One would imagine that a corporate whistle-blower film starring Matt Damon marks a complete return to the mainstream for Soderbergh after his four-hour Che (which I didn't see) and his escort-service film The Girlfriend Experience (which I did). But it's a surprisingly odd little picture that I expect will alienate half the audience who show up expecting a more conventional thriller.
Soderbergh seems less concerned with making the standard corporate intrigue picture than he is interested in the inner-workings of the mind of a man (Damon) who realizes that his penchant for lying is perfectly suited within the corruption of his company and has himself a ball manipulating his fellow workers and a group of FBI agents while lining his own pockets. Damon is very good here, bulking up and talking fast after his largely silent presence in the Bourne flicks (the interior monologues are very amusing...he seems to imagine himself as a character in a Grisham-y/Crichton-y kind of novel, and Marvin Hamlisch's silly, spritely score is a perfect complement to his mindset while still seemingly oddly unsuited to the actual movie that we are witnessing).
The film itself ultimately seems slight to me, not compelling or tense enough to work as a corporate thriller, not funny enough to play as farce, not deep enough for any kind of powerful condemnation of big business. But Damon is reason enough for a look and kudos to him and Soderbergh for continuing to pick interesting projects.
Sunday, September 20, 2009
Sunday, September 13, 2009
Nog Sees 9 and Finds Himself Bored / Nog Gets Edgy with Mr. Goldthwait
Shane Acker's 9 looks great, but once you've got a feel for it's post-apocalyptic landscape, it doesn't have much else to offer you besides a bombardment of action sequences the likes of which wouldn't feel out of place in your more run-of-the-mill summer fare. Tim Burton is listed as an exec-producer here, but there's none of the sense of play one finds in Nightmare Before Christmas or Corpse Bride (plus, the CGI is far less amusing than the stop-motion animation of those films). I suppose too much lightness would be out of place here, and there's something sort of admirable about its bleakness, its studious avoidance of whimsy, but there's ultimately nothing to connect to and the film finally dissolves into a strange and overly optimistic ending despite itself. I found the experience mononotous after twenty minutes and spent the time looking forward to the long-delayed The Road next month, providing us all a dose of pure despair that will at least likely be far more compelling to watch.
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Following up his alcoholic clown film and his film about the woman who gave a dog a blowjob, Bobcat Goldthwait delivers a film called World's Greatest Dad starring Robin Williams. And if that title and star conjures a vision of some unwatchable treacly mess of a family-film, you can take comfort in the fact that it's, in actuality, about a failed poet who exploits his son's accidental death by auto-erotic asphyxiation to further his own career.
Williams' son is a despicable person, a perverted bully hated by everyone (and at least strongly disliked, if not hated, by his own father). So when he turns up dead, Williams' disguises it as a standard suicide, fakes some deep and introspective diary entries, and ends up turning his son into a misunderstood hero among the school. On the heels of Michael Jackson's death, the film plays as an interesting take on the culture's need to mythologize the dead, smoothing over unpleasant and obvious truths and allowing us to feel better about ourselves in the process. Edgy stuff, but its shifting tones and too-nice ending keep it from being as strong as it could have been. Plus, we all know that Heathers is (and is likely to remain) the gold-standard of teenage suicide films (can anything top that film's deathbed prayers for each character: "Why'd you havta kill such hot snatch?" "I loved my dead gay son."--now that's dark humor at its finest, friends!).
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Following up his alcoholic clown film and his film about the woman who gave a dog a blowjob, Bobcat Goldthwait delivers a film called World's Greatest Dad starring Robin Williams. And if that title and star conjures a vision of some unwatchable treacly mess of a family-film, you can take comfort in the fact that it's, in actuality, about a failed poet who exploits his son's accidental death by auto-erotic asphyxiation to further his own career.
Williams' son is a despicable person, a perverted bully hated by everyone (and at least strongly disliked, if not hated, by his own father). So when he turns up dead, Williams' disguises it as a standard suicide, fakes some deep and introspective diary entries, and ends up turning his son into a misunderstood hero among the school. On the heels of Michael Jackson's death, the film plays as an interesting take on the culture's need to mythologize the dead, smoothing over unpleasant and obvious truths and allowing us to feel better about ourselves in the process. Edgy stuff, but its shifting tones and too-nice ending keep it from being as strong as it could have been. Plus, we all know that Heathers is (and is likely to remain) the gold-standard of teenage suicide films (can anything top that film's deathbed prayers for each character: "Why'd you havta kill such hot snatch?" "I loved my dead gay son."--now that's dark humor at its finest, friends!).
Monday, September 7, 2009
Nog Extracts a Few Laughs From Mike Judge's New Flick
Mike Judge's films seem destined to fail at the box-office and develop loyal followings later on. There's Office Space, of course, but also Idiocracy, which barely got released in theaters but whose reputation is already seeming to grow (less deservedly, but the names of its reality-shows are hysterical: Ow, My Balls!). And now there's Extract, which tanked badly on this holiday weekend (there were three people when I saw it, including me), but should make for some very entertaining DVD viewing later on.
Certainly it's not a great film, and there's no particular reason for most people to see it in the theater, but the fact that people are opting for a unanimously reviled Sandra Bullock comedy over this is sad (if not surprising, I guess). Extract has a strange rhythm and some nice character work. The problem, as with Office Space, is that there's also a cluttered, not-at-all compelling plot that gets in the way of these characters. Still, there's plenty to enjoy among the actors. Jason Bateman (in a likeable Michael Bluth from Arrested Development-mode) is good as a man who seems to have scored a good job and a nice house in the suburbs only to find that the job is unfulfilling, the wife no longer wants to sleep with him, and the neighbor wants to have interminable driveway conversations. So he takes to hanging out with his old friend and bartender (a very funny, bearded Ben Affleck) who wants to shake him out of his doldrums. Mix in the ever-reliable JK Simmons as a plant supervisor who can't remember anyone's name and David Koechner,especially, as the obnoxious neighbor, and you've got yourself a few laughs on a dull afternoon.
Also, Mila Kunis is just outrageously hot.
Certainly it's not a great film, and there's no particular reason for most people to see it in the theater, but the fact that people are opting for a unanimously reviled Sandra Bullock comedy over this is sad (if not surprising, I guess). Extract has a strange rhythm and some nice character work. The problem, as with Office Space, is that there's also a cluttered, not-at-all compelling plot that gets in the way of these characters. Still, there's plenty to enjoy among the actors. Jason Bateman (in a likeable Michael Bluth from Arrested Development-mode) is good as a man who seems to have scored a good job and a nice house in the suburbs only to find that the job is unfulfilling, the wife no longer wants to sleep with him, and the neighbor wants to have interminable driveway conversations. So he takes to hanging out with his old friend and bartender (a very funny, bearded Ben Affleck) who wants to shake him out of his doldrums. Mix in the ever-reliable JK Simmons as a plant supervisor who can't remember anyone's name and David Koechner,especially, as the obnoxious neighbor, and you've got yourself a few laughs on a dull afternoon.
Also, Mila Kunis is just outrageously hot.
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Nog Goes To Woodstock! (read after viewing)
Most of the criticisms you've heard of Ang Lee's Taking Woodstock are pretty apt. Yes, it feels very slight. Yes, the main character is less interesting than most of the supporting characters. Yes, it's just a little odd to make a film about Woodstock without a single shot of the performers on stage. Even so, I'd give it a marginal recommendation. It's ultimately so generally sweet and likeable that it's hard to hold much of a grudge against its many failings.
Lee is interested in the organization of the festival, the story of Elliot (Demetri Martin), a young Jewish man helping his parents run a fast-fading New York "resort," who takes advantage of a neighboring town's intitial cancellation of the festival and joins forces with local farmer Max Yasgur (Eugene Levy, unusually subdued) to unexpectedly bring 500,000 hippies out for three days of peace, love, and music. Elliot is a more-or-less closeted homosexual, and Lee wants to find in his coming-out story a parallel with the sexual liberation of the era (what's happening on stage is far less important, the film suggests, than what is happening in the audience, although of course the music does play a big role in the era's liberation, which doesn't get adequately addressed here). Elliot's story never feels particularly alive to me, and the film works best in funny and touching individual scenes. I particularly like the recurring bits with the Earthlight Players, a theatrical troupe Elliot houses in his barn, and a scene near the end where Emile Hirsch, as a mentally-addled Vietnam vet, experiences a remarkable moment of clarity at the festival, getting back in touch with the childhood that the war took away from him (somewhere Beth is saying: "But does he get naked?").
Woodstock plays less subtly than other collaborations between Lee and his constant screenwriter James Schamus, such as The Ice Storm and Brokeback Mountain. Perhaps that's appropriate to an era known for its politics and protests, but various speeches seem to oversell the idea that Woodstock was American culture's last gasp of innocence. Still, there are moments that play a bit more subtly in hinting at darker things to come. In a bit that plays almost as a winking aside to its contemporary viewing audience, Yasgur remarks on how the festival is becoming commodified even as it happens (locals are trying to sell bottled water for a dollar, he remarks, incredulous). And the film's final moment is nice too, with festival promoter Michael Lang vowing to do a "totally free" Stones concert in California. Here, Lee and Schamus trust their audience to understand the Altamount reference, and the final image leaves us with an ominous feeling as the camera lingers on the wreckage left in Yasgur's field after the crowds depart.
Lee is interested in the organization of the festival, the story of Elliot (Demetri Martin), a young Jewish man helping his parents run a fast-fading New York "resort," who takes advantage of a neighboring town's intitial cancellation of the festival and joins forces with local farmer Max Yasgur (Eugene Levy, unusually subdued) to unexpectedly bring 500,000 hippies out for three days of peace, love, and music. Elliot is a more-or-less closeted homosexual, and Lee wants to find in his coming-out story a parallel with the sexual liberation of the era (what's happening on stage is far less important, the film suggests, than what is happening in the audience, although of course the music does play a big role in the era's liberation, which doesn't get adequately addressed here). Elliot's story never feels particularly alive to me, and the film works best in funny and touching individual scenes. I particularly like the recurring bits with the Earthlight Players, a theatrical troupe Elliot houses in his barn, and a scene near the end where Emile Hirsch, as a mentally-addled Vietnam vet, experiences a remarkable moment of clarity at the festival, getting back in touch with the childhood that the war took away from him (somewhere Beth is saying: "But does he get naked?").
Woodstock plays less subtly than other collaborations between Lee and his constant screenwriter James Schamus, such as The Ice Storm and Brokeback Mountain. Perhaps that's appropriate to an era known for its politics and protests, but various speeches seem to oversell the idea that Woodstock was American culture's last gasp of innocence. Still, there are moments that play a bit more subtly in hinting at darker things to come. In a bit that plays almost as a winking aside to its contemporary viewing audience, Yasgur remarks on how the festival is becoming commodified even as it happens (locals are trying to sell bottled water for a dollar, he remarks, incredulous). And the film's final moment is nice too, with festival promoter Michael Lang vowing to do a "totally free" Stones concert in California. Here, Lee and Schamus trust their audience to understand the Altamount reference, and the final image leaves us with an ominous feeling as the camera lingers on the wreckage left in Yasgur's field after the crowds depart.
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Nog Joins Forces With QT's "Basterds!"
Tarantino's long-awaited war flick may not much resemble the movie a lot of fans wanted (it's certainly not the rip-roaring Great Escape-style picture QT often seemed to imply it would be). Instead, it's an outrageous, typically QT-stylized, wildly talky, revenge picture that boils down to two Jewish plots to wipe out the upper-tier of the Nazi party (including Hitler himself). Those who like to take Tarantino to task usually cite such faults as: (1) all style, no substance; (2) doesn't really care about his characters; (3) overly self-indulgent. They won't have trouble making any of those cases here, but why bother? QT does what QT does, and many of us can still dig it. Even if the film is less perfect than much of the rest of the QT canon (and I'm not quite willing to rank it yet, myself), there's still a crazy amount to enjoy here, such as:
--Brad Pitt chewing the scenery as the "Apache" Aldo Raine, the "di-rect descendant of mountain man Jim Bridger," a Tennessee moonshiner with an unexplained scar on his neck that seems to be from a hangman's noose
--Eli Roth, as the "Bear Jew," taking batting practice on a Nazi soldier's head
--everything Christoph Waltz's Hans Landa says (especially the long opening conversation). Surely this will get an Oscar nod?
--the Revenge of the Giant Face!
--Samuel Jackson's voiceover explaining the extreme combustiblity of film stock
--the wildly corny? pretentious? final line by Pitt
See it at once!
--Brad Pitt chewing the scenery as the "Apache" Aldo Raine, the "di-rect descendant of mountain man Jim Bridger," a Tennessee moonshiner with an unexplained scar on his neck that seems to be from a hangman's noose
--Eli Roth, as the "Bear Jew," taking batting practice on a Nazi soldier's head
--everything Christoph Waltz's Hans Landa says (especially the long opening conversation). Surely this will get an Oscar nod?
--the Revenge of the Giant Face!
--Samuel Jackson's voiceover explaining the extreme combustiblity of film stock
--the wildly corny? pretentious? final line by Pitt
See it at once!
Saturday, August 15, 2009
Nog's Lazy Capsule Reviews of District 9, Julie and Julia, and GI Joe!
I wanted to love District 9 as much as the raving fanboys over at AICN but, as a whole, it didn't fully thrill me somehow. I like most of the faux-documentary stuff early on, which sets up a lot of ideas that resonate on a lot of different levels, but once the second half turns into a more straightforward action picture those ideas dissolve a little and what matters more is exploding heads and ass-kicking "prawn" creatures which, admittedly, look amazing for a mere $30 million bucks (I'll take the look of this film any day over Transformers 2 or Terminator 4 or GI Joe). And there's definitely some strong, disturbing political commentary here early on that separates D-9 from the summer's other boneheaded action pictures and makes it well worth a look. I particularly like the scene where our hero, exploited by the "establishment," must slaughter an innocent "prawn." Let's hope Blomkamp keeps his budgets small and doesn't end up helming a future mindless summer franchise based on toys. But that's probably too much to hope for.
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Of course, the reason to see Julie and Julia is Streep's performance as Julia Child, and that's plenty reason enough. For me, there was a point about a half hour in when I ceased marvelling at her amazing impersonation and just accepted her fully as Child. Go ahead and hand her the Oscar. Too bad the rest of the movie, involving a contemporary Amy Adams as a new blogger cooking her way through Julia's famous cookbook, is far less compelling (and, from what I've read, Epron-ized into a more palatable romantic-comedy framework than the book it's based on). I suppose the two stories are cleverly integrated, to some extent, but the parallels between the two women don't resonate much. Perhaps a better dual storyline would have been one where we watch one of the "servantless housewives" of the 60's and 70's that Child was writing for finding herself "liberated" by the cookbook. Or, better yet, just a film that followed Child's full career, not just the period up to her first publication. But that would have been too "traditional" for today's Hollywood.
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GI Joe has one great chase through the streets of Paris that culminates in the Eiffel Tower getting eaten up by nano-somethings. You've seen it already in clips. Knowing to skip this shit is half the battle. But I always lose.
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Of course, the reason to see Julie and Julia is Streep's performance as Julia Child, and that's plenty reason enough. For me, there was a point about a half hour in when I ceased marvelling at her amazing impersonation and just accepted her fully as Child. Go ahead and hand her the Oscar. Too bad the rest of the movie, involving a contemporary Amy Adams as a new blogger cooking her way through Julia's famous cookbook, is far less compelling (and, from what I've read, Epron-ized into a more palatable romantic-comedy framework than the book it's based on). I suppose the two stories are cleverly integrated, to some extent, but the parallels between the two women don't resonate much. Perhaps a better dual storyline would have been one where we watch one of the "servantless housewives" of the 60's and 70's that Child was writing for finding herself "liberated" by the cookbook. Or, better yet, just a film that followed Child's full career, not just the period up to her first publication. But that would have been too "traditional" for today's Hollywood.
---
GI Joe has one great chase through the streets of Paris that culminates in the Eiffel Tower getting eaten up by nano-somethings. You've seen it already in clips. Knowing to skip this shit is half the battle. But I always lose.
Sunday, August 9, 2009
Nog Falls In Love With Zooey (And Likes Her Film Reasonably Well)
There's a moment relatively early in 500 Days of Summer where Joseph Gordon-Levitt's Tom Hanson, beginning a relationship with Zooey Deschanael's Summer Finn, rhapsodizes over various things he loves about her (her crooked smile, her knobby knees, how she always makes him think of the same dumb song). There's a moment later on, post break-up, where we hear this same monologue again, only this time as a venomous rant about all the things he hates about her. It's a sharp moment which gets at what the film is about: the way memory shapes and alters "reality." The film, as one can probably tell from the trailers, is a break-up story told out of chronological order, which allows the viewer to reconstruct the relationship and its fallout along with Tom. Although the film has an odd, often annoying, omniscient narration which pops up at times, the point-of-view is certainly Tom's. As some critics have said, this is essentially a romance for sensitive indie-guys, with Zooey perfectly cast, since the real Zooey, perhaps largely due to her recent musical stint as the "She" to M. Ward's "Him," has sort of become the indie "It" girl of the moment. Summer remains, appropriately, somewhat cryptic, with the film suggesting that perhaps much of her allure is due as much to what Tom projects onto her as much as any qualities she inherently possesses. As the narrator tells us, Tom's romantic sensibility has been forever shaped due to his "complete misreading" of The Graduate's final images: he projects forward to a happy ending, ignoring the bewilderment on the faces of Benjamin and Elaine as that film closes. And on some level his involvement with Summer serves to harden him, since she seeks to deny any notions of "true love" and "destiny." Yet it's Tom's romantic sensibility that finally gets the upper-hand here, leaving us with a magical meeting that's completely corny but totally appropriate.
The movie is enjoyable but certainly flawed, often too cute, and the supporting cast doesn't work very well. But Levitt, I think, is the real deal. Watch him in The Lookout, Brick, Mysterious Skin, and his powerful turn as Cobra Commander in GI Joe and judge for yourself. Okay, that last one's a joke. But the kid's a serious actor. And Zooey...Zooey is very adorable. Now I'm going to play my She and Him record.
The movie is enjoyable but certainly flawed, often too cute, and the supporting cast doesn't work very well. But Levitt, I think, is the real deal. Watch him in The Lookout, Brick, Mysterious Skin, and his powerful turn as Cobra Commander in GI Joe and judge for yourself. Okay, that last one's a joke. But the kid's a serious actor. And Zooey...Zooey is very adorable. Now I'm going to play my She and Him record.
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