Change Your Image
bartleby13
Reviews
Dahmer (2002)
criminally underrated
i'm at a loss to explain this film's meager rating. i suppose some of the voters are gore buffs who were disappointed by the film's lack of violence. DAHMER is the most underrated film i know of. the direction is concise, each shot like a terse, pungent threat of things that may lie ahead. the director is clearly gifted, and i expect he'll go on to do more great things. maybe at some point when his renown is established, people will go back and look at this superb little film and wonder why it was practically dumped into the straight-to-video pile. jeremy renner's performance is brilliant- wide, careful eyes; cocked head indicating bemusement and malice in equal parts; blank, defeated voice- it's just about perfect. one of the best things about his performance is that it stays true to the time-shifting character arc: he's a different person in high school, hiding behind glasses and long hair, than he is as a drink-lacing clubgoer, raping his passed out victims with both desire and uncertainty showing on his face, or as a smug, resigned adult, defeated by his dead-end job and the power of his sexual addictions. renner's performance radiates the kind of contradictory feelings and impulses that most movies choose to ignore: you can see the contradictions creasing his face as he smiles, or winces, or stares straight ahead. David jacobson is acute and sensitive both as a writer and a director. each shot is measured and intense; watching DAHMER i felt both in the moment and worriedly trying to see ahead. each shot is held just long enough for the viewer to feel the tension of duration and to think about what's coming next- not a second longer. that's a truly rare talent for a filmmaker to have, and i guess editor bipasha shom should get a nod, too. DAHMER is a film in which every shot contains a glancing shiver of suspense, like a cold breeze seeping in through the crack of and opened window and tickling your neck. it's a remarkable film.
Delivered (1998)
modest, solid little entertainment
flick takes the STRANGERS ON A TRAIN, WITH A FRIEND LIKE HARRY, etc. model of an unwanted double committing crimes that act to frame the hero because they fit with his motives. it's an old premise; in fact, everything about this unpretentious low-budgeter has the feel of a well-worn baseball glove- old but sturdy, tried but true, comfortably threadbare. you know all the grooves at first touch. the neat little spin here is the setting of post-secondary discontent; the hero is the disaffected misanthrope who scorns pretensions in others while doing nothing himself- a type so familiar to anyone under 35, especially in a college setting, that it's well on its way to becoming a new cliche. the bruno to his guy is a cutesy little psycho, hip and self-assured, who carries out the innocent's bitter "f___ the world" thoughts....it's simple stuff, really, but the film's wonderfully modest ambitions actually felt like a relief to me. it aims low and hits bang on; there's nothing at all wrong with that. and i loved the disaffected-slacker spin on the whole thing; the flick is cool as a gentle admonishment of sour gen-x (or whatever it's called now) disaffection, giving an example of how a bad attitude will give you a bad time in life. misanthropy sucks, man.......
Victim (1961)
dated approach to homosexuality
VICTIM is to homosexuality what IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT is to racism- an earnest, slightly stuffy and politically dated discussion of identity victim politics. Aesthetically, the film has its plusses and minuses. The opening sequence is wonderful: a man runs from the police, making desperate phone calls and contacting various men, all of whom are disturbed by his presence, to make oblique pleas for help. The speedy, elliptical structure and use of mystery and suggestion recall Lang and Hitchcock at their best. It is only later that you might consider the implications of evoking those two masters of the morbid thrill in a film about homosexuality. Then again, gay life was a deep and often deadly secret back then- when you consider the lifelong fear and suspense gays were held in back then, the thriller motif seems appropriate. Indeed, the film's selling point is its ability to capture the fear and helplessness that comes with The Closet. VICTIM was made in '61, on the cusp of the new permissiveness in cinema. It straddles the eras of old and new, of suggestion and frankness, and, like many films of the early/mid- sixties, the combination gives the worst of both worlds- not enough innuendo to be slick, only enough frankness to come off as awkward. The scenes where characters discuss the morality of homosexuality and its laws are real clunkers- corny, stiff, self-conscious, and totally out of rhythm with the narrative. They're public-service parentheses. The politics themselves, while bravely liberal for the time, would nowadays match up to your average Christian conservative's: homosexuality is seen as a lamentable affliction, not to be prosecuted, deserving of sympathy, but by no means beautiful. It's given no spiritual or moral equivalence to heterosexuality- "leave the poor buggers alone" is pretty much the attitude. Of course, it's easy to deride this stance in post- Stonewall, post- Rock Hudson 2002. Back then gays were- well, they weren't even gays yet. VICTIM did break down the wall, establishing a foundation for queer subjectivity to build on. For what that's worth- which is a whole lot to me- I'll give it thumbs up.