New Movie A Day: Next 167 Days

Watching a movie a day is really hard. The plan has derailed. In the next 90 Days I only manged to watch 34 movies. So I've caught the list up to present to represent more movies. All in all I've watched 128 new movies this year. So far. There's still over 100 days left in the year to catch up.

Here are some highlights:

Spike Lee films - I went through and watched several of Spike Lee's older films and I have to say I am not a fan. I think they fail on a lot of attempts, either from poor writing, odd formal elements or just that they're really bad. I can't tell if that means Do the Right Thing is that much better or maybe Do the Right Thing is actually not that great. What I think is the case is that he just happens to get the recipe right in Do the Right Thing. He mixes the right amount of social commentary with story. His other early works, with perhaps She's Gotta Have It, the mixture is way off. School Daze is so all over the place and un-cohesive that by the end when all of sudden every black character is out on the quad looking at the camera the message has never sunk in. This awakened moment is un-earneMo Better Blues has a narrative but it's so lightweight that it becomes boring by the second half of the film. And this is the straw that broke the camel's back with Lee acting in his own movies. He's a joke when he tries to act alongside the powerful Denzel Washington. Washington is the best part of that film and He's Got Game. He Got Game is probably the best of the early Spike Lee films, perhaps because it's not that early. But it has a stronger plot and some interesting characters. The B plot with Milla Jovovich really doesn't work and could and should have been cut from the film. Jungle Fever works on a lot of levels, but is really really dated with early 90's music and art direction. John Tuturro and that storyline actually is one of the best parts of the film, overshadowing in my mind even the main plot, partially because Tuturro is so good, but also it's more subdued and not as in your face with its half of the message.
d and out of place.

Major Disappointments - I was so looking forward to Dogtooth. The premise sets up so thoughtfully, but it never fully pays off. It would have paid to have a stronger structure, at least some structure because as is it's slightly random and in-cohesive. La Dolce Vita is a huge disapoint too. Another film where a little more structure would have gone a long way. It too was kind of just a string of scenes, that while are fun and interesting themselves, don't pay off as The Last Picture Show was slightly disappointing. I just never quite got into it. Anchorman 2. Now the definition of major disappointment. The fall off is tremendous from the first film to this one. The one bright moment is the epic newscast fight toward the end, which basically became the point of watching the film once it's realized the film awful.
much at the end.

Slight Disappointments - The Raid 2 will not be making any top ten lists. The first one is so tight and effective. This one is basically a martial arts crime film. Not the worst thing but just not as unique as the first film. My Neighbor Totoro was good but not one of my favorite Ghibli films. Totoro doesn't show up till 45 minutes into it. Although the huge highlight of the film is Catbus, my new favorite character of any Ghibli film.

Major Surprises: After Earth. It really wasn't that bad, just a little bad. The Lego Movie. It's true: Everything is Awesome, including this film. The hype is justified, it's super fun and awesome. I was nauseous the whole film and managed to hold off throwing up until the very end when I ran to the bathroom and vomited into the movie theatre toilet. The movie good enough to hold off my vomit. Totally worth it.

The Grand Budapest Hotel - My favorite film of the year.
I smiled the entire time in the theater. It was so delightful.

All is Lost - I think there are two or three bits of dialogue in the whole film. Amazing. Perfect minimalist film making, it's captivating from start to finish.

The sound work is stunning as well, there are other parts where the sound is prime in telling the story so well.

79. Apr 2 - 12 Years a Slave - award winner

80. Apr 2 - Fail Safe - compare to Dr Strangelove

81. Apr 3 - Anchorman 2 - just for funs

82. Apr 5 - Much Ado About Nothing - love the play

83. Apr 6 - He Got Game - unseen Spike Lee film

84. Apr 7 - Freakonomics - prep for class on Documentary

85. Apr 9 - Empire of the Sun - unseen Spielberg film

86. Apr 12 - Doctor Zhivago - unseen AFI Top 100 film

87. Apr 14 - Mo Better Blues - unseen Spike Lee film

88. Apr 15 - End of Watch - student suggestion

89. Apr 16 - Thor: The Dark World - pop culture

90. Apr 18 - School Daze - unseen Spike Lee film

91. Apr 19 - Blackboard Jungle - youth culture study

92. Apr 22 - Another 48 Hrs. - study of film sequels

93. Apr 27 - My Neighbor Totoro - unseen Miyazaki film

94. Apr 27 - Foreign Correspondent - unseen Hitchcock film

95. Apr 28 - The Guilt Trip - on the dvr 

96. May 2 - The Three Faces of Eve - students paper on mental illness on screen

97. May 6 - The Grand Budapest Hotel - Wes Anderson!

98. May 10 - Jungle Fever - unseen Spike Lee film

99. May 11 - After Earth - on the DVR, pop culture

100. May 12 - Muppets From Space - with the boys

101. May 14 - Frances - a students paper on mental illness

102. May 15 - Princess Mononoke - unseen Miyazaki film

103. May 17 - The Lego Movie - with the boys

104. May 20 - Dogtooth - sounded extremely interesting

105. May 24 - Escape from Alcatraz - unseen prison film

106. May 28 - Westworld - unseen sci-fi classic

107. May 31 - Escape From Tomorrow - pop culture, indie film

108. June 7 - Wall Street - unseen classic

109. June 8 - Freebirds - with the kids

110. June 16 - La Dolce Vita - unseen foreign classic

111. June 19 - The Firemen's Ball - unseen Milos Forman film

112. June 22 - All is Lost - unseen film from 2013

113. June 29 - The Secret Life of Walter Mitty - pop-culture

114. July 1 - Bringing Out the Dead - unseen Scorcese film

115. July 5 - Begin Again - went to the theater

116. July 8 - Shadow of a Doubt - unseen Hitchcock film

117. July 9 - The Last Picture Show - unseen classic

118. July 15 - The Life of Emile Zola - unseen classic

119. July 20 - All of Thomas Edison's short films to 1903 - unseen classic

120. July 21 - Tiny: A Story About Living Small - interesting doc

121. Aug 7 - The Raid 2 - just for funs

122. Aug 10 - Magnificent Obsession - unseen Douglas Sirk film

123. Aug 15 - The Cat Returns - unseen Studio Ghibli film

124. Aug 21 - Lone Survivor - pop culture

125. Aug 24 - Amazing Spiderman 2 - pop culture

126. Sep 2 - Saftey Last - unseen silent comedy classic

127. Sep 9 - August: Osage County - awards contender

128. Sep 10 - Captain America: Winter Soldier - pop culture

New Movie A Day: First 90 days

This year I decided to set a New Year's Resolution of watching a new movie every day. I've always felt so behind in what I haven't seen, this is the way to try to get over that. There's been plenty of missed days, and a few days with multiple new films to try and catch up, but it's pretty hard to consistently find the time to watch a new movie every day, especially since I also spend time re-watching some classics for other things and classes. For the first three months (90 days) I watched 78 new films. Here are a few highlights.

I watched a lot of films from 2004 I've previously missed because I'm going to do a "Am I a Lover or Hater of Film" for 2004. Worst film I've seen this year comes from 2004. The Butterfly Effect. It fails as a film on so many levels. The story is awful, makes little sense and takes way too long to get going. The cinematography isn't that great, neither is the sound design (which uses some very un-creative sounds). Then the theme I think is just ultimately poor and wrong. Closer is a close second. I thought it was awful, pointless and actually really boring.

I also watched a lot of new films from 2013 to catch up on what I missed. Her was amazing, and my favorite film from last year so far. I was also a big fan of American Hustle, it had me engaged the entire time. Short Term 12 is a hidden gem from the last year. Gravity was pretty amazing as well.

There are also plenty of classics. As I go over the list there's one film I can't remember at all: Monkey Business. It's a Howard Hawks comedy, but after that I can't remember one thing about it. Another forgettable film is the Marilyn Monroe iconic film Seven Year Itch. Monroe is hardly in it, mainly it's following a married guy in the summer when his wife and kid are vacationing and he keeps running into his upstairs neighbor, Monroe. It sets up for a good comedy, but then keeps getting bogged down by the awful inner thoughts and monologuing of the dorky main guy. The most iconic part of the film is the subway air vent blowing Monroe's skirt up, but the film version is nowhere near as interesting as the still photos that are usually shown instead, which is a wider shot and shows all of Marilyn including the fun look on her face. The photo attached here is not within the film, but a publicity photo. In the film, we never see her face and the skirt blowing up in the same frame, or the guy looking on.

One of the most interesting classics I saw was the grandfather of zombie films: White Zombie. The film is about a white woman that gets taken under the spell of a...plantation owner or wizard or Count..who knows what he is, but he's super creepy. He turns regular people into mindless workers, aka zombies in the voodoo tradition. It follows in the tradition of classic horror/monster movies of fear of the taking white women and what could happen to them. The entire film has some very creepy sets and locations, including the opening countryside where zombies come out of nowhere at one part and in another the travelers run into a funeral taking place in the middle of the road.

Maybe the best film was Capote. It seemed before like just one of those biography films where it's carried entirely by the lead actor and everything else is sort of at the behest of just that, like Ray (a good film but nothing without the performance of Jamie Foxx). Capote is carried by Hoffman as Truman Capote, but the entire film is amazing, from the cinematography to the supporting cast. It can be hard for a biopic to move beyond just telling events to getting to the heart of the character, and even moving deeper than that to why it's so important of a story. Themes in biopics can be very shallow and sometimes unclear. Sometimes that's because they try to cover too much and that gets lost in the scope of a person's life and sometimes it's because looking at just one person's life isn't always as valuable as important events or fictional stories that become better metaphors than true life accounts. What happens with Truman Capote is almost symbolic of a society losing it's soul and heart with the type of violence and disregard for life being seen in America through that time period. The lack of color through the film really shows this dismal outlook. This film was interesting in so many ways, it was engaging and one of the best biopics ever made.

Frozen was pretty good too. The hype is mostly justified. Because of the kids, we ended up watching this film 3 times over that weekend, and many parts of it since. It reminds me of when we got Aladdin on VHS when that came out. We watched it every day for a week and it didn't get old. Frozen is just that classic Disney film that is so easy to watch and so easy to get stuck in your head. And there's nothing wrong with the film at all; it's a simple, easy story that doesn't offend (unless you have some weird anti-gay agenda that some blog is supposing). As well, it's actually interesting how the film turns normal fairy tale tropes on its head in a very "wink and nod" sort of way. "You got engaged to someone you just met?!?" "But it's true love!" 

Here's the total list of films, with the reason for seeing them

1. Jan 1 - Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978) - comparison to the original

2. Jan 2 - The Wolf of Wall Street - awards considerations

3. Jan 3 - The Philadelphia Story - AFI Top 100 list

4. Jan 4 - Maria Full of Grace - from the year 2004

5. Jan 6 - Butterfly Effect - from the year 2004

6. Jan 8 - American Hustle - awards contender

7. Jan 8 - Cat on a Hot Tin Roof - I own the DVD 

8. Jan 9 - The Wolverine - just for fun

9. Jan 10 - Rise of the Guardians - on the dvr 

10. Jan 11 - Howl's Moving Castle - from 2004

11. Jan 13 - The Ladykillers - from 2004

12. Jan 14 - Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy - previous award considerations

13. Jan 14 - Fruitvale Station - awards considerations

14. Jan 16 - For Whom the Bell Tolls - from list of Hemingway films

15. Jan 16 - Justice League: Doom - just for funs

16. Jan 17 - Short Term 12 - awards consideration

17. Jan 20 - American Psycho - comparision to Wolf of Wall Street

18. Jan 20 - The Sea Inside - from 2004 (Best Foriegn Language film)

19. Jan 21 - Life is Beautiful - blaring hole for not having seen it

20. Jan 22 - The Butler - award's consideration

21. Jan 23 - Chronicles of Riddick - from 2004

22. Jan 24 - When Worlds Collide - sci-fi cultural comparision to Invasion of the Body Snatchers
23. Jan 24 - Mitt - I don't know

24. Jan 26 - The Color of Money - Scorcese film I haven't seen

25. Jan 27 - Journey to the Center of the Earth - comparison to other 1950s sci fi

26. Jan 29 - Captain Phillips - awards contender

27. Jan 29 - Resident Evil - glaring hole in pop culture reference

28. Jan 30 - Her - awards contender

29. Jan 31 - Monkey Business - a Howard Hawks film

30. Jan 31 - Blue Jasmine - awards contender

31. Feb 1 - Monsters University - own the DVD, with kids
32. Feb 3 - Don Jon - awards contender

33. Feb 5 - The Manchurian Candidate - from 2004

34. Feb 9 - Being Julia - from 2004

35. Feb 12 - From Here to Eternity - classic film on AFI list

36. Feb 12 - 48 Hours - to study the sequel Another 48 Hours

37. Feb 14 - Closer - from 2004

38. Feb 14 - Admission - for Valentine's Day!

39. Feb 15 - Gravity - awards consideration

40. Feb 17 - Dogville - from 2004

41. Feb 19 - Kung Fu Hustle - from 2004

42. Feb 20 - His Girl Friday - for feminist film theory

43. Feb 20 - Vera Drake - from 2004

44. Feb 21 - The Spectacular Now - awards contender

45. Feb 22 - Hansel and Gretel Witch Hunters - pop culture reference 

46. Feb 23 - Das Boot - unseen classic, and DVD was on the shelf

47. Feb 26 - Ender's Game - pop culture and awards contender

48. Feb 26 - The Lady Eve - feminist study

49. Feb 27 - Spirited Away - huge pop culture gap

50. Feb 28 - All the President's Men - on AFI list, unseen classic

51. Mar 5 - Rush - awards contender

52. Mar 7 - Dallas Buyers Club - awards contender

53. Mar 7 - The Bling Ring - pop culture

54. Mar 8 - I Don't Know How She Does It - with Betsy 

55. Mar 9 - Sanjuro - unseen Kurosawa film, and I own it

56. Mar 11 - Play it Again, Sam - unseen Woody Allen film

57. Mar 11 - Inside Llewyn Davis - awards contender

58. Mar 13 - Monuments Men - for class

59. Mar 14 - She done Him wrong - classic film, feminist study

60. Mar 14 - The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence - unseen classic

61. Mar 15 - An American Werewolf in London - with Boopie

62. Mar 16 - Girl Most Likely - I love Kristen Wiig

63. Mar 17 - The Exorcist - unseen classic

64. Mar 18 - Yesterday - from 2004, nominated for Best Foreign Oscar

65. Mar 19 - Man With a Movie Camera - unseen classic

66. Mar 19 - Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom - awards contender

67. Mar 21 - White Zombie - unseen classic

68. Mar 21 - Baby Boom - feminist study

69. Mar 22 - Frozen - with the boys

70. Mar 23 - Monsters - interesting concept

71. Mar 24 - Born into Brothels - from 2004

72. Mar 24 - Oz the Great and Powerful - pop culture

73. Mar 26 - The Seven Year Itch - unseen classic, feminist study

74. Mar 27 - Jules et Jim - unseen classic

75. Mar 28 - Red Dawn - pop culture

76. Mar 29 - Capote - past awards contender, relates to book on Cold War culture 

77. Mar 30 - Written on the Wind - Douglas Sirk film, feminist study

78. Mar 31 - Paranoia - a student's research paper

Finally My Best/Favorites of 2012 or Am I a Hater or Lover of Film 2012 Edition

Because I don't get to the movie theater as often as I like, I must rely on Netflix more than I like to watch the new great films. Which means the previous years awards winners aren't viewed until....May.

There's still a few outstanding on the list, but I feel confident that I can pick my favs and best films of the year from what I have seen.

10. The Grey - Bringing up the rear is a big surprise film that I didn't know how I would like it. But its simplicity of story and the amazing awesomeness of Liam Niesen draws you in. He's as captivating as in any other film he's ever been in. That's sort of all you need to know. The plot is rather simple, but that's something modern movies sort of pass over too much these days.

And Liam Niesen is fighting wolves.





9. The Avengers - Speaking of over-blown, plot heavy Hollywood monstrosities. It took 5 films just to set up the story of this movie. At times it seemed a little too complicated for it's own good (they spent an awful lot of time at SHIELD), but the characters were so well done. Joss Whedon should been rewarded simply for that. The arch of the team is so well managed. It wasn't the greatest film but it was really, really fun.

8. Zero Dark Thirty - And speaking of really fun movies. There's nothing like watching a 3 hour film about a decade long chase for a man hiding out in a compound being chased by people staring at computers and torturing people. But in all seriousness...I think it was fantastically well done. It is NOT The Hurt Locker by any means.....but that's the point. This film shows how modern warfare is really done...with satelites and phone hacking. I love The Hurt Locker, I think it is also a tremendous film, but this film Here's my mini review from a Facebook comment:

"The most amazing thing about the film is how reserved the movie is. From the character development to the pacing. I said after it was over to Betsy, I loved the music. She asked "why, it didn't stand out." I said, "Exactly." It was the music in the Bond film where it's slowly building while Bond is working and really doing his job well. The music, like the film, is not the grand climax. It's the slow, drawn out, paced endurance that is at the heart of the film. It might even be the theme of the film: We didn't catch bin Laden in the explosive invasion of Afghanistan, we caught him by putting our heads down and going to work. President Obama said something like we aren't going to "spike the football" afterward. American cinema is always going to be great at spiking the football. Our action films pretty much define America as football spikers, and when we go to the theatre, we want to be shown that. It was just nice that the film about our greatest post 9-11 triumph didn't spike the football. It just put it's head down and methodically went to work. (Maybe it was a little long, though.)"

7. Argo - Speaking of spiking the football! Well....spiking it 30 years later in a semi-fictionalized form. I wish this film had kept more to the facts, though, it would have made it feel more authentic. Seriously, maybe it's just my trivia hungry, history checking mind, but I kept thinking during the film, "Did it really happen like that?" I knew for sure, there was no way, the Iranians were driving down the runway at the end chasing the plane as it was taking off...it just seemed too film-climaxy to be true. And sure enough, that and a lot of other stuff was not true. But...it's based on real events, it's not real events. So just looking at the film, it was great. But is this better than Zero Dark Thirty...or why do I like it better? I'm just like everyone else...Argo was just more entertaining. It was fun to watch Americans stick it to the Iranians with the use of ingenuity and wit to outsmart them. More fun usually wins out.

6. The Hunger Games - And speaking of more fun. A fun game where youths are forced to kill each other in an arena. I honestly just like this film because I read the book. Or rather, I listened to it on a long car ride. It isn't perfect. I don't like some of the details of the world the book and film created. At times it seems rather far fetched. But that being said, I also think there are some really great things about the world that was created. Especially the visuals...District 12 was extremely well done...and the capitol is outrageous. All in all...not the most unique premise...but as an amalgamation of great sci-fi tropes and set-ups, it does pretty well with what it has.


5. Safety Not Guaranteed - And speaking of a film doing the best with what it has. This is the low-budget time travel movie that you didn't really expect to have any time travel in it. This was like the Hipster Time Travel film. It has the awkward girl from Parks and Recreations and the loud mouth from New Girl and together they balance out quite well. There actually isn't much to say about this. It was just so damn charming....and it sort of snuck up on you like that. Next thing you knew you were rooting for the awkward girl and the weirdo and it was over. And it was so cute.

4. The Raid: Redemption - Moving onto a film that is the opposite of cute. I don't usually get into Asian cinema, but for some reason this one reached out to me and said "Rent me." So I did. And I loved it. The big reason is the premise. A SWAT team is taking out a drug lord who controls a tall building. Floor by floor they make their way up taking on swarms of bad guys. I love situations like this...for one, it takes place all in one location and secondly, I just love the idea of people going through a building and taking out a whole gang. Sort of like Last Man Standing with Bruce Willis. There's a lot of shooting in that film and a lot of busting into rooms and shooting people. And there is a lot of shooting in this film. And some really good fighting. It takes a while for the emotional plot to get going, but that's actually a positive. The emotional arc never feels forced, it isn't cheesey or out of place. There was a perfect balance between awesome action films and actual dramatic story progression. Some might say it's the best action movie in decades.

3. Moonrise Kingdom - At this point it gets tricky. I love Wes Anderson. I love all his films and he might be my favorite director. And I absolutely loved this film. It's almost too Wes Anderson perfect though. Maybe in years to come this will be the film I return to from 2012. In fact, I know that will be the case. But the films ahead of this one are there for two separate reasons.

2. Silver Linings Playbook - I loved this film too. A lot. It was hilarious. And engaging. And it had Robert De Niro being amazing. This sort of took the mantle from Little Miss Sunshine and all the Oscar worthy dramedies that have come out in the past decade and it went one step further. The characters had more depth. The situations had more comedy and the story was so much more engaging. It was just a dramedy about a family in one weird situation after another...it was a family with meaningful characters stuck in a not so weird situation that somehow seemed kind of weird. Honestly, at any moment the film could have de-railed and gone wrong. But it never does. It sort of beautifully is one long de-rail that makes you realize in the end it was on the rail the whole time, the rail was just cockamamie. Silver Linings Playbook was a beautiful cockamamie masterpiece.

1. Wreck It Ralph - Yes! Hardly ever do I feel like watching a movie twice in a row. I didn't with this movie, but I felt like it! I won't spoil the film by overly discussing it. But it was freaking awesome. And finally John C. Reilly....finally the role he was born to play. He always seems sort of off in whatever role he's in, like somehow he took the mantle from Keanu Reeves in awkward acting style. He was the father in We Need to Talk About Kevin....and he did not belong there. He hardly ever belongs. But he did in this film! So good...and Sarah Silverman....amazing! I love Cinema!!!!!



Honorable Mentions:
The Hobbit (Great film, but a little long)
Lincoln (Great film, but too much talking)
Django Unchained (Great film, but way too much N-word)
The Dark Knight Rises (Good film, but way too little Joker)
Dredd (Good action film, but way too much copying of plot of The Raid: Redemption)
Prometheus (Great sci-fi film, but way too many plot holes)
Hitchcock (Best bio-pic of the year. But I don't like bio-pics)
Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (Bad film, but has what Lincoln was missing)
The Perks of Being a Wallflower (decent film, but really captured what high school was like in the 90's)

Dark City and the dark cinema of the 90's

The late 90's were kind of a blur. The technology that had been imagined and sometimes used in some sense was now coming around into everyday use. Cell phones, the internet, even cloning was real. The future was here. Or was it? People were still wearing jeans, rock and roll was still popular, but somehow the world was struggling to deal with it all. The world was moving faster and faster. For the first real time, computers were being outpaced at faster rates than consumers could purchase them. And all of a sudden in the world, a person alone could be in so many places at once and almost be no where at all. This is the time  frame that brought us a new range of film that like previous generations was struggling to cope with the world around. Some of the questions were the same; why am I here, who am I, what does it all mean. These questions have been asked since story crept into film, but now something new was happening. Filmmakers started questioning man's very existence. Where are we? Are we even we? These films weren't just thinking outside the box, they were questioning the very box's existence.

The Matrix, The Truman Show, and Dark City all landmark this trend, that has seen American film make the transition into the 21st Century, asking the questions that true art should be asking, and asking them in new ways.

The Truman Show was ahead of the reality show curve that came at us later in the 90's, took over in the 00's and hasn't left us still. Truman is a man who is living unawares in a tv show based all around him, where everything is fake; from his friends, to the town he lives in, to the sky above him. His first clue is a studio light falling from way up above. His world is literally coming down around him.

In The Matrix, the world as we know it is actually a computer program that we're plugged into to feed machines off our energy. In the Truman Show at least what he was doing was real, the world he knew was real, it was just fake. And outside his studio home, the world existed normally. In The Matrix, the whole world was fake. But still, you had your identity, you were still you, just an imagined self image, with flaws and talents. And again, the world outside The Matrix was real, albeit a futuristic wasteland.

In Dark City, mysterious aliens control a city, which is set in space, where they experiment on humans to try and find out what makes them unique; swapping out their memories and cycling them through endless cycles of lives. They not only control the city, by shifting building and streets to their choosing, they shape the lives of the people, changing jobs, spouses and sometimes circumstances and situations. In Dark City, the place isn't real. The world outside that place is empty. And your identity isn't even real. Where are you? What are you doing here? And most importantly, who are you?

A look at the evolution of Dark City's influences will help shed light on both social history and it's ties to the cinema that was made at the time. The most obvious influence to Dark City is, of course, Metropolis. (One of my favorite films of all time, and partially the reason I'm in the film industry.) The allusion to Metropolis is most obvious in it's production design and apparent themes. Metropolis is about a society literally split in two, where the upper half controls the lower half, literally. The poor live below and the rich live above. We can look at the simplicity of the film and laugh, but early cinema was by it's nature, and by necessity, very simple. What's so very clear in Metropolis is who is controlling the city and it's inhabitants. It's simple class struggle, but set in the distant future. It's social commentary about class warfare was fitting to it's time. In Dark City, class structure is joked about in one sequence, where the "Strangers" are placing lower class people into a rich person's setting with new memories of that life. But they know nothing of the switch, and the film moves on. What was so obvious with Metropolis, the idea of a whole society taking back control, basically through revolution, is still present with Dark City, but it follows one man. This one man is a theme shown in many of the modern science fiction films, dating from even Star Wars on to The Matrix, The Truman Show and Dark City. This one has the power in him all the time, but he's got to learn to control it, and with that power he can change everyone else's lives. Even in The Truman Show, where everyone knows the truth but him, he triumphs and allows everyone else to triumph with him and see that you can break the shackles.

Metropolis also brings in the expressionist motif and theme; the world around is distorted and dark. It doesn't always end up like it should, just like it doesn't look like it should. In Dark City, the city is ever changing, even the walls can turn into doors. Both sides, the humans and the Strangers, are somewhat at a loss for what's real. The Strangers keep changing the city and the memories, but the Strangers are also at a loss for what's inside the human's mind and soul. They can't seem to figure out what makes the humans tick, and they especially are at a loss when Murdoch begins using their powers.

The other great influence to Dark City is film noir. The film has all the trappings of a great noir; the hardened detective, the singing dame, the man waking up over a dead body not knowing what happened. Blade Runner is often touted as the great mix of Noir and Sci-Fi, but I don't think it fits so well as with Dark City.
These three science fiction films are the pre-cursors to the first genre films of the 21st Century. By the 2000's we were no longer questioning technology, and by extent science fiction films went back into asking the same questions science fiction had always been asking, what will we do when...we can clone, when zombies take over, when AI will kill us? Superhero films and merging of sci-fi and disaster films have taken over, i.e. Transformers and Cloverfield. It will either take another science or technology breakthrough to jolt the minds of filmmakers or a new set of filmmakers to begin asking real questions again to make the genre new and relevant.

Paisan: Italian Pick of the Month

I'm not a huge fan of Italian Cinema, or even European, even though my favorite foreign film is Cinema Paradiso (never ever ever watch the Director's Cut, it will ruin your experience forever, and you'll be forced to go to a memory doctor like in Eternal Sunshine to get the memory removed.), which is an Italian film. But I'm going through a lot of old European films to catch up for school and I've come across Roberto Rossellini's war trilogy films. The first one, Rome Open City, literally was made right after the Germans were pushed out of Italy. Then Paisan was made a year later in 1946, when the Allies were still in Italy. As is the case with a lot of post-war European films they used real people to play the parts. So for example in Bicycle Thief, they got a guy who gets off on stealing bikes. In Paisan, he got real American soldiers to play the Americans, and real street urchins to play the street urchins, and etc etc. 

Despite the annoying "realism" of the actors, this was a remarkable war film, perhaps one of the best ever made. And yet it features no battle scenes, and hardly any actual combat. It's mostly about how the soldiers interact with the Italians as the Allies push north through Italy. The film is divided up into different stories, set in sequence. First, when the Allies land in Sicily, then later when a city becomes a military hub, and in the North during the Germans last throes of combat in Italy. The theme through each part has to do with the lack of communication between the soldiers and civilians. The great thing about the structure of the film is that Rosselinni kept all the storylines separate, rather than try to connect them to seem clever, like so many episodic films of today do. There's nothing clever about writing a bunch of separate stories together to make them seem like coincidence. Magnolia, Babel, Crash....these aren't clever or fantastically artistic. The real skill comes from having different stories connect on a deeper level, finding meaning in their unique details, despite taking place hundreds of miles apart and at different times. From the opening sequence when the Americans need a town girl to help them, but only one guy speaks Italian and he leaves. Then they don't care about her later when they think she did them wrong. Compare that to the last sequence, when the Special forces soldiers are fighting alongside the partisans, and still there are some communication issues, but each is willing to die for the other. Each story in between is about the growth between the soldiers and people, and how they get from wanting to kill each other to willing to die for each other. Seeing that transformation provides a deeper connection into what it means to be at war, both for soldiers and civilians affected by it.

8: The Mormon Proposition

I will try my darnedest to be fair and honest in my review of this film. I've been interested in seeing it since it was playing at the Newport Film Festival, but didn't want to support the film monetarily because from everything I'd seen and heard it had an agenda and portrayed what I believe in an unfair way. And now after having seen it, I agree. But as a critic, I give my unbiased review below.

8: The Mormon Proposition - I can categorize most modern documentaries into 2 categories, based on Michael Moore's last 2 films, Sicko and Capitalism: A Love Story. Sicko being on the good side of the scale and Capitalism on the other. While both appear to tackle a contemporary issue, Sicko does it well. Capitalism seemed to be too little, too late. Everything in the film had already been in the news so much over the previous few years that the film was merely acting as a receptacle for the topic; gathering it into one place, then vaguely putting a spin on it. The film never attempts to offer any new insight into the issue, other than saying that Americans have a love affair with capitalism to their detriment. You sort of get a sense that Moore is hinting that communism is a better system, but he never addresses it or offers any insight into changing America's apparently screwed up system.
Sicko headbutts the healthcare debacle and doesn't care who stands in its way. Moore gets right into the middle of the issue from the get go. He hits the audience where it's vulnerable and like it or not, what he presents is hard to ignore. By the end, even if you don't agree with Moore's stance, you agree that something has to be done to fix the problem. And maybe because the first time I saw it I was in a dark theater, I actually cried during the film. (Email me if you want to know at what part.) (A hint, it actually was during a part that had little to do with healthcare.)
So where does 8 stand? Closer to Capitalism. It basically is a collection of news and events we've all seen so many times over the last 2 years since Prop 8 passed. It pushes back the curtain on the Mormon church's involvement, showing internal documents about their strategies and showing some video footage of church leaders rallying Mormons to action, but how revealing is that? Everyone knows the Mormon church was involved. And guess what, any organization that's involved in something is going to have "internal documents." Mormons aren't psychic. (Yet.) And what did they reveal? The church wanted to stay out of the public eye, use coalitions, and guess what....get their members involved. This is what Mormons were so worried about getting revealed? I actually was worried that they had footage from the broadcast that I attended, where they asked members to get involved. I thought, 'Oh man, what are they going to show that's going to be out of context and revealing?' Footage of the broadcast was shown intermittently throughout the film, masked behind secret looking graphics(probably because the quality was poor because it was a bootleg copy), but what was said may be shocking to those who have no clue what the Mormons are about, but to anyone else, it was pretty basic. Mormons believe in their religion and beliefs pretty strongly, so why is it a surprise that in the broadcast to members, they invoke the name of their savior and tell the members to use Twitter and blog?
Again, without taking sides, this wasn't very shocking. In fact, any of the tidbits and reveals dealing with Prop 8 weren't shocking at all. In fact, the film is actually very "vanilla" when it deals with Prop 8 and gay marriage in general. Never does the film offer any insight into the issue, any solutions or any unbiased presentation of the pro-Prop 8 stance. It actually hardly even presents the gay marriage stance. What was the point of this film then?
The last section of the film was actually the most thought provoking and eye opening. It deals with the Mormon culture's acceptance of homosexuality (or lack thereof). It looks, very briefly into gay teens, teen homelessness in Utah, and the suicide rate among gay teens. This should have taken up more time. If the filmmakers were bolder, more daring and dare I say it, more like Michael Moore, they would have honestly and directly faced these issues. But they spend a sparse few minutes with a group of homeless teens in Salt Lake, and spend just barely enough time on the suicide rate. But even then, they never get in too deeply into the reasons behind it or offer any solutions or direction.

But this film wasn't about the particulars of gay culture in Utah, it was about Proposition 8, and the Mormon ties to it. It's a shame they never got anyone within the church to be in the film, because I feel like there are so many Latter Day Saints that could have represented the church's side well. And because of that, we were left watching ex-Mormons saying why the church is bad, upset gay couples, liberal politicians, and some stock footage of Utah politicians with big mouths. It's a shame that this film didn't actually address the core of the issue and the points of view involved, because this is such a divisive and pressing issue, and rarely has logic been presented on either side effectively.

Everyone....Meet John Doe

Films get lost to history for several reasons, sometimes they suck, sometimes the reels are lost, but sometimes a filmmaker makes more memorable films that overshadow other good ones. I think that's what happened with Frank Capra's Meet John Doe. Because It's a Wonderful Life and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington are such remembered Capra classics, Meet John Doe is just not mentioned as much as perhaps if it were made by someone else. Maybe if it was made by someone else it would have been totally forgotten, who knows. It's a shame, though, because it's taken me this long to come across this forgotten classic, which I haven't immediately embraced as one of my recently watched favorites.
Meet John Doe is perhaps more Frank Capra than Capra's other films. It's a classic good guy in a dilemma piece, except here there are a few dilemmas. First, we have the newspaper reporter played by the amazing Barbara Stynwick. (Looking less sexy than her Double Indemnity wig wearing self, but still pulling off the working woman reporter cutie look. This was Lois Lane before Lois Lane was Lois Lane.) She loses her job to cutbacks, but writes one last column to stir things up. She writes an "open letter" to the editor saying she's John Doe and is fed up with the world, threatening to throw himself from a building on Christmas Eve. The letter makes a splash, as she hoped, but too big of a splash. People are clamoring for John Doe, to help him, to marry him, to offer him a job. So what does the editor do? First, he listens to her crazy ideas and then he acts on them, hiring a man to play the John Doe, then building him up as a new American hero, writing columns about the travesties in the world.
Next we have the John Doe, who's hired by the paper to play the down and out man. He's humble, perhaps a little too humble. Soon, they have him going around the country, speaking at rallies, inspiring people. A super tycoon invests in the whole enterprise, and then John Doe Clubs start forming all over the country, started by people who want to help their neighbors. A mass of people has join this new cause, all built around knowing your neighbor and helping him, and standing up for the little guy.
Stynwick is torn because it's all gotten so huge, and the tycoon keeps building this bigger and bigger, and she's started to have feelings for John, but where does it all end? It can't end good for them. And then John, of course, is torn because he believes in the message of John Doe, but knows it was built on a lie, and now the tycoon is using him to persuade this new mass of people. How can you keep the message alive, while not exploiting it, especially after the tycoon outs the whole thing after John threatens to expose him.
Then, the last dilemma surrounds the people themselves. The mass of followers that's gathered at a John Doe Convention, quickly turn on him when faced with the reality that John Doe isn't who he says he is. But can't the message of John Doe still last?
This film pre-dates so much of the madness of today's media world. Advertising hits us left and right, and our rational minds know they shouldn't be completely right, but somehow we're persuaded to eat something, or see something, or vote for something. What are the real intentions?
But my favorite part of the film centers around another theme and character, that of John's hobo friend. I failed to mention that John was kind of a hobo, after an accident that ruined his baseball career. As John gets more notoriety, his friend tries to ground him, with speeches about all the leeches that are soon to come. He rants about the freedom that comes from solitude, and how money messes everything up. That's really the essence of the film; no matter how good an idea is it can always be corrupted, just like people. But then, countering that, the real dilemma of the film is, how much do you need other people? Stynwick needs John. The John Doe faithful, who come to his aid even after the truth is revealed, show that John needs them, and of course, they all need each, to look after their neighbors. And then, everyone needs a John Doe, someone to look up to, as well as someone who can ground them to what's really important.
Hoorah!
Watch the linked video about Heelots.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M84XBBd-h_M&feature=related

Scarface and Public Enemies

Gangster films are the A-typical Hollywood genre films. They're visually stunning, filled with exciting sequences. They have fun villains, sometimes with cool names. They provide the wish fulfillment that audiences see movies for. And on top of that, they're morality tales, providing metaphors for life and tragic examples of exploitation. At their best, they are all these things. At their best, no other genre offers this much in any single film.

But just like other genres, there are formulas and story arcs, tropes, symbols, the whole thing; all to help the themes play perfectly. The classic gangster films usually got it right, hardly straying from the formula, providing different takes on the same tragic American gangster formula. But none was as pure as the original Scarface. The plot follows the basic outline of Tony, a low-level mobster's rise to power. He takes on the rival gang, going against his boss's advice, building the empire larger and larger. As the empire gets bigger, so does Tony's ego and appetite. He gets his come-uppins in the end when he's pushed the bubble of the empire just a bit too large, dieing in a shootout with a horde of police. (Spoiling the ending doesn't matter, you know going into it, he's gonna get it.)

The original gangster movies were heavy on violence, but subtle on theme. The rules and boundaries weren't overly outlined until The Godfather. In the 30's films, there's mentions of rules, like not killing cops, but there's never too much exposition like in the Godfather films or Scorcesse's films, about staying within boundaries. In Scarface this holds up. Before Tony starts pushing the scene there was a balance to the city and mob life. This mirrored the real life scenarios of gangs and the police, with blind eyes and tip offs and only verbal demands to clean up cities. Of course, that's on the local level, Uncle Sam had a different idea. But gangster films hardly endeavor into the national realm. Most of the classic films deal with local gangsters and their fights with the city and other gangs.
But beyond the structure of that, gangster films really are allegories for life, especially in America. A man pulls himself up, fighting and clawing to establish himself. All he wants is a place of his own and respect. But it's a dog eat dog world, and sometimes accidents happen, it's just the way it is; people get hurt sometimes. Generally, as long as you keep your nose clean, stick to the rules that either society or you, yourself, have established, you'll be fine. And of course, family comes first.

But as you build your life and establish yourself firmly in the upper realms of society, where or when do you stop? When you were a nobody, it was easy to say and easy to keep your ideals. But power corrupts, and tommy guns and cocaine corrupt absolutely. The real lessons we learn are from the great downfalls. And none is greater than Tony Montana's(accent added). He falls, literally, from his huge balcony

The re-make follows the same basic outline as the original, Tony builds his empire but his pride brings him down. The difference though, is that in the original, Tony had some pretenses toward wanting to do right at times and at least being likable. In the remake, you don't like him and his only redeeming quality is his witty gun remarks. But it still follows the genre rules and gives us a hint at what the "Shame of a nation" really is all about. And that's the link to Public Enemies.

Public Enemies follows the exploits of John Dillinger as he escapades around the country, robbing banks and being chased by the Feds. But even though the film is about gangsters, it's not a gangster film. It's really a biopic about Dillinger. And it's actually a rather boring one, at that, which is surprising, considering the subject matter. Half the film follows John Dillinger's love affair with his girlfriend played by Marion Cotillard and the other half is about the Feds chasing him. Dillinger remains aloof basically the entire film, so it's hard to relate to him and care about the character. So much so, that no tears are shed when he gets his brains blown out on a Chicago sidewalk. In a way, the Feds tracking him were far more interesting, and you felt their plight as they stumble and learn the new trade of gangster finding. But their storyline is so basic and left to a mere framework of plot that they have no characters.
So what are we left with? Some cool sequences, like the shootout at the hotel, and the car chases, and a love story we're supposed to care about but can't because we don't know them much. What we should at least feel is the adornment of the people's love and awe of Dillinger and the other '30's era bank robbers. The people loved them, and felt like they were modern day Robin Hoods, or at the very least, brave men sticking it to the Man during a time when people were stuck in the bowels of the Depression. This film could have been an Untouchables, but it never dares to get close enough to any characters for us to like them. And the film hardly gives us a lesson out of the gangster genre handbook.


10 Best Gangster Pics

10.Little Ceasar - perhaps Robinson's best gangster film
9. Bonnie & Clyde - a cultural icon that's about more than bank robbers
8. The Departed - the best modern setting of a gangster film
7. The Untouchables - most all around solid film
6. Goodfellas - this re-invented the genre
5. Casino - forgotten under the shadow of Goodfellas, but better on all accounts
4. Public Enemy - the grapefruit scene alone puts this on the list
3. The Godfather II - the Empire Strikes Back of gangster films
2. Scarface (1932) - the perfect formula for the genre
1. The Godfather - the Godfather of all gangster films


And the 10 Best Gangster Quotes

10. From now on, I want you to put an equal amount of blueberries in each muffin. - Casino
9 "Just when I thought I was out... they pull me back in." - The Godfather Part III
8 "Now go home and get your fuckin' shinebox." - Goodfellas
7 "Is this the end of Rico?" - Little Ceasar
6 "Marriage is an important part of getting ahead: lets people know you're not a homo; married guy seems more stable; people see the ring, they think at least somebody can stand the son of a bitch; ladies see the ring, they know immediately you must have some cash or your cock must work." - The Departed
5 "Leave the gun. Take the cannoli." - The Godfather
4 "I knew it was you, your broke my heart." - The Godfather Part II
3 "Make him an offer he can't refuse." - The Godfather
2 "I'm funny how, I mean funny like I'm a clown, I amuse you? I make you laugh, I'm here to fuckin' amuse you? What do you mean funny, funny how? How am I funny?" - Goodfellas
1. "Say hello to my little friend" - Scarface (1983)

Shutter Island's Plot Made Me shutter

Spoiler Warning! Spoiler Warning! This post is about the wild and un-realistic plot of the Scorsese film Shutter Island. Those who haven't seen it and want to know the idiotic twist ahead of time, proceed. Those who have listened to their Shutter Island loving friends and buy into the radical psychological twist and turny, edge of your seat, thrill ride and want to maintain a sense of wonder when watching, stop right now.

Shutter Island - I won't get into the amazing look and feel of the film. Scorsese does a great job putting all the pieces together to make an immersing thriller. But when you have a film where the audience is just waiting for the Hitchcock reveal the whole time, it doesn't matter. The whole film, we just kept hoping that it wasn't a dream, or that he's really a patient. It had to be better than that, this was Scorsese. Then the government conspiracy plot started to unfold and it seemed like the whole movie was going that way, to the "it's all such a huge secret cover up", reaching the highest levels of government.
That would have been interesting. But still, we hoped for something even twistier, darker or something that hasn't been done.
In truth, part of the actual reveal was darker. In fact, the real story is pretty messed up, his crazy wife drowns their kids and he's so guilt-ridden that he caused his own kid's death, his mind covers it up with a new story. But wait, is everyone else at the institution as insane as he is? Yes. They've been letting the "most dangerous patient" on the island have free reign in the most "elaborate role play" ever conceived. All in an attempt to wake up DiCaprio, or the "board" is going to have him lobotomized.
Movies always tackle plots from the back angle, telling us it was all a rouse AFTER the fact, hoping that since the audience has invested so much into the movie that we'll buy into it. Movies never start the story from the beginning of the rouse. Why? Because we'd walk out/turn off the TV because it's retarded. We'd see right through it.
So, let's re-inact the most elaborate role play from the beginning to see if what the head doctor is doing could be considered logical.
Andrew Laeddis arrives on the island and becomes the most dangerous patient because he hurts the staff, is violent, and is completely delusional(pretending to be a US Marshall on the island). Dr. Cawley (Ben Kingsley) decides, after attempts at permanently awakening Andrew to the truth have failed, that the only way to do that is to let Andrew loose on the island, pretending to be a US Marshall investigating a case. He and the staff act as if there is a patient missing, and they even let him interview some patients, who are given coached answers. I guess they knew what he was going to ask? Then, somehow they engineer a way for him to get to the lighthouse and learn everything. So along the way, how was Andrew supposed to figure out the real truth, when they're all lieing about the missing patient? He isn't, the only way that he figures it out is when Ben Kingsley just outright tells him the whole truth in the lighthouse. And even then, it takes a while to sink in.
So it begs the question....if the board was going to lobotomize this guy for being "the most dangerous patient" on the island, why would they let him loose on the island? Does Dr. Cawley have a Murder Mystery Theatre background? Because he's pretty creative. Pretty damned creative.