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Reviews
Taxi to the Dark Side (2007)
Must-see documentary is very nearly unwatchable at times.
Much like the director's Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room, the subject of Taxi to the Dark Side carries the dual burdens of public burnout and simultaneous public smugness. We're tired of hearing of prisoner abuse, and moreover, we think we know all there is to know about it anyway.
I wouldn't have guessed that I could be affected by unedited imagery from Abu Gahrib but as it turns out, it's 24 hours since I saw TTTDS and I can't shake the images from my head. Many will want to hide their eyes from what our own tax dollars hath wrought, and perhaps some will be right to do so. This is a brutal, agonizing, blistering and exhausting journey that doesn't pull any punches. No digital scrambling or government double-speak to hide the unpleasant parts - just pure evil.
The screening audience was active with conversation when the lights came up and one was heard to say that this was a truer documentary than any created by Michael Moore. I don't know what that means, but without a doubt no documentary I have ever seen has gotten under my skin to such a degree. What makes it brilliant is that it captures, simultaneously, the evil that men (and women) do AND the faith that we all carry for greater human achievement.
A college professor once described "Schindler's List" as the story of God's grace in a godless place. What's agonizing about TTTDS is that for much of the film God is nowhere to be found, beyond the desperate screams of "Allah" as extricated from captives by US Soldiers given no direction and without a magnetic north in their moral compass.
Those who not only condone but advocate the horrors on display in this film are all here, in their own words, to justify their leadership with the talking points we've heard again and again over the past 5 years. In the context of Bagram and Guantanamo Bay their words take on a sinister edge I'd not heard before. I can't recommend this film highly enough, nor can I suggest more strongly that you do not know what you're in for.
Bon Cop, Bad Cop (2006)
Ludicrous blender of trite cliché
This film proves one thing only: that Canadians are equally as capable of making hackneyed, clichéd "buddy cop" movies as Hollywood is. And indeed "Bon Cop, Bad Cop" faithfully churns out every single "buddy cop" cliché one can think of. If there were a "Mad Lib" template of "plug in the cliché" for cop movies, the result would be this film.
For that reason, I was bored, I checked my watch, I rolled my eyes more times than I can count. I think the "finale" alone garnered double-digit eye rolls.
I give the film 3 stars because the lighting is great and the cinematography is competent and there is no question that the crew did a very good job constructing a professional looking film. I would only ask, if "Rush Hour 2" looks professional, does that make it a good movie?
If you've seen "48 Hours," "Lethal Weapon," "Bad Boys," or any of the other endless trite by-the- numbers rehashes of the formula, then you've already seen "Bon Cop, Bad Cop." Unless you're interested in Canada's opinion of hockey in America, there's nothing to see here.
Miami Vice (2006)
Perfect Mann film, perfect TV adaptation
It works on every level. As an homage to an outdated source material; as a simple police procedural; as a violent meditation on justice and retribution; and most simply as a Michael Mann masterpiece.
I am a lifelong fan of Miami Vice and enjoy the shows to this day. I know about everything there is to know about the show, in front of and behind the cameras. I am not catching up with it now; I was glued to the set for the 1984 pilot "Brother's Keeper" and I've been glued to every episode since. Live, repeat, syndication, DVD-- and now, at long last, on the big screen where it belongs.
There's so many homages to the TV show it's hard to know where to start. But folks, if you're not a fan, you will miss it. If you're a casual viewer catching up in syndication, you will miss most of the references to the show. They're sly and subtle in some cases, obvious in others, but the point is that anyone who says "this movie bears no resemblance to the series" is flat- out incorrect. Period.
What Anthony Yerkovich and Michael Mann have delivered is essentially an episode of the series, with precisely the structure of an episode of the series. Had Miami Vice run on HBO and had they the budget. this is exactly what it would have looked like. Sounded like. Felt like.
Free of the limitations of network censors and the appalling drive of network heads to dumb TV series to the lowest common denominator, Michael Mann presents a moment in the lives of two vice cops that is not sugar coated for the kids and is not so pedantic that high-school dropouts can follow the bread crumbs. You either get it or you don't.
The effect is that as a viewer you feel as though you're being thrown into a world (voyeuristic in nature) that you would not otherwise experience. It's what the best movies all do- regardless of genre: it takes you someplace for two hours and does not let go until the final frame rolls and when the lights come up you feel as though you've been somewhere else for two hours.
It's got everything the show did: the Ferrari, the style, the lingo, the snitches, the kingpins, the riveting violence and the driving beat of a contemporary soundtrack that enhances the visuals and mood rather than just lay on the soundtrack like so much background noise.
It also moves as fast as the Ferrari does. You get swept immediately into an assignment and then the film proceeds to hurl forward from one scenario to the next in an ever-escalating web of lies, posturing and pre-emptive guesswork by the cops who work their way into the next dangerous level of an international drug organization.
Here's the facts: it's ultra-violent, it's fast-paced, it's demanding of attention to follow the chess moves on either side, it's got supercharged sex scenes and it's got that singleness-of- purpose that eliminates the need for childish distractions like ticking alligators and supporting-character hijinks.
(It's also got an informant who while not as funny as Noogie or Izzy is clearly cut from the same cloth.)
Look, watch "Smuggler's Blues" if you need to, but trust me, this is as true to Miami Vice and its legacy as it could possibly be. I cannot wait to see it again, and moreover, I'll be first in line for the sequel.
Stunning.
Batman Begins (2005)
Stunningly good
It's not merely the best Batman movie, it's quite possibly the best comic-book movie ever crafted. Seeing it on the big screen last night was a thrill, the kind of thrill provided by the original "Star Wars" or "Raiders."
Breathtaking cinematography combines with genius editing to replicate the comic experience in a way no movies have-- the experience of gorgeous art telling a tale in panels that aren't necessarily sequential nor do the spell out what's happening in a pedestrian way.
I'd suspect that Frank Miller would be impressed by this film.
The action sequences are so well-crafted and presented in such a unique way, I was reminded of the feeling I got watching the U-Boat landing in the beginning of "Saving Private Ryan." The difference is that Spielberg shot his wad in those first grueling minutes and was unable to return to that momentum during the rest of "Ryan." In the case of "Batman Begins," Nolan teases us with an ingenious prison fight sequence that is actually built upon--even topped--as the movie progresses.
This is finest E-Ticket ride, a roller-coaster that builds momentum to a thrilling conclusion that leaves the audience in wild applause. An intelligent, complex, brilliantly executed piece of film-making that just so happens to present the most authentic picture of the Dark Knight we've ever seen. Go ahead, file away that old 1989 copy of Tim Burton's "Batman"-- there's a new sheriff in town and his name is Christopher Nolan.
It just doesn't get any better than this. Can't wait to see it in IMAX.
Heaven's Gate (1980)
A lost classic that deserves its chance
Having just walked out of a theater showing Cimino's full original cut, including intermission, I can say that this film is a remarkable achievement and possibly one of the greatest crimes in American Cinema has been perpetrated around this film.
This is what the term "epic" was made for.
Love, war, friendship, betrayal, villainy, heroism-- this one has it all on a grand scale. Most of all it has a director with the patience to let scenes play themselves out and actually sink in, under the audience's skin. I can't think of another movie in the past 20 years that has so patiently and subtly revealed its characters lives.
In other words, today, it doesn't stand a chance.
I'm just as guilty as the next viewer of loving the quick moving jump cuts and I'll slap my $10 down on a 90-minute blockbuster as quickly as the next guy. But I really think this is what theaters were built for: gorgeous cinematography splashed across the big screen; a luscious score booming through the theater and performances that never ceased to satisfy. And Christopher Walken in a multilayered role that could be described in some ways as a good guy? Come on! This is why we don't simply wait for Netflix to deliver the next pile of DVDs to our mail box.
Heaven's Gate was quite simply destroyed by a horrible cut that cast the movie in the worst possible light, delivering an incomprehensible mess to American theaters and to a movie-going audience that was already primed to dislike it by the endless stories about its (gasp!) $40 million budget. In the context of a gas shortage and recession and hostage crisis its excesses were repellant and the critics savaged it. Practically cut in half, it made no sense, and how could it have? It seemed poorly edited-- of course.
One scene in the movie shows a group of well-heeled men preparing to vote on taking an action of monstrous evil against a town. One man stands and appeals to reason and morality but its clear that the mob mentality is about to take over. One by one in line, any man who might have been thinking wiser of it falls blindly in line with the masses.
Such was the case of critics of this film. Even to this day it's far from hip to praise "Heaven's Gate." What a sad state of affairs. See it as it was intended by Cimino on the big screen (it's playing film festivals) and then come back with a review. Anything less is a different movie.
Judging from the audience reaction at today's screening and the sidewalk discussions outside the theater (and during intermission), Seattle would have given this the Academy Award. One must wonder if Cimino has to pass away before people see this gorgeous epic for what it really is: possibly one of the greatest achievements in American cinema. Breathtaking.
Adam & Steve (2005)
Well-done date movie
What a fun, funny, sharp-witted, incisive film about the rocky road to romance. And how brilliant that it's about a gay couple-- a committed, monogamous gay couple who look very much like real gay human beings (as opposed to the broad caricatures usually seen in film and television). Is it possible that this will be the first "gay" date movie that straight couples will go to and laugh with?
Maybe that's hoping for an America more open-minded than it is, but certainly the open minded heterosexual partners are in for a good time.
Kudos to writer/directer Chester for creating what is an impressive mosaic of styles. In lesser hands the film, with everything from emotional honesty to slapstick comedy to over-the-top (and I do mean WAAYYYY over-the-top) camp, should be a mess. But somehow scenes of first love are actually made sweeter all the more by the slapstick running gag that accompanies them (sorry, no spoilers here!).
The leads are extremely appealing, the dialog is well-realized, and the realities of dating are sharply realized in a film that walks the fine line between maudlin and frank but rarely feels dishonest. That's going to sound ridiculous in the context of a film that includes a choreographed dance-off featuring a drag queen, but the movie is wise to use broad strokes of humor to help otherwise clichéd movie devices go down easier. Additional kudos to Parker Posey, who becomes the heterosexual equivalent of the "Jack" character on "Will & Grace." Her comic contributions are note-perfect.
Chester has commented that the use of comedy has a role in helping straight audiences better accept a budding romance between men. I hope that's true, because this film deserves better than the "cult" or "gay/lesbian" dungeon in your local video store.
Battlestar Galactica (2004)
The standout TV experience of 2004-05
There's so many levels on which this series works. To pick two:
1. As an hour long drama. Take away the science fiction element and Galactica works as one of the more effective pieces of drama on TV. I'm reminded of the early days of ER, when the writing was at its sharpest and the characters were compelling and surprising in their feats and foibles. No difference here. Complex, multi layered characterizations by some of the best actors on television. Writing that advances the characters, challenges the audience, and manages to mirror our post-911 world AND forward a debate between monotheism and polytheism. Much of this is likely lost on those who just showed up to watch spaceships go boom. The writers' refusal to dumb the show down to their level is admirable and rewarding.
2. As a remake. It's everything a remake should be. Take a weak first-stab and better it on every front. Better visual effects, better and fuller characters, better scripts on all levels. In many ways it's even truer to the concept of the childish original, as it refuses to shy away from the ugliness of a holocaust and how the effects of genocide are long lasting-- or permanent. Where the original gailey hopped along from planet to planet solving the problems of the locals in a tidy hour, the new one advances its story the way a good book unfolds.
It's no wonder that this excellent show has been renewed for a second season (another feat the original was incapable of), or that its ratings actually went UP over its 13-week run on SciFi. Now that it's in reruns, I can't recommend it enough to newcomers. Ignore the title, ignore the memories of the old Star Wars ripoff-- this is the most original Science Fiction TV series in years and it surpasses the genre by leaps and bounds.
While unlikely, it deserves serious consideration at Emmy time. With as many thrills as 24 and as fully-realized characters as The Sopranos, this show stands tall with the best television has to offer.
Forty Shades of Blue (2005)
Like sands through the hourglass...
What's great about seeing films as part of a film festival is that most of the time they've received little or no advance word-of-mouth. For me that makes encountering such films a very pure experience, having no expectations, just open to whatever story the filmmaker wants to tell. I hand myself over to the film and see where it takes me.
Within 15 or 20 minutes of watching this film, where it took me was straight to my left wrist to check my watch. For me, watching this turtle crawl was one of the more excruciating experiences I've had in a theater.
Spoiler warning, as above, and now here's the problem: a boring lead character who is bored and depressed spends the length of the film bored and depressed and ends the film bored and depressed. Guess where the audience winds up?
What's fascinating about the film for me is the director's insistence upon scenes that literally do nothing a go nowhere, telling us nothing. In one interminable sequence, our heroine walks around, looks at furniture, lays down on a bed, looks at the ceiling, stares at nothing, you get the point. With each edit the audience anticipates-- perhaps even prays for-- something, anything to happen in the next scene and there is literally no payoff.
Case in point: laboriously, slowly, she makes her way to a closet to pull a journal off a shelf. What will be in it? Some secret we don't know? Alas, it's a blank page. Now she's grabbing a pencil. What will she write? Is this her suicide note? Alas, we don't get to see what she's writing. Will it materialize later in the film? A crucial plot point to be revealed at film's end? No. Unfortunately this waste of 5 - 10 minutes of screen time literally goes nowhere, tells us nothing, and provides no break to the depressive monotony of the 90 minutes preceding it.
She's dropping her kid off at the day care. What will she do? What will happen? Nothing.
This is the case the entire film. It got to the point where the pointless culmination of each exhausting sequence elicited derisive snickering from those around me in the theater. As we exited, a thirtysomething woman behind me commented, "Every one of those people needed some caffeine or some prozac." Hear, hear. As did the audience by that point.
I don't know the work of Sachs, but it seems that Sachs was aggressively bound to make a film that flies in the face of conventional wisdom. Sachs would make a film in which our heroine makes no journey, learns nothing of herself, and winds up depressed and miserable, precisely where she started. With claustrophobic framing, dark and dreary colors, and an almost pervasive lack of music to break or enhance the mood, it's almost like Sachs was determined to leave the audience miserable as well.
Even the brilliant Rip Torn can't elevate this pointless dreck above the sensory experience of watching wallpaper dry.
The Lion King (1994)
A jewel in Disney's crown
I have a friend, whose opinion I value, who reacted to my enjoyment of The Lion King by saying, "You mean the animated movie? I don't watch animated movies. I'm an adult."
I don't understand that idea. And the more I see The Lion King, the more I just feel like that friend is being left behind in the cold. King is a beautifully animated work of art, so much so that you could randomly freeze almost any second of the film and have a cell worthy of framing.
King also features some of Disney's best vocal performances. Not just one over-the-top Robin-Williams-esque showcase, but hilarious turns by Whoopi Goldberg and Cheech Marin, a wicked performance from Jeremy Irons, a wise and understated performance by Robert Guillame. James Earl Jones' voice is spot-on perfection. Let's face it, how good must the OTHER performances be when the excellent Matthew Broderick goes practically unnoticed?
So the animation is a feast for the eyes, the performances are first rate... that leaves the story. Some simplify the plot by calling it "Hamlet," which is mostly accurate, but as with all great animated Disney films there is a theme to the movie which pervades its most powerful scenes and provides an added weight for the adult audience. It's not for me to say what the theme of King is, but it's there for the viewer to pick up. In my opinion to accomplish a mix of child-pleasing spectacle, clever humor, brisk pacing and a most grown-up thematic in 90 minutes is a far greater accomplishment than most films achieve. Most films don't achieve their stated goal, i.e., to be a thriller or a mystery, much less introduce deeper levels of storytelling.
Does being an adult mean we should pay to watch Adam Sandler mug his way through another brainless, sophomoric comedy? For my money The Lion King is ten times more adult, more sophisticated, more entertaining and more satisfying. When time allows The Lion King to be compared on its own merits and without the cultural trappings of feeling contemporary, I think it will be said to be a far greater accomplishment than most of the Disney films currently considered their best. We'll see.
X2 (2003)
Thrilling and surprising, better than the original
My expectations for summer blockbuster sequels have been virtually destroyed
by recent summers which gave us watered down mush like "MIB II" and the
feeble Star Wars sequels. Besides, the original X-Men was just a good, if not fully realized, superhero movie. I probably would have been happy if the sequel merely lived up to the original.
Within the first 20 minutes "X2" establishes itself as that rarest of beasts: the sequel that surpasses its predecessor on virtually every point of comparison. If anything it's even truer to the comic, as a cigar-chomping Wolverine comes into his own with the kind of brief responses and one-liners his animated counterpart has spat out for years.
The newcomers are engaging, especially Nightcrawler, who opens the film with
an action sequence that is made truly breathtaking with rocket-fast camera work, imaginative editing and cutting-edge special effects. Everything I've read so far makes reference to this sequence and with good reason. There is nothing like
an action movie that grabs you by the throat from frame one.
We learn more about the returning characters from the first film and we get to see them interact in new ways, some not by choice but by necessity. We
understand more about what makes them who they are in a way that is
universal to anyone who's ever felt excluded or outside looking in. This is due mainly to absolutely top-notch acting from almost everyone. It's like nobody has told Brian Cox, Patrick Stewart or Ian McKellan that they're in a comic book
movie and their line readings run the gamut from earnest to grave to brutally funny. I was starting to think Magneto was going to be sidelined for the film but when his moment in the sun arrives, McKellan is so good I actually was
cheering for him.
On that point, I'll just say that my audience was cheering, laughing, and
applauding throughout the film. Seattle audiences are desperately snooty and
we're quick to show our displeasure for cheese or lazy filmmaking (a la Star
Wars 1999-present) and all I can tell you is this film is a true crowd pleaser. Go stand in line! Every moment is worth it!
Star Trek: Nemesis (2002)
Hard to believe it's sunk so low
What is the worst crime committed by the movie industry upon the paying
public? These days my vote goes to the endless regurgitation of tired formulas, where so many movies should simply be advertised as a shameless remake of
a more original film. American cinema, it could be argued, is perhaps at its least inventive and certainly least risk-taking. Star Trek: Nemesis is the most flagrant example of such contempt for the audience that I can recall. Boiled down: this is a remake of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, almost scene-for-scene. You will guess what's coming next and you will always be right. Sprinkle in some tired elements from the ST:TNG TV show and you've got the cinematic equivalent of
vomit. Look close enough and there's pieces in there you can recognize but in the end it's just spew. For the record, I am a lifelong Trek fan, I currently watch Enterprise, and I have seen all of the movies more than once. I went to the
theater tonight with a sense of optimistic anticipation and I could not believe what played out. I still can't believe it. You know the guy at work who's not very good at telling jokes, who telegraphs the punch line from the beginning and
whose exposition is painful to sit through yet you patiently sit through it because you don't want to be a jerk? That's the only reason I didn't leave the theater. At long last, after 34 faithful years, I realize that I am at last done with Star Trek.
Star Trek: Nemesis (2002)
Hard to believe it's sunk so low
What is the worst crime committed by the movie industry upon the paying
public? These days my vote goes to the endless regurgitation of tired formulas, where so many movies should simply be advertised as a shameless remake of
a more original film. American cinema, it could be argued, is perhaps at its least inventive and certainly least risk-taking. Star Trek: Nemesis is the most flagrant example of such contempt for the audience that I can recall. Boiled down: this is a remake of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, almost scene-for-scene. You will guess what's coming next and you will always be right. Sprinkle in some tired elements from the ST:TNG TV show and you've got the cinematic equivalent of
vomit. Look close enough and there's pieces in there you can recognize but in the end it's just spew. For the record, I am a lifelong Trek fan, I currently watch Enterprise, and I have seen all of the movies more than once. I went to the
theater tonight with a sense of optimistic anticipation and I could not believe what played out. I still can't believe it. You know the guy at work who's not very good at telling jokes, who telegraphs the punch line from the beginning and
whose exposition is painful to sit through yet you patiently sit through it because you don't want to be a jerk? That's the only reason I didn't leave the theater. At long last, after 34 faithful years, I realize that I am at last done with Star Trek.
Die Another Day (2002)
The best Bond in ages
I can't remember the last Bond movie that I can say I was legitimately
"exhilarated" by. This film has breathless action sequences, from a
"gentlemanly" swordfight to what amounts to two spectacular end-sequences. It seems as though the Pierce Brosnan Bond series has followed the Connery
formula so slavishly that when watching movies such as "Tomorrow Never Dies"
and "The World is Not Enough" for the first time, you can predict the next scene well before it pays off. The pacing of the Brosnan Bond films has had the comfort of the best Bonds but perhaps too comfortable; this Bond is familiar without
mindlessly following in the footsteps of its predecessors. Appearances by our regular friends happen in unexpected intervals and new characters, especially an excellent Halle Berry, breathe fantastic life into the series. I love Bond, all things Bond, and I've been successively let down ever since "Goldeneye." This is the penultimate Bond film: Bond is incredible once more, and Brosnan at last is so good in the role that when present meets past in a very clever way you
almost think it could have been Brosnan all along. This film clearly sets a new "All Time High" for future Bonds to measure up to. Nobody Does it Better,
indeed!
Charlotte's Web (1973)
Like an old friend
Charlotte's Web was annual viewing in my home since its release. As with most children's movies, viewing it now as an adult there are plenty of things I could take issue with. But at the end of the day this is a heartwarming, funny movie that owns a place in my heart. In comparison to every other Hanna-Barbera movie that I've seen, this one should be the feather in their cap.