These are the movies being released this summer that I intend to catch...at some point:
Iron Man 3 (5/3)
Because everyone will be watching it.
The Great Gatsby (5/10)
Because Baz Lurhmann is never boring.
Star Trek Into Darkness (5/17)
Because I'm a huge Star Trek fan.
Before Midnight (5/24)
I haven't caught any of this series, but I will at some point.
Epic (5/24)
Animated flick featuring the voice of Colin Farrell.
Fast & Furious 6 (5/24)
Because it's a classic series at this point.
The Hangover III (5/24)
Ditto.
After Earth (6/7)
Because I'm a huge Shyamalan fan. And a huge Will Smith fan.
Much Ado About Nothing (6/7)
As much for Shakespeare as Whedon. Probably more for Shakespeare, though.
The Bling Ring (6/14)
Because I'm a huge Sofia Coppola fan.
Man of Steel (6/14)
Because I'm a huge Superman fan. And Zack Snyder fan.
Monsters University (6/21)
Because I liked the first one.
World War Z (6/21)
Because I'm a huge Brad Pitt fan.
Byzantium (6/28)
Because it stars Saoirse Ronan and Gemma Arterton.
Despicable Me 2 (7/3)
Because I loved the first one.
The Lone Ranger (7/3)
I wouldn't miss it for anything.
Girl Most Likely (7/19)
Because I'm a huge Kristen Wiig fan.
RED 2 (7/19)
Because I liked the first one.
RIPD (7/19)
Because it's high concept.
The Wolverine (7/26)
Because I'm hoping this one rocks.
300: Rise of an Empire (8/2)
Because I loved the first one.
Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters (8/7)
Because I'm a fan of the series.
Kick-Ass 2 (8/16)
Because Jim Carrey's in it.
Ain't Them Bodies Saints (8/17)
Because Rooney Mara and Casey Affleck are in it.
The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones (8/23)
Because Lily Collins is in it.
The World's End (8/23)
Because it's the conclusion of the Wright/Pegg/Frost "trilogy."
Closed Circuit (8/28)
Because I'm a huge Eric Bana fan.
Don Jon (8/30)
Because it's a film by Joseph Gordon-Levitt.
Wednesday, April 17, 2013
Monday, April 15, 2013
Seven Psychopaths
****
directed by: Martin McDonagh
starring: Colin Farrell, Sam Rockwell, Christopher Walken, Woody Harrelson, Tom Waits, Olga Kurylenko, Abbie Cornish, Zeljko Ivanek, Harry Dean Stanton, Kevin Corrigan, Gabourey Sidibe
Released in 2012.
Seven Psychopaths could very easily be mistaken for the continuing series of movies that wish very badly they were directed by Quentin Tarantino. Except, much like Joe Carnahan's movies, this is at worst a variation of a Tarantino flick. It's a film by Martin McDonagh, and that's becoming a thing now, after this and In Bruges.
Both star Colin Farrell, although aside from gunplay there's very little else that's overtly similar between them, other than confident and spectacular filmmaking on a fairly intimate level. Bruges was about a hitman who felt great remorse after the accidental murder of a little kid. Psychopaths is about a writer who's trying to work on a new story, but his subject matter has inadvertently drawn him into the very life he's been trying to evoke. The writer is Farrell, the friend who causes the latter is Sam Rockwell. If you know Rockwell at all, and you should, that part should more or less explain itself.
It's the structure that really makes the movie pop. McDonagh allows us to follow the characters Farrell is writing, and they have terrifically compelling narratives all their own, and even when you think the movie's done with them it surprises you again by bringing them back. Part of that is because at least one of the characters is drawn from the web Farrell is being drawn into, an acquaintance played by Christopher Walken. Walken is in top form. He's got a famously deadpan expression, but he knows how to sell a role because hardly anyone delivers a line like he does. I'll bet that anyone who just knows the name of the film and that Walken (not to mention Rockwell) appears in it will already think they know everything they need to know.
And yet the true genius of McDonagh is that he subverts every expectation. He knows and you know because that's one of the themes, what Farrell's writer tries to do and Rockwell's main function is to try and embody the reverse. Woody Harrelson is another presence that begs the boundaries of these expectations.
It's just this side of brilliant.
One of the things I look for in any movie that is or approaches brilliant is the ability to sneak in actors as good as the ones anyone will know appears in the movie in supporting roles. Here the list includes Olga Kurylenko (proving once again she's not just a pretty face), Kevin Corrigan, and Harry Dean Stanton, who has made a career of these kinds of roles. There's also Tom Waits, better known for his music, making another periodic movie appearance. His most recent role was in The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus. His appearance here is as similar as he could get. It's also worth noting that the late Heath Ledger based his Joker in The Dark Knight on Waits. Ledger's Joker is the iconic psychopath of modern cinema lore. It stands to figure that Waits would have to be featured in a movie with that term in its title.
If you're another of those film fans like me who enjoyed the chaos of the Coen brothers' Burn After Reading, this is an experience you'll definitely enjoy. Farrell is restrained, for the most part, but he loses his kit at least once, and that may be worth seeing right there.
directed by: Martin McDonagh
starring: Colin Farrell, Sam Rockwell, Christopher Walken, Woody Harrelson, Tom Waits, Olga Kurylenko, Abbie Cornish, Zeljko Ivanek, Harry Dean Stanton, Kevin Corrigan, Gabourey Sidibe
Released in 2012.
Seven Psychopaths could very easily be mistaken for the continuing series of movies that wish very badly they were directed by Quentin Tarantino. Except, much like Joe Carnahan's movies, this is at worst a variation of a Tarantino flick. It's a film by Martin McDonagh, and that's becoming a thing now, after this and In Bruges.
Both star Colin Farrell, although aside from gunplay there's very little else that's overtly similar between them, other than confident and spectacular filmmaking on a fairly intimate level. Bruges was about a hitman who felt great remorse after the accidental murder of a little kid. Psychopaths is about a writer who's trying to work on a new story, but his subject matter has inadvertently drawn him into the very life he's been trying to evoke. The writer is Farrell, the friend who causes the latter is Sam Rockwell. If you know Rockwell at all, and you should, that part should more or less explain itself.
It's the structure that really makes the movie pop. McDonagh allows us to follow the characters Farrell is writing, and they have terrifically compelling narratives all their own, and even when you think the movie's done with them it surprises you again by bringing them back. Part of that is because at least one of the characters is drawn from the web Farrell is being drawn into, an acquaintance played by Christopher Walken. Walken is in top form. He's got a famously deadpan expression, but he knows how to sell a role because hardly anyone delivers a line like he does. I'll bet that anyone who just knows the name of the film and that Walken (not to mention Rockwell) appears in it will already think they know everything they need to know.
And yet the true genius of McDonagh is that he subverts every expectation. He knows and you know because that's one of the themes, what Farrell's writer tries to do and Rockwell's main function is to try and embody the reverse. Woody Harrelson is another presence that begs the boundaries of these expectations.
It's just this side of brilliant.
One of the things I look for in any movie that is or approaches brilliant is the ability to sneak in actors as good as the ones anyone will know appears in the movie in supporting roles. Here the list includes Olga Kurylenko (proving once again she's not just a pretty face), Kevin Corrigan, and Harry Dean Stanton, who has made a career of these kinds of roles. There's also Tom Waits, better known for his music, making another periodic movie appearance. His most recent role was in The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus. His appearance here is as similar as he could get. It's also worth noting that the late Heath Ledger based his Joker in The Dark Knight on Waits. Ledger's Joker is the iconic psychopath of modern cinema lore. It stands to figure that Waits would have to be featured in a movie with that term in its title.
If you're another of those film fans like me who enjoyed the chaos of the Coen brothers' Burn After Reading, this is an experience you'll definitely enjoy. Farrell is restrained, for the most part, but he loses his kit at least once, and that may be worth seeing right there.
Monday, February 11, 2013
The Truman Show
*****
directed by: Peter Weir
starring: Jim Carrey, Laura Linney, Ed Harris, Noah Emmerich, Natascha McElhone, Holland Taylor, Paul Giamatti, Peter Krause, Harry Shearer
Released in 1998.
This was for a while my favorite film, and it easily earned that distinction, and forever set the standard by which my favorite films would be defined. It stars my favorite actor at the time (who remains a favorite), Jim Carrey, who like everyone else first wowed me as a comedic presence, and yet proved instantly compelling in a dramatic performance, because he is the rare comedian who embodies both sides of that coin, including the tragedy cleverly hidden beneath it.
The Truman Show, in fact, is a tragedy, and maybe that's not such a hard thing to discover. It's about a man who is living a reality show, and he's the only one who doesn't know it. He's been its star his whole life, and everything around him, including everyone he knows, has been manufactured in order to keep him happy enough to stay.
Except one day something goes off-script. At college he meets someone who was only supposed to be a background player. She instantly fascinates him, and although quickly booted from the production site Truman never forgets her. He settles into a picture perfect life, but yearns for something more, to explore beyond the scope of his world even though he keeps getting told that everything has already been discovered. Yet the crucial mistake made against him is that Truman wants to experience the world, not simply inhabit it. And eventually he finds the courage to do exactly that.
Now, obviously some of this is tailor-made for Carrey's comedic sensibilities. To a certain extent Truman must be entertaining enough for people to watch him so religiously. Yet the more his world crumbles around him, the more Truman must be something more, and Carrey is more than up to the task. He's a revelation in the film, not just in his own career but for any actor's. That's what set Carrey apart in the first place, that he was capable of inhabiting characters more thoroughly than his peers. At first it seemed that he was only being shameless, that he was only mugging, and at times in his career that has certainly been the case. The Truman Show is the mark of distinction. It's the high-water mark by which all his other performances must be compared (nicely mirroring its effect on my cinematic experiences).
There's more than Truman to The Truman Show, however. There's a rich cast around him, starting with Laura Linney and Ed Harris. This was Linney's first big role, and she instantly became a critical darling, someone you'd never really think of as a standout until she stands out, and she holds her own against Carrey (for some reason he tends to attract strong performances from his female co-stars). Likewise with Harris. Always one of the most dignified actors in Hollywood, his career reached new heights of respect after his appearance as the director of Truman's life.
One more performance worth singling out is Paul Giamatti's. It's a minor one, but it's also the one that started getting him noticed, until he finally became a leading man in American Splendor. Giamatti would reteam with Carrey for Man on the Moon, another highlight for both, in a far bigger role.
The psychology of The Truman Show is tremendous. It's not just a movie that predicted the reality show craze and its hollowness, but about the strength of the human mind. Truman seemingly has every reason to be happy, and yet he isn't, and the more those around him try to pacify Truman, the less happy he becomes. No one understands or cares about his needs. They're just there to maintain the status quo, and that means keeping Truman safely on the set of his show, a small island enclosed in a massive dome. Perhaps you think you'd be flattered to have such a life, but you'd probably wish that you were at least in control of it, and it's not even that Truman doesn't have that, but that you're as much aware that he's constantly being manipulated and doesn't even know it that draws you into the movie as that he rebels without even thinking, without even being outraged about this, that all he wants is to break free of what he's just become aware of, and reclaim something that's been stolen, namely the girl (played by Natascha McElhone, whose defining feature is her eyes, fittingly haunting) he was denied.
It's a movie that makes you think, and richly entertains you, and leaves you with a cathartic ending, and yet you keep thinking about The Truman Show well after it's over. Now, of course, you will probably think that Truman could never have truly escaped his curious hell. Princess Diana had just been killed in a car accident thanks to hounding paparazzi, and that was only the tip of the continuing media frenzy. Truman might escape the set, but he could never evade the press. He wouldn't have the first way of coping with them, especially after his dramatic exit from the show the whole world had watched. If he sued, the trial too would evoke massive coverage, as the OJ Simpson case proved a few years earlier still.
A massively memorable movie on all accounts.
directed by: Peter Weir
starring: Jim Carrey, Laura Linney, Ed Harris, Noah Emmerich, Natascha McElhone, Holland Taylor, Paul Giamatti, Peter Krause, Harry Shearer
Released in 1998.
This was for a while my favorite film, and it easily earned that distinction, and forever set the standard by which my favorite films would be defined. It stars my favorite actor at the time (who remains a favorite), Jim Carrey, who like everyone else first wowed me as a comedic presence, and yet proved instantly compelling in a dramatic performance, because he is the rare comedian who embodies both sides of that coin, including the tragedy cleverly hidden beneath it.
The Truman Show, in fact, is a tragedy, and maybe that's not such a hard thing to discover. It's about a man who is living a reality show, and he's the only one who doesn't know it. He's been its star his whole life, and everything around him, including everyone he knows, has been manufactured in order to keep him happy enough to stay.
Except one day something goes off-script. At college he meets someone who was only supposed to be a background player. She instantly fascinates him, and although quickly booted from the production site Truman never forgets her. He settles into a picture perfect life, but yearns for something more, to explore beyond the scope of his world even though he keeps getting told that everything has already been discovered. Yet the crucial mistake made against him is that Truman wants to experience the world, not simply inhabit it. And eventually he finds the courage to do exactly that.
Now, obviously some of this is tailor-made for Carrey's comedic sensibilities. To a certain extent Truman must be entertaining enough for people to watch him so religiously. Yet the more his world crumbles around him, the more Truman must be something more, and Carrey is more than up to the task. He's a revelation in the film, not just in his own career but for any actor's. That's what set Carrey apart in the first place, that he was capable of inhabiting characters more thoroughly than his peers. At first it seemed that he was only being shameless, that he was only mugging, and at times in his career that has certainly been the case. The Truman Show is the mark of distinction. It's the high-water mark by which all his other performances must be compared (nicely mirroring its effect on my cinematic experiences).
There's more than Truman to The Truman Show, however. There's a rich cast around him, starting with Laura Linney and Ed Harris. This was Linney's first big role, and she instantly became a critical darling, someone you'd never really think of as a standout until she stands out, and she holds her own against Carrey (for some reason he tends to attract strong performances from his female co-stars). Likewise with Harris. Always one of the most dignified actors in Hollywood, his career reached new heights of respect after his appearance as the director of Truman's life.
One more performance worth singling out is Paul Giamatti's. It's a minor one, but it's also the one that started getting him noticed, until he finally became a leading man in American Splendor. Giamatti would reteam with Carrey for Man on the Moon, another highlight for both, in a far bigger role.
The psychology of The Truman Show is tremendous. It's not just a movie that predicted the reality show craze and its hollowness, but about the strength of the human mind. Truman seemingly has every reason to be happy, and yet he isn't, and the more those around him try to pacify Truman, the less happy he becomes. No one understands or cares about his needs. They're just there to maintain the status quo, and that means keeping Truman safely on the set of his show, a small island enclosed in a massive dome. Perhaps you think you'd be flattered to have such a life, but you'd probably wish that you were at least in control of it, and it's not even that Truman doesn't have that, but that you're as much aware that he's constantly being manipulated and doesn't even know it that draws you into the movie as that he rebels without even thinking, without even being outraged about this, that all he wants is to break free of what he's just become aware of, and reclaim something that's been stolen, namely the girl (played by Natascha McElhone, whose defining feature is her eyes, fittingly haunting) he was denied.
It's a movie that makes you think, and richly entertains you, and leaves you with a cathartic ending, and yet you keep thinking about The Truman Show well after it's over. Now, of course, you will probably think that Truman could never have truly escaped his curious hell. Princess Diana had just been killed in a car accident thanks to hounding paparazzi, and that was only the tip of the continuing media frenzy. Truman might escape the set, but he could never evade the press. He wouldn't have the first way of coping with them, especially after his dramatic exit from the show the whole world had watched. If he sued, the trial too would evoke massive coverage, as the OJ Simpson case proved a few years earlier still.
A massively memorable movie on all accounts.
Tuesday, February 5, 2013
Just My Luck
**
directed by: Donald Petrie
starring: Lindsay Lohan, Chris Pine
Released in 2006.
This is a movie that you probably won't know off the bat. It's Lindsay Lohan at the start of her fall from grace, though at no fault on the part of Just My Luck, and Chris Pine at the start of his ascent.
Lohan was a darling as a child actor, whether in The Parent Trap or Mean Girls. When she grew up, like all child actors she suddenly realized that she wasn't a kid anymore, and that all the fame she'd had was based on very innocent roles, so she started to become that much less innocent in her real life. Luck, however, is still very much an innocent kind of movie, not a Disney movie like so many of her previous projects but it might as well have been. It's also one of her first roles where she was asked to carry the movie on her own merits, rather than depending on a studio or gimmick to do it for her. Except it's very much a gimmick movie, too, as the title helps explain.
Lohan's character has all the luck in the world. Pine's has none. Through a movie magic fluke, they exchange luck, and the results for Lohan are supposed to be charmingly hilarious. Except they end up being more embarrassing than charming, at least as anyone who expected something a little more adult from here at this point would have wanted. Like I said, it's not Disney but it's very much Disney, and Lohan hasn't figured out what kind of actor she is outside of the Disney formula that to this point in her career has completely defined her. This is not to say she's untalented, as people tended to start believing once she started asserting herself (the same thing that happened to Jennifer Lopez once she started a pop music career and dared to continue acting). It's just, Luck may have been a poor choice.
For Pine, it's much the same kind of performance he had in Princess Diaries 2, the romantic lead who plays second fiddle to his more famous costar. If people had cared about him at this point in his career, he might have gotten stuck in these roles, and not begun to explore his more edgy side, evidenced in Smokin' Aces and Star Trek (with a transition between the two in Bottle Shock). So it's almost a good thing, as far as Pine's career goes, that Luck was luckless.
Just My Luck is not a bad film, but it's also not highly recommended, except to see Lohan and Pine in transition.
directed by: Donald Petrie
starring: Lindsay Lohan, Chris Pine
Released in 2006.
This is a movie that you probably won't know off the bat. It's Lindsay Lohan at the start of her fall from grace, though at no fault on the part of Just My Luck, and Chris Pine at the start of his ascent.
Lohan was a darling as a child actor, whether in The Parent Trap or Mean Girls. When she grew up, like all child actors she suddenly realized that she wasn't a kid anymore, and that all the fame she'd had was based on very innocent roles, so she started to become that much less innocent in her real life. Luck, however, is still very much an innocent kind of movie, not a Disney movie like so many of her previous projects but it might as well have been. It's also one of her first roles where she was asked to carry the movie on her own merits, rather than depending on a studio or gimmick to do it for her. Except it's very much a gimmick movie, too, as the title helps explain.
Lohan's character has all the luck in the world. Pine's has none. Through a movie magic fluke, they exchange luck, and the results for Lohan are supposed to be charmingly hilarious. Except they end up being more embarrassing than charming, at least as anyone who expected something a little more adult from here at this point would have wanted. Like I said, it's not Disney but it's very much Disney, and Lohan hasn't figured out what kind of actor she is outside of the Disney formula that to this point in her career has completely defined her. This is not to say she's untalented, as people tended to start believing once she started asserting herself (the same thing that happened to Jennifer Lopez once she started a pop music career and dared to continue acting). It's just, Luck may have been a poor choice.
For Pine, it's much the same kind of performance he had in Princess Diaries 2, the romantic lead who plays second fiddle to his more famous costar. If people had cared about him at this point in his career, he might have gotten stuck in these roles, and not begun to explore his more edgy side, evidenced in Smokin' Aces and Star Trek (with a transition between the two in Bottle Shock). So it's almost a good thing, as far as Pine's career goes, that Luck was luckless.
Just My Luck is not a bad film, but it's also not highly recommended, except to see Lohan and Pine in transition.
Saturday, February 2, 2013
The Absent-Minded Professor
***
directed by: Robert Stevenson
starring: Fred MacMurray
Released in 1961.
I watched a lot of classic Disney films, both animated and live-action, growing up, movies made well before I was born. One of the more memorable of the live-action efforts was The Absent-Minded Professor, which is perhaps better known for the odd scientific breakthrough known as Flubber, made more obvious by the title of its sequel, Son of Flubber, and Robin Williams remake, Flubber.
Flubber is flying rubber, something any kid could easily embrace as a concept, but Fred MacMurray, a famous star in his day for movies like Double Indemnity and the TV show My Three Sons, for slightly more sober uses. (If you're still having a hard time picturing him, MacMurray also served as the visual basis for Captain Marvel, the same superhero who would later inspire Elvis Presley's late career wardrobe.)
"Slightly more sober" in this instance apparently means enabling his vintage Model T to fly and making basketball games far more interesting by sticking Flubber on the bottom of the players' sneakers. This means that the team bounces all over the place (like Gummi Bears), an incredible display of aerial acrobatics, and easily wins a crucial game.
So, not very sober at all, but far more sophisticated than simply wadding it into a ball and launching it recklessly into the air, which is what a kid would do.
It's harmless Disney fun, memorable and a fine vehicle for MacMurray. If you can get your kids to acknowledge that the world existed before computer animated films, The Absent-Minded Professor remains reliable family entertainment.
directed by: Robert Stevenson
starring: Fred MacMurray
Released in 1961.
I watched a lot of classic Disney films, both animated and live-action, growing up, movies made well before I was born. One of the more memorable of the live-action efforts was The Absent-Minded Professor, which is perhaps better known for the odd scientific breakthrough known as Flubber, made more obvious by the title of its sequel, Son of Flubber, and Robin Williams remake, Flubber.
Flubber is flying rubber, something any kid could easily embrace as a concept, but Fred MacMurray, a famous star in his day for movies like Double Indemnity and the TV show My Three Sons, for slightly more sober uses. (If you're still having a hard time picturing him, MacMurray also served as the visual basis for Captain Marvel, the same superhero who would later inspire Elvis Presley's late career wardrobe.)
"Slightly more sober" in this instance apparently means enabling his vintage Model T to fly and making basketball games far more interesting by sticking Flubber on the bottom of the players' sneakers. This means that the team bounces all over the place (like Gummi Bears), an incredible display of aerial acrobatics, and easily wins a crucial game.
So, not very sober at all, but far more sophisticated than simply wadding it into a ball and launching it recklessly into the air, which is what a kid would do.
It's harmless Disney fun, memorable and a fine vehicle for MacMurray. If you can get your kids to acknowledge that the world existed before computer animated films, The Absent-Minded Professor remains reliable family entertainment.
Thursday, January 31, 2013
Stranger than Fiction
****
directed by: Marc Forster
starring: Will Ferrell, Dustin Hoffman, Emma Thompson, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Queen Latifah
Released in 2006.
Will Ferrell is perhaps one of the more unlikely movie stars to emerge in the past ten years. He's one of many comics to come from TV's Saturday Night Live, known for skits and characters. Plenty of successful stars have come from SNL, but few of them have been able to sustain movie careers, and fewer still by basically keeping their SNL persona of inhabiting a new bizarre character with each movie appearance. Ferrell rose to success with Elf and Anchorman, but he's managed to sustain his career by continuing much along the same lines. When he deviates, he's less successful. Usually when a comedic actor deviates, it's to try more serious material, as with Robin Williams and Jim Carrey. Ferrell's Truman Show is called Stranger than Fiction, except it's very much Ferrell's version of the career move. It's more surreal than real.
Essentially, the movie is about Ferrell suddenly gaining a narrator in his life. Now, clearly this is not something that happens in real life, unless someone has developed a psychological disorder. That would be Ferrell's assumption as well, except he doesn't stop there. He consults a literary expert (Dustin Hoffman), to figure out what the narration itself may signify given analysis. Eventually Ferrell actually meets the writer who has been composing the narration (Emma Thompson).
The story also involves a romance for Ferrell (with Maggie Gyllenhaal), which is not something that typically happens in a serious way in a Will Ferrell movie. Oddly, it is an undercurrent in a lot of his movies, but there it is.
It's Ferrell doing a Ferrell movie but in a completely different way. Often in some of his smaller roles he's a character who is watching a greater story develop, reacting more than acting, but here it's Ferrell doing exactly that as the main character, and he plays the part to perfection, and it's a complete revelation.
For the other notable actors in the movie, I'll concentrate on Hoffman. As celebrated as he was early in his career, Hoffman tends to be taken for granted these days, but I always find him fascinating. He throws himself into all of his roles. Someone else might have made this one a counterpoint to Ferrell's or even an outright skeptic, but Hoffman keeps the project firmly grounded in reality, where Thompson exists simply to give it the touch of class that people would either not have expected at all in a Will Ferrell movie, or what they would expect from one in which he's trying to be serious. So it works both ways.
Stranger than Fiction isn't quite the triumph of The Truman Show, but it's certainly far more than a curiosity. It will remain one of Ferrell's best movies probably for a long time to come, something to point to not just to demonstrate his range but what he can accomplish when he pushes his natural instincts to heir best and most unexpected limits.
directed by: Marc Forster
starring: Will Ferrell, Dustin Hoffman, Emma Thompson, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Queen Latifah
Released in 2006.
Will Ferrell is perhaps one of the more unlikely movie stars to emerge in the past ten years. He's one of many comics to come from TV's Saturday Night Live, known for skits and characters. Plenty of successful stars have come from SNL, but few of them have been able to sustain movie careers, and fewer still by basically keeping their SNL persona of inhabiting a new bizarre character with each movie appearance. Ferrell rose to success with Elf and Anchorman, but he's managed to sustain his career by continuing much along the same lines. When he deviates, he's less successful. Usually when a comedic actor deviates, it's to try more serious material, as with Robin Williams and Jim Carrey. Ferrell's Truman Show is called Stranger than Fiction, except it's very much Ferrell's version of the career move. It's more surreal than real.
Essentially, the movie is about Ferrell suddenly gaining a narrator in his life. Now, clearly this is not something that happens in real life, unless someone has developed a psychological disorder. That would be Ferrell's assumption as well, except he doesn't stop there. He consults a literary expert (Dustin Hoffman), to figure out what the narration itself may signify given analysis. Eventually Ferrell actually meets the writer who has been composing the narration (Emma Thompson).
The story also involves a romance for Ferrell (with Maggie Gyllenhaal), which is not something that typically happens in a serious way in a Will Ferrell movie. Oddly, it is an undercurrent in a lot of his movies, but there it is.
It's Ferrell doing a Ferrell movie but in a completely different way. Often in some of his smaller roles he's a character who is watching a greater story develop, reacting more than acting, but here it's Ferrell doing exactly that as the main character, and he plays the part to perfection, and it's a complete revelation.
For the other notable actors in the movie, I'll concentrate on Hoffman. As celebrated as he was early in his career, Hoffman tends to be taken for granted these days, but I always find him fascinating. He throws himself into all of his roles. Someone else might have made this one a counterpoint to Ferrell's or even an outright skeptic, but Hoffman keeps the project firmly grounded in reality, where Thompson exists simply to give it the touch of class that people would either not have expected at all in a Will Ferrell movie, or what they would expect from one in which he's trying to be serious. So it works both ways.
Stranger than Fiction isn't quite the triumph of The Truman Show, but it's certainly far more than a curiosity. It will remain one of Ferrell's best movies probably for a long time to come, something to point to not just to demonstrate his range but what he can accomplish when he pushes his natural instincts to heir best and most unexpected limits.
Sunday, January 27, 2013
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
*****
directed by: Andrew Dominik
starring: Brad Pitt, Casey Affleck, Sam Shepard, Jeremy Renner, Sam Rockwell, Mary-Louise Parker, Zooey Deschanel
Released in 2007.
One of my hallmarks of great storytelling is knowing your characters. It's not always essential to base the entire story around exploring these characters so much as what happens to them, but it certainly helps. This is a movie about Robert Ford, not Jesse James. As the title suggests, Ford killed James, and this is an attempt to explain why.
Actually, that's half the fascination for me about Assassination of Jesse James, that it doesn't feature the more famous of its subjects as the lead. In this movie, Jesse James is more myth than man. All his best banditry is in the past. He's actually just a man, but he's most definitely a myth to Robert Ford, who has grown up reading about Jesse and all but fallen in love with him (although that's more implied than explicit). The basic plot is Robert signing up to be a part of Jesse's last big job and the gang's efforts to then fade away.
Now, obviously the notoriety of Jesse James works both ways. He'll have had his admirers. He'll also have had the authorities gunning for him. Robert Ford ends up straddling both, once he finally sees behind the curtain he previously held in front of Jesse. That's how he ends up standing behind the famous outlaw as Jesse stands on a chair to some dusting. It's a moment that's repeated several times at the back-end of the movie, first as it really happens and later as Robert recreates it for the stage. Because it's Robert's movie, it continues after the title event, as the so-called coward tries to come to peace with what he's done.
Robert Ford is portrayed by Casey Affleck, the younger brother of Ben Affleck. Although Casey has cared a pretty respectable career for himself, he's nowhere near the league of his brother. For one, he has a softer voice that he either can't or won't mask. It's an ideal feature for a youthful and naive character like Robert Ford, a sycophant who definitely suggests the sickness of such a role. You have sympathy for him, sometimes, and at others you despise him.
Which is funny, because the man he shoots was not a good man. Well, maybe some people could construe Jesse James in a positive light. In this movie he's played by the bigger star, Brad Pitt. I've long been interested in the career of Pitt. He's filled it with contradictory roles, mostly because he's terrified of being defined only by his physical appearance. Jesse James is certainly one of those contradictory roles, and maybe it's exactly right to cast a big star in the role, to signal to the audience in an immediate way that aside from everything else this was a guy who knew how to draw attention to himself. There would always be a lot more to him than someone like Robert Ford could comprehend, and yet he was also exactly what his historical reputation marks him out to be: a bad apple.
Yet Pitt finds the human in him, enough so that you're forced to remember that in Robert's mind this was a horribly complicated situation. Jesse was a hero to him, Robert's idol, and yet the man didn't live up to the myth. Robert quite deliberately shot him in the back. Pitt doesn't make the role too flashy, which is an underrated specialty of his. Occasionally he'll take a role like in Twelve Monkeys where he's a spastic attraction, but that speaks more to Pitt's range than any particular style. In the end he's exactly what he wants to be, and that's not just a pretty face. Assassination of Jesse James is his best film.
Director Andrew Dominik, who's still only at the start of a brilliant career, hits an unmistakable milestone with this film. It's divisive, because it's meditative where most viewers prefer action or clever characters, but it's also one of the most gorgeous movies you'll ever see. It's also got, behind Pitt and Affleck, plenty of supporting actors you'l love to watch navigate the film, including Jeremy Renner, Sam Rockwell, and Zooey Deschanel.
directed by: Andrew Dominik
starring: Brad Pitt, Casey Affleck, Sam Shepard, Jeremy Renner, Sam Rockwell, Mary-Louise Parker, Zooey Deschanel
Released in 2007.
One of my hallmarks of great storytelling is knowing your characters. It's not always essential to base the entire story around exploring these characters so much as what happens to them, but it certainly helps. This is a movie about Robert Ford, not Jesse James. As the title suggests, Ford killed James, and this is an attempt to explain why.
Actually, that's half the fascination for me about Assassination of Jesse James, that it doesn't feature the more famous of its subjects as the lead. In this movie, Jesse James is more myth than man. All his best banditry is in the past. He's actually just a man, but he's most definitely a myth to Robert Ford, who has grown up reading about Jesse and all but fallen in love with him (although that's more implied than explicit). The basic plot is Robert signing up to be a part of Jesse's last big job and the gang's efforts to then fade away.
Now, obviously the notoriety of Jesse James works both ways. He'll have had his admirers. He'll also have had the authorities gunning for him. Robert Ford ends up straddling both, once he finally sees behind the curtain he previously held in front of Jesse. That's how he ends up standing behind the famous outlaw as Jesse stands on a chair to some dusting. It's a moment that's repeated several times at the back-end of the movie, first as it really happens and later as Robert recreates it for the stage. Because it's Robert's movie, it continues after the title event, as the so-called coward tries to come to peace with what he's done.
Robert Ford is portrayed by Casey Affleck, the younger brother of Ben Affleck. Although Casey has cared a pretty respectable career for himself, he's nowhere near the league of his brother. For one, he has a softer voice that he either can't or won't mask. It's an ideal feature for a youthful and naive character like Robert Ford, a sycophant who definitely suggests the sickness of such a role. You have sympathy for him, sometimes, and at others you despise him.
Which is funny, because the man he shoots was not a good man. Well, maybe some people could construe Jesse James in a positive light. In this movie he's played by the bigger star, Brad Pitt. I've long been interested in the career of Pitt. He's filled it with contradictory roles, mostly because he's terrified of being defined only by his physical appearance. Jesse James is certainly one of those contradictory roles, and maybe it's exactly right to cast a big star in the role, to signal to the audience in an immediate way that aside from everything else this was a guy who knew how to draw attention to himself. There would always be a lot more to him than someone like Robert Ford could comprehend, and yet he was also exactly what his historical reputation marks him out to be: a bad apple.
Yet Pitt finds the human in him, enough so that you're forced to remember that in Robert's mind this was a horribly complicated situation. Jesse was a hero to him, Robert's idol, and yet the man didn't live up to the myth. Robert quite deliberately shot him in the back. Pitt doesn't make the role too flashy, which is an underrated specialty of his. Occasionally he'll take a role like in Twelve Monkeys where he's a spastic attraction, but that speaks more to Pitt's range than any particular style. In the end he's exactly what he wants to be, and that's not just a pretty face. Assassination of Jesse James is his best film.
Director Andrew Dominik, who's still only at the start of a brilliant career, hits an unmistakable milestone with this film. It's divisive, because it's meditative where most viewers prefer action or clever characters, but it's also one of the most gorgeous movies you'll ever see. It's also got, behind Pitt and Affleck, plenty of supporting actors you'l love to watch navigate the film, including Jeremy Renner, Sam Rockwell, and Zooey Deschanel.
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