Wow. Two Moon Junction has to be the Citizen Kane of Skinemax films. There's a tiny little plot packed between sequences of lustful actions to an alto sax. I didn't expect much and got just that.
Here's the plot. Are you ready for this. I'm just going to go ahead and say "I'm not bullshitting you" because it's going to have to be done anyway, so we might as well get it out of the way early. The "plot" (snicker) is that a Southern belle (the girl that wants the girl that's pretending to be a guy in Just One of the Guys) is engaged, but suddenly decides to start having sex with a carnie (the dad from Kindergarten Cop or, for those of you playing the home game, Buddy Revell in 3 O'Clock High). From there the film is basically the two having sex, followed by the Carnie treating her like garbage, followed by her showing back up for sex. This is repeated over and over again until the Southern belle's grandmother (Nurse Ratched) decides that this is all bullshit and calls Sheriff Burl Ives (!) to take care of the problem. That's right, BURL IVES!!!
So the movie is garbage. We all know that and I don't have to go into it any further. The one thing I want to throw out there is Louise Fletcher. I know I gave Cuba Gooding, Jr. a lot of crap about winning the Oscar and then flushing his career directly into the toilet, but after seeing this piece of shit I believe that Louis Fletcher is hands down the queen of career flushing. She winds the Oscar for Cuckoo's Nest and follows that one up with Exorcist II: The Heretic. If you go back in the archives you can see what a great movie that was. So after a decade of crap she decides to do this work... AND IT'S DIRECT TO VIDEO SEQUEL! If she's that strapped for cash we need to start a collection for this woman. I eagerly await the day when she stars in a film with Cuba Gooding, Jr. Hold on a minute and let me check...................................... nope, just some Oscar telecasts (now that's ironic). Nope, Marisa Tomei doesn't work either.
In closing: Two Moon Junction, while being a title that is mildly suggestive, sucks. But at least Burl Ives is in it.
There are many reasons why I love Mulholland Dr. (and please don't point out the obvious, those of you who have actually seen it). The film is so many things at once it's hard to keep track. It's a thriller. It's a noir. It's a triangulated love story. It's a tale of vengeance. David Lynch has spun all of these things together to create his masterpiece. He is the true master of the WTF.
The film is about many things. I could go into detail about them, not because I'm afraid of spoiling the plot, but because it will sound complicated. Just sounds, not that it really is complicated. The film basically follows Betty (Naomi Watts) and Rita (Laura Harring) as they try to piece together who Rita really is due to amnesia. Betty is a small town girl in Hollywood to make it big in movies. Throw in director Adam Kesher (Justin Theroux) and his ultimate bad day and you round out the main plot of the film.
Or so you think because this isn't your typical Hollywood fare. This is a David Lynch film and what appears to be simple is not. But it really is. Are you getting this so far? There are so many layers to Mulholland Dr., you will have to watch it twice to get to the core of the film. Nothing is what it seems, not because of sci-fi or Doc Brown. It's the basic human condition that makes people see what they want to see and be what they want to be. It's a film about lost dreams. It's Sunset Blvd. for the kids that grew up on Star Wars. It's a movie that doesn't just sit there on the screen. It gets your mind going. You make it what you want it to be.
In a sense, David Lynch's career has been pushing forward to this point. Starting with the extreme avant garde of Eraserhead, to the very approachable Blue Velvet (kudos to Dennis Hopper), proceeding down the Lost Highway, he has finally ended up with his finest work. A film that tells a Hollywood story without us even knowing it.
As I said, David Lynch is the King of WTF. You will say WTF a lot during the first three quarters of this film, but you'll still stay interested up until the final sense when it all comes together. Mulholland Dr. is a film that keeps the mind racing, daring you to figure out what the hell's going on before the credits roll. This is one of the most cerebral films ever. This is a true masterpiece.
If Alfred Hitchcock was still alive he would have made No Country For Old Men. The classic story of a man that, in the midst of the daily grind, ends up walking into a situation beyond what he thought he would experience that morning. Then he has to face the consequences of all of it. In No Country For Old Men Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin) stumbles on the remains of a shootout while hunting. As curiosity gets the better of him and he begins to examine the scene he discovers a briefcase full of money. Being the human being that he is, he takes the money and a pistol home and causes the dominoes to fall as he begins to be stalked by the psychotic Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem), the epitomy of unstoppable hit men who kills his way to Llewelyn and the money. Throw into this Tommy Lee Jones as the sheriff that's trying to piece it all together and save Llewelyn's skin and you get a cat and mouse game between a guy that was just out hunting and a vengeful drug cartel.
Adapted from the novel by Cormac McCarthy and dircted by Joel and Ethan Coen, No Country For Old Men is a great thriller that follows that classic Hitchcock formula ala North By Northwest- the guy that stumbles into trouble and has to get out of it while running from the bad guys. Llewelyn thinks he knows how to get out of this mess, but is really just drowning in the situation he's gotten into. Brolin plays him as totally optimistic, even when bleeding and hiding in a Mexican hospital. Bardem is the philosophical killing machine, debating the significance on whether a coin is heads or tails while on his killing spree to get back his money. He's like the Terminator- he will not stop until his goal, and his own sense of duty, are fulfilled.
The Coen's have filled the film with suspense. Most thrillers such as this run around in circles, but they have kept this film on a linear path that doesn't repeat itself over and over again. Between the game between Moss and Chiguhr, Tommy Lee Jones' character tries to sort everything out and save Llewelyn's ass. The problem that all of the characters have to face is the Killer's Morality- he is described as being on a higher standard than most and satisfies everything he promises, right up until the end.
As I said, No Country For Old Men is a Hitchcock film for the new millennium. A film filled with a thrilling plot that delivers a great ride for the audience. A real classic.
There Will Be Blood follows the exploits of Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day Lewis), an early 20th century oil man going through California communities and exploiting not only the land but the people above it. After meeting a mysterious young man that directs him toward his families land that rests above a large amount of oil. Plainview travels there with his adoptive son and encounters the young man's twin brother Eli (Paul Dano), who is considered a local prophet and figure head of his own local church. The film basically follows the trials and tribulations on both sides and how these things tear apart and break down people and families.
Paul Thomas Anderson shoots There Will Be Blood with a majesty that is reminiscent of John Ford, using nature as a magnificent back drop for the conflicts being laid out before the audience. There is such an eye for detail that many shots appear as if taken from a turn of the century newspaper or scrap book. It's the dirty details that real make this film stand out as something special.
Of course you can't talk about There Will Be Blood without mentioning Daniel Day Lewis. He is one of the best actors of this generation and also ranks among some of the all time greatest players. Just as he did with Bill The Butcher in Gangs of New York, Lewis has totally become the role of Daniel Plainview. He is a realistic portrayal of evil. Not the kind of evil that shoots lightning bolts or something that was born with him. The evil that is Daniel Plainview comes from what he has faced- the trials of being a miner and oil man and the greed that he not only holds in his heart but the greed contained in everyone around him. You can see him change throughout the film as he becomes older, crankier, and bitter. Daniel Day Lewis fills the role with a soul that you can't find on paper. Anyone can write a character, but it takes an actor to breath life into it. He gives Plainview a pulse. It was a formality to give him the Oscar.
The funny thing is that in any other year this would have been Best Picture. It is a true masterpiece in a decade filled with drivel and harkens back to earlier times and epic pictures. There Will Be Blood is the heir apparent to those epics. Some films try to be epic, but this one is built as one. A classic morality tale where everyone loses in one way or another.
James Cameron returns twelve years after drowning Leo and encouraging teenage girl to go to the movies over and over and over again with his latest project, returning to the sci-fi realm that he ruled with such talent before he sunk his ship.
Avatar stars Sam Worthington as Jake Sully, a paraplegic ex-Marine who replaces his dead twin brother in a project on the far away planet of Pandora. The planet holds a mineral called unobtainium (snicker if you like) and an indigenous species called the Na'vi, a blue skinned, humanoid like creature that lives in harmony with the planet. Jake's mission is to control an avatar that was created for his brother. An avatar is a biologically bred Na'vi that is controlled by the mind of it's driver, which in this case is Jake. His mission, being led by Dr. Augustine (Sygourney Weaver), is to examine life on the planet and come up with a compromise between the Na'vi and their human visitors. Jake inadvertently stumbles into Na'vi life and customs, greatly pleasing his military and science superiors. The problem is that Jake, who feels what it's like to walk, fly, and love for the first time in a long time, begins to understand the Na'vi attachment to their planets nature.
Of course, when you look right at Avatar you can see the metaphors. Environmental destruction. The elimination and relocation of natives. Military maneuvers to achieve natural resources. Cameron juggles these without being too preachy. I'm not saying it doesn't come off preachy, but it's not as much of a sermon as you may thing. The sad part is that some of the messages in the film tend to bog it down a bit, causing a "we have to get this in" attitude even at the cost of the story. From a screen writing point of view this is not Cameron's best work. The film tends to drag itself down a bit as it plays out. It starts out great, gets a middle that slows to a crawl, and then picks up during the last thirty minutes. It's the middle that gets you.
The acting is great, considering most of the characters are digitally rendered. This leads into the effects. The special effects of Avatar are state of the art and reveal some breathtaking shots of Pandora and the Na'vi. This is probably the first film I've seen where I forget a being is just a bunch of 0's and 1's. Cameron has created a triumph of digital effects and 3D that will benefit the next decade of film making to a degree. The action sequences are first rate, as they always are in a James Cameron film.
So what is the verdict on Avatar? Is it a revolutionary film that will dictate how movies are made or is it Cameron's folly? No, I don't think it will be as successful as Titanic due to its running time and dull middle, but it is a film that steps ahead of the curve a little bit and gives us a glimpse of things to come. There's been a lot of comparisons between Avatar and Star Wars and how each film defined how movies were seen and made during their respective eras. Both films held great technical achievements with Star Wars being the standard bearer for decades after its release, but there is a defining difference between the two films. Star Wars had a very approachable story that pulled from various sources through centuries of myth and story telling to create a story that was easily approachable for kids and adults alike. You were glued to the screen as the events played out like never before. With Avatar, the story is hard to get to, especially if your mentality tends to lean one way or another. The story grabs you in the beginning, but fails to hold you in its grasp for the entire picture. The effects are center stage, and they should be praised for that, but the story tends to push you away a bit. You could also compare Avatar to Toy Story in that each film represented what was to come before it, but the story is what made a good effects film great.
Now don't get me wrong, Avatar is a good movie that deserves some praise, because when it picks up it is a very entertaining action piece and will mesmerize during the first quarter of the film and subsequent points throughout. It just tends to allow itself to slow down too much for a film of this genre. Avatar isn't James Cameron's finest work, but it's still good to have him back.
Now you have to face facts at some point: Martin Scorsese is at his best when he's doing a gangster picture. We can go back to Mean Streets, through to minimal gangland influences in Raging Bull, jump forward a decade to the great Good Fellas, past Casino, and finally arrive at The Departed. It's funny looking at that list because it almost seems like not having DeNiro in his movie was why he won an Oscar.
The Departed takes place in Boston, a town that has been on the edge for two hundred years and probably will be for two hundred more. It opens with a flashback of crime boss Frank Costello (Jack Nicholson) working a grocery store and meeting a young Colin Sullivan (played later by Matt Damon). This is where Frank becomes the young Sullivan's mentor, molding him into the perfect tool for a notorious crime boss- a mole inside the police department task force investigating Costello.
Meanwhile, Billy Costigan (Leonardo DiCaprio) has just graduated the police academy, attempting to shed the demons of his families past. Due to this past he's asked if he will become and informant working undercover in Costello's crew. Yes, each side has a rat planted in their pantry. Instead of a plot about committing crimes and stopping them, The Departed is actually a film about being a rat, while trying to find a rat and hoping no one busts your ass doing it.
Based on the Japanese film Infernal Affairs, Scorsese delivers another rich gangster film that doesn't follow the parameters that he himself helped set in his own crime drama film making through the years. Damon and DiCaprio don Boston accents and grow out of the babyface personas they were pigeonholed into. This is a great performance for each of them. Nicholson is Nicholson, crazy as hell and finally jumping from the romantic comedy market into his specialty- crazy son of a bitch market. Of course you have Alec Baldwin, Martin Sheen, and Mark Wahlberg filling out a great cast, but the one guy that gets left out when discussing this film is Ray Winstone as Mr. French. This right hand man of Costello is played with such brutality and intensity by Winston that he should have been nominated for a supporting Oscar over Wahlberg.
Now this is a Martin Scorsese picture, so it's going to be good and won the Oscar for best picture. But is it better than Taxi Driver? Is it better than Raging Bull? Is it better than Goodfellas? Each of those films were screwed at the Oscars and The Departed seems to be payback for picking the popular schlock of the era of these masterpieces (take a look at what they lost to). The Departed is a great film, but will it be a member of that holy trinity of Marty films? It might, but it will be the younger cousin to those great masterpieces.
Now don't get me wrong, it's a great movie. Just don't go into it thinking it's his best, because it's not. But Scorsese at his worst is 10x better than most director's best.
Refugees on boats are replaced with refugees in a mothership that ends up hovering above Johannesburg, which we all know is the beacon of equality. District 9 is the area that the refugee aliens known as "prawns", are ushered into after a split second of humanity ends up being a police state. Of course, that old George Carlin bit about NIMBY (not in my back yard) takes hold with the demand for their removal pressures a private corporation into evicting the aliens from their shacks in District 9 to their new tents in District 10. These aliens are social outcasts because they don't know earthbound norms and look like a 6 foot cross between a crawfish and a grass hopper. Wikus Van De Merwe (Sharlto Copley) heads the eviction process, which spirals out of control when he is infected by an alien liquid, putting him on the other side of the fence.
This is a rare item today. A movie with amazing visuals, effects, AND a good story. The film is basically a documentary that book ends 72+ hours of Wikus' life. Obviously, there are parallels between District 9 and apartheid, posing as a history lesson into what was policy in South Africa twenty years ago. It's hard to get an alien to show emotion and even harder to get a digital alien to show emotion. District 9 achieves this with it's main alien being a single parent trying to get his child out of the hell that is District 9. As the movie progresses, his reasoning changes for wanting to leave this planet and return to wherever home may be. It's a nicely written film that is full of action and doesn't disappoint the viewer. Sure it has a message, but it's able to make that pill go down smoother and not be as preachy as other films.
Seeing how the film plays out and some major plot points that come up, there will be a sequel to District 9. It's inevitable and will also be an interesting picture as the prawn population grows and the human races begins to make payments on the sins they have committed.
Wow. Two Moon Junction has to be the Citizen Kane of Skinemax films. There's a tiny little plot packed between sequences of lustful actions to an alto sax. I didn't expect much and got just that.
