And thus ends the most boring Oscar season in recent memory, along with – if I may be so bold – one of the worst years for movies of the current decade. I shan’t belabor things.
5.12.2008
And speaking of boring Oscarbait: Ron Howard’s version of the genuinely good play Frost/Nixon! (Only in its Oscar-qualifying New York and LA run, but still…) I suppose I shouldn’t really hate Howard all that much – his films are invariably well-crafted – but he’s such a dully professional director without anything much in the way of imagination! And now he’s make a political film.
The other major film – actually, make that “only major”, since Frost/Nixon is just getting the old coastal rollout – is Punisher: War Zone, the sequel to a film that nobody ever saw in the first place. But since December is THE time for comic book action movies, I guess it makes sense.
Movin’ right along with a pair of indie-ish films that I know basically nothing about (Cadillac Records and Nobel Son), and a teen sex comedy starring Frankie Muniz and Michael Cera, unfortunately titled Extreme Movie: the _____ Movie construction being poisoned beyond repair by filmmakers wholly unassociated with this project.
If it weren’t for the one-week Oscar-qualifying run of Hunger, that magnificently mirthless IRA docudrama, there’d really be no reason to leave the house at all this weekend. And if you live anywhere else in the world than the Los Angeles Basin? SOL.
10.12.2008
So, when people ask me, “Tim, what’s the best American independent movie of the current decade? Excluding anything obvious, like the work of David Gordon Green. And for godsakes, I don’t mean those studio productions masquerading as indies because the cast takes a pay cut”, I’ll probably start the conversation off with Old Joy, which I’d assumed for quite a while was the directorial debut of one Kelly Reichardt, but not as it turns out. Anyway, it’s a work of uncut genius, and I’m probably more excited for her follow-up, Wendy and Lucy, than for all the prestigey Oscar films of December put together.
Also, a Nazi films opens, on the coasts: The Reader. If it’s Christmastime, it must be time for Nazis, like my mam always said.
12.12.2008
You know what? I’m actually glad they remade The Day the Earth Stood Still (with Keanu Fucking Reeves, of all people), Because this was the film that finally pushed me over the edge with the whole “remakes suck” thing. I mean, if you can remake one of the finest sci-fi films ever, one of the finest American films of the 1950s, possibly the very best social commentary film of the early Cold War, and you can make it into a dour explosion-based picture? Then you are beyond my ability to stop you, no matter how loudly I bitch and moan.
Those with a scrap of love for classic cinema can seek solace in Delgo, an animated film that has been delayed for something like four years at this point, involving what appears to be generic fantasy tropes; or Nothing Like the Holidays, a film that dares to ask the real questions, like “Nobody minds if Colombian actor John Leguizamo and British-born-of-Spanish-descent Alfred Molina play a Puerto Rican father and son, right? I mean, they all have the same accent!” Or, if they have an art theater handy, the week’s Oscarbait is Doubt, the second film in 18 years for director John Patrick Shanley (much, much better known as a theatrical playwright), and my God, does the trailer ever ooze that tasty “I don’t know how to make a movie” goodness. There’s a canted camera angle that makes no sense whatsoever from what little context we see, and I’d be at least a bit surprised to find out that it has better context that I don’t know about. Sometimes, a director just thinks, “man, extreme camera angles are awesome,” and in no time at all you have Battlefield Earth on your hands.
Those on – guess where? – the coasts can enjoy the Spanish sci-fi thriller Timecrimes. Or the extremely confusing releases of The Argentine and Guerilla, Steven Soderbergh’s two-part Che Guevara biopic that is apparently opening as a roadshow entertainment? Or something? Less than two weeks prior, it should be a bit more obvious what the hell is going on here.
17.12.2008
A confession: I’ve already seen Darren Aronofsky’s new The Wrestler, at the Chicago Film Festival. My thoughts? Entirely worth seeing, but don’t expect a timeless masterpiece. Just some really great performances and crackerjack editing.
Also, the inscrutable new Clint Eastwood vehicle (pun! but not on purpose) Gran Torino might be opening today; there are different release dates all over, but this one seems the most authoritative. The trailer looks… overbaked.
19.12.2008
AKA “The Day After My Birthday Is For Wacky Genre Experiments!” Or just the one, but I’m really excited to see what else Rian Johnson (of the superlative Brick) has in store. And The Brothers Bloom, a con-man thriller with Adrien Brody, Mark Ruffalo and Rachel Weisz sure does look fun…
More fun, anyway, than the requisite “Softer Side of Will Smith” feel-goodery, Seven Pounds (which may or may not be about a man divvying up his organs before his death), or Jim Carrey’s return to superwacky situational comedy in Yes Man. The Tale of Despereaux, a talking-animals cartoon about a mouse in a fantasy kingdom, may be good, or it may be hideously ugly. Hard to say from the trailer.
On the coasts (I am growing sick of that phrase), the 2008 Palme d’Or winner The Class starts its art house run.
25.12.2008
Do you love your family, and love spending holidays with them? I hope not, because Christmas Day has a boatload of films to see, and you’ll have to ignore everyone you know to get to even half of them: the Adam Sandler family comedy from Disney (ick), Bedtime Stories; the uplifting tale of a mischievous dog, Marley & Me; the wide release of that Ron Howard picture, Frost/Nixon; David “I like the serial killers” Fincher’s first-ever romantic historical epic, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (which I want to be excited about, but I’m way too nervous about the seemingly innumerable possible pitfalls); and Dustin Hoffman in one of those “never too late for love” dramadies, Last Chance Harvey. But really, what says Christmas more than a psychopathic misogynist vigilante in harsh black-and-white CGI, directed by that most festive of artists, Frank Miller? Well, somebody wanted to release The Spirit today. Probably the same person who thought that the horrible trailer made it look even half-way appealing. Seriously, when a theater full of action fanboys laughs at the footage? You’re fucked.
Coasts: Waltz with Bashir. Animated Israeli war drama. I need to think about moving to California.
26.12.2008
Everything about the trailer for Revolutionary Road screams “mannered middle-weight art film that spells out all its themes in the dialogue”, but Roger Deakins just about guarantees it will be gorgeous, and Kate Winslet is in it. Why, if her name doesn’t just about guarantee that a film is at least a little bit worthwhile, then I’ll give up drinking recall that she was in Finding Neverland and quietly go about my business.
Or you could just watch Valkyrie, where Tom Cruise wears an eyepatch and plots to kill Hitler.
31.12.2008
For Edward Zwick’s Defiance to come out on the last day of the year, and only in the NY/LA corridor, means one of two things: the studio has a gem that they want to show off at its finest advantage, without too many lesser films jockeying for attention and stealing its luster, paving the way for a bouquet of Oscar nominations; or they’re dumping it to satisfying contractual obligations. Spoiler: I have seen Defiance, and I do not anticpate anything but sound tech awards in its future.