MOVIE REVIEW
My Big Break (2008)
Bryn Mawr College
A young man moved into a house share in the Los Angeles suburbs in the 1990s and — to demonstrate his filmmaking skills with a camcorder, no script and no money — began documenting his housemates. They were also young men, all jobbing actors newly arrived in Hollywood looking for their big break. Two of them, Brad Rowe and Chad Lindberg, got steady and noticed work in films and television, and the third, Greg Fawcett, had an unshakable belief that his turn was right around the corner. The fourth was Wes Bentley.
Director Tony Zierra then turned this prototype reality-show footage into a film called “Carving Out Our Name,” which was shown at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2001 before being sunk by lawsuits and studio fear, among other things. This movie actually opens with Mr. Zierra smashing up the master reels of that first movie before urinating on them.
Continue reading “Hollywood Screen Kiss-Off” »
MOVIE REVIEW
I Need That Record! (2008)
Brendan Toller/Unsatisfied Films
Independent record stores — as with most independent retailers — are dying out. Small chains simply can’t compete with big-box or Internet retailers on price or the “long tail” — the ability to stock small amounts of the majority of items, which sell only very small numbers. But what they lack in mainstream success, the smaller shops make up for with a synesthetic shopping experience that simply can’t be replicated elsewhere. Some call this heart, others authenticity, still others community spirit.
Director Brendan Toller taps into the longing for this experience in “I Need That Record!” via the owners of Record Express and Trash American Style, two shops near his hometown in Connecticut. Record Express’s closing was the impetus for the film, in which Mr. Toller went on a road trip to other small record stores in Illinois, Ohio and Massachusetts to discuss how the music industry and retail markets have changed, and what small store owners are doing about it.
Continue reading “Die Fidelity” »
MOVIE REVIEW
The Men Who Stare at Goats (2009)
Laura Macgruder/Overture Films
Welsh author and documentarian Jon Ronson’s 2004 book “The Men Who Stare at Goats” examined the U.S. Army’s investigation of the psychological and paranormal and their potential uses in modern warfare. Utilizing this fascinating study of top-secret military research as source material, director Grant Heslov delivers an entertaining picture, albeit one which slightly trivializes the underlying seriousness of its content.
Continue reading “Paranormal Activists” »
MOVIE REVIEW
(Untitled) (2009)
Parker Film Company/Samuel Goldwyn Films
What is art? Can a thumbtack on an otherwise blank wall be a picture? Can someone kicking a bucket filled with chains be music? Most of us with great reason would say no. It takes more inherent talent to make art. Listen to “Trout Mask Replica” by Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band — 58th on Rolling Stone’s list of the 500 greatest albums, published in 2003. You may think there’s lots of improvising going on, but these songs were notated and practiced in order to be played the exact same way every time. Crazy, huh? Go to any modern art gallery, and you will more often than not see an entire display of large white canvases with one red dot or some variation thereof. It can’t be art if every single painting looks the same, right? Now, listen to Chuck Berry’s “School Days” and “No Particular Place to Go.” Pretty similar, yes? And have you seen Monet’s haystack series — different times of the day and year, but the same ol’ haystack?
Continue reading “Siblings Rival in Tortured Artistry” »
MOVIE REVIEW
44 Inch Chest (2010)
The Times BFI 53rd London Film Festival
“Sexy Beast” scribes Louis Mellis and David Scinto team up once again with acting talents Ray Winstone and Ian McShane for a well-observed study of the male ego. Those hoping for a sequel of sorts will find themselves in aurally familiar territory, but this is a very different beast and it’s anything but sexy.
Continue reading “Decline Gets Better With Rage” »
MOVIE REVIEW
Where the Wild Things Are (2009)
Warner Bros. Pictures
Spike Jonze has spent years putting together this ambitious adaptation of Maurice Sendak’s “Where the Wild Things Are,” one of the iconic staples of 20th-century children’s literature. In so doing, he and co-writer Dave Eggers have had to find a way to transform a 337-word story into a full-length feature, padding out the themes of loneliness and mischievousness that characterized Mr. Sendak’s exploration of the child psyche.
Continue reading “Bless the Beasts and Children” »
MOVIE REVIEW
The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009)
Liam Daniel/Sony Pictures Classics
Any picture associated with directorial visionary Terry Gilliam is always going to rouse the public’s attention, yet the tragic death of Heath Ledger midway through filming has ensured that the name “Doctor Parnassus” has been on everyone’s radar for more than 18 months. Much has been made of Mr. Gilliam’s fervent determination to finish the film and particularly the ingenious casting of Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell to fill Ledger’s void. Mr. Gilliam executes it with gusto, and — as should be expected from such an auteur — transports the audience into a visually fantastical world tinged with a didactic message about the importance and power of the imagination.
Continue reading “Double Dare the Devil” »
MOVIE REVIEW
Law Abiding Citizen (2009)
John Baer/Overture Films
In director F. Gary Gray’s revenge thriller “Law Abiding Citizen,” the vengeance is front and center. Acts of payback that range from robotic sniper machines to limb dissection keep the momentum in gear, the gory red stuff smeared like graffiti in surprising amounts. The plot’s crux involves a loving suburban father (Gerard Butler) who waits 10 years to wage violent retribution against the legal-system players (led by Jamie Foxx as a hotshot assistant district attorney) that let a murderer — the greasy, abhorrent deviant who killed the father’s wife and daughter — walk free. That Mr. Butler is behind bars as the plan unfolds lends an air of implausibility.
Beyond that, it’s difficult to grip any semblance of narrative fat. The cat-and-mice game orchestrated by Mr. Butler’s Clyde Shelton is so overpowering that any human elements are lost in the bloody translation. As his 2003 action triumph “The Italian Job” showed, Mr. Gray certainly knows his way around stylish anarchy, and the glossy brutality of “Law Abiding Citizen” is at times quite enthralling. Higher stakes, which could have been upped if the characters existed as more than archetypes, just aren’t in the cards.
Continue reading “Collateral Savage” »
MOVIE REVIEW
Triangle (2009)
Icon Film Distribution
Director Christopher Smith is slowly emerging as one of the most interesting young filmmakers currently operating in the thriller-horror genre. Having cut his directorial teeth on the superbly spooky London Underground-set “Creep,” Mr. Smith changed tack with his follow up, “Severance,” a grisly horror-comedy. Subverting the genre is clearly something Mr. Smith seems particularly comfortable with, even intrigued by, so it should come as no surprise that his latest offering, “Triangle,” ventures rather neatly into psychological thriller territory, albeit with a delicious twist.
Continue reading “Sink or Scream” »
MOVIE REVIEW
Wah Do Dem (What They Do) (2009)
2009 Los Angeles Film Festival
Guerrilla indie filmmaking meets slacker road movie, “Wah Do Dem” is a well crafted black comedy that benefits from its raw, improvisational feel. Conceived when young filmmaking duo, Ben Chace and Sam Fleischner, decided to turn a cruise Mr. Chace had won in a raffle into a film project, “Wah Do Dem” follows the hapless Max (a well observed Sean Bones) as he embarks on a cruise from New York to Jamaica and subsequently stumbles from one misfortune to the next. It’s a touching and sometimes farcical tale that touches on cultural isolation, loneliness and how desperate situations can sometimes be a blessing in disguise.
Continue reading “Cruise Without Control” »