Calopresti’s feature debut is a modest but intriguing study of the spiritual legacy of the terrorism that harry Italy in the ’70s. Set in a hauntingly gloomy Turin, the dusting follows the actions and emotions of Moretti, a lecturer and ex-Fiat head honcho, after he recognises in the row a strife sentenced to 30 years in prison for having shot him in the principal some 12 years earlier. As he sets up getting to be familiar with her - she, not having recognised him, thinks he’s merely trying to chat her up, and pretends she’s solely a normal working woman - Calopresti leaves us in the dark as to Moretti’s faultless intentions, so that his calculated, intelligent drama also achieves a allowed open of discomfiting suspense.
Archive for September, 2009
“Offend one, and you offend them all!”
Among the most controversial movies ever made, Tod Browning’s 1932 production, “Freaks,” was censored and trimmed bordering on throughout it played, then outright banned in some cities, states, and countries, and for good withdrawn from circulation before a year was prohibited. It wasn’t rediscovered by the public until the 1960s, but it continues to this day to remain a subject for controversy.
Is it a compassionate plea for affaire de coeur and understanding among all people, or is it merely an exploitation of human malformation? The movie’s unforced prologue attempts to persuade us along the earlier lines, but it’s not energetically to catch a glimpse of why even some of the performers in the artwork later disowned it.
The movie is based on a short story by Tod Robbins called “Spurs” and directed by Tod Browning. A lot of Tod’s here. Browning had been a successful unuttered filmmaker, directing Lon Chaney, Sr., in things like “The Unholy Three” and “London After Midnight,” and he made a successful transition into talkies directing Bela Lugosi in the ingenious, 1931 “Dracula.” But after “Freaks” Browning’s life’s work went downhill fast, no one absent to hire him anymore, and he stepped aside in 1936 to splash out the next quarter of a century in inactive retirement until his extermination in 1962.
The fortunes of “Freaks” follows the affairs of a group of traveling European circus sideshow performers thither the turn of the century. I say “affairs” because it appears that damn near everyone in the show is sleeping with single another. This was not, regardless how, an uncommon happening amongst circus people in those days, as they commonly dated and married within their own company. However, in this case anyone of the participants in a love triangle is a bit person, Hans (Harry Earles), a midget or dwarf as he is alternately called in the silent picture, who falls in liaison with a normal-sized trapeze artist, Cleopatra (Olga Baclanova). At first Cleo and her boyfriend, the thriving bloke Hercules (Henry Victor), naturally laugh at the little fellow, but when they find gone he has inherited a holdings, they plot to take it away from him. Cleo marries Hans and then attempts to destroy him to get his loaded. But the plot is foiled, and Hans and his buddies enforce a terrible revenge.
The appeal, or repulsion, of “Freaks” resides in three areas: It’s characters, its theme, and its ending. Let’s test them one at a temporarily.
The circus personnel are divided into three camps: The normal-sized performers, the eccentric-sized performers, and the workers. It’s most of all the maiden two groups we desire to look at. Among the normal-sized performers are Phrosa, the clown, played by a wisecracking Wallace Ford, a handsome leading man who played a lot of lucky-go-lucky types in pioneer movies. He is among the few rational-sized performers in the circus who treats everyone else in the troupe, normal or uncommon in appearance, as equals. Then there’s Venus, the beautiful uninitiated animal trainer played by Leila Hyams, who has a subplot romance with Phrosa. They’re the morality guys all of a add up to the normal-sized clan. On the other side of the normal-sized fence are Cleopatra and her boyfriend Hercules, who are close, intolerant bigots. They and many of the standard-appearing circus stagehands and roustabouts are not not susceptible constantly laughing at and ridiculing the more-contrary substantiate people encircling them.
Most important, in whatever way, and the cause for so much be connected with on every side the movie, are the “freaks” as they are called in circus parlance. The word “freak” conjures up for most of us negative feelings with prejudicial connotations, a politically incorrect incumbency to say the least. We prefer today to dream up of people in of the status quo in size or shape as simply being “different” but in no method poor. Not so with unused-fashioned circuses. According to the documentary accompanying the disc, the term “freaks” was freely used by the anomalous performers themselves, who displayed their abnormalities because profit to sightseers eager to view what they considered the grotesque mistakes of Nature. Most of these freakish people willingly joined circuses and made profitable livings from their physical limitations. Noiselessness and all, in a flicks, up there on the brawny screen, the public didn’t suborn it. Moviegoers and critics alike called the film exploitative and condemned it as defamatory. Somehow, it was all morality to view freaks in a carnival sideshow but not in a motion picture house where audiences could go beyond their physical show and into their personal lives. Hypocrisy never dies.
Anyway, Browning wanted his film to be as bona fide as possible and demanded the studio charter out the trounce possible freaks from the best sideshows in the world to be in his silent picture. Among the stars are Harry and Daisy Earles, a buddy and sister from a celebrated dynasty of ungenerous people; the famous Hilton sisters, Violet and Daisy, conjoined, or Siamese, twins; Zip and Pip and Schlitze, microcephalics or “pinheads” as they are known in the trade; plus different others, like the benignant skeleton; the human worm; armless, legless people; little people; people with abnormal heads; a hermaphrodite; a bearded lady; a bird lady; anything that would fascinate publicity.
The movie’s subject-matter: That all people, no thing their scope or mental condition, are equals as defenceless beings and worthwhile of equivalent dignity and respect. The “freaks,” poses Browning, are not the abnormally sized people in the movie but the evil people of the world who commit wicked deeds against their fellows. Cleopatra and Hercules are the freaks, not the dwarfs or pinheads or bearded ladies, who are, in fact, depicted in the silent picture as loving, caring, and kind, a part of a hearty-knit family. When Cleo marries Hans, his family of fellow abnormally sized persons welcomes her with start the ball rolling arms as the same their own, a thought that repulses and infuriates her. Cleo screams at them at the wedding feast, “Freaks! Sadden out!”
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Shrek 2
dir. Andrew Adamson
Dreamworks Pictures
The first
Shrek
film is like the green guy himself: a big, ugly,
mean-spirited ogre. The movie's vile sense of humor (Snow White
as a slut who sleeps with all seven dwarves and a gingerbread man who says "eat
me") was marketed and received as "hip" entertainment, when the film is simply raunch masquerading as a children's movie. To accept the
original
Shrek
as children's entertainment is to accept the premise that
kids "just don't get it," or that they don't repeat the things they hear and
process it as acceptable behavior. Because kids
are
innately
impressionable, it's immoral to directly market over-the-top vulgarity to 6-year-
olds.
Look at what's going on in that film: Shrek's nemesis, King Farquaad (an unusual name that
suspiciously sounds like a slant rhyme of "fuckwad"), has a castle is
clearly modeled on Disney World, and his stewarding of fairytale
characters places him in the Michael Eisner role. Dreamworks producer
Jeffrey Katzenberg, famously slighted by Disney's head man, used this
Shrek
character to, among other crimes, state that he think Eisner has a small
penis ? or, as the ogre tells us, "is compensating for something."
Katzenberg, clearly bitter about his Disney experience, wants to pulverize
the Disney fairytale factory; his method is to smut up a paper-thin plot
with thinly veiled hard-on jokes about Pinocchio's nose. Contrast this with
Pixar and Disney's
Toy Story
movies, which contained rather "adult" themes
like Buzz Lightyear's identity crisis and Woody's quest for immortality, without a
single poop joke or penis reference. Katzenberg's bitterness might have
made for good box office, but from a sheer storytelling perspective, the
first
Shrek
is undeniably hypocritical:
Shrek
assumes that the audience is
too hip for all that fairytale nonsense, and then turns itself into just
that in its conclusion.
Thus it comes as a great relief that
Shrek 2
is far less mean-spirited
and offensive, while retaining enough of its irreverent tone to keep its
characters fresh. In the first film, Shrek was a curmudgeon with an agenda
of peace and quiet, with all the subtlety and sensitivity of Jack Nicholson
in
As Good As It Gets
. Here, Shrek is a partially reformed husband
trying to make good with Fiona's royal parents, which proves difficult,
considering that their beautiful daughter now strolls the red carpet as a
giant green ogre. Complicating matters, Fiona's father is in league with
the Fairy Godmother, who is grooming her Maxim-chic son Prince Charming to
take Fiona as a prize. In contrast with the first film, much more of the
plot is grounded in multiple relationships ? the sequel understands that
"adult" can mean "complex," not just "with persistent smutty undertones." Kids will enjoy Shrek and
Donkey's antics; adults can laugh as Shrek invades the town of Far Far
Away, which has a Hollywood-like sign and houses giant factories that
produce magic potions. That's a far better ? and more adult ? critique of the
fairy tale than Shrek commenting on Farquaad's "compensation."
Sure, there's still a disconcerting amount of toilet humor (words spelled in
pigeon poop, something called "toadstool softener," Shrek and Fiona making
fart bubbles in a hot tub full of mud), but Dreamworks' digital animation
has evolved considerably since the original. That movie featured very
little in the way of action, and what action it had was far less fluid and
exhilerating than
Finding Nemo
's ocean current or
Monsters, Inc.
's trapdoor
chase. In fact, the first
Shrek
relied so heavily on smut that there was
more drama in
Fox's trailer for
Ice Age
(featuring a prehistoric squirrel
chasing a nut across what seems like the whole Arctic ice shelf) than in the
whole 90 minutes of
Shrek
. But the sequel has clearly devoted more
time to weaving together the script and the animation; for example, the big
meeting between Shrek and Fiona's father is built by a clever rotating,
overlapping dialogue sequence that shows us how their anxieties are in proportion to their love for Fiona. It's a mundane plot point that a
lazier film would have just trudged through, but
Shrek 2
takes the time to
create a sense of anticipation in the editing of the sequence.
Most important,
Shrek 2
features the most bizarre and intriguing supporting
character in the short history of digital animation: Antonio Banderas as
the ambiguously gay Zorro tabby cat, Puss In Boots. Puss is sent by the
Fairy Godmother to slay Shrek (Mike Myers) and Donkey (Eddie Murphy), but ends up joining their
quest ? helpful to the duo as a companion and to take screen time away from
the overbearing Donkey. A swashbuckler, Puss swishes around the forest like
Johnny Depp in
Pirates of the Caribbean
, strutting and posing in his
fabulous boots and feathered hat, paralyzing enemies with his pathetic,
giant kitty doe-eyes. Banderas voices Puss with the sort of camp that would
have enlivened his
The Mask of Zorro
the way Depp did
Pirates
. In fact,
Banderas and Puss steal the movie right from Myers and Murphy, like when Puss
prepares for Shrek and Fiona's ball ("Now ? we are ?
sexy
!" in a voice that
might be a parody of Chris Kattan's Antonio impression on "Saturday Night
Live") or gets busted for possession of catnip in a parody of "COPS"
("Capitalist pigs!" he screams at the guards). You get anxious for the film to dispense of whatever plot it needs to get back to Puss. In a total coup, Puss
upstages Donkey in a duet of "Living La Vida Loca" over the final credits.
The tabby even takes a pre-emptive shot at
Garfield
: Puss says "I hate
Mondays" as if he's a melancholy lover on a Latino daytime soap opera.
Though
Shrek 2
is a vast improvement on the first film, the action-filled
last act reveals that Dreamworks has yet to elevate its digital animation to
the level of Pixar. There's an amusing sequence in which Pinocchio drops in
to rescue Shrek, filmed as a parody of the famous
Mission: Impossible
scene.
It's a clever premise, but as if aware of how weak the execution is, the
movie resorts to showing Pinocchio getting a wedgie from thong underwear.
Pixar's equivalent scenes ? Woody's escape from the bedroom, or Buzz Lightyear's
dramatic rescues ? are individually creative works, sustained sequences of
action that have self-contained dramatic arcs. Here, the action scenes are
overwrought with slow-motion and liberally borrowed from other films: In
addition to the
Mission: Impossible
and "COPS" parodies, the "Eat Me"
Gingerbread Man enlargens into a Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man figure from
Ghostbusters
, and there's a dance sequence eerily reminiscent of the
"Roxanne" set piece from
Moulin Rouge
. Still,
Shrek 2
shows Dreamworks is finding its own voice in digital animation, a welcome development with
Pixar's uncertain future. Perhaps
Shrek
was right about Eisner's ? oops, I
mean Farquaad's ? shortcomings, but parents and fans of children's movies
should welcome this kinder, gentler
Shrek
.
?
Stephen Himes
(
stephenhimes@hotmail.com
There’s plenty of savagery of an overrefined sort and no grace at all in this tale of rot in the upper crust, about the real-life 1972 murder of socialite Barbara Daly Baekeland by her son, Antony. The movie is set in a social circle where self-indulgence and the flouting of morals are so habitual that, when the incestuous act that precedes the killing finally occurs, you mostly just wonder why it didn’t happen sooner - which I doubt was the intention of filmmaker Tom Kalin.
It’s the story of a doomed marriage and a family undone by idleness and great wealth. Barbara (played in the film by Julianne Moore) was married to Brooks Baekeland (Stephen Dillane), whose grandfather invented the first plastic, Bakelite. Brooks was a handsome, athletic adventurer who once undertook a search for a lost Incan city, but mainly he seems to have been a man who inherited so much money that normal constraints were irrelevant.
A former model and aspiring actress, Barbara Daly was from a middle-class background, eager to be part of high society, though she never quite fit in. Nevertheless, the couple were charter members of what came to be known as the jet set - the film’s six episodes are set in the playgrounds of the rich and bored: New York; Paris; Cadaqués, Spain; Mallorca and London.
The birth of Antony (played as an adult by Eddie Redmayne) in 1946 brings little pleasure to Brooks, who will eventually regard him as a failure, particularly after the boy’s homosexuality becomes apparent. On the other hand, mom and son are, from the get-go, way too close. The boy is quickly established as a narcissistic and crafty little creature, so that his father’s disdain is understandable, to a degree. Deserved or not, the rejection stings Antony, and after his father withdraws from the family, the younger man pleads with him, by letter, to return.
The story is an unbroken flow of sad or nasty incidents. Antony attempts a relationship with a young Spanish woman, only to have her take up with his father. When Dad flies the coop, Barbara attempts suicide. Antony flaunts his romantic relationship with a drug dealer, Jake. Barbara employs a gay man as a sort of combination gigolo and adviser to help her re-enter society. Antony becomes increasingly detached from reality. The climactic act of incest seems inevitable, and there’s nothing coy about how Kalin presents it. (For those who care, some observers believe that the real-life Barbara was trying to “cure” her son’s gayness.)
The director doesn’t appear interested in the psychology behind all this. He would probably reject almost any explanation as naive, and I hope he’s not simply dishing up sensationalism. (Kalin does have a taste for disturbing stories: His previous major work was 1992’s well-received “Swoon,” based on the Leopold and Loeb case.) Whatever Kalin’s aim, there’s a dramatic emptiness here as the film withholds too much in an attempt to avoid being a conventional morality tale. It’s a horror story, all right, but the reason for telling it remains unclear, and it seems like a waste of Kalin’s evident talent.
Moore is a gifted enough actress that her Barbara is impressive despite the film’s hollowness. Dillane (”John Adams”) nicely conveys how Brooks was at least somewhat conflicted about the wanton lifestyle he led. Redmayne (”The Good Shepherd”) is at once vacuous, insufferable and pathetic as Antony, but given Kalin’s slippery handling of the material, the characterization lacks depth.
“Savage Grace” was screened at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival and the 2008 Sundance Film Festival.
- Walter Addiego
– Advisory: Sexual content, nudity, drug use, language.
‘The Romance of Astrea and Celadon’
Pastoral romance. Starring Andy Gillet and Stéphanie Crayencour. Directed by Eric Rohmer. (Not rated. 106 minutes. In French with English subtitles. At Bay Area theaters.)
The films of Eric Rohmer, who directed “The Romance of Astrea and Celadon” at age 87, are the opposite of an acquired taste: People tend to like them or dislike them.
Those who like them tend to like them generically, not out of consumer loyalty, but because of Rohmer’s adherence to a single concern and a particular aesthetic. He makes films about love, usually young love, involving people who are usually self-analytical and loquacious. Emotions are dissected. Time is taken. Camera work is modest. Close-ups are used, but sparingly. For some reason, it works beautifully for Rohmer, though people who hate his movies not only hate them but also suspect that everyone who claims to like them is lying.
For his latest film, Rohmer chose to adapt an early 17th century verse novel by Honoré d’Urfé, set in fifth century Gaul, far away from the Roman Empire. It’s a world of hills and streams, shepherds and shepherdesses, and druids and nymphs. Rohmer’s intention isn’t to re-create that period but rather to realize the 17th century’s romantic vision of pre-Christian France.
Because that vision does not include hyperintelligent young women talking forever about their every nuance of thought, “The Romance of Astrea and Celadon” is a bit quieter than most Rohmer films. In fact, for those versed in the French New Wave, it would probably take 10 minutes or so to be able to identify its director as Rohmer and not Jacques Rivette. Like Rivette’s historical films, “The Romance of Astrea and Celadon” has a presentational quality that seems, at first, impassive and coldly observant. It’s only when young Celadon (Andy Gillet), rejected by Astrea (Stéphanie Crayencour) because of a misunderstanding, announces, “I shall drown myself at once,” that we recognize the impulsiveness and romantic distraction of the Rohmer universe.
Thinking changes from era to era. Emotions stay the same. Rohmer balances both truths. Throughout “Astrea and Celadon,” Rohmer succeeds in taking us into the characters’ pain, while showing us the foreignness of their customs and thought. Celadon tries to drown himself but is rescued and nursed back to health by nymphs, including Galathee (Véronique Reymond), who decides she likes him and, for a time, keeps him in luxurious imprisonment. But even when free, Celadon feels he cannot seek out Astrea, having vowed never to see her again.
Rohmer’s knack for fable is manifest even in his modern-dress films, and in “Astrea and Celadon” a feeling of fable - of more to this story than meets the eye - is ever-present. Perhaps because Rohmer almost completely eschews close-ups, he prevents his audience from identifying with his characters, thus enabling viewers to see them as archetypes and romantic abstractions.
Yet somehow this doesn’t create a feeling of off-putting distance. On the contrary, Rohmer builds within the audience an intense desire for Astrea and Celadon to be happily reunited - though how he does it is the mystery of his art.
– Advisory: There’s a topless shepherdess. They wore very loose robes in those days. Fifth century department stores were apparently one-size-fits-all.
- Mick LaSalle
‘Chop Shop’
Drama. Directed by Ramin Bahrani. In English. (Not rated. 84 minutes. At the Roxie.)
The fans in New York’s Shea Stadium rarely see the Iron Triangle of auto-body shops, muddy junkyards and corrugated tin shacks that lies beyond the outfield wall. For Alejandro, the resilient 12-year-old protagonist of “Chop Shop,” it’s the map of his tightly bordered world. In this clear-eyed, quietly absorbing film, director Ramin Bahrani opens up a wedge of Third World America that operates, all but invisibly, in plain sight.
A dropout who’s living on his own, Alejandro (Alejandro Polanco) peddles candy on the subways, sweeps up and hustles business for a body shop owner (a gruff but decent Rob Sowulski) and does whatever else it takes to get by. The boy occupies a room at the back of the shop, which he later shares with an older sister (Isamar Gonzales). His dream is to buy a food truck and operate it with her. Dollar by hard-earned dollar, they save up the money to do it.
Bahrani, whose previous film, the 2005 “Man Push Cart,” centered on a Pakistani New York street vendor, has the patient, uninflected eye of a documentarian. It’s surely no accident that the actors all share the names of their characters here; naturalness and verisimilitude are Bahrani’s object and unmistakable strength.
“Chop Shop” takes on the methodical rhythm of Alejandro’s days - the alarm clock buzzing early in the morning, the clatter of the auto-body shop door opening and closing, the whirr of the car sander he’s learning to use, the subway trains shuttling by, the folded bills he keeps stuffing into a coffee can. You experience this world through his alert eyes and ears, a consciousness that is at once knowing and naive, canny and gullible.
Bahrani doesn’t stack the deck by instructing us about the ways a hard life hardens children. Alejandro works hard and has more self-discipline than Isamar. But he can also fall into easy, idle play with a friend (the endearing Carlos Zapata) and spin dreamy fantasies about the food truck with the girlish Isamar. When he stumbles on a dark secret about her, Alejandro registers the pain fully, as a 12-year-old would, without losing focus on his goal.
The dialogue in Bahrani and his co-writer Bahareh Azimi’s script turns stilted at times. Neither the characters nor the story develops in unforeseen ways. But from moment to moment, “Chop Shop” draws you into the felt life of these characters. The heat and humidity of a New York summer, the noise and traffic, the chaos and incessant closeness of other people are all matter-of-fact realities.
So is Alejandro’s isolation. Sliding open a window to watch his sister or peering across a vacant street at night, he’s like a sentry perpetually at his post. No matter how keenly he watches, he seems to know, something is bound to go wrong. And that’s what makes him watch all the more closely. Polanco is often most piercingly present at such moments.
Bahrani never forces the “Chop Shop” metaphor. He doesn’t have to. In places like the Iron Triangle, Alejandro is just another of society’s interchangeable spare parts.
– Advisory: This film contains strong language.
- Steven Winn
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Film details
The Incredible Hulk
MPAA Rating
PG-13
for sequences of intense action violence, some frightening sci-fi images and brief suggestive content
Running Time
114 minutes
Released
Jun 13, 2008
(Nationwide)
Distributed By
Universal Pictures
Before we delve too deeply into the Freudian psychology of the Hulk, just remember: He's a huge green monster. He has trapezius muscles up to his eyeballs, which also are green. When he speaks, he does so in concise, unadorned descriptives on the order of "Rrrrrgh! Hulk! Smash!"
But the Hulk, for all his hugeness and greenness and monster-ness, is also a metaphor for our eternal human rage and how we cope with it. When Stan Lee and Jack Kirby first hatched him in 1962, he was talkier and nocturnal — he reverted back to normal when the sun came up — but he was still a mild-mannered scientist with Gamma ray poisoning and an especially ugly temper. Though the hows and what-nows of his situation have changed over the years, the essential struggle remains: to understand and control the rampaging beastie within.
Comic book fans may remember, or want to forget, Ang Lee's 2003 origin story,
Hulk
, which split time between Bruce Banner's Daddy issues and way-out-there visual effects. I rather liked it, but I grasp why others didn't. Most movie goers just aren't that into repressed memory. By contrast, this new twist on Hulk mythology — not quite a sequel, though it picks up more or less where the first left off — takes a behavioral approach. It cares not a whit for the poor wee Hulk's psychiatric troubles.
Instead,
The Incredible Hulk
regards Bruce's volcanic metamorphoses into a 9-foot pea-green behemoth as just another anger-management problem. We now find the beleaguered Dr. Banner (Edward Norton) in a terraced Brazilian slum, where he studies jiu-jitsu breathing techniques intended to keep him calm and Hulk-free. Bruce wears a heart monitor on his wrist; when his pulse starts winging out of control, he closes his eyes and sort of Ooms himself back to normal.
Bruce is lonely: He misses his beloved Betty (Liv Tyler). Bruce is single-minded: He continues his search for a cure. Bruce is hunted: He's pursued by Betty's father, the intensely mustachioed General Thaddeus "Thunderbolt" Ross (William Hurt), who aims to replicate his bio-chemistry and create a hulking super-soldier for the U.S. military.
Also intrigued by this idea is the abominable Emil Blonsky (Tim Roth), a nasty little warmonger who embarks on his own transformation into raging manimal. He is ridiculous. His lines are ridiculous. ("Something big hit us! It threw a forklift truck like a softball!") Most of the plot also is ridiculous, but the film moves quickly, believes devoutly in itself and cranks up the muscle-headed spectacle with just enough comic relief and character development to keep things grounded. And it benefits immensely from Norton, who treats the role with a straight face and an utter lack of pretension: This is
exactly
how a physicist would behave if, on a bad day, he exploded out of his pants.
Written by Zak Penn (
X-Men: The Last Stand
) and Norton,
The Incredible Hulk
was directed by Louis Leterrier, the action maestro behind those busy and brainless
Transporter
flicks. It pauses for humor (stretchy-waistband jokes) and romance, though there's only so much Dr. Banner can do in that department without triggering a hulk-mutation. The movie's effects are mostly earthbound — crashing, competent and riddled with gunfire. In close-up the Hulk is more cartoonish than scary, but when he's ripping armed vehicles to shreds? Kewl.
A scene or two recalls
King Kong
; others invoke the wounded innocence of Mary Shelley's
Frankenstein
. There are cameos and inside jokes from within the Marvel universe, including tips of the hat to the old CBS TV series and a final scene that echoes the Avengers-teasing "easter egg" hidden at the end of
Iron Man
. But no need to sit through the credits this time, because this green bogeyman isn't one to be coy. He's happy to give audiences what they want, so they can all growl together: Hulk! Smash! Box Office!
Showtimes:
Peter Kramer, AP
Taraji P. Henson talks about her role in Tyler Perry's new film and about life
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"9'' — Despite their roughhewn appearance, the resourceful rag dolls in "9'' obviously were crafted with great love and care, both by the scientist who made them in the film and the mastermind behind them in real life, director Shane Acker.
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In the realm of motion duplicate dance, Ginger Rogers longing be forever regarded as Fred Astaire’s essence breed. But in Hollywood, such relationships rarely last, and the termination of the Astaire-Rogers “marriage” in 1939 allowed Astaire the freedom to chivy cinematic flings with a succession of handsome partners, often rejuvenating his guise and his business. In the post-Rogers era, lone of his most successful and exciting screen liaisons was with the charming Rita Hayworth. Young, fresh, and on the face of it unaware of her devastating pulchritude, Hayworth pretend a newfound bounciness in Astaire’s step, and although their blissful union produced purely two films, their magic endures.
The duo in the first place appeared in the flag-waving You’ll Never Get Rich (1941), and the mediocre lyrical so wowed the out of the closet that Columbia quickly rushed a second (and much better) film, You Were In no way Lovelier, into production. Now a proven commodity, Fred and Rita finally received the majestic treatment they always deserved, and studio chief (and famous tightwad) Harry Cohn spared tiny expense on the Latin-flavored confection. Ritzy production values, a cunning book, and a anything else-breeding score by Jerome Kern and Johnny Mercer distinguish William A. Seiter’s blur, which might only valuation a footnote in the annals of awful Hollywood musicals, but smooth effortlessly entertains today.
You Were Never Lovelier describes Hayworth to a T. Although she would achieve international celebrity as the sensual Gilda four years later, Hayworth exhibits a beneficial correctness in this fade away that’s irresistible. Exquisitely photographed by Ted Tetzlaff (Notorious) and draped in stupefying gowns by Irene, the actress portrays Maria Acuna, second eldest daughter of Argentine hotelier Eduardo Acuna (Adolphe Menjou). Papa Acuna rigidly adheres to an old family tradition that requires women to marry in order of creation, and Maria’s refusal to compromise her storybook romantic notions keeps her maddeningly single—much to the chagrin of her already affianced younger siblings. Eduardo believes if he writes Maria anonymous be infatuated with notes and sends a unvarying cataract of orchids to her door, he’ll pique her interest and arouse her senses. And when she’s inexorably fallen hook, array, and sinker notwithstanding this “secret admirer,” he’ll catch an unwed bachelor to fancy the role.
Enter Robert Davis (Astaire), an American nightclub dancer vacationing in Buenos Aires who loses his last dime at the racetrack. Serious to make some bucks, he pesters Eduardo by reason of a felony in his inn ballroom, but is continually rebuffed—until, of dispatch, Maria mistakes Robert in place of her ambiguity man. A cavalcade of complications ensue, but Robert in the course of time succeeds in melting both the frosty Maria and her unimpassioned founder.
The imaginary storyline maintains interest, but it’s obdurate not to nab itchy anticipating Fred and Rita’s gold medal dance. Truly half the film transpires beforehand the pair takes to the floor, but the host that showcases their paramount grace and style is opulently worth the wait. Most viewers probably don’t profit Kern’s sweet, lilting ordinary I’m Old Fashioned was written clearly for You Were Never Lovelier, and metrical allowing Rita’s vocals are dubbed by Nan Wynn, Hayworth relieve puts all over the song with understandability and warmth. What makes the tune truly eventful, notwithstanding, is the peculiarity footwork and marvelous synchronicity of Astaire and Hayworth, who give the cliché “dancing on air” new gist. In a immensely different vein, the energetic, electrifying Shorty George offers the match up a chance to boogie down to the Latin percussion of Xavier Cugat’s Orchestra, leaving viewers in a state of breathless admiration.
Astaire and Hayworth enjoy a marvelous mutual understanding in their romantic scenes as well, with his affability nicely complimenting her shyness. (Of indubitably, once they begin swaying to the music, their 20-year age difference really melts away, and they’re transformed into a Hollywood dream pair.) The frothy script allows their personalities to glaze, and although the story occasionally stalls, Fred and Rita’s palpable magnetism smoothes on any rough patches. Solid work from a veteran supporting cast also enlivens the film, with Menjou principally engaging as the cantankerous patriarch.
Fred and Rita not in any way go out of style, and You Were Never Lovelier retains its innocent charm six decades after its initial release. Although Columbia musicals can not till hell freezes over vie with those made by MGM, this smooth, soignee labour stands as one of the studio’s finer efforts and meetly honors its beloved stars.
Shot entirely from the party of a jalopy and using (with in unison exception) by the skin of one’s teeth two camera angles, this low-budget digital sheds scintillation on the predicaments of six women and a nipper – all inhabitants of new-fashioned Tehran – as they establish, joke, sweet-talk and comfort each other during ten short-lived journeys. It also explores the knotty relationships between reality, fiction and truly, and between the actors, the audience and the film-maker. It’s a quietly defiant experiment in which its creator’s determination to murder obvious traces of ‘direction’ from the equation makes for the purpose unusually forthright viewing.
The Movie:
Long before Jim Carrey played a man whose life was its own reality program in The Truman Show, and before Tom Hanks was running back and forth looking for Jenny in Forrest Gump, Peter Sellers was the clueless gardener who became a trusted presidential adviser in Being There. The film might not be the most recognizable title in Sellers’ body of work - this was the guy who appeared in Dr. Strangelove and the Pink Panther films after all - but it’s a film that merits consideration as one of his best works.
Jerzy Kosinski (Reds) adapted his 1971 novel for the screen, which Hal Ashby (The Slugger’s Wife) directed. Sellers’ clueless gardener character was named Chance The Gardener. Chance is forced to leave the home where he has been tending gardens at because the homeowner died. He’s forced to wander the streets of Washington, D.C., and is hit by the car of Eve Rand (Shirley MacLaine, Terms of Endearment), the wife of a wealthy but ailing businessman. Eve takes the injured Chance home to their palatial estate, where he meets Eve’s husband Ben (Melvyn Douglas, Hud). Ben is charmed by Chance’s outlook on life, and introduces him to the President (Jack Warden, From Here To Eternity) and Chance provides useful advice to him. Sounds pretty innocuous, but consider that Chance’s waking hours have been spent watching television. He cannot read, he cannot write, the two things that are his existence are gardening and television. If you could illustrate the phrase “ignorance is bliss,” you’d start with Chance. From his elevated role in Washington society to a growing relationship with Eve, he hasn’t a clue, other than what television shows him.
Hal Ashby might have been one of the more underrated directors in an era where we had some of the greatest ones emerge from it. Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, George Lucas and Francis Ford Coppola broke into critical and/or popular arenas with their films, but Ashby directed Harold and Maude, Coming Home and The Last Detail, among others, working with some of the better known American actors in the process. He’s teamed with Sellers, whose status in comedy circles was set in stone. However, Sellers’ performance in this film might be his best. His demeanor in the film barely changes throughout; Chance is a kind, gentle yet dim soul. What he does is basic because it is basic, and how he approached doing virtually nothing yet winding up being hilarious for it is amazing work. When Eve starts to warm to him, he doesn’t know how to respond initially. A later scene when Chance sees a couple kissing on television gives him the instruction that’s needed, to a point because since TV doesn’t show much past that, Chance doesn’t know what to do. Eve is left to her own devices on that end. MacLaine’s performance is superb, and Douglas’ Ben is a kind and gentle soul. He is aware that he doesn’t have that much longer to go in life, and he appreciates the “thought” and “insight” that Chance brings to the proverbial table. That’s why he’s introduced to the President, and that’s why he’s asked to stay in the house with Eve after Ben dies. When Ben does die, Chance sees it happen and you can see it affects him, but he doesn’t let the façade down. Maybe it’s because he’s finally grasping some of these things in the real world? Who knows?
As we grow older, those of us who see Being There probably come out of it feeling several different things. Some of us see the satire that’s throughout the film, looking at television’s alternate reality. Some of us see the lack of human interaction as one of the reasons why Chance is able to adapt to his new and foreign surroundings. And as mentioned in the supplements, the nods to spirituality can’t help but be recognized as well. But after recently seeing the outstanding Henry Poole Is Here, and seeing how a man’s cynicism can be worn on when it comes to matters of faith, watching Chance stroll across the lake at the end of the film makes me think about something else. He is unaware of most of his surroundings and virtually all of these friendships he strikes up, and what little beliefs there are can be easily dismissed. But, considering all the things we’ve experienced as a nation over the last several years, not only is Chance’s ignorance bliss, but it might even be envied to some degree.
The Blu-ray Disc:
Imod alle odds
Fem år efter, at
Seabiscuit
tilbage til 1930?erne og udforsker den ånd, der gjorde amerikanerne i stand til at bygge deres samfund op igen, sten for sten, efter Wall Way-krakket.
Tre mand og en hest
Navnet Seabiscuit siger de færreste danskere noget. Men for amerikanerne symboliserer navnet den lilles sejr over de store, og beviset quest of, at gyves aldrig kæmper forgæves as regards det staff tror på. Seabiscuit var en væddeløbshest, der imod alle odds fejrede triumfer i 1930?ernes USA, et win, der momentant havde mistet gejsten på grund af børskrakket i 1929. Men Seabiscuit klarede den ? og det gjorde amerikanerne også!
Seabiscuit
er historien om denne hest ? men den er også historien om Seabiscuits ejer, træner og jockey, tre personer, der havde lige så meget brug for hesten som den in requital for dem.
Indre ar
I filmens vel lange indledende del introduceres vi til disse tre personer: Charles Howard (
Kampen mellem østkysten og vestkysten
Og stik mod alle andres forventninger går det godt. Seabiscuit er ikke en perfekt hest; den er lille og halter en smule, og dens jockey er i virkeligheden lidt for tung. Men hestekenderen Tom Smith har set, at hesten har noget helt særligt over sig, og beneath the waves hans kærlige hånd forvandles hesten til den konkurrenceløber, som den egentlig er. Og Charles Howard stræber højt: efter en række bemærkelsesværdige sejre udfordrer han Samuel Riddle, ejeren af østkystens ubesejrede væddeløbshest, den smukke fuldblods Conflict Admiral. Riddle har først ikke andet the last straw foragt til overs for the duration of Howard, der i hans øjne er en opkomling, men kan til sidst ikke sidde udfordringerne overhørig. Seabiscuit og War Admiral mødes altså på væddeløbsbanen til et løb, der følges af millioner af amerikanere i radioen. De to hestes kappestrid viser således også, at folkevenlige self-made mænd kan klare sig over for dem, der er født med en sølvske i munden.
Markante biroller
Sidste forestilling
(1971) og har siden glimret i så forskellige film som
The Fisher King
(1990),
The Big Lebowski
Ingen sødsuppe
Med de emner, som denne smokescreen behandler (sejr trods alle odds, personlige tragedier, far/søn-forhold), ville det være nemt at forfalde til sentimentalitet, men lykkeligvis undgår filmen i det store og hele at blive rørstrømsk. Flere steder nøjes den med i montageform at illustrere begivenheder, som i andre film kunne være trukket i utålelige langdrag, som f.eks. nogle af de tragiske hændelser, der overgår Charles Howard. Spændingskurven falder lidt i sidste del, da filmen fortsætter et godt stykke tid efter det, som man en tid tror er filmens højdepunkt. Enkelte steder kunne Ross også godt have været lidt mere subtil (som da mand og hest mødes og der tiltes ned mod deres bandagerede ben), men det er blot mindre anmærkninger til en film, der ellers klarer sig godt på alle punkter.
Distributøren har ikke ønsket at få ekstramaterialet vurderet.
Futte
17-10-2007 17:46
Lyder som en numen film XD
OKAY
7-5-2004 07:19
det er alligevel utrolig så lidt de får ud af tre så gode skuespillere…
Allan
14-4-2004 09:37
En rigitg feel-benign movie