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Palindromes (2005, Todd Solondz) |
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Pretty Persuasion (2005, Marcos Siega) |
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Swingers (1996, Doug Liman)** |
8 [Hilarious, touching, definitely
of a time and place -- it's a bit raw and green, but it has moments that really stand out as memorable and unique, something
to remind us of when Favreau and Vaughn weren't fat and sad]
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Changing Lanes (2002, Roger Michell)** |
8 [See this poorly written review for an explanation; I think the movie didn't hold up quite as well as I'd have liked, but I'm feeling generous]
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Twentynine Palms (2004, Bruno Dumont) |
2 [I think I'm starting to
feel about Dumont like I feel about Wim Wenders -- he's a smart, philosophical guy whose world views I sometimes tend to share,
but he has no clue how to express it in any remotely appealing cinematic language; in this laughably bad French artsploitation
flick, Dumont clumsily forces his camera and characters into Stark Compositions that never feel anything but desperate, the
two leads are psychotic and unlikable and far too shallow in their conception of Miscommunicating Lovers, and the admirable
existentialism that Dumont wants to convey is buried in moronic sex scenes, awful improv, and then the most helpless deus
ex machina ending in film history, a Plot Point falling out of the sky to cry out the movie's message in impotent, despicable
fashion; let this guy lecture a class, but don't let him near a camera -- he turns into a retarded hack]
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40 Days and 40 Nights (2002, Michael Lehmann) |
4 [Childish, unfunny, formulaic, and over-directed by a guy who desperately wants to recapture
his Heathers aggression; the picture is made watchable by Shannyn Sossamon, whose natural likability earns her character
more points than anyone else in the film put together, including the perpetually cold Josh Hartnett (someone get this guy
a sweater so he stops shivering please), and some of the supporting turns are amusing -- but this flick's got nothing to say
and doesn't say it very well]
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Sin City (2005, Robert Rodriguez & Frank Miller) |
8 [Gorgeously done, but still
has the low-budget attitude and size of most Rodriguez films -- it's a ton better than Once Upon a Time In Mexico,
mostly because his gore fetish here is served by a far more deserving comic book sensibility; never before has cinema been
storyboarded so meticulously like a graphic novel, and props to Rodriguez the DP for lighting it like a John Alton noir; Mickey Rourke
hasn't been this good since Angel Heart, and many other actors like Willis, Dawson, Owen, Gugino, and Del Toro fare well in this style (while
others, like Alexis Bledel and Jaime King, do not); left me a bit emotionally cold (evidently Rodriguez rarely filmed actors
together -- just using green screen and then F/Xing them into the same shot, a technique that removes intimacy
from acting), but it's quite a nifty and original feat, and worth a second look]
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Rounders (1998, John Dahl)** |
7 [Where's Edward Norton these days?]
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The Onion (2005, Tom Kuntz & Mike Maguire) |
3 [Yikes. Oy. So
what they did is take everything unique and clever about The Onion and remove it completely, leaving nothing but stale satire, obvious observations, and lowbrow humor (examples of what passes
for hilarity: old people swearing; gay sex; getting punched in the groin); it's in the vein of Kentucky Fried Movie,
but lacks that film's deft execution -- even the few sketches that are inspired or well-conceived are acted, shot, and cut
with clumsy incompetence that kills the laughs; hopefully the print I saw will be revised by the time it's released, but as
of now this is a depressingly bad attempt at comedy]
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Casualties of War (1989, Brian DePalma)** |
8 [Hmm... Didn't hold up as much this time, even though the last dozen viewings were pretty awesome;
I'll still give it a pass for the great visuals and Penn's marvelous performance, but David Rabe's script is surprisingly
really heavy-handed and Fox screws up a few dramatic moments -- still, DePalma knows a setpiece and the central conflict is
always harrowing]
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The Incredibles (2004, Brad Bird) |
5 [What a letdown; why is this
film so turgid and stale? From the conventional characterizations to the sitcom jokes to the predictable storytelling, there
was rarely a moment I was engaged; the last half hour has some creative animation, but this is the weakest Pixar film to date]
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Spy Game (2001, Tony Scott)** |
8 [This forgotten and underrated film boasts one of the more clever scripts Hollywood has cranked
out this decade; props also go to Pitt and Redford for strong performances, and Tony Scott's style, often overcooked, is just
right here -- as it is in all his best films (i.e. True Romance, Revenge, Enemy of the State, Crimson Tide)]
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Love Actually (2003, Richard Curtis)** |
8 [I have no good excuse for
seeing this film a third time; but I'll probably see it three more times before I wear it out -- wanna make somethin' of it, punk? I'm still
impressed with how economical Curtis's structure is, giving us just enough about each story to give it meat, but not too much
to weigh down the running time; Hugh Grant continues to be one of the best comic actors alive: the line reading that cracked
me up this time is his suddenly high-pitched delivery of, "Ooooh, would we call her 'chubby'?" I was tempted to bump the grade
up a notch just to piss off its cynical naysayers, but I suppose there are a few too many overly simplistic crowd-pleasing
moments of sugary sweetness to merit it "great film" status; still, I sure do enjoy watching it]
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The Door in the Floor (2004, Tod Williams) |
6 [Far more pretentious than it has any right to be; John Irving adaptations tend to suffer from
this drawback consistently, however. Enough with the heavy symbolism, color coordination, Mickey Mouse music cues, and
self-consciously "written" dialogue -- this undoubtedly works better as literature than cinema; Bridges is dependably good,
and Basinger is miles ahead of her inexplicably awful turn in Cellular; can't say I'm fond of Jon Foster's dull,
one-note performance; film finally does itself in with the hammer-headed final shot, but along the way there are some decent
moments and the funny stuff works all right]
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Manic (2001, Jordan Melamed) |
8 [A psycho-babble movie where
the psych stuff doesn't actually feel contrived or self-absorbed; this is very realistic drama and wouldn't even really need
to take place in a psych ward to have an impact; Cheadle is terrific, but it's really another showcase for the insanely amazing
Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who, with this and Mysterious Skin, has proven to be the most arresting and dynamic actor of his generation -- he's like a young Robert Downey, Jr.
without the sarcasm; watch this kid. Seriously.]
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Face/Off (1997, John Woo)** |
9 [I can watch this thing a million times and it always gets to me; the clever, heady existential
themes (that have always been Woo's domain [and Hitchcock's as well] -- that is, becoming your enemy in order to advance yourself,
the destruction of identity in order to create identity, etc.) and the raw emotion in scenes like the one where Cage tells
Allen about their first date and the drunk dentist; what really makes the material sing is the brilliance of Woo's visual
creativity and the acumen of leads Travolta and Cage, who have arguably never been better, having to act on Level III: playing
a character inhabiting another body and trying to impersonate the other actor; a few false moments here and there, of course,
but they don't bother me. One question I still have -- why doesn't Castor kill Sean in the prologue? Does his
sniper rifle only have one bullet? Once he sees it's the kid who got hit and Sean is still alive, can't he fire off one more
shot?]
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Ghosts of Mars (2001, John Carpenter) |
4 [Why do I keep watching John
Carpenter films made after 1988? I'm not even an auteurist]
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Destry Rides Again (1939, George Marshall) |
8 [Pretty stellar entertainment here -- snappy dialogue, excellent performances, snappy pace and
solid storytelling, even a few amusing musical numbers (one riot act by Marlene Dietrich is apparently historic); even better
is the message: who knew a stock Hollywood western would be so pro-gun-control? This is the last film the NRA wants
to see: its hero despises guns even while possessing exceptional hand-eye coordination, and when the climax devolves
into a shootout, only tragedy can result -- it's quite a sucker punch for a light-hearted piece of entertainment, which only
serves to drive home the message harder: Good. Fuck guns.]
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The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928, Carl Dreyer) |
5 [Call me a philistine if
you must; I just don't think this thing dates as a masterpiece; until the big action scene at the end, it's an artfully composed
but overwrought stage play that repeats the same themes over and over again; Falconetti's performance, while evidently stellar
for the time, today comes across as goofy -- it's all that head-cocked-back, wide-eyed fear-frozen glazed, I-feel-the-power-of-the-Lord
stuff; not so great. Dreyer called this a documentary: somehow I think Fred Wiseman would have gotten some better footage]
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Vanilla Sky (2001, Cameron Crowe)** |
9 [Yet another shamefully overlooked Tom Cruise performance; he just owns this film, mastering
his physical movements, dialogue delivery, and quiet emotional reactions -- what more do people want from this guy?
It also happens to be a fucking awesome movie (that holds up on repeated viewings); even better than its fine Spanish original, thanks to Crowe's razor sharp writing
and fantastic visuals (thanks John Toll once again); maybe there's a few scenes that go a bit too far (not a fan of Cameron
Diaz's turn) but it's still pretty great overall]
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Down By Love (2003, Tamas Sas) |
6 [A terrific showcase for
actress Patricia Kovacs, who gets the screen to herself for the entire film -- and while the camera floats around her in interesting
ways, modulating a pace that fits the constrained narrative and minimalist cinematography and set design, the material just
doesn't do the technique justice; we get a fairly banal psychological study of an unhealthy and emotionally abusive love affair
followed by a terribly predictable and pat moralistic conclusion; this is no Petra von Kant, that's for sure]
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How High (2001, Jesse Dylan) |
2 [This has the distinction of being the single worst edited film I've ever seen that got major
distribution in the United States; if any of the jokes had any hope of being funny (and I doubt they did), it was ruined by
horrific timing both in the cutting and the direction (shame on Dylan, whose credit had my hopes up since he made the exceptional
American Wedding); this total piece of shit is full of self-aggrandizing on the part of its two charisma-less stars, Method and Red,
and wastes other fine actors in poor cameos and lazy, uninspired set pieces; Harold & Kumar is a fine and hilarious
stoner comedy on its own, but next to this, it's Apocalypse Now]
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Elf (2003, Jon Favreau)** |
6 [Decided to watch it again,
just for the hell of it; didn't get any better or worse, but it's fun to hear the one-liners and see Ferrell's snappy improv
(and you can fast-foward through the dull sequences): "It's just like Santa's workshop! Only it smells like mushrooms
and everyone looks like they want to hurt me!"]
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6 [Somewhere between Made and Anchorman on the comedy scale, but luckily closer
to Made; this is Ferrell's best performance: lively and constantly inventive, especially his seemingly improvised
one liners ("Francisco! That's fun to say!"); the third act loses steam and suffers from a cutesy finale that pretty
much sucks, and this is no Bad Santa in the Christmas humor department, so it suffers from that comparison -- but Favreau and Ferrell have a comic sensibility
that works more often than it doesn't]
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Head On (2005, Fatih Akin) |
7 [These days, every romantic
comedy is an "unconventional romantic comedy" which really means it's formulaic in its quirky details and just replaces one
goofy set of characters for another -- well, here comes a really truly fucking unconventional romantic comedy; mostly because
its comedy comes in serious fits and starts, before finally imploding into a hardcore, rough drama full of tragedy and regret
and depression; the premise is tagline awful but it completely ignores the originality of how the story is told and the tone
of every scene; for every cliche there is something totally unexpected, and the arc of Cahit's character in particular is
quite exceptional -- you'd never expect from the opening scene to start caring for this guy]
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Secret Things (2004, Jean-Claude Brisseau)** |
7 [Wow, very frustrating. I fully expected this to go up on a second viewing, and was almost
sure it had a shot at my top ten list for 2004; no dice. It actually suffered slightly -- that third act just gets too
silly and while I like the direction of the film's theme (which I still stand by in this review), it just doesn't fully work as far as execution; still, the film's merits are strong: excellent direction, very good acting,
a smart idea, and often very funny]
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Garden State (2004, Zach Braff) |
5 [This film is very annoying;
and hey, I like twee as much as the next Shins/Belle & Sebastian fan. But there don't seem to be any original ideas
at all in this picture -- just a series of film-school-cute widescreen compositions and a lot of mundane dialogue that is
meant to be down-home poetic, when it's just basically Good Will Hunting psychobabble bullshit; but the reason my
grade is so high is because of Natalie Portman; what a comeback! After kicking her career off with scarily awesome performances
in The Professional, Beautiful Girls, and Heat, she turned over to the Dark Side around the time
of her Star Wars virus; she's not even that great in Closer, where Roberts, Owen, and Law act her off the screen
-- but all of a sudden she comes alive here as the sweetest, most endearing character of the year; adorable, complicated,
flawed, unsure, and brave all at the same time; when she cries it's an absolutely heart-breaking image, and when she spontaneously
starts to tap-dance during an awkward silence it is magnificent -- if only Braff hadn't ruined a good performance by writing
a shitty script and delivering his own banal leading turn]
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Maria Full of Grace (2004, Joshua Marston) |
7 [Strong lead performance, good tone, interesting use of a constricted narrative rather than
expanding the subject matter out to a longer period of time; some cliched melodrama here and there, but it's balanced out
by some good Catholic metaphors -- looking forward to more work by Marston and especially Sandina Moreno]
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Cellular (2004, David R. Ellis) |
3 [My favorite part was when
the kid stole a boarding pass so he could get through airport security, and they conveniently didn't even check his ID; no,
wait -- it was when he dove down a construction tube and landed safely in a dumpster that happened to be padded with the film
crew's very own Furni pads (sound blankets); there isn't anything in this film that's not totally fucking stupid; I did like
Macy and the lawyer asshole guy, and I liked that it was only 93 minutes long -- but they had to find a lead actor as horrific
as Chris Evans to make Kim Basinger look competent]
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Touching the Void (2003, Kevin Macdonald) |
5 [A very good story made not-at-all great by this weak filmmaking; the mix of interview headshots
with dramatic re-enactments never gets as gripping as it should be given the traumatic and intense activity; fails to achieve
the existential heights and life-affirming awe of films like Gerry or even Alive]
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The Big Red One {reconstruction} (1980, Samuel Fuller) |
9 [So I never saw this thing in
its mangled-by-the-studio version; imagine my surprise when this WWII film directed by the over-the-top filmmaker who brought
us such nonsense as Shock Corridor and The Naked Kiss turned out to be graceful, poignant, and even very
funny; Lee Marvin and Mark Hamill play major roles in this ensemble piece, and once again make we wonder why they were movie
stars -- but supporting turns by Robert Carradine (4 years before he would lead a revenge of the nerds) and a nobody named
Bobby DiCicco (who would sadly go on to do nothing but sorry-ass B-movie thrillers) are terrific; there are just far too many
great vignettes and moments to name, but the effect is pretty formidable and this should take its place alongside the best
war films ever made]
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Meet the Fockers (2004, Jay Roach) |
5 [At least it doesn't suck -- but still, what a letdown after the brilliance of the first film; this limp sequel has none of the Clinton-Starr subtext of the original, so it just rests on sight gags and elaborate set
pieces that often fail; the charm comes from Hoffman's character and to an extent Streisand's, but the inevitable arc of Stiller
finally standing up to DeNiro never really generates a catharsis, and Stiller & Hoffman also fail to really satisfy a
bizarre lack of father-son bonding; whereas the first one was about invasion of privacy vs. lying in order to ingratiate,
this one simply come down to some far more shallow messages about family and trust; not that it isn't funny in many places,
but that it's just not good enough to really justify its existence]
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Collateral (2004, Michael Mann)** |
7 [Jamie Foxx is clearly the
lead role in this; good job Academy (not that Tom Cruise is any slouch -- he definitely makes a mark)]
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I'll Sleep When I'm Dead (2004, Mike Hodges) |
4 [First of all, Malcolm McDowell needs to stop doing films where he rapes people; by the way,
why does the movie spend its entire second act mercilessly struggling with what it must perceive of as the most devilishly
sinister act of all time -- anal sex -- and then structure an entire narrative around it as if it were worse than 9/11?
These characters wouldn't last five seconds on Oz; aside from the implicit homophobia, there's the whole problem of neo-noir
cliches, dangling plot threads, unexplored characters, and boring, rhythmless dialogue; I did like aspects of it -- the small
details here and there, the subtle camera moves that revealed more than a direct cut would, etc.; but this thing sort of stinks
in the end]
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Babe: Pig In the City (1998, George Miller)** |
9 [One of the darkest, weirdest,
most twisted children's films ever made; I love it love it love it]
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Before Sunset (2004, Richard Linklater)** |
8 [Comments on the way...]
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Before Sunrise (1995, Richard Linklater)** |
9 [Comments on the way...] |
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Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle (2004, Danny Leiner) |
7 [Extremely funny almost all the time; directed without a whole lot of brio, and some of the
setpieces fail, but as a stoner comedy with a nice point of view on cultural stereotypes, it's about as good as could be;
Neil Patrick Harris is nothing but genius]
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