Aaron Sorkin fails to fix the problems of The Newsroom - indeed, he makes it worse, and I greeted the final episode with a sigh of relief. Like even the worst of Studio 60 at Sunset Strip this remained watchable - Sorkin's dialogue is musical like and I always enjoy listening to tunes, even if the quality of the lyrics and books varies wildly.
A lot of better writers than me have taken umbrage at what Sorkin did, or failed to do with this season. My take: some of of this was good, even excellent; it's a well produced show, and I always enjoy Olivia Munn. But I don't think Sorkin got what his show could and should have been - or maybe he did and wanted to go in another direction.
This should have been a show about people doing good work - trying to be good journalists. We should have seen them investigate stories, come up against big and powerful opposition who put pressure on them to not tell the truth. That would have been awesome. And the times we get that - when we see our people do their jobs - this show was enjoyable.
But instead we have far, far too much time spent on ethics and the declining standards of journalism and scenes of middle aged men or their surrogates lecturing the forces of evil. That's alright I guess if you think the antagonists are evil, like the Tea Party (the targets in season 1), but here it's people who work for websites where you get extra money the more clicks the articles have, or come up with silly ideas for articles on the show websites, or who would like the audience to send in vision and story ideas.
I think Sorkin believes he's got his bases covered by having the other side present reasonable arguments, which they do, and often - but that has the effect of making the lead characters look like sel righteous idiots.
Jeff Daniels was even more insufferable this season, continually going on about how famous he was, then pulling out the abusive father at the eleventh hour to do it. I don't think we ever really saw his character do more in this series than read questions off an auto cue and act the grumpy paterfamilias and be Sorkin's surrogate. I was really hoping he'd get shanked in prison. His chemistry with Emily Mortimer remains nil. Mortimer's character is not shown doing anything hard except sigh at the actions the boys get up to and have comic OTT banter about her wedding. Olivia Munn's Sloan Sabbith gets a few heroic moments. Sam Waterston drones on and on about declining standards, then sells out a bit which was interesting and then he dies. Dev Patel goes on the run but we don't go with him and apparently he's heroic because he doesn't give up his source even though he doesn't seem to do any reporting. Alison Pill is finally giving an empowering story then is dumped into inspired Studio 60 on Sunset style rom com with John Gallagher, whose character was appalling this season - he doesn't do any reporting, is horribly self righteous to a nice girlfriend, can't even find Edward Snowden, gets back with Pill, plays guitar, then takes over the show.... Yuck. Thomas Sadoski impresses and gets to do scenes with Munn but is given the worst Sorkin surrogate story - the date rape campus one, where he scolds a rape victim (admittedly with sympathy) then robs her of a voice by saying he couldn't find her.
An amazing number of storylines were resolved with a deux ex machina - a big government leak and was conveniently solved by a suicide and then the government, a lets-pretend-to-not-go-out-to-HR rom com plot is resolved by the HR guy going "I knew all along", the evil billionaire who owns the company is dismissed by a convenient off screen sexual harassment/sexism claims. This, on an HBO drama.
They shouldn't have bothered coming back for a third season.
Friday, January 30, 2015
Tuesday, January 27, 2015
TV review - "Boardwalk Empire - Season 5" (2014) *** (warning: spoilers)
Not a notable improvement on Season 4 although at least this has a really strong, emotionally satisfying finale. For most of the running time however this seems to be tap dancing. The kid characters were either undercast or just not evocatively written - Nucky's uninteresting nephew, and the mysterious kid who pops up wanting to be mentored; I kept forgetting who they were. Kelly MacDonald is given something to do but not that much really. You feel like the makers just listed who they wanted to kill off, and let that drive episodes.
Some deaths come as a jolt - Patricia Arquette's and Michael Shannon's especially. Chalky's death was moving but didn't make any dramatic sense for me - I know you could argue it, but I didn't buy it, not after everything he'd been through. Michael Shannon again looks lost for a lot of the time, so when he dies, while it's sudden, it's also a bit of a relief because his character never seemed to have direction after he left the FBI. (Which I'm sure was the point it's just not that satisfying to watch).
Eli was just dull here, moping around with three day growth all the time. It was also annoying how the FBI were so ruthless they tortured a Capone accountant into informing - at this point I felt the writing was just plain lazy, basing the show on production design and HBO coolness. The flashback scenes involving young Nucky were really distracting because of the guy's teeth. Gretch Mol in the nut house wasn't bad, but got repetitive.
But there were some fantastic bits - in particular the action sequences have never been done better. And like I said the finale was incredibly moving, where Nucky does a genuinely horrible thing (throughout the run he's been more bad ass than bad, never as evil as people around him i.e. a Hollywood gangster) and is shown to deserve to die and is executed by someone with the right to do so. The writing picks up too with fresh takes on Capone.
So in the end I feel that the series probably should have wrapped up after three, but the last two installments weren't bad and it did have a satisfying conclusion.
Some deaths come as a jolt - Patricia Arquette's and Michael Shannon's especially. Chalky's death was moving but didn't make any dramatic sense for me - I know you could argue it, but I didn't buy it, not after everything he'd been through. Michael Shannon again looks lost for a lot of the time, so when he dies, while it's sudden, it's also a bit of a relief because his character never seemed to have direction after he left the FBI. (Which I'm sure was the point it's just not that satisfying to watch).
Eli was just dull here, moping around with three day growth all the time. It was also annoying how the FBI were so ruthless they tortured a Capone accountant into informing - at this point I felt the writing was just plain lazy, basing the show on production design and HBO coolness. The flashback scenes involving young Nucky were really distracting because of the guy's teeth. Gretch Mol in the nut house wasn't bad, but got repetitive.
But there were some fantastic bits - in particular the action sequences have never been done better. And like I said the finale was incredibly moving, where Nucky does a genuinely horrible thing (throughout the run he's been more bad ass than bad, never as evil as people around him i.e. a Hollywood gangster) and is shown to deserve to die and is executed by someone with the right to do so. The writing picks up too with fresh takes on Capone.
So in the end I feel that the series probably should have wrapped up after three, but the last two installments weren't bad and it did have a satisfying conclusion.
TV series review - "Boardwalk Empire - Season 4" (2013) *** (warning: spoilers)
It was always going to be hard to top Season 3, with its fantastic climax of Nucky under threat, and they didn't manage it. Best thing about this was the addition of Jeffrey Wright as a kind of black power, highly educated gangster - a different sort of black gangster to what we've seen before. His clashes with Chalky White, Nucky and so on were very exciting. Stephen Graham's Al Capone is always interesting.
Far less gripping is the psychotic FBI agent Tolliver, and stuff involving Nucky's nephew, and the Gretchen Moll stuff with Ron Livingstone (though this does have a decent pay off) and Nucky's adventures in Florida with Patricia Arquette.
They ran out of stuff for Kelly MacDonald to do. Michael Shannon always looks as though he's going to do something interesting but never quite crashes through - I expected him to be running his own gang by now. And you get the feeling when they ran out of ideas they just decided to kill someone off - like Harrow or Eddie. Always watchable, just a dip in quality - I think they'd run out of things to say.
Movie review - "The Last of Sheila" (1973) *** (warning: spoilers)
It's not hard to see why theatre and film buffs dig this - it's based on a script by Stephen Sondheim and Anthony Perkins, no less, based on their real life passion for scavenger hunts and games in New York City involving their friends from show biz. It's a murder mystery shot in the South of France with an all star cast playing show biz types, some of whom play characters based on real life types.
It's a very clever story with plenty of twists and turns and you have to pay attention to follow what's going on - I admit I got lost in places and had to look up the story on various websites. It's not like a traditional mystery in that it doesn't have a detective character per se although the last act Richard Benjamin and then James Mason take over.
I think that factor may have prevented this becoming a bigger success at the box office - there's no hero to invest in. And yeah yeah I know that's old school, and I'm sounding like a studio suit, but it's something you're used to having, so when you don't, it throws you off. And the person who figures it all out - James Mason - doesn't turn the killer in; he blackmails him into financing a film. And Mason is revealed (I think, anyway) to be a little child molester - so our detective is a pedophile. (Maybe they were meaning late teens or something.)
Another flaw is the characters - only a few really stand out. I know it's hard in an ensemble piece but one feels with a little more fleshing out it could have been done. The stand outs: James Coburn as the super confident, Machiavellian producer; Dyan Cannon's blousy, fast talking, sexually voracious agent based on Sue Mengers (Cannon supposedly gained 19 pounds for the role but she looks pretty good in a bikini); Raquel Welch as a shallow starlet; Richard Benjamin's mysterious screenwriter (with a gay past but now straight... is this based on Herbert Ross? Or the then-recently-turned-straight Anthony Perkins?).
People who have less of a chance to make an impression include Joan Hackett (not really her fault - she has to play drab), Mason and Ian MacShane (Welch's husband/manager). Everyone's a good actor, I just wish they'd had more to do.
Pleasing views of the south of France. Raquel Welch and Hackett don bikinis too.
Monday, January 26, 2015
Movie review - "They Both Came" (2014) ***
Genuinely funny take off of romantic comedies - most specifically You've Got Mail but also a whole swath of them. It's a sign of the changing Hollywood that instead of being done for a decent budget with a big marketing push it was made for a relatively low price and seems to have found only a small audience online.
The cast are full of names, even if at times it feels like the same old gang: Paul Rudd and Amy Poehler in the leads, Bill Hader and Ellie Kemper as their friends (either could have played the lead as well), Colbie Smulders as the bitchy fake love interest for him, Ed Helms as the boring fake love interest for her, Jason Mantzoukas and Max Greenfield as Rudd's posse. They're all brilliantly talented performers and do a fine job.
There's lots of funny moments and jokes. I do feel for a feature length satire to work you have to ultimately care about the lead characters - like I did in Flying High. I didn't quite get there here, and occasionally if felt like a sketch that had been stretched out, but it was highly enjoyable.
The cast are full of names, even if at times it feels like the same old gang: Paul Rudd and Amy Poehler in the leads, Bill Hader and Ellie Kemper as their friends (either could have played the lead as well), Colbie Smulders as the bitchy fake love interest for him, Ed Helms as the boring fake love interest for her, Jason Mantzoukas and Max Greenfield as Rudd's posse. They're all brilliantly talented performers and do a fine job.
There's lots of funny moments and jokes. I do feel for a feature length satire to work you have to ultimately care about the lead characters - like I did in Flying High. I didn't quite get there here, and occasionally if felt like a sketch that had been stretched out, but it was highly enjoyable.
Saturday, January 24, 2015
Movie review - "Turkey Shoot" (2015) ** (warning: spoilers)
The third remake of an Aussie-sploitation "classic" following The Long Weekend and Patrick, which doesn't look like being any more successful than those films, though I could be wrong. This was a frustrating movie which actually seemed closer to the 1987 Arnie film The Running Man rather than the Aussie original and is irritatingly dumb in some parts, but isn't all bad.
First of all the good stuff. Jon Hewitt knows how to use the video camera well and there were some exciting scenes where we'd cut to CCTV footage and then back - I think this was done to help cover the low budget (especially a car chase) but it was effective. I really liked the music and some of the action sequences were very well done.
But it's a poor story. And a boring one. Satire of game shows where people watch other people being killed was done a lot in the late 80s - not just Running Man but also Robocop - but here its presented like it's something new and fresh and funny. Smiling cheesy comperes talking about people being killed - hahahaha! Satire! The network executive (Belinda McClory) is ruthless about ratings - wow! satire! (Will network TV even exist a few years in the future? That doesn't seem considered here. We see the complete credits for the Turkey Shoot TV show not just once, but three times.
I never got a true sense of the world - it's a few years in the future, okay, set mostly in the US (it's annoying that there's Australian tax payer dollars in this with all the characters acting in American in a story which could have easily been set in Australia but never mind...), where the US has been at war in Africa which is going on and on with no end in sight, and Dominic Purcell is in prison for supposedly having committed a massacre in Africa, which the audience boo at, but America has been transformed into this society where there's a show where people cheer at criminals being hunted down and killed? I didn't buy it - at least not the way set up here.
Dominic Purcell lumbers through the lead - he's got the looks and the physicality, but lacks charisma, sensitivity and humour. He never seems too stressed or torn or worried by what's going on- and the script makes him far too much of a superman. It's like there is no threat on Earth enough for him - they constantly introduce all these antagonists and have Purcell dispatch them in about five to ten seconds. The one that made me really mad was when he took out an entire squad of trained killers with automatic weapons by using nothing but a few hand guns and quick reflexes. At this point I felt the filmmakers could be bothered bringing in any tension or legitimate excitement, they were phoning it in. So by the end of the film when they have Purcell take on "the world" - which is admittedly a clever concept and could have sustained the movie if introduced earlier and actually explored - I didn't get into it because I knew they wouldn't do much with it, and they don't.
Viva Bianca at least has warmth, even if she's not terribly convincing as a Navy officer - the filmmakers made the mistake of introducing her via a long take of her walking down the corridor in uniform, and she sashays so much I thought they were setting things up with the gag that she was a stripper. She doesn't have much of a character to play either but at least she participates in the action. (No nudity though despite her track record on Spartacus - like a bewilderingly large proportion of modern day movies which are nods to 70s/80s exploitation, this is relatively sexless and tame in the nudity department.)
Robert Taylor should have made a good villain - he's got the voice, the talent, the presence. But the filmmakers cut off his balls by making him the most incompetent sniper in recent cinematic memory - Purcell sneaks up on him easily not once, but twice; he shoots at Purcell several times but never shoots him; Purcell knocks him out.
The consistent plot holes in this movie were infuriating. The powers that be want to take out Purcell because he knows The Truth but have been unable to kill him over three years even though he's been in prison? (I get that he can survive the occasional shanking in the showers but three years?) General Nicholas Hammond wants to make amends for what he's done with his life (a good character motivation, and his death scene is the best bit in the film).... so instead of just confessing himself, he arranges for Purcell to go on this show, and then Bianca to help him escape, and engineer it so that Purcell visits him? How about just screen something yourself? And Purcell is given the "secret information which could bring down the government" - he doesn't give it to a journalist or upload it himself, he gives it to a random woman (Leah Vanderberg) he meets at a protest? Seriously, she could have been anyone.
I think the big problem with this film is it was made by people who were technically skillful, had some vague idea of what was commercial from what they'd read about, who ripped off a bunch of far too old ideas from the 80s, threw in some lazy "hey the war in Afghanistan is a con" type satire and blamed no one turning up at the cinemas on the fact that there's no market for this sort of movie any more.
First of all the good stuff. Jon Hewitt knows how to use the video camera well and there were some exciting scenes where we'd cut to CCTV footage and then back - I think this was done to help cover the low budget (especially a car chase) but it was effective. I really liked the music and some of the action sequences were very well done.
But it's a poor story. And a boring one. Satire of game shows where people watch other people being killed was done a lot in the late 80s - not just Running Man but also Robocop - but here its presented like it's something new and fresh and funny. Smiling cheesy comperes talking about people being killed - hahahaha! Satire! The network executive (Belinda McClory) is ruthless about ratings - wow! satire! (Will network TV even exist a few years in the future? That doesn't seem considered here. We see the complete credits for the Turkey Shoot TV show not just once, but three times.
I never got a true sense of the world - it's a few years in the future, okay, set mostly in the US (it's annoying that there's Australian tax payer dollars in this with all the characters acting in American in a story which could have easily been set in Australia but never mind...), where the US has been at war in Africa which is going on and on with no end in sight, and Dominic Purcell is in prison for supposedly having committed a massacre in Africa, which the audience boo at, but America has been transformed into this society where there's a show where people cheer at criminals being hunted down and killed? I didn't buy it - at least not the way set up here.
Dominic Purcell lumbers through the lead - he's got the looks and the physicality, but lacks charisma, sensitivity and humour. He never seems too stressed or torn or worried by what's going on- and the script makes him far too much of a superman. It's like there is no threat on Earth enough for him - they constantly introduce all these antagonists and have Purcell dispatch them in about five to ten seconds. The one that made me really mad was when he took out an entire squad of trained killers with automatic weapons by using nothing but a few hand guns and quick reflexes. At this point I felt the filmmakers could be bothered bringing in any tension or legitimate excitement, they were phoning it in. So by the end of the film when they have Purcell take on "the world" - which is admittedly a clever concept and could have sustained the movie if introduced earlier and actually explored - I didn't get into it because I knew they wouldn't do much with it, and they don't.
Viva Bianca at least has warmth, even if she's not terribly convincing as a Navy officer - the filmmakers made the mistake of introducing her via a long take of her walking down the corridor in uniform, and she sashays so much I thought they were setting things up with the gag that she was a stripper. She doesn't have much of a character to play either but at least she participates in the action. (No nudity though despite her track record on Spartacus - like a bewilderingly large proportion of modern day movies which are nods to 70s/80s exploitation, this is relatively sexless and tame in the nudity department.)
Robert Taylor should have made a good villain - he's got the voice, the talent, the presence. But the filmmakers cut off his balls by making him the most incompetent sniper in recent cinematic memory - Purcell sneaks up on him easily not once, but twice; he shoots at Purcell several times but never shoots him; Purcell knocks him out.
The consistent plot holes in this movie were infuriating. The powers that be want to take out Purcell because he knows The Truth but have been unable to kill him over three years even though he's been in prison? (I get that he can survive the occasional shanking in the showers but three years?) General Nicholas Hammond wants to make amends for what he's done with his life (a good character motivation, and his death scene is the best bit in the film).... so instead of just confessing himself, he arranges for Purcell to go on this show, and then Bianca to help him escape, and engineer it so that Purcell visits him? How about just screen something yourself? And Purcell is given the "secret information which could bring down the government" - he doesn't give it to a journalist or upload it himself, he gives it to a random woman (Leah Vanderberg) he meets at a protest? Seriously, she could have been anyone.
I think the big problem with this film is it was made by people who were technically skillful, had some vague idea of what was commercial from what they'd read about, who ripped off a bunch of far too old ideas from the 80s, threw in some lazy "hey the war in Afghanistan is a con" type satire and blamed no one turning up at the cinemas on the fact that there's no market for this sort of movie any more.
Movie review - "The House of 1,000 Dolls" (1967) *
Mark McGee in his history of AIP films says this was the sleaziest movie ever made by that company which got my hopes up - as did the brilliant story in that book about the topic matter being so racy they told the Spanish authorities they were making a film about Abraham Lincoln and had an actor dressed as Lincoln on set all the time just in case. However it's just dull - at least, in this version (star Vincent Price alluded to a porno version being shot on the days he wasn't on set).
The story isn't bad - a magician (Price) and his accomplice (Martha Hyer) kidnap women for the "white slavery racket"; the partner of one such woman goes looking for them.
There are some bright moments - the opening sequence, some whipping and cat fights among the girls, attractive women - but not enough of them. Price is professional but is part too small; George Nader is okay as the investigating hero, though bland; Martha Hyer is a non-entity. There are too many scenes where nothing happens and it lacks suspense or even just plain good old fashioned exploitiveness.
The story isn't bad - a magician (Price) and his accomplice (Martha Hyer) kidnap women for the "white slavery racket"; the partner of one such woman goes looking for them.
There are some bright moments - the opening sequence, some whipping and cat fights among the girls, attractive women - but not enough of them. Price is professional but is part too small; George Nader is okay as the investigating hero, though bland; Martha Hyer is a non-entity. There are too many scenes where nothing happens and it lacks suspense or even just plain good old fashioned exploitiveness.
Friday, January 16, 2015
Movie review - "Grease 2" (1982) ***
Like a surprisingly large amount of people I have an affection for this much-maligned sequel, in part because of the set up: nerdy guy, considered a joke by the cool kids, becomes a cool motorcyclist and wins the heart of Michelle Pfeiffer. So I'm not very objective about it, but I will do my best.
It was directed by a choreographer, Pat Birch, and she does a decent job - the screen is packed full of production value (it's very bright and colourful), and there are some well shot numbers, such as "Back to School" (which feels like the one bit in the movie everyone can admit they like) but also "Score Tonight" and "Reproduction".
I felt the music is good too; it lacks Grease's classics, but there are some genuinely strong rock numbers ("Back to School", "Cool Rider", "Prowlin'"), some very fun over the top ones ("Reproduction", "Score Tonight", "Let's Do It For Our Country", "Rock a Hula-Luau"), the camp classic "Who's That Guy?" (with ridiculous lyrics but a thumping, kick arse bass), some syrupy sweet tacky ballads that I actually liked ("Charade", "Turn Back the Hands of Time") and the sweet "Girl for All Seasons". The only real flat song in the soundtrack is "We'll be Together" but you don't mind so much since it's at the end.
Michelle Pfeiffer is an absolute star in this movie - the people who didn't discover her until The Fabulous Baker Boys were foolish, her charisma is all over this, and she's absolutely perfect; not the best singer or dancer it's admitted, but so well cast.
The supporting T-birds and Pink Ladies are strong - not outstanding but up to the standard of Grease: Lorna Luft, Adrian Zmed, Maureen Teefy (who did Fame and this then seemed to vanish) etc. Plus there's some fun adults, like Eve Arden (making every line a winner), Sid Caesar, Tab Hunter, Connie Stevens, etc - as well small roles from Matt Lattanzi and Lucinda Dickey.
So what are the main flaws? (I'm aware all the things I listed above are positive, others might find negative.) Maxwell Caulfield is a big one - he's got the right look for the role, dreamy and sensitive and all that, but he doesn't have Pfeiffer's charisma and strength; he has this moony look far too much of the time, as if he spends a lot of his down time staring at himself in the mirror. (Check out the poster - Pfeiffer's eyes are alive and engaged, looking at Caulfield; he's just staring at the mirror.) It's also really annoying he can't sing or dance; Pfeiffer gets by just but Caulfield collapses. Neither of them have the genuine performing chops of Olivia Newton John and John Travolta - surely they considered other names for the lead?
It's not all Caulfield's fault - the script is a lot to blame because of it's structural dodginess. Pfeiffer is set up at the beginning as being over Adrian Zmed and sick of life as a Pink Lady - so it doesn't make sense that she turns down Caulfield (the real guy not the pretend guy) because she's a Pink Lady. Also Zmed is meant to be jealous over Pfeiffer but hooks up with Lorna Luft straight away - so when he continually whinges to Pfeiffer it gets dull and repetitive.
(I have a friend who wanted to remake this as a lesbian love story with Michael and the Cool Rider as a girl - it made more sense that way because then you have the societal block of Stephanie being attracted to a woman.)
This problem is increased by the fact they weaken the T-Birds too much - in the original sure the T-Birds could be clowns but Danny Zuko and Knickie were bad-asses who didn't back down from a fight; here Zmed and the others are downright cowardly, running away from Balmudo and generally being idiots. It makes no sense that there are all these scenes were they chase after the Cool Rider (who, after all, helped them by knocking over Balmudo). It also means at the end when Zmed invites Caulfield to join the T Birds there's no sense of triumph as he is obviously too cool for that group by then.
It's nice how Pfeiffer and Caulfield bond genuinely when he helps her study, but that comes too late in the film; and far too often it's like these two are in their own movie, separate from the others. Danny and Sandy in Grease were in the thick of things, with Danny head of the gang and Sandy wanting to join the girl gang - but Michael is off doing his own thing, and Stephanie barely wanting to be a Pink Lady. (In the production number 'Reproduction', it jars you when you see Caulfield and Pfeiffer joining in - you're reminded that they actually go to this school and sit in the same classes as the others.)
I think this problem might have been fixed if Michael had been related to one of the T Birds instead of Didi Conn; I get why they went the way they did, but at least then he would have had more connection to the boys, and had some mates. Also Stephanie/Pfeiffer really needed to lead the Pink Ladies.
Anyway, it's all done now and the movie lives on in the hearts of it's fans.
It was directed by a choreographer, Pat Birch, and she does a decent job - the screen is packed full of production value (it's very bright and colourful), and there are some well shot numbers, such as "Back to School" (which feels like the one bit in the movie everyone can admit they like) but also "Score Tonight" and "Reproduction".
I felt the music is good too; it lacks Grease's classics, but there are some genuinely strong rock numbers ("Back to School", "Cool Rider", "Prowlin'"), some very fun over the top ones ("Reproduction", "Score Tonight", "Let's Do It For Our Country", "Rock a Hula-Luau"), the camp classic "Who's That Guy?" (with ridiculous lyrics but a thumping, kick arse bass), some syrupy sweet tacky ballads that I actually liked ("Charade", "Turn Back the Hands of Time") and the sweet "Girl for All Seasons". The only real flat song in the soundtrack is "We'll be Together" but you don't mind so much since it's at the end.
Michelle Pfeiffer is an absolute star in this movie - the people who didn't discover her until The Fabulous Baker Boys were foolish, her charisma is all over this, and she's absolutely perfect; not the best singer or dancer it's admitted, but so well cast.
The supporting T-birds and Pink Ladies are strong - not outstanding but up to the standard of Grease: Lorna Luft, Adrian Zmed, Maureen Teefy (who did Fame and this then seemed to vanish) etc. Plus there's some fun adults, like Eve Arden (making every line a winner), Sid Caesar, Tab Hunter, Connie Stevens, etc - as well small roles from Matt Lattanzi and Lucinda Dickey.
So what are the main flaws? (I'm aware all the things I listed above are positive, others might find negative.) Maxwell Caulfield is a big one - he's got the right look for the role, dreamy and sensitive and all that, but he doesn't have Pfeiffer's charisma and strength; he has this moony look far too much of the time, as if he spends a lot of his down time staring at himself in the mirror. (Check out the poster - Pfeiffer's eyes are alive and engaged, looking at Caulfield; he's just staring at the mirror.) It's also really annoying he can't sing or dance; Pfeiffer gets by just but Caulfield collapses. Neither of them have the genuine performing chops of Olivia Newton John and John Travolta - surely they considered other names for the lead?
It's not all Caulfield's fault - the script is a lot to blame because of it's structural dodginess. Pfeiffer is set up at the beginning as being over Adrian Zmed and sick of life as a Pink Lady - so it doesn't make sense that she turns down Caulfield (the real guy not the pretend guy) because she's a Pink Lady. Also Zmed is meant to be jealous over Pfeiffer but hooks up with Lorna Luft straight away - so when he continually whinges to Pfeiffer it gets dull and repetitive.
(I have a friend who wanted to remake this as a lesbian love story with Michael and the Cool Rider as a girl - it made more sense that way because then you have the societal block of Stephanie being attracted to a woman.)
This problem is increased by the fact they weaken the T-Birds too much - in the original sure the T-Birds could be clowns but Danny Zuko and Knickie were bad-asses who didn't back down from a fight; here Zmed and the others are downright cowardly, running away from Balmudo and generally being idiots. It makes no sense that there are all these scenes were they chase after the Cool Rider (who, after all, helped them by knocking over Balmudo). It also means at the end when Zmed invites Caulfield to join the T Birds there's no sense of triumph as he is obviously too cool for that group by then.
It's nice how Pfeiffer and Caulfield bond genuinely when he helps her study, but that comes too late in the film; and far too often it's like these two are in their own movie, separate from the others. Danny and Sandy in Grease were in the thick of things, with Danny head of the gang and Sandy wanting to join the girl gang - but Michael is off doing his own thing, and Stephanie barely wanting to be a Pink Lady. (In the production number 'Reproduction', it jars you when you see Caulfield and Pfeiffer joining in - you're reminded that they actually go to this school and sit in the same classes as the others.)
I think this problem might have been fixed if Michael had been related to one of the T Birds instead of Didi Conn; I get why they went the way they did, but at least then he would have had more connection to the boys, and had some mates. Also Stephanie/Pfeiffer really needed to lead the Pink Ladies.
Anyway, it's all done now and the movie lives on in the hearts of it's fans.
Movie review - "Birdman" (2014) ****
A movie of very high quality, particularly the directing and acting, but I didn't think it was quite up to the praise it's received. My main beef was with the script, which feels a bit wonky and improvised - all the subtext is spelt out in dialogue, and is too often repetitive ("what is real?" "are you real?" "this is all fake").
The supporting characters weren't that memorable despite the quality of the people playing them - Naomi Watts is a jobbing actor and that's it, Emma Stone is a recovering junkie and that's it, Andrea Riseborough is a bit mad but basically nice, Amy Ryan (Keaton's ex) is just a nice person and that's it.
And also it lacked a certain reality for me - all this hoo had taking place on stage felt too OTT, there were far too many scenes of things going viral, and I'm no fan of theatre critics but the depiction of the one here (played by Lindsay Duncan) was really unfair.
But I loved a lot of it: it really captures the atmosphere of New York's Broadway district (something too few movies attempt these days) with its random musicians, crazy people and hustle and bustle of the streets; it's a Broadway movie at a time when such a beast is rare (are there really that many back stage people at shows today?); Ed Norton is great fun as an egotistical capital "t" theatre director; it's stunningly directed by Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, and shot by his cinematographer with those fabulous long takes; the editing is a marvel; Michael Keaton completely commits to the role.
The supporting characters weren't that memorable despite the quality of the people playing them - Naomi Watts is a jobbing actor and that's it, Emma Stone is a recovering junkie and that's it, Andrea Riseborough is a bit mad but basically nice, Amy Ryan (Keaton's ex) is just a nice person and that's it.
And also it lacked a certain reality for me - all this hoo had taking place on stage felt too OTT, there were far too many scenes of things going viral, and I'm no fan of theatre critics but the depiction of the one here (played by Lindsay Duncan) was really unfair.
But I loved a lot of it: it really captures the atmosphere of New York's Broadway district (something too few movies attempt these days) with its random musicians, crazy people and hustle and bustle of the streets; it's a Broadway movie at a time when such a beast is rare (are there really that many back stage people at shows today?); Ed Norton is great fun as an egotistical capital "t" theatre director; it's stunningly directed by Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, and shot by his cinematographer with those fabulous long takes; the editing is a marvel; Michael Keaton completely commits to the role.
Tuesday, January 13, 2015
Movie review - "Darling Lili" (1970) ** (warning: spoilers)
Every now and then Julie Andrews tried to "shake up her image" - she did it in her second film, The Americanisation of Emily, then in Torn Curtain, then here, then in The Tamarind Seed, then SOB. Never did anyone particularly care - while she's a perfect singing nanny, she's not remotely interesting as a sexy seductress. Here she does a strip tease (down to her underwear only, admittedly), is a spy for the Germans in World War One, seduces Rock Hudson, kisses him naked while in the shower... but she's still just good old Julie Andrews.
It's a tribute to the filmmakers that this cost so much money. There are some snazzy enough production numbers but not like teams of extras - some songs in a tavern, and a music hall (the old WWI songs are sung beautifully by Julie A, incidentally). There are some airplane stunts, which are impressive enough (b-plane action) but mostly dogfights between one or two planes - nothing on the scope of Hell's Angels or something like that. (And the plane stuff could have even be cut out, too - the movie could have worked set all indoors. Which is why it's hard to believe director Blake Edwards' claim that the movie cost an extra $5 million due to bad Irish weather.)
It's not a particularly interesting story. The set up is okay, kind of like Ninotchka - a German spy is turned via love for an Allied person she sets out to seduce, in this case Rock Hudson. Hudson is dashing and handsome enough. But Lili isn't much of a character - in Ninotchka Garbo's character was clear, she was dour and humourless and loved communism, until converted via love and champagne to the delights of capitalism. Here Andrews' Lili is a feisty singer and super spy who works for the Germans because... um... anyway, she does, and she falls for Hudson because, um, I guess he's hot, and it's love (they have okay chemistry but not treacherous-inducing, I would have thought), so she changes sides, and gets jealous at the thought of him with someone else.
This isn't offensively bad or anything, I urge all Julie Andrews fans to see it, they'll get a lot out of it - it's just not particularly well done. There are some good things like the production design, and a strong support cast of character actors, plus pleasing photography.
It's a tribute to the filmmakers that this cost so much money. There are some snazzy enough production numbers but not like teams of extras - some songs in a tavern, and a music hall (the old WWI songs are sung beautifully by Julie A, incidentally). There are some airplane stunts, which are impressive enough (b-plane action) but mostly dogfights between one or two planes - nothing on the scope of Hell's Angels or something like that. (And the plane stuff could have even be cut out, too - the movie could have worked set all indoors. Which is why it's hard to believe director Blake Edwards' claim that the movie cost an extra $5 million due to bad Irish weather.)
It's not a particularly interesting story. The set up is okay, kind of like Ninotchka - a German spy is turned via love for an Allied person she sets out to seduce, in this case Rock Hudson. Hudson is dashing and handsome enough. But Lili isn't much of a character - in Ninotchka Garbo's character was clear, she was dour and humourless and loved communism, until converted via love and champagne to the delights of capitalism. Here Andrews' Lili is a feisty singer and super spy who works for the Germans because... um... anyway, she does, and she falls for Hudson because, um, I guess he's hot, and it's love (they have okay chemistry but not treacherous-inducing, I would have thought), so she changes sides, and gets jealous at the thought of him with someone else.
This isn't offensively bad or anything, I urge all Julie Andrews fans to see it, they'll get a lot out of it - it's just not particularly well done. There are some good things like the production design, and a strong support cast of character actors, plus pleasing photography.
Sunday, January 11, 2015
Movie review - "Monsieur Hulot's Holiday" (1953) **
French comedy classic from Jacques Tati was very popular in France on release, and the art house circuit, but I wasn't wild about it. I didn't find it very funny and it felt as though it went for along time - the plotlessness of it adds to that. It's a series of jokes centered around a holiday town with a bunch of people on holiday - Tati is in it as Hulot but it's not really a vehicle, lots of other people have a go. There are pot shots at bragging war veterans, intellectuals, sexy girls, bratty kids, English women.
it has a pleasing laid back charm and captures the atmosphere of sea side holidays. But if I want silent (or silent ish - there's a little dialogue and a lot of sound) comedy.
it has a pleasing laid back charm and captures the atmosphere of sea side holidays. But if I want silent (or silent ish - there's a little dialogue and a lot of sound) comedy.
Movie review - "Barbarella" (1968) ***
The sort of film you wish was better because the whole idea of it is so great - and it may seem better on re-viewings because you know what you're getting into and won't be disappointed. It's Roger Vadim's first English language film, though made in Italy, and was a big budget adaptation of a kind-of popular comic strip (there was a brief vogue of these in the late 60s which also saw Modesty Blaise and Danger Diabolik).
I get the feeling Vadim was found out a bit here - he'd come to fame via exploiting successive lovers on screen (doing it well) and pushing the boundaries of screen eroticism. He had a big budget here, and a supportive studio, and while the set design and costumes are consistently interesting, some of the script funny (Charles B. Griffith was an uncredited writer) and Jane Fonda fabulous in the title role, Vadim fails to get much drama or excitement out of it. I think he was distracted by the design; and after watching a bunch of his movies, I've come to the conclusion he didn't really have much of a grip on story or drama... he was really a photographer and designer rather than a director. None of the action scenes are that thrilling - there's no sense of urgency. It all feels distant.
Still, Jane is heaps of fun in a series of sexy outfits, from her disrobing in the title, to wearing boots and stumbling about, having sex with various men, doing a series of great double takes, and even defeating a sex machine by her ability to have pleasure.
The support cast is excellent - Marcelle Marceau talks as a professor, Milo O'Shea is a mad scientist, David Hemmings alright as a revolutionary, John Phillip Law is objectified as an angel, and Anita Pallenberg perfect as a tyrannical queen. Many visually interesting moments such as the killer dolls.
I get the feeling Vadim was found out a bit here - he'd come to fame via exploiting successive lovers on screen (doing it well) and pushing the boundaries of screen eroticism. He had a big budget here, and a supportive studio, and while the set design and costumes are consistently interesting, some of the script funny (Charles B. Griffith was an uncredited writer) and Jane Fonda fabulous in the title role, Vadim fails to get much drama or excitement out of it. I think he was distracted by the design; and after watching a bunch of his movies, I've come to the conclusion he didn't really have much of a grip on story or drama... he was really a photographer and designer rather than a director. None of the action scenes are that thrilling - there's no sense of urgency. It all feels distant.
Still, Jane is heaps of fun in a series of sexy outfits, from her disrobing in the title, to wearing boots and stumbling about, having sex with various men, doing a series of great double takes, and even defeating a sex machine by her ability to have pleasure.
The support cast is excellent - Marcelle Marceau talks as a professor, Milo O'Shea is a mad scientist, David Hemmings alright as a revolutionary, John Phillip Law is objectified as an angel, and Anita Pallenberg perfect as a tyrannical queen. Many visually interesting moments such as the killer dolls.
Saturday, January 10, 2015
TV review - "The White Queen" (2013) *1/2
Game of Thrones has made a lot of TV series in the historical/fantasy realm seem worse by comparison and this is one such case. It takes one of the most exciting, fascinating periods in English history - the war of the Roses - with a fresh idea - telling it from the POV of the women involved rather than the men - and muffs it.
There's uninspired direction, mediocre writing and some drab performances. Rebecca Ferguson is a particular disappointment in the lead, a role that cried out for and deserved a star; Faye Marsay isn't that much better as Mrs Richard III and Amanda Hale really got on my nerves as Henry VII's mum. There's so many scenes of them speaking softly with this irritating enunciation with the volume of their words turned right up - it drove me bonkers.
Characters come and go - it's hard to tell them apart, no time is spent investing in them, the deaths mean nothing, the politics is poorly conveyed. This was hard to get through.
There's uninspired direction, mediocre writing and some drab performances. Rebecca Ferguson is a particular disappointment in the lead, a role that cried out for and deserved a star; Faye Marsay isn't that much better as Mrs Richard III and Amanda Hale really got on my nerves as Henry VII's mum. There's so many scenes of them speaking softly with this irritating enunciation with the volume of their words turned right up - it drove me bonkers.
Characters come and go - it's hard to tell them apart, no time is spent investing in them, the deaths mean nothing, the politics is poorly conveyed. This was hard to get through.
Movie review - "La Ronde" (1964) aka "Circle of Love" **
Roger Vadim had a bit hit with Les Liaisons Dangereuses which presumably inspired him to film another "sexy classic", Schnitzler's famous play, a daisy chain of love affairs - a work much performed by drama courses because it gives so many people a decent sized role.
It's a pretty faithful adaptation - Jean Anouilh did the screenplay - which actually might have been better had it been sexed up a bit. It's not particularly erotic - certainly not to compare to Vadim's other movies like And God Created Woman or Blood and Roses. It's as if Vadim was especially on his best behaviour to avoid censorship issues and the fun is muted.
The cast doesn't help - the actors certainly aren't as good as the 1950 version. Best value is Jane Fonda, speaking in French, as the wife who sleeps with a younger man and then her husband; she's younger than I always pictured this character, and no doubt I'm influenced by the fact she's the most familiar cast member to me, but she had beauty, sexiness and gives a good performance. The men are damp squibs for the most part (Jean Sorel is okay as the young officer) but the women include Anna Karina and Catherine Spaak.
Apart from Fonda's bits no vignettes really stood out for me, and that was mostly due to her - the characters weren't that interesting. While they each have a decent amount of screen time, enough to make an impression, they're not compelling. And there isn't sexual tension to compensate, or even nudity - just the odd flash of a bare back. It's disappointing. There is however impressive colour photography and art design.
It's a pretty faithful adaptation - Jean Anouilh did the screenplay - which actually might have been better had it been sexed up a bit. It's not particularly erotic - certainly not to compare to Vadim's other movies like And God Created Woman or Blood and Roses. It's as if Vadim was especially on his best behaviour to avoid censorship issues and the fun is muted.
The cast doesn't help - the actors certainly aren't as good as the 1950 version. Best value is Jane Fonda, speaking in French, as the wife who sleeps with a younger man and then her husband; she's younger than I always pictured this character, and no doubt I'm influenced by the fact she's the most familiar cast member to me, but she had beauty, sexiness and gives a good performance. The men are damp squibs for the most part (Jean Sorel is okay as the young officer) but the women include Anna Karina and Catherine Spaak.
Apart from Fonda's bits no vignettes really stood out for me, and that was mostly due to her - the characters weren't that interesting. While they each have a decent amount of screen time, enough to make an impression, they're not compelling. And there isn't sexual tension to compensate, or even nudity - just the odd flash of a bare back. It's disappointing. There is however impressive colour photography and art design.
Friday, January 09, 2015
Movie review - "Easy to Love" (1953) **1/2
The challenge of Esther Williams movies was finding different excuses for the swimming related musical numbers - this one handles it well by setting the action at Cypress Gardens, a water ski theme park in Florida. It's run by Van Johnson whose star attraction Esther Williams keeps threatening to quit.
Williams is pursued by three men here - Johnson (though he's only doing it to keep her with his business... what are the chances she's genuinely fall in love), singer Tony Martin (who does a lot of singing) and fellow water skiier John Bromfield (who spends most of the movie walking around with his shirt off).
Williams wears a huge variety of outfits and some of the musical numbers are done very well, including one on a pond covered in flowers, one where Esther is dressed as a clown, and a truly spectacular water skiing finale. Carroll Baker pops up in a small role as a woman interested in Martin.
It's done with professional sheen and all of MGM's skill - which was then still considerable - but I couldn't warm to the movie. Something about the central romance struck me as a bit yuck - Johnson was a horrible boss to Williams and there was no good reason for her to love him other than he's played by a movie star; I didn't much like her for doing it either.
Williams is pursued by three men here - Johnson (though he's only doing it to keep her with his business... what are the chances she's genuinely fall in love), singer Tony Martin (who does a lot of singing) and fellow water skiier John Bromfield (who spends most of the movie walking around with his shirt off).
Williams wears a huge variety of outfits and some of the musical numbers are done very well, including one on a pond covered in flowers, one where Esther is dressed as a clown, and a truly spectacular water skiing finale. Carroll Baker pops up in a small role as a woman interested in Martin.
It's done with professional sheen and all of MGM's skill - which was then still considerable - but I couldn't warm to the movie. Something about the central romance struck me as a bit yuck - Johnson was a horrible boss to Williams and there was no good reason for her to love him other than he's played by a movie star; I didn't much like her for doing it either.
Wednesday, January 07, 2015
Book review - "Farewell My Lovely" by Raymond Chandler (1940)
When reading this I would occasionally get bogged down in the descriptions - don't get me wrong, it's always marvellous descriptions, it was just the story got lost. I sometimes struggle to follow Chandler plots - mind you, I have to admit that by the end I find the resolutions very satisfactory. (Apparently the plot was cobbled together from three short stories - at times you can tell).
This books contains one of Chandler's most memorable creations, the lumbering, love sick, near indestructible Moose Malloy and the intriguing Velma. There's also a not particularly memorable heroine Anne Riordan who happens to be conveniently passing by and gets involved in the story. The climax is on a gambling boat - has this ever featured in any of the adaptations?
This books contains one of Chandler's most memorable creations, the lumbering, love sick, near indestructible Moose Malloy and the intriguing Velma. There's also a not particularly memorable heroine Anne Riordan who happens to be conveniently passing by and gets involved in the story. The climax is on a gambling boat - has this ever featured in any of the adaptations?
Tuesday, January 06, 2015
Movie review - "And God Created Woman" (1956) ***1/2 (warning: spoilers)
There are few better star entrances in cinematic history than Brigitte Bardot's here - sunbaking naked next to a sheet (we see her side) as she chats to Curt Jurgens. No wonder she made an impression. It's a brilliantly constructed star vehicle, with writer-director Roger Vadim beautifully exploiting Bardot's person. She pouts, wiggles, lolls about topless on a yacht, sunbakes, listens to romantic songs, dances evocatively to jazz, and generally runs riot.
The plot isn't sensational but has plenty of meat in it: Curt Jurgens wants to build a casino but it stopped by brothers Christian Marquand and Jean Louis Trintignant who own a boat yard; Brigitte loves Marquand who isn't keen on her until she marries his doting brother Jean Louis Trintignant. She winds up in a storm with Marquand and has sex on the beach with him, then when she gets back struggles to readjust.
It gets very French towards the end (i.e. melodramatic and sexist): Trintignant goes to shoot Bardot but is stopped by Jurgens who takes a bullet in the hand but shrugs it off as the price of love. Trintignant smacks Bardot a few times in the face but she seems to respect him for it, and they go off into the sunset (rather the beach) together. Marquand and Jurgens bail town, with Jurgens commenting that woman was born to cause trouble, and that maybe Trintignant will get over Bardot in time.
I loved the colour photography and St Tropez setting gives it plenty of atmosphere. If you watch this in the right spirit it's great fun - Bardot is a star, and Vadim adores her. There is strong support from the three guys - Trintignant, Marquand and Jurgens are all good, masculine rivals.
The plot isn't sensational but has plenty of meat in it: Curt Jurgens wants to build a casino but it stopped by brothers Christian Marquand and Jean Louis Trintignant who own a boat yard; Brigitte loves Marquand who isn't keen on her until she marries his doting brother Jean Louis Trintignant. She winds up in a storm with Marquand and has sex on the beach with him, then when she gets back struggles to readjust.
It gets very French towards the end (i.e. melodramatic and sexist): Trintignant goes to shoot Bardot but is stopped by Jurgens who takes a bullet in the hand but shrugs it off as the price of love. Trintignant smacks Bardot a few times in the face but she seems to respect him for it, and they go off into the sunset (rather the beach) together. Marquand and Jurgens bail town, with Jurgens commenting that woman was born to cause trouble, and that maybe Trintignant will get over Bardot in time.
I loved the colour photography and St Tropez setting gives it plenty of atmosphere. If you watch this in the right spirit it's great fun - Bardot is a star, and Vadim adores her. There is strong support from the three guys - Trintignant, Marquand and Jurgens are all good, masculine rivals.
Book review - "Total Recall" by Arnold Schwazzenegar (2013)
Reading this I kept thinking I could swear I'd read an Arnie memoir before, but nope - this is his first. I think because at his height in the 80s and 90s we kept hearing his story in every second article about him: the Austrian upbringing (was dad a Nazi, waking up in the freezing cold to milk the cows etc etc), the body building obsession (up at the break of day to work out, the admiration for Reg Park), his domination of competitions, the move to American, making his own fortune via mail order, construction and real estate before becoming an actor, getting off to a great start with Stay Hungry and Pumping Iron before wobbling for a bit (Cactus Jack) then finding genuine stardom with Conan and icon status with The Terminator, Republican leanings despite a Democrat wife. When his film career wobbled he went into politics, becoming governor of California.
Arnie worked super hard at everything - even though this is a memoir I don't doubt it, just look at the dude. He seems to have been a prized novelty in the 70s, hanging out with Nicholson and Beatty, guest starring on Lucille Ball's show - but he was keen to learn and always pushed himself.
He's such a positive person - in this book he goes on and on about how great Maria is/was and their courtship and love the family... mentions of his affair with Brigitte Nielsen (on Red Sonja, before he was married but well after he started going out with Maria) and the housekeeper which resulted in a kid, are given short shrift. To be fair though at least they're there - Arnie is also up front about his use of steroids, gamesmanship tactics in the world of body building in order to win, highly competitive nature, desire to say something outrageous which frequently got him into trouble. (He's more coy on the sexual harassment claims though they are consistent with the depiction of himself he sketches here.)
The chapters on California politics were a lot more interesting than I thought they would be - being governor sounds like a horrible job, but at least Arnie was a centrist Republican (it's enjoyable to hear him get stuck into the lunatic fringe of that party). It seemed to dent even his relentlessly upbeat nature.
I was most interested in the movies, of course, and while I am fairly familiar with Arnie's career there was plenty of new stuff: genuine affection for John Milius, taking a punt on John McTiernan for Predator off the back of Nomads (Arnie took a lot of risks on newer directors starting out, eg Jame Cameron, McTiernan), criticisms of the Predator and Conan sequels, dissastisfaction with Paul Michael Glaser's direction on The Running Man. He doesn't go into too much detail about the bad luck that dogged his cinema career from the mid 90s onwards - ever since True Lies, really, the Arnie movie, which used to be something special, has become a "whatever" movie. Eraser, Jingle All the Way, Collateral Damage, The Sixth Day, End of Days - anyone could have made these. And the public don't seem to care since he went back to acting. (He doesn't mention Christmas in Connecticut for some reason.)
I also found other stuff interesting too - body building, Austria, life with the Kennedys, politics, his scandals. He deserves all the success he's had, and the brickbats that have come his way (the housekeeper? really?) but I have such affection for him, that I wish him well and look forward to seeing what he's going to come up with next.
Arnie worked super hard at everything - even though this is a memoir I don't doubt it, just look at the dude. He seems to have been a prized novelty in the 70s, hanging out with Nicholson and Beatty, guest starring on Lucille Ball's show - but he was keen to learn and always pushed himself.
He's such a positive person - in this book he goes on and on about how great Maria is/was and their courtship and love the family... mentions of his affair with Brigitte Nielsen (on Red Sonja, before he was married but well after he started going out with Maria) and the housekeeper which resulted in a kid, are given short shrift. To be fair though at least they're there - Arnie is also up front about his use of steroids, gamesmanship tactics in the world of body building in order to win, highly competitive nature, desire to say something outrageous which frequently got him into trouble. (He's more coy on the sexual harassment claims though they are consistent with the depiction of himself he sketches here.)
The chapters on California politics were a lot more interesting than I thought they would be - being governor sounds like a horrible job, but at least Arnie was a centrist Republican (it's enjoyable to hear him get stuck into the lunatic fringe of that party). It seemed to dent even his relentlessly upbeat nature.
I was most interested in the movies, of course, and while I am fairly familiar with Arnie's career there was plenty of new stuff: genuine affection for John Milius, taking a punt on John McTiernan for Predator off the back of Nomads (Arnie took a lot of risks on newer directors starting out, eg Jame Cameron, McTiernan), criticisms of the Predator and Conan sequels, dissastisfaction with Paul Michael Glaser's direction on The Running Man. He doesn't go into too much detail about the bad luck that dogged his cinema career from the mid 90s onwards - ever since True Lies, really, the Arnie movie, which used to be something special, has become a "whatever" movie. Eraser, Jingle All the Way, Collateral Damage, The Sixth Day, End of Days - anyone could have made these. And the public don't seem to care since he went back to acting. (He doesn't mention Christmas in Connecticut for some reason.)
I also found other stuff interesting too - body building, Austria, life with the Kennedys, politics, his scandals. He deserves all the success he's had, and the brickbats that have come his way (the housekeeper? really?) but I have such affection for him, that I wish him well and look forward to seeing what he's going to come up with next.
TV review - "Fargo Season 1" (2014) **** (warning: spoilers)
A very satisfying mystery, which is a real page turner - I couldn't pick what was going to happen for the most part and the filmmakers cleverly play with expectations (introducing a character with a pregnant wife and heaps of backstory then killing him, setting it up as if Keith Carradine is going to die but then not doing it). Full of fresh touches - a deaf hit man and so on. Some brilliant suspense is created - I can't recall a series that had more tension, except maybe Game of Thrones.
Some drawbacks - it never made sense for me why Martin Freeman's character decided to take it to Billy Bob Thornton at the end; the scene where Freeman is bullied by the truck guy and is kids was far too over the top (the kid characters were done too broadly); Billy Bob's character was a bit too much of a superman at times (wiping out 23 mafia members at one time? being a dentist for six months to get close to a contact? really?); and that Australian mafia character in Minnesota was really annoying. Can Hollywood please stop putting Aussie characters randomly in things?
But overall this was excellent and I liked it a lot.
Some drawbacks - it never made sense for me why Martin Freeman's character decided to take it to Billy Bob Thornton at the end; the scene where Freeman is bullied by the truck guy and is kids was far too over the top (the kid characters were done too broadly); Billy Bob's character was a bit too much of a superman at times (wiping out 23 mafia members at one time? being a dentist for six months to get close to a contact? really?); and that Australian mafia character in Minnesota was really annoying. Can Hollywood please stop putting Aussie characters randomly in things?
But overall this was excellent and I liked it a lot.
Movie review - "All Pretty Maids in a Row" (1970) **1/2
Odd combination of black comedy, murder mystery and TNA as cheerleaders start turning up murdered at an American high school. It was Roger Vadim's first Hollywood movie, made at MGM when it was under James Aubrey, who was apparently a womaniser himself so presumably enjoyed having the famous lady killer director under contract.
Vadim doesn't have any of his famous lady friends in the cast, although Angie Dickinson is very sexy in a cougar way (as she often was in the 70s - very happy to strip in a good cause was Angie) as a school teacher. Her part actually isn't strictly needed story wise - it's more a subplot: footy coach and teacher Rock Hudson (very good) encourages her to seduce one of his students, a nerdish kid who assists him with the team. The bulk of the storyline though involves the murder investigation by Tely Savalas (superb as a cop), and wondering whether Hudson - who sleeps with lots of students - is involved.
Occasionally the direction is "over pervy" (as Vadim could be) and its disappointing none of the girls that Hudson sleeps with is given much of a character - they are all into him and that's it. (Also his wife Barbara Leigh and fellow teacher Dickinson also find him irresistible without much variation).
But the film's sheer wildness and oddness does make it compelling, and Vadim has a nice eye for composition. There's a fun support cast including Roddy McDowall, James Doohan and Keenan Wynn.
Vadim doesn't have any of his famous lady friends in the cast, although Angie Dickinson is very sexy in a cougar way (as she often was in the 70s - very happy to strip in a good cause was Angie) as a school teacher. Her part actually isn't strictly needed story wise - it's more a subplot: footy coach and teacher Rock Hudson (very good) encourages her to seduce one of his students, a nerdish kid who assists him with the team. The bulk of the storyline though involves the murder investigation by Tely Savalas (superb as a cop), and wondering whether Hudson - who sleeps with lots of students - is involved.
Occasionally the direction is "over pervy" (as Vadim could be) and its disappointing none of the girls that Hudson sleeps with is given much of a character - they are all into him and that's it. (Also his wife Barbara Leigh and fellow teacher Dickinson also find him irresistible without much variation).
But the film's sheer wildness and oddness does make it compelling, and Vadim has a nice eye for composition. There's a fun support cast including Roddy McDowall, James Doohan and Keenan Wynn.
Movie review - "The Bear and the Doll" (1970) *
For a country with such a strong cultural tradition, France spent a lot of time aping Hollywood movies. Here is there attempt to do a wacky 30s screwball rom-coms in the vein of Carole Lombard, but it was beyond the capability of the filmmakers. The plot is particularly dim: a socialite crashes into a bespectacled musician (nod to Cary Grant in What's Up Doc? no doubt) who doesn't find her hot unlike most men apparently so she sets about trying to seduce him.
Brigitte Bardot is ideally cast in the lead because her persona is such that you could believe she would find a man who found her resistible irresistible. She is a little old for the part - I don't mean to be ageist here, it's just that these sort of movies are more fun when the girl is younger because you cal tell yourself "well she just has to grow up a little and she will once she finds the right person" and so when she meets her antagonist in the film you can convince yourself they will be together forever. But Bardot's character here is clearly late 30s and you feel her character is well and truly formed so when she hooks up with the guy at the end, you feel it'll last for five minutes.
It doesn't help that she has minimal chemistry with Jean-Pierre Cassel, who isn't particularly charismatic. The scenes of her chasing and basically sexually harassing him are uncomfortable rather than fun. In What's Up Doc? and Bringing Up Baby the attraction between the characters was clear - the wacky girl would help loosen up the stuff guy and he would give her stability. There's no reason for them to be together. I can't even remember the moment where he started to fall for her.
Even more unforgivably the movie has no support characters to speak of. They set up Cassel's family but don't do anything interesting with them. Where is Bardot's lover, wacky friends, etc? Where is Cassel's rich bitch fiancee? This is what happens when you try to rip off old movies but don't pay close enough attention.
Brigitte Bardot is ideally cast in the lead because her persona is such that you could believe she would find a man who found her resistible irresistible. She is a little old for the part - I don't mean to be ageist here, it's just that these sort of movies are more fun when the girl is younger because you cal tell yourself "well she just has to grow up a little and she will once she finds the right person" and so when she meets her antagonist in the film you can convince yourself they will be together forever. But Bardot's character here is clearly late 30s and you feel her character is well and truly formed so when she hooks up with the guy at the end, you feel it'll last for five minutes.
It doesn't help that she has minimal chemistry with Jean-Pierre Cassel, who isn't particularly charismatic. The scenes of her chasing and basically sexually harassing him are uncomfortable rather than fun. In What's Up Doc? and Bringing Up Baby the attraction between the characters was clear - the wacky girl would help loosen up the stuff guy and he would give her stability. There's no reason for them to be together. I can't even remember the moment where he started to fall for her.
Even more unforgivably the movie has no support characters to speak of. They set up Cassel's family but don't do anything interesting with them. Where is Bardot's lover, wacky friends, etc? Where is Cassel's rich bitch fiancee? This is what happens when you try to rip off old movies but don't pay close enough attention.
Movie review - "Swimming Pool" (1969) **1/2 (warning: spoilers)
The first two thirds of this was terrific - Romy Schneider and Alain Delon (a one time real life couple) hanging around a swimming pool in their fancy house in the south of France, looking hot and engaging in (it is heavily implied) some kinky sex; then Schneider's ex, Maurice Roget, turns up with his nubile bikini wearing daughter, Jane Birkin, and when Ronet bats his eyes at Schneider, then Delon figures he'll have a crack at Birkin. There's a lot of cock-off-ing between Ronet and Delon who's a recovering alcoholic, and Birkin talking about how Ronet likes it when people think she's her father's girlfriend.
It's slow paced but the four leads are excellent cast and very good looking and glamorous and the location helps a lot. It all builds logically to Ronet falling in the pool and Delon drowning him. But after that, when the film should get more complex/thrilling/something it slows down and just becomes "will Delon get away with it" as an inspector pokes around and hey presto... yep, he does. Birkin's character becomes entirely passive, as does Schneider's.... and I felt the movie just fizzled. Maybe I was overly influenced by Les Diaboliques and was hoping for something along those lines - sorry, can't help it. I went with the slow moving atmosphere but wanted more of a pay off - another plot twist, or some really interesting character stuff, another death, something.
But fans of the four lead stars will enjoy it and it did pass the time. It's four people hanging around a swimming pool in a beautiful location - these are the sort of movies we could easily make in Australia.
It's slow paced but the four leads are excellent cast and very good looking and glamorous and the location helps a lot. It all builds logically to Ronet falling in the pool and Delon drowning him. But after that, when the film should get more complex/thrilling/something it slows down and just becomes "will Delon get away with it" as an inspector pokes around and hey presto... yep, he does. Birkin's character becomes entirely passive, as does Schneider's.... and I felt the movie just fizzled. Maybe I was overly influenced by Les Diaboliques and was hoping for something along those lines - sorry, can't help it. I went with the slow moving atmosphere but wanted more of a pay off - another plot twist, or some really interesting character stuff, another death, something.
But fans of the four lead stars will enjoy it and it did pass the time. It's four people hanging around a swimming pool in a beautiful location - these are the sort of movies we could easily make in Australia.
Movie review - "The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse" (1962) **
A fascinating disaster, one of the movies that (along with Mutiny on the Bounty and The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm) helped end the Vogel-Siegel regime at MGM. It would have to be one of the most miscast movies in history - a few basic decisions sunk this to the bottom of the cinematic ocean even before the cameras rolled.
It updates the story from World War One to World War Two, which wasn't in itself fatal, it just makes the movie more obvious - lots of talk about Nazis and standing up to Nazis. Mortally wounding is putting Glenn Ford in the role which made Rudolph Valentino a star; Ford was a competent actor with a decent range but he's hilariously inappropriate as an Argentinian playboy and wastrel who dabbles in painting - far too American and stiff, and way too old to be a drifter. (The younger Ford of Gilda may have gotten away with it - but someone of Ford's age in this film who is without a solid foundation... that suggests an entirely different sort of character) They occasionally have Ford do a bit of Valentino - ride a horse, fly a plane, do a little dance (though not a tango), paint - and it's always a mistake. A bunch of other actors were considered - Vincente Minnelli says he wanted Alain Delon, press reports say George Hamilton and Maximilian Schell were looked at - and all would have been better than Ford.
Secondly they got Minnelli to direct. He says in his memoirs the studio forced him to do it, but surely the person behind Gigi could have gotten out of it? I think he was just embarrassed when it turned out to be such a disaster... and Minnelli must take a lot of the blame. It's a candy coloured MGM look at the war, with some snazzy art direction and costumes that make the whole thing seem unreal. You couldn't do that in 1962 - especially not for a serious drama about war, love, family and passion.
The casting is dreadful - good actors have rarely been so wrongly used. You've got Yvette Mimieux, who I normally like as Ford's Argentinian younger sister who gets involved in the French resistance - blonde Mimieux who specialised in ethereal types (notably in The Time Machine) isn't convincing for one second as an (a) Argentinian (b) sister of Ford (c) daughter of Charles Boyer (d) someone who cares enough about politics to join the French resistance.
There's also Ingrid Thulin as the married woman Ford loves.... Her performance isn't bad but she's dubbed very distractingly by Angela Lansbury (very unfair on Thulin to get such a distinctive actor to do it, completely undermining her). She's not helped by her subplot, where she has an affair with Ford despite being married to an anti-Nazi.... played by Paul Henreid. This brings in echoes of Casablanca this movie really shouldn't have done, because it doesn't do well by way of comparison. (For instance, Casablanca nodded at the complexity of Vichy politics of the time - here everyone descended from the Germans is a Nazi, everyone descended from the French is an anti-Nazi, even if it takes some time for them to get violent about it.... there's no mention of collaborationists here.)
Lee J. Cobb is ridiculous as an Argentinian patriarch (described by Ford as "pure Argentine"), in a bad wig and moustache, delivering an outrageously over the top performance, even by Cobb's standards (he has this ripe death scene, railing against Nazis, saying the four horsemen of the apocalypse are coming, then collapses and dies in the rain).
Having vented all that spleen, I should point out that Charles Boyer (Ford's French father), Karl Boehm (Ford's German cousin), and Paul Lukas (Ford's German uncle) are all very comfortably cast - but the film never recovers from the quadruple punch of Ford, Cobb, Mimieux and dubbed Thulin.
Dramatically the movie is hurt by the fact we never see any friendship between Ford and Karl Boehm (they are cousins) - even just a scene between them early on would have helped. The change to World War Two I think could have worked but it makes the whole thing about Nazis - Cobb doesn't prefer Ford to Boehm because he's a bit of a prick, like in the original, now it's political; Henreid ignores Thulin because he's devoted to fighting Nazis. Mimieux hates the Nazis and wants to fight them; Ford and Boyer don't like the Nazis either, it just takes them a while to get into it. I'd wish they'd given the characters different points of view - there's no really differing attitudes towards Nazism from Lukas and Karl Boehm, for instance, they are just "Germany is awesome". There's no differing attitude towards the war from Boyer or Ford, as well - Boyer has a bit of guilt for ducking World War One service, but that's it.
There's also no real big dramatic set piece the movie makers could bank on. Ben Hur had the pirate battle and the chariot race - plus also the resurrection scene, I guess. There were director and actor proof moments. The original Four Horsemen didn't have those - it had a tango scene plus a tragic ending. And so they get rid of the tango scene. This movie was a big budget production but it actually didn't have to be - there are no balls, or battles, or scenes on water. The final action scene is bombs dropping on a building but that's it. Most of the action consists of people talking in a room - and usually only two people. Its a monument to MGM's (and Minnelli's) inefficiency.
Could this have worked with Ford's casting? Maybe - I think the family needed to be American, not Argentinian. The story as written needs to have them as Argentinian in order that Ford can stay in Paris through the war - but you could have set it prior to Pearl Harbour when America was neutral.
There are some effective moments - Thulin and Ford consummating their love during an air raid, Minnelli's use of colour, Boyer chastising Ford for seeing a married woman. The second half is better because they refer less to the fact that Ford is Argentinian. But it's still pretty poor.
It updates the story from World War One to World War Two, which wasn't in itself fatal, it just makes the movie more obvious - lots of talk about Nazis and standing up to Nazis. Mortally wounding is putting Glenn Ford in the role which made Rudolph Valentino a star; Ford was a competent actor with a decent range but he's hilariously inappropriate as an Argentinian playboy and wastrel who dabbles in painting - far too American and stiff, and way too old to be a drifter. (The younger Ford of Gilda may have gotten away with it - but someone of Ford's age in this film who is without a solid foundation... that suggests an entirely different sort of character) They occasionally have Ford do a bit of Valentino - ride a horse, fly a plane, do a little dance (though not a tango), paint - and it's always a mistake. A bunch of other actors were considered - Vincente Minnelli says he wanted Alain Delon, press reports say George Hamilton and Maximilian Schell were looked at - and all would have been better than Ford.
Secondly they got Minnelli to direct. He says in his memoirs the studio forced him to do it, but surely the person behind Gigi could have gotten out of it? I think he was just embarrassed when it turned out to be such a disaster... and Minnelli must take a lot of the blame. It's a candy coloured MGM look at the war, with some snazzy art direction and costumes that make the whole thing seem unreal. You couldn't do that in 1962 - especially not for a serious drama about war, love, family and passion.
The casting is dreadful - good actors have rarely been so wrongly used. You've got Yvette Mimieux, who I normally like as Ford's Argentinian younger sister who gets involved in the French resistance - blonde Mimieux who specialised in ethereal types (notably in The Time Machine) isn't convincing for one second as an (a) Argentinian (b) sister of Ford (c) daughter of Charles Boyer (d) someone who cares enough about politics to join the French resistance.
There's also Ingrid Thulin as the married woman Ford loves.... Her performance isn't bad but she's dubbed very distractingly by Angela Lansbury (very unfair on Thulin to get such a distinctive actor to do it, completely undermining her). She's not helped by her subplot, where she has an affair with Ford despite being married to an anti-Nazi.... played by Paul Henreid. This brings in echoes of Casablanca this movie really shouldn't have done, because it doesn't do well by way of comparison. (For instance, Casablanca nodded at the complexity of Vichy politics of the time - here everyone descended from the Germans is a Nazi, everyone descended from the French is an anti-Nazi, even if it takes some time for them to get violent about it.... there's no mention of collaborationists here.)
Lee J. Cobb is ridiculous as an Argentinian patriarch (described by Ford as "pure Argentine"), in a bad wig and moustache, delivering an outrageously over the top performance, even by Cobb's standards (he has this ripe death scene, railing against Nazis, saying the four horsemen of the apocalypse are coming, then collapses and dies in the rain).
Having vented all that spleen, I should point out that Charles Boyer (Ford's French father), Karl Boehm (Ford's German cousin), and Paul Lukas (Ford's German uncle) are all very comfortably cast - but the film never recovers from the quadruple punch of Ford, Cobb, Mimieux and dubbed Thulin.
Dramatically the movie is hurt by the fact we never see any friendship between Ford and Karl Boehm (they are cousins) - even just a scene between them early on would have helped. The change to World War Two I think could have worked but it makes the whole thing about Nazis - Cobb doesn't prefer Ford to Boehm because he's a bit of a prick, like in the original, now it's political; Henreid ignores Thulin because he's devoted to fighting Nazis. Mimieux hates the Nazis and wants to fight them; Ford and Boyer don't like the Nazis either, it just takes them a while to get into it. I'd wish they'd given the characters different points of view - there's no really differing attitudes towards Nazism from Lukas and Karl Boehm, for instance, they are just "Germany is awesome". There's no differing attitude towards the war from Boyer or Ford, as well - Boyer has a bit of guilt for ducking World War One service, but that's it.
There's also no real big dramatic set piece the movie makers could bank on. Ben Hur had the pirate battle and the chariot race - plus also the resurrection scene, I guess. There were director and actor proof moments. The original Four Horsemen didn't have those - it had a tango scene plus a tragic ending. And so they get rid of the tango scene. This movie was a big budget production but it actually didn't have to be - there are no balls, or battles, or scenes on water. The final action scene is bombs dropping on a building but that's it. Most of the action consists of people talking in a room - and usually only two people. Its a monument to MGM's (and Minnelli's) inefficiency.
Could this have worked with Ford's casting? Maybe - I think the family needed to be American, not Argentinian. The story as written needs to have them as Argentinian in order that Ford can stay in Paris through the war - but you could have set it prior to Pearl Harbour when America was neutral.
There are some effective moments - Thulin and Ford consummating their love during an air raid, Minnelli's use of colour, Boyer chastising Ford for seeing a married woman. The second half is better because they refer less to the fact that Ford is Argentinian. But it's still pretty poor.
Movie review - "And God Created Women" (1988) *1/2 (warning: spoilers)
Remaking your own film isn't than unusual - Hitchcock and John Ford did it - but this is different in that Roger Vadim really only reused the title of his most famous film. He does have a shapely, sexually independent woman in the lead but Rebecca de Morney is a long way from Brigitte Bardot.
It's not that de Mornay is bad - she always gives at least a competent performance, she has a great figure - it's just she lacks the It factor of Bardot. She also doesn't have as interesting a character to play, or story to appear in, or locations that are as nice as St Topez (this is in New Mexico which looks all desert-y).
The story has her as a jailbird and aspiring rock guitarist who gets out of prison by marrying a man she doesn't love (Vincent Spano), though she has seduced him when he came in to do some tradie work at the prison - this is actually the hottest scene in the movie, a nude de Morney hiding from the guards, asking Spano to protect her, then going for it. A few more moments like this might have livened up things.
Anyway, she gets out of prison and there's some argy bargy with Spano who wants to have sex with her but she refuses. She has a fling with politician Frank Langella (these sex scenes are not hot), gets jealous when Spano goes off with a girl, engages in some Overboard style comedy with her helping look after Spano's son, decides to have sex with Spano and they fall in love (at some stage, I wasn't quite sure where), then she's going to be sent back to prison because someone takes photos of her and Spano having sex but she gets out of it by playing a song in a rock band and praising Langella. At which point the audience is likely to go "huh?" if it hasn't already gone "I don't care".
There's not enough sex for this to be erotica or thrills for it to be a thriller; it's not melodrama. It's just drama with a bit of sex thrown in, along with horrible 80s music (campest moment is that climactic song played by De Morney's band where everyone is watching it thinking it's awesome). The original was a flawed piece but it had a good solid dramatic situation (i.e. two brothers want the one girl) exploited well. In a weird way if you cut down the explicitness of the sex, this wouldn't be a bad movie for tweens because it's got a girl in spiky hair running around having adventures, with men panting over her, playing in a band coming up triumphant. As it is, it falls between stools.
It's not that de Mornay is bad - she always gives at least a competent performance, she has a great figure - it's just she lacks the It factor of Bardot. She also doesn't have as interesting a character to play, or story to appear in, or locations that are as nice as St Topez (this is in New Mexico which looks all desert-y).
The story has her as a jailbird and aspiring rock guitarist who gets out of prison by marrying a man she doesn't love (Vincent Spano), though she has seduced him when he came in to do some tradie work at the prison - this is actually the hottest scene in the movie, a nude de Morney hiding from the guards, asking Spano to protect her, then going for it. A few more moments like this might have livened up things.
Anyway, she gets out of prison and there's some argy bargy with Spano who wants to have sex with her but she refuses. She has a fling with politician Frank Langella (these sex scenes are not hot), gets jealous when Spano goes off with a girl, engages in some Overboard style comedy with her helping look after Spano's son, decides to have sex with Spano and they fall in love (at some stage, I wasn't quite sure where), then she's going to be sent back to prison because someone takes photos of her and Spano having sex but she gets out of it by playing a song in a rock band and praising Langella. At which point the audience is likely to go "huh?" if it hasn't already gone "I don't care".
There's not enough sex for this to be erotica or thrills for it to be a thriller; it's not melodrama. It's just drama with a bit of sex thrown in, along with horrible 80s music (campest moment is that climactic song played by De Morney's band where everyone is watching it thinking it's awesome). The original was a flawed piece but it had a good solid dramatic situation (i.e. two brothers want the one girl) exploited well. In a weird way if you cut down the explicitness of the sex, this wouldn't be a bad movie for tweens because it's got a girl in spiky hair running around having adventures, with men panting over her, playing in a band coming up triumphant. As it is, it falls between stools.
Sunday, January 04, 2015
Movie review - "Indian Summer" (1972) **
Alain Delon changes pace and goes in for some character melodrama - he plays a professor who arrives to teach in a small town where all the students are left wing. He gambles and has a crazy wife but it's okay there's a hot student for him to fall in love with.
There's lots of talk, and people looking anguished. The sex scene between Delon and the girl is quite hot and I enjoyed his nutty wife - less so the stuff involving Delon and his mates talking about the meaning of it all. It's beautifully shot and there's plenty of atmosphere with the rain swept small town by the sea, wind and so on (there's a British couple in a yacht at the opening which I liked).
Delon gives an excellent performance - he looks tired, jaded and actually damn cool with three day growth and a cigarette hanging from his mouth. But it's not story heavy to put it mildly and I grew impatient with it - I found it dull. And for all the talk about the meaning of life it's basically about a middle aged man rejuvenated by banging a young girl and it's hard to make that fresh.
There's lots of talk, and people looking anguished. The sex scene between Delon and the girl is quite hot and I enjoyed his nutty wife - less so the stuff involving Delon and his mates talking about the meaning of it all. It's beautifully shot and there's plenty of atmosphere with the rain swept small town by the sea, wind and so on (there's a British couple in a yacht at the opening which I liked).
Delon gives an excellent performance - he looks tired, jaded and actually damn cool with three day growth and a cigarette hanging from his mouth. But it's not story heavy to put it mildly and I grew impatient with it - I found it dull. And for all the talk about the meaning of life it's basically about a middle aged man rejuvenated by banging a young girl and it's hard to make that fresh.
Saturday, January 03, 2015
Movie review - "The Room" (2003) */*****
Every era of story telling is a golden age of something - right now it's dark times for rom coms and medium level thrillers, say, but its a golden age for low budget art house, expensive comic book spectaculars, and cable TV drama. It's also great to see Hollywood's capacity for producing crap classics has come back in a good way - movies like The Room and Birdemic are the equal to the golden era classics like Robot Monster and Glen or Glenda?
The Room is hard to describe - at it's core it's meant to be a melodrama about a love triangle involving two friends and the woman who comes between them, resulting in tragedy (a good, standard basis for drama which means the heartbeat of this film is essentially sound)... but it goes off into all sorts of tangents and subplots. The girl's mother with her once-mentioned-and-that's-it breast cancer, the guy's "ward" and his drug habit, the random scene in tuxedos, the repeated mention that the girl is sick of the guy and the guys are best friends, the random friends who pop up and disappear. I can't think of a movie that sets up more subplots which aren't resolved and scenes which aren't explained.
There are also continuity errors galore, campy acting, cinematography that goes in and out of focus, hilarious sex scenes, and most of all the magnificent performance of it's creator, Tommy Wiseau, which has to be seen to be believed. Performance wise the best friend Mark (Greg Sestero) is at least handsome and Robyn Paris is decent as Michelle.
This totally holds up on it's own as a piece of entertainment watching at home alone but the crowd participation is also fun with some first rate running gags, eg saying "Alcatraz" every time you see the island or bars, throwing spoons at all the spoon imagery, crying 'you're doing it wrong" during sex, and mocking the film's misogyny. (Although at the screening I saw some guy kept yelling "slut" every time Juliette Danielle appeared - I think he thought it was really funny, but it wasn't especially as there was such hate and aggression in his voice.)
The Room is hard to describe - at it's core it's meant to be a melodrama about a love triangle involving two friends and the woman who comes between them, resulting in tragedy (a good, standard basis for drama which means the heartbeat of this film is essentially sound)... but it goes off into all sorts of tangents and subplots. The girl's mother with her once-mentioned-and-that's-it breast cancer, the guy's "ward" and his drug habit, the random scene in tuxedos, the repeated mention that the girl is sick of the guy and the guys are best friends, the random friends who pop up and disappear. I can't think of a movie that sets up more subplots which aren't resolved and scenes which aren't explained.
There are also continuity errors galore, campy acting, cinematography that goes in and out of focus, hilarious sex scenes, and most of all the magnificent performance of it's creator, Tommy Wiseau, which has to be seen to be believed. Performance wise the best friend Mark (Greg Sestero) is at least handsome and Robyn Paris is decent as Michelle.
This totally holds up on it's own as a piece of entertainment watching at home alone but the crowd participation is also fun with some first rate running gags, eg saying "Alcatraz" every time you see the island or bars, throwing spoons at all the spoon imagery, crying 'you're doing it wrong" during sex, and mocking the film's misogyny. (Although at the screening I saw some guy kept yelling "slut" every time Juliette Danielle appeared - I think he thought it was really funny, but it wasn't especially as there was such hate and aggression in his voice.)
Friday, January 02, 2015
Movie review - "Love on a Pillow" (1962) **
Roger Vadim married Brigitte Bardot and helped make her a star; they divorced but remained friends and colleagues, collaborating on this minor effort. She plays a young woman who saves a handsome mystery man (Robert Hossein) from a suicide attempt and, although engaged to someone else, becomes obsessed with him.
Because it's a Bardot movie there's scenes were she rolls around in a sheet naked, and one where she stands in front of the fire with no clothes on. It's based on a novel but interestingly some elements of this - a woman so obsessed with a man she puts up with anything he does, even seeing a hooker - are reminiscent of the way Jane Fonda later said she behaved in her marriage to Vadim.
The film isn't that good though - it drags despite a not particularly long running time, and always felt as though it needed more story or something... such as the former fiancee seeking vengeance, or something getting a terminal illness. As it is, it's mostly Hossein acting badly, Bardot complaining but being drawn back.... then eventually he comes to his senses.
James Robertson Justice pops up in the second biggest role - a friend of Hossein. (He would later appear in Two Weeks in September with Bardot.) Vadim shows off his love for jazz again in an extended party sequence which reminded me of Les Liasions Dangereuse.
Hossein gives a pretty good performance and so does Bardot - she has a scene where she loses it, presumably an obligation after her success in The Truth.
Because it's a Bardot movie there's scenes were she rolls around in a sheet naked, and one where she stands in front of the fire with no clothes on. It's based on a novel but interestingly some elements of this - a woman so obsessed with a man she puts up with anything he does, even seeing a hooker - are reminiscent of the way Jane Fonda later said she behaved in her marriage to Vadim.
The film isn't that good though - it drags despite a not particularly long running time, and always felt as though it needed more story or something... such as the former fiancee seeking vengeance, or something getting a terminal illness. As it is, it's mostly Hossein acting badly, Bardot complaining but being drawn back.... then eventually he comes to his senses.
James Robertson Justice pops up in the second biggest role - a friend of Hossein. (He would later appear in Two Weeks in September with Bardot.) Vadim shows off his love for jazz again in an extended party sequence which reminded me of Les Liasions Dangereuse.
Hossein gives a pretty good performance and so does Bardot - she has a scene where she loses it, presumably an obligation after her success in The Truth.
Movie review - "Naughty Girl" (1956) ***
Really fun, silly French musical comedy starring Brigitte Bardot which was actually more popular at the box office than And God Created Woman. It's not hard to see why - the other film is more for adults and this is more a family picture, the sort of thing you could easily imagine Debbie Reynolds starring in at MGM or Sonja Henie in one of her films.
The plot involves a lot of set up but basically Brigitte's dad runs a nightclub and he asks singer Jean Bretonniere to look after his little girl while he tries to find out who is running at forgery operation out of his nightclub. Cue lots of cute antics with Brigitte running havoc - setting fire, clashing with Bretonniere's butler, winding up in jail and then on stage doing a number, fighting off gangsters, and it winds up with a big brawl at the nightclub.
It's formulaic and silly, but is a lot of fun. It's in colour and CinemaScope and the production values are high. Bretonniere isn't much of a lead and his romance with Bardot is underdeveloped but the support cast includes people like Francoise Fabian (the financee) and Mischa Auer. Brigitte is in terrific form, running around and pouting, getting into mischief; there's a scene where she wears a bikini which feels shoe horned in, but the dream sequence feels like a more organic way (if that makes sense) to justify a whole bunch of costume changes.
The plot involves a lot of set up but basically Brigitte's dad runs a nightclub and he asks singer Jean Bretonniere to look after his little girl while he tries to find out who is running at forgery operation out of his nightclub. Cue lots of cute antics with Brigitte running havoc - setting fire, clashing with Bretonniere's butler, winding up in jail and then on stage doing a number, fighting off gangsters, and it winds up with a big brawl at the nightclub.
It's formulaic and silly, but is a lot of fun. It's in colour and CinemaScope and the production values are high. Bretonniere isn't much of a lead and his romance with Bardot is underdeveloped but the support cast includes people like Francoise Fabian (the financee) and Mischa Auer. Brigitte is in terrific form, running around and pouting, getting into mischief; there's a scene where she wears a bikini which feels shoe horned in, but the dream sequence feels like a more organic way (if that makes sense) to justify a whole bunch of costume changes.
Thursday, January 01, 2015
Movie review - "Les Liaisons dangereuses" (1959) ***
Years before Cruel Intentions there was another modern day updating of this famous tale, which resulted in Roger Vadim's biggest hit - it made more at the French box office than And God Created Women. The public were no doubt in part attracted by some other factors: the movie was banned for export for two years, featured Gerard Philippe in one of his last roles, and encountered criticism from literary organisations who requested the name be changed to add "1960" at the end so people didn't think it was a straight adaptation.
Setting the film in the modern day does mean you lose some French revolution era political stuff (as well as fun costumes). This feels very much late 50s with it's black and white photography, suits and ties, and Thelodius Monk jazz score. There are some scenes in the French Alps but it's more comfortable in the world of late night parties and bedrooms.
There are two particularly excellent interpreters in Jeanne Moreau (as Juliette) and Gerard Philippe (as Valmont) (aka Glenn Close and John Malkovich, or Sarah Michelle Gellar and Ryan Phillipe). Here the two are married and have a full on open relationship, having affairs and telling each other in detail about them - a device which works really well (and may have contributed to the censorship troubles... something about a married couple doing all this makes it feel especially decandent.)
Annette Vadim was a little on the dull side but it's not fatal - that role (the Michelle Pfeiffer/Reese Witherspoon part) suits bland people, and she is definitely super beautiful. Jeanne Valerie is alright as the 16 year old Philippe seduces but Jean Louis Tringinant makes the most of the kind of worthless part of her secret lover.
There's some classy nudity - Annette Vadim likes naked on a couch (legs and arms folded to make it tame by today standards), Jeanne Valerie shows off her butt in bed. Vadim doesn't have much of a reputation these days but I thought this was a pretty good film; flowery in spots, yes, but effective.
Setting the film in the modern day does mean you lose some French revolution era political stuff (as well as fun costumes). This feels very much late 50s with it's black and white photography, suits and ties, and Thelodius Monk jazz score. There are some scenes in the French Alps but it's more comfortable in the world of late night parties and bedrooms.
There are two particularly excellent interpreters in Jeanne Moreau (as Juliette) and Gerard Philippe (as Valmont) (aka Glenn Close and John Malkovich, or Sarah Michelle Gellar and Ryan Phillipe). Here the two are married and have a full on open relationship, having affairs and telling each other in detail about them - a device which works really well (and may have contributed to the censorship troubles... something about a married couple doing all this makes it feel especially decandent.)
Annette Vadim was a little on the dull side but it's not fatal - that role (the Michelle Pfeiffer/Reese Witherspoon part) suits bland people, and she is definitely super beautiful. Jeanne Valerie is alright as the 16 year old Philippe seduces but Jean Louis Tringinant makes the most of the kind of worthless part of her secret lover.
There's some classy nudity - Annette Vadim likes naked on a couch (legs and arms folded to make it tame by today standards), Jeanne Valerie shows off her butt in bed. Vadim doesn't have much of a reputation these days but I thought this was a pretty good film; flowery in spots, yes, but effective.
Movie review - "La Curee" (1966) **1/2
Roger Vadim became known for soft-core-ish movies as well as having a series of really hot wives, but in the 60s he was most commonly found adapting the classics. It makes sense when Dangerous Liasions had been his biggest hit - he followed it up with La Ronde and here he has a go at Zola.
The movie is a vehicle for Jane Fonda, who became his wife shortly before filming. Critics distracted by her disrobing did not always appreciate what a first rate performance she gives - yes she's sexy, and goes topless in the sex scenes (which happen around the middle mark and that's it), but she also gets to play the gamut of emotions: flirty, scared, lustful, passionate, concerned and, in the end, devastated. It's a performance that would have been beyond Deneuve and probably Bardot (though I think the latter was an under-rated actor).
Her French is pretty good too - at least, it was to my untrained ears. She wears a variety of different outfits and Vadim knows how to make her come across well on screen. (Though I admit at times his direction felt a little "over pervy".)
Michel Piccoli was born to play a wealthy cuckold (you might recognise him from films like Belle de Jour). Peter McEnery is alright as the lover - he's not in Fonda's league as an actor, or as a charismatic presence, but he does okay.
No one else has much of a role though the cast also includes Tina Aumont, daughter of Maria Montez, as McEnery's girlfriend.
I felt Vadim's direction was fairly effective - occasionally flashy to flashy's sake, and some bits felt included just for the critics (there's this thematic thing about Asia going on, with McEnery dressing up as Genghis Khan in one scene, and meeting some Chinese in another.)
Story wise it dragged every now and then but the ending was effective.
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