Mad Max

I finally saw the beginning of my beloved Mad Max franchise. I have to say, I'm a little disappointed. All the superior elements of the franchise are there: a brooding Mel Gibson, spectacular CGI-less car stunts, crazy (CRAZY) villains, and notable cinematography and style. The problem is that all these elements aren't perfected until The Road Warrior. Mel Gibson, despite of all his charisma, shows his lack of experience. The stunts are still there, but they're certainly less necessary. When the cars and/or motorcycles aren't driving across the endless asphalt, there isn't a whole lot to love in Mad Max. There are some very memorable shots in the movie, but these shots only punctuate the droll interlude between them. Thank goodness for Hugh Keays-Byrne's work as Toecutter, the psychotic leader or a motorcycle gang out for revenge after their even crazier former compadre is killed in the film's opening car chase. Toecutter is the snarling, edgy precursor to The Might Wez and Lord Humungous (The Road Warrior) and Master Blaster (MM: Beyond Thunderdome) of subsequent films. While he feels a bit out of place in Mad Max, it's clear writer/director George Miller is honing his world and style here. It's a good film with great moments, but it pales in comparison to its sequels. A great finish to a lackluster beginning.

***

On Watchmen...How This Fan Watches the Watchmen by A. Gates

About a half hour into Watchmen, as the rude and crude Comedian was being laid to rest with Simon and Garfunkel's "The Sounds of Silence" playing sweetly in the background I thought to myself, "Oh, no. This is self-important pretentious posturing." Then, fairly, I thought back to the source graphic novel - the comic geek's War and Peace if you will. "Was that self-important pretentious posturing as well?"

The truth is, these concerns quickly subsided as I again surrendered myself to the story and, in this oddest of cases for this comic geek. the incredibly reverent storytelling. Watchmen, the graphic novel and the film, are self-important pieces of fiction stemming from the arrogance of the brillant weirdo Alan Moore. But, as anyone who really works through the deconstruction of the superhero myth that Alan Moore laid out 20+ years ago, it is objectively important. A social commentary, epically told superhero story with heroes afflicted with the human condition in all its debilitating glory.

Rorshach, easily my favorite character in both mediums, is a psychopathic sleuth with a brutal, uncompromising sense of justice. He's a jarring character, an socially inept weirdo in a costume who is also a mentally and emotionally scarred deviant working outside the law. On the page, his words are put in scratchy, sketchy balloons and we as readers are left to imagine what sort of unusual voice would deliver such oddly drawn speech patterns. And perhaps that's where the gift of the film begins. Jackie Earle Haley, that newly rediscovered talent from the 70s, was nominated for a Best Supporting Actor Oscar in 2006 for his work in Little Children. I thought the whole performance was overrated. After seeing his work as Rorshach, I reconsider. You see, his characters, although both scarred social outcasts, are on opposite ends of the performance spectrum. His brutality, his growl, his stiff anger as Rorshach is the foil for his Little Children's character's weakness, sadness, and quiet anger. And that growl(!), I am more than pleased to say, is exactly how I imagined Rorshach would sound even if it never occurred to me until I heard Haley's first words in the trailer.

But each of these performers in the movie playing these characters firmly placed in my memory is for better or for worse the perfect person to play their part (save maybe Carla Gugino as Sally Jupiter, playing it campy). I say for better or for worse because naturally some of these characters work better on the page than on the screen. Laurie Jupiter (aka Silk Spekter II), is one of those characters. And I won't fault Malin Akerman for any of it, though many reviews I have read turn quickly on her. She fits the part to a tee and executes it wholley reverently. But something about Laurie fits within comic panels better than the confines of the silver screen. As the naive and sweetly sexy ingenue heroine acting as knowing commentary on the comic book medium, Laurie Jupiter works. But that role in a film, that medium where we haven't seen that obligatory gal in spandex to the same effect, the character seems an odd fit. And to see her and her mother as the transition from the Golden Age to whatever the geeks are calling this age makes eerie sense in the comics and very little on film where the Golden Age has all but been ignored completely.

Kudos to Patrick Wilson, Haley, Billy Crudup, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, and Matthew Goode for their insight into bringing the pages and characters to life. Each is an uncanny fit for their character counterparts and whomever cast this film has to be pat on the back. Haley and Crudup are the standouts receiving all scant critical praise, and deservedly so. Crudup, in particular, delivers a performance of tremendous subtlety and restraint (albeit through a CGI avatar). His character is more than a comment on superheroes. Dr. Manhattan is a comment on religion and on God seen through a glass darkly. The insights, while not my own on this subject, are fascinating and bracing. It's a difficult character to bring to life, but Crudup and Snyder's team of special effects wizards more than conquer the challenge. Crudup's Dr. Manhattan, perhaps even more so than in his graphic novel incarnation, is an indelible film creation.

Zach Snyder and his screenwriters David Hayter and Alex Tse are aware of how to tell the story in this medium. The unnecessary parts of the graphic novel (or, for the fanboys who just gasped at the hint of anything in Watchmen being unnecessary, "medium-specific") are left out and the good stuff is left in. The big change to the ending pleased me the most. The crux of the graphic novel is perfect for that medium - a ugly monster spelling possible doom for the world and our heroes. But that doesn't work on the big screen where even the most outlandish of villains (I'm looking at you, Willem Dafoe as Green Goblin, and you, Colin Farrell as Bullseye) are more real than what is depicted in the last fourth of the graphic novel. So, bravo for the change. There's the fact that it is minor yet still makes the whole calamity at end actually work. The Black Freighter allergorical interludes and newstand gang on that iconic corner are largely absent from the big screen version. Good. These were my least favorite parts of the graphic novel and have no place in the big screen story. After all, we're watching the story of the Watchmen and there's enough of that story to adequately fill its runtime and more.

I like Zach Snyder. With Dawn of the Dead and now Watchmen, he has proven to be a visually savvy storyteller with a leaning towards the sensational. But anyone who has seen 300, fans and non-fans alike, can tell you he knows nothing of subtlety. His fetishizing of slo-motion and violence in 300 isn't at full-throttle in Watchmen, but he certainly isn't afraid to push the limits. The violence is brutal and graphic, but he eases up on his slo-mo habit enough to keep Watchmen watchable.

I was worried after I finished reading Watchmen for the first time last Spring. "How can they make this movie? No one will want to see it?" I say this knowing that, like me, there were leagues of fanboys frothing at the mouth at the mere prospect of a big screen adaptation. The "no one" in question is the general public, the ones who go to see the Spider-man, Batman, or (Heaven forbid) the Fantastic Four movies but more than likely would not care to see their heroes deconstructed. There was talk of this public being ready for a movie like Watchmen after the success of The Dark Knight, but I knew and you will know that this is a hasty comparison. Bruce Wayne as Batman is haunted and conflicted, but he is not the deranged Rorshach. If you could love the Joker (and some of us really did), then maybe you'd like Rorshach, but not as hero. In the end of the Dark Knight, after all the darkness and despair, Batman rides off as the "hero" in every sense of the word. In Watchmen, "hero" takes on its own meaning and the term "anti-hero" doesn't fully capture the complexity of its characters. Watchmen is not The Dark Knight, and I expect to see a sharp drop off in box office after all the marketing hoopla and hype dies down and that general public tells their general public pals it wasn't what they wanted.

This calls into question the audience. Who is this movie for? Zach Snyder has said that the movie is for fans first. I believe him. An editor for Rottentomatoes.com, after being told by another reviewer that non-fans won't be able to follow the epic story and mythology, said something along the lines that they, like she, won't care to. That's probably the case. So, what do we have? We have Warner Brothers thinking a $150 million dollar (reportedly) production budget (along with anywhere from 20-35+ million dollars for marketing) for a film taken from a cult comic book with critical acclaim will appeal to its targeting ticket paying audience. And they're wrong. The movie is good for me. I love the movie. And Warner Brothers will likely make enough money through box office receipts and DVD sales and countless special editions to make a profit. But in today's Hollywood, making $100 million dollars domestically isn't enough. Time will tell if Watchmen is viewed as a success for Warner Brothers. My question is what happens when they want to make something faithfully for us fanboys next time? I don't think it'll happen so easily (a joke if you consider Watchmen's 20 year production hell).

Let's just say for now, for me, I love it. I got chills several times. The kind where you see something imagined realized for the first time. And that's a special feeling Watchmen offers me and my geek brethren that we might have to wait another 20to feel again. Watchmen has always been something you finish with your emotions deflated and exhausted and your head spinning around the implications of it ending. Hopefully, not every one will leave the theater talking about what's in the movie and what isn't or what they wish it would have been like, but rather discussing that ending. After all the hoopla and hype are gone, that ending resonates over even the harshest of critics.

****


Joe Morgenstern Wall Street Journal Watchmen Review 3/6/09
Roger Ebert Watchmen Review 3/4/09
Box Office Mojo Weekend Report 3/8/09

Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome

It's hard to praise the third installment of The Mad Max Franchise, because it is essentially a retread of its own now familiar territory. Mad Max is a great character and anti-hero and his journey to stay alive without giving too much of himself to others is an intriguing one. I've read that before starting to plot out The Road Warrior, writer-director George Miller immersed himself in old Samurai and western films. Mad Max certainly fits within those forebearers' walls. In Mad Max Beyond the Thunderdome, he is even briefly referred to as the "Man with No Name," a not so subtle shout out to Clint Eastwood iconic character in Sergio Leone films.

But Mad Max places it's anti-hero in an original backdrop - a post-apocalyptic, gasoline and morally starved Australia whose inhabitants have taken to dressing like punks and renaissance fair rejects.

It's an intriguing setting for action, and it seems that, above all, that is the chief component of the Mad Max series.

When Max is thrust into the gladiatorial Thunderdome of the title, it's a sensational set piece - strange because it is used only once and because it echoes the poorly conceived gauntlets of the syndicated 90s American Gladiator show. Then, echoing the amazing final action set piece of The Road Warrior, director Miller sets the reluctant Max driving away from a horde of baddies on his tail. It's a bit too familiar, but still finishes in grand fashion.

Thunderdome features unique aspects, too. Tina Turner (?!) as the head miscreant rivals Lord Humungous for spiteful power. A little person using a masked brute as his vehicle/bodyguard who starts the film as a odd bully grows to be the more valuable of supporting characters. But most important and entertaining of the new additions is a group of Lord of the Flies/Lost Boys tribal kids who think Max is the one prophesied to take them to their own Promised Land. The scenes with the kids and Max eerily echoes the introduction of the Lost Boys in Hook to the point that my brother was blindly shouting "Rufio" over the action onscreen.

As I said earlier, Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome isn't anything superbly new or exotic when compared to its prequels, but it is supremely entertaining and opens the Max's world to let more imagination in. And though Thunderdome is softer than its predecessors, it is dark and odd enough to rightfully be claimed a part of the Mad Max franchise.

****

Fierce People

This is a disappointing film not so much because I had high hopes, but because I spent two hours of my life on it.

A shallow coming of age movie pretending to have emotion weight and truths loses track of itself after it jumps into the world of these "fierce creatures". Character motivations are unclear and forced in a way that made me think maybe I had missed entire scenes that could explain actions or people that were never satisfyingly explained. People behave in ways that further plot rather than moving from a character's center or voice. The film hinges on a twist that is meant to surprise and enrage and change us, but in truth we always suspect that it was so even though we never believe the reason given for it being so.

The only highlight comes from the lead - Anton Yelchin. He seems to be a young actor of the moment and delivers a performance certainly deserving of a better film.

**

Tim Burton's Batman "The Joker is more of an annoying pest than a villain."

I didn't see this movie until college. I liked it. I thought it was a lot of fun. I asked for it for my birthday. I got it. I watched the excellent special features yesterday afternoon. I got excited to see the movie again. By the time the credits started rolling, I was disappointed. There's no real excuse. I first saw it when my eye for quality was developed. I had seen it several times on AMC (albeit in parts). I hadn't loved the film as a kid, so nostalgia wasn't an excuse for my mistake.

Batman is an exercise in ambition. Tim Burton and the film's producers had big plans for the movie. From the DVD interviews, it's apparent that they thought they had created something really special. The problem is that ambition is nothing without execution. Batman fails in nearly every aspect of its execution.

It's hard to criticize Jack Nicholson for going over the top with his performance. He's the Joker, for Moses' sake. There aren't any rules for playing a character like that. There should have been, though. Nicholson is clearly having the time of his life playing the role, but I must admit I had very little fun with him. He does anything he pleases and I wish a director would have reigned him more. Nicholson unleashed in any situation is cause for alarm. He's not menacing enough. And somebody tell somebody that Jack Nicholson's little jigs in character are not amusing.

That led to other problems. The screenwriters have to make scenes for Nicholson to do his thing, so they put him in that stupid museum scene. A chance to work in the Prince music ("Partyman" is the title of the song) should have been passed up. A terrible idea. Batman's entrance and exit are good. The rest is hammy junk.

Another scene suffering from failed ambition is the bell tower scene. Great plan. Bad execution. It shows sparks of quality, but crumbles under the weight of Nicholson and Basinger's goofy routines. Seriously, there's nothing less climatic than watching Nicholson ham it up as he dances on that ledge and makes his getaway.

Putting Batman into action is the best thing the filmmakers do. It's when they throw him in the mix with the Joker that things falter. And that's a lot of the time. I actually liked the action scenes for what they were, but again the Joker is more of an annoying pest than a villain. Batman should have kicked the crap out of him twenty times over.

The Bruce Wayne scenes are fairly bad as well. There is no chemistry between Michael Keaton and Kim Basinger, so their scenes together are always a bit awkward. It doesn't help that Basinger isn't a good actress. I'm not saying the role called for her to stretch her acting muscles, but any number of actresses could have added zest to the role. Keaton can play the charming billionaire well, but when he's out of costume, he left me itching for him to jump back into it. His knight in shining armor shtick at Vale's apartment is weak and laughable at best. Put the guy in that suit and let those eyes and that cool, stoic hero's voice do the work.

The sets are great. The first third of the movie is actually quite good. But I'm afraid that the corniness and levity that the filmmakers said they so wanted to avoid eventually crept in and sapped all the entertainment from Batman.

**1/2

Ordinary People

For the longest time, the only time I heard about Ordinary People was when people mentioned that it robbed Raging Bull of Best Director and Best Picture Oscars in 1980. Then I saw Timothy Hutton in Beautiful Girls a while back and tried to find out what he's all about. Turns out he won a deserved Best Supporting Actor Oscar in 1980 for Ordinary People. "Huh," I said. "I oughtta see that." And now i finally have.

Ordinary People is a film boiling over with emotional truth. The ordinary people of the title are relatable. I could know them. I could be them. I certainly saw parts of myself in characters.

The film is about a family struggling to connect and keep a sense of normality after the accidental death of one son and the attempted suicide of another. That's enough to make any family crack. And they certainly do.

Hutton plays the son, Conrad, who attempted suicide. The film starts as he is going back to school at the beginning of a new school year. He received the Oscar for a supporting role, but his story anchors the entire film. He carries it. Everybody else helps, but he shoulders the best of it.

He delivered a big, bright, and amazing performance. Somehow he was able to stare blankly at nothing and convey an avalanche of thought behind his eyes. His awkwardness and anger in therapy scenes with Dr. Berger (Judd Hirsch) were accurately and believable performed. What really struck me in those scenes was the details he put into inflection, stops and starts, and change in emotions that were impeccable.

Hirsch played the dream psychiatrist, one who pulls you through your reluctance and resistance to a place you could never have reached on your own. It might be a movie myth - this amazing type of psychiatrist. But it certainly works in Ordinary People.

I liked that the love story between Conrad and a co-ed (Elizabeth McGovern), although helpful and ultimately rewarding, was shown as a brief interruption from troubles, but ultimately not the answer. A lesser movie would have made the journey to revelation for Conrad be with his girlfriend and not his psychiatrist.

Conrad's parents are a mess. They're able to fake pleasantness and stability, even happiness, but it's all just an escape from all the shit that keeps happening around them. The father Call, played by Donald Sutherland, is attempting to address the hardships head-on. The mother Beth, played by Mary Tyler Moore is trying to get over it all and get on with their lives.

The parents are a flip on conventional parental and gender roles. Cal is worried, nurturing, loving, and supportive. Beth is emotionally distant and/or callous, and wants to gloss over the past in favor of a happy future. This displays a characteristic common to all the characters and performances. They are all complicated, layered, and detailed.

I've never seen Sutherland like this before cautious, questioning, contemplative. And his work as a father fits him well. It's hard when an actor's been around so long that and the young people (myself and contemporaries) are only familiar with his work in Outbreak, The Italian Job, and The Puppet Masters. He's good.

Moore is amazing in this role. It's the performance of a lifetime. Her Beth is complicated and maddening but still sympathetic somehow amongst all her transgressions. When her characters was finally revealed as weak, the revelation clarified everything that preceded it and acted like a magnifying glass on Moore's perfect gift for imperfections.

Robert Redford directed the movie and handles his performers exceptionally well. His handling of flashbacks and memories was less successful. The echoed voices, the fuzzy outlines, the quick cuts - it's all too conventional and too showy for a movie that is able to understate other big themes and performances so well.

This movie was like therapy for me. The aftermath of a suicide attempt is familiar. The loss of control. The way others handle you with kid gloves that bothers ya', or bothers ya' when they don't. And most familiar was the struggling with what confronting real, raw, and honest emotions will mean. Ordinary People does it all so well.

Good Will Hunting and American Beauty owe debts to Ordinary People. They didn't steal from it, but they still owe a lot.

****

The Pope of Greenwich Village

The Pope of Greenwich Village is about Charlie (Mickey Rourke) a cool Italian New Yorker trying to get by and move up. The only thing standing in his way is his cousin...his obnoxious, cowardly, big time wannabe, dim-witted cousin Paulie (Eric Roberts). But, hey, he's family, right?

Paulie's the perpetual screw up who doesn't even realize he's a screw up. He screws up and can't say he screwed up. Charlie takes care of him, humors him, and watches out for the guy. One man can only take so much, but Charlie sticks with Paulie because they're not only pals (best friends even) but also family. So, even when the fairly stupid cousin brings a fairly simple heist, Charlie goes in. Turns out the heist wasn't nearly as easy as Paulie made it out to be.

Mickey Rourke was reborn on my TV screen during The Pope of Greenwich Village. There was no more mutant face or smoker's growl. Just charming, smooth, cool as ice though guy Mickey - the way it should be always as never shall be again. There was a time when Rourke was going to be big. Pope was part of that ladder to the top.

Eric Roberts is out of control, let off his leash to run wild. Sometimes that's good and sometimes bad, but it seems that the role was made for show-stopping, scenery-chewing, stand-on-the-tips-of-your-toes theatrics. And in that way, Roberts serves his purpose.

Daryl Hannah played Charlie's girlfriend. She usually bothers me, mostly because I think she looks manish, but she's solid enough in the supporting role.

A problem for the movie is that there are scenes that are too big for everybody's britches - too much music, too much theatrics, too much spiked punch.

However, some scenes are tight. Watching Charlie getting ready to make a big impression and swaying to Sinatra, having a verbal and physical sparring with Hannah, and especially his "Pope of Greenwich Village" moment - all memorable for the best reasons and all involving Mickey Rourke. He never made it all the way to the top. He made sure of that, but it's sure fun to watch him on the way up there.

***

Stranger than Paradise

Stranger than Paradise lives up to its title. It's strange all right. It's like an impenetrable, boring, morose, deadpan strange trip to Cleveland, New York City, and Florida. And that be exactly what writer/director Jim Jarmusch was going for. If so, Bravo! Still, the film left me wanting ol' Roberto Benigni from Down by Law to waltz in with his zaniness and liven up the joint.

Instead, I got the droll, monotone comedy and silence of John Lurie, Eszter Balint, Richard Edson. Lurie plays Willy, whose cousin Eva, played by Eszter Balint, from Hungary comes to visit during a stop on a trip to Cleveland, Ohio. When she leaves, a year passes before Willy and his pal Eddie, played by Richard Edson, drive out to Cleveland and rescue Eva from a cold winter and boring nights at home with Willy's aunt (a deadpan, monotone, very foreign, and funniest performance by Cecillia Stark). When they get to Flordia, they discover Florida isn't the Paradise they expected it to be. A series of comical miscommunication and misunderstandings follow.

John Lurie is an actor I'd prefer not to see in movies again. He is as bland as they come. Even when conveying emotion, he's lifeless. Any laughs from the film are hard to come by because the comical moments are so underplayed that it's hard to know if they're even supposed to be funny. So, instead of natural reactions of laughter, I did a lot of head scratching trying to figure out if things were funny or if I just needed to find something to laugh at to keep me going. Lurie is the chief culprit, but Jarmusch writes and directs moments engineered for this strange ambiguity of appropriate reaction.

Most of the time, my reaction was just looking at sometimes beautiful black and white cinematography and freeze framing shots in my mind (or literally with the pause button).

Like Down by Law, I don't really get the point or points if any that Jarmusch is trying to make. If his point is just to entertain, he failed me.

I can say that there is a big improvement from Stranger than Paradise (his first movie) to Down by Law (his next movie after that). I can only hope that if I see enough of his movies, his work might eventually improve to a completely enjoyable experience.

**

Kaze no tani no Naushika (U.S. Title - Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind)

I've been wanting to see this movie for a while. I saw the DVD at Best Buy and almost pulled a blind buy, but the cost was too high for such a maneuver. I tried to find it to rent around the area, but to no avail. I looked it up on Google Video and was surprised to see that the whole movie was up for viewing (probably illegally). And so, for the first time, I watched a movie illegally. And I don't feel all that bad. I'm asking for the DVD for my birthday. So everybody wins. Everybody wins!

Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind reminded me a lot of Princess Mononoke. Each features one wise person preaching the saving of the environment from rulers bent on destroying it. Both plots balance action with quiet conversations amongst the wild and within towns and villages. And both are really good. Princess Mononoke gets my pick over Nausicaa, but both rule.

Nausicaa is considered to be the first of the Studio Ghibli films. That's particularly interesting because Nausicaa is much more like Princess Mononoke than other 1980's Studio Ghibli films even though the two films were released 15 years apart from each other. Still, the Miyazaki animation style is present. The detail and beauty of his hand-drawn art is breathtaking. I've noticed that he animates smoke and fire better than any other animator than I've seen. There's something so distinctive about his style that makes his films' look and storytelling unique, which is a pleasure amongst the now standard Disney animated fare (still...goooooo Pixar!).

The story is basically that the world is overwhelmed by a toxic vapor emanating from the jungle where giant deadly insects rule. Chief among the insects are slug/snail, caterpillar/what-in-the-world-looking behemoths who transform from docile eyesores into raging runaway trains at the drop of a hat. It seems that only one person can calm these creatures, save her people, bring peace to the land, and learn the secrets to the preservation of her world. That person is Princess Nausicaa.

Princess Nausicaa is a refreshing heroine. She possesses many characteristics that make her a good role-model - determination, strong leadership, wisdom, strength, love, courage, and much more. What a gal! I was reading on Wikipedia (the famous beacon of truth) about how a U.S. version titled Warriors of the Wind was released in the 80's with a poster/VHS box art featuring male characters that appear only briefly or merely as supporting characters. And there was Princess Nausicaa, the true protagonist and great character as a background afterthought. Rotten, no good, boy-centric-programming 80's!

A major plus was some swell aerial action scenes that were smooth poetry and excitement. Its a blast to watch complicated movements and details flow perfectly across the screen. It's a bummer to think that movies like this (immaculate hand-drawn animation) will be non-existent soon enough. That's why it's really worth checking out Miyazaki's films even if you find the pacing boring or the stories strangely childish though told ultra-seriously.

Some things that bothered me included some of the hijinks humor that I have found to be common in Miyazaki's films. Presumably this is because these films are created for children, but I can't really imagine any kids being able to pay attention to Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind long enough to get a kick out of it. Still, I might be selling today's kids short because I can only speculate that I wouldn't have been able to sit still through the 2 hour run time at age 9 or 10. I've also realized that some of the zaniness of the hijinks and humor can be cultural specific. After all, all Miyazaki films premiere in Japan way before American eyes ever see a frame.

***1/2

Down by Law

Down by Law is still walking around in my brain. I saw it last night. I'm still deciding how I feel about it, so this may end up being a stream of consciousness review when all is said and done.

I think I liked it. It definitely did not possess the usual attributes and qualities I look for in a film, especially independent film. It's atmosphere is pretty bare. Jarmusch creates a stale air speaking "Louisiana, Louisiana" and "jail, jail." I can't really put my finger on it more than that.

I felt distanced from the film and the characters for most of the film. There were times when they opened up or had a brief spell of interaction that was mildly amusing, but there was also a lot of bland waiting and silence. It can surely be said that silence can say a lot, but I don't think the silence in Down by Law said that much. More accurately, it said what it had to say and then kept repeating it over and over again.

Of course, whenever you add Roberto Benigni to the mix and you get more interest and excitement than whatever you had before. he adds life and mischief to the film. The best moments in the film - and there are several really, really good scenes - take place after Benigni joins the other two characters in their jail cell. I'm not particularly a fan of Benigni, but I am impressed by how his mere presence in Down by Law made the film and the other two main characters interesting.

Jarmusch employs a leisurely pace. He certainly doesn't rush things. At times, he tried my patience. Other times, especially when the three main characters were on the lam, he kept me engaged (for the most part).

Since this is only the second Jarmusch film I have watched all the way through (the other being Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai, which employed a similar leisurely pace), I can only really speculate here...but I think Jarmusch is still trying to find his voice in Down by Law. He doesn't really say that much in the film. And what he does say, he doesn't say well. I might be looking for meaning in all the wrong places, but it seems he was really just making a dark, bleak, sometimes zany comedy about casual friendships and the long arm of the law. It also moves along the lines of a tough-love letter to the seedy streets, back alleyways, back woods and swamps of Louisiana.

I had a love-hate with the cinematography. On the one hand, the black and white images on screen could be beautiful. Black and white lends itself to beauty. But the camera was stationary or static for many shots. This added to the stale air. It must be difficult to film a jail cell and make it interesting, but Jarmusch didn't even try. If his intention was to show the boredom of jail, he succeeded. As a setting for a film, I think that setting has to be visually interesting for the audience.

I'll give this movie a marginal recommendation, though I do want to see Down by Law to see if I missed the point along the way the first time. I also look forward to seeing what ol' Jarmusch has up his sleeve.

***

The Color of Money

The Color of Money is gold. No kidding. The Hustler is better, but The Color of Money gives its predecessor a run for its money.

The melodrama of the first is toned back. Scorsese puts together a great cast, minus the big pro Cruise battles at a pool hall and in the tournament. When I first saw The Color of Money, I resisted liking it. Paul Newman won his only Best Actor Oscar for the film, and part of me was just bitter he didn't get it for Cool Hand Luke and The Hustler. But Newman deserved his Oscar. His Fast Eddie Felson is older, but not necessarily wiser. He still is suceptible to the rush of the pursuit of the perfect pool shot and knowing you're the best player out there. Newman again shows the rise and fall of pride. But he learns how to pick himself up again. And that's where wisdom gained comes from.

Cruise is great as a player even more cocky and talented than Fast Eddie, if that's possible. When I first saw the movie, I thought his performance was too "out there," too over the top. But it fits. It actually fits. His Vince is over the top, a ball of egotistical energy. His black T-shirt with his name in big white letters across the chest is splendid. It captures the character's drive - to be front and center all the time. I want a "Vince" t-shirt for myself.

Mary Elizabeth Mastriantonio is a spit fire gal with a manipulative streak. Her three way mental match between Vince and Fast Eddie provides most of the drama. She's good and so young. It's weird to think that not too long after she was Ed Harris' wife in The Abyss, still a spit fire, but somehow so much older than in The Color of Money.

Drawbacks: The film's score. I get what soundtracks do. They set the time. They let us know when and where we are. That's why the music in the pool halls and bars works. However, the obvious 80s music pulses throughout the score in driving scenes and the like. I've always thought that a score should be timeless, well mostly timeless. I can't imagine how old Run Lola Run's score will sound in 20 years. Another drawback was short and bitter. Scorsese chooses to slow down to a freeze frame when a newly reinvigorated Fast Eddie leaps out of a swimming pool's water. I get it. He's back. Born anew. Good idea. Poor execution. The short break bumped me from the story. It's corny. Old men bursting out of pools with deep, loud breaths don't really work on a dramatic level for me.

I watched this movie a third time with Andrew Siragusa and my brother. They said they liked the movie because it took a different approach to the ending. They said that instead of the usual change-for-the-better story arc, Fast Eddie Felson and Vince remain approximately the same throughout the film. There are obvious times when each could have turned a corner and gone in a different direction, but they don't take it.

SPOILER:
I agree on the one hand. Vince doesn't change dramatically. If anything, he's more cocky, hardened to the world. But Fast Eddie definitely changes. At the beginning of the film, he's been out of the game for twenty plus years. He watches from a far with a yearning for the fast life again, hustling hustlers for their cash and pride. But he does it by proxy through Vince. He changes. He fights back. He joins the fray, putting himself back into the game. And he has to overcome his pride. It's easy to say he doesn't in fact overcome it. After all, the film ends with him cockily slamming the cue ball into the other balls at the end of the table, saying "I'm back." But I think the tell tale sign that he has in fact overcome his pride comes just prior to this moment. He basically admits that Vince is better than him, and may beat him time after time again, but he won't bail. He can win one. Until he does, he'll take the losses and get right back in the mix to get his win. He's "back" because he learned his lesson. Pride in pool will get you bad if you let it. It took his love away from him in The Hustler. It left him in The Color of Money (schooled by a young hustler played by Forest Whitaker), but he can keep going. He's smarter. Finally, he's wiser. In the end, he wants to teach Vince the lesson he learned. Maybe with some bitterness involved, but still that wisdom that makes Felson better even if Vince has more talent.

****

Some Kind of Wonderful

My biggest complaint with Some Kind of Wonderful is that it's really just Pretty in Pink with a change in genders and ending. The rest is basically the same. I don't really want to argue with the film's fans, but the comparison is easily made. A misfit with good grades and growing pains (Ringwald in PIP, Eric Stoltz in SKOW) falls for a popular kid (Andrew McCarthy in PIP, Lea Thompson in SKOW) with popular friends that don't approve. All the while, the misfit's best friend (Jon Cryer in PIP, Mary Stuart Masterson in SKOW), also a misfit, is in love with them. The misfit ends up with one of them, but the end result flips from one film to the other.

The difference is I didn't care about the characters nearly as much as I did in PIP. As much as I like Stoltz, I couldn't root for him as much as I should have. I didn't care who he ended up with. I didn't care that he told his dad that “I don't want your life” (go Varsity Blues). He seemed nice enough, but the whole “stick up for yourself” thing never reached a satisfying end. It was just a mess. Lesson: to stick up for yourself, get your friends to threaten your enemies.

Pluses: Elias Koteas as a punk high schooler. He's funny. Candace Cameron (D.J. Tanner herself) as Stoltz's precocious little sister. She's funny.

**1/2

Pretty in Pink

Pretty in Pink is good John Hughes, not grand John Hughes like the Breakfast Club. But good is...well, good. Part of the reason I like Hughes is he writes complicated teenagers. Complicated “villains”...not so much. James Spader delivers a one-note performance as the popular, rich jerk. But he does it so well, I can't really complain.

Molly Ringwald is so good in Hughes movies that I wonder how she fell so far off the map. She's no Meryl Streep, to be sure, but she always played her roles well in her Hughes films. My guess is her talent didn't mature enough to play adult roles. That and adults probably weren't willing to see her in “their” movies.

The adoring weird friend is a common character in Hughes' world, and Jon Cryer delivers a fine performance as Ducky.

I also liked Harry Dean Stanton as Ringwald's dad. The guy's a pro, never playing down to genre that usually didn't let the adult performers shine.

As a writer, Hughes always made a real effort to show how teenagers can be smart, complicated people who we can all relate to. He showed complexity in social classes that often gets glossed over for stereotypes. The guy was good. I miss him. The rumor was that he wrote Maid in Manhattan. If so, I cry. But the guy needs to jump back in and do the teenager thing. Because even if the 80s soundtracks and vocabulary of its main characters must be changed, the issues are still there. And teenage movies can be good again.

My major complaint: The end feels incredibly rushed. All the problems seem to fix themselves in one big whirlwind. The film had earned a better constructed ending.

***1/2

Dead Poets Society

Dead Poets Society is great. It's not perfect, but I cannot really deny it is great. Robin William's performance as an unconventional teacher at a prestigious prep school is ripe for poking fun at, but it is also very good. But the big draw is the crop of burgeoning talent from the young cast. Ethan Hawke, Josh Charles, Robert Sean Leonard, and Gale Hansen (among others) shine as students encouraged to seize the day by Williams and a display case full of alumni. By now, the amazing teacher inspires students subgenre is well established and tired. But it feels fresh in Dead Poets Society. Rather than heart-string pulling at the hands of directors and screenwriters, I felt the story and performances really did the heavy lifting here. The ending is one of my favorites.

Detractions: 1) Running through the snow after the death looks wonderful, but rings false when one character emotionally tries to console another. 2) That score. It doesn't really hold up well to time. It has that heavy feeling late 80s. It's instantly recognizable. But I cringe slightly when I think of its sound during big scenes. 3)The actor who played Cameron was bad. I liked him in Way of the Gun when he was older, but he stuck out like a sore thumb here.

****

Wings of Desire

This film is beautiful to look at. It is also boring as all get out. I tried very hard to give the film time to develop, to get better and bring my attention back. It barely happened during the film's final twenty minutes or so. All that preceded it was philosophical posing. The film would have made a better short or work of fictional literature. On screen, it merely is a chore. I had to make myself sit through it. Again, the cinematography is gorgeous, but the story (thin as it is, which can be okay, but wasn't) didn't earn my time. I did watch the making of doc on the DVD, and it allowed me to have some respect for what they were attempting to do. But the idea wasn't translated into a very good film. Shorter might have equaled better, but I'll never know. I sat on my bed watching, giving time limits for the film - "It's been a long time. Nothing's really happened. It'll end soon." "I was wrong last time. But it has to end soon. Nothing has changed." "Dear Lord, help me. Finish it."

Maybe one day I will give it another chance. Someday far off in the future. You can't even see it from here.

**