Matt’s Week in Dork! (8/31/14-9/6/14)

    I feel like I didn’t get a lot done this week, but I also know I was out and about, and very busy for most of it.  My downtime on Sunday and Wednesday night was just so unproductive…Anyway.

    Seeing two classics on the big screen this week did remind me of a few things.  Movies are simply better on the big screen.  Not only the size of the screen and (hopefully) the immersive sound.  But also the group viewing experience.  You can feel the crowd, sense their reactions.  At Singin’ in the Rain, you could feel the joy, hear the feet tapping with the music, and catch the giggles at various jokes.  At Jaws, you could feel the tension, hear the intakes of breath, and yeah, I heard that little kid nearby announce that she’d spotted the shark.  And having seen both films on the small screen, in the privacy and comfort of my own home, I can say that seeing it in a theater with a bunch of people was better.  Yes, you run the chance of having a bad experience.  Yes, I had that awful child with the jittery legs and the constant sniffing (seriously, two hours of sniff…sniff….sniff…sniff) when I went to see King Kong.  But those are relatively rare.  If you’re just watching movies at home, you’re missing out on the wonderful and strange experience of group viewing.  And living here, in the greater Washington D.C. area, I’m so lucky.  We have theaters all around, and many of them run various older films for special showings.  The Alamo, The AFI Silver, The Angelica, even the Rave at Fairfax Corner all do special showings of classics, 80s nostalgia, and more.  However, I’ve been very frustrated to see how little reaction local film buffs have to this.  I talk to movie fans all the time, and they always have excuses as to why they don’t go out and support this awesome activity.  The excuse usually comes down to ‘it’s too expensive’ or ‘I’m too lazy to be bothered.’  Now, the price, I get.  It’s not cheap to go to the movies.  I’d argue that most people I talk to would go spend that money on something equally frivolous (or more) like drinking at a bar or over-paying for sushi.  But whatever.  The laziness thing actually pisses me off.  ‘It’s too far to drive?’  We live in an area where there are almost as many movie theaters as Starbucks.  The Alamo recently tried to do a Spaghetti Western series, but each showing had less and less people, until they just canceled it.  That pretty much says to me that my hoped for Martial Arts film series won’t happen.  When we go to the AFI to watch some amazing screenings of movies like Sweet Smell of Success or Razorback, the place is mostly empty.  A beautiful, huge, comfortable theater with good popcorn and clean bathrooms, and nobody goes!?  I know not everyone is into movies like I am, or like Brad is.  But we have some amazing opportunities to see great films in the way they were intended (on the big screen, with crowds of other people), and on the whole, we’re squandering it.  We’re voting with our dollars to be stuck in our homes, being schlubs, not socializing or supporting interesting things.  It makes me sad.

    On Sunday, I did manage to finish up reading the newest Philip Reeve (with Sarah McIntyre) book, Oliver and the Seawigs.  It’s a cute, if slight kids book.  Probably best for kids graduating from stuff like the Magic Tree House or Boxcar Children to slightly more advanced books like Geronimo Stilton.  The illustrations are copious and enjoyable.  Reeve always weaves a good yarn, but I can’t help but want something a bit more meaty from him.  His last book, Goblins, was also a lot of fun in that Lloyd Alexander sort of way.  But I’m hoping for something a bit more Mortal Engines.  I just don’t know if he’s all that interested in writing the bigger, more epic, big-idea science fiction.  But I can hope.  He remains one of only two writers (Christa Faust being the other) I’ll buy anything written by, sight unseen.

 Masters of Sex: Season 1:  A good companion show to Mad Men, Masters of Sex actually gets some things right more often.  Like Masters’s family life is actually interesting, and his wife feels like a human character.  The show is cute, awkward, touching, sad, and occasionally uplifting and wonderfully pro-science.  I tip my hat to everyone involved.  The cast is excellent, with not only a good core group, but lots of very good supporting character performances.  There's a lot of good TV being made these days if you take the time to seek it out.  This is on that list, for sure.

Age of Uprising: The Legend of Michael Kohlhass:  Visually rich, this historic drama about a man pushed too far by injustice never quite becomes the movie you keep wanting it to become.  Throughout, it sets the stage for some grim, revenge fueled violence, but time and again fails to deliver.  Medieval Death Wish turns into Medieval Sleep Wish.

Singin’ in the Rain:  Seeing the film for my second time, and my first on the big screen, I feel comfortable calling this one of the best movie musicals of all time, and a wonderful movie all around.  And, like The Artist, which covers the same general subject, this is a movie for lovers of movies.  The silent era fades and the passing fad of sound takes over.  The musical numbers are great, but the story itself is also engaging.

Jaws:  My first viewing of Jaws on the big screen, and I’ve never enjoyed it more.  Jaws is a weird one for me.  On the one hand, I know it’s an excellent movie.  And while I’m watching it, I love it.  But when I’m not watching it, I’m not thinking about it.  It holds little sway over me.  Yet, while I was watching it, I loved it more than ever before.  The camaraderie that develops is beautifully played, with Robert Shaw as the salty old seaman, Richard Dreyfuss as the rich nerd who turns out to be as tough as the old man, and Roy Scheider as the cowardly cop, trying to overcome crushing fear.  An awesome movie all around, and a good reminder of what can be done with practical effects, and how they would not translate to CGI.  Look at this movie, and then imagine what it would look like if made on a substantial budget today.  It wouldn’t look so good, I can tell you that.

Magic in the Moonlight:  I don’t like Woody Allen movies since way back.  And I generally try to avoid them (especially if he appears in ‘em).  But I also find Colin Firth to be infinitely charming, and I do like old timey Europe.  Set in the Jazz age, the movie is about a stage magician/fraud debunker who finds himself believing in the possibilities of the supernatural when he meets a profoundly gifted young spiritualist.  There’s a lot of cute and some funny.  I found the presentation of Firth’s skeptic a bit annoying, as it felt like the condescending way they tend to be portrayed in many mainstream movies and more expectedly in Christian themed film.  Yet that portrayal belied the message of the film.  Which was lacking in what the kids call subtlety.  My other complaint is that it felt too long.  The last 30 or so minutes could probably have been trimmed to 10 minutes and been much, much better.

    On Saturday, Lisa, Brad and I headed up to Baltimore for the Comic Con.  We also met Robert and Emily there.  I believe a good time was had by all, though the first half was a bit rough for me, as I developed a debilitating headache (something I’m generally not prone to) and had a hard time thinking about anything else.  After taking some drugs, eating lunch, drinking a bunch of water, and seeing Thor stride forth from the men’s room in a manner befitting the God of Thunder, I felt better and was more into it.  With nobody I was especially interested in seeing, I looked around Artists Ally and the vendor booths a bit more than usual.  Actually, I feel like I was around the vendor booths WAY more than usual this year, and there were some very good deals.  A lot of trades for deep discounts.  But oddly, there seemed to be a lot of repetition in what was available.  I don’t know if all these folks got their bulk purchases from the same place or what.  But you’d see volume 2 of a slightly obscure series at every booth.  Anyway.  It was weird.  Overall, the show seemed pretty good, there was a lot of good cosplay (can’t believe I just wrote that), and everyone seemed to be having a good time.  One thing though, parents, don’t be dumb.  Keep better track of your children.  I think in all the years previous that I’ve visited this convention, I’ve heard perhaps one or two announcements about lost children/parents.  This year, it seemed to happen every five minutes.  What’s up people?

Photo credit: Brad.

-Matthew J. Constantine

Matt’s Week in Dork! (6/8/14-6/14/14)

    In spite of some difficulties, I’m loving life right now.  This week, I even managed to get in some good Dork living around the other stuff.

All You Need is Kill (aka Edge of Tomorrow):  With a good amount of humor and plenty of balls to the wall action, this science fiction adventure film was a pleasant Summer Blockbuster.  Unusually, the fast cutting and hand-held camera work was good.  Tom Cruise, for all his wackiness off camera, is still a charming dude.  And Emily Blunt is awesome.  Truth be told, I wish she’d been the star of the film.  She’s a close second in an Obi Wan Kenobi sort of way.  The Groundhog Day storytelling works well and the overall vibe of the film is great.  I think the ending could have been better.  But it’s not bad.  Well worth checking out.  Give me more of these, and less Transformers/Avatar type movies.  Give me movies where the effects help tell the story, not where they take the place of the story

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Girly:  Super boring.  Super British.  It’s another movie about upper-class twits going crazy and being evil.  There was a cinematic epidemic of this sort of thing in the 60s and 70s, and this is a lackluster entry.  If Steed & Peele had shown up half way through, things might have gotten interesting.  They did not.

    On Monday night, I went with Ben and Nick to a place I’d never been to before, and frankly, probably never otherwise would have gone to.  Hooters.  So, here’s the thing.  Every time anyone brings up Hooters, someone says ‘they’ve got great wings.’  I love wings.  And it’s certainly not that I’m put off by beautiful women in skimpy outfits.  But somehow (well, I think the "how" is obvious), Hooters has always had a certain something about it, in the cultural zeitgeist, that I found off-putting without ever actually going.  So, we went and yes, the wings are great.  I got all-you-can-eat, and made it worth the money, eating three plates.  The best were the lemon & pepper.  I want to go back and try all the other flavors I didn’t get to (there are like 10).  That said, the place has a very, very weird vibe.  It feels like an uncomfortable mix of family restaurant, sports bar, and strip club.  No, the women aren’t stripping, but their outfits are so out of keeping with the rest of the place that you can’t help but notice.  Whatever the case, I had a good time and ate some good food.  And yeah, I’ll probably go back, because I want more wings.  In stead of Hooters, though, they might want to call it Wedgies.

The Best Years of Our Lives:  I found this film pleasantly honest.  The lives of three WWII vets get complicated when the return home and try to pick up their old lives.  One is haunted, one is wistful, an done is physically damaged.  Each one faces his own set of demons, each one must find his own way, while forming a bond of friendship.  It’s a good movie about men, and about soldiers.  For a film made in 1946, I found it’s frank look at the damages of war to be refreshing and surprising.  This would be an excellent capper to a WWII movie marathon.  It is rather long for its type.  It isn’t an epic, but it’s nearly three hours long.  However, it’s not boring, and well worth the time. 

    What’s a little apocalyptic downpour?  Wednesday night, we went to the Alamo, and were treated to a massive thunderstorm with out Spaghetti Western.  About 20 minutes from the end, the power went out for a bit, giving folks a break to get up and walk around.  But all was well, and the show went on.

For a Few Dollars More:  Dare I say it?  Is this the best of the Man With No Name trilogy?  I kind of think it is.  Everything works here.  It’s beautiful.  It’s funny.  It’s violent.  The music is flippin’ amazing.  Lee Van Cleef is so danged good.  And that finale?  Awesome.  Straight-up awesome.  I saw these films when I was a boy of maybe 12 or 13, and I didn’t really get them.  Though I knew I was seeing something different from the ‘black hat-white hat,’ John Wayne strutting Westerns I’d disliked on Saturday afternoon TV, I didn’t get what I was seeing.  A quarter century later, and I get it.  Darned fine stuff.

The Cranes are Flying:  Russia.  World War II.  Yup, this film is super depressing.  However, it’s also beautifully shot and filled with uplifting moments and relatable characters.  With a strong anti-war message, and a weirdly non-political (at least, non-Communist VS Capitalist) spirit, I’m not surprised that this went on to international success when it came out.  The camera work alone is more than worth the price of admission.  Forget Alfonso Cuaron’s gimmicky long-shots.  The camera here is an intimate partner of the actor in a way I’ve rarely seen.

The Horror of Party Beach:  Ultra-campy, and a ton of fun, this movie about a bunch of kids (played by very adult actors) having fun in the sun while being menaced by terrible looking fish-creatures (who are really Zombies!) this is a must see.  The MST3K boys took their turn at it, but honestly, it’s just as much fun without ‘em.  If you’re in the mood to watch a stupid movie with friends, this is a great choice.  Check it out.  And stay groovy!

The Curse of the Living Corpse:  Roy Scheider and Candace Hilligoss in a movie together?  OK.  Sign me up!  Unfortunately, that’s the best part of the movie, right there.  No, not them in the film, but that they were cast in the film.  The film is stupid.  But worse, it’s boring.  Other than some laughably bad acting, there’s nothing to see here.  Move along.  Move along.

    Saturday morning, I finished Authority, the second book in the Southern Reach trilogy.  Pretty darned good.  Can’t wait ‘til the third volume comes out in September.  Saturday afternoon, even though I knew I wasn’t going to make it to the book club, I finished off volume 1 of Preacher (thank goodness, I didn’t have to suffer through volume 2).  I know.  People love it.  But I am not one of those folks.  This was my second try reading it, and while the first time (about 10 years ago) I found it boring and didn’t finish the trade, this time around I outright hated it.  The further in I read, the more I hated almost everything about it.  I won’t be writing an extended review, so I’ll just say here that I thought the dialog seemed to have been written by a 13 year old boy trying his little heart out to be shocking.  The characters are all cardboard.  And the plot twists range from obvious to stupid.  I’ve heard the series gets better as it goes.  But I don’t care.  I got the same gut-level hate feeling I got from Saga, and like Saga, have to stare at the people telling me it’s great with a slack-jawed, dumbfounded look.  There’s obviously something I’m missing, and nobody has been able to explain to me what it is.

Colour From the Dark:  Another adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft’s The Color Out of Space.  It’s not too bad.  Fairly well produced (though the footage looks made for TV, the editing and composition are more ‘theatrical’), with some good creepy bits, it does fall a bit too heavy onto the Good VS Evil fallacy that is so wrong with Lovecraft.  The actors are a mixed bag.  And considering that it is supposed to take place in WWII era Italy, the fact that there are so many different accents is a bit weird.  Not nearly as good as Die Farbe, it’s still worth a watch, and better than many adaptations of the author’s work.

Riddick:  I know, I know.  I enjoy these Riddick movies.  I liked Pitch Black a lot.  I thought Chronicles of Riddick, for all its many faults, was a lot of fun.  I enjoyed Dark Fury, the animated short bridge film between the first two.  And I like this one.  This third feature is more in keeping with the original, and not just because the latter part of the film is something of a carbon copy of the first, but because it feels like it’s set more in an Alien type universe, as opposed to a Star Wars type universe (as Chronicles of Riddick did).  I really like the first half hour, where he’s kind of Robinson Crusoe on a desert world.  Once the Mercs show up, it’s not as good, but still watchable.  I’ve said this of several films in the last couple of years, but this is the sort of thing that should be a dime a dozen these days.  Mid-level, entertaining science fiction films.  Yes, I’d love for there to be great science fiction films.  But in between the great ones, I want to see a dozen or so of these more pulpy efforts.  This movie also reminds me that there’s no valid reason for not doing a live action Warhammer 40,000 film.

Oblivion:  My second viewing of this film, and darn it, I just really like it.  Absolutely, many of the ideas, if not all, are lifted from other science fiction films and books.  But so what?  My problem isn’t with lifting ideas, it’s with using them poorly, and this film isn’t guilty of that.  The movie is a feast for the eyes and the ears, with stunning visuals, gorgeous location shooting, and an excellent semi-electronica score.  Like Moon before it, Oblivion raids sci-fi of the 60s and 70s, and comes out with some very watchable stuff.

Chef:  This is definitely what the internet has termed ‘food porn.’  But it’s also a Capra-like comedy about a guy who falls on hard times, then learns valuable lessons about life and fatherhood (with WAY more swearing than Capra).  On occasion, it does stretch credibility (like, everyone talks about needing money, but they all seem to have enough to do whatever they want at any given time, including quitting good jobs with no prospects…and I’m not just talking about El Jefe).  And the very end?  OK, that seemed silly.  However, the movie has a great deal of heart, and the cast sells the familiarity of close friends.  In fact, the scenes between Favreau, Leguizamo, and Cannavale feel more true to what men are like without women around than most movies manage.  Like The Big Night, this movie makes you want to do a serious restaurant crawl.  I wanted to reach into the screen and eat some of everything.  I never had any interest in going to Miami, New Orleans, or Texas before, but suddenly the idea of a food tour is sounding amazing.

    I’m still listening to a bunch of Black Mountain.  I tapped into that 70s rock/metal vibe and can’t seem to shake it.  I may have to load up some Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, and Blu Oyster Cult this week to keep the train rolling.

-Matt

Matt’s Week in Dork! (5/25/14-5/31/14)

    Sunday involved a lot of riding around the Northern Virginia area, seeing some parts I hadn’t seen before, and moving a bigass TV.  When I dragged my sorry butt back home, I sat down and finished Annihilation, which was really good.

Dinner at Eight:  “You’re young and fresh.  And I’m burned out.”  An all-star cast digs in to a comedy-drama about various people trying to keep it together or get it together in the post collapse world of New York City’s wealthy elite.  It’s funny and sad, in much the same way Grand Hotel was.  John Barrymore is typically charming.  It’s not as good as Grand Hotel, but it’s pretty good.

The Immigrant:  A beautiful film, with a fantastic performance from Marion Cotillard, The Immigrant is ultimately sunk by the male leads.  Be it performances or script (or a mix of the two), Joaquin Phoenix and Jeremy Renner are frustratingly uninteresting.  Phoenix is particularly bad, too.  It's like he's channeling Marlon Brando from On the Waterfront, where he's acting in one movie, while everyone else is acting in a totally different film.  I loved the world that was created, and even most of the bit parts and supporting players were quite good.  This all makes the failures of the film more pronounced.  There was a great film in this mix, but it’s lost the shuffle of love triangles and murder, and obscured by weird acting choices.  While worth watching for fans of the period, the movie is ultimately a disappointment.  It’s also part of that ‘all men are monsters; all women their victims’ subgenre that has become so tiresome.  That too could have been avoided by removing the two male angles of the love triangle.

A Fistful of Dollars:  “That’s not gonna break my heart.”  Clint Eastwood is just so darned likeably charming as the wandering gunslinger out to make a buck off two warring families.  This remake of Akira Kurosawa’s Yojimbo (itself an adaptation of Dashiell Hammett’s Red Harvest) finds the story transported to the Mexican/American West…by which I mean Spain.  Plenty of colorful characters, awkward dubbing, double crosses, and tough guy dialog.  And a lot of wacky killing.  The Western would never be the same.

    On Thursday night, Brad and I went back to The Alamo (we'd gone there to see A Fistful of Dollars the previous night).  This time dressed like idiots, draped inappropriately in the Flag, to see one of the most 80s films ever.  Walking up to the counter, our outfits tipped off a fellow to which movie we were going to see.  Perhaps it was a bit obvious.  And then, while we were getting ready to go into the theater, a rep from a beer company spotted us, asked to take our picture, and bought us beers (Rye of the Tiger).  Awesome.

Rocky IV:  “Whatever he hits, he destroys!”  The only Rocky film I’ve ever seen, and the only one I ever will, Rocky IV has been a weird absence in my life, now filled.  Such a wonderfully stupid, wonderfully 80s film.  Four montages?  Four?!  Fantastic.  It’s poorly shot, poorly written, and even the montages are clumsy (did I mention there are four?).  The jingoistic idiocy is palpable.  Dolph Lundgren and Brigitte Nielsen are about as Russian as Jack Kennedy.  And seriously.  What’s up with Paulie and the robot?  What’s up with Paulie and the robot?!  Excellent.  So dumb.  So awesome.

La Bete Humaine (The Human Beast):  This Jean Renoir film helps presage the Film Noir genre that would rise a few years later.  There’s even a proto-Femme Fatale.  But it’s also full of Renoir’s love of people, reveling in the everyday life of the working class.  If you’re a train person, this is some serious porn.  The train footage alone is worth the price of admission.

Witchville:  Another straight to video movie that seems like someone wrote the script based on an old D&D game.  The acting is all over the place…if that place is where bad acting lives.  The CG is typical TV level.  The costumes aren’t bad.  The action isn’t good.  Sadly, the film is just silly and goes over territory that lacks freshness.  I see so many of these movies made on very limited budgets, with limited resources, that manage to do some impressive things.  But they’re sunk in the scripting.  All the low-budget pluck and can-do spirit amounts to little if there aren’t some solid, interesting ideas at their heart.  All those great third string science fiction movies from the 80s are remembered because they combined can-do attitude with creativity.  With movies being easier than ever to get made (not saying it’s easy), creativity is too often skipped.

The Magic of Melies:  A good, informative discussion of Georges Melies and his wonderful films.  There are interviews and some recreations, as well as plenty of clips of Melies’s films, other films of the era, and photographs.  His story is a fascinating one, and very important to our understanding of film as an art form.  Movie buffs should see this, for sure.

My Fail Lady:  Rex Harrison is charmingly cruel as the language expert who decides to make a proper lady out of a low-class flower seller.  Audrey Hepburn…Well, she’s not so great as the flower seller.  The movie is fun and lavish, if a bit overlong (OK, maybe more than a bit overlong).  Several of the songs are quite good.  But I can’t get over Hepburn.  I know the movie is supposed to be somewhat broad, somewhat exaggerated, but her accent is absolutely awful, to the point of being distracting.  And they never really make her look like anything other than cute little Audrey wearing a funny costume.  Though I didn’t love the movie, Rex Harrison is enough fun that I still recommend checking it out.

    In between watching these movies, I’ve been watching more Space 1999.  Cool show.  I like how often episodes have a somewhat horror story vibe.  There’s certainly a lot of mystery and weirdness.  Other than that, I’ve just been trying to read Preacher again (limited success) and I started Authority, the sequel to Annihilation.

-Matthew J. Constantine

Matt’s Week in Dork! (5/18/14-5/24/14)

    Another good week.  Work has been rough, but life has been good.  That makes a huge difference.  I’ve been listening to a bunch of new music lately, but haven’t been able to concentrate on it as much as I need to.  Sometime coming up, I’ll be doing a new “What I’m Listening To” post.  Some good stuff.  Been reading a lot, too.  Should have some more to say on that soon, too.  I’m so glad I’ve got a long weekend.  I need it.

Too much Prog Rock?

Godzilla VS. Megaguirus:  There are some bits of this one I really enjoy, and I like the sort of evil Mothra creature.  But for the most part, this one is another mild dud, featuring so-so characters.  The various stages that lead up to Megaguirus are disgusting.

Black Orpheus:  An absolutely gorgeous film adaptation of the Greek myth, this vibrantly colorful movie is a treat for the eyes.  It’s also crammed full of music and dance.  It really takes its time and creates a mad world of joy, danger, life and death.  Breno Mello is a likable cad.  Marpessa Dawn is stunning.  Orpheus’s descent into the Underworld is pretty wild.

    Monday night, Paul, Ben, Brad, Lisa and I all headed out to the Alamo to watch Big Trouble in Little China.  Brad and I saw it some time ago on the big screen (I don’t remember where/when) and it was an OK showing.  But for whatever reason, I was really into it Monday night, and it was a great time.  Ben wasn’t so into the film, and I think he might think the lot of us are nuts for loving it.  But dang it, I do love it so.  I also enjoy how much Lisa loves it.  She’s like a tiger defending her cub.  Awesome.

...What?

Big Trouble in Little China:  “We really shook the Pillars of Heaven, didn’t we, Wang?”  My second favorite film of all time.  It’s an amazing conjunction of Kurt Russell, John Carpenter, Chinese mythology, and the mid 80s.  It’s got a crackerjack script, with tons and tons of stuff to catch on re-watch.  In fact, for a long time, I used to say I saw something new every time I watched the film (and that’s a LOT of darned viewings, let me tell you).  Seeing it on the big screen this time around, it proved to be true, as I (and oddly Brad noticed the same thing for the first time) saw David Lo Pan’s blade like fingernails extending during his transformation from the little basket case on wheels to the ten-foot-tall roadblock.  What I didn’t realize during my many viewings of the film as a lad was something that dawned on me about 10 or 12 years ago.  Jack Burton (Kurt Russell) is the bumbling comic side-kick.  You think, sitting down to watch an 80s action movie starring Russell, that he’s the hero.  And we do spend much of the film seeing the mad world of Chinatown through his eyes.  But Wang is the hero, here.  Wang is the guy on the quest, the warrior who much triumph over evil.  Jack is his idiot buddy who gets into trouble left and right, who delivers the jokes and takes the falls.  And Russell is such a sport about it, looking like a moron, mugging for the camera and taking pratfalls that would make Bruce Campbell proud.  I also realized on this viewing, that Gracie Law was probably supposed to be played by a Chinese actress, which would have made a heck of a lot more sense for a lot of reasons.  A wonderful films.  Nearly thirty years on and it’s still bringing me a lot of pure joy.

    On Wednesday night, I headed in to DC and met up with Rebecca to check out Coming Attractions Trailer Night with the DC Film Society.  It was an interesting little event, with free giveaways and a chance to vote on the most interesting trailers (which I gather gets passed on to powers that be).  I got a copy of Donkey Skin out of it, which is cool, because I’ve been wanting to see that film for some time.  And free stuff is awesome.  The two film critics?  Well, I’m always a bit taken aback by film critics who don’t seem to enjoy watching movies.  Both seemed to hate everything (though one liked Ted, I think).  It was like listening to hipsters yammer on about how everything you like is stupid.  If it had explosions or action, it was too actiony.  If it didn’t, it was boring.  OK.  They do prove that anyone can do the job, so maybe one day someone will pay me to do it.  That would be swell.

The Railway Man:  A fine film, well made and well acted.  It deals with the scars of war, the horrors that haunt people who have been through terrible things.  And it looks at the human cost of human villainy, on both the victim and the perpetrator.  Colin Firth is typically excellent.  I have mixed feelings on the horrors portrayed in the film.  On the one hand, I don’t feel like I need to be subjected to the absolutely disgusting things done to folks by the Japanese during this time.  On the other hand, I don’t know that what was shown would have made the extremely broken man depicted by Firth.  Does that make sense?  I’m not sure what would have been better.  I don’t think violence needed to be explicit.  Perhaps it would have been more effective if what torture was shown, particularly during the final interrogation hadn’t been shown, had been more hints and glimpses?  I don’t know.  I think back to Lawrence of Arabia, when Lawrence is captured by the Turks.  We don’t see what happens to him, but that, combined with his attitude shift, lets us know that it was some inhuman stuff.  Anyway, the movie is quite good, and well worth seeing.  I don’t think it’s great, and I think it could have been.  It would be a good companion to The Bridge on the River Kwai.

    I had a crazy week, involving a lot of traveling around the region, and a lot of late nights and early mornings.  So, when Friday afternoon came along and I got home from work, I was looking forward to plopping down on the couch with a glass of wine and some dinner, and a movie or two.  No sooner had my clothes hit the floor than I got a text from Brad.  “Wanna go see Cold in July at E Street at 9:30 tonight?”  Perhaps the sane answer would have been no.  With little thought, I responded in the affirmative, and so found myself heading in to DC once again.

Cold in July:  Want some brutal, ugly neo-Noir?  Try this.  It’s 1989, and after a home invasion puts a nervous schlub in the spotlight, a vengeful ex-con comes a’calling.  Where the movie goes from there?  You’ll never suspect.  You can’t blame this one for being ‘too predictable.’  Michael C. Hall is good as the doofy, horrible haired bumbler.  Sam Shepard wowed me as the deadly old criminal.  And I was shocked to find myself loving Don Johnson.  Could it be time?  Could Old Man Johnson become someone I look forward to seeing in films?  Time will tell.  Co-writer and Jim Mickle regular Nick Damici shows up for a quick supporting role as a local sheriff.  This film starts dark.  Then it kind of lightens up.  Then it goes really, really, unsettlingly dark.  The music and the look of the film are very 80s, but the black heart feels like it comes out of the nastiest of Hard Boiled Pulp Fiction.

Grand Piano:  De Palma wishes he could get this close to Hitchcock.  No, the movie isn’t all that great.  But it’s pretty good, and does a better job of doing De Palma’s derivative wannabe Hitch than De Palma ever did.  The acting is fine.  The tension is good.  The way it all plays out?  Well, sometimes that ain’t so good.  I liked it.  It’s interesting.  It’s not anything to get all worked up about, but if it’s on and you’re not busy, it’s worth watching.

Kenneth Anger: Volume I:  This collection of avant-garde short films from the 40s and 50s is an interesting glimpse into the underground, independent, ‘art’ film world of that time.  However, I didn’t find these films particularly interesting or inspiring.  Puce Moment is probably my favorite.  Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome had some good stuff, but went on for WAY too long and became extremely repetitive.  The others were kind of meh.  I much prefer the work of Maya Deren, whose surreal short films create a lot more atmosphere and emotion.  Many of these Anger films seem cobbled together, or like technical experiments.

Raze:  Ugh.  Zoe Bell.  What are you doing?  Why won’t you let me love you?  You’re so funny and charming, so tough and fit.  You seem like a cool lady, and you sure as heck seem capable of being one massively badass action heroine.  Yet, time and again, you star in shoddy, hollow films with awful scripts.  Raze is yet another potentially interesting idea turned to crap (see Angel of Death or Bitch Slap).  A secret society kidnaps women, trying to create warrior women?  OK.  Groovy idea.  Maybe it’ll have a touch of Cabin in the Woods’s modernization of paganism?  Maybe.  However in execution, this is just crap.  The acting is a mixed bag, where most of the nuts are rotten.  The action is boring (super, super boring).  The way the film plays out is obvious, bordering on insulting (it’s on the insulting side of that border).  I wanted to like it.  I wanted to take something away from it.  I still really, really want to like Zoe Bell and look forward to seeing her in films.  But I didn’t.  I don’t.  I’m sad.

    Another week down.  Looks like some of my Summer Anticipation movies are going to be difficult to see.  Tracks doesn’t seem to be playing anywhere.  We’ll see.

-Matt

Sure is raining cats and dogs...