Lessons of Darkness

Constructing Past and Present

Mira Nair's Vanity Fair, an adaptation of William Makepeace Thackeray's acclaimed novel, adds a dose of modern "you go girl" feminism" - as well as some Indian flavor - to the nineteenth-century British proceedings. Christoffer Boe's Reconstruction, winner of the Camera d'Or at the 2003 Cannes Film Festival, is a semi-pretentious rumination about love, fate, and memory that revels in its own artificiality. My deconstructions of both are now available online:

Vanity Fair (Slant magazine)
Reconstruction (filmcritic.com)

Garden State (2004)

(Originally published in Rocky Mountain Bullhorn)

In Zach Braff’s sincere Garden State, depressed, heavily medicated L.A. actor Andrew Largeman (Braff) returns to New Jersey to attend his mother’s funeral and winds up embarking on a four-day journey of self-discovery in which he parties with his grave-digging childhood friend (Peter Sarsgaard), falls in love with an idiosyncratic epileptic girl (an adorable Natalie Portman), and confronts his pill-pushing psychiatrist Dad (Ian Holm). For its first half, Braff’s ode to mid-20’s aimlessness boasts a sweet, moody rhythm, capturing the tumultuous frustration born from not knowing how or where one fits into the world. Yet by the time Largeman and his two cohorts find spiritual release by screaming into a mysterious, bottomless Jersey abyss (symbolism alert!), the amiable Garden State – by overusing pop songs to underline every emotional scene and having characters, especially during the limply clichéd climactic ten minutes, articulate the obvious – has withered as a result of overexposure to over-exposition.

Catwoman (2004): D

Tossing history, taste and common sense to the litter box, Catwoman foolishly reimagines Batman’s foxy feline nemesis as a pseudo-hero who, as played by Halle Berry, fights crime while outfitted in a ridiculous, and ridiculously revealing, S&M leather get-up. Berry is the type of actress whose most captivating work is done by her body, and in this debut feature by director Pitof (named, presumably, after a failed perfume), the stunning actress struts and shimmies around computer-generated city skylines as if they were her personal fashion runway. Berry plays Patience Philips, a frumpy graphic designer for a beauty product company, and when she discovers that the company’s new facial crème has some serious side effects (like addiction and facial mutations), she’s murdered by megalomaniacal model/CEO Sharon Stone. Rescued by magical Egyptian cats – which give people breath, rather than stealing it – Patience is reborn as a Catwoman, meaning she transforms into a rubbery CGI monstrosity who, when not pouncing around the frame with Gummi Bear abandon, eats tuna out of a can (just like my cat!) and maniacally coos and flirts with a hunky cop (Benjamin Bratt) who’s hot on the trail of the mysterious crime fighter. Bratt’s cop is so stupid that one can imagine him being endlessly distracted by a ball of twine, while Berry’s whip-crazy heroine amazingly exudes not a single iota of Julie Newmar’s playful sensuality or Eartha Kitt’s purring animalism. Within ten minutes of the opening credits, I felt as though this avalanche of de-clawed idiocy was slowly neutering my brain.

The Watcher (2000): D

Who watches The Watcher? Probably no one, and with good reason. One of the lamest serial killer thrillers of the post-Silence of the Lambs era, this jarringly incompetent film (by music video vet Joe Charbanic) has the bad sense to cast Keanu Reeves – he of the vacant, dim-bulb charm – as a homicidal maniac who moves to Chicago so he can continue playing a cat-and-mouse game with James Spader’s mentally unstable detective. Spader takes meds to ease his migraines and visits a shrink (Marisa Tomei, with duffel bags under her eyes) to discuss the guilt he feels for letting Keanu kill his lover years earlier. Meanwhile, Keanu dances around to Rob Zombie tunes, watches lots of victims and explains to Spader that they’re “yin and yang.” With the killer constantly taunting the cops (after a while, he starts mailing photos of his victims-to-be to the police), Spader’s distraught detective fearing he’s all-too-similar to his criminal counterpart, and more bad camera tricks than one can tolerate – what purpose does it serve to shoot Keanu’s POV shots in digital video? – it’s as if Charbanic wants only to provide a handy compendium of well-worn genre conventions. Unfortunately, to see them all on display, you’d actually have to watch The Watcher and, well, I can’t see any reason to do something like that.

Bloody Hell

Rampant killing is a prominent feature of two upcoming releases, but only one will get your blood pumping. Bang Rajan, an acclaimed hit from Thailand about a famous 18-century battle between the Siamese and Burmese, is a stirring, violent epic about national pride and personal sacrifice. Suspect Zero, on the other hand, is a dunderheaded serial killer thriller about psychic F.B.I. wackos and vigilante justice. My Slant magazine reviews assess the carnage:

Suspect Zero
Bang Rajan

28 and counting

My birthday was this past Friday and, besides celebrating with friends, I spent part of the day writing two new reviews for Slant magazine. My critiques of the awful Exorcist: The Beginning and the unremarkable I Am David (a family film which comes out in late October) are now available for your Monday morning reading pleasure...

Oh, and I've also added a Google Search to the site (at the bottom of the right sidebar), which should make finding reviews and posts even easier.

Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen (2004): C-

I have a confession to make: In the celebrity feud of 2004, I side with Lindsay Lohan and against Hillary Duff. That said, I could barely stand Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen, last year’s pre-Mean Girls Lohan vehicle which – with its inattention to narrative or character development (aside from watered-down after-school special lessons) and maniacal focus on fashion, make-up, and sexualized young girls – is nearly identical to a half-hour episode of Duff’s former Disney Channel program The Lizzie Maguire Show. This excruciating Sara Sugarman-directed fiasco tells the too-cute tale of Lola (Lohan), an obnoxious bohemian and aspiring actress whose mother uproots her from beloved Manhattan to New Jersey, where she has to teach her high school friends and rivals that being yourself is, like, the coolest. It’s hard to even call Teenage Drama Queen a movie, since there’s virtually no story or cinematographic value to this parade of underage, underdressed hotties. Lola models an exhausting array of ultra-fashionable outfits, but her battle against a bitchy rival (Megan Fox) is so mind-numbingly juvenile that it’s difficult to even pay attention to Lola and her best friend Ella’s (Alison Pill) attempts to crash a going-away party for their favorite band SidArthur or the climactic Brittany Spears-inspired high school adaptation of “Pygmalion” which Lola headlines. And if I still haven’t convinced you to avoid this deflating dud, I have another confession to make: My teen movie-loving wife disliked it even more than I did.

Taking Lives (2004): D+

As the late Henny Youngman might have said, if this is what the serial killer genre has come to, take my life, please! Perhaps the most derivative Hollywood serial killer thriller since, um, well, since the last one, Taking Lives involves Angelina Jolie’s pseudo-psychic F.B.I. agent (she lies in victims’ graves to “understand” what happened to them, à la Red Dragon) as she tracks a murderous Canadian drifter who assumes the identities of his fallen prey. From its Seven-inspired opening credit sequence and grime-infused cinematography to its gimmicky villain (highly erudite, loves to play games with the cops), “guess whodunit” plot structure and sexual link between the detective and the deviant, D.J. Caruso’s film is just a ridiculous, rehashed patchwork quilt made from old decaying movie parts. Since there are only two reasonable suspects for the crimes – and one is clearly a red herring – the film eventually shifts its focus to its heroine’s immense lips and undulating unclothed chest. Nothing inherently wrong with that, but with a decent cast including Ethan Hawke, Kiefer Sutherland, Gena Rowlands, Olivier Martinez and Tchêky Karyo, it would have been nice if the filmmakers had come up with at least one narrative surprise that didn’t involve Jolie’s T&A. As it is, Taking Lives won’t kill you, but it will steal precious hours you’ll never have back.

Godsend (2004): C

Here are the three things I learned from Nick Hamm’s Godsend: Don’t ever let your kid hang out alone on a New York City sidewalk while you sign a credit card receipt in a store; don’t ever trust Robert DeNiro if he offers you a deal too good to be true; and don’t ever attempt to clone your child unless you’re absolutely sure that the test tube tyke won’t be demonic. Somewhere inside this idiotic horror-thriller is a debate about the moral implications of human cloning, but Hamm’s allegiance is to frightening, not enlightening, his audience. Unfortunately, that goal goes wholly unaccomplished. Greg Kinnear and Rebecca Romijn-Stamos are Manhattan parents who partake in Dr. DeNiro’s 21st-century Frankenstein experiment when their 8-year old son is killed in an accident, but after relocating to the quiet, anonymous suburbs with their new baby, they slowly learn that their genetically manipulated offspring may have a nasty little satanic streak. Alas, the kid (Cameron Bright) – despite a naturally disturbing face (check out how far apart his eyes are!) – is no Damien, Godsend is no The Omen, and this pudgy, obvious DeNiro is definitely not the one I grew up admiring.

Good, Bad and Brown

While I still haven't seen AVP yet (sorry Wawa!), I have caught a few films in the last week. Below, you'll find DVD write-ups for The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra and Fifty First Dates, as well as reviews of the new theatrical films Napoleon Dynamite and The Manchurian Candidate.

But if that's not enough, I've also got an advanced review of Vincent Gallo's already infamous The Brown Bunny over at Slant magazine. Is it the disaster Roger Ebert claimed it was after last year's Cannes film festival, or a heady (hehehe) masterpiece? The answer is a mere click away...