Pure Film

Inglorious Basterds August 4, 2010

Utterly frustrating viewing experience. There is an excellent film in here but it’s ruined by the way in which Tarantino breaks the contract with the viewer. There is absolutely no need to vandalise the viewing experience by insulting the intelligence of the viewer and by scribbling (literally) over the images on screen in a way that further implies the viewer is an idiot who could not follow a simple story without the guidance from an unseen hand.

The obvious thing to do to improve this film by 100% is to get rid of the Inglorious Basterds. They are completely irrelevant to the action and the storyline. You need an American covert presence in Europe to carry the story but the basterds team in no way fulfils this requirement, rather it detracts. For one thing the whole scalping and torturing your enemy storyline makes the basterds no better than the Nazis; for another the Brad Pitt character is an embarrassment from start to finish. I do not blame Pitt for this as he is clearly playing the part as the cartoon character that was defined by the script.

I’m not averse to doing things differently and I think the unexplained change to the real historical timeline and the use of contemporary music works well. The first “chapter” is a master class in creating tension as is the sequence in the cellar. As others have commented the acting of Christoph Waltz is astonishing and quite the best thing in the film. But there are other beautiful sequences such as the opening of chapter five with its superb framing and use of the colour red. Such a pity that the rest of the film is so poorly done.

Whilst I know that few will agree with me, the director Tarantino most reminds me of is Stanley Kubrick. Like Kubrick he can produce scenes of breath-taking originality but he is unable to sustain the vision over an entire film. If Tarantino could shed his sometimes infantile interjections into his own film-making process he could produce a work of true genius. Inglorious basterds is half genius, half embarrassing nonsense.

The White Ribbon July 10, 2010

Although there seems to be some question as to what this film is about, the director spells it out in an interview on the blu-ray version I watched. I did not put the same interpretation on the film that he suggests but I can see it makes sense. He is also at pains to say that this isn’t just about German society and could have been about anywhere with analogous conditions.

I always hesitate to use the “M” word but in this case I would call the film a masterpiece. I can also see that it isn’t a film that everyone would like because it is a very still and calm film, despite the violent acts that take place. It also runs like a mystery but there are no easy answers given which might be unsatisfactory for some viewers. I generally like two sorts of film; either a straightforward good action or genre film or films that are highly metaphorical and mysterious. This is definitely in the latter category.

The White Ribbon is such a beautiful visual experience that I feel it could be watched with sound and the subtitles turned off. There’s so much to see in each frame and the black and white photography is better than anything I’ve ever seen in a film before. Oftentimes the effect is quite painterly especially when featuring the interiors of buildings. It also leaves the viewer to do a lot of the work – sometimes the characters leave the frame and shut doors behind them and the camera is static for several seconds before characters come back into frame. Could be deadly yet it’s always done in a way that allows you to know what is happening behind the closed door or at least be intrigued by the possibilities. Even though the film moves at a slow pace I felt constantly on the edge of my seat.

The only thing I can compare this to is Powell and Pressburger’s A Canterbury Tale which had a similar set of disturbing events going on in a rural town. But the White Ribbon stands on its own as a masterpiece of modern cinema. Although I’ve nothing against a good bang, crash type of film as I’ve said, this is on an entirely different level. This is pure art and lots of people won’t like it. It just so happens that I do.

The Killer Inside Me June 11, 2010

The Killer Inside me is a very well done film noir set in the 1950s. The casting and the acting is excellent and the soundtrack, comprising popular music of the time, is very well chosen. Casey Affleck is particularly effective in the lead role. The plot is nicely convoluted though credibility is stretched towards the end. Beautifully photographed it often reminds you of Edward Hopper paintings and I am sure this was done deliberately. The only thing that spoiled the atmosphere of the piece was a very obvious and poorly-done piece of CGI towards the end of the film. I’ve said it before and I’ll no doubt say it many more times but CGI still doesn’t work as well as miniatures or mechanical work in many if not most instances. The studios would have us believe CGI is good enough but I’m still not buying it.

There have been some high profile discussions of this film in the British media regarding the violence shown against women with some critics saying it is misogynistic and the violence is too graphic. In the case of Hadley Freeman, a writer for the Guardian, she defended the film on the grounds that the violence is realistically shown and that is much better to use realism than it is to use the cartoon violence so often seen elsewhere. If it wasn’t for the controversy it generated in the press I probably wouldn’t have gone to the cinema to see this film.

I really don’t know what the fuss is about. Yes the two female leads are beaten and kicked in graphic detail but I can’t say it was worse than any other violence I’ve seen in films. I’ve recently watched Band of Brothers and The Pacific and the violence in these two series was far more extreme to the point where I began to wonder about the psychology of watching what is essentially war pornography. However I think the violence in modern WWII films is justified because at least we get an idea of how awful the reality was. The same is true for The Killer Inside Me – it’s a film that would not make sense unless we see the real effects of the violence on these women.

I saw the film at an afternoon matinee. In the evening I watched Coronation Street and Legend of the Seeker. In Coronation Street one of the main female characters was beaten up in prison and we see her in hospital with a bloody and bruised face. In Legend of the Seeker two scenes featured women with very bloodied faces. There’s a large female cast in Legend of the Seeker and they are often punched or kicked in the face during the frequent fight scenes. I’ve not heard anyone complaining about the violence against women in these TV programmes.

The Killer Inside Me is a very good film noir that I would recommend to anyone with an interest in 50s Americana. The violence is justified and no worse than you would see in most modern films. I suspect that David Lynch would have done an even better job with this than Winterbottom but I could be wrong.

James Cameron, Avatar and 3D June 8, 2010

I’ve watched Avatar twice in the last couple of weeks; once on my computer and once on my TV. I haven’t seen it at the cinema in 3D but don’t feel I’ve missed much.

Every now and then the idea of making 3D films comes around again. This time the film companies and TV moguls have convinced themselves that 3D really is the future of film/TV/everything and are busy trying to sell us this idea. Although I’ve always been a fan of James Cameron’s work I somehow never got around to going to watch Avatar at the movies in 3D. I intended to but I had no enthusiasm for sitting in uncomfortable 3D glasses for two and half hours. I already wear glasses for short-sightedness and having a second carboardy pair over the top has never been a pleasant experience. I’ll give it a try when the marketeers get around to realising the blu-ray version in 3D with extras. Funny how they try to sell everything several times over isn’t it?

So now I’m partly into Mary Whitehouse territory (historical reference – look her up) in reviewing something I’ve not seen. Well I’ve seen the film but not in its full 3Dness. I can imagine how it might look in 3D and I can imagine it might offer a few thrills but I can’t imagine it making it a better film. Neither can I imagine 3D* adding to my viewing pleasure for any other form of entertainment.** Films and dramas are about storytelling and 3D is about sensationalism. I know I’ve carped on about movies needing to move and I’m no fan of slow dramas. But even crash bang movies like Armageddon need a good story and good dialogue.

So I’m going to judge James Cameron’s Avatar by the normal standards of film making and not on its 3dness. It’s OK. No, no, it’s good. Mostly. It’s an adventure, it’s got action, it’s got a message. Sometimes you’ll think you are watching an anime (in a good way). You’ll enjoy it whilst thinking that the plot is so utterly predictable that you know exactly what’s going to happen next.

The shocker for me though is that, far from presenting us with something new and innovative, Cameron has gone backwards and I can only think that the technology is to blame. For one thing Avatar shares a large part of its DNA with Aliens; grunts come out of hibernation, militaristic figures dominate, arrival on planet, feisty female pilot, rapacious corporate designs, evil corporate representative, Sigourney Weaver. But worse than this lazy writing is the often poor realisation.

A good example of poor realisation is the way that the transformer-like mechanoids, driven by the evil military genius and his men, are clearly animated by CGI transformations and it shows. Compare this to the mechanically produced dock loader driven by Sigourney Weaver in Aliens and I’m sure you’ll conclude Cameron was producing more realistic effects over twenty years ago. It’s the same with many of the scenes featuring machinery in Avatar, whether flying, ground based or otherwise. They look like CGI. I don’t care what anyone says I still think good miniature and mechanical work looks better than anything CGI can produce. It’s really only the computer displays that look any better than previous incarnations and the debt to Minority Report is obvious.

So Avatar is a fun film, demonstrating how good animation can be but never transcending the anime-like approach to film making. Despite claims that 3D is the cutting edge of film making this looks like a giant step backward for James Cameron to me.

*And BTW good surround sound is far more capable of making me feel like I’m in the centre of the action than any 3D will ever deliver.

**Well there was that time in the 70s when someone made a soft porn film in which a woman stripped and threw her clothes at you and wobbled her breasts in your face but this was hardly good film making.

The Pacific and Band of Brothers June 4, 2010

There was a time when I avoided watching war films. This stemmed from early experiences of being a moviegoer in the 1950s and 1960s when I was convinced that all war films were propaganda. I’ve changed my mind over the years and now I’m keen to see and read as much as I can about WWII. I’ve watched The Pacific as its been broadcast. Many have commented on the link with Band of Brothers so I also obtained BoB on blu-ray and watched it in the same time period that I watched The Pacific. I can therefore make some comparisons without being biased by seeing one before the other. I can start by saying that, despite the rabid promotion of Band of Brothers above The Pacific by some critics, I cannot adjudge one to be better than the other.

In Band of Brothers I was puzzled by the decision to virtually isolate the paratroopers from their families and backgrounds. The emphasis was on the boot camp and then the war in Europe and the fact that you never saw what each character’s background was like made them ciphers to me. With one notable exception there wasn’t even the development of relationships with anyone outside of the band and nothing about fraternising or weekend passes during the training. I could only conclude that this was deliberate but it made the men less believable to me.

The Pacific took the opposite tack and spent significant time showing us the homes and families of the men both before and after the fighting. Unfortunately this didn’t prove to be any better as, apart from Sledge and Basilone, I couldn’t really distinguish one character from another from week to week. Worse, this approach was used to beat the viewer senseless by manipulating emotions. Basilone’s romance and marriage took up more than half of one episode only to have him senselessly go back to war and be killed. In slow motion. With syrupy music. And almost Christ-like posing in the death scene. Whereas lots of characters get limbs blown off, decapitated etc Basilone has to die elegantly. The only thing I liked about this particular episode was the sensible decision to severely limit how much action to show on Iwo Jima. It’s been done so much before, and definitively by Eastwood, that any new version was almost bound to fail.

Looking back over the two series I still can’t say that BoB was better than The Pacific. At least BoB gives a straight account of the horrors of war without any unnecessary frills, whereas The Pacific is shameless in its manipulation of the audience. But then BoB also gives the impression that the USA alone won the war in Europe and portrays the English and other allies as morons so that must count against it.

In the end though I don’t think we should carp about either series too much. Yes they have faults but you can see they were made with good intent. I’ve seen few other films that so brutally show the horrors of warfare and the production values in both series were outstanding.

Lawrence of Arabia April 13, 2010

I had a bad experience with Lawrence of Arabia when I was a lad (the film that is, not the person). I still have vivid memories of sitting through this interminable film and over forty years later still remembered it as the distilled essence of boredom. It can’t possibly be as bad as I remember, I told myself. I must have been too young to appreciate it at the time. Still somehow I never got around to trying it again.

Recently I acquired a box set of David Lean films running from his first as director, In Which We Serve, through to Hobson’s Choice in 1954. All the films had some restoration work done to them and they all looked good. In fact I wasn’t prepared for just how good some of the films were. Of course, I was familiar with Brief Encounter and Great Expectations, both as good as ever but I wasn’t prepared for just how good all the rest were. Passionate Friends is similar in some ways to Brief Encounter to my eyes a much more adult treatment of the issues than the rather soppy, though irresistible, Brief Encounter. Oliver Twist quite took my breath away with its cinematography and Robert Newton’s portrayal of Bill Sykes, a singularly chilling performance which is far more disturbing than the anaemic serial killers we see in more recent films. It was all looking promising then for a reappraisal of Lawrence of Arabia. Even so the DVD sat unwatched on a shelf for several months, so bad was my memory of the original experience of seeing it. Eventually the fateful day arrived (well two days to tell the truth as I stopped at the original intermission and resumed the next day).

So, was it any better than my memories suggested? Not much. At least I knew a little more about the history than I did before and could find something interesting from that point of view. But otherwise it was every bit as bombastic, boring and ennui-inducing as I had found it originally. On IMDB I see that the average score is 8.6 and it ranks at number 42 in the top 250 so someone clearly likes it. Here’s why all those people are wrong:

1 The film has been praised for its cinematography, particularly the desert photography. I’ll agree that there are some good shots but they aren’t that great. If I want desert shots I can see much better by buying the box set of “Life” and watching the episode on deserts. In fact I can find a dozen BBC series, usually in High Definition and usually narrated by David Attenborough which outstrip anything in Lawrence. If you like desert shots my advice would be get the documentaries instead and turn off the sound so you aren’t disturbed by Attenborough droning on and on. In fact play some good desert music like Tinarewen in the background, turn the central heating up and refuse to drink water for 24 hours for a really good effect.

2 The majority of the film is taken up by Lawrence seemingly crossing deserts in real time. This is both boring and pointless as a filmic experience. An alternative would be to try (1) above.

3 The theme tune – you know, the one you can’t get out of your head even if you try, occurs exactly when and where you think it will, usually signalling another real time trek across another bloody desert (or back again). At least you can enliven your viewing experience by predicting when the theme tune will come back in – I guarantee you’ll get it right every time.

4 The action scenes all run left to right (or is it right to left, I forget). There’s a reason for this which I also forget but bores on IMDB can explain it to you. Despite the huge numbers of extras, camels etc employed it generates some really unimpressive battle scenes when you start to notice the left-to-rightness of the action.

5 I’ve not read any of T.E. Lawrence’s original writing but I’d be very surprised to learn he was such a crashing, pompous bore and bigot as the portrayal in this film suggests. The character in the film is so deeply unlikable as to immediately nullify my suspension of disbelief. My mind keeps interrupting my concentration as it asks how anyone can be inspired to follow this idiot.

6 Many say that Peter O’Toole’s portrayal is magnetic, compelling, heroic and so on in this film. I say his acting suggests that he is completely bewildered by what the character is supposed to be like so he’s just settled for acting mad and unpleasant whilst staring distractedly into space.

7 Goggles on a bush. How much more obvious and clichéd can you get?

8 So that’s where Alec Guinness got his inspiration for Obi-Wan Kenobi?

9 Coming in at just under 47 hours in length this film is just too long. Simply taking out Omar Sharif’s entrance scene would trim 24 hours from the running time. Ideally a ninety minute cut would be just about watchable.

It wouldn’t be cricket to not mention the good points of the film as well and they can be summarised in just two words – Claude Rains.

Slumdog Millionaire February 28, 2010

I’ve never read the book on which this is based but my main reaction to the film was that it would have been vastly improved by removing all the sections based around Millionaire and just telling the story straight. Oh, that and all the main characters should have died in a hail of bullets in the final scene.

It just doesn’t work as a film in any coherent way. I imagine the meeting where the film is first pitched – “It’s about the poverty of Indian children who live in the slums and how they have miserable and exploited lives – no wait, the high concept is that we can make it a feelgood movie with a happy ending and some Bollywood music and dance.”

In the end we have film in which the poverty and misery is made to look chic by the way it’s shot and musically scored underpinned by all the usual Hollywood clichés. The result is something that people who really don’t care about movies can think is arty and of course it’s perfect Oscar fodder. It’s exotic, it’s abroad, it’s a bit harrowing but not too much, it has a happy ending. (Goodness knows what kind of sheltered lives some of the critics on imdb have led if they think the violence and poverty shown here is too horrific for their weak constitutions. The problem is that it’s not real enough).

I like fantasy. I like realism. On the whole I don’t think they mix well. (Pan’s Labyrinth being another example where the mixture really doesn’t work.) Danny Boyle has tried to have his cake and eat it too. It obviously worked at the box office but it didn’t work for me.

Wild Things April 25, 2009

CREDITS: Director: John McNaughton Cast: Kevin Bacon, Matt Dillon, Neve Campbell, Denise Richards, Robert Wagner & Bill Murray USA 1997 (18)

INTRODUCTION: A clever take on America’s so called class system (I’ve never felt that a class system based entirely on income deserves the name) in yet another slice of small town weirdness where the alligators are constantly poking up their noses from the swamp to remind us that there’s danger lurking just beneath the surface here.

SYNOPSIS: Feuding high school students, rich debutante Kelly Van Ryan (Richards) and poor white trash Suzie Toller (Campbell), come forward independently to accuse their counsellor Sam Lombardo (Dillon) of rape. Detective Ray Duquette (Bacon) sets forth on an investigation that reveals more than he ever expected. After this point it’s probably best just to lay back and go with the flow as twist is piled upon twist and turn upon turn, until long after “the end” of the movie.

REVEIW: McNaughton shows the love of excess that established him as a controversial director with “Henry: Portrait Of A Serial Killer” by producing what is outwardly an attractive Hollywood thriller and adding into to the mix rape, lesbianism, brutal murder, violence, corruption, Richards breasts and Bacons penis.

As for the plot itself, let me assure you that Occam’s Razor does not apply here, with the choice of two explanations it is not the simplest, in fact it’s often not even the second simplest, it is full of mind-blowing twists and turns, very reminiscent of one of my favourite movies of last year, the BAFTA winning “Le Apartment”. I successfully predicted the end of “The Usual Suspects” and “Se7en” (although I must confess I didn’t expect it to be the same guy in both films) but this film left me bewildered. I’m still not entirely certain what happened.

Dillon puts in one of his subtlest performances in years, and Bacon (complete with member) puts in one of his only performances in years. Theresa Russell and Gloria Perez deserve special mention for the performances as Kelly’s mother and Duquette’s partner respectively, both thankless supporting roles that they bring alive. Murray and Wagner turn up for amusing cameos that, while potentially distracting in a film this complex, just add to the fun. However, at the heart of the film is the combined acting talents of Neve Campbell (“Scream”) and Denise Richards (“Starship Troopers”) two hot young actresses from two of the most entertaining movies of last year, and “Wild Things” is in many ways a combination of those two films.
Just as “Scream” parodied the horror genre and “Starship Troopers” parodied militaristic sci-fi genre, so “Wild Things” parodies the crime thriller, subtler than the self referential in-jokes of “Scream” but too self-conscious to play it so straight you’re left wondering if it was parody. As with “Starship Troopers”, “Wild Things” falls somewhere between these two extremes, by portraying a good crime thriller and then taking it a stage further than is realistic.

Let’s not forget that apart from anything else this movie is very useful for anyone playing six degrees of Kevin Bacon, the game briefly mentioned in “Scream 2”, where you must link a Hollywood celebrity to Kevin Bacon via the movies they have appeared in, in less than six moves.

Stylish post-modern take on film noir.

Mutts Rating: ****

Western April 25, 2009

CREDITS: Director: Manuel Poirier. Cast: Sergi Lopez, Sacha Bourdo & Elizabeth Vitali. France (subtitled) 1997 (15).

INTRODUCTION: A wonderfully poetic character study from the arse end of France, that was a truly deserving winner of the Grand Jury Prize at Cannes.

SYNOPSIS: Two strangers thrown together by circumstance discover themselves as they travel across the length and breadth of central Brittany in search of love.

REVIEW: An unusual road movie that covers less than seven miles in over 120 minutes of running time, compared to “Leningrad Cowboys Do America” which went from the Siberian wastes to Mexico via most the United States in less than 90 minutes. This film does however go far further into the characters and explores their inner depths, but one would expect nothing less from the feature debut of Poirier, a former Peruvian social worker..

Lopez beautifully underplays his role as Nino a Catalonian shoe-salesman while Bourdo hams it up as Paco a Russian hitch-hiker, creating one of the most endearing double acts in cinematic history. Vitali and Matheron provide wonderful backup as the objects of Nino and Paco’s affections while Siekoua puts in a show-stealing performance as the wheelchair bound Baptiste.

But the true star of the film is Finisterre in western (hence the title) Brittany, beautifully lensed scenery shown to a Cesar (the French Oscars) winning soundtrack from Bernardo Sandeval creates a truly powerful look at this little known area of France that has been described as the Wales of the continent.

Good morning France.

Mutt’s Rating: ****

Washington Square April 25, 2009

CREDITS: Director: Agnieszka Holland. Cast: Jennifer Jason Leigh, Albert Finney, Ben Chaplin & Maggie Smith. USA 1997 (PG)

INTRODUCTION: Yet another Henry James adaptation trundles off of the production line and onto the silver screen. Is there still a market left for this stuff?

SYNOPSIS: Young heiress Catherine Sloper (Leigh) is wooed by poor lad about town Morris Townsend (Chaplin), despite her complete lack of grace and charm, and while her hormonal aunt and governess (Smith) positively encourages the tryst, her overbearing father (Finney) is, to say the least, less than pleased, believing the boy to be a gold digger.

REVIEW: It was of course all done better by William Wyler with his 1949 big screen adaptation which one legendary costume designer Edith Head won her first Oscar as well as securing the best actress Oscar for a youthful Olivia De Haviland.

While Leigh is wonderfully gawky in the lead role she should not be expecting a repetition of De Haviland’s success. Chaplin plays his difficult part with suitable ambiguity, to leave doubt in the audience’s mind, while Finney is so brilliantly overbearing to dispel aforesaid doubt completely. Meanwhile Smith hams it up in blissful oblivion to her surroundings.

The plot, while far from original, I seem to remember a Henry James novel with a vaguely similar theme, has a wonderfully twisted ending with that fatal 90’s cop out of suddenly turning the heroine into a feminist well ahead of her times.

Uninspired by-the-book (or not as the case may be) adaptation saved by some fine performances.

Mutt’s Rating: **