Well, I will freely admit that this movie made me more terrified than I have been since the 2004 presidential election.
Most people have called this a more comfortable version of "Funny Games", but as someone who is (possibly unnervingly) comfortable with repeated viewings of "Funny Games", I found "The Strangers" far more frightening. It is a basic home-invasion story, hence the Haneke comparison, but more similar in tone to Peckinpah's "Straw Dogs". Liv Tyler and Scott Speedman are a feuding young couple who are attacked by masked instruders at their isolated country home after a friend's wedding. The plot essentially ends there. The use of negative space, however, does not.
The film's first-time director shows a masterful grasp of manipulating the audience through the simplest alteration of the onscreen image. Simply dropping music from many of the most suspenseful scenes subverts our horror-film expectations and makes it that much creepier when a villain is shown standing quietly in the background of a shot while the film goes on in the foreground. After all, if we were the ones standing around the dining room in flannel, smoking our cigarettes, violins on the soundtrack would not announce the arrival of an intruder. At times he lets the incidental sound do the work, such as when the arrival of a wispy blonde is heralded by what sounds like a battering ram knocking politely at the front door. We all know that whatever produced that heavy sound was not wielded by model Gemma Ward (playing the intruder).
The film is reminiscent of mid-period Hitchcock in its use of small details and everyday occurence to create its climate of dread. It deals ably with the modern horror-film question, "Why don't they just use a cell phone?" It has surprisingly little violence and seems at first to be unjustified for an "R" rating. Upon further inspection, though, perhaps this is an example of how more films should be rated. Instead of counting swear words or frames in which breasts appear, the MPAA appears to have considered the overall mood of the film and its very unsettling content. The film would be very frightening for viewers under 13, and even had this 27-year-old checking the locks twice at night. In deference to parents who might not want to spend all night reassuring terrified children, an appropriate rating has been assigned.
As for the ending, which has been criticized as pat and cliched, there is really no satisfying resolution to a film like this. Supernatural explanations for why the intruders can move so quietly and silence neighborhood dogs would have produced a feeling of disappointment in a film styled so realistically from the start. If they turned out to be a Manson-like family of real people, we would be discouraged as we learned human details about them which contradicted the fears and traits we had projected onto their tabulae rasae. Ending the film quickly and giving us as little information about the strangers as possible is the only workable compromise. It even winds up with a throwback horror cliche dating back to De Palma, and one after which the killers in "Funny Games" would turn to us, wink, and grin.
*Correction: 11:25 a.m.*: The last sentence of this post originally referred to the killers of "Funny Games" as "the heroes". While I'm sure Michael Haneke would smile wryly at that appraisal, I have changed the sentence to remove my personal value judgment from the review.
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Friday, June 13, 2008
My Blueberry Nights
Look up Roger Ebert's notion of "vaporfilm".
This is my personal definition.
I saw this movie three weeks ago and retain precisely three impressions:
1. Neon.
2. Blueberry pie that looked tasty yet sexual.
3. Wong Kar Wai has made many better movies. In fact, all of them are better.
Now go watch one of those. Yes, even that wretched DVD of "Ashes of Time" where you can only see half the frame is preferable to this.
This is my personal definition.
I saw this movie three weeks ago and retain precisely three impressions:
1. Neon.
2. Blueberry pie that looked tasty yet sexual.
3. Wong Kar Wai has made many better movies. In fact, all of them are better.
Now go watch one of those. Yes, even that wretched DVD of "Ashes of Time" where you can only see half the frame is preferable to this.
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
Certainly I can't be the only one to find George Lucas overrated, but sometimes it sure feels that way. He has either personally created or been a force behind two trilogies which seem to make a far better impression on nine-year-old males than they do on me. The first, of course, is "Star Wars". The second, of course again, is the Indiana Jones trilogy. (It's a shame that "Howard the Duck" was never extended into multiple parts so that I could have a trilogy of trilogies to write about here.)
Don't get me wrong; the Indiana Jones films are perfectly entertaining, impeccably staged pieces of popular entertainment. Because they were actually directed by Steven Spielberg and not by Lucas himself, they feature actors doing real acting. The shots follow one another gracefully. The action sequences are so carefully plotted that it is generally possible to storyboard them in reverse and arrive at essentially what Spielberg himself conceived before shooting. But I didn't see an Indiana Jones film until my early 20s, and even now I haven't viewed enough classic adventure serials to be truly familiar with the style of filmmaking that Spielberg is harkening back to. I enjoyed the films thoroughly, remember little of them years later, and haven't been stricken with a desire to rewatch them in the intervening years.
That being said, this newest Indiana Jones caper essentially revisits the same territory. Our hero looks a bit the worse for wear and occasionally makes quips to that effect, and he has been given a sidekick, a chimpanzee with extensive knowledge of fighting techniques. Oh, sorry, that last bit actually belonged in the "Speed Racer" review. Indy's sidekick is actually a scowling adolescent played with the usual LaBeoufness by Shia LeBeouf, an actor second only to Keanu Reeves in his ability to subtly display all facets of human emotion. In a rarity for a Lucas or Spielberg production, the women in this film are given quite a bit to do. Cate Blanchett has finally finished digesting all the scenery she chewed in "The Aviator" and has come here for seconds. Her villainous Irina Spalko is a military Russian interested in harnessing paranormal phenomena for possible use in weaponry. She and Indy race each other for possession of a mysterious crystal skull that can give the bearer knowledge of all human wisdom.
It was on this lone but major plot point that my disappointment with this movie rests. If everyone in the movie had only begun this fight twenty years later, there would have been no movie, because the skulls would have been shown as human creations not more than one hundred years old. The presence of aliens, discredited skulls, and other ideas that I heard tossed around by people in macrame vests at Phish concerts drags the overall quality and believability of the film down.
The polar opposite of Blanchett in appearance and acting style, Karen Allen makes a welcome appearance, providing fans with the return of an earlier character and proving that an older woman can still play an action heroine and love interest with fire and conviction. She steers a rowboat through numerous waterfalls and pilots a jeep through the film's thrilling jungle chase centerpiece, all while making Indy fall in love with her all over again. Allen has expressed delight at her casting in various media outlets, and I for one think that (aside from Harrison Ford) she deserves much of the credit for making the film feel as comfortable yet exciting as it does.
Ford himself should be given a solid pat on the back, once it is no longer sore from all of his stuntwork. Watching his landings and jumps, it is obvious that he did much of this work himself, and his ability to make Indy seem both iconic and human is crucial to the film's success. Spielberg shows his touch with a few shots of a fedoraed silhouette or tricks with a whip that could easily tilt into camp but don't, and Ford deserves credit for these moments as well.
If you're a fan of the Indiana Jones films, you don't need to have read this far. Just go see the movie. If by some strange stroke of fate you missed the first few, you can jump in here without studying the Indiana Jones mythos and leave the theater entertained.
If you're not a fan of action movies at all or have something in particular against the Indiana Jones films, may I recommend the Masterpiece Theatre adaptation of "Sense and Sensibility" that I recently watched? It's about as far from this film as you can get.
Don't get me wrong; the Indiana Jones films are perfectly entertaining, impeccably staged pieces of popular entertainment. Because they were actually directed by Steven Spielberg and not by Lucas himself, they feature actors doing real acting. The shots follow one another gracefully. The action sequences are so carefully plotted that it is generally possible to storyboard them in reverse and arrive at essentially what Spielberg himself conceived before shooting. But I didn't see an Indiana Jones film until my early 20s, and even now I haven't viewed enough classic adventure serials to be truly familiar with the style of filmmaking that Spielberg is harkening back to. I enjoyed the films thoroughly, remember little of them years later, and haven't been stricken with a desire to rewatch them in the intervening years.
That being said, this newest Indiana Jones caper essentially revisits the same territory. Our hero looks a bit the worse for wear and occasionally makes quips to that effect, and he has been given a sidekick, a chimpanzee with extensive knowledge of fighting techniques. Oh, sorry, that last bit actually belonged in the "Speed Racer" review. Indy's sidekick is actually a scowling adolescent played with the usual LaBeoufness by Shia LeBeouf, an actor second only to Keanu Reeves in his ability to subtly display all facets of human emotion. In a rarity for a Lucas or Spielberg production, the women in this film are given quite a bit to do. Cate Blanchett has finally finished digesting all the scenery she chewed in "The Aviator" and has come here for seconds. Her villainous Irina Spalko is a military Russian interested in harnessing paranormal phenomena for possible use in weaponry. She and Indy race each other for possession of a mysterious crystal skull that can give the bearer knowledge of all human wisdom.
It was on this lone but major plot point that my disappointment with this movie rests. If everyone in the movie had only begun this fight twenty years later, there would have been no movie, because the skulls would have been shown as human creations not more than one hundred years old. The presence of aliens, discredited skulls, and other ideas that I heard tossed around by people in macrame vests at Phish concerts drags the overall quality and believability of the film down.
The polar opposite of Blanchett in appearance and acting style, Karen Allen makes a welcome appearance, providing fans with the return of an earlier character and proving that an older woman can still play an action heroine and love interest with fire and conviction. She steers a rowboat through numerous waterfalls and pilots a jeep through the film's thrilling jungle chase centerpiece, all while making Indy fall in love with her all over again. Allen has expressed delight at her casting in various media outlets, and I for one think that (aside from Harrison Ford) she deserves much of the credit for making the film feel as comfortable yet exciting as it does.
Ford himself should be given a solid pat on the back, once it is no longer sore from all of his stuntwork. Watching his landings and jumps, it is obvious that he did much of this work himself, and his ability to make Indy seem both iconic and human is crucial to the film's success. Spielberg shows his touch with a few shots of a fedoraed silhouette or tricks with a whip that could easily tilt into camp but don't, and Ford deserves credit for these moments as well.
If you're a fan of the Indiana Jones films, you don't need to have read this far. Just go see the movie. If by some strange stroke of fate you missed the first few, you can jump in here without studying the Indiana Jones mythos and leave the theater entertained.
If you're not a fan of action movies at all or have something in particular against the Indiana Jones films, may I recommend the Masterpiece Theatre adaptation of "Sense and Sensibility" that I recently watched? It's about as far from this film as you can get.
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
Commando
I had the overwhelming feeling while watching this film that I was walking in the midst of events whose beginnings I didn't fully understand. There is an entire genre out there of films from the late 1970s and early 1980s wherein men whose families/lives/countries are threatened are inspired to become one-man vigilante armies, inflicting massive collateral damage on their way to avenging themselves against those responsible.
I have never until now actually seen one of these movies.
I begrudgingly admit to enjoying the movie more than I expected to, which is not the same thing as wanting to explore any other canonical works of the genre. Still, there were a couple of promising undercurrents of dark humor, not to mention the simpler pleasure of watching peak-period classic Schwarzenegger delivery. The film brims with all types of anxiety just offscreen: Reagan-era conservative paranoia, homophobia, the nervousness that '80s parents felt about losing children they didn't like that much in the first place. Against this backdrop, Arnold's refreshingly brief, unironic readings of each line provide welcome clarity.
The plot begins with a hilariously literal representation of our hero leaving behind a pastoral and well-earned life of calm and descending into an urban jungle to recover his offspring. Here is where Arnold and I diverge. I would have let the bad guys have the shrieking tot and enjoy my mountain lake home in welcome silence. This would also have saved the world from Alyssa Milano's future guilt-tripping of the entire world because none of us donate enough to Oxfam for her liking. But, plots must move forward or die and so Arnold teams up with Rae Dawn Chong, who has great legs and should have let them speak for her instead of trying to do any acting about the waist. A role like this could have been hilarious if played by 80's-era Melanie Griffith, who could make us believe that she eventually comes to sympathize with the stranger who has destroyed her car and cost her her job, all in pursuit of a child she's never met and can't be sure exists. As it is Chong looks mildly annoyed, as if Arnold has caused her to break a heel, and eventually moves on to what the script intends as sympathy but which reads as distraction. It's a performance that's enough to make you long for the subtlety of Madonna in "Who's that Girl?"
No one watches this type of film for the nuanced acting by the female leads, though. There are lots of explosions, some hilarious killings (many made more hilarious by how dated the outfits look), and the requisite amount of stormtrooper aim on the part of the bad guys. It's a cute way to pass an afternoon and, unlike many similar films today, knows when to stop. With a brisk running time, a classic Schwarzenegger performance, and a script that could wink at itself even before the costuming became hilarious, this served as a suitable introduction to the vigilante genre for me.
I have never until now actually seen one of these movies.
I begrudgingly admit to enjoying the movie more than I expected to, which is not the same thing as wanting to explore any other canonical works of the genre. Still, there were a couple of promising undercurrents of dark humor, not to mention the simpler pleasure of watching peak-period classic Schwarzenegger delivery. The film brims with all types of anxiety just offscreen: Reagan-era conservative paranoia, homophobia, the nervousness that '80s parents felt about losing children they didn't like that much in the first place. Against this backdrop, Arnold's refreshingly brief, unironic readings of each line provide welcome clarity.
The plot begins with a hilariously literal representation of our hero leaving behind a pastoral and well-earned life of calm and descending into an urban jungle to recover his offspring. Here is where Arnold and I diverge. I would have let the bad guys have the shrieking tot and enjoy my mountain lake home in welcome silence. This would also have saved the world from Alyssa Milano's future guilt-tripping of the entire world because none of us donate enough to Oxfam for her liking. But, plots must move forward or die and so Arnold teams up with Rae Dawn Chong, who has great legs and should have let them speak for her instead of trying to do any acting about the waist. A role like this could have been hilarious if played by 80's-era Melanie Griffith, who could make us believe that she eventually comes to sympathize with the stranger who has destroyed her car and cost her her job, all in pursuit of a child she's never met and can't be sure exists. As it is Chong looks mildly annoyed, as if Arnold has caused her to break a heel, and eventually moves on to what the script intends as sympathy but which reads as distraction. It's a performance that's enough to make you long for the subtlety of Madonna in "Who's that Girl?"
No one watches this type of film for the nuanced acting by the female leads, though. There are lots of explosions, some hilarious killings (many made more hilarious by how dated the outfits look), and the requisite amount of stormtrooper aim on the part of the bad guys. It's a cute way to pass an afternoon and, unlike many similar films today, knows when to stop. With a brisk running time, a classic Schwarzenegger performance, and a script that could wink at itself even before the costuming became hilarious, this served as a suitable introduction to the vigilante genre for me.
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