symmachos's Reviews

Amsterdam (2022)

7/10

18 December 2022

Amsterdam is a thoroughly eccentric film that centers on an equally eccentric character portrayed by Christian Bale. True to form, Bale undergoes an extreme physical transformation to bring his character to life.

The movie unfolds as a murder mystery with strong political overtones. As stated at the beginning, the story is based on an actual historical incident -- the so-called Business Plot of 1933 (Google it). However, all the characters and events in Amsterdam are completely fictitious, with the exception of MacGuire, who really did exist and really did die under peculiar circumstances in 1935. (The character played by Robert DeNiro is based on General Smedley Butler, whereas DeNiro's character is called General Dillenbeck.)

I found the movie entertaining from start to finish. I was never bored or confused by the narrative, and I was suitably impressed by the all-star cast. One detail was especially amusing -- the nonsense songs that the three main characters sing.

I didn't like the photography, though. There were lots of very low camera angles, many shots were intentionally overexposed, and the color palette was dominated by shades of red, orange, and brown. If the intention was to be grotesque and unsettling, it worked.

I'm fascinated by the sharp divide in these user reviews. Many IMDb commenters say Amsterdam was a masterpiece, while just as many say it was total garbage. I disagree with both extremes. I liked the movie well enough, but I can't say I loved anything about it. Watch it if you like zany excursions into the early 20th century.

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Toscana (II) (2022)

4/10

A string of cliches

26 May 2022

I liked three things about this movie: the food; the gorgeous landscapes of Toscana; and Cristiana dell'Anna, who was so memorable in Gomorra, and who still managed to tug at my heart in this venture. Unfortunately the script fell far short of the photography and the cast, and that ruined things for me.

There are no surprises after the first 15 minutes. If you've ever seen a movie about a chef, or any rom-com whatsoever, you know what's coming next.

A better story and more plausible characters would have helped a lot, but as written, neither Theo nor Sophia made any sense to me. I hope Cristiana dell'Anna gets better parts in better movies very soon!

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Piranhas (2019)

6/10

Paranza means "small fry"

4 May 2022

This movie is fast-moving and superficially entertaining, but despite an appealing cast and great photography, it doesn't offer much in the way of character, story, or insight into the reality it depicts. Like many viewers I watched it after digesting Romanzo Criminale (the TV series), Gomorra (the TV series), and Suburra: Blood on Rome. However, "Paranza dei Bambini" (original title) suffers from comparison with any of those excellent series.

Of course, as a standalone film, Paranza can't match those series for depth or scope, but I did expect a much harder look at the main characters and especially the consequences of their actions. Sadly, I was disappointed.

A 15-year-old boy named Nicola embarks on a life of crime so that he and his poor but hardworking mother can have nice things. Despite a few setbacks, he's amazingly successful in a very short span of time. The editing of the film leaves out all transitions, so you really have to stay on your toes in order to follow the rather implausible sequence of events. (For example, I was baffled by how quickly Nicola became a "frate" of the heir of the Striane gang, as well as how quickly the two of them fell out -- what made them such fast friends? Why couldn't they reconcile?)

Oddly enough, none of the audacious crimes Nicola commits seem to bite back at him very seriously until about 2 hours into the film, when somebody gets fatally shot. But that potentially dramatic scene is presented in a rush -- I had to rewind to be sure which character actually went down -- and the director purposely seemed to avoid evoking any pathos or sympathy.

And then, as many others have written, the movie just ends without any clear resolution. I felt cheated.

(Postscript: This movie is not about the Mafia. It's about the Comorra. Pay attention, guagliu -- the setting is Napoli, not Sicilia.)

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Luna Park (2021)

2/10

Bad music makes this show even worse

29 March 2022

I really wanted to like this show, but it was impossible. I recently watched another lightweight Italian series on Netflix that I did enjoy -- "Guida Astrologica per Cuori Infranti" -- and I was hoping that this one would be similar. Since my primary motive was to practice understanding standard Italian (as opposed to the Neapolitan dialect in Gomorrah) I naturally watched the version in Italian with subtitles.

But this series is garbage. The plot is a worn-out cliche, the acting is dreadful, the characters are unbelievably dense, and the soundtrack made me want to run screaming from my TV. Somehow someone thought it would be a good idea to make a show set in the 1960s and yet avoid using ANY music from that famously musical decade.

Still worse, when a familiar tune (from a much later decade) pops up, it isn't just background music -- it dominates the mix so heavily that the dialogue is drowned out.

I mean really -- they picked "Lovefool," a 1992 dance hit from a Swedish pop group, to convey girlish excitement in Italy in the 1960s??

Moreover, the writers don't seem to know anything about anything in their story. There's an early scene that is evidently supposed to be a Tarot card reading -- yet it proceeds like no Tarot reading I've ever heard of, with the reader (not the querent) selecting cards at random from a spread and then just laying them down side by side. We never see a single card face-up. At one point the reader refers to "The Old Woman," which isn't even a Tarot card.

It looks like nobody took the trouble to learn what they needed to know. As a result the series is so idiotic that I can guarantee you this: Any reviewer who gives it a 10 is a paid shill. Of the 11 reviews visible at this moment, only a few sound like they were written by someone who actually watched the show. I gave up after the first episode.

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1983 (2018)

8/10

Gorgeous photography, neo-noir political drama

4 January 2022

I'm a sucker for good photography, so I was hooked on this series from the first episode. Hand-held shooting is rare (wobbly images appear only in a few action scenes) and shots are generally well focused, well lit, and well composed -- like classic Polish cinema from the 50s and 60s, except in glorious color.

The narrative zigzags back and forth between historical Poland in 1983 and a glitzy alternative Poland in 2003. This seductive dystopia offers sparkling glass towers, stylishly dressed Party members, and a flourishing Little Saigon with its own underworld. It's all beautiful to look at, even if the action is often harsh and the plot is multilinear and bewildering.

But the complexity of the storyline is justified by the complexity of the situation. Poland is now a world power, independent of the USSR (which still exists) as well as NATO. However, the omnipotent Party must still tangle with internal factions -- regular police (Milicja) vs. Political police (SB) vs. The Light Brigade (a radical left movement) vs. The Vietnamese Mafia -- as well as various foreign actors -- the KGB, the CIA, and Mossad. Several of the characters are entangled with two or more of these factions, so it can be a challenge to grasp their motivations.

For me, at least, the story wrapped up in a satisfying way, but there were enough loose ends and enough apparently-dead-but-maybe-alive characters to fuel a sequel. In fact, many of the people who posted their reviews in 2018-2019 were hoping for a second season, but as of January 2022 nothing has materialized. So I think one season is all we're getting. And that's enough for me.

The title -- 1983 -- was carefully chosen, for historical as well as literary reasons. 1983 was the year Lech Walesa, leader of the Solidarity movement, won the Nobel Peace Prize. 1983 was also the year before 1984.

Early in the series we see the Milicja (or was it the SB?) confiscating forbidden books, including Orwell's 1984. Then the antihero (a hard-boiled cop in the Milicja) tells one of his junior colleagues to read the book in case it offers some clues for their current investigation. After a few chapters the colleague asks, "Is this fiction?"

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Agora (2009)

9/10

This is how to make a movie about ancient times

27 December 2021

As a well-crafted and historically accurate chronicle of Alexandria in late antiquity, this movie compares favorably with HBO's *Rome,* and it actually trumps *Rome* in its fidelity to fact. Without sentimentality or smarminess, without intrusive soundtrack music, we see the life and death of Hypatia, one of the greatest astronomers & mathematicians of the ancient world. The ever-lovely Rachel Weisz gives a thoughtful performance as the title character, and Max Minghella is very good as Davus, the brooding slave boy whose unrequited devotion remains as steady as the stars.

Although Davus is fictional, the other major characters - Theon (Hypatia's father), Orestes (her aristocratic suitor, played by Oscar Isaac), Synesius (her Christian student, later Bishop of Cyrene), Cyril (Bishop of Alexandria), and Ammonius the monk - were all real people who behaved more or less as they are portrayed. The story is extremely relevant to contemporary events, both in the U. S. and in the Muslim world, yet it never falsifies its source material. The destruction of the Serapeion, the religious policing of the Parabolani, the persecution of the Jews, the public attack on Orestes, and the high status of Hypatia in her native city are all recorded by authors who lived in that era.

Especially striking for me was the fact that Hypatia's disciples included both pagans and Christians, and that she herself considered such religious differences insignificant next to the humanity we all share.

I recommend this movie for anybody who enjoys historical dramas. For more details on the historical background, try *Hypatia of Alexandria* by Maria Dzielska.

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The Wheel of Time (2021– )

5/10

Cheesy and derivative

24 December 2021

I just watched the Season 1 finale, which confirmed for me that this series is a pale, mediocre, and deeply derivative failure.

When I heard that Amazon was going to make a big-budget TV adaptation of RJ's Wheel of Time, I was interested enough to read the first two of the 14 novels. That much reading told me that RJ had trouble creating original content. His epic tale borrows very heavily from two much better series: Tolkien's Lord of the Rings (as anyone could tell you) and C. J Cherryh's Morgaine series (first book: Gate of Ivrel, 1976). I haven't seen anyone draw the second connection, although RJ's debt to Cherryh is obvious. (Look up Gate of Ivrel if you've never heard of it. The protagonists are Morgaine, AKA the White Witch, and her stoical samurai-type bodyguard, Nhi Vanye. And that's just the beginning of the parallels.) Anyhow, I found the first two books of Wheel of Time hard going, partly because they were so derivative of superior works, but mostly because (1) the story moves very slowly, (2) the characters are generally bland, and (3) the author constantly tells you what's going to happen next.

The TV series departs significantly from the books in ways that I found baffling. The story does move more quickly - a plus! - but few characters really come to life. And we still get prophecies on top of prophecies.

It's understandable that the writers would simplify the story - e.g., cut out lesser characters and subplots - but what they did was throw out a lot of interesting stuff and replace it with cliches. They also added conflict and melodrama where none was present in the books. A key example is episode 5, whose melodrama focuses heavily on a warder named Stepin, while largely ignoring the central characters from the Two Rivers. Why was so much screen time wasted on this minor subplot, instead of giving us more about Rand, Perrin, Mat, and Egwene?

A related problem is the eclipse of the major male characters - Mat, Perrin, Rand. While the books have many strong female characters, on the page they do tend to be overshadowed by the men. But the TV show overcompensates by focusing even more strongly on the women, at the expense of the men. Rand in particular - who's central in book one - becomes a cardboard cut-out whose main concern seems to be improving his archery.

It shouldn't have been a zero-sum game. All genders deserve to shine.

The production values are also surprisingly skimpy. Game of Thrones delighted fans with location photography in various corners of Europe - Iceland, Ireland, Spain, Croatia. That emphasis went a long way toward giving the show an epic feel. In WoT, sadly, we mostly get middling-quality green screen, so the visual presentation falls far short of grandeur. The costumes in WoT also tend to be cheesy, with many pieces - Rand's sweater, those '70s-style sheepskin coats, and the Dark One's Eurotrash ensemble - looking like they were bought off the rack.

Evidently most of the production budget went to the scenes at Tar Valon, so the finale in particular looks like it was done on the cheap.

In sum: I did manage to watch all of Season 1, but I wouldn't recommend this series to anybody.

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Dark Woods (2020– )

8/10

Excellent miniseries, complex story, satisfying finish

4 December 2021

I had trouble getting into the first episode of this six-part series. That was partly because it was hard to sort out the flashbacks from events in the present day, and partly because the show looked like a standard European procedural with a mismatched male/female pair of detectives (one cliche) investigating the disappearance and murder of various young women (another cliche) as well as a few men. But since the show was streaming on Topic, and just about everything else I'd seen on Topic turned out to be excellent, I persisted and was glad I did.

The story is complex and the investigation ends up lasting for decades, but the plot is well constructed and the conclusion makes sense. All the actors are strong, especially the tormented protagonist, played by Matthias Brandt (who was also brilliant as Benda in Babylon Berlin). I'd recommend this show to anyone who likes crime dramas -- especially true crime, since "Dark Woods" is based on an actual case: the Göhrde murders of 1989.

One commenter complained that the title (in German -- Das Geheimnis das Totenwaldes, The Secret of the Deadly Forest) was misleading. I don't understand that criticism, since many of the corpses were discovered in Iseforst, a forest in Germany; the forest itself appears in every episode; characters often mention Iseforst; and in the series, the media start calling the crime scene "Totenwald." So the title seems perfectly apt, in English as well as German -- especially if you interpret it both literally and metaphorically (e.g., the "selva oscura" -- dark forest -- mentioned in the opening verses of Dante's Inferno).

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Polina (2016)

6/10

The dancing is the best part

4 December 2021

Few films offer an authentic look at ballet or modern dance. This is one of those few. Unlike Black Swan, which was totally absurd, we get to see real dancers engaged in real dancing -- as in such great films as The Red Shoes (1948) and The Turning Point (1977). The makers of Polina understood that dancing isn't about faces -- it's about bodies moving through time and space -- so they present long takes that show the dancers from head to toe.

For me the high point of this movie was the long scene with Sergio's improvisation group -- the skinny guy with arms & legs like noodles, and then Polina's wonderful solo.

Unfortunately, the story falls apart not long afterward, and then, after a rushed montage that leaves too much unresolved, it ends abruptly. The disintegration of the narrative is the reason why I rated this movie six stars instead of seven or eight.

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Baron noir (2016– )

8/10

Excellent political drama

4 December 2021

I just watched all three seasons of this show over the course of a few weeks. I really enjoyed it, and now I'm yearning for a fourth season, although rumor suggests it won't be happening.

I found the characters very compelling, above all Kad Merad as Philippe Rickwaert, the master Machiavellian. After one episode I thought, "This guy reminds me James Gandolfini, which would make Rickwaert the Tony Soprano of French politics" -- and sure enough, by season 3 one of the characters was making the same comparison. (Rickwaert doesn't kill people, but his associates do have a habit of committing suicide.)

Almost as notable as Merad are Anna Magloulis as Amelie, Astrid Whetnall as Veronique, and Hugo Becker as Cyril Balsan, all of whom were new to me. I've watched other French shows (Village Francais, Engrenages, Dix Pour Cent, Parlement) but the only faces I recognized in BN were Philippe Resimont as Kalhenberg (he played a collabo in VF) and Scali Delpeyrat as Borde (an uber creepy aristocrat in Engrenages).

Several commenters have compared the show to Borgen, and I agree. But whereas Borgen seems positive and feel-good, Baron Noir delights in exposing the vanity, deceit, and ruthless venality of its political players.

I knew next to nothing about French politics before I watched this show, and my ignorance made it hard to follow certain episodes (especially given the subtitles, which can be misleading). But the series is so well-produced that I kept going. By season two I was consulting Wikipedia a lot. At least to this outsider, French politics seems far more complex and labyrinthine than politics in the US or UK -- e.g., the sheer profusion and volatility of the political parties. When I finished watching the whole thing, I read some formal reviews and realized that many of the characters were directly inspired by real people.

This show won't be everybody's cup of tea. It's most likely to appeal to political junkies and those with a taste for European TV. I fall into both categories. I also have a goal of improving my French, so I watched many scenes twice in quick succession, reading the subtitles the first time & ignoring them the second. That tactic really improved my comprehension, and made me appreciate the series' production values even more.

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The Icebreaker (2016)

1/10

Impossible to watch with bad dubbing

12 October 2021

I was intrigued by the trailer so I tried watching this. But instead of the original Russian dialog with subtitles, I got a version with the worst dubbing I've ever heard. It sounds like the same non-actor was voicing all the characters. It was absolutely ridiculous. I couldn't stand it for more than 3 minutes.

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High Maintenance: Dinah (2013)

Season 1, Episode 7

Classic Episode of a Brilliant Series

14 February 2020

I only discovered High Maintenance a week ago, and since then I've happily binged through all the webisodes and all the HBO episodes through Season 4, #1. This webisode (originally aired February 2013) sticks in my mind for two reasons - it documents one of NYC's big snowstorms of the past 10 years and it introduces a major recurring character, a stoner Romeo named Chad (Chris Roberti). After watching it, I discovered a movie called Jammed (released May 2014), starring Chris Roberti as Mike and Leah Rudick (who played Isabel, one of Chad's hookups in "Diana") as Rachel.

Here's the thing: except for their names, Roberti & Rudick play exactly the same characters in Jammed as they did in "Dinah," and many of Roberti's mannerisms and obsessions in Jammed recur in post-2013 episodes of HM.

So what I want to know is, how did that happen? Did HM rip off -- or at least draw inspiration from -- an early script for Jammed? Did Jammed rip off -- or at least draw inspiration from -- "Dinah"? Or in both cases, did the producers/writers simply ask Robert to create a character, and he did a version of Chad in each case?

Regardless of the answers, HM is uniformly excellent, and it's among the most cinematic TV comedies I've ever enjoyed, so watch it!

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The Fall (I) (2013–2016)

7/10

One season too long . . .

15 April 2018

I really enjoyed the first season of this show - the casting, the dialogue, the plot development, the photography, the creepy & foreboding atmosphere. The second season also started off well, but then things got awfully bogged down. I fully expected the story to be finished by the final episode of that season, so I felt badly cheated when it ended on a cliffhanger. Nevertheless, even after the long wait for the third season, I still found myself curious enough to see how everything worked out. Unfortunately, the third season is the weakest of all. It's excruciatingly slow in pace, with many long silent takes, supporting storylines that go nowhere, and what seemed to me (as an American) to be absurd lapses in procedure. Maybe things are different in the UK, but over here a confessed serial killer (especially one so physically formidable) would not be allowed into an interrogation room without being well restrained. (Not to mention what happened afterward at the psychiatric facility!) Now that I've seen all three seasons, I still think this is high-quality long-form TV, but for me it can't compare with such other recent thrillers as The Bridge (original Danish/Swedish version), the first season of True Detective, or the ongoing Icelandic thriller, Trapped. One final point: I notice a sharp split in these IMDb reviews about Gillian Anderson's performance. Like many others, I was somewhat annoyed by the increasing breathiness of her voice over the three seasons, but I still find her a riveting presence on screen, and her name at the top of a cast list will still be a major draw for me.

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The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)

6/10

Might have worked better as stop-action animation

16 March 2014

I really liked Bottle Rocket and Moonrise Kingdom, and I appreciate the warmth and humor of Rushmore. I've also seen most of Wes Anderson's other feature films, but they didn't engage me anywhere near as much as those three. Grand Budapest, unfortunately, is another also-ran. It seems more like a cartoon than a story about people. It presents caricatures instead of characters and make-believe instead of history. I do enjoy stylized films and TV, but extreme artificiality only works for me if it plays off something honest and real. Grand Budapest, however, is a cold and mechanical film: a caper of sorts, with a surfeit of chase scenes and narrow escapes. It might have been a ballet danced by wind-up toys. Although we glimpse dozens of beloved stars flitting across the screen, the effect is more like celebrities voicing animated images than an ensemble cast bringing events to life. (At least it wasn't in 3D!) I'd like to see the talented Mr. Anderson return to making movies about actual breathing people. Presenting misfits struggling to find their place in the world is what he's always done best. Maybe the idea of Grand Budapest started out that way, but that's not where it ended up.

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John Carter (2012)

6/10

Beautiful But Flawed

10 March 2012

Warning: Spoilers

I first encountered Edgar Rice Burroughs and his Martian tales exactly 50 years ago, as a collection of beautifully illustrated books stowed in the back of my small-town public library. That library has since burned down, and the books went with it, but my love for Barsoom never abated. So last night, when Disney's adaptation of A Princess of Mars premiered under its focus-group-approved title of John Carter, I was there.

Overall I enjoyed the movie. Disney wisely decided against updating the source material and kept the action embedded in its 19th century context. They did an excellent job of capturing the atmosphere of the old illustrations, so the visual impact of the film is strong. Those six-limbed green Martians have been brought to life as only CGI can do it, and the vast, swirling battle scenes look like they leaped from the pages of the book, with John Carter hurtling over his enemies like Douglas Fairbanks. I especially liked the glimpses of Helium and Zodanga, the battling Martian cities; these are thoroughly otherworldly places, with an ancient/future look that is central to Burroughs' vision. At times it even seemed that director Andrew Stanton took some Futurist cues from Aelita, Queen of Mars (1924).

I also liked Taylor Kitsch in the title role. I might have picked somebody more convincingly Southern and military (Josh Holloway springs to mind), instead of an ex-model for Abercrombie & Fitch. But Kitsch brings a wry sense of humor to Captain Carter, and I liked his chemistry with Lynn Collins, the actual Princess of Mars. Physically Kitsch is ideal, with a lithe body like you see in illustrations from the 1920s, rather than a steroid overdose.

Lynn Collins faces more barriers as Dejah Thoris, the perennial damsel in distress, but at least she wields a sword with the best of them, and we are constantly reminded that this princess is a scientist. Disney's Dejah departs from the original in one key area: she's the one who first puts the moves on Carter. I thoroughly approve.

A FEW SPOILERS AHEAD

Now for what I didn't like. One strength of A Princess of Mars is the way it takes you step-by-step from Earth to Mars, providing a detailed narrative of Carter's early days among the green men of Thark and letting us watch the strange world of Barsoom unfold through his eyes. Stanton chose the opposite approach. He begins the movie in the midst of wild Barsoomian action involving the men of Zodanga, and only later introduces John Carter. He also adds an absurdly complex back story to explain how Carter traveled to Mars, where Burroughs was content with Apache magic. To do so Stanton took two minor characters from the original series – Sab Than, Prince of Zodanga, and Matai Shang, Holy Hekkador of the Holy Therns – and goosed them into major villains. I would have been far happier if Matai Shang did not appear at all, and certainly not in this bald, shape-shifting, and thoroughly anti-Burroughs incarnation.

Just as unfortunate is the choppy way in which John Carter's early days among the Tharks are handled. Burroughs built a careful narrative of Carter's rise through the ranks, paralleled by the rise of his Martian friend, Tars Tarkas. Every time Carter killed a Thark, he took the dead warrior's name and possessions, winning the right to live among his captors as "a prisoner with power." Similarly, Tars Tarkas begins simply as a chieftain, and only slowly rises to Jed (big chief) and finally Jeddak (emperor).

But in the film, Tarkas is already Jeddak at the outset, and we never learn why the green Martians call our hero Dotar Sojat (it's because he killed two guys named Dotar and Sojat). Still worse, we get only a garbled version of my favorite part of the Tharkian chapters: the strange history of Sola, the only green Martian capable of love and compassion. Although Sola appears in the movie, and we do learn that she is Tarkas' daughter, her story unfolds in a puzzling, disjointed way that is bound to confuse anybody who doesn't know the book. Thus Stanton squandered an opportunity to tell an alien but moving story, and failed to flesh out two characters who are central to his plot.

I could continue listing all the departures from Burroughs, but I'd sound even more like a geeky old curmudgeon. I'll make just two last complaints. First, Disney was stupid to introduce Dejah Thoris on screen before John Carter meets her, so we lose the opportunity to see her from his perspective. Second, one key scene violates everything Burroughs tells us about Martian mores. Tardos Mors, Jeddak of Helium, tells Dejah that she must marry a villain she hates in order to bring peace and save her city. I had to stifle a groan.

To quote from the novel: "Tardos Mors . . . has sent word that he and his people would rather look upon the dead face of their princess than see her wed to any than her own choice, and that personally he would prefer being engulfed in the ashes of a lost and burning Helium."

Bottom line: I enjoyed the movie, but with mixed feelings. It's gratifying to see these old Martian visions brought to life, but Disney and Stanton undercut their success by treating the source material in such a cavalier manner. This retelling of A Princess of Mars could have had an impact similar to Avatar or Lord of the Rings, but the creative team decided instead to concoct an unnecessarily contrived and chaotic story that is unlikely to translate into market share.

Peter Jackson understood that you need to follow the book and pay attention to hardcore fans. Andrew Stanton did not. I'm grateful that he brought us this gorgeous piece of cinema, but I doubt we'll be seeing a sequel in my lifetime.

Still, I'd love to be wrong.

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The Fourth Kind (2009)

1/10

Total piece of garbage sold with dishonest marketing

8 November 2009

I love movies that actually scare me, but unfortunately very few are good enough to pull that off. THE FOURTH KIND is not one of them. This is a really, really stupid movie that trots out every known cliché in the Ufological dictionary of dumbness -- including alien abduction, memories retrieved through hypnosis, and the fact-challenged notion (popularized decades ago by Erich von Daniken and Brinsley Le Poer Trench, and roundly refuted since) that flying saucers are the vehicles of "ancient astronauts" who have been visiting Earth for millennia. Now, it would be possible to juggle these elements into a new narrative and achieve something worthwhile, but nothing like that happened in the present case. This movie offers nothing new in the way of ideas, and nothing impressive in the way of writing, acting, or photography.

Before going to see this film I glanced at several comments on the IMDb site, and writer after writer testified how terrifying they found THE FOURTH KIND. Now, you can't argue about taste, but given the extreme ordinariness of this movie, I strongly suspect that these comments are part of the film's marketing campaign and do not reflect the reactions of real viewers.

What definitely count as false advertising are the repeated claims that this movie is based on real individuals (e.g., a therapist named Abigail Tyler) and true events. The movie itself contains numerous segments that it identifies as raw video captured by these supposedly real individuals. Since the video is obviously fake, and since Google searches can't substantiate the existence of Abigail Tyler, those advertising claims are deceptive.

This bugs me. A site like IMDb should not be lying to its visitors.

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District 9 (2009)

1/10

Incredibly overrated

17 August 2009

I'm flabbergasted by the amount of positive feedback this film has received. It's more of a straight-up action movie than anything resembling science fiction, and while it has plenty of explosions and lots of splattering blood & guts, DISTRICT 9 is severely deficient in story, characters, ideas, and surprises.

In fact, you could argue that it doesn't have any characters at all, just a few types: the nerdy Accidental Protagonist, the Inscrutable Alien, the Executive Villain, the oddly unkillable Grunt Villain. Everybody else is just an intermittent talking head.

There's almost no story, and what plot developments do emerge are predictable way in advance.

Without giving too much away, I can say that the basic premise is a lot like that Outer Limits episode starring Robert Culp, with a slight twist. To that slender premise the script adds various clichés from recent SF films and series. But the movie never does what good SF does best: it never presents or explores big ideas, it never portrays alien worlds, and despite its CGI creatures, it never explores extraterrestrial psychology or culture.

DISTRICT 9 is also lacking in internal logic. As in the Star Wars series, aliens speak Alienese (with subtitles) and humans speak English, yet each species easily understands the other's language (even though the humans can't even read the subtitles!). Now I might buy into the notion that the aliens have special senses or faculties that enable them to understand English without speaking it, but I really can't believe that the humans somehow learned fluent Alienese without also learning SOMETHING about their biology, culture, technology, etc.

The aliens' physical appearance is strictly Motorized Action Figure. They are humanoid bipeds, yet they have bug-like or mollusc-like features. Somehow they are perfectly capable of breathing the Earth's atmosphere and eating terrestrial food. It's even suggested that they can have sex with humans.

Now when is the last time you had sex with an octopus or a cockroach, y'all?

At one point we are told that all the aliens we see are members of a worker caste, without any intelligence, yet we quickly learn that this isn't true. But if it isn't, why do the aliens usually behave as if they aren't sentient?

If I'm supposed to trust that the sequel clears all this up, well, you've already lost me. No way do I spend another dime on this franchise!

The film's portrayal of the aliens is somewhat less xenophobic than the handling of the bugs in STARSHIP TROOPERS or the scary creatures in INDEPENDENCE DAY, but its portrayal of black Africans seems downright racist. I'm a bit surprised that there hasn't been any noise about that.

The movie that DISTRICT NINE most closely resembles is BLACKHAWK DOWN. If you loved that one, you might get a little out of this one. But even then, you'll find yourself wondering -- why don't the aliens just shoot down those darn helicopters? They get plenty of opportunities!

In a word: yuck.

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Humpday (2009)

8/10

Funny movie with great acting and a ton of humanity

12 July 2009

I just saw one of the premiere screenings of this film in Seattle, with director Lynn Shelton on hand afterward for Q & A. I found this a very funny movie with refreshingly real characters, and the rest of the large & enthusiastic audience at the screening seemed to agree. The director chose a highly unlikely scenario -- two straight guys setting out on a dare to film themselves having sex with each other -- and then handled it with total humanity and authenticity.

Watching the film I thought it was obvious that Shelton followed the same method that Larry David uses in *Curb Your Enthusiasm* -- i.e., she wrote out a detailed scenario and then had the actors improvise the individual scenes. The director confirmed this in the Q & A, adding that she developed the story in collaboration with the three principal actors and then shot the film over a period of 10 days in completely real-life settings. The actors had the freedom to do long takes, which were shot with two digital cameras to ensure coverage. The results were edited down to a well-paced 90-minute comedy.

In *Humpday* the fourth wall that they always talk about in theater completely disintegrates. I felt like I was right there in the same room with these people, whose "performances" were indistinguishable from reality. Shelton's directorial technique takes cinematic honesty to a new level, and I think we will be seeing more and more of her approach in the future.

"Mumblecore" is neither a fair nor accurate description of this movie. The dialogue is articulate and fully audible, and the portrayals are carefully thought through. Just as inaccurate is the media characterization of Shelton as the "female Apatow." Far from celebrating bromance, Shelton and her actors live it through and live it out.

Although deconstruction has come to seem an awfully dated concept, it still provides a fine description of what Shelton does to Apatow in *Humpday.* Having suffered through *Pineapple Express,* a chuckle-free exercise in self-indulgence, I gotta say that when it comes to producing laughs, Shelton now has the edge on the man who brought us the *40-Year-Old Virgin.*

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Dead Snow (2009)

1/10

Boring and stupid

21 June 2009

Evidently I'm not part of the target audience for which this juvenile gore-fest was intended. I like smart, creepy movies that plant disturbing ideas in your head and then harvest them with an interesting story that leads to a powerful climax. Nothing like that happens in this extremely predictable and totally un-scary chunk of Scandinavian dreck.

I could care less about the two-dimensional "characters" and their misadventures with a very large contingent of (omigod!!!! how do they think of these things!!!) Nazi zombies. It was obvious within the first 5 minutes where this thing was going. The filmmaker missed so many opportunities to craft better characters and a more compelling plot that I was ready to walk out after 45 minutes.

All I can say in this movie's favor is that the audience at the screening I attended (at a big film festival) cheered and applauded. I guess they were all zombie fans. I'm not.

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The Fall (I) (2006)

8/10

Lush visuals, appealing cast

22 June 2008

If Fellini had gone to India to make a movie with the Monty Python crew, and then included a few hunky American guys, plus one of those cute little girls who often appear in contemporary European art films, the result might resemble "The Fall."

It's a whimsical, engaging picture with a simple premise. We're at a hospital in LA during the 1920s. Among the patients are a handsome young stuntman and a little girl who is the daughter of orange-pickers who immigrated from Eastern Europe. Both have been seriously injured by falling. As they try to climb back up again (or not), the stuntman entertains the little girl with a fantastic adventure serial set in the Mughal palaces and forts of India.

The tale features no deep meaning or shocking plot twists, just some gorgeous scenery, some appealing characters, and a few laughs. If you're nostalgic for old-time Hollywood spectaculars with more than a dash of Mumbai, this one's for you.

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10,000 BC (2008)

8/10

A Great Old-Fashioned Saturday Matinée

9 March 2008

The caveman epic is a neglected film genre. The trailer for this movie led me to expect something like "Walking With Cavemen," that excellent BBC documentary of 2003 (except with more drama & violence) or "Quest for Fire," a still more excellent feature film of 1981 (except with better mammoths).

But despite a title that recalls two previous caveman attempts the rather laughable "One Million B.C." from 1940, and the still more laughable "One Million Years B.C." from 1966 (that one starred Raquel Welch and her two most marketable assets) "10,000 B.C." is actually straight-up science fiction. And that's not a bad thing at all.

This movie has plenty of action, plenty of CGI, gorgeous location photography from Africa and New Zealand, a durable quest narrative, and a hunky leading man in the form of Steven Strait, self-doubting mammoth hunter. The producers make some nice gestures toward Ice Age realism with their portrayal of the encampment of the mammoth hunters, who have cool dreadlocks (like most folks in prehistoric movies nowadays), cool face paint, fancy bone weapons & jewelry, and appropriately furry garments.

There's a lot that the producers get wrong, period-wise. Ice Age hunters didn't live in large groups, they didn't live in permanent villages, and they certainly didn't spend the winter up in the mountains (duh). The mammoth-hunting techniques that we see seem highly dubious also. Still worse, the scenario is geographically challenged - there's no way anyone could walk from alpine mountains to East Asian bamboo jungles to sub-Saharan Africa over the course of a few weeks.

Most annoying to Anglophone viewers will probably be the funny accents. I mean, we all know that nobody spoke English ten thousand years ago, and we're all very comfortable with the convention of portraying cinematic Romans and Spartans (not to mention hobbits and elves!) as speaking English instead of their true languages. So what not have Delay & his people just talk like ordinary Americans? Instead they're given this silly Middle Eastern/Middle European accent that sounds like bad Middle-1960s dubbing.

But that's a small quibble. The most important point here is that "10,000 B.C." is really a homage to the pulp adventures published in "Weird Tales" during the 1920s and 1930s. In this film we're very much in the territory of Robert E. Howard (author of the Conan stories) and Edgar Rice Burroughs (creator of Tarzan, Barsoom, and the lost world of the cavemen "At the Earth's Core"). Because once the story gets rolling, we discover that the mammoth hunters have predatory neighbors whose technology (horseback riding, bows and arrows, sailing ships, woven cloth, monumental architecture in dressed stone) is thousands of years ahead of theirs.

"Some say they came from the stars, or from a land that sank beneath the sea." Aha! What we have here is a lost colony from Atlantis. Exactly the kind that Howard and Burroughs and their many Depression-era imitators loved to write about. Once the Atlantis thing kicks in, you know that evil priests, false gods, ancient prophecies, human sacrifice, and a slave rebellion are all in store. (See "Atlantis, the Lost Continent" (1961) for more of what I'm talking about.) And in this regard "10,000 B.C." does not disappoint.

In the end this film resembles nothing so much as an unauthorized prequel to "Stargate." It's a great Saturday matinée.

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Lost (2004–2010)

6/10

Intriguing and habit-forming

7 January 2007

Once TV sucked. Its fatal flaw was the "reset button," that annoying device whereby no matter what happens in a given episode, everything returns to square one by the end. The reset button guaranteed triviality.

Then things changed. The first time I noticed was "Twin Peaks," which was as intense as any movie and, with its serialized, constantly developing, ever-mysterious storyline, far more addictive than junk food. Later came high-class dramas like "The Sopranos," droll fantasies like "Dead Like Me," cinematic SF like "Farscape" and "Firefly." No longer could I claim that movies had it all over TV.

Now there's "Lost," with the production values of a feature film; a sexy, talented cast that keeps your eyes glued to the screen; and a creepy "Twilight Zone" plot that hooks you faster than cocaine. Who knew network TV was capable of this stuff? Now, I'm not one of those "Lost groupies" who think the show can do no wrong, but I am a highly satisfied viewer who raced through Seasons 1 and 2 on DVD and still beg for more.

The pilot episode was brilliant, better than most action films and infused with plenty of dark weirdness. Plane crash on a tropical island! Explosions, violence, death! Mystery and romance! Sensuality and horror! I couldn't wait for whatever was next.

Like many viewers, however, I found that subsequent episodes often got bogged down in flashbacks. They're supposed to reveal each character's real life before the plane crash, but most of them are absurdly contrived, and they tend to complicate far more than they illuminate. My favorite flashback sequences are the ones that introduce new genres e.g., the Korean soap opera story of Sun and Jin, the SoCal slacker comedy-drama surrounding Hurley. My least favorite ones are the blatant melodramas Jack's doctor dilemmas, Kate's stepdad issues, Michael's custody battle. Instead of delving into these tedious dead ends, I'd much rather confront the island's anomalies.

Also like other viewers, I was annoyed by the characters' seeming obliviousness to reality during much of Season One. Hey, you're on a mysterious island explore it! Find out what's there, find food and water, figure out the best place to camp. But the show's writers had other ideas, with the main goal always, "Surprise the audience and keep them guessing," rather than, "Give them a realistic story of survival on a desert island." Nevertheless, clues accumulated; relationships developed; and the pace picked up toward the end of the season to deliver a slam-bang cliffhanger climax. And for my taste, at least, Season Two was still better. The story seemed to move forward more quickly, with fewer digressions into silly flashbacks. Questions start getting answered.

Overall, I'd say that Season One is more about characters and background, with a slow accumulation of teasers about what might really be going on behind the smoke and mirrors. Season Two is more about moving the narrative forward in the present and solving at least a few of the island's many mysteries. On those grounds I find Season Two much more satisfying. I do notice, however, that we seem to lose track of certain characters for long stretches. E.g., Kate seems less central to the story than in Season One; Sayid keeps to himself more than before; Charlie becomes a bit of an exile. In compensation, we get a string of appealing guest stars from canceled SF series: Clancy Brown of "Earth Two" appears as a CIA operative; Katey Sagal, voice of Leela on "Futurama," appears as a shrink; and Wayne Pygram, Scorpius on "Farscape," appears as a psychic.

Bottom line: if you appreciate nail-biting suspense, breathless action, gruesome revelations, dark comedy, excursions into horror, and sexy characters, you may find yourself turning into a fan of "Lost." Meanwhile, let's get one thing straight. Besides all the polar bears, there's an elephant in the room. It's "Earth Two," an SF series that aired in 1994-95 and was quickly canceled. One of its regular characters was played by Terry O'Quinn (Mr. Locke on "Lost"). "Earth Two" focused on a group of highly photogenic castaways who crash-land on another planet. They face all the survival issues, they work out the group dynamics, they flirt and romance, and they slowly begin to understand that the planet they're on is ALIVE, full of mysteries and powers, good and evil . . . not to mention a secret colony of survivors from a previous mission who find the unsuspecting newcomers an ideal target for exploitation.

Sound familiar? You might just want to dismiss the similarity as coincidence, but you'd be wrong. Watch the episode "Grendlers in the Myst" from "Earth Two." Then watch "Solitary" from Season One of "Lost." There's no way those parallels are accidental. Mr. Abrams, Mr. Lindelof, care to explain?

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A Canterbury Tale (1944)

Neither here nor there

27 December 2003

Some of the Archers' films have moved and delighted me -- BLACK NARCISSUS, THE RED SHOES. Others have interested me but left me rather cold -- PEEPING TOM, TALES OF HOFFMANN. This one falls right in the middle. The wartime milieu, the surprisingly *dark* nighttime photography, the central characters, the supporting cast of Kentish country folk -- all these engaged me for about the first hour of the movie. But in the second hour, as the "Glue Man" theme became increasingly worn out and the prospect of "miracles" in Canterbury loomed larger, I felt more and more detached from the proceedings. Especially unwelcome was the churchy quality of the denouement. Still, I have no argument with the commenters who have praised the film so highly. So let me turn the denouement of my own commentary into a list of the positive impressions that stayed with me after "The End" appeared so unexpectedly on the screen.

First -- I loved the camaraderie that developed immediately among all the ordinary folks thrown together and forced to work as teammates for the common cause. (If war is good for anything, it must be that.) Second -- I liked the tall skinny American soldier and the difficulties and simple pleasures he found among the Brits -- I've been there, done that, and P&P captured the feeling very nicely. (Note: Bob Johnson's accent is quite authentic for a rural Oregonian, so stop complaining, you funny Commonwealth lot!). Third -- I enjoyed every minute that Sheila Sim was on camera. Finally -- that cut in the prologue, from the hawk to the fighter plane, was excellent indeed. (And yes, I'd bet my piggy bank that Stanley Kubrick got his idea for the bone-to-space station cut in 2001 from this very film.)

But wait, I realize that I do have to register one last complaint. I love black & white movies, so much that whenever I hear twentysomething kids whine that they can only watch movies in color, I am nauseated. And yet -- I wager that any filmmakers who purport to represent the beauty of the Kentish countryside on a summer day will truly achieve their goal only if they film in color. England's green and pleasant land just can't be painted in shades of gray.

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Devil Girl from Mars (1954)

Darth Vader's Fairy Godmother Revealed!

12 March 2002

There's no other movie quite like Devil Girl from Mars. It's cheesy and low-budget, unfolding like a stage-play ineptly filmed, with a script dulled by timid ideas and old-school misogyny. Yet in Patricia Laffan, the British actress who plays Nyah the Devil Girl, this picture presents a space-queen unrivaled in the annals of B-movie campiness. Her dominatrix boots and patent-leather cape, not to mention her highbrow imperious accent, easily outclass the features on display from those Venusian babes in Queen of Outer Space (1958) or the Martianettes in Flight to Mars (1951). And check out that Devil Girl headgear, a cross between medieval helmet and Egyptian sphinx! In silhouette, Nyah is the image of Darth Vader, striding about with cape swirling to do something unspeakably naughty. But before you conclude that Ms. Laffan's over-the-top performance is an instance of bad acting, consider this: there's no way to play a character like Nyah with psychological depth. The Devil Girl is a comic-book villainess, an icon, somebody who has to be bigger than big. Patricia Laffan is the perfect drama queen to meet the challenge. If you like her in this movie, be sure to see her in Quo Vadis? (1951), a glorious sword and sandal epic that also features the burning of Rome and the martyrdom of the Christians. In that film Laffan plays Poppaea, wicked Empress of Rome, opposite Peter Ustinov's even more formidable Emperor Nero. From bride of the Roman Antichrist to warrior-woman of Mars is just a small step -- or should I say, it's a small step for Patricia Laffan, but a giant leap for anyone else.

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Fellini Satyricon (1969)

A glimpse through an unexpected window at a beautiful, alien world

14 February 2002

Fellini's films are some of the most visually exciting ever made, and among them SATYRICON stands out as a masterpiece of hallucinatory cinema. Crisp, deep-focus camera work, sun-drenched colors, dramatic lighting, careful editing, and the most striking faces ever assembled in a film: all these combine to make SATYRICON a dream come to life. The film is based on a 2,000-year-old Roman novel by Petronius. Fellini, a Roman himself, is extremely faithful to his source, reproducing it episode by episode. But because the novel survives only in disconnected fragments, with neither a beginning nor an end, the film is designed in the same way. It opens with a passionate lament by its anti-hero, Encolpius, who alludes to painful events that have just occurred, without ever explaining what they were. It closes literally in mid-sentence, at a point when Encolpius has recovered from his sorrow and is on the brink of new adventures that we will never see. Viewers of Fellini's film, just like readers of Petronius's surviving fragments, must connect the dots by themselves. We are given a mass of colorful detail that we ourselves must make sense of. The more we know about Rome, Fellini, and Italian cinema, the more sense we can make.

SATYRICON isn't light entertainment. Nor is it a film with deep characters or a coherent social message. Nor is it even a historically and archeologically accurate depiction of ancient Rome. It's just a glimpse through an unexpected window at a bright, beautiful, totally alien world. GLADIATOR might show you how ancient Rome looked, but SATYRICON shows you how it felt. Its sets are abstract, high-modern sculptures. Its soundtrack consists mostly of traditional African and Asian music. These design features only heighten the power and weirdness of the film.

The images in SATYRICON are undeniably sensual, and many are homoerotic. (But note that the most explicit eroticism is always heterosexual.) Some viewers are apparently disturbed by this imagery -- quite a tribute, I'd say, for a film made over thirty years ago! But if you're neither sex-phobic nor homophobic, you shouldn't have a problem.

I saw SATYRICON for the first time as a teenager in 1970. I was so enthralled that I sat through the movie twice in one night. I've seen it at revivals more than a dozen times since, always on the big screen, until last night, when I watched it as a newly-purchased DVD. Make no mistake - SATYRICON has comedy, pathos, action, sex, violence, philosophy, and poetry, both verbal and visual. If you enjoy good movies, watch this one.

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