mirror of the same problem in providing a video game narrative with the greatest graphics possible which are actual images. We follow the characters around as though characters who never die in an MMO video game, wandering from adventure to adventure. That’s what I mean by experiment. It was as though Deakins and Mendes wanted to prove that cinema could still provide a better real-time experience. Nevertheless, the issue with a video game structure is the inherent limitations that live-time photography provides. The story suffers as it’s forced to accommodate unrealistic action pieces over and over again. It was a common criticism of Gravity. It was fun to watch, but people got so carried away with the spectacle that they forgot how ridiculous the story was. When you drop the technical prowess, 1917 is an equally absurd story in which a simple MacGuffin propels the character forward into surviving a booby trapped explosion burying him in rubble; fighting a Nazi fighter pilot to the death; battling a Nazi sniper firing in a massive abandoned and bombed out town; and running across the battlefield as his fellow soldiers storm the German trenches. All in half a day. It is a character moving from one problem to another, each getting increasingly more difficult and emotionally intense. Just like a video game. A live-time action-drama war film necessitates a thrilling story. It cannot be gritty or real the way the greatest war films are. That also doesn’t matter. If you accept that each moment is serving the craft more than the character or plot, it’s easy to accept the cinematic achievement. It begs the question as to what the story could have been instead of what it is. Long and elaborate takes wouldn’t accommodate a story with slower pace. The one direction that might have worked better is what I expected going in - a battle between the Allies and the Germans in which we’re following the character in real time. They would line up along the trenches, the whistle blows, and we would follow a two hour battle with the character. This isn’t to say there aren’t moments that in and of themselves were some of the finest bits and pieces of cinema I’ve seen all year. When the dog fight plays in the sky, I knew the inevitable fate and yet never could have imagined where it went or how they achieved it. Blake is stabbed and just when I thought Saving Private Ryan retained the most gruesome death scene in a war film, the live-time provides what most other films lack. Blake is stabbed, Schofield refuses to believe the situation, and then grasping the reality, we watch as Blake passes away, shifting from excruciating pain and into chills and calmness. It’s a moment forever burned into my mind. The experience then shifts a bit from there, as you can’t help wondering how much wilder each scene will get, setting expectations so high that while there are great moments, with the exception of the iconic run through No Man’s Land, nothing comes close to matching the death of Blake. Then again, after a week went by and I talked to more people, I found myself wanting to go back and experience it all again. The oddest part of the film is how quickly you forget you’re watching a single take; providing this weird zen-like interaction in which I lost all sense of watching a film and therefore had no idea what magnificence I missed. That alone goes to show how amazing the movie is. It’s not the greatest war film ever made, but it might be one of the most impressive technical achievements I’ve ever seen in theaters. NOTE: I ended up returning to the cinema for a second screening and was unfortunately disappointed. No longer surprised by what was to come, something felt far more underwhelming; serving as an example where the video game format fails by locking us into a journey that initially felt unprecedented and lost its magic on the second round. It’s still a magnificent achievement, but I’m not sure when I’d return. BELOW: Best scene of the movie Like what you read? Support the site on Patreon Please report any spelling, grammar, or factual errors or corrections on the contact page  Not sure what animating the entire film accomplished Director: Robert Zemeckis Writer: Robert Zemeckis; based off A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens Cinematographer: Robert Presley Producer: Steve Starkey, Robert Zemeckis, and Jack Rapke by Jon Cvack I’ve been my way through the various Christmas Carol adaptations. As of this writing, I have Patrick Stewart’s 1999 television version left and sure enough FX released a new adaptation just last week. It’s my very favorite repeated adaptation - up there with the ancient classics, Shakespeare, Jane Austen, Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, and others; an incredibly rare achievement in creating a story that stands the test of time; people drawn back time and again, always finding a fresh connection to the material and demonstrating how timeless art can become. A good Scrooge fits any age, a person who can just as easily play a charmer as well as an asshole. Ideally, we see tiny slivers of a good person between the bad. It’s why Reginald Owen from the 1932 version, Alastair Sim from 1951, and Bill Murray from Scrooged (1988) are all so good. And it’s why George C. Scott in 1984’s version fails to work, let alone when Scott breaks into song and dance; he’s just too intense and serious a person. This marks the beginning of Robert Zemeckis’ peculiar shift away from an absolutely dominating reign in cinema in which he created classic after classic film. The split year of 2000 marks an immediate wedge between his two ears - Cast Away (2000) earned another position in our popular cinema pantheon and What Lies Beneath (2000) marks a failure to reimagine Hitchcock. He wouldn’t make another movie until 2004 with another classic The Polar Express. From there on out he spent the next half decade making only animated films, culminating in A Christmas Carol. As mentioned in other thoughts, the 2000s is becoming an endearing turning point in spectacle cinema. Just as the 50s sci-fi introduced cheesy monsters, aliens, and other creatures and the 80s would master them, the 2000s is when tentpole films leaned into underdeveloped special effects; most of which are aging horribly. See my thoughts on Lord of the Rings (2001) where while most of the film still works, there are a few special effects which are shockingly awful. Filmmakers should remaster these films, not just release higher definition copies. Sometime in the last few years, as I played a few video games here and there, I realized that we are not - yet - in danger of CGI characters taking over in narrative films, but that video games and CGI narrative have so successfully merged that it demands filmmakers use style to differentiate themselves. It’s why Pixar is successful and Paddington (2014) works. But I’m left wondering if it could ever allow for what Ghost in the Shell or Akira accomplished; allowing actual people to exist within an animated world. A Christmas Carol doesn’t feel like a movie so much as watching the B-Roll of a video game. At points, it even feels as though it’s setting you up to play a game. It follows the traditional story in the classical era with Ebenezer Scrooge played by Jim Carrey (along with performing the three ghosts of past, present, and future). Ebenezer is designed as a frightening and intimidating man; tall and hovering over people, failing to have even an ounce of kindness anywhere in his body. Although played by Carrey, the filmmakers opted to remove all humor. Perhaps at the time, when Carrey was at the top of comedy, there’d be an irony in how serious the performance came across, but I was left wondering how much better it could have been if Scrooge made subtle jokes and remarks under his breath that at least provided him a sense of wit. Instead, it was dry and cold. The story follows the normal trajectory. We meet Bob Cratchit (Gary Oldman, who also plays Scrooge’s old partner Jacob Marley), Scrooge’s nephew (Colin Firth), and his former fiancee Belle (Robin Wright Penn; who also strangely plays Scrooge’s younger sister as well). Each scene is absolutely beautiful and stunning with some interesting visual effects to mix things up, but for the most part, the whole time I was wondering why this wasn’t live action. Before the future segment arrives, most of the scenes involve normal looking people in normal locations. I was left imagining Jim Carrey’s makeup and the kinds of visual and practical effects that Zemeckis has perfectly blended in the past. So many frames were gorgeous, but fell far short of what an actual set with real people could have provided. It’s the type of film you wish would get remade Psycho-style in order to prove that CGI isn’t meant to recreate life but the imagination (wild visual effects aside). BELOW: I'd love someone to explain to me why going through all this was somehow a better idea than live action Like what you read? Support the site on Patreon Please report any spelling, grammar, or factual errors or corrections on the contact page  The technology just wasn't there to pull off playing drums with a scarf Director: Zhang Yimou Writer: Li Feng, Peter Wu, Wang Bin, and Zhang Yimou Cinematographer: Zhao Xiaoding Producer: William Kong and Zhang Yimou by Jon Cvack This is the first action film I’ve seen since getting into Yimou Zhang as the art house Chinese filmmaker who made Raise the Red Lantern (1991), Coming Home (2014), Not One Less (1999) and about a half dozen other acclaimed movies. He’s also made Hero (2002 with Jet Li), The Great Wall (2016) with Matt Damon, and a movie I had never even heard of with Christian Bale called The Flowers of War (2011). It might be the greatest example of the “one for you, one for me” filmmaking philosophy. I had always thought House of Flying Daggers exploded in America, but in fact it was Hero which was made two years prior and made over $175 million from its $31 million budget. House of Flying Daggers followed it up, offering that unique 00s vibe of special effects that looked pretty good at the time, now in dire need of remastering. Remembering nothing about Hero and therefore only having his beautiful dramas in my mind, I figured that it’d at least be a gorgeous movie to look at. And it is. But damn do the effects bring it down. The film opens by explaining that as the oppressive Tang Dynasty fades, various factions have risen up in revolt, including the House of Flying Daggers. Later, we meet a blind dancer Mei (Zhang Ziyi) who’s been captured by police who suspect she’s connected to the organization. The set looks fake, the colors feel empty, and I got that immediate sense of alarm; made all the worse when somehow the situation leads to the blind girl being surrounded by drums and the judge or policeman says she has to recreate the sounds of dried beans hitting the instruments where she’ll then use her scarves to somehow recreate the sounds. The beans look fake, the scarves look fake, the slow motion looks tacky, and I knew I was watching a film from an era not quite able to pull off the effect; the way it’s hard to watch Futureworld (1976) and how much it leans into the 70s. This is made using the nascent technology from the age which would progress and look exponentially better in less than 20 years. The story moves on from there with reversals and deaths, but ultimately it’s all about the fights - featuring everything from a sequence in a bamboo field that was pretty cool, in which using the whistling sound the plants would make when soaring through the air, along with the pliability of the stalks, Yimou made a mostly believable sequence as a few of the characters are chased down. The final scene is a bit more difficult to swallow, involving this hyper stylized knife throwing throughout the rest of the film that simply doesn’t look good; by now closer to a video game than reality. Knives are tossed back and forth and slow motion shots dominate the sequence. The final stand off in the snow has its moments, but is mostly forgettable. Writing this a little over a week later, there were few other scenes that stand out. The thing is, very few films from this era have aged well. Even Lord of the Rings (2001 - 2003) needs a major remastering of about 25% of its material. It’s an interesting era in allowing us to anticipate where it was all going to go, but the film’s themselves are now becoming museum pieces. Perhaps one day they’ll take on the vintage feel of a Universal classic horror or 50s monster movie. Then again, these are also some of the first films sharing a comparable experience with video games, where it seems like these sequences could have found a better home. I might try out Hero one day in the future. If not, I’m completely satisfied with his dramas. If anything it makes me wonder why he can’t find a better balance between the two, as I’m entirely confident Yimou would create a modern Ran (1985), if given the proper opportunity. As is, it seems best to stick with his smaller stories that contain enough heart to battle and win against any epic. BELOW: A scene that works with the available tech Like what you read? Support the site on Patreon Please report any spelling, grammar, or factual errors or corrections on the contact page  A film that feels like a drug trip Director: Gaspar Noé Writer: Gaspar Noé and Lucile Hadzihalilovic Cinematographer: Benoît Debie Producer: Brahim Chioua, Vincent Maraval, Olivier Delbosc, Marc Missonnier, and Shin Yamaguchi by Jon Cvack There are a handful of disturbing movies that I’m fairly certain I’ll never watch again. Ken Park (2002), The Brown Bunny (2003), Gummo (1997), and Antichrist (2009) are some of the first that come to mind. They’re all made by good, or even great directors, but all cross that particular threshold of providing a cathartic experience and toward functioning as a nightmare. At the same time, I’m not against returning to Requiem for a Dream (2000), Kids (1995), Salò (1975), and I often revisit the Saw series during October. We all have thresholds (most are shocked when they hear I un-ironically enjoy the Saw series), but then many people I know have Requiem for a Dream as one of their favorite movies; a film I don’t find disturbing enough to forever ignore, but can’t imagine when I’d be in a mood to electively put it on. Enter the Void exists somewhere in the middle. I had never seen any of Gaspar Noe’s work up to this point, nor did I know anything about Enter the Void. I knew it had something to do with psychedelics and by the time the opening credits of the cast and crew literally flash by, preventing even the fastest reader from seeing any name before tossing us into the story. The opening scene is of the coolest and most original I’ve seen in awhile, taking the POV of the lead character, a drug dealer named Oscar (Nathaniel Brown) who lives in a tiny high rise Tokyo apartment with half a kitchen and a gorgeous view over the downtown skyline. He’s joined on the balcony by who we later discover is his sister Linda (Paz de la Huerta) who says something about being like a plane flying across the sky, looking down at the city; an idea that Linda finds frightening. She then heads off to work at a strip club and Oscar lights up some DMT and we get our first trip out scene. Still in a single take - broken up only by the screen blinking like an eyeball - he’s soon visited by his friend Alex (Cyril Roy) and the two decide to head over to The Void dance club in order for Oscar to make a delivery to his younger friend Victor (Olly Alexander). On the way over, Alex asks if Oscar has read The Tibetan Book of the Dead, explaining its view that once someone dies they simply float above the Earth, watching life take place for all eternity. An idea that Oscar finds terrifying. With the single take still going, Oscar finds Victor crying, sits down, and the police come barging through, chasing him into a disgusting bathroom where Oscar attempts to flush the pills, soon shot by the police through the stomach and he dies in the stall. The single take ends and Oscar floats out of the body per the very method The Book of the Dead and ascends throughout the skies of Tokyo, drifting in and out of character’s lives and their histories. What prevents the film from going into Antichrist territory is the narrative, which at its core is a fairly simple story about a kid who lost his parents at a young age, was later separated from his sister in foster care, and turned to both abusing and dealing drugs; determined to increasingly alter his mind and soon dying as a result; following everything up from his initial conception (as in sperm and seed) and up to his last dying breath. On the other hand, for nearly three hours the movie takes a voyeuristic eye of god position which becomes stale quickly. Allegedly Gaspar Noe was inspired by tripping out while watching the first person film noir The Lady in the Lake (1947). The idea is simple enough, film is about having storytellers offer us objective images to look at; framed, composed, designed, and blocked to be as engaging as possible. First person POV is limiting, forcing us to only see what a character sees and preventing what is arguably the purpose of cinema - to have beautiful images arranged in such a way that allows the viewer to connect patterns. First person doesn’t allow for cutting; the viewer is instead forced to look at whatever they’re looking at and due to its perspective, it just cannot compete with a more omniscient perspective. It’s the reason why so few films have adopted it for the full running time. This is of course combined with the plethora of disturbing images Gaspar forces upon us - of countless amounts of women and men having sex in full nude, often at dirty strip clubs and typically empty of any form of emotion beyond the raw experience; going so far as to show a penis entering from the inside of the vagain and ejaculating. Of horrible drug abuse that leaves people hurt, dying, or dead in a city that, while vibrant, does not at all care about its casualties. Or of the countless times Gaspar cuts to a graphic and horrifying car accident that leaves Oscar and Linda’s parents dead with their skulls bashed in and blood everywhere. Or of some suggestively incestuous relationship between Oscar and Victor which is taken up to the point of showing them sleeping with one another. Or of a desolate Victor giving oral to a pair of businessmen in an elevator, likely to make his next score. For two and a half hours after the intro, we are forced into this exhausting POV, made to watch vapid and terrible acts in a confining peeping Tom perspective. I had divided the film into three parts and by the last night, I struggled to even put the film on; not at all interested in having my mood inevitably pulled down. Like Antichrist and its peers, there wasn’t all that much beyond the amazing intro that made me excited or made me excited to return to the story. There are ideas about fate and circumstance, and there’s an interesting exploration of a rippling effect that can take place through an event years past, and while they’re interesting, I’m not sure when I’d return, if ever. However, I’d also recommend it for any fellow cinephiles who want a unique and unforgettable experience. The story seems to be that some are determined from the very moment of conception to live a life of tragedy. At its best I suppose the film makes you appreciate your circumstances by actually placing you inside of what it’d be like for someone to experience a tragic life. It’s the complete lack of hope that drags it all down. The movie itself functions as a trip - you are distracted by the bright colors and showy photography, until you then return to the real world, realizing how horrifying it all was. BELOW: Five minutes of what I think is about a thirty minute opening scene Like what you read? Support the site on Patreon Please report any spelling, grammar, or factual errors or corrections on the contact page  Only Tarr could make opening the blinds so beautiful Director: Béla Tarr and Ágnes Hranitzky Writer: Georges Simenon (novel), Béla Tarr, László Krasznahorkai Cinematographer: Fred Kelemen Producer: Humbert Balsan, Christoph Hahnheiser, and Juliusz Kossakowski by Jon Cvack I had discovered Béla Tarr from a philosophy professor who inspired me to take up the major, starting with Damnation (1987) and having that perfect experience of wanting to invite all your film friends over to watch it; containing a style as unique as Lynch or Haneke where you’re hungry for the rest of the filmography. For those unfamiliar, always in black and white, Tarr utilizes long single takes; not revealing grand set pieces and walks and talks, but with subtle changes in composition, shifting from close ups to wides to two shots and back; other times holding the camera down as action unfolds before it, fully utilizing the monochromatic light and shadows. The Man From London opens in close up on the submerged hull of a ship, slowly rising up, revealing the depth number, moving all the way up to starboard where a couple of men discuss something in the captain's room before the other throws a briefcase out into the water, continuing up to a railway viewing tower where Maloin (Miroslav Krobot) watches it all take place. Still rolling on the first take, he watches as the men exit the ship, turning left out toward the docks where one of the men from the captain’s office boards a train which we then follow out. It’s a take that’s modest and yet meticulously crafted. Not every take is as engaging and Tarr understands it. The Turin Horse (2012) is almost torturous to watch in portraying the grueling life of abject 18th century poverty. The Man from London the Hitchcockian/classic noir crime story of the common man becoming entangled in a dangerous situation that spirals his life out of control. Maloin steals the cash, hoping it could relieve his meager existence; where his daughter works at a butcher, dressed in a skimpy outfit that shows off her underside while his wife Camélia (Tilda Swinton) prepares their sparse dinner and cleans their empty apartment day after day. From there, the film follows a labyrinthe path, between Maloin, the man Morrison (János Derzsi) who stole the money, and a shady police officer Morrison (István Lénárt) who investigates the crime; abiding by Dashiel Hammett’s complexity. What I love about Tarr’s work is that I have yet to even come close to fully comprehending what they’re about. It’s all about the experience with images and characters. When finishing, I remember fragments - drying the money on an air vent, the kid playing soccer in the narrow alley, the old man eating bread and soup at the restaurant. Reading the synopsis, I realize how much I didn’t even comprehend as I was so transported by his world. It provides that strange meditative viewing experience; where what you’re watching is so profound that you at times lose concentration in order to follow a thought. It’s exactly what you hoped for from the master. BELOW: The opening single Like what you read? Support the site on Patreon Please report any spelling, grammar, or factual errors or corrections on the contact page  Couldn't find much better so here's a bland picture against a wall Director: Mia Hansen-Løve Writer: Mia Hansen-Løve Cinematographer: Pascal Auffray Producer: Oliver Damian, Philippe Martin, and David Thion by Jon Cvack I keep wanting to start a page about Netflix spoiling movies by providing synopses that often extend more than halfway through the film, in this case - spoiler - telling me that the main character commits suicide, which I don’t think I would’ve anticipated for at least the first quarter of the movie. This is the second movie I’ve watched from the French filmmaker Mia Hansen-Løve (a woman filmmaker in case any others wouldn’t guess with). The reason I even mention it is because the first film I saw, Goodbyife, First Love (2011), felt a bit creepy to tell. As mentioned in my thoughts on If Beale Street Could Talk (2018), it just goes to show the importance of having stories told from particular perspectives; allowing us to dive into a long unfamiliar worldview. It also makes the Father of My Children all the more interesting. The plot follows a successful film producer Grégoire Canvel (Louis-Do de Lencquesaing; a man) whose lavish life begins to crumble as he discovers his production company is near bankrupt. We meet his wife Sylvia Canvel (Chiara Caselli) and two girls, Clémence (Alice de Lencquesaing; who’d be in Goodbyife, First Love) and her sister Billie. They have a loving and affectionate relationship, taking weekend trips up to their second home in the country. With two movies in production, including a 19th century period piece, and another Korean film a few weeks out from production, Grégoire learns from his lawyer that the company is in serious financial trouble. With few films bringing in the returns required to pay off over four million Euros in debt, and with his present catalogue already mortgaged, the best he could do is sell the company for only a quarter of what he owes. Mia Hansen-Løve does an exquisite job of building the world of a film producer, and capturing the spirit of independent production. It’s a small operation, employing less than ten people, and yet always filled with people coming in for meetings; including a young writer/director who Grégoire invited in to collaborate on a project and gets caught in the whirlwind of his collapse. Soon the ailing finances smother Grégoire, and knowing there’s no way out, he kills himself by shooting himself in the head on a random sidewalk in the middle of the street. The family is later notified and so begins the second half of the story, as Sylvia attempts to rescue the business while consoling her daughters. It’s here that the film takes a bit of a dip, as while I never hoped it’d enter into melodrama, there’s a peculiar distance the family has from what just happened. We never see them or even get a suggestion of their grief, whether the wife or the daughters. Sylvia tries to make deals that buy time or at least preserve the company’s existence, and the older daughter Clémence starts going out with the young filmmaker, who without a signed contract, can’t make his film. We never hear all that much from Belle. Later Clémence discovers that her father had lived a double life, having another son with a different woman. In the end, the company is sold, and the finances appear cleared out, and I was left wondering what to feel for Sylvia and her daughters. What I assume had to be denial, came across as indifference; leaving me to wonder if they were all just putting on an act in the earliest scenes as they demonstrated their love. And yet that seems too cynical. It’s as though the story didn’t know what to do with the characters once their father was gone. BELOW: Couldn't find much beyond the trailer, so here ya go Like what you read? Support the site on Patreon Please report any spelling, grammar, or factual errors or corrections on the contact page  Unfortunately, there's like two hi-def images on Google Director: Alfonso Cuarón Writer: Alfonso Cuarón, Timothy J. Sexton, David Arata, Mark Fergus, and Hawk Ostby; based on The Children of Men by P. D. James Cinematographer: Emmanuel Lubezki Producer: Hilary Shor, Iain Smith, Tony Smith, Marc Abraham, and Eric Newman by Jon Cvack As mentioned in my thoughts on Roma (2018), I hadn’t revisited Children of Men since making my movie Road to the Well (2016) and directing other projects; providing that magnificent experience of grasping how technically phenomenal the story is. Not just from the cinematography, but the art direction, costumes, story, and performances. I think I had seen the movie once or twice before this round. I remembered the masked people in cages, the long take in the car, the Strawberry Cough, and the birthing sequence. For some reason I feel as though I missed it’s connection. I keep thinking this movie was made in 2010, but quadruple checking, I’m surprised to see it was 2006; while Bush was president with record low approval numbers; knee deep in the Middle East, a year out from the Katrina disaster, and rolling out increasingly pervasive intelligence techniques. I was getting more into politics at the time, swinging far and away from my conservative family. In terms of history, the facts are that George Bush approved the torture of prisoners of war and engaged in a counterproductive campaign that killed over 5,500 members of the military and over 150,000 Iraqi civilians; all while creating the PATRIOT Act which has impeded on our fourth Amendment rights. Children of Men takes place in 2027, when the world has gone infertile due to a pandemic of antibiotic-resistant plagues. The U.K. has become a police state, instituting strict checkpoints to repel and expel any and all immigrants. The film begins in a coffee shop, with a bunch of the patrons watching the latest bad news regarding terrorist attacks. Theo Faron (Clive Owen) waits for his coffee and exits, getting about a block down before the coffee shop explodes. Someone had planted a bomb that could have killed him, though still he continues to go to work, lasting but a moment before requesting to go home where he’s then kidnapped by a group of left wing terrorists named “Fishes”, led by Julian Taylor (Julianne Moore); providing one of the first great - and incredibly simple - set pieces; a small windowed room with newspaper taped up on the glass and a yellow bulb burning bright within. Describing this, it’s only Emmanuel Lubezki who could make such a setting feel so fresh. We learn that Theo used to be a member of a left wing radical faction; electing to become a regular old government bureaucrat instead; opting to ignore all that’s going on around him. It’s where the role is fascinating, as my memory of the film up to revisiting was a much less advanced world. It’s through Cuarón's phenomenal direction, allowing the camera to take the subjective view of Theo that allows it work. There are the disturbing images of people in cages and violent streets, but it all seems to operate within the background. Theo isn’t interested because he can’t be interested. Julia offers Theo money in exchange for getting a woman she knows some transit papers. Theo rejects the offer, though makes you feel a passionate concern and desire for the other person, though they only talk for minutes. He goes on to visit his old friend and former cartoonist Jason Palmer (Michael Caine) who now sells pot, grown in a cozy house in the middle of the woods, providing the one bit of escape Theo can find in the crumbling world. He decides to hit up his government minister cousin who lives an extravagant life in a massive (albeit sterile and claustrophobic) apartment or condo of sorts; eating beautiful food while looking upon an industrial wasteland with a floating pig (straight from Pink Floyd’s “Animals” album cover; not to mention some Banksy art years before his widespread acclaim). The cousin agrees to the transport papers, though they require Theo as an escort; which he uses to leverage even more money. The Fishes agree and discover the woman, Kee (Clare-Hope Ashitey) is pregnant. Grasping the significance, Theo joins Julian, the armed radical Luke (Chiwetel Ejiofor) and a midwife Miriam (Pam Ferris) as they attempt to have her meet up with the Human Project; an organization determined to solve the infertile pandemic. So begins one of the two of some of the greatest single takes in the history of cinema; as to do this day I have no idea how they accomplished this technically (and I never wanted to look in fear of spoiling the magic). Riding down the rural road, surrounded by forest, Theo sits in the left shotgun while Julian’s behind him. She removes a ping pong ball and the two play a game of blowing and catching it in their mouths. Soon the ball drops and the two begin making out and the camera pans back to the front of the car where dozens of motorcycles with riders holding weapons cruise by and fire toward their position. Still going, Luke stops and reverses. Julian catches a bullet to the head and dies and Theo fights off some of the motorcyclists, where again in the same take, he opens his door to slam them off their bikes before Luke finally stops the car and the camera - still rolling - gets out from the car with them to decide what to do. Luke decides to take them to their terrorist outpost in rural London where through another brilliant use of the camera, Cuarón allows us to join Theo as he sneaks around the house; soon hearing that they plan to kill both Theo and Kee once she has the baby in order to use him as leverage in the pending revolution. Theo decides to act quick, waking up Kee in the middle of the night who escapes, providing another thrilling moment, which is straight out of a first person shooter game; as we remain with Kee and Theo while they bounce from car to car looking for keys, all while hearing some terrorist guards having a discussion throughout the complex. In a wide, Theo and Kee ride in a car down a hill while the others chase them down the hill, hoping to catch up before they can start up the vehicle and gain some speed. Theo drives on to Jason’s to help buy some time, though it’s not long until the terrorists catch up. Jason gives them their car and points them to a way out. Later distracting the terrorists with his charming self, then getting shot dead and Theo suddenly realizes how close he is to all he’s been ignoring. They’re led to an abandoned school where Kee’s water breaks; later meeting a Romanian woman Marichka who helps them with the bird; who, by this point, we assume has the worst intentions. With the revolution launching an offensive against the British she leads them to a dingy apartment where we watch the full action of the baby coming out, which seems a bit too much until you think of how good it looks. Later they meet a man named Syd (Peter Mullan) who learns of the bounty on their head, who attempts to turn them over to the Fishes until Theo clobbers him in the head with an old car battery. Nevertheless, the fishes catch up to them, stealing the baby as British soldiers close in on their position and so begins one of the most impressive - if not the most impressive - single take ever captured on video, which I somehow completely forgot about while getting sucked into the story. The Fishes led by Luke kidnap Kee and her baby at gunpoint as gunfire pours in from all directions. He works his way through the labyrinthian urban streets as Fishes lead the soldiers onward, ending up in a rundown apartment complex and heads onto a public bus to take cover where someone gets shot. Blood covers the camera and Theo exits, discovering a British tank dialed in on the Fishes position; blowing up the entrance and Theo heads inside, up the stairs, searching for Kee and then finding her next to Luke. The greatest long takes function as some of the greatest passages in literature or even the greatest scenes from film; in which they transcend language by pushing the craft to its very brink; where most can agree of their beauty. A scene like this is something where I assume even the below average movie watch would find it incredible, even without ever realizing its marvelous technical feat Theo survives the ordeal, escaping with Kee and the baby through the sewer system, though getting shot along the way. They make it to The Human Project. The baby survives but Theo doesn’t; sacrificing his life for another as a result; the way those closest to him did as well. It expresses such a poetic message - that in a time when humans can no longer procreate, to sacrifice one’s life to amend the problem is the greatest gift someone could provide. My friend watched this film about a year ago, just as Trump’s immigration debate started up once again. Most have now forgotten how disastrous the Bush administration was. They look past Katrina, 9/11, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Abu Ghraib and its torture policy, the PATRIOT Act, and the failure to get Bin Laden or end Islamic Radicalism. We now remember Bush as a decent man who upheld the office and the whole criticism seems so weak. I’m sure most of us wish we could pass on candies to former political opponents in order to gain the respect of all. So we see elitism, and like Theo’s cousin, those who live in guarded communities and in the high rise tower are completely detached, watching the world burn below. Trump’s radical immigration policy best connects to this story. Many ask what they themselves would have done if they were in Germany during Hitler’s rise. The sad truth is few of us are doing anything now. People say they are burnt out and tired of the endless scandals (this entry was written two years ago); hoping for 2020 to arrive so things can return to normal, and refusing to accept that Trump has demonstrated how frail our country is. What scares me isn’t Trump, but what Trump is showing other evil geniuses; that our institutions can be corrupted and the checks and balances can easily fall into line. The question is what happens when climate changes make a more dire impact and millions of refugees flee from the inhabitable desert, or if another global financial crisis hits - if the wrong person is in charge what becomes of other people’s rights and how much will we care? It’s wonderful to imagine we’ll change like Theo, but then I think of how many other people he knew who never changed at all; who kept watching the world crumble. I’m not sure when a setting like Children of Men will occur (if ever, of course), but minus the infertility, of all dystopian tales, this seems like the most prescient. BELOW: Cinema at its finest Like what you read? Support the site on Patreon Please report any spelling, grammar, or factual errors or corrections on the contact page  Director: Josh Safdie Writer: Josh Safdie and Eleonore Hendricks; Josh Safdie, Andy Spade, and Anthony Sperduti Cinematographer: Brett Jutkiewicz Producer: Brett Jutkiewicz, Sam Lisenco, Zach Treitz, and Josh Safdie by Jon Cvack NOTE: I wrote this about 18 months ago before seeing either Good Time (2017), or of course, Uncut Gems (2019). I had received Good Time (2018) from Netflix, reading about it on a few lists and watching a couple of interviews with the filmmakers. I started it up and so began the type of movie where within ten seconds I knew I was watching something incredible; so much so that I turned the film off, wanting to watch it with my girlfriend, finding it on Amazon Prime and returning the disc; never syncing up with my girlfriend as we were still trying to get through the last five Sopranos episodes. I’m approaching an age where my generation of filmmakers are starting to come to fruition. Ari Aster’s Hereditary (2018) served as a fantastic debut from the 30-year-old filmmaker, 32-year-old Damien Chazelle is at the top of Hollywood with Whiplash and LaLa Land, and I’m now discovering that the 32-year-old Safdie’s have just released their fifth feature. They have a fascinating though mysterious story in that after graduating from Boston University, they were approached by Partner & Spade to create a commercial. They were provided a $200,000 budget, in which they produced the commercial for 10% of that and took the rest to make The Pleasure of Being Robbed, opting to shoot on film and making you understand how they spent a $180,000 on a 65-minute mumblecore film. It would premiere at SXSW and win the Grand Jury Prize, and so their careers were launched. The Pleasure of Being Robbed is about a kleptomaniac Eléonore (Eleonore Hendricks) who wanders the streets of New York, stealing people's purses and bags. In the opening scene, she approaches a random woman on the street, acting like they know each other, hugs her and say they should hang out, before walking off, bag in hand. I get the feeling that this was actually a random woman they approached rather than an actor, which is genius. She then steals a man from Fifth Avenue’s bag as his doorman helps him unload the car, taking it back to her apartment along with a bag full of kittens. Later she steals some grapes from a fruit stand and somewhere between all this, she plays in a ping pong parlor. We then get into the meat of the story when she steals a pair of Volvo car keys and bumps into an old friend Josh (Josh Safdie) who helps her track down the car and drive her home. They spend the night together and she leaves the next day, heading to a park where she conspicuously snoops through a mother’s apartment who screams for help. Eléonore gets arrested and the cops stop at a zoo where she begs them to let her visit for ten minutes, which for some reason one of the cop grants, gets booked and then released and that’s it. The Pleasure of Being Robbed came out at the peak of mumblecore, offering a story that’s more of a slice of life, in which a shaky camera and mumbling characters are combined into a meandering narrative; often excused when compared to the New Wave or Rossellini's post-war work, as though just because it’s rough, shaky, and handheld with no plot, there’s a need to celebrate it. While Eléonore was an interesting character, I knew no more going into the film than coming out. I’m not sure what I was supposed to learn other than that there are some weird people out there with complex personalities. It’s not a bad movie, it just blends in with all other mumblecore filmmakers - early Duplass brothers, Joe Swanberg, and Andrew Bujalski. Few of their films are bad, but many of them blend together; in which it’s more about individual images and moments than the grand narrative or style. Perhaps that’s the point. If pressed, given their down to Earth personalities and humor, it almost feels like the Safdie's pulled a fast one on the film world; to make us think we were watching something heavy and profound, when it was all meant to be meaningless. Then again, when I'm pulling the credits, I notice Benny's name is not on any of the film, so maybe he was the missing ingredient. BELOW: Weird though prescient scene of where the Safdie's would go Like what you read? Support the site on Patreon Please report any spelling, grammar, or factual errors or corrections on the contact page |
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