Ishtar, Wicker Man, Little Man Tate, Win a Date with Tad Hamilton!, Next, Speed, Bowfinger, Deconstructing Harry, Dolores Claiborne

Ishtar
Its reputation as a bad movie is accurate, mostly because scenes in the desert with Isabelle Adjani shrouded in a scarf have an inherent silliness and her performance is anything but silly. But it's not just her fault: The premise of the movie, two songwriting friends who go to Ishtar and find themselves in some political hot potato, gets dumber and dumber as it goes along. What's mostly disheartening about the movie is that the first twenty minutes, of Warren Beatty and Dustin Hoffman bantering back and forth and singing out loud their ideas for songs, are funny in the same dumb-comedy way that's become extremely popular now. The montage scenes that Elaine May makes out of their ideas are often pretty funny, and had she just stuck to that the movie could have probably worked pretty well.

The Wicker Man
To make a movie with some kind of spooky, culty quality to it you may need the added benefit of making your movie in a low-budget way. What drains this remake of any scariness is that the plot and the way it's presented to us has been drained of anything remotely archaic, it's glossy and professional and not at all spooky. (Ellen Burstyn's face make-up is so perfectly applied that you admire its perfection rather than find it creepy or ominous.) It's also bereft of any kind of pleasure because Neil LaBute is so humorless in his approach; many scenes of Nicolas Cage crying out in anguish are effective only in how increasingly funny it becomes to see the seriousness of the movie lacquered on with the stupidity of the plot.

Little Man Tate
The benefit of having actors direct movies isn't that they've been around film sets and have a little on-the-job training, it's that most serious actors -- or actors who care about acting rather than being models -- bring a greater attention to human beings than a director would. The downside is that sometimes these actors are not very familiar with the film medium as an art, so while they may make more interesting and truthful choices regarding characterization and behavior, they can lack an overall sense of the film as an art itself; the film can be conventional while the acting is special.

Jodie Foster's film isn't necessarily a great drama, although it obviously has similarities to her own life. (Interestingly, she casts herself as a downtrodden mother with the prodigy child.) What it has going for it is that it has a great deal of empathy, especially for children (as well as their families). While she gives a certain degree of fairness to both the mother of this prodigy and the academic who sees potential in him, eventually she sides with the mother who lets him just be a kid, but who doesn't challenge him mentally. (The academic who challenges him does so with kindness, but also with an order based on book-reading rather than messy life experiences.)

What Foster lacks is a visual flair; she tries to liven things up with dream sequences and images of the way the boy sees the world mathematically, but her staging is overly obvious -- there are a great deal of wide, open shots to emphasize loneliness and a lack of closeness.

Win a Date with Tad Hamtilon!
It's not the type of movie that knocks it out of the park, but from moment to moment it's an affable affair, both due to the enormously appealing performers and the slightly farcical tone (although, save for Nathan Lane, the timing isn't sharp enough to have the quality of good farce). The movie ultimately adopts the outlook that life can be like a movie even though the "right" choice (picking your childhood love over a movie star) isn't very plausible. It might have been more believable for the girl to go off with the movie star first, be crushed when it doesn't work, and then return to her childhood love. But "love" as a notion of ending up with someone as a result of available options would be too depressing for teenage girls to think about, and this wants the optimism of movies with the "true love" message that makes girls feel happy about their boyfriends who've gone to see the movie with them.

Next
Although the ending essentially makes what excitement the movie has generated pointless it's a quickly-paced B movie. It's not ineptly made, just not very plausible. (For a guy who has a superpower with strict rules there seem to be a lot of exceptions.) There's a pleasantly ludicrous quality to Nicolas Cage as a hero, and he's never bothered me the way he bothers some other people. His hair is absurd and his expressions are too, but he's the definition of a stylish actor, and there's something fun about an actor made famous for his risky, offbeat choices becoming the headline star of Hollywood action movies. There's not much that's clever about the film -- the conceit of looking into the future is pretty hokey and never aptly explained (nor is the generic threat of terrorism, with old-fashioned Russian terrorists to keep from any unsettling qualities invoked from, you know, real-life terrorism). Julianne Moore doesn't have many notes to play, but she does the efficient, calculated professional type as well as you can. And the surprise of Peter Falk would make any movie more enjoyable.

Speed
The cool, icy opening credits made me take notice and think maybe "Speed" was as good as I remember it being when I saw it at eight years old. It turns out the director worked as a cinematographer for Paul Verhoeven, so he would have some experience in glossy thrills. The opening set piece in an elevator, with its echoes of "Silence of the Lambs," is terrifically sustained, and Dennis Hopper and Jeff Daniels fill the movie out nicely. While the idea for the speed-detonated bomb is often exciting, it loses that excitement the moment the bus jumps over that ramp (all the set-up shots make it look impossible). And when they repeat the entire movie as a subway chase for the last 15 minutes it degrades into outright silliness. But there are enough distractions along the way -- oh no, Hopper has an underground money tunnel! -- that make it entertaining, and ultimately it's Keanu Reeves' show. He was never more sleekly beautiful.

Bowfinger
Its good nature makes its shortcomings more acceptable (such as Eddie Murphy's second role as a movie star's geeky brother), and while generally you could say that it's a "satire" of the movie industry it's more specifically satirizing obsession with celebrity and actor pretentions. (There's an exchange of gold when Steve Martin tells Christine Baranski that their film is in a new style, "Cinema Nouveau," and she slowly replies "Ohhh" as if she understands.) Murphy's perfirmance as the movie star reminds you what makes him such a vital, exciting comedy presence (contrasted against Martin's braininess).

Deconstructing Harry
The most jarring thing about it is how full of foul language it is, and then how nonchalant it is about things like prostitution. But it's still as watchable as any Allen movie. The cast seems weirdly dated -- Billy Crystal, Demi Moore -- and Judy Davis' performance is so frenzied it barely resembles a human being.

Dolores Claiborne
I haven't read Stephen King's story, but the characters have been created with such richness that his depictions are sympathetic simply by virtue of his intense interest. The movie has been filmed like a stern melodrama from the '30s -- the stylized, accented performances easily bring to mind Katharine Hepburn (in particular the amazing Judy Parfitt). The cast is incredible, but it's not a stunt assembly; they fall perfectly in their roles. Kathy Bates and Parfitt have the fortune of being able to play two ages, and we can clearly, beautifully see how their relationship changes over time (and how Bates changes from polite and subservient to a hardened woman). The movie will have a sudden burst of violence, as when David Strathairn hits Bates, but more often the drama comes from emotional abuse, how Bates and Parfitt eventually bond over their mistreatment by men, or a bank scene in which Bates realizes her money is gone, or a distressing scene where Strathairn abuses his daughter and her face goes slack when she finally relents. The movie has many beautiful lines, the best being the doctrine that Parfitt passes down to Bates: "Sometimes being a bitch is all a woman has to hold onto." It's definitely a woman's movie, but not necessarily man-hating; even the reprehensible Strathairn character calls his wife the shortened "D," alternating between impotent frustration and wanting her approval. The bleak, rotten blue tones of the present against the warmer tones of the past give the movie a visual beauty.

Love Actually

Love Actually (2003, Richard Curtis)
In what mostly amounts to a cinematic happy pill (a shot of simplistic optimism earned not through depth but from Hallmark schmaltz) the first movie from Richard Curtis gains a degree of levity from his propensity for light vulgarities -- porn stars finding love, a Prime Minister's aid who blurts out "fuck," etc. -- and a cast worthy of more than the gloppy simplicity of his lovey-dovey Christmas movie. (It may Curtis' idea of good writing to have Bill Nighy play an aging rock star who remakes the Troggs' "Love Is All Around" as a Christmas song and also use that song's theme to bookend the movie with images of loved ones reuniting in airports, but it's curious that he would so easily call the song shit -- and it is shit -- and not then be doubtful about the premise of his own movie.)

When it aims to be uplifting it's in a cutesy way that doesn't mean anything, as when a boy chases after a girl he's got a crush on and gets a kiss. That's fine on paper, but when you play it as some major set piece for a movie, and load it up with the pretension of saying that if the kid doesn't chase the girl now he'll regret it for the rest of his life, the movie becomes weirdly top-heavy. Curtis' movie may be thematically and emotionally lumpy, but he's got a keen eye for actors, and a number of them -- Nighy, Emma Thompson and Alan Rickman, Laura Linney -- navigate his script without succumbing to sentimentality, and Thompson in particular injects the most shaded performance of the lot by giving her hurt wife role some weariness. Nighy is an absolute hoot, and Rowan Atkinson and Hugh Grant are both pleasurable in their moments on screen. And in their segments that are shamefully neglected at the ending wrap-up, Linney and Rodrigo Santoro (a beautiful and suggestive actor) manage to give a tragically unworkable tinge to their budding relationship of co-workers whose feelings for each other have been left untouched for years.

Brief Crossing

Brief Crossing (2001, Catherine Breillat)
What is it about Catherine Breillat's films that are so beautiful? Aside from her reputation as a gory porn mistress, she is enormously tender (with the ability to make you feel like you're on the edge of a cliff emotionally and take everything away just as easily as she's given it to you). Her camera, documentary-like but often with poetic placement, observes minor, gentle inflections. She very strongly makes her characters exist in an environment -- here, a ship sailing. And even more strongly she can exploit a situation to great effect, such as one scene where the two newly acquainted lovers sit in a lounge, while the camera observes a magic show in the background with its cheesy mystery music scoring their drinking.

Breillat has a definite type -- dark, lean, nubile young men. But her female characters, demanding to be in the forefront with their frequent proclamations, are just as much of a type, intelligent and world-weary. In this, among the most affecting romance-while-traveling movies, she (Sarah Pratt) laments her age compared to his (Gilles Guillain) mere sixteen years. On their first meeting she seems mildly irritable, accepting his help (in the form of a cafeteria tray) only until she finds a better option elsewhere. As the two become more involved her insecurity around him reveals itself further, despite his gentle nature. With the ending you're unsure if this is a woman who breaks hearts along her way or if she ultimately views him as another in the line of brutes she generalizes men to be. This is a woman who isn't afraid to indulge in an affair, and she's not afraid to continue it -- but who selfishly, mechanically cuts herself off from feeling when it's necessary to do so. That's a lot for Breillat to put forth in the film's final scenes, but she does it, and it rests largely on the searching, wrenching face of Guillain, who frantically comes to the realization that, however cruelly, he's a little bit older now.

Welfare

Welfare (1975, Frederick Wiseman)
The degree to which the film is rewarding is partly based on the inherent drama of people in dire circumstances. Some are irritable, some are manipulative, some are defeated, some are confused, some are driven insane, and some are simply content making conversation while waiting. (The "waiting" aspect is brought poetically to the fore when one subject invokes Godot.) And while Wiseman may not make clear points about his feelings, his subjects often do, as with one white client asking a black security guard why blacks, who account for ten percent of the population, are responsible for sixty-three percent of the crime. We see many immigrants and minorities in the welfare office -- but so too do we see a great number of black security officers. We see a lot of legislative rules that prevent people from getting money NOW, which could be cynically seen as an act to kill off the needy, or push them to the limit so as to get help elsewhere first.

In a world pre-computer, the office is filled with a lot of paper and slips and ultimately disorder, resulting in clients repeating their stories over again, and with increasing urgency they often have a hard time being clearly understood. The officers who work at the welfare office are snippy, evasive (mentioning things to get clients to focus attention elsewhere, like continually suggesting they "come back tomorrow"), some are concerned, and some are interested primarily in their position in the office hierarchy. You would hope that new computerized systems would increase efficiency, transparency, and bring different offices together without endless telephone calls and letter writing, but the human drama -- the way people behave and interact to get what they want -- remains stark, complex, and unobstructed.

Space Cowboys, Finding Graceland, A Night in Heaven, Swimming with Sharks, Son of Rambow

Space Cowboys (2000, Clint Eastwood)
The limitations of Clint Eastwood's skill as a director -- his bluntness, for instance -- are overcome in "Space Cowboys" by the offhand fun in the exchanges between Eastwood, Tommy Lee Jones, Donald Sutherland, and James Garner. That fun never becomes slapstick, it retains some measure of weight -- it's the bullshitting of my father's generation, and the moments requiring a bit of gravity (the diagnosis of an illness, say) are done without sentimentality, but rather a restrained kind of acceptance. The last image in particular, a far-out scene that has the logic of magic realism (unlike the overall plot of the movie, which is mostly preposterous), is neither weighty nor frivolous; it's jazziness in space.

Finding Graceland (1998, David Winkler)
Although it occasionally veers into sentimentality, "Finding Graceland" has some charm to it, and it's a perfectly fine example of a road movie, albeit one tinged with tragedy. (The idea, someone who pretends to be someone else to escape from grief, is certainly good dramatic material. And the bookend structure of bringing closure to broken souls is somewhat touching.) Although Harvey Keitel has the flashier role, it's Johnathon Schaech who gives the movie some off-beat mileage. His angular, distinct beauty seems out of place in the South, and his hairdo sticks on his head like a wig, but he has the cornball innocence of the '50s and that seems right here. He's an enormously appealing actor, and I wish he had a more extensive resume. Keitel, on the other hand, is serviceable in his role, but his hamminess is sometimes grating, as with his overdone accent and his stereotyped squeal-cry of anguish. A performance scene of Elvis' most enjoyable song, "Suspicious Minds," is also undone by Keitel's singing which is most likely lip-synching.


A Night in Heaven (1983, John G. Avildsen)
A sturdy showcase for Christopher Atkins at his hard-bodied, all American boy peak, but the movie is a bit confused in what it's trying to say. When his teacher (Leslie Ann Warren) happens to be in the strip club where Atkins works he gives her an electrifying lap-dance. It might be something that sets the stage for an awakening in her home life, but the movie results in a messagey morality play something like "Eyes Wide Shut" but with a subplot about her husband's career that seems like another movie entirely. For some reason it's decided that Atkins' role must become a character demanding punishment. For what reason? Presumably because, despite the movie featuring a brave image of Atkins' penis during a sex scene, the movie was required to have a pro-marriage stance where no woman having an affair could ever think to leave her partner.

Swimming with Sharks (1994, George Huang)
Too dreary and one-note to be successful in what it tries to do (it comes across as a revenge movie aimed at cruel bosses), it lacks the fun of other boss-from-Hell movies like "The Devil Wears Prada." It attempts some kind of substance by sheepishly suggesting that even an awful boss has his reasons, and its dark and implausible ending suggests that the only way to be successful in Hollywood is to join the other assholes. Some people may find it brave that the movie shows a character who becomes what he loathes, but what little logical support there is for it is flimsy at best, and it comes across more like a movie trying to be truthful by simply being dark.

Son of Rambow (2007, Garth Jennings)
With a premise similar to that of "Be Kind Rewind," "Son of Rambow" has less going on as far as that film's statement on community, but it may be more simply entertaining. There's something pleasurable about watching the film's hero (Bill Milner), a self-styled son of Rambo involved in a do-it-yourself remake/sequel/pirate copy of "First Blood," find himself in situations that require his tiny little body to go flying through the air. It's a more simply heartwarming film than "Be Kind Rewind," something that imbues itself with sentiment so as to be emotionally satisfying to a large audience, but there's nothing that isn't genuine about the young performers in the movie. It's particularly on-target with a French foreign exchange student, styled in the latest New Wave trends, that the British schoolchildren fall in love with (and who is lightly satirized as a fair-weather friend seeking recognition).

Who the Fuck is Jackson Pollock?

Who the Fuck is Jackson Pollock? (2006, Harry Moses)
A similar-styled expose of the art world as "My Kid Could Paint That," except flipped: where that film seemed to be about a fraud, this one seems to be about an authentic work. Teri Horton, the trucker who finds the discarded painting that looks like a Pollock, isn't dumb, but she's not an aesthete -- she's flabbergasted that people could be interested in Pollock's paintings. In many ways the film is drawing comparisons between Horton and Pollock. The art establishment -- by and large made up of businessmen -- doesn't much care for Horton and doesn't believe in her painting. The former director of the Met, Thomas Hoving (a man who contorts his body wildly when examining a painting for authenticity), claims she "knows nothing." The film portrays her as a hard drinking woman who's led an unconventional and sometimes tragic life, including the death of her daughter; it's easier to see similarities between her and Pollock than with Pollock and the Tiffany's heir and Princeton-educated Hoving.

Although the painting has no buyer history, striking scientific evidence seems to point in the direction of authenticity. A finger print on the back of the found painting matches a print on a paint can in Pollock's studio, as well as a Pollock painting in a gallery. A celebrated forger, whose fakes were sold by Christie's, says Pollock's painting method would be too much to think about and says he wouldn't be able to replicate them himself. Standing mostly on principle and turning down offers less than what she imagines the painting to be worth (in the millions), it's perhaps ironic that the painting Horton views as ugly is the same thing that's inspired her for a decade.

Fabulous! The Story of Queer Cinema

Fabulous! The Story of Queer Cinema (2006, Lisa Ades, Lesli Klainberg)
Mostly affirms what we already know, but there are a handful of titles discussed that I was personally in the dark about, mainly lesbian ("Desert Hearts," "Go Fish," "All Over Me," "Watermelon Woman") or black titles ("Punks"). B. Ruby Rich makes the apt observation of how earlier in gay cinema men looked to beefcake physique films, and another commentator rightly laments the loss of the communal theater experience in favor of the DVD market, where going to the theater could sometimes be a gay bar for people who don't go to gay bars.

In the movie's chronological approach it feels as if the major gay films of the '60s and '70s (Warhol, Anger, Fassbinder, Visconti, Jarman, Pasolini, Akerman) are more substantial than what followed, at least until the New Queer Cinema of the likes of Todd Haynes, Gregg Araki, Gus Van Sant, et al. But John Waters makes the point of being interested in films that are more than just gay, as with his satirical idea about a mother who forces her straight son to be gay when he's not. The aims of gay films in the '90s may be to infiltrate the Hollywood mode and provide greater representation in mainstream media. But I don't feel that that has necessarily resulted in good films, and embracing the values of bland Hollywood formulas, even with those political aims, seems to me more like back-peddling from the already astonishing achievements in do-it-yourself, individual filmmaking that resulted from marginalized people creating their own modes of expression.