Reviews

Before seeing Frost/Nixon, I didn't think much of Ron Howard as a director (both A Beautiful Mind and Apollo 13 struck me as no more than mediocre commercial jobs). Despite my long admiration for Frank Langella's work on stage and for Kevin Bacon's work on screen, I expected no more than a moderately OK movie). Underwhelmed by most of the new 2008 movies (f'rinstance, except for Cate Blanchett, Benjamin Button disappointed in every aspect), the best 2 new 2008 movies I saw were Edge of Heaven and Stop-Loss (OK, I'm quirky, so what?). Until Frost/Nixon, that is. Its excellence in every area astonished me. Best movie of the year, best directing, best acting by the male lead, best adaptation. The supporting actors were admirable, especially Kevin Bacon, which came as no surprise (though if I were a voter, my vote for supporting actor would go to Robert Downey). I cannot praise Ron Howard enough for using his commercial skills as solid building blocks for a film partly about people selling entertainment and themselves in a mass medium. Nor can I give enough praise to Langella, whose decades of acting experience paid off in what may be his most challenging role--of a man whose decades of performing for his own audience was, in a way, his own most challenging role.

As an admirer of Kaufman's other work ("Being John Malkovich," "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," "Adaptation"), which I consider excellent and "Eternal Sunshine" a film masterpiece, I was greatly disappointed upon seeing "Synecdoche, NY," to which I looked forward. At least at this point in his career, Kaufman needs a director to say "No" to, "change," or "add to" certain scenes & help him guide the narrative so that it makes sense. I enjoy ambiguity and don't care about lack of clarity upon a first viewing as long as the general narrative makes sense or is understandable on a surface level. Thus, for example, I loved "Adaptation" even though I enjoyed only its surface on a first viewing (on a later viewing I recognized that the title also refers to the real not reel Charlie Kaufman's adaptation to Hollywood requirements) and I found Guy Ritchie's "Revolver" and "RockNRolla" immensely entertaining even though much of the story makes no sense to me on a third viewing of the former and a first viewing of the latter). Maybe a second or third viewing of "Synecdoche" will unearth its treasures, but after one viewing on the big screen, all I found was incoherence and perhaps self-indulgence. "Noble effort but unsatisfying" is, sadly, my general verdict, at least now; when I see it again on DVD I hope to change my mind.

Saw a preview at my local mall in SW VA. Then visited a friend in Winston-Salem, where the Reverrun Film Festival showed it. Based on preview at my mall, which generated much laughter, I persuaded g.f. to see it & both of us thoroughly enjoyed it, as did the rest of the audience at that screening. Rashly, I predicted it would be the Little Miss Sunshine of 2008. But then it opened at theaters in selected big cities in the U.S. To my g.f.'s & my surprise, the national reviewers didn't take to it & moviegoers in the big cities followed the their generally lukewarm reviews & stayed away. Thus, Son of Rambow never got the distribution it deserved. It was scheduled for an August '08 DVD release but that was delayed. Hope it's released soon. I look forward to seeing it again.

I happened to be in NYC when this was released. Read no reviews of it, but having recently seen Craig Wasson in Go Tell the Spartans (still the best fiction movie about Vietnam) and having admired Frank Grimes since I saw him as the lead in The Playboy of the Western World in Dublin years earlier, I decided to go. And was glad I did. This movie is a gem. Its disappearance after that initial showing in NYC (and probably other metro centers in the US) baffles me. Even more baffling is its non-resurrection in DVD. The Wasson character sort of made the film a sequel to Go Tell the Spartans. The story (which I won't spoil by telling the plot), about both IRA-ers and Brits using the American for their political ends was great, as were the acting and directing. Still vivid in my memory is the emotional ending with Wasson in a phone booth in Detroit. I keep searching for its release on DVD, with no luck.

Yes, its story is an old chestnut. There's an excuse for Marcello Mastroianni to tell a story about himself and a Russian woman, and he does it, and there's an aftermath. But the story is so good and so well told (and acted and directed) that the device is like an old friend. This is one of Mikhailkov's best, right up there with Burnt by the Sun. It draws on Heifetz's Lady with a Dog (and Chekhov's short story too, for that matter) and parodies (or pays homage to) Fellini's 8 1/2--both just right for this Italo-Russian piece about Italians and Russians, which I found a pure delight. It revels in both poking fun of and warmly enjoying both Italian and Russian types and moods. For me, there was the additional pleasure of seeing Innokenti Smoktunovsky, who played the title role in Kozintsev's Hamlet, now middle-aged and as fine an actor as ever. Will it ever be released on DVD? It's about time this one is rediscovered.

I can't understand the negative or so-so responses to this. I saw it with my wife on the first day it opened when visiting NYC, without the dubious benefit of having read reviews, because the combination of Gianatti, Loren, Mastroianni, and Wertmuller was irresistible. Both of us were amazed that the critics didn't go bananas over it, as we did. The acting, the script (that was political without hitting you on the head with politics), and the ambiguous ending (with Loren telling each of the men who is the father of her child-to-be) were just lovely. I guess the lukewarm reviews prevented it from getting the wide distribution it deserved. This is yet another film waiting to be released in DVD in its complete version.

No, you don't have to be Australian to enjoy this. I'm an American who was in Oz when this was released, went to see it, and thoroughly enjoyed it. True, there were a few bits I wouldn't have got had not my g.f. told me (the name of the detective's dog was a big political name in Papua New Guinea), but such things numbered fewer than half a dozen, as I recall, and even before I was told the reference it didn't matter. Parts were hilarious, parts were suspenseful, all of it was well acted and directed, and everything added up neatly at the end. I mainly recall the screen going black when the detective fell asleep in an alcoholic stupor. Been trying to find this for years first on VHS, now on DVD. I think Godot will arrive sooner than this one.

The subject (Hungarian Uprising of 1956), which has been unjustly neglected, is well worth filming and I learned things I hadn't known before or had forgotten. The movie itself is obviously the director's first feature, and as such it has both the flaws of a first feature and the promise of a director who has the main principle right: find a good story, especially one that has not been filmed before. One problem is that there is too much time devoted to talking heads, which got a bit boring, at least for me. The director might have used more of the talk (reminiscences and analysis) as voice-overs while showing archival footage, much of which is excellent. That could have tightened the film, which needed greater variety of pace and a sense of build-up. That said, I'm glad I saw it and I recommend it. It's good and worth seeing, but don't expect a masterpiece. Some of the comments about it are from the heart and draw on personal memories and more intimate (family?) knowledge of the events. I can't and don't argue with that, for this is valid. I write as someone not of Hungarian descent who is interested in the subject and in films. I wanted to like it more than I actually did, though I did.