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Reviews
Too Much Flesh (2000)
Flipside of Chocolat
Although this film may have been a (somewhat) unrealistic handling of the sort of back woods US towns I grew up in, Too Much Flesh likely did much more justice to the US than, say, Chocolat did to France. At least the French makers did the movie, set in Illinois, in English. Both films look into the provincialist persecution of freer sexuality and mores, but, with regard to the nature of sexual experience, at least, Too Much Flesh was a bit more realistic. It's not realistic just in that the "sex scenes" showed (almost) everything, but that real thought went into the directing of them. I noticed that the audience, like myself, was involved with these scenes just like any other acting in the movie - not seeing them just as an added entertainment perk, but as an important part of the subject matter. Overall, the main character, Lyle, the one with too much flesh, was a very inspired character, as was his actor, Jean-Marc Barr. The wife played by Rosanna Arquette embodied a very tortured and, I think, very possible psyche. Sure, there are weaknesses in the film. It might have been better if there were no "message" in the end, but leaving out the ending, the movie's progression was refreshing, with many interesting and original plot developments and a good number of laughs, too.
Dracula 2000 (2000)
Contains a major spoiler...read it and miss the movie
Dracula is Judas Iscariot. That's the big twist. That's a good start for a script. But why set it in New Orleans? Why not Antioch or something? That might be interesting, vampires in the Middle East. Anne Rice traced them back to Egypt, so let's do it there next and keep the whole Judas/Dracula bit. Maybe set it when Jesus returns, during the rapture and everything. Dracula and Lestat get together and try to suck Jesus' blood to get even more immortal or something and Winona Ryder plays Jesus' love interest and it turns out in the end that Jesus and van Helsing are actually one and the same! Call it: "Dracula and Lestat Tagteam Jesus: 2010". Wes Craven will back it for sure. (Don't forget to include the unveiling of the mystery of the pyramids, probably having something to do with alien visitations, etc. - lotsa potential here, and lotsa blood.)
On a positive note, Omar Epps is a good actor.
The Legend of Bagger Vance (2000)
Glad I trusted Ebert on this one!
I have a lot of faith in Will Smith and Matt Damon. They seem to keep their integrity even through the worst settings (Smith in the *Fresh Prince of Belair* series and *Men in Black* and Damon in Spielberg's *Saving Private Ryan*). So when I saw they were both in this movie, I had to see it. Then I read some professional reviews from various magazines, etc., and heard almost nothing but that the movie was pretentious, slow, pointless, self-indulging, etc. Thank God I happened upon Ebert's review amongst all these negative ones. He nearly stood alone in judging it to be a movie with a lot to offer, and so I took the chance, and I think he was right. (If I were to do a review of movie reviewers, he'd get two thumbs up from me--very even-minded, not given to knee-jerks, even if I don't always agree with him.)
Though a long movie, I didn't notice the length. I have to admit, I stumbled through the choppy beginning as Charlize Theron struggled to hold up scenes on her own. I began to fear that all the other reviewers were right, but when the golf got started, so did the movie. It was a very nice movie about personal resolve and achieving excellence, and was wisely philosophical as well (through the mouth of Smith's Bagger Vance character).
By the way, I don't know anything about golf, but I read another user commentator who swears the movie was 100% historically accurate in depicting the state of golf at the time, even if there didn't seem to be quite as much racial prejudice on and off the golf course as you would expect during the Depression. The two golf competitors, played by Bruce McGill and Joel Gretsch, were both amazing supporting actors, making the golf competition that much more of a rich experience. The movie also had it's share of humor: the entire scene with Damon's character, Junuh, playing cards with his black drinking buddies; and when Junuh turns to Vance during the tournament and declares, "You're one hell of a caddy."
I'd probably only give the movie a 6, if I thought such unqualified ratings very valid, but if you go to movies to find at least a few great moments, as I do, this movie is sure to bring you out of the rough with a number of inspiring master strokes on director Robert Redford's part.
American Psycho (2000)
Reasons why AP is a good study of serial killers and why Kafka would be proud
Sorry, some spoilers:
My first reaction to the movie was that, though I personally found it very absorbing, I walked away not understanding why Patrick Bateman was a serial killer in the first place. I now think this is mainly because we get no peek into Bateman's child life, but I don't think that's necessary to the story and would have probably ruined it. I came up with some reasons why Bateman is a believable serial killer. Support from the movie is given with each reason:
1/ Serial killers are notably superficial, though not often described this way. This can be said especially of male serial killers, who typically kill randomly, without regard for any personal relationship with the victim.
Bateman: A large part of the movie was showing how the superficiality of 80's corporate society and serial killing are strangely resonant. One theorist of serial killers, thinking before *American Psycho,* uses a metaphor to understand their psyche: that they are basically a black hole. Once they get started killing, their personality just gets sucked into non-existence, into a sort of black hole. Sometimes, they scramble to regain that personality, the memories, attitudes, experiences and personal relationships that made them unique and gave their life long term meaning, meaning beyond the next kill, but after the slayings pile up, this becomes quite difficult. Reminds me of Bateman.
2/ Serial killers often attack prostitutes, since they're easy nocturnal targets, and the killing is usually predominantly sexually motivated as well.
Bateman killed hookers.
3/ Serial killers are generally unable to explain why they do what they do.
Bateman couldn't help doodling death scenes, so preoccupied was he. Also, in his phone confession toward the end of the movie, Bateman realized how basically compulsive it was for him to kill, that he just keeps wanting to do it and does it, there being no other reason really that he could think of.
4/ Though rarely able to explain their bloodthirsty desires and actions, Ted Bundy, when interviewed about it, came up with a "possession" theory. Killing his young female victims was like the ultimate possession of them.
Bateman displayed a marked obsession with possessions. Major theme of the movie.
5/ Ted Bundy was charismatic and smart, too, and even acted as his own defense attorney.
So, it's not impossible that Bateman could be a serial killer with very, at least, surface social traits and also function in a corporate environment that places demands on one's intelligence and focus, while at the same time killing regularly.
6/ Serial killers often feel like people are out to get them and/or feel superior to others.
Bateman had these sorts of experience and attitudes within the corporate environment and acted on them lethally.
7/ Serial killers are typically not "insane," which connotes that they can't in any way understand that what they're doing is wrong. Rather, serial killers are typically "psychopathic" and are prone to feelings of regret, even if they tend for the most part to feel justified. Their conscience often returns most strongly, if it does, when the cops catch up.
Bateman had a great need to confess after the cops chased him.
These are just a few reasons for believing *American Psycho* could be thought of as an accurate portrayal of the psychopathic serial killer. I haven't read the book, but I suspect that the psychology would be even better explored there. Even if Bateman is peculiarly different from past serial killers, each serial killer is different, and serial killers do evolve with society. I think this movie goes beyond previous slasher films in psychological insight, maybe beyond Stone's *Natural Born Killers,* too.
Final note on literary parallels (here's the real spoiler). In the end, Bateman has the need to confess, but is unable to gain recognition for his guilt. The satisfaction of confession is prevented because the level of superficiality is so high in his corporate subculture that no one is certain who's who anyway. So, who's the killer? And what's it mean to say, "I am"? The meaningless, grotesque superficiality of the work place and the confusing misplacement of guilt and punishment are themes reminiscent of Kafka's work, say "Metamorphosis" and *The Trial.* If you asked, "What's the point?" of Kafka's stuff, you're probably asking that about this movie too.
The Man Who Cried (2000)
Don't blame the actors!
My conscience won't allow me to call this a good movie, however much I feel compelled to defend everyone involved. Wherever you place the blame, it would be unfair to place it all on the actors. Christina Ricci does well in her element: see *Opposite of Sex* and *Buffalo 66* (unfortunately the actress playing her character's younger self in *The Man Who Cried*, Claudia Lander-Duke, did a better job). Johnny Depp should not play a supporting role. He needs to have the extra time on screen for us to get past his handsome face and pursed lips to see that he's a real actor, as was better achieved in *Gilbert Grape* and *Dead Man*, to name two (c'mon, he was better in *21 Jumpstreet*!). John Turturro and Cate Blanchett did their best with the poor script. I'm left wondering how any of these high profile actors and actresses were convinced to do this movie. High-sounding speeches about the current times (brink of the 2nd world war) seemed forced into already emotionally faltering scenes. The historic grandiosity of the movie overshot character development and we're left with a patchwork from many other better period piece films. Our natural instinct is to blame the actors, because that's who we see subjecting us to horrible turns of phrase and overly stereotypical character portrayals and downright goofy eye play (such eye play, unbearable to watch, constituted Ricci's and Depp's "dialogue" for the first quarter of the movie). But it's fairly obvious, if you look at the same actors' work elsewhere, that writing and/or directing is the culprit, and this points the finger at Sally Potter, since she did both. But I'm compelled to jump to her defense as well, since *Orlando* and her (still somewhat annoying, but much more convincing) *The Tango Lesson* were better. In any case, don't blame only the actors, and let's hope everyone involved has come to realize that, despite a few good lines and moments (Turturro's Italian character prays for God to let the Germans win, thinking it would be better for his operatic career), this movie is a step in the wrong direction in all their careers.
I vitelloni (1953)
Kevin Kline should be cast as Fausto in the remake.
My first Fellini flick. This is a movie which, at least today, is beyond critique. You can only sit and study it. It's a lightly moralistic tale, with unmistakeable insight into people of all kinds. Hard not to enjoy. One major realization is that Kevin Kline has to be the cinematic reincarnation of the main actor Franco Fabrizi. Watch it if you can find it.
The Pillow Book (1995)
*Pillow Book* definitely had a point and a resolution
I first saw this movie in the theater extremely drunk with friends and had no idea what was going on. Images everywhere, several languages untranslated, lots of naked men and women. When it went to video, I rented it one lonely night because I was horny and I could at least remember the movie had a lot of nudity and sex. On a somewhat more sober viewing of *Pillow Book* at home, I became committed to the movie for a month or so. I wrote a rather long paper on it for a feminism class. Writing and thinking about it sent me into euphorias not unlike the ones portrayed in the film.
(For those who haven't seen the movie, the following paragraph is not a synopsis, though not a spoiler either.)
Put in a rather windy, but as brief a way as possible, I believed Greenaway to be expressing a complex message through the movie. On the one hand, today's "Western" society, as opposed to, say, traditional Japanese society, offers the woman freedom to "be the pen and not just the paper" (Ewan McGregor's character, Jerome, offers this express possibility to Vivian Wu's character, Nagiko, that she write on him rather than the opposite). In this way, "woman" breaks free of her assigned roles, often submissive (an assignment evident when the father gives the young Nagiko her identity by writing on her at the beginning of the film). But at the same time, this same Western society fosters, more negatively, a commercialistic environment which has lost the rich meaning that tradition and ritual provides. But, I think Greenaway means to persuade us, the good elements of both sorts of society can co-exist, judging by what I take to be a happy ending for Nagiko (sorry, shouldn't give it away). In the end, she is both "empowered" and able to lead a meaningful, traditional lifestyle. In this blending of cultures, there is also no loss of natural female eroticism, like that found in the original "Pillow Book".
I think there are many other points made by the film, and I don't mean to anaesthetically boil down the movie to any of them. I mention these to show (whether you like the background theory or not) that there definitely are at least a few major points in the film and that, also, the film definitely can be seen as having a resolution. Many other reviewers had trouble believing either were true, even those who liked the movie. Also, even if I read the above analysis into the movie and, say, Greenaway wouldn't do so, the film has point and shows great depth of consciousness and self-consciousness on Greenaway's part in simply being amenable to such challenging interpretation.
This was the first of Greenaway's movies I'd seen, so when I discovered there were others by him, I tried to see at least a few. Earlier movies, *The Cook, the Thief...* and *Prospero's Books* seemed to me early attempts to convey the themes to be better mastered in *Pillow Book*: writing vs. body, vulgarity vs. sensuality, etc. I was pleased to see that his great concern, in these two movies, with incorporating stagelike qualities into cinematography dissolves, in the *Pillow Book*, into intense and omnipresent image frame play, a technique which more greatly utilizes what is peculiar to the medium of cinema. I also rushed to see Greenaway's more recent *8 1/2 Women*, but thought it a step down from the *Pillow Book* epiphany. But maybe that's the, or a, point made by the movie. Anyway, I only saw *8 1/2 Women* once, and ... I was a little drunk.
Umberto D. (1952)
From the POV of someone half as old as this movie
I noticed that this movie was playing in town for one night only, so I checked IMDb for more information. Based on the user ratings and comments, I figured I shouldn't miss this opportunity to educate myself with such a classic, but I was somewhat apprehensive. I haven't had a lot of luck with, say, pre-60's movies. Especially not ones about hard social conditions, which I suspected would be a little too heavy handed or self-absorbed to reach a late 20th century person like myself. I felt safer with Hitchcock or the Three Stooges if I were going to go that far back.
But I think Sica did a great job. There was real human depth which almost entirely erased all sense of historical distance, as if I were reading great literature, able to forget it was written hundreds of years ago. There was great atmospheric depth, more than I've learned to expect from B&W cinematography. (The scene with the cat night-prowling as seen through the glass roof is evidence of the director's subtle aesthetic sensitivity, and there were many such touches throughout.) Also, the story was very well-developed, and with many real comedic elements, along with very sad and anxious elements. I could easily relate, and that's what eliminated the distance. No cultural distance was produced either, even with the very rich depiction of Italian culture in Rome, (but, thank God it was subtitled, of course!). This is not just a work of art of a particular time or place. It's not even ahead of its time--this movie is for all times and people.
I wonder what will happen to Umberto, though? Was his dog, Flick, his salvation, or the prolongation of his despair?
I'll definitely be on the lookout for more Sica films, though I hear this is one of his best. Maybe I'll even extend my education further into other "neorealist classic" films of this era and learn to embrace more of the early B&Ws!
Bounce (2000)
In defense of Affleck
By now this movie's received enough reviews that I'll spare you the plot summary. I want only to address those few, what another reviewer described as "painful", scenes in which Affleck's challenge is to show deep emotion.
I'm on the fence. I've actually met people who express emotion the way Affleck had his character Buddy express them--stone-faced, with a tear or two. The thing is I can believe that such a person would react to situations as he did. On top of that, I believe that Paltrow's more expressively emotional character, Abby, who is also emotionally needy (sometimes easier to act) at the time of meeting Buddy, would believe Buddy felt all that we're led to believe he felt (by the way, this is the first movie I really liked Paltrow in). I, too, was uncomfortable that maybe Affleck was dropping the ball in those emotion scenes, but for me, it bounced right back into his hands and I found that I really felt for Buddy, genuinely intrigued by his character. Stone-faced in the theater, I shed a tear or two for Buddy! Whether Affleck is a genius in tackling Buddy's complex interior, or if he's just plain lucky that Buddy made sense to some viewers, is a burning question. Judging from *Goodwill Hunting* and *Chasing Amy*, I think we should give Affleck the benefit of the doubt.
Brother (2000)
What violence?
Compared to true crime committed by real gangsters, serial killers, and other mass murderers (world leaders, etc.), Kitano's depictions of violence are pretty, and pretty easy to watch for the most part, but not as pretty as John Woo, or, even, some Spielberg movies (Schindler's List/Saving Private Ryan). Kitano has a really blank, airy style in *Brother*. Kind of reminded me of John Waters' style in "Pecker" or "Cecil B. Demented" in terms of the juvenile character relationships and the simple enjoyment of situations Kitano fosters in the screenplay (basketball scene, football scene, the various gambling games played between the main character and the black hooligan he befriended). The language/culture challenge was interesting, but a lot more deep insight into Japanese vs. "Western" society can be found in Greenaway's "Pillow Book". Or maybe a closer example is Jarmusch's "Ghostdog". Are the Japanese inscrutable? See Spoilers below.
The best actor of the film is Omar Epps. His final scene was a nice little roller coaster of emotion. I don't agree with another reviewer that Kitano is not an aesthete (being what I called blank & airy is not to lack aesthetics--Pecker was a very nice movie). The broken chopsticks scene from the POV of the victim was an acute aesthetic jolt, utilizing simplicity for maximum effect. It's not just violence, it's depicting something in a new way, which takes aesthetic sensibility. Judging from this film, I think Kitano likes to ponder gangster situations, their set up and outcome, and likes to add a lot to the mix and deal with it all in some original way. This is a decent obsession, and who needs some further point to a movie? Even if many of the films' elements can be found elsewhere, this flick is a worthwhile pay-off for Kitano's obsession and originality.
A spoiler used to address whether the Japanese are inscrutable (as it seems Kitano wishes us to ponder judging from what he has the bartender say last): I knew the right hand man was going to shoot himself after failing the task given him. Back at the limo, he was visibly embarrassed. I don't think this was intended as comedy by Kitano as another rash viewer judged. This was an act of Japanese honor that you come to expect if you watch enough films about Japanese culture. Add Akira Kirosawa to the Greenaway and Jarmusch heritage. Add decades of exposure to Roddenberry's Klingon culture. It's an honor/loyalty system, which requires the context of war to sustain itself (federation war, gang war, etc.). If you still ask: but why do they do it?, then the Japanese (or at least such strains of Japanese culture) are inscrutable.
Baise-moi (2000)
my girlfriend liked it more than I did...
...which is a surprise, since she hates porn. I think my girlfriend was especially impressed that women were behind the making of the movie. I'm glad the French didn't give it an X rating. My girlfriend wouldn't have come to the sex theater with me to see it. Though I noticed some other reviewers were down on the acting of the two main actresses, this is one of the things we thought good about the movie. When confronted with very natural acting, some seem to think no acting is present at all. I was also pleased to see that the (apparently) video format didn't ruin the draw of the film. Better than Thelma and Louise, I think, lacking all that Hollywood candification, as found in the recent Hannibal. I'd like to see a reality film that's not so pessimistic, though. But, I guess, reality films get their stigma from not being purely entertaining, and optimism would be entertaining. Main criticism: what's the point? With reality films (also: Harmonie Korine stuff), part of the point seems often to be the lack of point in life or that some people don't have it so good (pessimistic points). Point taken, but I still secretly believe that "What Women Want", even with it's nearly impenetrable candy shell, was more memorable, made me think more, believe it or not, than "Rape Me".