1990s List Discussion and Suggestions (Lists Project Vol. 3)

[Gropius]

I think part of the satirical value of Starship Troopers lies in its metatextual relationship to the work of Robert Heinlein. While I haven't actually read the source novel beyond a few extracts (and nor did Verhoeven), I have read a bit of his other work, and he epitomises a certain nostalgic, chauvinistic notion of science fiction as a specifically American genre about tough, capable men blasting their way through space in the face of opposition from pansy liberals and the weak-willed bovine masses. (A similar world-view to Ayn Rand, in other words, although Heinlein incoherently combines libertarian and authoritarian/militarist streaks.)

For those who take Heinlein seriously - right-leaning sf nerds - Verhoeven's film was a travesty of the book, throwing out its supposedly 'important' themes and reducing it to a brash cartoon. Of course it's a mainstream blockbuster, but what makes it great is Verhoeven's irreverence: where James Cameron's Aliens had been a fairly brainless shoot-'em-up that thought it was something more profound (see also Roland Emmerich's elephantine Independence Day), Starship Troopers revels in being a brainless shoot-'em-up while telegraphing, however unsubtly (and, as Zedz says, cake-and-eating-it-ishly), a sense of the futile delusions underpinning both the genre and the species consuming it. However, one's enjoyment of the film will still depend on a basic enthusiasm for generic sci-fi/action ingredients.

[matrixschmatrix]

I've read Heinlein's book, and it's as fascist as anything he ever wrote- to the degree that Heinlein's defense was not so much 'this is not a depiction of a grunt-to-officer transition in a fascistic military dictatorship' as 'well I didn't say it was a good thing'. It even has extensive flashbacks to Rico's schooling and his conversations with his "History and Moral Philosophy" professor, who is basically the Marine in that Atheist Professor email forward.

[swo17]

Lumière et compagnie
An interesting experiment wherein a lot of great directors commemorate 100 years of movies by having a go at creating minute-long actualities with the original Lumière camera. Ultimately I think too many of them waste the opportunity (having celebrities clumsily approach the camera and then wave strikes me as missing the point of that early era of discovery) but at least Rivette's acknowledgement of his own failed attempt is priceless. The most celebrated segment from the film is surely the Lynch short Premonitions Following an Evil Deed (available on the new Criterion edition of Eraserhead) and it is excellent, though I think I'd actually pick another short as the most successful here, particularly in capturing the spirit of the Lumières while still conveying the passage of a century. This is the (untitled) Lucian Pintilie segment, which shows what looks like a circus troupe marveling at a helicopter that's about to take off. The Lynch short is a very clever navigation of the rules imposed on the project to deliver something quintessentially Lynchian that technically could have been made 100 years earlier (but never would have been). In contrast, the Pintilie short packs a wealth of visual stimuli into its single, brief frame, but not in a showy and clearly staged way like a few other selections here. Like the most alluring Lumière shorts, it feels like a scene that was miraculously stumbled upon, with the film's subjects as dazzled by their environment as we are by them.

[knives]

Jungle Fever
This reminds me of an old MadTV sketch where a film indicates it's being classy by hiring Ruby Dee and Ossie Davis. The film really does suggest an air of class and respectability that seems otherwise absent from Lee's career like a lovingly malicious take on old Hollywood. The Turturro stuff feels directly lifted from any number of working class schlub films from the '50s while the main plot is like a far more intelligent updating to Gentleman's Agreement by way of Black Orchid. I know the political element is probably the big thing to talk about here, but honestly aesthetically is the most shocking part to the film staying fresh while being so '90s in all the right ways. The scene early in where they bond over different foods talking about nothing in particular as the light fades in and out is the perfect example of this especially with that piano score. It's like a lost Leo McCarey film it plays so well. It might well be Dickerson's best film fusing all the sources mentioned before with Coutard inspired movement and little bit of his own lighting style to make something so utterly unique and delightful. Of course though I also had to add the malicious phrase to all of this because as accurate and well felt the movie is to all of these sources it is absolutely and amusingly filthy. Roughly the same zone of filth as Deconstructing Harry and with the same unexpected viscera. And all of these compliments are without getting into Samuel L Jackson who gives the performance of his career despite a shockingly small role.

Stone
This is another great director who I can intellectually appreciate the hubbub over, but can't connect that into any great or even minor passion. This film, for instance, is clearly genius with an excellent use of silence and off framing that makes the movie come across as the love child of Poe and Kafka which can only be a good thing. Also it seems very clear that Sokurov was a huge influence on the Quays when they broke out into live action using much the same style. Yet for as mad as I am over them I can't offer more than a description for Sokurov. Though of course that's my issue and irrelevant to the film itself which does get in some great humour that allows its portrayal of a hollow existence to feel real even as it is represented only in poetics. Perhaps this is a film better while pondered over than viewed.

Hard Core Logo
I have to admit the existence of Burst City makes this otherwise excellent film seem so small and insignificant. McDonald does a typically great job etching fascinating characters full of humour and madness. It is compelling to see him work in the real world as the mock doc format seems to force him into. What it lacks in full on punk madness it gains in snowbound melancholy as it sketches a death the body is blind to. Sometimes they seem aware at what a loss this attempt to regain a musical footing through supposed charity is like the funny Bovine cover close up. Perhaps a better comparison than Burst City, which really is a different film, is McDonald's own Trigger which tackles all of the same issues in a better package. This is me being excessively harsh on what is a very good if not great film though. The characters are often funny and smart without feeling false to their nature. In turn successes and failures it's easy to see why they need to be rock stars as they strip away the lamed age into being convincing stars. it's further to the film's benefit that this schism is not used to further denigrate these characters which already basically destroy each other, but rather helps make them seem all the more worthwhile.

Crash
Having finally seen the infamous cripple sex I have to admit disappointment that it wasn't a more graphic. I want my righteous indignation to be something worth the scorn at least on the surface level. Jokes aside I suppose it says everything that this character so clearly Cronenberg also has the name Ballard. Any claims of the film being something other than wish fulfillment and porn are probably wrong, but thankfully Ballard and Cronenberg's sexualities are off enough that the film becomes a compelling study of sex by that virtue. It almost works like a pre-Internet culture exploration of therapy by public yet anonymous fetish workouts. The way the seatbelts are shot in the first driving scene after the crash is like him brandishing a dildo as he waits for a consent to let the fetish out. That the film hints that maybe car crashes will be mainstreamed as a fetish only furthers the Internet comparison. There's almost a sweet quality to all of this even as the film repeatedly admits the negative effect defining themselves by this fetish has. Pretty much any scene between the two male leads has a laid back sensuality that's basically unheard of. Of course possibly I just find Elias Koteas really charming. Sexiest film of the '90s I say only half jokingly.

Clockers
Keith David shows up for one minute and steals the whole show. It's been a while since I've seen a film sum itself up so perfectly in just one scene. Which might be for the better as the whole is very muddled even by Lee's standards. Part of the problem seems to be that Lee is having troubles taking what he wants out of a story that doesn't really conform. The whole Keitel plot seems like leftovers that the film wished weren't still in the fridge. It sits there like a lost episode of Law and Order and not even a good one. That said the film is still pretty great seeming both dated, in a positive fashion, and eerily prescient with scenes of stop and frisk mixed with problems of communication that wouldn't present themselves in the same way today. Part of that feeling might come from how much Lee's subsequently cannibalized from the film with 25th Hour, Red Hook Summer, and a few others stealing images from the movie.

Thematically there's a lot going on even if Lee's handled most of these issues better before or after. This is probably the most upfront I've seen him about the police which is probably an after effect of the novel. This definitely forces him to be more complex with his cop characters particularly the aforementioned Keith David. Sure they're all crooked, racist, or both but not always for malicious means. David uses his corruption at least by word to help children while Keitel seems like an honest cop who is following the law as best as he can which is very fortunate. Finally the film just earns points for reminding that Mekhi Phifer was perpetually the next new and great thing growing up. What happened?

Avalon
This is easily the best Levinson film I've seen even if it is to Radio Days what When Harry Met Sally is to Annie Hall. All of the characters are well sketched and fascinating with a few tics that manage to be true to life rather than obnoxious caricatures, but it really does offer nothing new to these memories of family and immigration.

Velvet Goldmine
Before I begin I have to mention the great coincidence of one of my neighbors blaring Ground Control to Major Tom while I watched this. The film itself isn't so good clearly being the weakest thing I've seen from Haynes featuring all of his worst traits magnified due to it basically being a remake of Eddie and the Cruisers. The film really does come across as a self conscious let's make a film that plays on the glam image, but beyond the surface it doesn't really represent or discuss the music or musicians well enough to justify being so damned coy about it. I guess I could see that as being the point, but what a lousy point that is. Also Bale's reporter is just really bad. I mean to the point where he comes across as completely lacking in talent. I don't even think it is great, but Hedwig and the Angry Inch does everything this film tries and more infinitely better and with more humour (which is the main thing this lacks). Haynes delivers a books report that it is clear he only read the cliff notes for. Revisiting his best film, Superstar about halfway through only cements this fact.

[Mr Sausage]

The Rock (Michael Bay, 1996): Well before I knew who Michael Bay was or that I was supposed to hate him, I knew this movie as perhaps the most widely loved action film of my cohort. All my friends loved it, acquaintances loved it, family members. Girls in my highschool more into romantic comedies and disney lit up at the mention of this film. And I just did not get it. I saw a movie that was sorta entertaining but undistinguished. At the time, my understanding of gunfights came mostly from John Woo. To me, a good gunfight was an intricately choreographed ballet that was organized according to rhythm, that maintained a strict logic of who was shooting where and doing what damage even within complex scenes, and that would isolate individual moments within a frenzy of destruction and draw them out so that you were always anchored somewhere in all the chaos. A great gunfight married brutality and elegance. Having internalized that, I'd watch something like the gunfight in the shower in The Rock and see a mass of disparate and unconnected movements: people shooting, people falling, squibs exploding, but no sense of movement between these moments. They were all occurring simultaneously, like a collage. And it wasn't exciting. Judged next to the grammar I had internalized, the scene lacked life or feeling. There was no elegance or bravura--just mess. A suitable action scene that wasn't anything more than people shooting and dying. So the action scenes weren't thrilling, the character interaction was shouted one-liners, and the plot was routine. I could understand being entertained by it, but I couldn't grasp the sheer love for it.

I revisited the movie for three reasons: to figure out why it was so loved, to assess Bay's action scenes on their own terms rather than John Woo's, and because this has a reputation for being one of his more tolerable movies. Yet in spite of coming in with the hope of maintaining my initial opinion, I became excited: the music was intense (always my favourite part of the film--catchy score) and all the swooping shots and intense close-ups were having their effect. It all felt really intense and important. But that feeling only lasted for thirty minutes. Still, I appreciated Bay's technique in the action scenes more; I could see they were not failed attempts to sculpt a Woo gunfight, but an attempt to create action as a tapestry, with your eye drawn everywhere over a flat plane until you come away with the impression of speed, movement, destruction, and energy, without having a precise idea of what is happening. The individual pieces aren't so important, it's the impression they create in tandem with each other. The movie was occasionally funny, and I appreciated that Cage made his character awkward and bumbling.

So why had the movie petered out for me after thirty minutes? I think it exhausted me. That collage technique applies to the whole movie: it has one setting, intensity, and it milks it unendingly until the techniques burn you out and no longer seem interesting. The effect is flattened: there are so many bold closeups of urgent line readings that your interest is exhausted and moments cease being all that important. The camera is swooping in on a character or a moment because that's what it always does, not because you need to pay special attention. I was fatigued by the repetitiveness. I also figured out another reason why the action scenes never did much for me: there's no build-up to them. Every scene has the same level of intensity, so there's no anticipating a burst of action since it feels no different than what surrounded it. Bay actually takes away from his exciting moments by trying to make every moment exciting. Not a new criticism, but I gained a new appreciation for it (this is the first Bay film I've watched entire since I was 19).

And yetThe Rock is still actually kind of fun. It is not even close to the most egregious example of Bay's limits (it remains the most tolerable of those I've seen*). Bay is quite talented and uses those talents to turn an banal script into a vivid and stylish movie. But, still, it's over-long (did this need to be two hours?), has an inconsistent sense of humour, camera and editing techniques that try to turn unimpressively blocked and choreographed action scenes into great ones through sheer punishing force of will, and lends the script as much ludicrousness as it covers over. Yet it's not a bad movie. I get why people love it, now. Sort of.



*cue a Pain and Gain reference from knives.

[colinr0380]

I prefer a film like Sudden Death, which is just as silly but more coherent, but I think a big plus to The Rock is that Connery and Cage walk the line perfectly between taking the events seriously enough to engage the attention but not so seriously that they can't have a wry reaction to the craziness of the situation (a sense of fun being something which Armageddon arguably begins with but loses in its overblown disaster movie dramatics and attempt to muscle in on Titanic-style tear-jerking territory). Ed Harris is great in the sympathetic villain role too, and one of the film's greatest assets, although I'd suggest he's far too good for the material and his intensely committed performance gives the ridiculous situation a dramatic weight that it really doesn't deserve by itself!

I think the key sequence in The Rock to illustrate your points about space, action and the exhausting nature of it in Bay's films is that Humvee vs Porsche chase scene in which our lead actors have hilariously fake and shaky insert shots behind the wheel of their (presumably stationary at the time of filming!) vehicles and all logic gets thrown out of the window as Bay delights in throwing ever more ludicrous obstacles in the way of the chase, building to a gobsmackingly ridiculous image of a wheelchair bound basketball team all deciding to cross that one particular street at the same time. Of course everything climaxes with a careening streetcar hurtling down a hill throwing about a hundred passengers off of each side of it which in the blurry flurry of flailing limbs almost turns into a display of abstract modern dance (I'm sure some passengers jump off, then climb back on only to throw themselves off again), all whilst a crazed comic relief conductor throws out paniced one liners during the two seconds it cuts to him. And then of course everything explodes.

[Mr Sausage]

Bay loves racial stereotypes, too. I think there are a total of three black people in the movie and each one spends their small bit of screen time carrying on loudly, including one female hostage who castigates the tour guide for not having a gun before saying "I've got a goddamn gun! If I'd've known this was going to happen, I'd have brought my motherfucking gun!"

But the film is exceptionally well cast. Not just Harris, but David Morse, Michael Biehn, William Forsythe lend their scenes a needed weight, as you say. Connery breezes through on his charm, and Cage plays his character as though he is aware that he is stuck in a silly action movie. There are some genuinely funny moments (the whole exchange about the twitching foot) mixed in with all the terrible humour.

My own pick for the best 90's Die Hard-scenario film is Under Siege. Similarly well cast, but not so aggressively over-the-top or juvenile. Plus Andrew Davis is a fine action director.

[knives]

Tony Todd is another of those secondary that breathes surprising life into the film. Actually in general Bay is a surprisingly good caster even if it sometimes seems like 70% of his process is to see who has been in a Coen Bros film.

[matrixschmatrix]

The thing that has always delighted me about The Rock is that the collage technique you're referring to seems to have been applied to the acting and the scripting as well as the staging and cinematography- everyone in it seems to be in a different movie, and the writing comes from maybe half a dozen people, each of whom have a very strong individual touch. Sean Connery is a past master at silly crypto-Bondian action by 1996, and breezes through the movie- but Ed Harris is treating it like the most serious thing in the world, and Nick Cage is applying his (now standard) technique of having one million terrible ideas and doing them all at once, which somehow comes together into a strange, sort of charming weirdo. It's full of extremely weird lines, some of which are classics of the genre ("Carla was the prom queen!" feels like a punch up line in the best way) and the Bayian mixture of casual racism, contempt for the audience (in the commentary, he notes that the car chase in the beginning was because he figured the audience would be unable to pay attention if we went a full half hour without an action scene) and strangely compelling imagery (the lift from Platoon with Cage holding the green flares or torches or whatever works surprisingly well) that all comes together into something that manages not to stay on any one note long enough to be obnoxious, and is full of enough fun to be a delight.

[Mr Sausage]

I really like what this video has to say about Bay's style, especially the observation that "he shows you a lot for just a moment then takes it away." I think this is crucial for the abstractness of Bay's approach to action scenes: any one individual moment or shot or even movement in the frame is unimportant; but many different variations on the same moment, shot, or movement pieced together rapidly will give an overall impression of the kinetic force of the scene. It pushes almost towards avant-garde montage without ever crossing the line (unlike late era Tony Scott, who did cross that line and whose movies are somewhat more admirable than Bay's). The sheer complexity and ingenuity with which he accomplishes this is incredible but borders a bit on madness. So much time and money and effort for things that people are meant to register more than perceive.

The other thing that strikes me is that Bay is so energetic and ambitious, and deploys so many complicated techniques, all just to accomplish a very small set of goals. Like the video above says, Bay loves shots that have size and intensity and puts his efforts into making dynamic shots that have those qualities. But that's about it: all that time and energy for a single feeling. So he's an intensely visual and stylish filmmaker who has no interest in telling a story visually. This is why, for example, even at the end of Pain and Gain Mark Wahlberg is still stepping out of helicopters into low-angled hero shots. Narratively and thematically, it's inappropriate, obviously so; yet it looks great, and has looked great every time it's been used in the movie. Bay does not seem to tailor his aims to his movies, but rather vice versa. So all I can think is that he's an intuitive filmmaker: he chooses his shots based on what feels right to him, and what feels right is aggrandizement, over and over. And, again, he deploys the most ingenuitive and complicated means to accomplish it (tho' also ends up repeating a lot of the same visual ideas).

Bay's most emblematic film is Bad Boys 2, because it takes his entire ethos and exhausts it. I have never seen a movie that climbs so high so fervently and successfully that it comes out the other side, ie. the bottom. It's grotesque and punishing. Like this review says, "it violates you with entertainment". It's incredible in a way. It makes sense that his next movie was in a totally different genre. He had to do something different.

For some reason Bay's techniques fascinate me. Not enough to seek out his films (until this weekend, where I watched 3, I hadn't seen a full Bay movie in about 10 years), but enough that I've given them real thought every time a discussion comes up and have watched that video I linked to like four times now. Also, why hasn't Criterion upgraded its two Bay films yet? If any films in the collection would benefit from the upgrade (and a lowered price point), it'd be them.

[Gregory]

Regarding the racial stereotypes, something I've noticed in a lot of action films, and even some kids' films, is that they give the non-black characters all kinds of generic one-liners and catch-phrases. Then, feeling some need to have at least one black character, they give them emblematically "black" one-liners and catch-phrases that add to the movies' palette of 'tude. It reminds me of Wanda Sykes's book in which she lists the things that people in the industry are consistently trying to get her to say but that she refuses to say:
1. I'm gonna shove my foot up yo' ass. 2. Oh no she didn't. 3. Talk to the hand. 4. You better recognize. 5. You better bring it. 6. Check yourself before you wreck yourself. 7. You go, girl. 8. Don't go there. 9. You can't touch this. 10. I'm about to knock this fool out. 11. I'ma smack the taste right outta your mouth. etc. (Thanks, Google Books.) Some of these examples are specifically female black catch-phrases which the mainstream probably learned largely thanks to shows like Jerry Springer, and there's easily a long list of male counterparts to these.

[John Cope]

Bay's most emblematic film is Bad Boys 2, because it takes his entire ethos and exhausts it. I have never seen a movie that climbs so high so fervently and successfully that it comes out the other side, ie. the bottom. It's grotesque and punishing. Like this review says, "it violates you with entertainment". It's incredible in a way. It makes sense that his next movie was in a totally different genre. He had to do something different.

This one and Transformers 2 are by far my favorite Bays for exactly this reason.

[colinr0380]

I'm embarrassed now: I use all of Gregory's examples in my daily life, although rather than just saying "Don't go there", I like saying "Could you possibly, if it wasn't too much trouble, perhaps not bring that subject up in polite company?", with my best Hugh Grant stammer. Unfortunately by the time I've said that the other person has already "gone there", so I have to put some sort of shoe up their bottom.

I like the idea from the lamppost section of that video that Michael Bay has almost been producing a lavish scaled, hyperactive version of Vertical Features Remake!

The one thing I'd add to Mr Sausage's comments about "Bay not tailoring his aims to his movies and vice versa" is that this is why Pearl Harbor plays like Transformers, or why Transformers can repurpose imagery from Pearl Harbor. Because it is just imagery without context, or any sense of the 'real world' there beyond cool, or iconic, or stylish imagery, much like the rest of the world is just there to get destroyed or show people listening intently to their radios for news in Armageddon. There's no particular moral point to be made by any of the films or reason for being except to show spectacular destruction on a massive scale (in that sense the comparison to the Lego Movie is a good one, as it is just someone playing with a larger toybox).

Disclaimer: I kind of like Pearl Harbor (which got the bad press that I still contend was building up from Armageddon, as all the critics reached their breaking point for love triangles) for the way that it reduces a historical event to a parade of heavily glossy images of the era (perhaps the purest modern version of World War II fetishisation, almost up there with Atonement. Although Atonement is doing that fetishisation for a purpose) and revels in making lots of mini-sequences link up within the main attack itself. It is reprehensible in a lot of ways, especially if being viewed as some sort of 'faithful' historical re-enactment of a real event, but by pushing to that level of extreme imagery it outdoes (and in some ways exposes) a more 'tasteful' film like Saving Private Ryan for its own manipulations by being so blatantly artificial and obsessed with spectacle.

In a way it is the auteur theory writ-large (emphasising that the auteur theory is a tool to tie themes together within a body of work, rather than a guarantee of quality) in the sense that all his films take place inside a 'Michael Bay-universe' that is as distinct and self-referential as any other director's body of work could be, as instantly recognisable as one of his films (in some ways I guess it is quite a feat for a director to put their individual mark on such CGI-intensive films, when other directors might defer to their effects artists, resulting in CGI-sequences looking similar to each other). But in the seeming overriding interest in the sensation of pure imagery without any sense of real human emotions underpinning such imagery, or modulation of action scenes, that can leave the films feeling simultaneously exhausting and flat and dramatically uninteresting. It is as if witnessing the spectacle was thought to be enough for an audience, rather than the audience taking away any particular interesting story from the experience. In a way that is why I'm glad Bay does the Transformer movies, as that has allowed the imagery to run riot unburdened by any real world concerns apart from product placement, and push to the limits of action, even if it all eventally feels hollow underneath.

[matrixschmatrix]

For good or bad, I think it's undeniabile that Bay is one of the most auteurist directors around, in the sense of being a director who stamps his personality on everything he does- his TV commercials and music videos are still instantly recognizable as being his, and that quality of never bothering to change his approach practically guarantees that piffling things like generic concerns or tone will never eclipse his fundamental Bayness. He is therefore, I think, a fairly succinct argument for why the idea that 'auteurist' and 'good' or even 'interesting' are synonymous is such an unconvincing viewpoint.

[thirtyframesasecond]

Silences of the Palace (1994) is a Tunisian drama that has a somewhat similar premise to Zhang Yimou's 'Raise The Red Lantern'. A young girl returns to the ruins of the estate where her mother worked, along with others, in domestic and sexual servitude. Shot mostly in flashback, it's sombre and muted, quite different to Zhang's more melodramatic and eye-popping film. It's shot solely within the interiors of the oppressive estate where women have no voice, whilst allusions to the outside world solely exist by the radio announcements of the Tunisian fight for independence from the French. It won an award at Cannes and although it might be difficult to find, it's well worth seeing.

[knives]

Wonderland
This film is easily the best thing I've seen from Winterbottom and gets to what doesn't work for me with his later films. That is his intensely shaggy style doesn't seem to work when he is actively trying to get the audience invested in the characters. Here the reality is so surface contented that the rise of the characters to people you have to empathize with seems totally accidental and feels a little detrimental to the stylistic point. A contradiction I recognize, but one that aids the film as a positively hypocritical structure. Winterbottom really needs to return to this psuedo Dogme style rather than giving us another Steve Coogan masturbates to the sound of his own voice-a-thon.

How I Got Into an Argument..or My Sex Life
Desplechin is really good even if he does come across as Eustache desperately trying to be Woody Allen. I probably need to see this again to get a serious handle on the film, but there is only so much time for three hours of academic and professional ennui.

Affliction
While this is definitely a man's film and she plays a fairly small role to the film Sissy Spacek really pushes this from an interesting film into semi-greatness. Has nothing to do with the character which is fairly generic for a woman in a Schrader film. It's the performance which in its small time shows an opposite affection to Nolte than what Coburn (in one of the scariest performances ever) represents. That she is an active part of the present almost gives the movie a sense of optimism within the otherwise pitch black self destruction it emotes. It also has that wonderfully procrastinated Schrader plotting that everyone from with most recently Villenvue on Prisoners so regularly try to only the achievement of bloat. That opening scene with the daughter lays everything bare that it could successfully work as its own short despite having nothing to do with the seeming plot of the movie which really starts at several different points (as late as Dafoe's arrival I guess it plays with ignoring plot).

It's hard to, especially with the Dafoe character, not view this in relation to Fargo which is a leaner and more concise film. Aesthetically this is the weaker of the pair, but the mess Schrader presents at times is more effective and it is interesting to see the Coen's morality shifted away toward Schrader pessimistic Protestantism. Maybe that's why the film needs a living ghost.

The Beautiful Troublemaker
Before seeing this I had only heard of this movie as Rivette's 'raincoat brigade' picture so call me pleasantly surprised that that element is borderline non-existent for much of the film which seems to owe itself as much to Rozier's seaside films as much as anything else. Rivette though endows his film with less high energy and seems interested in the creation process of Piccoli very deeply. Not just in the painting scenes, the first of which is one of the best things I've ever seen, but throughout whether it is getting to know his muse or the reason for focusing on an aspect of the model or anything else you can relate to the process. It's actually almost cute because the style of the film is very distant and observational as if Rivette were making a play to objectivity, but those barriers are always breaking down as like a child his camera becomes engrossed with the thought processes which have to destroy objectivity to really be observed. This leaves the film despite tone and visual content rather childlike and lovable. I sort of feel out of love into like during Rivette's '80s period, but as an opening to the '90s for me I'm back in love.

I No Longer Hear the Guitar
This is easily the best argument I could conceive of against the use of colour. It's the only significant element different from my previous Garrel experiences, but it makes a big impact and not of the good kind. Everything so much more dreary and lifeless in colour that the entire time I just didn't want to stay here even as the characters remained amusing with some interesting things to say.

Flirting with Disaster
Russell seems to have a thing for blondes in ill-fitting white lingerie and overalls. Actually my big take away in general for this film is finally understanding what makes him tick and the separation people make with his early and post-Nailed films. Though it, as opening bad joke indicates, also connects with those films very well which I guess is appropriate for the plot. Some of the film's pieces also feel very loose thanks to this as the elements he'd repeat are significantly shaggier with the coarse philosophizing and violent class satirizing typically not working and feeling too straight to its means (the bit in San Diego with the black drivers is the most prominent instant though the repeated adoptions are the most aggravating part especially as it often leaves Arquette's otherwise great performance as a shrill nag however correct the film shows her to be. It's just boring to have a character whose job it is to not buy into the madness around them though this Zeppo fairs better than most. These are mostly minor complaints anyway and the film is at least as worth as I Heart Huckabee's take that as you wish. The cast is really amazing featuring the best Stiller performance I've seen, taking that also as you wish, and great cameos from a murderer's row of character's actors like a mad Mary Tyler Moore (who knew she had it in her) and an almost lyrically annoyed Richard Jenkins.

Basic Instinct
This has one of the worst, most overwrought, and just plain stupid scripts I've ever encountered. It even manages to be more useless for its aims than Showgirls. Thank heavens then that Verhoeven is the director since he brings the right mixture of laughing at the project and genuine masturbatory interest to make this one of the funniest films of the decade. I might have to watch it again to get everything because I spent far too much time just laughing and physically tossing to actually pay attention. That first interrogation scene with all of the men luring at Stone as if she were fucking a donkey is so gloriously over the top and absurd. The only thing that would make the film better is if it went full The Tenant and had Douglas dying his hair blonde and dressing in the white silk. You're already suggesting it so might as well as take the plunge since the rest of the movie did. How anyone could take this as anything other than a The Room like success is beyond me. Even more thanks needs to go that he seemingly only told Stone that this was a comedy as every other factor is played as straight as an arrow. Goldsmith seems to desperately trying to be the new Bernard Herman with a twanking score ripped from the best passages of Psycho and Jan De Bont has never worked harder by turning this into a colour Double Indemnity. Their sincerity only works to make this even funnier.

[zedz]

Desplechin is really good even if he does come across as Eustache desperately trying to be Woody Allen.

I think I see it more the other way around, which might be my problem with Desplechin.

[knives]

The reason for my phrasing is that I find the Eustache elements to be more defining of the style with the Allen elements sort of a striven for characterization. Either way though I find this generally to be a plus.

[swo17]

This is just a reminder that, starting on Monday, the film club in conjunction with the '90s list project will present a discussion of David Fincher's The Game, starring all of you. Please participate or I will be forced to send all of you special birthday presents next year.

[A]

DESPERATELY SEEKING SO AND SO

Is there a film you're dying to see but you've exhausted all possible avenues for finding it and still come up short? List it here and perhaps some kind soul will be able to direct you to a copy by PM. Please limit listings here to only a few films that you're most desperate to see.

It doesn't hurt to ask: One of the films that will make it on my Top 50 selection is Jianxin Huang's and Yazhou Yang's Mai Fu (Surveillance, China 1997) which got selected as a main competition entry to the Berlin Film Festival at that time, and which I was lucky to catch on TV a a few years later. Haven't been able to get my hands on it ever since, and I'd love to revisit it. Anyone have any ideas how to get this (preferably with subs)? Or how to get hold of any other 90s films by Jianxin Huang (except Wu kui [The Wooden Man's Bride, 1994], that is)?

[A]

Jingle All the Way [director's cut] (Brian Levant, USA 1996)

I just rewatched Jingle All the Way, an Arnold Schwarzenegger vehicle from the 90s, directed by Brian Levant (The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas [2000], Snow Dogs [2002]). I had previously encountered this movie by chance some ten years ago, and it wasn't an experience I like to recall. I considered the film repellent and was even a bit disgusted with myself for having decided to spend one and a half hours within its influence. What had I been thinking!?

Exactly: What had I been thinking!? As I looked forward to another encounter with Jingle All the Way during the last couple of weeks, it dawned on me that the quality and originality of the film had initially gone completely over my head. As is often the case with great cinema, the first encounter can leave a viewer preplexed, exhausted and overwhelmed. I remember how my first viewing of Gabor Body's Kutya eji dala (The Dog's Night Song, Hungary 1983) left me perplexed and clueless. It took me some mulling over and a second encounter with the film till I could grasp some of its greatness and get a clearer understanding of how exactly it was working. We all have such experiences. It's part of watching movies. Hell, it's part of life.

So what did I find out the second time around, what had I felt, how had I miscomprehended my feelings during my first viewing? What had actually been so difficult to understand? Probably, it was the simple fact that the film wears its ideology so openly on its sleeve. A horror trip wrapped in glittering fancy paper, it epitomizes what the so-called "christmas experience" has become. A darkly human fable about lost people living in a 1984-like society, clutching at straws of humanity. Its very setting, with the candy-colored look and twisted sense of humor doesn't hide but lays bare the core of our desperation, the gaping abyss which our civilization has become. The roads to hell are paved with good intentions. And I didn't even mention Phil Hartman!

In other words: Jingle All the Way is a true work of art. If you haven't seen it, do yourself a favor and watch it for this poll. If you hate it, you're probably right - you should hate it, should despise what it embodies. But the raison d'etre of art isn't to make us feel comfortable. It can shock us, disgust and repell us, make us aware, make us see and haer and feel and think something we would have rather avoided. That might be one of it's biggest strengths: to reveal things to us, to make us experience what we didn't want to experience, aknowledge what we had never wanted to think about. To confront us with the human existence in all its facets.

[Cold Bishop]

Let's not do this.

[domino harvey]

Between this, the guy bragging about how he doesn't like plays in the Vanya thread, and a prominent poster calling Gone Girl an "evil" film, it's been a day of second-hand embarrassment on the forum

[colinr0380]

I always thought that Jingle All The Way was less a scathing critique of consumer culture as a whole than a weirdly period-specific take on an annual rush to get the latest toy for Christmas that every kid had to have. It might just be because I don't have kids or know anyone working out what to get children for Christmas now, so it might still be going on without my knowing about it, but it seemed like the mid-to-late 90s was all about there being one specific toy that every kid wanted (or was told to want) which was immediately sold out, which was a trend that seemed to climax and end with the Buzz Lightyear doll around Christmas 1999. Which was something that strangely the desperate clamouring for the superhero toy in this film seems to anticipate!

[domino harvey]

Here in the states it was without a doubt Tickle Me Elmo, though the trend went back to Cabbage Patch Kids a decade earlier and no doubt others before or since