There are two overriding passions in my life: music and movies. Of late, the former has taken precedent over the latter. I'm not even entirely sure this review will come to anything; the thought has been less than motivating of late. Still, the thing that often drives me is the conflict surrounding a film. Not controversy necessarily, as it tends to relate more to how a conflict exists in film interpretation or reflection. Here, that comes in with the idea of a biopic so convoluted in its aim. It's not a movie about an enormous figure that we all see regularly who speaks to us via interviews on talkshows and performance in movies or recorded music or in government. Sure, Mark Zuckerberg is in the periphery for most or many in that Facebook is and his name is closely tied to it. But it's not a face and personality and idea that we identify so clearly. There are other instances of this, but let's lay the basic groundwork here first.

Opening to find future Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg (Jesse Eisenberg) speaking to a girl, Erica Albright (Rooney Mara), and going down in flames. Going home angry, the idea of degrading women in general passes between Mark and a roommate, and he manages to destroy Harvard's network with a brand new website. This snowballs into the interest of the Winklevoss twins, Cameron and Tyler (Armie Hammer for both), who have been working with Divya Narendra (Max Minghella) to create the Harvard Connection, another iteration of internet socialization that gains primarily from its exclusivity. Mark takes the idea and brings it back to his friend Eduardo Saverin (Andrew Garfield) and they run with it. They quickly bring up The Facebook, and begin to take the world by storm, eventually flashing forward to Zuckerberg being sued by both Saverin and the Winklevoss twins as the story of the website unfolds, in its effects on these people, and the people who wander in from outside--like Sean Parker (Justin Timberlake), alleged co-founder of Napster, who brings flash and world-changing, big picture ideas to the whole thing.

There are, of course, people who circled the film, sniffed it and turned their nose up as they walked away because the film does not represent the real Mark Zuckerberg, Saverin or Parker. Zuckerberg in particular is naturally singled out as the lead character in the film and the most public of all of these figures. Hell, I heard Sean Parker and thought, "Huh? I thought it was Sean something else..."¹ So, with even some more familiar public figures attesting to Mark's personality and the positive qualities thereof, it becomes relevant to some that the film is not particularly flattering to Mark. Well, this isn't strictly true. Allegedly² it mis-characterizes his motivations, and changes all kinds of things, but this comes to the heart of all of it. Ask screenwriter Aaron Sorkin, or director David Fincher, even Eisenberg who plays him--that's not the point. The beginning of behind-the-scenes documentary How Did They Make a Movie of Facebook? is composed of cast and crew noting that it's not "about Facebook." Hammer refers to it as "#5 or #6" on the list of points or ideas the movie is about. And it isn't. This is Aaron Sorkin, he of Sports Night and The West Wing, Fincher of Se7en and Fight Club. Both of them, as pedantic, specific and perfectionist as they can be, are about their art. There is basically no chance they will sacrifice story or art for 'truth' or 'accuracy.' It's not the object for them, and it's not really the object for viewers--unless we're looking at a documentary.³

As entertainment the film is unsurprisingly brilliant. Of course it's not really about the invention of Facebook as a website, it's about the people around it and the ideas of it, and the contrast in the nature of socialization in the world before it and after it, the way it affected the world, the rules, values and injustices of exclusive social circles and systems. It's about isolation, oddly, in particular for Zuckerberg. It's about never learning the social mores, about not understanding the rights and the wrongs of most interactions until seen in hindsight, or misappropriating values from one circle to another, which never works. And Sorkin and Fincher put together a script and film that does all of these things successfully. This isn't a shock from either of them, and Fincher has clearly not lost his most notorious tendencies toward perfectionism: everyone refers to the number of takes for given scenes--often in the high double and near-triple digits. The final effect is fantastic, as he always comes out with movies that feel finely crafted but natural. There is no moment of stilted construction, nor of loose and sloppy film-making. The number of takes manages to bring a familiarity to the actors and an insane level of refinement that simultaneously perfects it.

As one of the formative musical artists of my life, nevermind my aforementioned love of music, it must be noted that Trent Reznor and his frequent collaborator/producer Atticus Ross (who also produced the last album Coheed and Cambria released, which I have to note as they can readily be referred to as my favourite band) produced an Academy Award-winning score for the film. It fits in with Reznor's work for the last two decades, and even easier with the work the two of them have done in the past one. It's a brilliant stroke, which is unsurprising in a Fincher movie, as he almost seemed to single-handedly inform half the public of the existence of the Pixies by either choosing "Where Is My Mind?" as the closer for Fight Club, or at least bringing in the people who chose it. Reznor and Atticus' work has been deeply cynical, dystopian and subtly menacing, and that is exactly what the movie demands. Not because it's humourless, or truly dark and nihilistic, but because of the sense of isolation, the ideas of crumbling relationships and intruding collapse of integrity as Parker brings in the ideas of money and fame and standing over others--"anarchy" in the words of Fincher himself--being the ones behind revolution. Innocence removed, lost or forgotten, trampled in the desire for money and credit and ego. It's carried out but the music makes it clearer, gives us that anticipation and dread the dialogue should not in this context. It's brilliant, and deserving of its award.

The film overall deserves it's accolades, there is no doubt about this. I realize I'm one of the last to see it, but there it is. See it if you would be even more last than me. Make it someone else--and make them get someone else behind them.

¹Shawn Fanning, publicly the equivalent of Mark Zuckerberg if we speak of Napster. To my understanding, anyway.
²I don't know, do I? So, rather than claim that I can either confirm or deny the movie, I leave all of it as alleged for me.
³Debatably, of course. The question rages as to whether the object of documentaries is to be objective or to convey a point of view. Still, people look to those more for the actuality. One hopes more are looking there, at least.

I haven't actually seen many John Woo movies. I own Hard-Boiled, sure, but I've never seen A Better Tomorrow or The Killer or even, as I hoped for a bit while it was in a local theatre, Red Cliff. But this one, being less well-known, I was able to pick up at a serious discount on travels some years ago, and shrugged thinking it must have some kind of redeeming qualities, coming out of the team responsible for so many well-respected movies (I had not, at that point, even picked up or watched Hard-Boiled, so it was as blind a buy, for my personal taste, as could be). The cover art for the Region 1 release is a little out of place, implying a serious action movie filled with gunplay and explosions. It's not explicitly noted that this is a comedy, with simple "code" like "light-hearted" and "mixed with comedy and romance" only just barely alluding to it. Then again, I make it a point to avoid back covers as much as possible, so I was really misled. Or would have been, if I thought cover art was at all representative. I've been known to judge books by their covers (or at least choose whether to read them, most often being drawn in rather than pushed away) but rarely movies. Unless they have an extremely interesting looking monster or creature, but that's neither here nor there in this instance.

Joe (Chow Yun-Fat), Jim (Leslie Cheung) and Cherie (Cherie Cheung)­¹ are three orphans adopted by Chow (Kenneth Tsang) and trained to be thieves. Their current objects of interest are valuable and historic paintings. A crated up Modigliani is their first target, taken only during its transport, in the first of many relatively complicated action scenes. After this acquisition, they take it to its prospective owner, The Frenchman², who wants them to run another job--an extremely profitable attempt to acquire Paul Trouillebert's "Servante du harem," which is also strongly desired by Chow. The Frenchman offers them a substantial sum, but Cherie tries to run interference and mistranslates back to the boys, attempting to discourage the Frenchman and let Jim and Joe believe they are indeed taking up the job. Despite promises to quit, Cherie wants to retire and so Jim starts off to make the theft anyway, though their "Godfather" (Chu Kong) is a policeman who recognizes their good hearts, has also strongly encouraged them to stop. The theft itself is managed quite easily, but the two are caught up in the end and violence ensues, changing how they do things quite thoroughly--in a less light-hearted moment.

I found myself drifting away from this movie at multiple points, perhaps because I was out of practice with watching definitively dubbed movies. By "definitively," I mean that all languages are dubbed, similar to Italian movies in decades past, where all audio is ADR and syncing is not heavily sought after. It's hard to tell if the actors are even speaking Cantonese (the other language track given on the Region 1 release) as there is a slight variance in vocal charater to onscreen character. Of course, it is a Hong Kong movie, so one would think Cantonese was the language of choice, but who knows for certain? No one I can contact, that's for sure. Still, it is a pretty big jump between the two and it made it difficult to concentrate, wondering if I was at least getting a reasonably accurate audio stream to tell me what the intended characters were like, even if subtitles might suffer in accuracy. A nice averaged out medium is often helpful for this, and I had no idea whether I was hearing or reading anything properly. Having the names "Joe" and "Jim" really did not help my impression of the subtitles, as it smacked of laziness in giving the characters anglicized names. In the course of attempting to decipher this, though, I discovered the film is occasionally categorized as "mo lei tau," which is a comedic style most closely associated with Stephen Chow. I have yet to watch his movies, but I always got the impression they were very heavy on comedy. This sort of re-arranged my expectations a bit, though I'd already noticed the movie is heavily oriented in that direction, though it seemed more like a romantic comedy with and action movie jammed into the cracks somehow, which is vaguely disorienting.

The plot is not completely paper thin, but it is still pretty weak and hardly the basis for the movie. It's simplistic heartstring-tugging for all emotional involvement, but it doesn't hold itself as anything more than that. It comes off as a framework to fit in jokes and stunts, a purpose that, in all honesty, it's pretty well suited to. It's fun when it should be, and the action scenes are very Woo, with that hint of reality in amongst the insanely impossible reactions to physics and prescient gunplay from our protagonists (landing and aiming exactly where an enemy happens to be next entering a room, for instance), with bodies that move with the obvious force of physics working against their ridiculously athletic flips and such. A leg that does not maintain a perfect straight line, that sort of thing. It gives it just the right kick of believability alongside everything else to make those scenes that much more exciting.

Overall, it's not a film I am terribly excited about, but there are some gags and stunts that blow the so-so plotting and characters out of the water. Plus, Chow Yun-Fat at the very end is completely worth it.

¹For reasons I looked into but could not find linguistic explanations for, "Joe" is often listed as "Red Bean Pudding" and Cherie as "Red Bean." I'm guessing this is some weird mixed joke where the characters making up their names in Chinese translate as these things but sound acceptable as names despite this. That, or there are actual names there that just translate to this. I have no clue, and not being in on the joke or cultural reference, I'm going to skip doing any more with it than list this information here as a footnote.

²I cannot find any (English) listing for the actor's name, so my apologies to him, but I haven't got a good solution outside of learning Chinese really, reall quickly, which I can't feasibly do (bad at languages anyway) and I am out of contact with the only Chinese speaker I am at all friendly with.

"The Box." That was the name of the interrogation room in NBC's Homicide: Life on the Streets. It was featured in an episode entitled "Three Men and Adena," where Detectives Pembleton and Bayliss go after the man they most strongly suspect of the murder of Adena Watson, with a twelve hour time limit, during which they try every tactic they can think of to get a confession. This episode began to circle my head very early on in a movie about an unsolved set of murders of young girls, and two cops insistent that they find an answer and focusing on the man they believe is responsible.

Captain Victor Benezet (Morgan Freeman) is a friend of lawyer Henry Hearst (Gene Hackman), but finds his story of the discovery and report of the second murder victim questionable when it conflicts with the testimony of other interviewees. Before Hearst is to give a speech at a charity fundraiser, Victor calls him in for "ten minutes" of questions. It rapidly becomes apparent that Victor's genial tones are just a tactic to keep Henry somewhat at ease and pull information from him. His wife Chantal (Monica Bellucci) waits for him at the charity event, but Victor eventually lets in the more aggressive Detective Owens (Thomas Jane), who makes no bones about his own suspicions. The two of them circle Hearst, whose shifting story and reluctance to elaborate on his life do him no good in his continued insistence on his innocence.

I was relatively surprised to see this movie as, well, not quite panned, but certainly looked-down-upon as it is. I could feel the theatrical origins (admittedly, it has none, but that doesn't stop me) and learned appreciation earlier for the "bottled" drama. Of course, director Stephen Hopkins does not actually keep everything enclosed. After all the characters are rounded into Victor's office from more spacious locales, he makes brief exits to visualizations of Henry's recollections of his memories. Victor and Owens periodically appear in those memories to ask questions or observe the events he describes, scrutinizing them for missed details or discrepancies. Chantal wanders in to the police station eventually, which expands the environment beyond Victor's office just a bit.

Freeman and Hackman are brilliant and play their roles to the perfect point of believable straightness--there is no guarantee of what Hearst is hiding, nor what Victor truly believes or is holding back to sling at Hearst later. Going in, the movie can be seen easily as either an innocent man being worn down by insistent police or policemen attempting to wear down a guilty suspect who refuses to admit his guilt. All of Hopkins' interesting choices, like rapid cuts to frame, reframe or emphasize an element and play it up, or Victor's appearance in the memories of others never serve to encourage one suspicion or the other, and nothing but the facts, opinions and comments are built in to the audience's perception of Henry. The film itself is neutral, only serving to facilitate these things, biasing itself only to the current speaker and his or her feelings within a memory or comment.

There's a strange amount of discussion for a pretty clear ending, albeit one that is not completely spelled out. The issue of guilt is established clearly by the end, through evidence that few could really argue with. Some have come up with cockamamie plots and secret ideas about how the murders were carried out, but none are borne out by the evidence that is put on display. There is a certain ambiguity to how the primary characters interact at the end, when guilt is clearly laid out, but it's conveyed quite clearly all the same.

This is a solid movie, cleverly put together without treating its peculiar choices as gimmicks to ride on, and with very, very excellent performances from Freeman and Hackman, both men so certain of themselves but taken around and around as the story unfolds.

Defiance of expectation. I'd say that's the basis of appreciation of a piece of art, but there's too much to be found in satisfaction of expectation. Still, it's the basis for a kind of appreciation, naturally the more surprising variety, or at least unexpected. All of us go in to movies or music with the expectation that some element tells us exactly what we should expect, or at least gives us a vague idea. Some of us use a knowledge base that informs us based on a director, producer or other behind-the-scenes element. Some go from trailers, actors, themes, hunches from general experience of movie going, history, descriptions from others, comparisons made and any number of other sources. Sometimes it's bang-on reliable--few of us who know the name "Michael Bay" are ever surprised by a film that comes out with his name attached as director. Sometimes this is a pleasing comfort, sometimes a stimulus to avoid the end product like nothing else. I have a general wariness of French directors with reputations and Criterion releases. I've yet to see any Godard or Truffaut, for instance. This brings us to Louis Malle, who...quite honestly I had completely misplaced, in terms of his filmography.

Atlantic City is one of Malle's films made after a move to the United States. Lou (Burt Lancaster) is a washed up old hood in that famed New Jersey gambling town, acting as servant to a woman with more money than he, Grace (Kate Reid), who met Lou and his pal "Cookie" Pinza in the city years ago. That marriage and her subsequent entry into a beauty contest have left her with the feeling that she is, or should be, a pampered princess. Across the way from Lou is Sally (Susan Sarandon), from Saskatchewan, who is attempting to work her way up to a casino dealer. Unfortunately for the both of them--or fortunately, for Lou, who harbors a voyeuristic yearning for Sally--her estranged husband, Dave (Robert Joy) and the woman he ran off with, Chrissie (Hollis McClaren), appear in Atlantic City carrying a stolen pound of cocaine and seeking help from Sally.

I realized in looking through Malle's work that I had no idea what his filmography consisted of. This is ridiculous for a number of reasons, and interesting for a handful more. First, my aversion to French filmmakers stems from an Italian filmmaker. This isn't due to any confusion between the countries or in which names come from which country or anything more than a mental association that developed behind the scenes. Fellini's Satyricon is one of a handful of films I simply could not tolerate. Finding that Pauline Kael hated it makes me feel a little bit better but does not really resolve my embarrassment over the nonsensical associations I made. It's not totally out of bounds--the logic went: Fellini was an arthouse director, a renowned one in circles that appreciate such films; Satyricon is a well-liked work of his; Fellini is associated with Italian Neorealism; Italian Neorealism is seen as part of the impetus behind the French New Wave; Malle is associated with the French New Wave, having made films in the same time frame and using some elements from it. This isn't really an excuse, just symbolic of the mess of my understanding of arthouse film in the 60s and 70s.* Sorting this out has led me toward Malle's other films, a number of which I would really like to see, as well as one that may finally provide the key to a question amongst friends: Jeremy Irons seems to be pretty awesome, but what on earth ever told us this? His filmography is beyond checkered and is not like that of some other respectable actors where it was solid until a certain point.

But I digress. Severely.

There was a point to that digression, though. The point is this: I expected to have a strangely half-intolerably slow or ponderous, possibly very internal or overly symbolic film filtered through well-known American actors, or techniques from such films shoehorned in to a more "normal" one, or some combination thereof. Instead, I got the elements of La Nouvelle Vague in an otherwise recognizable film. At least, my understanding of them. It was a pleasant surprise in this respect.

I am familiar with Burt Lancaster as a square-jawed man's man-type actor, but have seen him in nothing but The Professionals up to this point. His performance is fantastic, sliding into the necessary roles for any given emotional motivation in Lou's character throughout. He shifts whenever he enters Grace's presence, whatever that presence means to him at that time, and when he sees the chance to win over the woman he desires, he transforms, but believably, into a slick and suave man of culture--or at least the kind with money and influence. It feels like a perfect revival of the young Lou that we never actually get a chance to see. A guy who uses money or knows how to use it, saw it used, to achieve goals without necessarily holding the culture that he conveys. When he finally achieves almost everything he can think of, the chance to prove he finally "made it" to all his old friends--he falls into a laughable-in-a-saw-way braggart. It's not obnoxious so much as sad, we can see that this is what he wanted to be for all his life, and no one else particularly cares, but he acts as though they not only should, but do.

Sally is caught up in him and between her past with Dave and his current state. Make no mistake: Dave is, to quote Sally herself, "a shit." There's no real way around it. He uses everyone around him, and manipulates everything he can find, but is also too stupid to realize that his skills are imperfect and do not work on everyone. For Sally, though, it's bouncing between the well-intentioned manipulator and the utterly selfish one, slowly tearing down the miserable existence she has set out for herself, which is not much to be proud of, but is still something compared to what it could be, and moving along the road to what she does want for herself.

What's fascinating about the film and instantly noticeable as peculiar when compared to the average American-made movie is the slim, trim soundtrack. There's music, to be sure, but most of the film carries those traditions of the aforementioned schools of film-making: very little music except where legitimately present in a scene, and lots of natural light and sound. The absence of music never feels empty or claustrophobic, it just conveys a solid reality to all the scenes, helped along by a muddled set of characters who do not all seem to be pushing a pre-determined plot toward a pre-determined outcome.

I've mentioned before the tendency of people to decry sports films as having obvious endings--but they simply are binary. The team/athelete wins, or loses, most likely. And here, as with most films, we have the major options of primarily happy or primarily sad ending. Which of these it is does not matter so much as the believability of reaching it, whether the steps and the characters seem to deserve this ending--not morally, but in reflection of the actions they take on their journey toward it; does the work put in by these characters justify their reward, punishment, or normalized and continued existence?

This time, it most certainly does. It's a good ending, happy or otherwise--and I think those descriptions would be imperfect and debated anyway.

*I am also well aware that many of those leaps actually do not follow. Satyricon is hardly indicative of Italian neorealism, after all.

It's funny to think that by 2001, no one had yet named a film simply "Heist" (okay, there's a forgotten one from 1998, but prior to that, shockingly, none, with a few possible translated exceptions). I suppose it's kind of a post-modern title--forget being poetic or unusual or unique, just go minimalist and directly descriptive, and be relatively original (the first few times at least) by ignoring all those expectations and methods of naming. In that sense, then, it makes sense as a film released in 2001. Of course, heist movies are far older than that--Kubrick's 1956 The Killing and Ocean's 11 in 1960 off the top of my head--but they are a reliable source of entertainment for those who like them, and are generally fun for their cleverness, so long as they succeed at intentions.

One of few heist films that start from a heist instead of building to a brand new one, Joe Moore (Gene Hackman), Bobby Blane (Delroy Lindo), Don "Pinky" Pincus (Ricky Jay) and Fran Moore(Rebecca Pidgeon) are not new to thieving, nor to teaming up with each other. In the middle of a jewelry heist, the aging Joe's face is caught on camera when a few steps go off plan. Joe decides this is the end for him, but Mickey Bergman (Danny Devito), who fences most of their loot, disagrees and insists that, before paying the group, they carry out one last heist: Swiss gold being brought in by airplane. Joe is against it and refuses and argues, but relents, and finds himself stuck with Mickey's rather green nephew Jimmy Silk (Sam Rockwell). Friction is generated between the two as Jimmy and his uncle believe Joe is off his game and Jimmy begins to pursue Joe's wife--fellow thief Fran.

I was reluctant to pick up this movie, on the fence because of the solid cast but familiar plot, until I noticed who wrote and directed: David Mamet. If you like Mamet's work (and you should, really), that's enough there, and when it's combined with something that is usually passably entertaining like a heist film and you're pretty well guaranteed good stuff. He keeps dialogue and plotting kinetic and exciting in whatever he does, and even when he doesn't keep you guessing, he fulfills expectations in the most satisfying ways. Mamet films are absolute pleasure, hitting the perfect balance of skill or talent and entertainment. For those who believe in such things, there is no need to bring up guilt with your pleasure, nor is there a need to worry that it will talk over you or just completely leave you in the dust. Your brain is engaged without being overwhelmed, and your appreciation and enjoyment are both satisfied. Your sympathies are put in the right places without the feeling of outright manipulation, as the characters pop and crackle with Mamet's most famous asset--witty dialogue--and become real enough, or at least strong enough projections, to carry all of their actions easily into the realms of believability. This speed and craft is most evident in a film based on deception and confidence games, as the characters slide from internal and real conversations with each other to blatant manipulation of external characters with barely a notice. And then in the third act, you realize that the internal dialogue wasn't always real either, and these characters are all constantly plotting, preparing and being in place for everyone and everything around them.

This is a potent and enjoyable example of heist films that outshines its fellows and manages to feel fresh and interesting and exciting despite coming so late to the party in a very specific genre, without having to resort to redesigning the concept of a heist film. And in many senses, it also manages to be exactly what its' title purports: a perfect crystallization of what heist films are defined as and should aspire to be.

"How did it end?"
"If it had ended, we would not be here."
In some circles, Richard Matheson is a highly-praised name. However, those circles are often the same who bemoan the fate of his novels in film translation. Those circles tend to be small, being as few could identify the author behind The Last Man on Earth, The Omega Man and I Am Legend--much less that all three were based on the same source novel (itself sharing the name of that third adaptation), changed to great degree in all instances, with not a single one retaining the true meaning of the very title of the book. It's with this in mind that I turn an utterly boggled mind toward the "Fox Flix" trailers chosen to adorn the DVD of one of the few filmings of his horror novels that Matheson has not expressed open dissatisfaction with: Batman: The Movie (1966), Bedazzled (2000), Buffy, the Vampire Slayer, and Big Trouble in Little China. Cheese, comedy, horror-comedy and intentional cheese. What on earth were they thinking? The film itself is, while maybe a bit unintentionally campy, hardly portrayed as or visibly humourous. And yet there almost seems to be enough of a theme to suggest the choices were deliberate. Then again, maybe it was simply minimalist thinking of the worst kind: Michael Gough played Alfred Pennyworth in Tim Burton's Batman (1989), so that explains the first, the second and third involve vampires and the devil (ie, the supernatural) and the last...is from a well-renowned horror film-maker? In any case, those have no relation to even the way that Fox themselves portray the movie in menus and cover art.

Mr. Deutsch (Roland Culver) decides to serve himself and physicist Lionel Barrett (Clive Revill) by exploring the idea of "life after death," through the usage of The Belasco House, known as the "Mount Everest of haunted houses." Barrett brings his wife, Ann (Gayle Hunnicutt), and Deutsch sends, additionally, Benjamin Fischer (Roddy McDowall, who had been making something of a name for himself as the apes Caesar and Cornelius), the only one to survive a previous attempt to spend time in the Belasco House and a self-described medium, and Florence Tanner (Pamela Franklin), a minister and another medium. Barrett derides supernatural explanations as nonsense, bringing a machine of his own devising that will purge the building of 'electromagnetism' (once a go-to explanation for many things supernatural). Fischer remains in this only for the money, having seen what the House can do and has done, while Tanner believes she can do something for the spirits of victims she believes are amongst those haunting the House. These motivations are all in opposition to each other, as it is a clinical problem to Barrett, a threat to Fischer and a project for healing to Tanner. These thoughts are eventually the defining traits of each character as the House beings to work its wiles on all of them.

As both a novel (Hell House, by Matheson, of course) and a film, there is endless comparison to Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House and Robert Wise's adaptation thereof, The Haunting (curiously, an inversion where the longer book title is cut short instead of lengthened, as it is here). While both Hauntings could both be considered restrained and polite, The Hell Houses are neither. The film is deliberately "watered down," as the book's events would thoroughly guarantee an X rating, as well as nausea and outright vomit from all but fans of the work of Jörg Buttgereit (one of which I am not), but is still stronger on both major taboo elements--sex and violence--than The Haunting. Nothing is truly explicit, which is hardly a surprise considering the age of the film, which came out a year prior to The Texas Chainsaw, notorious for its "graphic violence," which, in actuality it lacked. Sure, Herschell Gordon-Lewis had started the subgenre of "splatter" with Blood Feast, and Romero's Night of the Living Dead had its own elements, but it was still a good bit of time before graphic effects became a relatively standard trope (and eventually, for many, a tired one) of horror films. So, for a mainstream film, it was still reasonably violent for its willingness to show blood and its portrayal of sexuality as Tanner suffers a twisted form of psychological torture contrasted with her own sexual nature.

Much ado is often made of the ending's revelation. It isn't a horrifying, enormous, gigantic, roaring secret,¹ but that's almost the point. It's petty and stupid because that's the basis for much evil in the world, especially the worst kinds of violence--the need to show control, dominance and power over others where little exists. By the end, though, it's clear, through this revelation, that, despite an early framing around Revill that Franklin and McDowall have stolen the show. Both act in the extreme, ranging up and down and side to side in any and all moments, bouncing here and there and all over, covering and attempting to make up for the elements of their lives outside these terrifying events. Fischer is especially haunted--in either an ironic or "meta" fashion--by his previous time in the House, where he purports that it almost succeeded in killing him. He's tortured by knowing its power and his arrogant assertion that he knows how threatening it is--especially as he insistently remains despite his attempts to convince everyone they are at risk and that he only wants to get out. Revill and Hunnicutt end up relatively bland in the end, with Revill's rote insistence on "scientific explanation," which may or may not carry weight, but that denies any and all supernatural elements for the explanations.

¹If you've seen this movie, you're welcome for that one.

I've no idea, really, how Michel Gondry or Spike Jonze came to my attention. I know I saw handfuls of music videos from both of them when music videos used to air regularly, once upon a time. But at the time I couldn't name the directors of any movies I'd seen, barring, perhaps, Steven Spielberg, so I certainly didn't know music video directors. I know "The Directors" label releases caught my attention, but I ignored Gondry and Jonze, caring only for Chris Cunningham--because, of course, he directed some videos for The Aphex Twin. Still, I think the association was enough to catch my attention in all honesty, and I do think, at least, that it's what planted their names so firmly in my head. While both worked with Charlie Kaufman (which generally sits quite well with me), I didn't know his name either, though Gondry and Kaufman were brought most firmly to my attention with Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. I don't think either name was really entrenched in my list of "names to follow" by the film, but it was definitely a film I recognized at least retroactively.

Mike (Mos Def) and Jerry (Jack Black) have a tendency to hang around the severely outdated video rental shop Be Kind Rewind, owned by Mr. Fletcher (Danny Glover), with Mike actually being employed there. Being in a slum-like building in Passaic, NJ, Mr. Fletcher is threatened with condemnation of the building he occupies, the birthplace of jazzman Fats Waller according to Mr. Fletcher. He goes off to research the video rental business via big-box rental stores (a la Blockbuster) while Mike runs the store. Neither Mike nor Jerry is terribly bright, but Jerry also happens to be a conspiracy theorist, convinced the local power plant is sending out microwaves that are brainwashing the public. He enlists Mike to help him sabotage the plant against Mike's own thoughts, but finds himself alone in an accident there instead, which magnetizes his body completely, leading him to enter Mr. Fletcher's shop and accidentally erase every tape there. When regular Mrs. Falewicz (Mia Farrow) comes in attempting to rent Ghostbusters, the pair is left with no choice but to find an alternate copy of the film. Being so terribly outdated, finding it on VHS is nearly impossible* and so Mike suggests that they take an elderly VHS-based camcorder and re-record the film themselves with homemade special effects. When another customer comes in demanding Rush Hour 2, they take the successful completion of their rendition of Ghostbusters and continue the process. When Jerry refuses to kiss his mechanic Wilson (Irv Gooch), they are forced to recruit the help of local female Alma (Melonie Diaz). Soon it catches on with the Passaic locals and brings them hope for saving Mr. Fletcher's store.

I think a lot of people took from the trailer that the primary focus of the movie was the versions of famous films the boys film with each other. Of course, they do just that, and they are a strong part of the film, but it's a little more of the "heartwarming save the old homestead" trope. I don't mean that as disparaging--insert discussion of the limited number of stories in existence here--but rather to clarify the film's intents, motivations and methods. The device of the "Sweded" films (their term for these "imported" versions) is part of the whole rather than the whole itself. None of them appears in their entirety within the film. It's really about love, love of film (for the viewer and one suspects the cast and crew), love of home (both Passaic and the Be Kind shop), and losing these things to homogenization, legalities and money in general. There are some rather nasty digs at Blockbuster and its ilk when Mr. Fletcher is doing his research--talking about reducing the store to "action" and "comedies." It doesn't paint "West Coast Video" as anyone in particular, nor does it specifically insult anyone working in the imagined store, so it comes off as a general, cultural criticism rather than an indictment of anyone or anything in particular. It's a little more comfortable for that, feeling like a poke at marketing trends rather than pointing fingers at big business X, Y or Z.

There's a very peculiar nature to the relationship between Mike and Jerry. It's a lot more innocent--as the film itself is--than usual, with a relatively PG vocabulary and less clever sniping between the participants. Both of them are really complete doofuses, though. Not utter idiots, but lacking in some things that just about any average viewer would realize or know better how to deal with. It's not condescending to them, though, nor to the viewer. As long as you are willing to take the film and its characters only as seriously as they ask to be taken, it's a good bit of harmless fun. It doesn't feel like we're intended to point and laugh at Mike and Jerry like they are a trainwreck or pathetic, but at their earnestness and willingness to try. Jack Black manages this--just barely--despite my reservations about him as, well, anything. I don't write him off completely (there are few actors I do, possibly none, but he's way up that list, though this makes three movies I have no real problem with him in) but I am very wary of his over-enthusiastic shtick. Jerry, though, is kind of a jerk, so once again Black's natural tendency to be an ass works for the character instead of against the movie. Mos Def is odd, being terribly subdued and almost comatose in the role of Mike, seeming almost like another local--as there are many--pulled in from the area to work on the film. It never comes off as false, just amateurish, even if deliberately so.


But if you can't accept the idea of a video store existing in the modern age, well, this movie is not going to be for you. It's not about "realism" by any stretch of the imagination, something a little refreshing to me in this day and age, taking an utterly absurd accident (the power plant one) and pretending it could have the absurd effect it does. The whole film is that way--the efforts of the boys to film are simultaneously charmingly homemade and yet unbelievably creative and perfectly made. Gondry's specialty is visuals, though, so it isn't surprising. Of course he can put these things all together properly, and make us both believe in them and marvel at them--which is the reason I check out Gondry's work. It's always simutaneously grounded and whimsically awesome--in the sense of inspiring awe, not being "totally bitching."

*I think my copy is still hanging around, actually.

I had two free passes to the local arthouse styled theatre that were running out Monday, so I decided to go see whatever the heck was showing. One film was House of the Devil, a throwback horror film that I truly loved, the other was a film that I thought sounded like the kind I might pick up on a whim (lo, it was released by Sony Pictures Classics, an arm of Sony I trust pretty blindly to do right by me)--this one. I knew the essence of the plot, but tried to keep my readings vague, so as to avoid spoiling any of it, this being my preference when I see any film. I knew only the name Peter Sarsgaard of the primary cast and had never heard of Danish director Lone Scherfig.

Jenny (Carey Mulligan) is a 16 year old prep school student in 1961 Twickenham, London who plans to go to Oxford and then "become French," living in France, reading French literature, speaking French, eating French food, and smoking constantly. Her father Jack (Alfred Molina) discourages her from doing anything that does not further her education (barring those things which are appreciated by acceptance boards at Oxford), even things like playing her cello, which he notes will impress Oxford as a "hobby," but then continues need not be practiced as it is a "hobby." Her mother Majorie (Cara Seymour) tries to smooth things between them as Jenny tests her father's "rules," attempting to reason him into allowing her some ideas. Jenny has a fledgling romance with orchestra-mate Graham (Matthew Beard) until the poor boy makes the mistake of suggesting he might take a year off from school, which does not earn the respect of Jack. One rainy day after orchestra rehearsal, Jenny is approached from a car by a man who offers to at least shield her cello from the rain as she walks home by placing it in his car. Jenny's amused by the man's charm, and he introduces himself as David (Sarsgaard) and strikes up a conversation, eventually getting herself out of the rain alongside her cello in David's sportscar. Slowly taken with him and running into him periodically, Jenny begins to accept offers from David when he gives her the opportunity to experience the culture she so loves and admires--concerts, jazz bars, art auctions and so on. He introduces her to his friends Danny (Dominic Cooper) and Helen (Rosamund Pike), and begins to take her further and further out into the world, all the while slowly romancing her. His charm works even on Jack and Majorie, allowing this to happen with their consent. A trip to Oxford pushes at Jenny's principles, but she finds herself torn between a small moral capitulation and the chance to have a "real life."

Of course, once I saw the cast appear onscreen, I realized instantly that there was another name here I knew very well: Alfred Molina. In fact, this knowledge was humourous to me as I watched Jim Jarmusch's Coffee and Cigarettes and the segment with Molina and Steve Coogan showed, where the joke was how unknown Molina was--when the opposite was true for me. Of course, I also know the screenwriter, Nick Hornby, albeit primarily from the Americanized film version of High Fidelity. Still these were primarily passing knowledge, especially Hornsby and Sarsgaard. The synposis I read led me to expect something far more drastic was hiding behind these scenes than actually turned out, so I was surprised in this respect, and it probably helped to keep my understanding of the film "in line" with its intentions. It's worth noting here that it is an adaptation of journalist Lynn Barber's actual experiences, and that this often shores up some seemingly unusual choices.

The most interesting role by far is that of David, as Sarsgaard is forced, as many have put it, to walk the line between charming and creepy. He is charming and does not come across as purely sleazy, despite being a 30-something man romancing a 16 year old girl, though I did spend half the movie with fingertips placed at my forehead in a sort of preliminary (or perhaps vestigial?) representation of the desire to hide the film from my eyes. I was hideously uncomfortable for a lot of it. I was perhaps too charmed by David myself, but could not shake the feeling that something was very, very wrong anyway. I'm a little more open-minded than most, I suppose, as I roll my eyes at those who called American Beauty a sick film about a pedophile, but I had great difficulty stopping myself from slumping down further and further into my seat and squirming at many moments (the scene involving pet names was particularly excruciating). I can't say it was a flaw, but it was a bit of a problem. I suppose I was really directed very perfectly into the place of Jenny herself, torn between the allure of an exciting life and the responsibility of the one that is hard and boring but theoretically the "best" choice. At the same time, there was a definite feeling that it was entirely too easy to see how she was deceived, and yet wish she wouldn't be. Jenny is not stupid, she is very clever in her interactions with everyone, but she's so thoroughly charmed by David that she's easily taken in by him, but especially because he brings her all the things she wants.


The central concept is the variable defintion of "education," being either the worldly education offered by David or that of Oxford, with various tangential definitions, such as learning about life via the parts of David that were not showing originally. It's a valid argument that Jenny gives her Headmistress--that there is no one telling the students why, exactly, they must get an education--except to go on and use that dull, hard, boring education to live a dull, hard, boring life. It makes the choice of David seem obvious, yet, at the same time, we know (hopefully!) is not so simple as all of that. There's no good argument (at least none I've heard) against Jenny's, but at the same time there's an understanding, for me at least, that other paths are more difficult or simply aren't as good as they seem to be. It's nice that the film doesn't attempt to truly explain or answer this question, even if it does show Lynn Barber's actual decisions and life at the end, what she chooses to pursue and follow for her life. She admits that she has aged but not become experienced or wise because of the events she takes part in, which seems a good way of putting it.

"Throwback" is a lovely little term that is, er, thrown around quite a lot these days. So are terms like "rip off" and "homage," but at least "throwback" is generally a positive term--at least when describing media. I suppose one could use it condescendingly, but it's typically seen as at least neutral, if not generally positive. Horror fans in particular tend to sigh contentedly when using the term to describe a film. Most of us seem to have very set and distinct ideas of what horror film should do based on the ones we saw in our youth. Of course, I was an older youth (if you will) when I began to earnestly watch horror films, so I still can't quite lay claim to such an idea. Still, I was raised less on contemporary films and more on ones made before I was born (or old enough to follow movies). That said, the term usually applies to a tonal throwback, like Wrong Turn (I'm too lazy to double check myself, but I believe I described that film in such terms. You can dig up my review on it if you wish to come back and smarmily inform me I'm mistaken*). This is a throwback of a different kind.

An opening block of text informs us that a great majority of the American population allegedly believed in Satanic cults in the 1980s, and that a large minority believed many of them were covered up. From this, we see young Samantha (Jocelin Donahue) looking at a house she's hoping to move in to under the eye of the home's landlady (Dee Wallace, first of a handful of genre nods in casting). The landlady has a "gut feeling" about Samantha and decides to cut her a deal on the rent and deposit, and Samantha is thoroughly appreciative. As she leaves, preparing to pay the $300 for rent the following Monday, she stops at a public posting board and takes down a slip for a baby sitting job. Calling the number from a payphone in front of her dorm, she leaves a message, only to be called back at the same phone moments later. A polite voice (that of Tom Noonan) answers and agrees to meet her shortly thereafter. She waits and waits, but the man, Mr. Ulman, does not show. She goes to a pizza place to get lunch with her friend Megan (Greta Gerwig), who is protective of Samantha for being mistreated by this callous stranger. When she returns to her dorm room, though, Samantha finds that Mr. Ulman attempted to call her back at the number she left and begs her to come down for the job that very night. Megan takes her out to the isolated house after she agrees, and they agree to split if the family seems too peculiar.

Now, typically, a throwback in the modern age is a modern film that has the sensibilities of an earlier one--avoiding the post-Scream tendency toward self-awareness and "smart" characters (who know not to open "that door" or go down in the basement) and some of the other more cynical elements of modern horror. But they remain very modern films all the same. A huge smile spread across my face as Samantha walked down the street after agreeing to the landlady's terms. Of course, I smiled a little to see Ms. Wallace as well, but it was the opening titles** that really made me grin. They are backed by an 80s synth-beat and matched to grainy stock (I could swear it was 16mm, and a little research confirms this) with periodic freeze frames. I'm not talking "end of a sitcom" freeze frames, so much as the sort of enthusiastic matching of cutting a scene to fit a beat. It's used in a much more hip fashion these days, and often comes to more of a "slow motion" feel than actual freezing, but it's just absolutely perfect. I only smiled more as familiar names bumped in with the clunky yellow credits (the title not being stylized at all, and complete with "MMXVIII" copyright notice at the bottom) that I actually couldn't place at the time but knew I knew. Those names, of course, were Tom Noonan (who has been in a few movies I've seen, but I mostly know as The Monster Squad's Frankenstein) and Mary Woronov (who was a regular cast member for Paul Bartel).

This is a lot of what makes the film. No one is running around listening to 80s hit after 80s hit (only one 80s hit is used, and it isn't one of those intensely iconic ones, though most everyone will know it, and it's used in an appropriate place and way) while they wear Jams, use Valley Girl dialects, feather their hair (okay, hair's feathered, but like it was, not to parody-style excess), play with Rubik's cubes and quote Max Headroom. It looks more like someone found this film in a box somewhere, shelved 30 years ago. It's brilliantly done, with nods and winks, but all of them the kind that you leave you thinking, "Oh, perhaps he was just blinking..." I'd not heard of Ti West prior to this, but I shall have to keep an eye on him. So how does it fit in, really? How is it a throwback? How does it work now? Well, this is a quieter, slower movie (some strange review I read said West seems to want to be "The Terence Malick of horror films," which tickled me endlessly, but seems inaccurate--though I must admit I'd be curious to actually see that, even if I think it wouldn't actually work for horror) and less in the vein of what we often think of as "80s horror movies," and more like the smaller, smarter gems that only horror fans seem to know about. The film that kept popping into my head was the George C. Scott-starring The Changeling, but that was a much bigger film. There are hints of a very competent Last House on the Left, in the sense of not having tons of money behind the film, or perhaps the original The Amityville Horror--as if a director pulled out some competent unknowns and just put together a movie he thought would be scary.

As any review of this film will tell you, the majority of the film is extremely tense buildup. It's "slow" and "boring" if you have that mindset--again, this is why I think of films like the above. This isn't The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, though it eventually builds into that sort of eyeball-clawing tension once the regular suspense finally bursts. It's good to know that going in, I suppose, though I tend to look at any such claims (or the reverse) with a wary eye, as I am reluctant to trust the opinions of others on both what is slow and what is not. But, as the review that mentioned Malick said, faulting the film for being "slow" is silly, as it fully intends to reel itself out slowly. It's not the overly funny (there's not really much humour, unless you just insist on finding the accuracy of it funny for some reason--some think the synth-beat opening is "hilariously hokey" for instance, though I just thought it set the tone perfectly, which does require admitting my ubiquitous soft spot for synth-based scores) sort of horror that we often associate with the 80s, which is why I specifically delineate it as early 1980s, before films like Fright Night took off, and when Friday the 13th was just a single movie. But it's got a little more grindhouse, a little more independence and underdog feel to it to accurately compare to that film (or any other slasher). I also found myself thinking of films like Rosemary's Baby--the more intelligent, less insulting variety of horror that's often occupying unnoticed nooks and crannies of horror shelves in collections public and private. The ones that a big-time horror fan often hands you excitedly and tells you is just fantastic.

It's not amazingly ground-breaking or something fantastically new, but it's something that manages to perfectly achieve the idea of "throwback." The clothing is the way people in smaller 80s films dressed, the camera shots are deliberate and possibly a bit modern, but not distractingly so. The score is good and hits the right notes. The film doesn't wink broadly, nor does it condescend in other ways. Effects, while still physical, are very modern and very well done. It's just right for my tastes, so I'll admit I'm frothing a bit here, in the positive way. I was very excited to see it, and love the fact that a film with such a brilliantly old-school poster (seriously, the poster designs are fantastic, reminiscent, again, of the films it refers itself to) lives up to that feeling of being a lost film from that time. Even Noonan, Woronov and Wallace are just sort of there--as if this was just another of the many genre roles they've taken over the years, and not a clear nod, homage and treat for longtime fans, the way that Tarantino or Rob Zombie might use (and in Zombie's case, has used) them. There's nothing wrong with that approach, but this is something no one else seems to do--truly a "lost" 80s horror movie.



*I know entirely too many people who are now grinning and rubbing their hands together, planning to do just that.
**I've spent the last 20 minutes trying to find out who wrote them, I remember from the credits as I sat in the theatre that it was someone other than the film's primary composer, Jeff Grace, and I found a post by the guy who wrote it on a messageboard, but I can't find his real name. My apologies, sir, I seem to recall you are in fact male (double or triple my apologies if I'm not even remembering that part correctly), but no one seems to list your credit for them!

I felt a colossal idiot one day when watching an interview with Tony Scott and thinking, "Gosh, he has the same sort of dialect as Ridley Sco--oh, crap. Of course." Not my proudest moment, to be sure. Still, it gave my brain purchase to help along my appreciation for Tony Scott as a director. It's no secret that I love Ridley Scott as a director, nor is it actually much of one that I really like his brother Tony. However, Tony is less well-regarded, to put it mildly, with films like Top Gun under his belt. It makes it difficult to bring myself into some circles of film fans when I freely admit to my appreciation of the "lesser Scott" as a director. It's an old appreciation though, as I have seen many of his films over the years, often shortly after they came out, and have always been entertained, if memory serves.

Bobby Rayburn (Wesley Snipes, pre-tax problems and associated outrageous claims, pre-R.C.-has-a-personal-bias-against-him-for-appearing-in-a-series-of-films-that-turn-an-interestingly-psychotic-character-into-a-cool-badass) is a heavy hitter recently traded to the San Francisco Giants for a $40 million contract. This excites lifelong Giants (and baseball in general) fan Gil Renard (Robert De Niro), who is on his last legs as a knife salesman in a company begun by his father but traded into different hands to value value over quality. Gil is also on poor terms with ex-wife Ellen (Patti D'Arbanville-Quinn) over custody of their son Richie (Andrew J. Ferchland), mostly regarding poorly kept appointments, an issue with his job, as well. When Rayburn begins to falter thanks to an injury, the player the team replaced with him begins to rise, Juan Primo (Benicio Del Toro, still riding along in accent-heavy supporting roles). When failed sale after failed sale--partly encouraged by the decision to attend the opening day game and run the risk of missing an appointment--leads to the loss of his job, and the same decisions lead to his neglectful approach to taking care of his son and thus the legal removal of custody, Gil buries himself in support for Rayburn. Overhearing conversations, Gil decides the problem is Primo, and confronts him. Lost in a world that he barely had a grip on in the first place, Gil's obsessions with baseball, the Giants and Rayburn takes him into dangerous and violent territory.

What's magnetic and fascinating about this film is the way that Bobby and Gil are portrayed. There's a greater complexity and reality to them than is usually given in most thriller-styled movies. Rayburn is an arrogant git to be sure, but he's a good player and a reasonable guy. He's a loving father and he does what he can to earn his keep, but is "not nuts," as Gil points out, for taking the salary he does. Gil is especially complex. He's not a simple psycho, nor is he a misunderstood simpleton. Gil is not stupid, but he does not understand or empathize with other people. If I had a psychology degree of any kind, I'm sure I could tell you exactly what sort of disorder he is exhibiting. He values important things, though, at least in principle. His frustration with his father's knife company comes from his expertise in the art of knife-making, but he fails to recognize the world--and thus the company, since it exists in that world--has changed. He values his son, and values imbuing in him the principles that he holds dear. He talks baseball up, and tells lies about knowing Mick Jagger (silly Gil, the version of "Start Me Up" that appeared on Tattoo You was not recorded in 1978, nevermind that you weren't there!) and other similar things. He obfuscates his own past and the importance of the knowledge he has, imparting the wisdom of his former teammate "Coop" as regards baseball.

What's important in making the film work is that Gil's son Richie does not outright fear nor fearlessly love his father. He shows signs that he wants to follow and appreciate him, while maintaining that childlike willingness to occasionally say things that are abrasive and abrupt. He tries to emulate his father even as he shows that he does fear him in places. Gil shows how poor he is at recognizing these things, but Richie continues to want to earn his father's approval anyway, even as Gil's temper easily rears its head. Gil's obsession is realistic and acceptable, so far beyond the pale it's extremely uncomfortable to see, yet perfectly real in this context, and utterly believable. This is the kind of role that De Niro is best suited to: a man with serious anger issues who is not particularly aware of them. The way he loses himself in a role, he does not so much subdue his own character as he manages to make us realize just how much the character onscreen is unaware of his own, well, craziness. Travis Bickle, Rupert Pupkin, Johnny Boy, Noodles--they are all characters who are shocking in their relative depravities, even if they might be placed in a way that we sort of root for them. They are antiheroes, to be sure, and we feel sympathy for them because we know they mean well and are just incapable of recognizing the real world and their position in it.

This, of course, is really the point. Scott's films tend to get middling acceptance--"well-produced but brainless fluff," characterizations of that nature tend to stick to them quite thoroughly. But it's about Gil, and it's about Bobby, about living up to absurd expectations and the different ways that people perceive a collective image or idea like baseball. It's life to some ("better than life," Gil says at one point, "because it's fair.") and it's a game to others, like Bobby. Bobby, despite his distance, despite not being as closely involved with his son, is the better father, not just wanting to care but actually doing so. Of course, it's the isolation--however self-inflicted--that so thoroughly ruins Gil's grasp on reality. Bobby has his agent, Manny (John Leguizamo, who was still working very bland characters in mainstream film, supporting and smaller roles), who supports him even in the downtimes and through personal trauma and professional. While he may be doing it for money, there's clearly at least some regard for Bobby as a human behind it.


This is a very solid examination of obsession, managing the right low-key approach to many of the things Gil does (thanks, in no small part, to De Niro's note-perfect performance), while not at all suggesting the actions involved are minimal in their effects. They are normal to Gil, and the film follows things primarily from his point of view, showing how he thinks that he's doing the right and acceptable things, while everyone else clearly sees the danger--albeit, perhaps, not clearly enough.