Nat'l Board of Review is Looking Up

The National Board of Review prides itself on being the first awards service to grace the Fall Movie Season. You have to wonder about an organization that honors the best films of a given year when there are still four weeks left in that respective year. That said, this is the first award that can be considered a "big deal", Oscar-wise. After all, last year's NBR winner (Slumdog Millionaire) went on to win the Best Picture trophy. Here were there choices this year:

BEST PICTURE: Up In The Air
BEST DIRECTOR: Clint Eastwood, Invictus
BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY: Joel Coen & Ethan Coen, A Serious Man
BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY: Jason Reitman & Sheldon Turner, Up In The Air

Top 10 Films of the Year
(Well, Top 11 if you count Up In The Air):

500 Days of Summer
An Education
The Hurt Locker
Inglourious Basterds
Invictus
The Messenger
A Serious Man
Star Trek
Up
Where The Wild Things Are

Hmmm... No Precious is a bit of a surprise, and they certainly love Invictus more than other people seem to. The Messenger and Star Trek are also surprising, I guess, but the NBR always likes to be the first awards body to make an audience go "Wha???".

BEST ACTOR: (tie) George Clooney, Up In The Air
AND Morgan Freeman, Invictus
BEST ACTRESS: Carey Mulligan, An Education
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR: Woody Harrelson, The Messenger
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS: Anna Kendrick, Up In The Air
BEST ENSEMBLE: It's Complicated
BEST BREAKTHROUGH ACTOR: Jeremy Renner, The Hurt Locker
BEST BREAKTHROUGH ACTRESS: Gabourey Sidibe, Precious

No Mo'Nique for Best Supporting Actress is a little bit of a shocker (but Kendrick was so good also, so I can't really complain), and the only attention they gave Precous at all was Sidibe's win for "Breakthrough Actress". Will The Messenger have as big of an awards' presence as the NBR seems to think it will? I don't think so, but that's what these early awards circles are about: leading us astray.

So here's what we know now: Up In The Air is now a serious contender for Best Picture, and so is Clooney for Best Actor. I still think Precious will hold on through this, but this wasn't a good start. I was excited that Carey Mulligan got some recognition (though it only cements that Tilda Swinton's work in Julia will get ignored), and I hope she won't get abandoned at the last moment like Sally Hawkins was last year (for her greatness in Happy-Go-Lucky). Glad the awards season is started!

Trailer Watch: The Last Station

This is the latest arrival of the Oscar hopefuls and possesses a tremendous cast of actors (Plummer, Giamatti, McAvoy, and Mirren). Michael Hoffman's latest film seems a bit stuffy on the surface, but if early word and this trailer seem to suggest that there is a lot more here. It seems funny and sexy, even without a performer that is either funny or sexy. I'm excited about it, and it could be a very serious player come January and February.

Fantastic Mr. Fox (***)

FANTASTIC MR. FOX
Directed by Wes Anderson

***

Wes Anderson has never made a film I have disliked. He's been working since 1996's Bottle Rocket, and has made six films overall. Each film has been touched with the same flavor of detachment, smugness, and a golden ear for classic rock. Many film lovers have become perturbed by Anderson's seemingly stunted creativity, stating that all of his films have become to similar in style and theme. With Fantastic Mr. Fox, we are given Anderson's first stab at animated filmmaking, and many see it as Anderson's opportunity to outgrow the similar nature of all his films. But Anderson's got another trick up his sleeve.

Mr. Fox (George Clooney) is a world-class chicken thief, but when Mrs. Fox (Meryl Streep) declares to him that she's pregnant with their first child, Fox decides to give up his dangerous lifestyle for something a little more practical. Two years later (twelve fox years), Fox has reinvented himself as a columnist for his local newspaper and has a teenage son named Ash (Jason Schwartzman). The Fox family lives comfortably in their foxhole, but Fox refuses to live in poverty. Despite the imploring of his lawyer, Badger (Bill Murray), Fox decides to move his family to an uptown tree.

Fox enjoys the prestige of his tree, and he's particularly happy when his nephew Kristofferson (Eric Anderson) comes to stay with them for a while. Kristofferson is a world class athlete, practices yoga and meditation, and has all of the qualities that Fox needs in a son. Fox's love for Kristofferson only creates a bigger divide between him and Ash, who was unfortunately born without all of the gifts Fox and Kristofferson were blessed with. When Fox and his possum friend Kylie (Wally Wolodarsky) decide to re-enter the chicken-stealing business, he brings Kristofferson along for the ride, further enraging Ash.

Fox begins barking up the wrong tree, though, when he decides to steal from the three notorious farmers Boggis, Bunce, and Bean, who inspired this children's rhyme: "Boggis, Bunce, and Bean/ One fat, one short, one lean/ These horrible crooks/ So different in looks/ Were none the less equally mean". The three, particularly the cold-blooded Bean (Michael Gambon), plan furiously to kill the nefarious Fox. They use everything from bulldozers and dynamite, and before long, the entire animal society is threatened by the three men. With everyone looking to him for answers, Fox must find a way to outsmart smart these farmers once and for all.

The biggest trick that Wes Anderson pulls here is that he isn't pulling any tricks at all. There is nothing about Fantastic Mr. Fox that separates it from The Darjeeling Limited thematically or The Royal Tenenbaums stylistically--other than the animation, of course. It contains all of the dry, sardonic dialogue we've come to know from Anderson's films (he co-wrote the screenplay with Noah Baumbach), and while following the plot elements of the original novel by Roald Dahl pretty closely, there is really none of the essence that Dahl had in his book.

I don't know if Anderson is a fan of Roald Dahl (I know I am, but that's a story for another day), but he certainly isn't interested in recreating Dahl's vision. If anything, he's interested of telling Dahl's story in his own vision--which I'm sure will rub some people the wrong way. The biggest grenades that Anderson's critics usually lob is that he has not evolved his style, and Fantastic Mr. Fox is certainly an act of stubbornness in which Anderson so fully embraces the lackadaisical nature of his previous films. He's drawing a line in the sand here and we have to choose to follow along or just move on.

That said, it's a very quaint, funny movie. The dialogue runs sharp and ironic, and nothing ever seems out of place. It moves briskly, and has plenty of tension when it needs it. The characters of Ash and Kylie give the film its strongest laughs, while Kristofferson and Mrs. Fox give it some true heart. The food pillaging scenes are shot with great adventure in mind, and using his usual staple of British Invasion pop songs in the background, everything has an air of nostalgia and grooviness simultaneously. Essentially, you'll like this movie for the same reasons you liked every other Wes Anderson movie.

I said I've never disliked a Wes Anderson movie, and I stand by that statement. I will admit, though, that I probably enjoyed Fantastic Mr. Fox the least out of the six. It's a bit inconsequential in nature, and at times seems at odds with its own genre (children's films). There are moments of self-reflective mocking, pointing the finger at its own wholesome nature. The violent nature of the animals and "cuss words" are dealt with curiously. This film is the closest thing Anderson has ever come to an identity crisis. It must really mean something when you're least impressive film is not much worse than your most impressive. In Anderson's case, they've all been exceptional, so he's got that going for him.

Precious (***)

PRECIOUS: BASED ON THE NOVEL 'PUSH' BY SAPPHIRE
Directed by Lee Daniels

***

There are some films that are so bleak that they'll make your head spin. They pile on the most harrowing aspects of life, and create a world so horrible that it barely seems like reality. Is Precious one of those films? Almost. But more times than not, it is able to keep its head above water and let in moments of sunshine. Precious has a heavy load of hype atop of it, which makes it hard to watch objectively, but it is certainly one of the most powerful films of 2009--even if I'm not sure if it's one of the best.

Clarice 'Precious' Jones (newcomer Gabourey Sidibe) is morbidly obese, illiterate, and pregnant with her second child--both given to her by her faceless, incestuous father. She lives with her mother Mary (Mo'Nique), who is sad sack of bitterness and violence. Mary beats her, makes her cook all the food, and advises her to quit school so she can pick up some more welfare money. Few movie characters are more emotionally and physically abusive than Mary, and she has numbed Precious to the point that violence has becomes passe.

When her school learns of her new pregnancy, they kick her out and tell her to attend the alternative school "Each One, Teach One". There, she meets her new teacher Ms. Blue Rain (Paula Patton) and an assortment of degenerate young women hoping to get their GED. They learn to read, they learn to be civil, but probably most important, they develop friendships. In addition to her new classes, she is forced to meet with a social worker Ms. Weiss (Mariah Carey--yeah, that Mariah Carey), and explain what has happened in her life and how it has effected her poor student work.

When Mary learns of Precious' new school and newfound ambition, she is instantly antagonistic towards it, explaining that Precious is too dumb to expect anything from herself. She should just go on Welfare, Mary says. After the birth of her second child, Precious begins to see the brighter aspects of life after befriending her classmates and a friendly nurse named John (Lenny Kravitz--yeah, that Lenny Kravitz). Precious realizes that she must try her hardest to rid herself of her painful past and try to start anew. To do this, she has to do her best to separate herself from the monstrous Mary. This is something that is much harder than it looks.

I mentioned earlier that Precious is a film that is so harrowing that it barely fits reality. Actually, there are a great many fantasy sequences throughout. The only way Precious can overcome her violent situation is to escape toward vibrant fantasies that embody all of her biggest dreams: to be a superstar, date a light-skinned man, star in a hip-hop music video. These moments comprise some of the very best moments in the film, but also draw upon its harrowing nature. The character of Precious is dealing with such a litany of psychological issues, that even a two-hour film can't properly explain it.

Perhaps Precious' biggest flaw is that director Lee Daniels (producer of Monster's Ball) tries a little too hard to visualize all of Precious' pain. Not only does this lead to rather sad movie, but it also lends to various sequences of over-direction. There is a mixture of flashbacks, surrealism, and musical intervention that clash so often, and I'm not totally sure how effective it is. Any visual motif used more than moderation can become distracting, and Daniels certainly runs his motifs into the ground.

It should be said, though, that Daniels does an astonishing job directing his cast. Dealing with mostly first-timers and non-actors, the actors involved create a world tragedy, while never falling deeply into melodrama. Patton and Carey are exceptional as the two women who choose to right Precious' ship, neither relying on obvious acting, just simply reacting as the events unfold. In her first film, Gabourey Sidibe is given a hell of a responsibility, and she doesn't totally hit it out of the park. As the performance has settled with me, though, I've realized that there couldn't have been a better way to show Precious' total numbness. With a angry glare glued to her bloated face, Sidibe wraps Precious in a sheet of self-loathing neurosis, and she does a good job of doing so.

The show-stopper is comedienne Mo'Nique as the vile, repulsive Mary. Mary hates Precious for "stealing her man", and makes Precious wait on her like a slave: cooking her food, even lying to social workers in order to get more Welfare money. When Precious' therapy leads to their Welfare getting cut off, Mary's ticking time bomb of contention bursts into a mushroom cloud of hatred and violence. In the film's single greatest scene, a defeated Mary tries to explain her horrid behavior to Precious and Ms. Weiss. I won't give away any more details of that particular moment, other than this: it may single-handedly win Mo'Nique a Best Supporting Actress Academy Award.

Precious is certainly the most talked-about film this year. It's being endorsed by Oprah Winfrey and Tyler Perry, and has gotten serious Best Picture buzz. Much like Slumdog Millionaire last year, this makes it nearly impossible to walk in theater with the appropriate expectations. Everything has doubled (or even tripled) since this movie premiered at Sundance this January and everyone was calling it a sleeper pick for the Fall. I don't know, this movie just didn't blow me away. It didn't wreak me emotionally, leave me wanting more. It's a very good film, just not a great one.

Note: This film was originally named 'Push' after the novel it was based on. But when that horrific film of the same name came out earlier this year, Lee Daniels decided to change the name to 'Precious' to avoid confusion. Can't we make a law that forces us to forget all films as horrible as February's 'Push'? Seems strange that 'Precious' would have to conform for that piece of crap.

Trailer Watch: Crazy Heart

Is Jeff Bridges on the way to his very first Oscar? Too early to say, still, but it could be his time. This trailer certainly promotes the movie as 2009's version of The Wrestler, but Bridges is not carrying a load of "should've had a better career than I have had" baggage (the way Mickey Rourke was last year). No, Bridges has been just as good as we expected him to be, and a lot of times even better. Now, he's in a rather bait-y vehicle, starring as a grizzled country singer seeking redemption. Seems like the perfect equation for an Academy Award, since there's no gay performances up for anything. (Oh wait, forgot about Colin Firth...)

For Your Consideration: Tilda Swinton in 'Julia'

Using my nifty Netflix instant account, I was able to see the Tilda Swinton film Julia. My initial reaction was shock (with how good it was), then there was reflection (about how good it was), and eventually glee (with discovering a movie that was so good). After all that hyperbole, I will make this one confession: I did not enjoy the movie itself, as much as I loved Swinton's spectacular performance.

I don't think there has ever been a movie character as wrong-headed, stubborn, or irresponsible as Julia (played by Swinton). If there has been, then I probably walked out of the theater in frustration. Falling down a slippery slope of kidnapping, extortion, and even murder, the story within Julia moves so quickly (well, as quickly as a film can move in 143 minutes) that we almost forgive her incredibly dumb decisions. She lacks forethought and empathy, but for some reason she is riveting and audiences won't be able to stop watching.

Swinton is a great actress, we all know. But with Julia, she is submerging into her truly transgressive core. In films like Orlando and Female Perversions, she took full advantage of her androgynous allure and vulnerability on screen. Even in Michael Clayton (for which she won the Oscar), she shows how unafraid she is to look unflattering. Yet, there is something incredibly enticing about her when she's on the screen, and Julia may very well be her greatest achievement. Her character is an alcoholic, sleeps with men precariously, has debts owed to various people, and decides in one moment to kidnap her neighbor's son. So why do we want to watch this woman for more than two hours? Because Swinton commits fully to this troubled woman and makes her tragic. As she digs herself deeper and deeper, we know that there is no way she'll be able to escape her situation, but we always hope that she'll find a way.

'Julia' is yet another Swinton performance that makes you rethink her position on the Great Actress Pantheon (yeah, I think about these kinds of things...)

The film was from 2008, but distribution problems prevented the film from being released before earlier this year. Because of that, most people have yet to see Julia—though those who have mention Swinton just as glowingly as I do. In a fair world, Swinton would be getting some serious Best Actress traction (and other than Carey Mulligan, Swinton is the only other actress who I would nominate today), but I don’t think she’ll be able to overcome the strong influence of veteran actresses like Meryl Streep (for Julie & Julia) and Helen Mirren (for The Last Station), or subvert the growing buzz for the newcomers Mulligan and Gabourey Sidibe (for Precious).

So, I guess all I can say is this: watch the film. It’s a stunning piece of work by a filmmaker who I’m not familiar with (Erick Zonca) but has a concrete vision. Also, you get to see what I think could be the seminal performance from one of today’s best actors. FYC: Tilda Swinton in Julia.

An Education (****)

AN EDUCATION
Directed by Lone Scherfig

****

Within the film An Education, there is a performance of spectacular grace and beauty. That performance comes from Carey Mulligan in her first starring role. It's the kind of performance that will make her a movie star, if we're all lucky enough. Of course, I'm not saying anything new. People have been praising Mulligan for her performance in this film since it premiered at the early film festivals like Cannes. What hasn't been said enough, though, is how fantastic the film is on the whole. Based on a screenplay by the superb novelist Nick Hornby, An Education is one of the best films of the year.

Set during the budding years of the 60's, the film is about Jenny (Mulligan) a sixteen-year-old school girl whose charm is only surpassed by her unbound work ethic which allows her to achieve exceptional grades in all her classes. Of course, this is something she has to do because her meddling father Jack (Alfred Molina) will accept nothing less than Jenny getting into Oxford. Jack makes sure that she does everything she needs to do to achieve: makes her study instead of listen to music, makes her take up the cello as a hobby, and even dismisses possible boyfriends who seem like nothing more than "wandering Jews".

Coming home from cello practice, Jenny gets caught in the rain and is approached by a much older man who offers to give her a ride home. This man is David (Peter Sarsgaard), and he takes an almost immediate liking to Jenny. He asks her if she would like to accompany him to a classical music concert, but she knows that her father will never allow it. David arrives at Jenny's home, and within a matter of minutes, he begins to throw his indelible charm at Jack. Not only does he get permission to take Jenny to the concert, but even gets permission to keep her well past her curfew.

Jenny meets David's posh friends: Danny (Dominic Cooper) and Helen (Rosamund Pike) and they have a wondrous night on the town. They smoke, listen to jazz, and eat good food at fancy restaurants. For the first time, Jenny is experiencing life outside of her textbooks and she's become intoxicated with it. She becomes intoxicated with David as well, even though he is nearly twenty years older than her. When rumors of her "new boyfriend" begin to reach the ears of administrators at her all-girl boarding school, she is warned about the consequences of her actions. Jenny must decide between the conservative, safe path of books and universities or the dream life with David.

Hornby has always been a gifted writer (High Fidelity remains one of my all-time favorite novels), but this is probably his most polished effort solely as a screen writer. An Education is a much more entertaining film than its trailers seem to display. It goes beyond the ho-hum coming of age tale most audiences will expect, and instead is a fiercely emotional, legitimately funny story about the many lessons life can teach us. It never mulls around in sentiment or melodrama. It trusts in its characters and their personalities just enough that the audience falls in love with them--even if they are scoundrels (or turn out to be scoundrels).

This is the first film I've ever seen by Danish filmmaker Lone Scherfig (though she has a film on her IMDb page--Wilber Wants To Kill Himself--which seems intriguing based on title alone) and what I believe is her first English language film. I appreciate the modesty with which Scherfig tells the story, never allowing the camera to get in the way. Not to say that the film isn't filled with visually stunning shots and exceptional work by cinematographer John de Borman. Visual work this subtle and unobtrusive very rarely gets acknowledged, but it's the prudence behind the camerawork which makes it so perfect for this film.

The film contains what is probably the greatest ensemble of performances so far this year. As Jack, Jenny's micromanaging father, Alfred Molina is allowed to express himself in histrionics at times, but always gives Jack that small glimmer of self-awareness that always redeems him. As the less-than-genius but glamorous Helen, Rosamund Pike is quite brilliant. Witty but simple, judgmental but sweet, Pike gives a performance which is just as star-making as Mulligan's. Emma Thompson and Olivia Williams both give small but effective performances as administrators at Jenny's school, both showcasing adverse reactions to Jenny's budding rebellion. As David, Sarsgaard is quite good as well, even if his accent isn't exactly stellar*.

But I won't kid you, this film is the undeniable showcase for Carey Mulligan. In a premiere performance, Mulligan's beauty and charm hearkens back to the performances from Audrey Hepburn and Grace Kelly in the late 50's. Perhaps it's better that Mulligan was twenty-two when playing the sixteen-year-old Jenny, because that transformation (that education, if you will) feels so organic. We feel for Jenny even in her moments of most naivete. Watching Mulligan in An Education is like watching the beginning of something that is sure to be great. Like seeing Brando in Streetcar or Meryl Streep in The Deer Hunter. I will be shocked if she isn't given an Oscar nomination (and I'll be disappointed if she doesn't win it all).

I loved the practicality in this movie (which may be a round-about way of saying I simply love this movie). Hornby and Scherfig were a perfect combination it seems, and their collaboration lead to something not only beautiful but invigorating and impactful. Some could say that An Education is drab (that's what I thought when I saw the trailer), but its the meticulous nature with which the story evolves that makes it so entertaining. Sometimes the lessons we learn in life are hard, but they will not always be disparaging. I feel that most people will take the lesson Jenny learns in this film, if it required the same curriculum.

*I can't decide which was worse: Ewan McGregor trying to be American in "Men Who Stare At Goats" or Sarsgaard trying to be English in this film. In both cases, the accents are so bad that you eventually just shrug your shoulders and give up. Not worth getting worked up over those types of details.

The Men Who Stare At Goats (***)

THE MEN WHO STARE AT GOATS
Directed by Grant Heslov

***

What do you think when you hear about a film with a title like The Men Who Stare At Goats? Certain things can be assumed: it will be well humored (probably silly), it will possess an ensemble cast (mostly men, of course), and it will probably be unlike most films that you've ever seen. Grant Heslov's latest film checks all of the items on this presumptive, make-believe checklist, but it's what the film does that isn't expected that makes it exceptional. An unforeseen human story and a spectacular cast helps the film rise above its goofy title, and creates one of the funniest movies of the year.

When journalist Bob Wilton (Ewan McGregor) meets with an eccentric man named Gus Lancy (Stephen Root), he hears stories about reading the future and killing hamsters using your mind. Bob dismisses Gus and his tales of Jedi warriors, and is more worried about details in his home life: his wife is leaving him for his one-armed editor and he has lost that fire that once inspired his journalism. In an arbitrary attempt to impress his ex-wife, Bob goes into war-ravaged Iraq in hopes of finding a gripping story to write about. Instead, he finds Lyn Cassady (George Clooney).

Bob remembered Lyn's name when Gus Lacey was talking about the best Jedi warrior. Lyn has a reputation: he can crash computers with his mind, burst clouds in the sky, and once murdered a goat just by staring at it. Bob decides to follow Lyn on his latest Jedi mission, which includes driving through the dessert and getting kidnapped by Iraqi criminals. Facing fierce characters and constant danger, Bob finds the adventure he was looking for only to decide he'd rather not be there. Tagging along with Lyn, Bob finds the perfect story in the perfect disaster.

Bob and Lyn's journey is inter-spliced with flashbacks detailing the US Army's First Earth Battalion, where Lyn was trained in his Jedi ways. A military division created to promote passive, sometimes paranormal actions in the battlefield, it was lead by Bill Django (Jeff Bridges) who preferred to have the men in his division meditate, collect flowers, and dance during training. Lyn was the main prodigy within this experimental division, but the jealous Larry Hooper (Kevin Spacey) was always on his tail. After Larry botched an attempted experiment with LSD, Django was fired and the First Earth Battalion was disbanded.

The film begins with the caption: "More of this is true than you would believe". I'm still a bit skeptical, but I don't think that really matters. The film is directed by Grant Heslov, a filmmaker (and character actor) who has worked many times with Goats' main star George Clooney. Heslov was the co-writer and producer on Good Night, and Good Luck and the producer on Leatherheads. Now, he is directing his own feature, studio film and has called on his buddy to help him out. These stories of friends helping friends in Hollywood always makes me feel fuzzy inside, especially when they produce such quality films.

Does the film stumble over its final act? It most certainly does. But the film's final moments only cement a whimsical exuberance that exists throughout the entire film. It's hard to take a film like Goats, which possesses such unrestrained playfulness, and resolve it with something that doesn't feel contrived. Heslov instead chooses to take that playfulness and push it even further by the film's end (which includes a deliciously hilarious closing line by Spacey which I will not reveal here), and I'm not sure whether or not that's a bad thing. But I enjoyed it, so take that and make what you will of it.

The film's cast is probably its strength. Clooney--who is in the middle of a busy season which will later include Up In the Air and Fantastic Mr. Fox--is certainly funny as Lyn Cassady, but what's surprising is how strongly Lyn becomes the heart of the movie, and we never even realize it till the end. As neurotic journalist Bob Wilton, Ewan McGregor gives his best performance in several years (and it includes several layers of irony, since the actor behind Obi Wan seems increasingly skeptical of Jedi warriors). Both Bridges and Spacey are great in supporting roles, particularly Spacey who gives his first meaningful film performance since his Oscar-winning work in American Beauty (I should probably be honest and admit that I loved him in K-Pax, but that's not the most popular opinion).

The Men Who Stare At Goats inspired a lot more laughs than I thought it would. It felt a lot like Three Kings to me (for obvious reasons), but it's not nearly as profound. I'm not sure this movie was meant to be profound, though it does have some identity issues. Jeff Bridges reinventing The Dude seems to suggest straight comedy, but there were moments where there was actual social commentary (though never fully exploited). All these questions/doubts, are nitpicky in nature, and don't matter in the large scope of things. Because this is a good movie, and those are pretty hard to come by most of the time.

Trailer Watch: Green Zone

A LOT of people are adverse to the style of director Paul Greengrass and his shaky, handheld camera movements. What's hard to dispute, though, is the quality of his films this decade (the last two Bourne films, and the brilliant 9/11 film United 93). This trailer seems a bit more "summer action flick" than I would like, but it has a great cast (Matt Damon, Amy Ryan, Greg Kinnear) and I don't think Greengrass has made a bad film yet. It's sure to be a taught thriller, and whether or not the story will be sound is still yet to be discovered.

P.S. Yes, I've seen the released trailer for Clint Eastwood's Invictus yesterday, but there's nothing that I learned while watching it. We've essentially known everything about this film for about a year.

How many times can Werner Herzog go crazy?

Who thought that Harvey Keitel's 1992 film Bad Lieutenant needed to have a completely unrelated sequel? Evidently, Werner Herzog does. It isn't surprising if you're familiar with the reputation of Herzog. This is the same man who once threatened to kill star Klaus Kinski and then threatened to kill himself on the set of Aguirre, The Wrath of God. He is an eccentric to the max, the kind of guy who always seems to be in middle of all kinds of chaos (including getting shot by a sniper with an air gun during an interview, seen here). So, all that said, it seems like an almost perfect decision that Herzog would direct the new film Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans.



The film seems to possess an almost manic energy and a complete dismissal of reality. In the lead role, Nicholas Cage seems completely let loose, playing a cocaine-snorting cop who's seeing images of iguanas and making jokes toward drowning inmates. It feels like utter anarchy, and though there seems to be absolutely nothing of substance within the film, it seems incredibly intriguing. I'm actually considering paying money to see Herzog and Cage combine for a nihilistic experiment in sadism. Why? Because Herzog is at his best when he has gone crazy--and he's gone crazy quite a few times.

**In total fairness, Herzog has directed two documentaries this decade: Grizzly Man and Encounters at the End of the World. Both are beautifully crafted and have a much more subdued feeling of "crazy".

Trailer Watch: That Evening Sun

Hal Holbrook built up a lot of good will with one hell of a performance in Into The Wild. He was only in the film for a small fraction of the time, but in that limited space he reminded most people just how good of a performer he can be. That was in 2007, and two years later, he is headlining That Evening Sun, and getting several good notices. I'm not sure how many people are interested in a film that has an eighty-four year old in the starring role, but I doubt this film was produced for the box office intake. The trailer exults a Flannery O'Conner-esque Southern Gothic, and who doesn't like that? (The Answer is: most people, but I'll still be in line to see it)

A Serious Man (***1/2)

A SERIOUS MAN
Written, Produced, and Directed by Joel Coen & Ethan Coen

***1/2

If we are to believe that the Coen Brothers are the seminal filmmakers of their generation, it is mostly because of a style that they pioneered. A style that has stayed consistent throughout their careers and really defined them as true autuers. I feel that even the most zealous followers of the Coens may not know what to make of A Serious Man. Their careers are some consisting of almost twenty films that are the very definition of eccentricity. Yet, I feel that with this film they may have crafted their most mystifying, and most philosophical project to date. They are breaking the mold here, and trying something different.

Larry Gopnik (Michael Stuhlbarg) is having a lot of trouble in his life. He is a physics professor who is on the verge of being tenured, but their seems to be a few things still standing in his way. A clueless student of his tries to bribe him into giving a passing grade, and though Larry refuses, the tenure board begins to receive anonymous letters disparaging him. At home, Larry's family is becoming unglued. His troubled brother Arthur (Richard Kind) is sleeping on the couch and won't leave. This burdens his entire family, particularly his harpy wife Judith (Sari Lennick).

One night, Judith tells Larry that she wants a divorce, and that she has been having an affair with his fellow colleague at the university, Sy Ableman (Fred Melamed). Judith is cold in her delivery, advising him to find a lawyer and move into a motel as soon as possible. Larry has a son, Danny (Aaron Wolff), who is weeks away from celebrating his Bar Mitzvah, but prefers smoking marijuana and listening to Jefferson Airplane on his transistor radio. His daughter, Sarah (Jessica McManus), only cares about washing her hair, but this task is made difficult when Uncle Arthur will never leave the bathroom.

Larry doesn't know why all this trouble seems to be simultaneously raining down upon him, and he seeks desperately for the answers. He visits several rabbis of various ages and one tries to compare life to a parking lot, while another tells him a meaningless anecdote about a dentist who saw Hebrew letters in a man's teeth. The most respected rabbi in his neighborhood refuses to even speak with him because he's too busy "thinking". He is becoming overwhelmed, and the only thing he has going for him is watching his neighbor Mrs. Samsky (Amy Landecker) sun bathe in the nude.

Beginning with No Country For Old Men and especially after Burn After Reading, many of the Coens' biggest fans began to wonder why their films were beginning to drift into incoherency (at least plot-wise). Yet, everyone was still behind them, putting their trust into their filmmaking abilities. A Serious Man will probably test Coen fans more than anything else they've ever done. It is something different then there usual work, something more personal. For the first time, they seem to be looking into a bit of their history, i.e. 1960's Midwest Jewish suburbia. And for the record, they are not looking back with a very kind eye.

Perhaps it is simply that the film is under-viewed (there are no stars in the cast, and I don't think there could be any above modest expectations at the box office), but I'm surprised that more Jewish representatives have not stood up in protest against this film. The religion is seen as shallow and nothing more than a romantic ideal. Of course, I feel the Coens are actually going after religion in general, and Judaism just happens to be what the subjects follow in this film. The character of Larry is searching the depths of his humanity to discover what in his life has prompted Hashem (God) to punish him so, and he can't find an answer.

Despite a rather large cast, the film is mostly a showcase for actor Michael Stuhlbarg. A Julliard-trained, Tony Award-nominated actor, Larry Gopnik is his first starring role in a feature film, and he will be an actor to watch. Stuhlbarg plays Larry with fantastic nuance, and is probably the single reason why A Serious Man does not come off the tracks. In the small role as Larry's conniving but slothful brother Arthur, comedic character actor Richard Kind gives the film some terrific strangeness and Fred Melamed's performance as the surprisingly softhearted "other man" has some of the best comic moments.

A Serious Man never lets up, and it never feels that Larry has had enough. In a lesser filmmaker's hands, the film could have become terribly disjointed (and to be completely honest, it still kind of is). That said, the film contains several flashes of brilliance common in a Coen Brothers movie. There's quirk and laughs, juxtaposed by the darker elements of paranoia and grief. On a single viewing, it's very hard to tell what A Serious Man is truly about, and many would say that the Coens don't even care. I would say that they care very much, and they expect you to work very hard to figure it out. It's hard to fault anyone who doesn't want that responsibility.

Up In The Air (***1/2)

Up In The Air
Directed by Jason Reitman

***1/2

I don't like flying in planes. The anxiety of being up in the air so high plagues me weeks before any planned flight. I actually lose sleep in anticipation of flying, so I try to avoid airplanes if I can help it. Up In The Air, Jason Reitman's latest film, is about a man who is the exact opposite of me. He adores planes so much as to consider them his home--actually more than that. He sees planes as a sanctuary which allows him to hover above (literally and figuratively) the confines that come with everyday aspects of work, family, relationships, etc.

Ryan Bingham (George Clooney) is a representative for a company that specializes in career transition counseling. In essence, he fires people, and the way things have been going with the economy lately, business is booming. He'll visit your office, and meet with sometimes upward of twenty people to tell them that they've been let go. Ryan has become numb toward the raw, sometimes violent emotion he has to face from hostile ex-employees, and is willing to endure anything at his job as long as he is able to continue his lifestyle in the air.

His lifestyle is threatened, though, when his company hires Natalie (Anna Kendrick). Natalie is fresh out of grad school, and comes up with a new, cost-cutting strategy: fire people over the internet. Using webcam-streaming technology, you can put yourself right into the room with the people you're meeting with and you don't even have to leave your office. Ryan is immediately hostile, defending what he considers to be the nuance of his job. There is an art to what he does, and all the charm is lost if his face is a computer monitor. His boss, Craig Gregory (Jason Bateman), tells Ryan that he must take Natalie on assignment to teach her the ropes. Ryan is burdened, but is more than happy to explain to her just how useless her ideas are.

Off they go, and Natalie sees first-hand just how good Ryan is at avoiding human connection. He's charming and can get women, including Alex (Vera Farmiga) who is an equally disconnected frequent flier who likes to meet up with Ryan in between flight connections. But he is not tied down to anything, and though Natalie tries to explain to him the values of being with another person, he is stringent in his feelings against monotony. "The slower we move, the faster we die," Ryan says at his many conference speeches. Even his family, which includes a younger sister Julie (Melanie Lynskey) who is getting married soon, feels like they have no connection to Ryan at all.

The film is based on the book of the same name by Walter Kirn. Kirn's novel was quite idiosyncratic and had a story that stumbled over several conflicts that Kirn never commits to. Reitman really compresses the story, and unloads some of the many conflicts, which allows the story to flow more and have a real focus. Using a spectacular cast, Reitman takes a story that could have been tedious and makes it something truly refreshing. Containing serious wit and three-dimensional characters, Up In The Air is one pleasurable cinematic experience.

It is only Jason Reitman's third film, after Thank You For Smoking and Juno. The son of comic film legend Ivan Reitman, Jason has a great ear for humor, but an even sharper eye behind the camera. Like Smoking and Juno, there is a real delicate attention paid to the characters, and though their mouths were not spewing out Diablo Cody's loaded dialogue, they speak with swift effectiveness and never seem contrived. Much in the tradition of Robert Altman, or more directly Alexander Payne, it is the characters that are the driving forces behind the film's themes, and this allows them to unfold in a very organic way.

Of course, great characters are nothing if they aren't filled out with good acting. Even minor characters are supplied with wonderful performances--specifically, JK Simmons and Zach Galifianakis have great one-scene cameos as fired employees. Anna Kendrick (who I don't remember, but IMDb says I should have seen her in Twilight) is a revelation as Natalie. She looks like she's twelve, but rides an emotional roller coaster throughout the film that may have seemed a bit egregious if left in the hands of someone less talented. Vera Farmiga, an actress who seems to be forever a bridesmaid, is a wonder to watch as the catty Alex. She's a sexy seductress one moment, and then a shielded businesswoman the next. She may be on her way to an Oscar nomination.

Which leaves us with George Clooney, who I think is the very best movie star in Hollywood today. He's charming and funny, but has enough gravitas in his record to be seen as a serious actor. He has been a part of some great movies this decade, both in front and behind the camera, but Ryan Bingham may end up being Clooney's signature role and part of me feels it should be. Sure, Michael Clayton and Syriana expressed a darker side that many didn't see from him beforehand, but it is Clooney's playfulness that has made him a household name. Up In The Air allows him to flex his dramatic muscles, sure, but the performance reaches its peak when he is allowed to heckle and flash that wonderful grin. Ryan is an instinctively flawed human being, but that doesn't mean Clooney has to mope around the whole time.

Parts of the third act felt slow to me, and some moments were a bit more sentimental than I would have liked, but I guess this is part of the film's sensible appeal. The resolution will seem anticlimactic to some, but I didn't mind it that much. The film is filled with such break-neck poignancy and puts itself into a corner that is hard to get out of in the end. I feel that a less confident filmmaker would have punctuated the film with something more banal in fear that most of the audience would have felt jaded otherwise. I feel the ending is a good decision, one of many good decisions that add up to an exceptional film.

The Women

Could 2010 be the very first year that more than one woman is christened with a Academy Award Best Director nomination? In the history of the Oscar, only three women have been given the Best director nod (Lina Wertmuller, 1976; Jane Campion, 1993; Sofia Coppola, 2003), but none of them were ever considered serious contenders to win. This year, there are three women filmmakers who are serious contenders to get recognition for their directing. There's action film veteran Kathryn Bigelow (The Hurt Locker), the Danish filmmaker Lone Scherfig (An Education), and a familiar face: Jane Campion, who made Bright Star, her best film in over a decade.

We all have the same feelings about Oscar: we all say that it doesn't have great significance in the long run of film history (Hitchcock, Kurosawa, P.T. Anderson, to name a few, have ever won one). The truth, within Hollywood circles, is that everyone wants one. But the golden statue could be particularly coveted by women filmmakers. Not because they want awards more than men, but specifically because they've never been given it. When Sydney Portier became the first black man to win a Best Actor award, it was considered revolutionary. When the first woman, white or black, wins Best Director, I assume it won't get the same amount of hoorah, but it should.

Bigelow directing in the desert...

I've seen The Hurt Locker, and feel that it was probably the greatest film made about the Iraq war. It was understated, methodical, and wondrously created. Bigelow, best known for her films Point Break and Strange Days, allowed the film to take its time which gave room for the characters to fully encapsulate the tension and obsession that comes with war. It was different from any war movie I'd ever seen, and I'd be very disappointed if she isn't recognized. I've yet to see An Education, but I've announced my love for Campion's Bright Star here. I won't delude myself into thinking that two of them, let alone all three, will be nominated (not with the big dogs like Peter Jackson and Clint Eastwood releasing films later in the year), but there is no denying that this year will give a lot of exposure to women filmmakers. Hopefully, Mira Nair's horrible Amelia won't set them back twenty years.

Amelia (*)

AMELIA
Directed by Mira Nair

*

There are a handful of people in history that you can just name and think "I'd like to see a movie about this person". Amelia Earhart is one of those people. Unfortunately, Amelia seems to be a film made by a bunch of people kicking around the idea about a film of Earhart, but with no idea how to execute it. The result is a stunningly boring film containing absolutely no characters, just caricatures.

It's not like the film does not have pedigree. It stars Hilary Swank in the title role, and has Richard Gear and Ewan McGregor in supporting performances. It also is directed by the visual seamstress Mira Nair, the filmmaker behind Monsoon Wedding and Vanity Fair. I'm not sure though, how much any of these people actually care about the story of Earhart, because what they produce is nothing more than a surface-y costume biopic that has no interest in telling a functional, engrossing story. Instead, viewers are forced to experience one of the most misguided film experiences of all time.

The film starts when Amelia is introduced to her future husband George Putnam (Gere), a feisty, opportunistic publicist who plans to make Amelia the female Lindbergh. She crosses the Atlantic (as a passenger, not a pilot), and is the first woman to do so. This does not satisfy her hunger for the air. George and Amelia fall for each other, and together they make her a public relations darling and product spokeswoman which supplies them with the money to fund her flying. After she successfully flies her own plane across the Atlantic, she becomes the most famous woman in America.

As she becomes a worldwide celebrity, she attracts the attention of fellow aviator Gene Vidal (McGregor). The two exchange knowing glances of passion, and before long indulge in their attraction. When George discovers the affair, though, Amelia quickly ends it, and realizes how much she has with George. Amelia convinces George to finance her next project: a flight around the world. She has the help of expert flight navigator Fred Noonan (Christopher Eccleston), who has a bit of a drinking problem. I think we all know what happened when she went on that flight.

If my plot summary felt vapid and unpoetical, it is only because the film itself is so completely convoluted and empty, that you're left with nothing but a fifth-grade picture book about Amelia Earhart. The film cannot focus on a central conflict. There is Amelia's struggle to thrive in a male-dominated profession (this includes combating the blatant misogyny of George). There is the romantic conflict, where she becomes torn between two men. Then, there is the conflict dealing with the difficulty of her flights--which, as we all know, was what lead to her demise. The film does not commit to any of these conflicts, and all are horribly underdeveloped. There is a scene where Amelia explains to George that she is free woman, who can't be held be "even the most attractive cage". The filmmakers expect us to just accept this as the major conflict, but it is simply too weak.

If we accept Amelia as an honest portrayal of Amelia Earhart, then we are also expected to believe that Earhart was nothing more than a unsuspecting adulteress who spoke in nothing but the most abominable cliches. She doesn't seem to possess anything in the way of emotion, which is interesting because she seems to smile and cry a lot--sometimes simultaneously. Perhaps most of the blame can be placed on Hilary Swank, who gives the most sluggish performance of her career, but she's not the only one to point the finger at. McGregor and Gere are equally mediocre, and Nair's direction is particularly lazy. There is absolutely no effort put forth by any of the filmmakers to capitalize on some of the more compelling opportunities the Amelia Earhart story presents. Which is a shame, cause its such an interesting story.

The last act has some punch, and Eccleston gives the only performance of substance, but the film never really encapsulates the aura of aviation I feel it should have. The Aviator kind of raised the bar for movies in that regard. The early word was that Amelia was going to be an Oscar bait film, and Swank was an early prediction for Best Actress. I could assume that the production of Amelia was probably rushed for its Oscar campaign, and I'd like to think that instead of simply that the filmmakers are mediocre. I wondered throughout the film why the characters of Amelia and George sounded like the Kennedys, but then I remembered: this film does not care about why something is, just that it is as much as possible.