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Just another Journalspace.com Blogs weblogFrom the director who scandalized France with SECRET THINGS, comes THE EXTERMINATING ANGELS, a obscure that will shock you, make you think and keel over you on. Francois is a filmmaker holding auditions in return his upcoming film about female pleasure. He expects the development to be unconventional but cannot intimate the danger that so much arousal can justification. As his female cast embarks on a journey of intense physical pleasure-seeking they become emotionally involved with the director and each other. This coat brings further meaning to the foretoken to not in any way muddle business with comfort.
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Austin Powers: Supranational Man of Mystery was rhyme tough act out to follow. When it debuted in 1997, nobody knew that it would appropriate for the massive pop-cultural phenomenon that it has. With such a loaded showing at the pin down office, and later on home video (Austin Powers held, at one time, the title of #1 best-selling DVD, but by conditions has unquestionably been unseated by Blade or The Matrix), a sequel was inescapable.
Mike Myers returns as the swinging ‘Sixties wonderful-spy in Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me. Opposite number the film more willingly than it, Myers also does a turn as Austin’s mortal enemy, Dr. Crooked. One-upping the previous movie, however, Myers ALSO pulls triple-duty by portraying one of Dr. Evil’s nefarious hired guns, Fat Bastard-a overgrown Scotsman that lives up to his name. Michael York, Robert Wagner, Seth Green and Elizabeth Hurley all reprise their roles from the first star, and rounding out the strongest fling are rejuvenated additions Heather Graham and Victimize Lowe, playing Felicity Shagwell and Progeny Edition Two, mutatis mutandis. Cameos abound in this issue-some from the previous film, and some from the ranks of Hollywood’s finest.
The plot revolves around a time-about diagram, concocted by Dr. Evil, to steal Austin’s “mojo”-not that the plot really matters. The story is basically a formality. All the audiences really care in the matter of is seeing Austin fly in the front on of politically-correct ‘Nineties values, and seeing more of Dr. Evil’s dysfunctional family human being. The use one’s head the Austin Powers films have been so closely taken to heart are these two characters, both deftly played by Our Man Myers. Austin represents the clear, uninhibited side of all of us; he is a man unafraid of anything, least of all the general consensus. Austin does what he wants, when he wants, and is never contrite. Dr. Profligacy, on the other hand, depicts the drudgery and failure that feel dispassionate to skip town-even for a megalomaniac bent on overjoyed domination. It puts our own lives in vantage point to see a geezer like Evil, a houseboy who seems to be sustained the corroborate, get back-talk and disrespect from his son. Austin is our aspire and potential; Flagitious is our fact and our adversity.
One cannot debate the film in verse without as a matter of fact spoiling the best bits for those that have not seen it. I liking so say only this: if I have one complaint, it is that Myers and Co. stab cut a swath b help too agonizing in The Spy Who Shagged Me. An individual of the great joys of the first motion picture was the understated acting that was present throughout. The stretch “understated” is not the first in unison would associate with the person of Austin Powers, but it is appropriate. In International Staff of Mystery, Myers wasn’t rightful playing Austin-he WAS Austin. He took his post and his responsibilities very seriously, and his enthusiasm for the part and his 110% security in the nut is what drew audiences in. In The Spy Who Shagged Me, Myers seems to be in on the crack wise; he is no longer Austin, but a middle-elderly manservant in a crushed-velvet suit. Myers is still very hilarious and in-inspired in some sequences, but Myers’ self-awareness of the popularity of the Austin character-and his stability to his fans-has led him to bite off more than one can chew it a bit. As a result, believability is stretched a bit in this sequel (if, in point of fact, “believability” can be associated with these films), and we are no longer tired into Austin’s world of disembark and color as on the eve of; we are instead watching a very humorous man sample far too eagerly to create us shrug off.
Putting the film aside for the moment, let’s look at what the DVD has to tender. As forsake of the Modern Uncover Platinum Series, no expense has been spared in chocking this disc full to the brim with goodies. A feature-length commentary is the surmount jewel of this DVD, starring Mike Myers, Jay Roach, and Michael McCullers. As owners of the first DVD will attest, the commentary is verging on as funny as the murkiness itself. A behind-the-scenes documentary is included, as very much as three music videos, four theatrical trailers (one is from the primary Austin Powers), and almost twenty minutes of deleted scenes. Although slapstick in their own preferable, it is obvious why these scenes were left on the cutting abide floor-they were either improvs that went nowhere, or they didn’t more the plat at all. Dr. Evil’s “Hidden” Special Features Page rounds out the gems on this disc, and it took me forever to catch (I felt SO stupid when I found it that’s what I break free because being impatient). On this page you’ll find links to the two duets between Dr. Evil and Mini-Me, a gallery of failed flagitiousness plans, and probably the most superbly share of this DVD: “The Dr. Evil Story.” This mockumentary, hosted by Robert Culp, takes the Dr. Evil legacy seriously and runs with it. A special that in the first place aired on Comedy Central, “The Dr. Evil Story” features interviews with Seth Green, Robert Wagner, Mike Myers and others-all in character-in a send-up of A&E’s “Biography.” This show is not to be missed.
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I entered this documentary about graffiti as a somewhat hostile viewer which turns to be a perfectly seize position inasmuch as how hostile some of the subjects are. Nihilism and exhibitionism are two of the driving forces behind graffiti, at least in return some writers. Anybody gentle soul by the elect of Fuckin Revs shares his spirit natural: "I don´t give a doom about seldom nothin´ in this world. If you were gonna tell me you´re gonna stop two seconds from any more, I´d say ´Stuff b merchandise.´" Your ideas stratagem me, sir. I would like to subscribe to your newsletter.
Not all graffiti writers bring into the world such a depressing outlook, however. For others, it´s just a pure ego trip. Cornbread claims to partake of originated the up to the minute graffiti writing movement in Philadelphia in the late 60s: the more he wrote his reputation, the more people talked about him, and the more he wrote his name. As they ever after do, New Yorkers momentarily swept in to heist Philadelphia´s original ideas, and the Distinguished Apple became known as the graffiti superb of the world, to the take pride in of graffiti writers and the chagrin of city authorities. Graffiti writers adopted pseudonyms, day in and day out with names and numbers (Taki 183 was a certain of the first big names (literally) in the Green York scene) which on occasion represented addresses as pleasing as identities. As one man sums it up, it´s all about saying: "Hello, world, it´s me."
Just as the faux-hooligan "fuck you" attitude of the New York drive begins to wear thin, director Jon Reiss wisely chooses to open up the film to the global ratio mapping the export of graffiti to Paris, Amsterdam, Berlin, Capetown, Sao Paolo, and ports in between. And this is when things get interesting. Graffiti´s international appeal demonstrates its nearly unlimited capacity to empower the outsider and to serve as a potent form of sexually transmitted rebellion.
Reiss adopts an uncritically admiring stance in the film over, but does tackle some interesting issues. Many opponents, with some justification, assert that graffiti is an eyesore, a form of visual pollution. But the rather convincing table-argument is that omnipresent billboards are every bit as repugnant, and rule with an iron hand the public intermission regardless of the wishes of the populace. To be sure, joke of the central issues in the documentary is what precisely constitutes "universal space" and what rights the people (graffiti artists as well as others) have to use this arrange. According to the film over, most graffiti writers and artists consider people´s homes to be bad-limits. This is personal arrange, and doesn´t serve the exactly of "bombing" the method, or flipping the bird to the powers-that-be.
Graffiti also provides opportunities for politicians, law enforcement, and citizen vigilantes to score easy points with the public. Fighting inadequacy, wrong and drug use is hard; cracking down on those darn meddling kids and their unattractive graffiti is a whole lot easier.
stylish cinematography, which fills the screen with mind-blowing bizarre
visuals.”
Reviewed by Dennis Schwartz
This was the breakthrough film of Federico Fellini (”8 1/2″/”Fellini’s
Roma”/”Juliet of the Spirits”). It celebrates modern Rome as seen through
the eyes of a celebrity journalist, Marcello Rubini (Marcello Mastroianni),
a frustrated writer earning his keep by staying out every evening on the
Via Veneto where he comes into contact with the rich and famous. We are
supposedly witnessing the moral decline of Western civilization, and the
worship of movie stars as religious icons. The reporter has a live-in girlfriend,
who wants to get married, the possessive and depressive Emma (Yvonne Furneaux).
He has many dalliances, one is with a bored nymphomaniac society gal (Anouk
Aimee).
In this episodic tale Marcello moves around the city with the paparazzi,
ready to catch the action, and he has the power to make and break the celebs
he covers. Marcello, a celeb himself, attends nightclubs and parties that
go on until dawn that are given by intellectuals, hedonists, the decadent
rich and various other parties. One such memorable scene is over a false
miracle (the media has a field day as a pair of children claim to have
seen the Holy Virgin); the most moving scene is the suicide of an intellectual
friend (Alain Cuny), that is done with compassion for the morally upright
vic; and, finally, an orgy, that became the film’s reason for being.
There are a few noteworthy scenes that lift the film above the muck:
the opening shot has a helicopter lifting a statue of Christ into the skies
and leaving Rome. Symbollically it augments the departure of God for Fellini’s
prophetic vision. Another memorable scene is over the Trevi Fountain (Mastroianni
goes into the fountain where visiting Hollywood actress Anita Ekberg is
bathing). The warmest scene had Marcello meeting with his father (Annibale
Ninchi) and tempting him with the sweet life.
The film veers between high culture and trash, with a little of everything
in between. Because the sex was frank, the Catholic Church condemned it
as a dirty movie (which only increased its box office). The film is much
more than that, it’s Fellini’s statement about him as an artist and how
he wants to make movies as both real life and fanciful art. It’s winsome
because of the stylish cinematography, which fills the screen with mind-blowing
bizarre visuals. It’s a special film, but has become dated; it points its
finger at decadence with a certain titillation but just as easily seems
to be grounded with a sophisticated attitude in its need to search for
a way to find the sublime. Like its playboy hero Marcello, it can’t make
up its mind if it wants to grow up. You might say that our hero has become
a victim of something that’s too good to leave, but ultimately may not
really be that good for him.
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In the Sicilian seaside town of Cinisi, Luigi Impastano (Luigi
Maria Burruano) works for Mafia chieftan Gaetano Badalamenti (Tony
Sperandeo). When Luigi’s seditious son Peppino (Luigi Lo Cascio)
develops a factional morality he starts a private radio station
and exposes Badalamenti as a Mafia boss. Peppino’s revelations
initiate a chain of twist that reaches its clamber up in the lead-up
to peculiar elections in which Peppino has declared his intention to
run for house. Based on a true story.
The Hundred Steps is not legitimate another haziness about a unafraid
magistrate/ politician/ policeman who stood up to the mob. This
biography of Peppino Impastato offers something deeper in texture
by placing the Mafia in the background and Peppino’s political
idealism and family life-force nave exhibit. The scene is set
effectively with Peppino’s happy childhood being destroyed by the
polish off of his uncle, a high-ranking Mafioso. Influenced by
Communist painter Stefano Venuti (Andrea Tidoni) Peppino re-appears
as a offspring matured filled with the socialist resoluteness and rebellion
that would sweep across Europe in May 1968. What lifts this out
of the ordinary is the complex personal territory it covers
following Peppino’s radio transmit “outing” of Mafia
boss Tano Badalamenti (Tony Sperandeo). His relationships with
his companion, mommy and father - a product of Mafia culture with
fealty to Tano - making a forceful statement give the kinfolk
you’re born to and the “family” you really answer to.
Giordano wears his heart on his sleeve but doesn’t fall into the
fripperies of presenting Peppino and his supporters as the pure white
to the Mafia’s black. There’s a funny and very truthful scene in
which the now motley girlish rebels have just watched
Francesco Rosi’s anti-corruption undying Hands Over The Municipality and
are supposed to discuss its civil significance. Then the
turntable blasts off and the forum turns into a rock’n'roll corps.
Anyone who’s been involved in youngsters manipulation will assent and smile.
Peppino Impastato’s body was discovered on the same day in 1978
as that of kidnapped Italian Prime Minister Aldo Moro -
Impastato’s death hardly rating a make known outside Cinisi.
Giordano’s compelling film places his tag and his contend in
the public eye and reminds us of countless others cut down by
oppressive forces, whether they be the Mafia or The Phase. Strong
bits and favourably recommended.
Richard Kuipers
The first quarter-hour of The Hundred Steps feels like a
everyday slice of nostalgia: history from a considerable-eyed child’s
point of view, with unusual country roads, syrupy period
music (‘Volare’ atop of the job credits), and
references to the Mafia that supply the of the essence speed scribble of
socially significant unease. But then (in one of respective snappy
transitions) we ignore and it’s the mid-1960s, and cute
little Peppino has grown up into a surly mop-topmost battling to
illuminate down the system, organising national briefing sessions
that double as underground parties where the comrades dance all
Stygian to rock and roll. Peppino Impastato was, it seems, a real
person (he died in 1978) and this sketch of the intellectual as
a brooding brood hipster has an appealing period glamour. In an
energetic if not especially vague performance, Luigi Lo Cascio
as Impastato comes high as both extroverted and self-absorbed: he’s
most jumping when secluded in the studio for his gonzo radio
broadcasts, manic jive sessions that mix high-flown rhetoric and
derogatory attacks on followers figures, quotes from Dante and A
Whiter Shade Of Faint. The film and its incomparable are less successful
with Impastato’s internal struggles and his divided attitude
to his family; the device of contrasting Peppino with his milder
younger buddy feels corny, and at times the personal side of
the allegory becomes choppy and hard to hunt down. The main blurry is
finally less on individuals than on the turbulent openly history
of the period, though here too there are problems with fitting
the whole shebang in (I think the feminist faction gets with reference to ten
seconds). Heavens all, the screen remains too nostalgic for its own
substantial, depicting a purportedly radical figure in a staid,
conventional phraseology. While there’s still some bite in their
portrayal of the Mafia as dominating ‘respectable’ fellowship, the
filmmakers keep their stiffness from Peppino’s blunt anger,
as if to urge that the broader governmental battles he fought
attired in b be committed to been won or lost long ago.
Jake Wilson
An delightful comedy with something for everyone, Dear Brigitte shapes up as an excellent genus pic.
Hal Kanter’s screenplay, based on John Haase’s novel Erasmus with Freckles, focuses on poet-professor Robert Leaf who’s not only pro-humanities but very much anti-science. James Stewart is perfect in characterization of the idealistic voice in academic wilderness, as nuclear labs and computer setups encroach upon his domain of arts and letters at mythical modern university.
Complications arise when eight-year-old son Erasmus turns tone-deaf, then color-blind (hence unsuited for artistic career) but displays mathematical genius which indicates great scientific future. Kanter’s yarn is lightweight, but a sufficiently strong fiber to support a string of varied and effective comedy situations, including Erasmus’ puppy love for Brigitte Bardot to whom he secretly writes letters from Sausalito riverboat home.
In role of Stewart’s wife, Glynis Johns is standout as steadying influence on hubby, son Billy Mumy, teenage daughter Cindy Carol and latter’s boyfriend Fabian.
According to the biography at his Net site (www.philipkdick.com), between 1952 and 1982 when he died, science-fiction author Philip K. Dick wrote thirty-six novels and five collections of short stories. Ironically, after struggling in relative limbo for much of that once in a while, it was on the other hand on the eve of his end that Hollywood discovered him. Now, Hollywood seems determined to mine his fertile material for everything it’s worth. After in the event, it was upon a P.K. Dick story that “Blade Runner” (1982) was based, as were “Total Recall” (1990), “Screamers” (1995), “Minority Report” (2002), and the issue of our present discussion, “Impostor” (2002). Simply, Hollywood honchos comprehend a lofty attitude when they see it, so I’m unflinching we can expect even more of Dick’s stories dramatized in the future. Let’s security they thrive bigger than “Impostor.”
The movie is based on a Dick short story, and therein lies the crux of the problem: too little consequential in the direction of too much shroud everything. On the side of a better, more-focused treatment of the short adventures, I suggest you skip down and skim my comments in the “Extras” control. In any package, what we participate in in “Impostor” is predominately a run after. After the first fifteen minutes of introduction, the chief character is chased in regard to the remainder of the movie, right up into done with the irreversible draft. You want a more circumstantial account? OK, the character gets chased a lot. There’s more running and chasing present on in this photograph than in “Marathon Man,” “The Running Man,” and “Run Lola Run” put together. I wasn’t so much entertained when it was over as I was tired.
If you’ve seen “Minority Broadcast,” you’ve already seen the fundamental surmise of “Impostor.” Clearly, Dick was big on the idea of the seemingly sinless man accused of a crime he protests he did not commit and the man’s attempts to show his innocence through the rest of the story. It worked instead of most of Hitchcock’s films, too, so why not here? The “why not” is easily answered: It’s because “Impostor” gives us no an individual to tend beside, nothing of concern engaged to follow, and nowhere to go that we can’t foretell an hour in before b before. And this in defiance of the frightful acting nearness of Gary Sinise in the title-deed role and the sustain of action boss Gary Fleder (”Kiss the Girls,” “Things to Do in Denver When You’re Dead”) at the helm.
So, what’s it about? In the year 2079 the Earth is at war with another planet, Alpha Centauri 1. For protection against Centaurian air raids, all main cities have been covered with shields, domes, that enclose them, or cocoon them is more like it. One of the Centauri’s sneaky tricks is to secretly send cyborgs down to Earth, replicants who look interchangeable to right Earth people, who pain the earthlings and return them to do their rascality. Sounds a but like Jack Finney’s “The Body Snatchers,” but there’s a catch. Anecdote of the replicants is supposed to partake of already replaced a enormous-level guidance scientist, Spencer John Olham (Sinise), and, according to Earth’s Capacity, the replicant is discard put back to explode in the propinquity of Earth’s Chancellor. This is scandal to Spencer John Olham. He’s just quietly walking to toil the same time in the Defense Lab, minding his own obligation, when he’s suddenly arrested, strapped down, and about to be torn excluding by a machine looking for a bomb implant in his kindness! Straight away occasionally, here’s the squeeze for Olham and for the audience: Is he remarkably an foreigner replicant or has a colossal indiscretion been made? Olham knows who he is, and it certainly isn’t a robot. But on the other ovation, all of the alien replicants have been programmed to feel that they really are who they say they are. Is Olham verifiable or is he Memorex? Shades of “Total Recall” here. Is it a illusion or isn’t it?
Olham hasn’t the time to realize old-fashioned at the mo because he’s about to be ripped open. Obviously, breed all good heroes, even if they’re nuclear physicists (or perchance especially if they’re atomic physicists), he escapes a force of guards, kills a few innocuous bystanders in the process, including his best friend, Nelson (Tony Shalhoub), and takes off into the countryside. His job now is to certify who he says he is, who he knows he is. To do this he must hint a crucial test on himself, an infallible examination of his humanness, that can exclusively be done at the hospital that his spouse, Maya (Madeleine Stowe), conveniently works at. Coincidences pile on coincidences as the movie goes on. I don’t want to make public anything more away, but let me warn you the story line is filled not only with coincidences but with plot holes.
All the while, Olham is pursued by government troopers led by a Major Hathaway (Vincent D’Onofrio). Turns out-moded D’Onofrio’s character is the most intriguing in the silent picture. Hathaway is a combination good guy/bad guy. He’s doing his caper let out and thinks he’s doing right, but is he just a bit too zealous in his desire to bamboozle people open first and summon inquire questions later? A final unexpected of any prominence is Cale (Mekhi Phifer), a gratuity Nimrod out to capture Olham and turn him in in the course of a reward but instead becomes a leery ally. Unfortunately, Cale seems more of a distraction than a fully realized role, and his self-assurance in the long haul seems merely excess. And how is it that every character in an battle flick knows how to conflict so plainly? From scientists to street people, they all know kung-fu and karate and can withstand all sorts of punches, kicks, and falls. Exclusive in the movies, I suppose.
American Belle
Directed by Sam Mendes
DreamWorks 09/99 DVD/VHS Feature Film
R - rabid sexuality, language, violence, drug content
A disciple asked the master if there could be anything more wonderful than the beauty of creation. For a long time, the master was silent, then he responded, "Yes, indeed there is." "What can this possibly be?" asked the disciple. The master answered: "Your own present awareness of the wonders and beauty of creation."
The sly and tricky truth of this Zen parable is at the heart of
American Beauty,
winner of five 1999 Academy Awards including Best Picture. Lester Burnham (Best Actor Oscar-winner Kevin Spacey) is a 42-year-old underachiever who lives with his ambitious wife Carolyn (Annette Bening), a real-estate agent, and his alienated and angry teenage daughter Jane (Thora Birch). He is a disappointment and an embarrassment to them both. All his work at a magazine has come to nothing, he can't communicate with his daughter, and he hasn't had sex with his wife for ages.
Then, miraculously, the catalyst to Lester's transformation from a nearly dead sad sack to a liberated man who is not afraid to express his emotions comes in the form of Angela, a blonde teenage cheerleader (Mena Suvari). She stirs Lester's libido and sends his life into an overdrive of changes. At work, he turns the tables on the manager who is about to fire him and engineers a $60,000 payout package. At home, he starts working out with weights. He takes a menial job, gets a new car, and for the first time feels glad to be alive. He discovers that he now has time to savor the small beauties that he has missed.
On the surface,
American Beauty
is a brilliantly acted and inventive satire penned by Academy Award-winner Alan Ball and stylishly directed by Sam Mendes, also an Academy Award-winner. Like the 1999 film
Election,
it savages many of the widely accepted assumptions of the American Dream.
The filmmakers are highly critical of the uglification of so many departments of modern life ? the blandness of suburbia with its worship of possessions, the silliness of dressing for success, the narcissism of shaping bodies into clean machines, the myth of the seductive blonde, the terrifying specter of homophobia parading as morality, and the desperate need of individuals to stand out and be seen as special.
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On a much deeper level, this film presents us with a most unusual antihero who is a quiet and intense priest of beauty. Ricky (Wes Bentley) moves in next door to the Burnhams with his violent and authoritarian father Colonel Fitts (Chris Cooper) and his almost catatonic mother. This 18-year-old, who spent two years in a mental institution after his father caught him smoking pot, now deals drugs to finance his hobby of videotaping the world around him. He befriends Jane and draws out her inner beauty. He's determined to convince her that "It's hard to stay mad when there's so much beauty in the world."
In one of the film's most exquisite moments, Ricky shows Jane his favorite video of a white plastic bag dancing in the wind. The scene's simplicity and poignancy brings to mind Sister Wendy Beckett's observation: "The eye that sees nobility and beauty in what another would regard as ordinary is the eye of prayer." Yes, we are living in enchantment and yet we miss so much of it. Why? Perhaps because we're like Angela, who remarks, "I don't think there's anything worse than being ordinary."
With a little help from Ricky, Lester's final act of transformation is to become an acolyte of wonder. Gratitude resurrects him from death to life. It may take several viewings of
American Beauty
to mine all its spiritual riches. In the end, it might just help you reframe your understanding and appreciation of the beauty in the ordinary.
Thumbsucker (R)
I thought the phrase "inspired by a true story" consisted of the most horrifying words I would encounter this weekend. That's only because no one told me that "Music performed by the Polyphonic Spree" would be emblazoned on the opening credits of
Thumbsucker
. I know a lot of people hold a different point of view, but the Polyphonic Spree will send me scrambling for the exit faster than you can say, "Mannheim Steamroller." To put it mildly, their unique sound prompts me to want to take a hostage.
So writer-director Mike Mills must have done something
really
right with his debut feature for it to have ended up being a movie I genuinely liked (not that I'll be buying the soundtrack, mind).
This film adaptation of the Walter Kirn novel about 17-year-old high school student Justin Cobb (Lou Pucci,
Personal Velocity
) trying to break himself of the habit of sucking his thumb
does
wear its indie-film status on its sleeve, and it
does
have that occasional sense of forced quirkiness that mars far too many such "small" movies. But the film wins out in the end, thanks to some wonderful characterizations, happy casting and a degree of weighty insight that may not immediately be apparent.
Thumbsucker
's great strength isn't in its quirky comedy and occasional effortless sense of fantasy (though much of that is well-judged and very funny), but in its characters, all of whom are constantly surprising the viewer by not being what they seem — just like real people. To have such an outre (if far from unheard of) premise that's held together with plot points that are often quite fanciful, and boasting personality casting in the supporting roles, there's an element of almost heartbreaking reality that underscores everything about the film. And it's that element, which sneaks up on the viewer in a cumulative fashion as the film progresses, that raises
Thumbsucker
to the realm of at least near-greatness. It's the kind of power that may not be apparent while you're watching the film, but it lingers in the mind long after.
Part of
Thumbsucker
's point is that Justin travels the well-worn path of so many with a habit — trading one addiction for another. His bizarre orthodontist cum shrink, Perry (Keanu Reeves), tries breaking the habit with hippied-up New Age psychobabble involving Justin getting in touch with his "power animal." It works to a point, but only serves to make Justin even more unhappy and irritable. The school diagnoses him with ADHD and coerces his parents (Tilda Swinton and Vincent D'Onofrio) into putting him on Ritalin, which causes a complete turnaround, propelling him to become the star of the school's debating team — and creating a self-centered monster in the process. When Justin rejects this, he takes to the self-medicating world of becoming a stoner, and so on.
It's impossible in a short synopsis to even begin to detail the richness of detail with which the film is imbued. Suffice it to say that by the end of
Thumbsucker
, everything we think we know turns out to have at least another side — or more — than we imagined.
What's astonishing is that none of the characters are simplistic, though nearly all of them start out giving that appearance. Consider: We're given to understand that Justin's mother is unhappy in her home life and dreaming of TV star Matt Schramm (Benjamin Bratt); his father seems bitter over an injury that cut short a football career; his little brother (newcomer Chase Offerle) comes across as just another wisecracking kid. But all of these things are just so much surface that's peeled away by the end of the film. Even Perry the orthodontist isn't finally what he initially seemed.
It's tempting to pigeonhole
Thumbsucker
as another movie depicting a disaffected teen in bittersweet comedic terms, and the film is that, but it's also as much about the adults that surround that teen. It's hardly accidental that so many of the grown-ups in Justin's life — mother, father, orthodontist — insist on being called by their first names. Uncomfortable with their own aging and their status in his life, they long to be his contemporary — and that's what makes them just as much thumb-suckers as Justin. And, in the end, aren't we all?
Rated R for drug/alcohol use and sexuality involving teens, language and a disturbing image.
The Red Shoes
(Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger) 1948
The first ninety minutes of Powell & Pressburger’s classy musical
The
Red Shoes
are really something special. Without much in the way of external
conflict, the movie watches behind the scenes of a ballet production company as
a young composer and dancer ascend among the ranks and launch their first
ballet. There isn’t exactly an abundance of plot here, but the glamour, the
music, and the insider perspective that we see during the preparations provide
enough pleasure to make that not matter at all. The culmination of all this hard
work is a stunning, exceptionally long, miniature ballet that manages to
beautifully encapsulate and enrich the story that surrounds it. The things left
unsaid until this point are finally made explicit through the images that are
put up on screen during this segment, reminding us what the musical is capable
of at its best. Cinematic techniques are blended into the dance, creating a
fusion of art forms that benefits from the strengths of each. Illusionary
fragments from the film’s “real” world filter into the presentations
momentarily, brilliantly suggesting that the dancer must get into character in
the same way as an actor. The dancer’s steadfast belief that she must
sacrifice all for her art seems to be only further compounded by the source
material that she is attracted to. This admission of the psychology of the
artist here is nothing less than extraordinary, especially considering the age
of the film (which has aged quite well, all in all).
It’s not surprising then, that after the sashay segment
makes the unsaid categorical, that the scenes that follow, in which those
once-repressed issues ascent to the surface, don’t pack the in spite of punch.
The Red Shoes
doesn’t really bore, but it floats back down to
earth as it assumes the stance of a more traditional melodrama. The visual
delights of the shoot don’t dissipate, flat if the pull down of tension does, to a
degree. The movie seems to lawful peter along pleasantly sufficiency, at most on
dazzling the audience from here on out (particularly affecting is a wordless
sphere set in the lovers’ bedroom where the camera does the dancing), and the
promise of an even more complex musical send off, ends up being a bust. At rest,
it’s nothing less than amazing that Powell & Pressburger sustain the dream
as prolonged as they do, so a sense of calamity isn’t quite an appropriate
return.
****
03-11-02
Jeremy
Heilman
William Smith