2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
VERDICT:
10/10 Paranoid Androids
Pretty much the be-all end-all when it comes to sci-fi movies.
2001: A Space Odyssey is about…well, it’s about a lot of things. It’s about man’s evolution from ape-like scavenger to neanderthal hunter, it’s about man’s intergalactic search for knowledge and new life thousands of years later, it’s about the dangers of technology and how our ever-increasing reliance on it will ultimately come to bite us in the ass, and how all this stuff was more or less planned out and triggered by a greater intelligence far beyond our understanding.
Yeah, this baby’s about as epic as they come and if you’re not prepped for it beforehand, you may very well not know what in the fuck is going on. Don’t get me wrong, a lot of what makes this movie so mind-blowing and captivating goes right back to how ambiguous and trippy it is, but if you want the full picture instead of glimpses at genius, do the right thing and read the book first.
Before you start rolling those eyes, please bear with me ’cause I swear this isn’t gonna be another “book vs. movie” review. This is coming from someone who goes into movies as blind as possible and has had his fair share of moviegoing experiences tarnished by reading the book beforehand, but here is the rare case where it’s almost required.
The unique thing about the novel and this script is that they were both written at the same time by Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke rather than adapted after the fact. They’re both on the same page, it’s the same story being told, the only difference is that Kubrick is far more cryptic behind the camera than Clarke is behind the keyboard. This isn’t usually the way folks go through the writing process, but it works like gangbusters and I absolutely love how the book works as a companion piece to the movie, like a blueprint that only adds to the experience and doesn’t take away from either finished product. Man, read the book even if you’re not gonna see the movie, it’s amazing stuff.
But as integral as Clarke is to the script, the this baby’s all about Kubrick. For a movie made over four decades ago, the only remotely dated things I could pick up on were the interior decoration of a moon lander that could double as the Brady’s living room and the assortments of spacesuits that look about as futuristic as The Michelin Man. But everything else is flat-out stunning and has held up outrageously well over the years. The stunning color scheme, the multitude of gravity-defying sequences that I’ve stopped trying to wrap my head around because I’m surprisingly comfortable with the idea that Kubrick just went and filmed this in space, all the iconic imagery that can’t be boiled down to three little screen grabs in a movie review – it’s a jaw-dropping feast for the eyes and it’s stuff you’ll never forget because it’s unlike anything you’ve ever seen before.
God, it’s just insane. I mean, how do you film, let alone create, the mysteries of the universe? Where would you even start and how would you go about conveying it to an audience? It’s mind-blowing stuff that seems as alien as that shadowless monolith and . I know it took Kubrick a long-ass time to make this, but I really have no idea how he pulled it off, I can’t believe this was made in ’68 when it could have been made in 2012, and it’s as timeless as the story it’s telling.
And what a freakin’ story it is.
Clarke and Kubrick drop a lot of knowledge here, it’s a lot to take in and process all at once, but that’s also the whole idea. Whether it be triviabots that are built for the sole purpose of winning at Jeopardy!, machines that can perform hospital surgeries instead of doctors with, or all those creepy dancing, singing, glorified blow-up dolls that the Japanese keep on making for some reason, the warning that HAL represents is becoming that much more of a reality for mankind with each new technological development that comes along and brings our creations that much closer to a level of sentiency where they would in fact fear “death”. One of the many reasons (let’s not forget that numbingly monotone voice of his) that that effing red-eyed computer is one of the all-time great movie villains. But the thing that I love most about this story is the cornerstone that despite how humanity has considered itself an advanced and dominant over the course of four million years, we’re essentially the pet project of something far beyond us and we will never be able to comprehend that. It’s terrifying, it’s astounding, and I can hardly believe a human came up with it.
For Chrissakes, the martian/higher being/lordknowswhat of the movie is a fucking monolith. A MONOLITH! You can keep your Cloverfield monsters, your Borgs and your little green men, that silent, black slab of mystery is the most original-looking alien I’ve ever seen. So simple and so brilliant.
Like anyone was thinking about that stuff back in the ’60s. Just crazy.
Also love the way Kubrick takes his time with the pacing. It doesn’t drag since it’s more of a meditation than a slow boil, and as a result it produces this epic, expansive mood that perfectly complements a setting that couldn’t be larger. It makes you focus on every frame he’s showing, you could pretty much photograph every shot here to frame on your wall, and then he throws in that monumental score on top of it and the whole thing becomes one breathtaking cosmic ballet. Absolutely beautiful, folks.
Although I wish I had some praise to throw to the actors because Keir Dullea’s good as our main spaceman, David Bowman, but this movie really isn’t so much about the characters as it is about everything else. Still, surprised the name ain’t ringing any bells. Figured this would be one hell of a launching pad.
Aside from it just being a cool tagline, 2001 really is “the ultimate trip”. There’s so much to think about and write about, then again, it’s one of those things you’re probably better off discussing than preaching about. You don’t have the read the book to appreciate what an effing milestone this is for the genre and for filmmaking in general, but if you don’t want to risk the chance of wondering who dropped acid in your corn flakes during the last half-hour of the movie, read up, brotha’. There’s still a handful of Kubrick movies I need to get through before I can pin where this lies respect to his life’s work, but I know a masterpiece when I see one and 2001 fits the bill from start to finish. Might even be in the Top Ten.
FUN FACT: Add one letter each of HAL’s initials and you get IBM. That’s some Skynet shit right there.
DOUBLE FUN FACT: Kubrick initially asked Pink Floyd to do the score, but Roger Waters (regrettably) declined the offer. Not that the score isn’t perfect as is, but that would have been so, so awesome.
I’M A DC FO’ LIFE, SON!
Alright, despite the inital tempation to indulge in a nerd argument that rarely comes up around the watercooler, I wasn’t exactly planning on doing this because the temptation to be lazy is a hard one to ignore. But thanks to the prompting of Kate from The Stories That Really Mattered to take part and Kai over at The List for siding with his namesake, I’m throwing down the gauntlet and fighting the good fight in the argument of a lifetime:
Are you a Marvel, or are you a DC?
I don’t know about you gringoes, but I’m picking up the DC flag and flying it like a bastard. You want reasons? Oh, I got ’em, baby. I got ’em in spades! SHAZAM!
5. Kingdom Come
First thing’s first: DC’s just got a better roster. It’s a smaller roster, but it’s quality over quantity that matters. I’ll get to Bats in a minute, but we’ve got Robin (and Nightwing), The Joker, Supes, Bizarro, The Flash (my personal favorite), Wonder Woman, The Green Lantern, Captain Marvel, The Green Arrow and about 650 more total badasses who make Tony Stark look like the alcoholic Tin Man he is. Anyway, here they all are in one place, drawn to astoundingly convincing life by Alex Ross in the best Ultimate Suphero Showdown on the block. As someone who usually walks right past the superhero graphic novel shelf, I couldn’t believe how blown away by this and it’s a total page-turner from start to finish. Talkin’ ’bout fan service at its best.
4. Preacher
Alright, now this one along with my top two slots were published under the Vertigo label, but that’s a direct offshoot of DC and it totally freakin’ counts. Jesus, the fact that DC has a badass label like Vertigo under its belt is more than enough to win this fight, but I digress. Preacher is about an alcoholic priest from Texas who gets possessed by the bastard child of an angel and a demon is then able to speak the Word of God (which makes anyone do whatever he says). So God finds out about this, He sends His #1 heavenly hitman to take the priest out pronto before the priests and his traveling buddies (an old fling and an Irish vampire) find Him first. It’s offensive, it’s sacriligious, it’s brutally violent and it’s definitely not for everyone, but I had a blast with it and it’s one of the more memorable series I’ve gotten through in recent years. I think someone out there is trying to make this into a movie, I have no idea how they’re gonna pull it off, but I’m seeing it if they do. Bonus points for the simple fact that The Saint of Killers could single-handedly take out Marvel’s whole crew at once.
3. Batman: Year One
Took me way too long to discover it, but this is the best Batman graphic novel of all-time. Better than The Dark Knight Returns, better than The Dark Knight Rises Again, better than Hush, better than all of ’em and those are all winners. Seriously, this is unbelievable stuff, it’s the best treatment that Master Bruce ever got and if Batman Begins had given the same kind of spotlight to Commissioner Gordon that this did, that bad boy would have been a 10.
2. Watchmen
No explanation needed.
1. Y: The Last Man
Folks, this series did the impossible, this is the series that bested Watchmen. I borrowed every issue from a friend in college, read through it faster than Johnny-Five with a lightning rod up his ass, and I really wish I had the shelf space and funds to buy them all for myself because I would do it in a heartbeat. Look, I don’t know what else to say other than Y: The Last man is one of the best things I’ve ever read, graphic novels or otherwise, there’s not a thing in Marvel’s repertoire that even comes close to matching it, and there’s no way in hell that you’ll feel otherwise after taking the plunge. Read this immediately, read any of these choice five immediately, and believe you me, you’ll be converted.
So I realize that this was more of a DC’s Greatest Hits list than anything else, but I’ll take one graphic novel over a thousand comic books any day and DC’s where it’s at in that regard. Still not accounting for Alan Moore’s Swamp Thing run, V for Vendetta and Neil Gaiman’s Sandman series which I still need to get through, but I think this coffin’s already got enough nails in it as is.
Then again, this is a movie blog, so that’s a whole ‘nother can of worms we gotta run through right quick:
Marvel – The Good
1. Blade
2. X-Men
3. Blade II
4. Spider-Man
5. X2
6. Spider-Man 2
7. Iron Man
8. The Incredible Hulk
Marvel – The Heinous
1. Red Sonja
2. Howard the Duck
3. The Punisher (the one with Dolph Lundgren)
4. The Fantastic Four
5. Daredevil
6. Hulk
7. The Punisher (the one with Homeless Dad)
8. Blade: Trinity
9. Elektra
10. X-Men: The Last Stand
11. Ghost Rider
12. Spider-Man 3
13: Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer
14. Punisher: War Zone
15. X-Men Origins: Wolverine
16. Iron Man 2
TOTAL SCORE: – 8
DC – The Bitchin’
1. Batman (the ’66 version where the seal/dolphin sacrifices itself to save Adam West)
2. Superman
3. Superman II
4. Batman (the Tim Burton version)
5. Batman Returns
6. Batman Begins
7. The Dark Knight
8. Watchmen
DC – The Criminal
1. Superman III (the one with Richard Pryor)
2. Supergirl
3. Superman IV: The Quest for Peace
4. The Return of Swamp Thing (the one with Heather Locklear)
5. Batman Forever
6. Steel
7. Batman & Robin
8. Catwoman
9. Superman Returns (I liked it, but I’ll put it up anyway, ya’ vultures)
10. Jonah Hex
TOTAL SCORE: -2
Argue those numbers all you want, but here’s my thinking: Marvel may have a bigger roster, but it ultimately sets them up for failure more than anything else. Yeah, DC’s got its fair share of stinkers, but we will never let you forget about Howard the Duck. And you’ve still got another Ghost Rider movie on the way! Fuckin’ harsh, man.
Marvels, don’t get me wrong, I love ya’. You’re my boys and you’ve put out some damn fine stuff in your time, but alas, the proof is in the pudding.
I am such a freakin’ DC.
And the Best Actor of 2010 is…
COLIN FIRTH!
Darn tootin’. Homey got robbed last year, and even though I think he deserved it more for George Falconer than King Bertie, I’d love to see this guy go home with a well-deserved Oscar. I don’t know if he’s always been this awesome, but whatever, he’s quickly turned into one of my personal favorites as of late.
Hella good voting, folks.
RESULTS:
– Colin Firth: 11 votes
– James Franco: 9 votes
– Jesse Eisenberg: 7 votes
– Ryan Gosling: 5 votes (dude deserves it)
– Jeff Bridges: 5 votes
– Mark Wahlberg: 3 votes
– Kevin Spacey: 0 votes (proving once and for all that effing no one saw Casino Jack)
– Other: 2 votes for Christian Bale (will get to the Best Supporting categories in due time, buds), 1 vote for Michael Douglas (guessing he was the one redeeming aspect of that movie), 1 vote for Jasper Pääkkönen (NO idea who that is, but IMDB informs me that we have a fan of Moomins and the Comet Chase in the house), 1 vote for Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson (at least someone’s still smellin’ what he’s cookin’), 1 vote for Tom Hardy (word), and 1 vote for Me (double word).
Dr. No (1962)
VERDICT:
8/10 Original Swanksters
It kicked off the longest-running movie franchise in history for a reason, folks.
Dr. No is about the most pimpin’ secret agent at Britain’s disposal (way more pimpin’ than the six dudes before him) who gets shipped off to Jamaica to crack some skulls and investigate the murder of a fellow double-O that was stationed there. With each new bullet he dodges and each new bombshell he lands in the sack, our suave motherfucker of the hour starts to realize that this goes way beyond someone getting offed over a stolen case of Red Stripe, this is a case of…world domination! TIME TO KICK SOME ASS!
So way back in good ol’ December of 2010, my buddy Paul over at Paragraph Film Reviews signed me up to take part in a “James Bond January” month-long review fest where I was supposed to run through the whole JB franchise in one fell swoop along with a handful of other highly respectable movie nerds around the blogosphere. Sadly, I have failed miserably at this task and am now forced to milk this baby into “James Bond Indefinitely” event that will hopefully wrap up right around the day Bond 23 hits theaters. In my defense, I blame the crew behind Netflix Instant for not getting their shit together when everyone obviously knew that this was happening, but alas, I’ll pick up the slack in due time.
Anywho, I can’t even remember how old I was when I first saw this movie but all I know is that I was way too young to appreciate it. Going into it again without the attention span of a Jack Russell on meth, I had two memories to go off of: this movie was boring and Dr. No goes out like a bitch. Luckily, my thoughts on the former have changed drastically over the years, but Dr. No does go out like quite the bitch.
I guess the best thing about Dr. No is that it’s simply James Bond before Q entered the picture and turned the guy into the sexpot version of Inspector Gadget. This is the kind of bare-bones vibe that Casino Royale successfully replicated and straying away from that vibe is exactly what sent the series down the shitter time and time again. It’s great to see Bond having to use his brain, brawn and kryptonic sex appeal to get out of sticky situations instead of turning his sports car into a parasail to escape an Arctic tidal wave. It seems like he’s always up against the ropes, never in charge of the situation and has to act on the fly in order to stay alive, and I love that, you worry about him a lot more when the chips are down.
With the exception of a chase scene with a hearse that’s about as convincing holding up a dinner plate while looking through a View-Master and Bond’s penchant for punching out everyone he runs past during his escape from an island’s self-destruct system, the action scenes actually aren’t half bad. Lots of punching and such, lots of stealth kills will sleek little guns that fit nicely in one’s back pocket, nothing fancy and that’s the way you do it. But I gotta say, Bond does have a pretty slick quip after the said chase scene comes to a fiery end:
Construction Worker: “What happened?”
James-Fucking-Bond: “I think they were on their way to a funeral.”
That’s right, Jamaican assassins. We laugh at your stupid deaths.
And how about that Sean Connery, huh? What a boss. The dude just looks the part, he makes cool look easy and I can see how the ladies would be helpless to resist his effortless sex appeal (I don’t know about all four of the ladies, but definitely one or two). He’s the best Bond there ever was and he sure did set the bar pretty high. Ursula Andress is also doing her thing as the first Bond girl with a truly dumbass name, Honey Ryder, and it’s impossible to watch Joseph Wiseman as Dr. No without thinking of Dr. Evil in that ridiculous see-through hazmat suit.
With that being said, I’ve got Austin Powers to thank for every last gripe I’ve got with this movie. You’ve got your highly-escapable life-and-death situations, villains who would rather have dinner with his enemy than just shoot him in the face, Bond knocking boots with all four of those girls on the poster with hardly so much as a fart for a pick-up line, and a whole mess of other stuff that was probably pretty cool back in the ’60s but rings pretty ridiculous almost half a century later. Had no idea that so much of what those movies were harpooning was taken right from here. But by the same token, I still think some of this stuff would have been pretty laughable even if Mike Meyers hadn’t pointed it out to begin with.
Bizarre opening credits sequence, too. Someone was definitely hittin’ the bong that day.
I wasn’t expecting to like Dr. No all that much, but for all the faults that it sets itself up for, it’s still an awesome, old school example of the essential James Bond. This is were it all started, gang, and while it’s definitely dated in some respects and surprisingly hard to follow sometimes, it’s still a fun time and got me a lot more pumped for this epic Bond-a-thon than I had been initially.
And what a kickass poster. They sure knew how to make ’em back then.
The Elephant Man (1980)
VERDICT:
9/10 Golden Rules
And that, kiddies, is why you don’t judge a book by its cover.
The Elephant Man is about one John Merrick who spent most of his life as a London carnival attraction during the late 19th Century due to a severe birth deformity that engulfed nearly his entire body and outcasted him from normal society. Then one day he finds himself rescued from the keep of his abusive ringmaster of sorts and taken under the wing of a highly-regarded surgeon who initially regards him as a research subject but eventually comes to see him as a human.
There are a lot of things I dig about director David Lynch, things that I should probably save for a review more fitting of his ability to eff with the mind on a mass scale, but it always kind of amazes me that this of all things was his follow-up to Eraserhead. As a guy who tends to get pigeonholed for making the biggest cinematic headfucks in town, this leap to the bizarrely mainstream doesn’t really make a whole lot of sense, nor does following up Lost Highway with Disney’s The Straight Story. But as great as he is in his niche, he’s just as good on the other end of the spectrum, and that kind of range is hard to find.
With that being said, this was my first introduction to Lynch and this really is as good a place to start as any. I think I was a freshman in college, I went in completely blind with no knowledge of the movie or Merrick beforehand aside from that rumor about Michael Jackson buying his bones (I’d believe it), and then I pressed PLAY and proceeded to cry by my lonesome for the next two hours. For a movie that can be so freakin’ sad, I’m somewhat surprised that I’ve seen it a handful of times since, and even though it doesn’t have the impact it once did way back when, it really is one of the great powerhouse tear-jerkers I’ve ever had the pleasure to find and completely transcends the pop culture stigma surrounding it.
So it’s well-directed and we’re even treated to some of Lynch’s signature weird-ass shit within the first five minutes, but the heart of this movie really is Merrick’s story and what it stands for.
On the one hand, there’s what he stands for. Merrick is tough to look at and it never really gets any easier thanks to an incredibly spot-on makeup job, his life seemed to amount to one big tragic existence before someone finally saw him as more than a simple-minded freak, and his deformity is a challenge for anyone to initially overcome. But he’s not one to pity himself, ask pity from others or be mistaken as brave, he’s just an iron will with a thirst for life who’d rather spend his time appreciating the gift horse in front of him rather than dwell on the hardships he’s had to endure. It’s a rare mindset to find from anyone, but the challenge with Merrick is being able to see it.
And on the other hand is the surgeon that saves him from a life in a cage, Frederick Treves, as the personification of our preconceived notions. At the start, he’s actually not all that different from Merrick’s paying customers, parading him around to his colleagues as a groundbreaking find in the field of science and seemingly convinced that the man’s lack of intelligence is only matched by the horror of his appearance. Eventually, Treves finds his foot in his mouth when Merrick is forced to muster up the confidence to reveal that he is in fact somewhat brilliant, but even that opens up a whole new can of worms for the surgeon in regards to how he can go about providing his patient with an otherwise “normal” life without taking on the role of ringmaster for new audience.
Although it’s not a religious adaptation of Merrick’s life (after all, his name is actually Joseph Merrick), the heart is all there and it ultimately brings up some profound insights about what it means to be human and what it means to be treated as such. Just so many memorable scenes here of cruelty and compassion that’ll break you down and lift you up without being melodramatic or cheap.
And while Treves is a great character and a catalyst for many of the ethical questions this movie brings up, I’ve never been a huge fan of Hopkins in this role since he insists on rocking the same emotionally frozen look on his face from beginning to end. It’s a fine look, a look he seems to have grown quite fond of over the years, but he really doesn’t have another expression to work with here. But a completely unrecognizable John Hurt is great as Merrick. Can’t even imagine what a bitch it must have been to have all that makeup applied and taken off every day let alone try to act with it on, but it ends up being a fantastic role by a fantastic actor who still hasn’t really gotten his due after all these years.
Also nice to see Anne Bancroft as an admiring actress; John Gielgud is, not surprisingly, the man as the hospital’s Governor (I guess that’s what they’re called); Freddie Jones is one warped sonofabitch as Merrick’s “owner” during his days as an indentured carnie; and a young Dexter Fletcher (aka: Soap from Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels) has a neat little turn as Jones’ assistant. Good job on everyone’s behalf is what I’m trying to say.
If you’ve never seen it, chances are the only thing you’ve heard is the whole “I AM NOT AN ANIMAL! I AM A HUMAN BEING!” line which doesn’t quite carry the same weight on I Love the ’80s as it does here. Out of context, it might sound a bit silly, but make no mistake, that effing line will shake you to the core and make you feel like the biggest asshole in the world for ever writing off someone because they were “different”. You’re gonna be disappointed as hell if you go into this with the expectation of a black-and-white prequel to Mulholland Dr., but as an entirely affecting drama about the importance of looking past first impressions and judging someone based on who they are rather than who you think they are, it doesn’t get much better than The Elephant Man. Like I said, super sad but super important on a very universal level.
Irreversible (2002)
VERDICT:
3/10 Night Terrors
Cannot be unseen.
Irreversible is about a guy, his girlfriend and her ex who all go out for a night on the town but get separated after the boyfriend gets wasted and his main squeeze goes home by herself. Not five minutes after she leaves the party, the woman is brutally raped and assaulted by a pimp until he puts her in a coma. She gets transported to a hospital, her boyfriend and her ex are devastated when they see her on the stretcher, and they immediately start searching the streets to find the pimp who did this to her and make him pay.
This is one of those movies that’s had one mean reputation going for it since it first blew up on the scene, and as a result, it took me a really long time to finally pump myself up to watch it. And now, after somehow managing to sit through the whole thing without pressing STOP or vomiting in my hand, there are definitely aspects worth appreciating, but I’m not so sure it was actually worth it in the long run.
The only other movie I’ve seen by writer/director Gaspar Noe was his debut effort, I Stand Alone, and that one quickly took the award for Most Loathsome Movie of All-Time. It’s the closest thing to a snuff film I’ve ever seen, I was completely unprepared for it and I’m still kinda wondering why it exists. All the same, there’s something to be said for a director like Noe who can push things to the extreme and showcase the depths of the human soul without nosediving into the realm of torture porn. Then again, I think I’d have a damn hard time defending that argument against someone who believes otherwise.
But Noe is a good director, a great director even. Told in reverse chronological order from aftermath to lead-up, he films this thing like a drunk on a Tilt-A-Whirl with a camera that rarely stays still or in focus, and the way it goes from frantically erratic before the opening credits even leave the screen to the polar opposite end of the spectrum by the time it all wraps up, it’s darkly hypnotic and will take you places you never want to go. It’s a total nightmare and the score by Daft Punk’s Thomas Bangalter heightens it to a point of palpability, but as misleading as this sounds, there a fucked-up beauty to it. Also amazed at all his invisible cuts that make each new scene look like it was filmed in one long, fluid take. Could not have been an easy thing to pull off.
So from a technical standpoint, Noe is brilliant and the mood he creates from so many different angles is just astounding from start to finish. But then there’s the rape and the murder that he puts on display here, and as soon as they hit, you may very well forget everything else that this movie has to offer.
These are two traumatic, awful scenes of unbelievable violence the likes of which I have never seen before and pray I will never have to see again. For starters, the rape scene goes on for nine straight minutes with the camera never panning away and finishes even worse than it starts, and then there’s the murder which takes place during the first 15 minutes of the movie and wraps up with half of a man’s head caved in. Trust me, even with this brief look into what the scenes have to offer, your jaw will drop and you will be left horrified. I remember stumbling upon the murder scene back when I first discovered YouTube and feeling like I had just undergone shock therapy, and even having seen it before with full knowledge of what was coming, I still lost sleep over this movie.
As to why Noe takes the unflinchingly visceral approach that he does, your guess is as good as mine, but that also seems to be the desired effect. It messes with you, it burns its way into your memory banks and it will inevitably leave you wondering “Why?”. I just have a hard time believing that someone would create such a monster as this for the sake of “Why not?”
And I really can’t imagine what it must have been like to see this in a theater, but that is one bullet I’m glad to have dodged and I probably would have been one of the many to walk out if I didn’t have this darned movie blog to consider. God, how on Earth do you watch this movie with someone else in the room let alone act in this?
Although Monica Bellucci, Vincent Cassel and Albert Dupontel do deserve some kind of strange award for signing up and giving this their all. I don’t know how many people would actually get through this movie and immediately strike up a convo about how good the acting was as soon as it ended, but this is some royally demanding shit and the way their dynamic changes in the face of such a tragedy adds a great deal to legitimizing the movie as a whole. Very sexual, very vulnerable and very humane in avenues that aren’t easily tapped into.
As much as I’d like to give this movie a higher rating because of how well-made it is, I could never in good faith recommend this movie to someone for fear of having to be That Guy Who Told Someone To See Irreversible. I know it’s just a movie and I do feel like there’s more to this than just serving as an excuse to shock the shit out of people, but thanks to the sheer brutality of those two scenes that could easily be construed as deplorable on a number of levels, it’s not an experience I would encourage someone to undertake if they weren’t already interested. A 3 is a pretty misleading score for a movie that I don’t consider bad, it’s just a movie that ultimately left me more sickened than impressed.
I almost wonder if that was the whole point.
The Green Hornet (2011)
VERDICT:
5/10 Anti-Antiheroes
Starts off strong, but wears out by hour two.
The Green Hornet is about the party animal son of a newspaper mogul who finds himself staring responsibility in the face when his dad suddenly dies, leaving the publication and family fortune in his hands. But since he doesn’t know the first thing about running a company yet wants to do his part to bring down crime in L.A., he teams up with the family mechanic/kung fu master, pimps out a vintage Chrysler with enough ammo and gadgets to make Q look like a home ec. teacher, and gets to cleaning up the city one meth lab at a time all while pretending to be one of the bad guys.
So the only thing I know about the TV show this was based on was that Bruce Lee was in it, apparently he was a badass and totally stole the spotlight like the boss he was, and that’s about it. I’m pretty sure it wasn’t going for the same comedic angle that this runs on, but since I’ve never seen an episode, I have absolutely no base of comparison when it comes to whether this does justice to the source material. All the same, it ended up being a pretty entertaining superhero riff before it all started to crumble under its own weight.
Way back when this was still in the early development stages, the most awesome Stephen Chow of Kung-Fu Hustle and Shaolin Soccer fame was set to direct and star in this, and as a big fan of Chow’s, I think that would have been pretty effing perfect. Anyway, that didn’t happen, so by some strange course of events, the powers that be got Michel Gondry to take the reigns and bring Seth Rogen’s baby to life. Now, I think Gondry’s one of the best directors out there, absolutely no one can make a movie quite like him, but I can’t be the only one who thinks his involvement here was a bit odd.
I mean, Chris Nolan did a damn good job transitioning from psychological thrillers to churning out two of the best superhero movies of the past decade, but Gondry’s never been one to go mainstream like this, and after seeing Be Kind Rewind it almost seemed like he’d be the last person to ever take on a big budget Hollywood action movie. I don’t know, it’s not that he does a bad job or anything, because the first fight scene in the movie really is awesome and the epic amount of destruction that goes down during the last 15 minutes makes that strip mall drive-through scene in Blues Brothers look like a stroll through the park, it’s just that this movie definitely doesn’t give him a whole lot of room to use his imagination, and that’s what he’s always done best. Jesus, he’s the guy who did Eternal Sunshine, I don’t see what could have gotten him on board for this outside of blackmail.
Regardless, Gondry’s not the problem here even if every other fight scene could have looked more realistic than computer generated, the real problem is the script.
The thing is, the script is actually pretty solid for a while. Written by Rogen and pal Evan Goldberg, it’s a lot funnier than I expected it to be, it had me laughing out loud pretty consistently from the time James Franco turns up in the first five minutes and starts dissing Christoph Waltz for dressing like a “disco Santa”, and the whole first Act is actually great in that regard. It’s no Superbad by any means, but it’s got a solid sense of humor throughout and that went a long way.
But then the movie keeps going, the laughs get harder and harder to come by, the run-time starts to feel an hour longer than it actually is, and it ultimately falls prey to the Achilles’ heel of every superhero movie: having too much shit going on at the same time. We’ve got Rogen’s estranged relationship with his late father, Rogen trying to maintain an amicable partnership with his sidekick even though his sidekick is essentially the real hero of the two, Rogen attempting to run his dad’s newspaper, Rogen and his sidekick trying to go after the same girl, Christoph Waltz trying to reinvent his image while taking out Rogen, and there’s still one or two other plot lines that make what could have been a straightforward superhero movie with a faux-villain twist into an increasingly muddled mess that ends up being way too complicated for its own good.
Although I don’t really have anything bad to say about the cast, so that’s a plus. Seth Rogen works as The Green Hornet himself, Britt Reid, since he delivers as the comedic weight of movie and doesn’t have to be much of a superhero since he’s not the one doing much of the fighting; Jay Chou (who I’d never heard of) was pretty legit as Kato and sure does kick a fair amount of ass even if he doesn’t pull off the impossible by one-upping Bruce Lee; Tom Wilkinson is here for all of two minutes as Reid’s dad; Cameron Diaz is here for some reason as Reid’s new secretary; and Christoph Waltz ain’t half bad as L.A. crime lord, Chudnofsky, even if his whole reinvention shtick gets old after a while and he doesn’t pull off the impossible by one-upping Hans Landa. At least he didn’t have a Jamaican accent.
Big fan of that Franco cameo though, and Edward Furlong of all people gets a brief cameo as a meth dealer, too. Nothing wrong with that.
And on another note, it’s also really freakin’ violent for a PG-13 movie. Usually don’t even notice that kind of thing unless we’re talking about The Sixth Day, but not only does it seem like every other word out of Seth Rogen’s mouth is some variation of “shit”, dudes get mowed down in this movie like gangbusters and Christoph Waltz gets offed in a most outrageously brutal of manners. Didn’t hurt the movie or anything, just think I’d be pretty taken aback if I was taking my kids to see this is all.
God, I sound like such a fucking loser.
Anyway, The Green Hornet wasn’t exactly a disappointing way to kick off the new year, it just started out at a solid 7 and slowly bored its way down to its current standing. If it wasn’t structured so poorly it could have been a total blast, but as enjoyable as it is in some aspects, it’s hard to focus on the good stuff when you could really care less about the story it’s trying to tell. Although there is a great fight scene that could only have been inspired by the fight scene from They Live, and that is sweet.
So is the car, that is beyond sweet.
Inside Job (2010)
VERDICT:
10/10 Wall Street Governments
The best movie of 2010. And that, boys and girls, is why you don’t jump the gun on your Top Ten lists.
Inside Job is a documentary about how in 2008 we found ourselves in the worst global recession since the Great Depression thanks to the greedy mother effers who got us there, the gross negligence and corruption that allowed it to happen, and why we’re still knee-deep in it to this day. So if you’re one of the many who lost your job, lost your home, and/or lost your savings because someone in the richest 1% of the population felt like gaming the system for trillions of dollars and ultimately got away with it, this one’s for you.
I guess it wasn’t until this past year that I truly started to realize how freakin’ much I love documentaries, and let me tell ya’, there was a lot to love. As great as fiction can be when I’m jonesing for a good story or a two-hour escape from the 9 to 5, it seems to pale in comparison after I stumble upon something like this and am immediately reminded of why I watch movies in the first place. No, a movie doesn’t have to make a difference in order to be great, but a movie that does make a difference, that is so important it makes everything else seem like a thrill ride at Six Flags and renews your faith in the power of film as both an art form and a call to arms, those movies are the ones worth celebrating.
And that’s exactly what Inside Job is.
It’s the sophomore effort by director Charles Ferguson, and considering that this is also the guy who made No End in Sight – one of the best documentaries about American involvement leading up to and during the Iraq War – I think it’s safe to say that Charles Ferguson is very much the man these days. And here, he’s pretty much got two things on his mind: giving his audience the complete low-down on how things went from morally sound to hell in a handbasket over the source of several decades and doing what he can to prevent it from happening again. He asks all the questions during his interviews with those responsible and continue to benefit, those who saw it coming and couldn’t do a thing even if they tried, and those who still deny we’re even in a a recession, but he doesn’t make it about him, he’s just giving these sonsabitches the trial they never had, and more power to ‘im.
But as for the content of his movie, I can’t go into specifics because Ferguson and his interviewees can explain all this stuff far better than I could ever hope to and because this review would be a good 3,000 words at least if I tried to run down every last thing that made me want to move to Canada. Although the one drawback here is that even after listening as hard as I could to Matt Damon narrate the basics of “derivatives”, “CDOs” and a multitude of other outrageously complex financial loopholes that all essentially measured up to one big Ponzi scheme, it’s damn hard to follow along if you’re not already on the level. But by the same token, those things were meant to be mindbogglingly confusing, that’s why they were so effective at swindling everyone on such a large scale, and even if you give up on trying to make heads or tails out of it, the real-life impact it had is impossible to miss.
But here’s a number of things I do know:
1. Fuck deregulation. Believe it or not, there once was a time on Wall Street when the heads of Merrill Lynch, AIG and Lehman Brothers were hard-working men who made honest, living wages by not robbing others blind, playing by the rules and recognizing that to operate an economy where anything goes would eventually lead to complete and utter ruin. Those were the ’70s, those were the days when the market was regulated, and when it was raining, you weren’t actually getting pissed on. Then came the Reagan era, Alan Greenspan was named Chairman of the Federal Reserve, he deregulated the shit out of everything, he was then reinstated by Bush I, Clinton and Bush II where he continued to raise hell and destroy a perfectly sound system with his legion of coattail riders solely for the sake of garnering more money than any man would ever need without any legal repercussions. Didn’t even know what deregulation was before last week, but even with a layman’s education on it, I have no idea how it ever got out of the starting gate.
2. Take a good look at the guys in the pictures I’ve put up here. Starting from the top left and making my way down, we’ve got Henry Paulson, Ben Bernanke, Tim Geithner, Larry Summers and Alan Greenspan. These guys were, and continue to be, the cornerstones that led to our financial meltdown, the Top Five on America’s Most Wanted that you won’t see on TV. Folks, I’ve never been one to start mobs or wish violence upon anyone, but I think it would be pretty fair if anyone and everyone could go up to these guys on the street, mug them dry until all they’ve got left are their hands over their groins and have the cops keep on drivin’. Seems fair to me, but since that will never happen, we should all at least know what evil fucks these guys are. Then again, as loathsome as they are, there should have been someone to stop them from square one.
3. Obama is, unfortunately, no better than his four predecessors. Look, I voted for the guy, he’s gotten a lot accomplished during his term in office even if he does a horrible job of letting people know about it, and so I was hoping that eventually the movie would get to him and the tone would shift to “But Barry’s done fixed it!” But alas, he has not. For a guy who got elected to office as a beacon of “change” in our country, it’s heartbreaking to see that his entire Economic Council is pretty much comprised of the same bastards who got us into this mess in the first place. Why they’re throwing rocks in the White House bowling lanes instead of making sure they don’t drop the soap this time in Sing-Sing is something I truly cannot understand, but it’s an absolutely heartbreaking fact that just adds insult to injury.
Alright, those were just three points of many, so I should probably start winding this thing down because even though I’m writing about this movie a good four days after the fact, you can probably imagine how heated I was about all this when I left the theater. It takes no prisoners, it doesn’t sugarcoat any of the ugly details, it ought to be shown in every high school and college economics and history class, it’s just required viewing on the highest level.
I was lucky enough to see this with a packed crowd last week, and while that’s usually my least favorite condition to see a movie under, it really was something to hear everyone reacting the same way to what we were all seeing. I was shaking my head more times than I could count, I was literally on the edge of my seat in a state of sheer disbelief as the atrocities snowballed to heights that made my head spin, and so was everyone else. It was a chorus of disappointment, frustration and shock that made me want to scream at the top of my lungs if only to let out some of the pent up rage that only fostered when all was said and done, and it almost makes me want to cry just thinking about it.
I wouldn’t go so far as to call Inside Job an “entertaining” movie per se, but it’s like being on the shore and watching a tanker sink over the course of two hours. You can’t believe what you’re seeing, you’re utterly helpless and you can’t look away. Even if you weren’t/aren’t directly affected by all the events and individuals that led to this movie being made, you really do deserve to hear everything this movie has to say. I truly hope that future generations will look back on this movie and take steps towards preventing history from repeating itself, because this shit cannot happen again.
The First Annual Crappy Awards
That’s right, folks. It’s The Crappies. Might need to work out the kinks on that name, but since The Golden Globes don’t look to be on their A-game this year, figured this would be as good a way as any to hand out some well-earned superlatives and highlight all the ups and downs of this past year in movies that won’t be covered in my Oscar predictions. So without further ado, I give you this year’s esteemed winners:
Breakout Actor of the Year:
TOM HARDY
There were some good ones this year thanks to the likes of Andrew Garfield, Armie Hammer and John Hawkes, but Hardy stole the spotlight right out from under JGL and Leo, he was unreal in Bronson, and he will be an effing awesome Mad Max. What a badass.
Breakout Actress of the Year:
JENNIFER LAWRENCE
Yeah, Emma Stone was the peach of the year in Easy A, Hailee Steinfeld held her own like a boss in True Grit and Chloe Moretz had two winning roles going for her in Kick-Ass and Let Me In, but if Natalie Portman didn’t have that Oscar in the bag this year, my vote would go to Lawrence for her turn in Winter’s Bone. No idea where this girl came from, but she is no joke and has the chops of a veteran twice her age. Keepin’ an eye out.
Hardest-Working Actor the Year:
MATT DAMON
Is it just me or did it seem like he was in a good 40 movies this year?
Best Line:
MARK ZUCKERBERG: “Winkelvii.”
It was either that or the “I’m six-five, 220 pounds, and there are two of me,” line, but the plural thing was just too damn good.
Worst Line:
ALICE, right before taking out the Jabberwocky: “Off with YOUR head!”
Awful. Just fucking awful.
Best Comedy:
I LOVE YOU PHILLIP MORRIS
Great to have you back, Jim. Keep it up.
Best Horror Movie:
THE CRAZIES
Also happens to be the only horror movie I saw all year, but it was a pretty damn good one at that.
Best Visuals:
TRON: LEGACY
Goo-goo, ga-ga.
Worst Visuals:
RESIDENT EVIL: AFTERLIFE
As gimmicky as they come. Still can’t believe I actually saw this.
Best Character:
SCOTT PILGRIM
So epic.
Worst Character:
GREENBERG
Originally went with The Red Queen from Alice, but then I suddenly remembered this guy and it occurred to me that I completely overlooked the definitive whiny bitch of 2010. What a douche.
Favorite Scene:
Ryan Gosling serenading Michelle Williams on the ukelele while she tap-dances along in Blue Valentine.
Biggest “WOW” Moment:
The rotating hallway fight scene in Inception.
Biggest “WTF” Moment:
Casey Affleck introducing his fists to Jessica Alba’s face in The Killer Inside Me. Did not see that one coming, kind of amazed that no one walked out.
Best Moviegoing Experience:
THE ROOM
Don’t see it by yourself, see it in a packed theater at midnight, it will change your life. And bring spoons.
Worst Moviegoing Experience:
BURIED
Well, it’s actually more of a double-edged sword. Chatty woman a couple rows back wouldn’t shut the eff up, pretty sure the movie was ruined for me as a result, but I did get to tell her off at the end, and that was a major high point of the year. Booyah.
Best Celebrity Sighting:
MIKE STARR
Walked right past William Hurt, saw John Larroquette at a concession stand, was on the same subway car as Kal Penn, but running into The Gas Man and mustering up the courage to tell him that he was great in Dumb & Dumber quickly turned into one of my favorite stories of the year. Dude could not have been nicer, seemed to make his day as much as it made mine. Awesome.
Most Emasculating Moviegoing Experience:
TOY STORY 3
Thank God for the cover of those 3D glasses, because those tears were a-flowin’.
Biggest Disappointment:
IRON MAN 2
Just one big infomercial for The Avengers. Boooooooo.
Biggest Surprise:
EASY A
The best teen comedy I’ve seen in ages, the trailers did not do this baby justice.
Best Trailer:
THE SOCIAL NETWORK
And in related news, the sky is blue.
Best Movie That Absolutely No One Saw:
MUGABE AND THE WHITE AFRICAN
Already gave it an Honorable Mention in my Top Ten, but this really is one of 2010’s best docs in a year filled to the brim with winners. Hit up that Netflix Instant, yo.
Worst Movie of the Year:
ALICE IN WONDERLAND
Saw it with three friends, I was the only one who stayed awake, I should have followed suit. Just stunning how bad it was.
Well, that’s it for this year, folks. Congrats to all the winners, sorry for all the Alice have that I’ve finally gotten out of my system, and thanks for tuning in!
Golden Crappies all around!
And the Best Movie of 2010 is…
INCEPTION!
Won’t argue that in the slightest and would be oh so happy to see Nolan get his due this year. And for the record, the totem falls down. Michael Caine said it himself, folks.
RESULTS:
– Inception: 19 votes
– Black Swan: 11 votes
– The Social Network: 9 votes
– Winter’s Bone: 3 votes
– Toy Story 3: 3 votes
– The Town: 2 votes
– True Grit: 2 votes
– 127 Hours: 2 votes
– The King’s Speech: 1 vote (good call, Deirdre)
– The Fighter: 1 vote
– Other: 1 vote for Despicable Me (why not?), 1 vote for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 (in typical muggle fashion), 1 vote for Blue Valentine (here, here!), 1 vote for Machete (I really need to see that, huh?), 1 vote for Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (damn right), and 1 vote for Let Me In (way to represent, Sebastian).
Strut away, Leo. Strut away.
Cut The Crap Movie Reviews 
