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  • 12 Feb

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    Film on TV: Feb 13-19

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    You’d think after taking several weeks off from this column, there would be a bunch of new films to write up, but there are only a few. Still, with TCM in the midst of their annual 31 Days of Oscar programming schedule (every film has at least been nominated for an Oscar), there are some very good things playing this week. On the newer movie front, Sundance has last year’s The Fighter much sooner than I would’ve expected, it playing it twice on Monday. Meanwhile, IFC has Danny Boyle’s Sunshine on Wednesday and Terrence Malick’s The Thin Red Line on Saturday.

    Monday, February 13

    6:30am – TCM – Splendor the in Grass
    Warren Beatty made his screen debut in this film of frustrated young love (written by Thomas Inge), fairly racy for the time as Beatty and Natalie Wood struggle with sexual repression and social mores.
    1961 USA. Director: Elia Kazan. Starring: Natalie Wood, Warren Beatty, Pat Hingle, Audrey Christie, Barbara Loden.

    9:00am – TCM – Boys’ Town
    Spencer Tracy made Oscar history in 1938 when he won a second Best Actor Oscar in a row for this film, playing a priest who founds the mission of the title, trying to keep troubled boys away from a life of crime.
    1938 USA. Director: Norman Taurog. Starring: Spencer Tracy, Mickey Rooney, Henry Hull, Leslie Fenton.
    Newly Featured!

    9:15am – Sundance – The Fighter
    One of the best-reviewed movies of last year, with David O. Russell combining boxing and family drama to great success, thanks in no small part to the bevy of fine actors assembled.
    2010 USA. Director: David O. Russell. Starring: Mark Wahlberg, Christian Bale, Amy Adams, Melissa Leo, Mickey O’Keefe.
    Newly Featured!
    (repeats at 2:15pm)

    3:00pm – TCM – In Cold Blood
    The film version of Truman Capote’s chilling retelling of the murders committed by Dick Hickcock and Perry Smith, and their subsequent incarceration and trial.
    1967 USA. Director: Richard Brooks. Starring: Robert Blake, Scott Wilson, John Forsythe, Paul Stewart.
    Newly Featured!

    5:30pm – TCM – North by Northwest
    Roger O. Thornhill (Cary Grant) gets mistaken for George Kaplan and pulled into an elaborate web of espionage in one of Hitchcock’s most enjoyable and funniest thrillers. So many great scenes it’s impossible to list them all.
    1959 USA. Director: Alfred Hitchcock. Starring: Cary Grant, Eva Marie Saint, James Mason, Martin Landau.
    Must See

    8:00pm – TCM – Z
    Extremely solid political thriller following the true story of the overthrow of Greece’s democratic government. Equal parts historically accurate political document and detective thriller as the magistrate tries to uncover the conspiracy behind a liberal politician’s assassination, the whole thing is riveting.
    1969 France/Algeria. Director: Costa-Gavros. Starring: Yves Montand, Jean-Louis Trintignant, Irene Papas.

    5:00am (14th) – TCM – 8 1/2
    Federico Fellini translates his creative block in making his next film into a film about a director with a creative block – and in so doing, makes one of the most brilliant and creative films of all time.
    1963 Italy. Director: Federico Fellini. Starring: Marcello Mastroianni, Claudia Cardinale, Anouk Aimée.
    Must See

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  • 11 Feb

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    Saturday Morning Toons: Munro (1960)

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    The first film produced outside the United States to win an Academy Award for Best Animated Short was this adorable satire of a four-year-old boy drafted into the army, unable to convince the bureaucracy in charge that he shouldn’t be there. As you might guess by watching it, the “outside the United States” is a bit of a technicality, as it was directed by long-time MGM and Fox animation director Gene Deitch and written by cartoonist Jules Feiffer, known for his long-running comic strip Feiffer in the Village Voice. In order to get the cartoon financed, Deitch accepted a job and funding from a Czech animation studio (most of the rest of his career has been out of Prague). Still, not too many independent cartoons were being made even toward the end of the studio era, so Munro is something of an oddity. But an amazing one. The film is based on Feiffer’s own experiences in the army, but filtered through the eyes of a small boy, lending an air of obvious absurdity to the often absurd yet totally accepted practices of a bureaucratic military. The style is far from the common look of Looney Tunes or Tom & Jerry, or even the more experimental UPA – a rough and minimalist look that totally matches the raw narration style.

  • 04 Feb

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    Saturday Morning Toons: The Abominable Snow Rabbit

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    Picking up one of our cats and going “I’m gonna hold him and squeeze him and call him George” while cuddling them so close the cat stares at us in disdain is not uncommon in my household. Seemed like a good time to revisit the classic Chuck Jones cartoon that inspires those outpourings of affection. Bugs and Daffy take that wrong turn in Albuquerque and wind up in the domain of the Abominable Snowman. But the extent of his abominability is that he just might love you to death. Filled with classic Jones face-pulling and bright, minimalist backgrounds.

  • 02 Feb

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    Rewatched and Reconsidered: Kiss Kiss Bang Bang

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    (3.5/5)

    On paper, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang ought to be a film I absolutely love. Film noir homage? Check. Twisty turny crime plot? Check. Self-aware meta narration? Check. Robert Downey Jr? Check. Yet when I first saw the film several years ago I remember being underwhelmed and every time I’ve thought of the film since it’s been with a sort of vague discontent. But a lot of people who generally like the same stuff as I do constantly praise it and think it’s brilliant. I couldn’t really remember enough about the film to identify what it was that left me cold, so I figured it was time for a rewatch – maybe I’d get it this time, or at least be able to pinpoint what about it didn’t work for me.

    The initial premise is pretty great, with RDJ as a small-time crook who stumbles into an audition as he’s running away from the cops after a badly botched job (in which his partner got shot and killed). Unwittingly playing along, he winds impressing the casting directors and is carted off to Hollywood, where he’s assigned to shadow a real detective (Val Kilmer) as preparation for this role he might get. Even though the detective, nicknamed Gay Perry (“because he’s gay”), insists that real life detective work is boring and not like the movies, bodies soon start piling up, seemingly unrelated events turn out to be intertwined, and RDJ ends up right in the middle of all of it. Meanwhile, he offers almost continual narration of the most self-aware type; he comments on how things like this play out in the movies (“don’t you hate in movies when it seems like that one guy died, and then it turns out he didn’t and jt’s so fake”) or how bad a narrator he is (going back to tell a part of the story he neglected to tell earlier).

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  • 28 Jan

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    Saturday Morning Toons: Red Hot Riding Hood

    4

    No other classic cartoon director was as visually inventive as Tex Avery, who could come up with a visual pun for just about anything. He was also able to take a joke far past the point where most other directors would’ve left it and vary it just enough to keep it hilarious. After a brief stint at Warner Bros., where he contributed greatly to the development of Bugs Bunny in A Wild Hare, he ended up at MGM directing the Droopy cartoons as well as a bunch of toons starring the nearly forgotten Screwy Squirrel. And also the trio of modernized fairy tales that perhaps stand as his finest legacy – Swing Shift Cinderella, Little Rural Riding Hood, and the one that started it all it, Red Hot Riding Hood. From breaking the fourth wall by having the characters demand a new version of the story to the sexed up Riding Hood as a burlesque dancer to the depiction of the wolf as a Hollywood womanizer to the manhunting grandma, this is the risque side of Avery turned up to eleven, and it is awesome.

  • 27 Jan

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    Review: Coriolanus

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    (2.5/5)

    Sometimes I think there are reasons why some Shakespeare plays remain largely unknown among his vast repertoire – I have never read Coriolanus or seen it performed, but assuming this is a fairly faithful adaptation in terms of the text itself, it’s just…not that interesting. Caius Martius (Ralph Fiennes, who also directs) is a great military leader in Rome (here modernized in everything but language, and acting styles to some degree) whose contempt for anyone not born patrician makes him no friend of the commoners rioting over their lack of food. After a successful war against the invading Volscian army, he’s granted the honorific “Coriolanus” and encouraged to run for the consul, which he does, even briefly gaining the support of the commoners before a pair of conniving tribunes double-cross him and, with the support of the crowd, call for his banishment. He joins the Volsci, becoming the right-hand man of his former blood enemy Aufidius (Gerard Butler) to attack Rome, until his wife and mother (Jessica Chastain and Vanessa Redgrave) beg him to stop.

    All of the twists and turns in the plot seem to come out of nowhere, with people changing sides or points of view at the drop of a hat. The script is probably abbreviated from Shakespeare’s play (the film runs just over two hours, about an hour less than most Shakespeare done in full), which might explain some of the disjointedness, but unfortunately it also feels longer than it is. It’s hard to relate to Coriolanus, who has a highly developed sense of honor but is also a total dick a good portion of the time – his shifts from speechifying the commoners to get their support to denouncing them as unworthy to vote are practically bipolar, and so is the crowd’s instant reversals from distrust to support to anger. These may all be problems inherent to the source material, but the overwrought and unintentionally comical acting styles in this section don’t do anything to help it.

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  • 24 Jan

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    My Favorite Non-2011 Films Seen in 2011

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    All of our favorite 2011 films are posted here as a series of top ten lists, and we’re all busily discussing this year’s Oscar nominations, but there are, of course, plenty of films we watched in 2011 that were released in all kinds of other years. These are some of my favorites of the films I saw for the first time in 2011, regardless of what year they were originally released. Not limited to a specific number, nor specifically ranked, though films I liked the best are closer to the top.

    What are some of the best things you saw in 2011, regardless of release date?

    Le cercle rouge (1967)

    I had a feeling I was going to like this film, just based on how much I’ve liked Jean-Pierre Melville’s other films, especially Le samourai, which, if I recall correctly, topped my favorites list in 2010. I had no idea I’d like it as much as I did. Melville weaves several plotlines together, involving a criminal just out of prison, the mob he steals money from, a detective chasing a different escaped con, a former sharpshooter cop who’s now an alcoholic, and more. Each of them has their own narrative rise and fall, and each character has their own arc, but they all interplay in an incredibly intricate way, as different ones join up on a heist (one of the best heist sequences in cinema) and others try to track them down for their own reasons. It’s hard to explain, but very easy and clear to watch. Brilliant work on all levels.

    » Read the rest of the entry..

  • 19 Jan

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    Trailer: Resident Evil 5

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    You didn’t think I’d pass up this trailer, now did you? Take one part of the teaser trailer for Resident Evil: Apocalypse (still one of the best teasers ever made, for my money, regardless of how crappy the movie turned out), one part all-out global warfare (with very few zombies in sight, to be honest), and if that’s not epic enough, throw in music from The Who and Inception Tron: Legacy [my bad] and then top it all off with a bunch of Sony product placement, and there you go. Milla Jovovich is ready to kick ass as Alice for the fifth time in Resident Evil: Retribution. One thing I’m unclear about – wasn’t that Michelle Rodriguez? As I recall, her character is a little bit….uh…dead. Flashbacks, I suppose? I wonder how Paul W.S. Anderson will manage that level of complexity.

    I’ll be out opening weekend. Such is the duty required of Milla adoration.

  • 13 Dec

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    Yet a Third 2011 Montage…

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    These things are popping out of the woodwork now, it seems. This one does an outstanding job of making the films “talk” to each other via carefully chosen dialogue snippets, forming little sections of story that blend into each other really well. I’m not a fan of all the music choices (though extra thumbs up for the David Lynch track), but in terms of creating a narrative and emotional throughline, this may be the best of the 2011 montages yet. Plus, it includes some films that the other two we’ve found haven’t included, especially some foreign stuff like Heartbeats, Love Crime, and A Separation. Kudos for variety!

  • 12 Dec

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    Film on TV: December 12-18

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    Fanny and Alexander, playing Sunday on TCM

    A few choice new ones this week, including holiday favorites A Christmas Carol (the 1951 British version) and The Bishop’s Wife, plus iconic Newman film The Hustler, Amy Adams breakthrough film Junebug, Katharine Hepburn-Cary Grant collaboration Holiday (playing in a block with their other three films together), and Ingmar Bergman’s Fanny and Alexander.

    Monday, December 12

    6:00pm – MGM – A Shot in the Dark
    Here’s your counter example for the “sequels are never as good as the original” argument. This second film in the Pink Panther series is easily the best, and stands as ones of the zaniest 1960s comedies ever.
    1964 USA. Director: Blake Edwards. Starring: Peter Sellers, Herbert Lom.

    8:00pm – TCM – A Christmas Carol
    Usually considered among the best of the classic adaptations of A Christmas Carol, with Alastair Sim certainly playing a pretty definitive Scrooge surrounded by a great cast of British character actors.
    1951 UK. Director: Brian Desmond Hurst. Starring: Alastair Sim, Jack Warner, Kathleen Harrison.
    Newly Featured!

    9:45pm – TCM – Oliver Twist
    One of a couple of definitive film versions of Dickens’ novels that David Lean did in the ’40s. This is one of the few Dickens stories I actually do like, yet I haven’t gotten around to this version of it yet.
    1948 UK. Director: David Lean. Starring: John Howard Davies, Alec Guinness, Robert Newton, Kay Walsh, Anthony Newley.

    2:00am (13th) – TCM – Great Expectations
    David Lean’s definitive version of one of Charles Dickens’ most well-known books, about the boy Pip and his rise to fortune through the aid of a mysterious benefactor. I’ve avoided this because of my distaste for Dickens, but hey. The movie can’t have time to ramble on like Dickens does, so maybe I’d like it.
    1946 UK. Director: David Lean. Starring: John Mills, Tony Wager, Valerie Hobson, Jean Simmons, Bernard Miles, Martita Hunt.

    4:15am (13th) – TCM – Pygmalion
    A straight non-musical version of the George Bernard Shaw play that would later become My Fair Lady, with Leslie Howard as the prickly Professor Higgins who takes in street vendor Eliza Doolittle (Wendy Hiller) to turn her into a lady. A bit more acidic than the musical version.
    1938 USA. Director: Anthony Asquith, Leslie Howard. Starring: Leslie Howard, Wendy Hiller, Wilfrid Lawson, Marie Lohr.

    » Read the rest of the entry..

  • 09 Dec

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    The Films of 2011

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    I posted this on our Google+ page a little while ago, but it’s worth a post here as well. A really well-edited look back at the films of 2011 (I’m guessing the footage is all taken from trailers), split along different themes or tones. The way the editing makes the films “interact” with each other is pretty cool. There was one of these out last year for the films of 2010 that was excellent (found it!); this is not from the same person, but the person who did last year’s is apparently planning a followup as well, so we’ll have competing 2011 mashups before too long! In the meantime, enjoy this one. The YouTube description page starts with “Many good films came out this year.” Not all of these films are good, but there’s a surprising range once you get into the video a little way, and it is definitely a representative selection. Certainly makes me want to go back and revisit some stuff!

  • 08 Dec

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    DVD Triage: Week of December 6

    12

    A bunch of summer release movies out this week that I…didn’t see. Seriously, I haven’t seen any of the new releases this week. Except the Dragon Tattoo films, and those are extended from the versions I saw. So there’s a lot of “I’m hoping to see this sometime…” in this post. Thankfully, I HAVE seen the two Criterion releases and I can recommend them wholeheartedly, and there are also some very excellent choices coming on Instant Watch, including all the James Bond films. Again.

    New Release Picks of the Week

    The Help
    This seemingly innocuous little film about domestic race relations in the 1950s gathered a fair bit of critical controversy over the summer, but audiences generally loved it. I’m curious to check out the hullabaloo myself.
    2011 USA. Director: Tate Taylor. Starring: Emma Stone, Viola Davis, Bryce Dallas Howard, Jessica Chastain.
    Amazon DVD | Amazon Blu-ray | Netflix

    Cowboys & Aliens
    Across the board negative reviews or not, I can’t shake my interest in checking this out, at the very least to see how bad a trainwreck it is. Are we talking Wild Wild West level horrific here?
    2011 USA. Director: Jon Favreau. Starring: Daniel Craig, Harrison Ford.
    Amazon DVD | Amazon Blu-ray | Netflix

    The Debt
    The second film out this week with Jessica Chastain, who was in eleventy billion movies this year, a flashback structured spy film that got a mixed reaction, but I’m still down to give it a shot.
    2010 USA. Director: John Madden. Starring: Sam Worthington, Helen Mirren, Jessica Chastain.
    Amazon DVD | Amazon Blu-ray | Netflix

    Dragon Tattoo Trilogy: Extended Edition
    Now this sounds interesting. The second and third Dragon Tattoo films were apparently chopped down for theatrical release here, and these are the full versions that were on Swedish TV – 30-50 minutes longer. Here the whole trilogy is split into six segments, like a miniseries. Curious if this improves parts 2 and 3.
    2009 Sweden. Director: Niels Arden Oplev, et al. Starring: Noomi Rapace, Michael Nyqvist.
    Amazon DVD | Amazon Blu-ray

    » Read the rest of the entry..

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