KICK-ASS: The Film Babble Blog Review

KICK-ASS (Dir. Matthew Vaughn, 2010)


Aaron Johnson, as geeky high school student Dave Lizewski, wonders in a world where millions love comic book and movie superheroes, why don’t more people actually try to become real-life superheroes? His mother has just died, he’s invisible to girls, and chronic masturbating is his biggest hobby (yeah, I know – TMI) so we can see why he fantasizes so vividly about being a superhero. Not letting the fact that he possesses no special powers get in his way he orders a green wetsuit online, dubs himself “Kick-Ass”, and sets about fighting crime on the streets of New York City.

Kick-Ass gets his ass horribly kicked by a couple of petty thugs on his first outing enough to put him in the hospital. He’s not deterred from his superhero pursuits though, because he’s now reconstructed with metal grafts and with his deadened nerve endings he can fight without pain. So when another brawl is captured by camera phones he becomes an internet sensation via YouTube and a household name.

A girl he has a crush on (Lyndsy Fonseca) suddenly takes an interest in him, but as his snarky friends (Clark Duke and Evan Peters) suggest it’s because she thinks he’s gay. Fonseca has no inkling of Johnson’s infamous alter ego when she emails Kick-Ass’s MySpace account (the only aspect of the film that feels out of date) asking for help. A dangerous drug dealer is harassing her at the needle exchange clinic she works at and immediately Kick-Ass is on the case.

However, the pile of bodies that results in a ghetto showdown comes not from Kick-Ass, but from the surprise appearance of “Hit-Girl” (Chloe Moretz). The foul mouthed and fast acting Hit-Girl (who’s 11 by the way) takes no prisoners, killing every attacking lowlife and leaving Kick-Ass stunned. She’s the real deal he sees, and she’s the protégé of another real deal – her father Nicholas Cage as “Big Daddy” whose shiny black costume makes him look like Batman’s brother and he has lethal weaponry out the wazoo to match.

From here out Hit-Girl and Big Daddy steal the movie from Kick-Ass and he never quite gets it back. The villains they all go up against are big time mob boss Mark Strong and his son, McLovin himself – Christopher Mintz-Plasse, who has his own mock superhero guise: Red Mist.

Kick-Ass calls it quits now that shit just got real (not a line from the film but it just as well could be) and comes out as straight to Fonseca – the old pretending he’s gay in order to get closer to her premise you see. Of course, he’s gonna have to get back in the game and join Hit-Girl for the inevitable action movie climax.

KICK-ASS has so many successful sequences going for it that I can overlook the myriad of problems I have with it, but for the record here they are. The satirical nature of the material replaced with predictable noisy bombastic mechanics in the last third, with the laughs sadly fading with the satire. And in the words of Grandpa Simpson: “The romantic subplot felt tacked on.”

That said, KICK-ASS has a great cast – Johnson, Mintz-Plasse, and Strong are all solid and it’s great to see a porn-stached Cage chew up the scenery with Moretz whose Hit-Girl poise, presence and power, as I said before, really steals the show. That is, if you don’t mind the extreme profanity and ultra violence that she brings.

Don’t bring the kids, or even the kid inside you to see this movie; it’s an dark adult shoot-em up with a high body count packaged as a teenage superhero comedy – it’s SKY HIGH as directed by Quentin Tarentino. It might not kick ass as much as I thought it could, but, as it’s the first major movie to use the internet popularized phrase that something or someone “owns”, for the most part it does indeed own.

More later…

The Film Babble Blog Top Ten Movies Of 2009

All this last month readers have been asking me for my top 10 movies of 2009. I’ve mentioned before that some major prestige films don’t get to my area until late January or early February or later, and that’s not considering many Foreign films that aren’t released in these parts until months after the Oscars so it’s usually a month or so into the year before I post my picks. So since there’s no way I’m going to catch up anytime soon and because tomorrow the Academy Award nominations are going to be announced, now is as good a time as any for my list for what I think was a great and diverse year for film:

1. A SERIOUS MAN (Dirs. Joen & Ethan Coen)

“The greatest films are the ones that leave you not able to explain, but you know that you have experienced something special. I’ve always had this feeling that the perfect response to a film or a piece of work of mine would be if someone got up and said, ‘I don’t know what it is, but it’s right.’ That’s the feeling you want – ‘That’s right’ – and it comes from four or five layers down, it comes from the inside rather than from the outside.”
– Robert Altman

I’ve been plowing through the new book: “Robert Altman: The Oral Biography” since I got it for Christmas and I was struck by the quote above. It made me think of A SERIOUS MAN, though the latest Coen Brothers cinematic conundrum is anything but Altman-esque. With Michael Stuhlburg leading an equally unknown cast into the academic abyss of late 60’s suburban Minneapolis, it’s the Brothers’ most personal work to date. Whether it’s a post modern riff on the story of Job or a series of nonsensical jabs at everybody’s existential expense, it’s a perplexingly pleasing parable. Read my original review here.

2. UP (Dir. Pete Docter)

Last year the same #2 position on this list was held by a Pixar film (WALL-E) so I was tempted to go in another direction here. But, that would’ve been wrong because UP honestly deserves this space. The first 10 minutes alone deserve this space. This wonderful tale of Carl (voiced by Ed Asner) – a crotchety old widower who attaches thousands of balloons to his house in order to fly it to Paradise Falls in South Africa is a rambunctiously inventive and funny flight. And if you don’t cry at that sweeping opening montage, either you have a heart of stone or you’re Armond White. Read my original review here.

3. THE HURT LOCKER (Dir. Kathryn Bigelow)

Every explosion has an emotional impact in this gripping war drama featuring Jeremy Renner as a bomb defusing expert who’d rather risk his life in Iraq than be home with his wife. Read my original review here.

4. INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS (Dir. Quentin Tarantino)

This indulgent alternate history World War II film is possibly over-stuffed with story strands but as I said in my original review: “the pulse and tone of Tarantino’s best work is intact.” Read the rest of that review here.

5. BLACK DYNAMITE (Dir. Scott Sanders)

Though it was little seen, this is hands down the funniest film of 2009. Forget THE HANGOVER, this blaxploitation homage/satire/greatest hits has more laughs per minute and is sure to be one Helluva a future cult classic. Read more here.


6. THE FANTASTIC MR. FOX (Dir. Wes Anderson)


Wes Anderson’s stylistic whimsy works wonders in this friendly, fuzzy, and ferociously witty film adaptation of Roald Dahl’s beloved children’s book. So does George Clooney’s charm which I enjoyed more here than in a certain air-born live action film that is sure to get more acclaim awards wise. Read my original review of THE FANTASTIC MR. FOX.

7. BRIGHT STAR (Dir. Jane Campion) An unfortunately overlooked period piece centering on poet John Keats’ (Ben Whishaw) doomed courtship of Fanny Brawne (Abbie Cornish). A beautifully moving work with first rate performances including a scene stealing Paul Schneider as Keats’ writing partner Charles Armitage Brown. With hope the Academy will take notice. Read my original review here.

8. DISTRICT 9 (Dir. Neill Blomkamp) Without a doubt the most frighteningly original (and strikingly satirical) work of science fiction of the year. A misadventure in alien apartheid leaves a wet behind the ears field operative (Sharlto Copley) with his arm mutated to that of a “prawn” and he…oh, just go watch it. Read my original ravings here.

9. ANVIL! THE STORY OF ANVIL! (Dir. Sacha Gervasi)

This documentary about a Spinal Tap-ish band of aging Canadian heavy metal rockers may have you snickering at first but before you know it they win your heart over with their “never say die” determination. As I said in my original review: “Metal heads and casual movie-goers alike (which means just about everybody) ought to dig it.”

10. BAD LIEUTENANT: PORT OF CALL – NEW ORLEANS (Dir. Werner Herzog) Speaking of “never say die”, Nicholas Cage re-ignites the crazy edge of his persona in this twisted and surrealistic corrupt cop crime caper while he re-ignites his “lucky crack pipe” yelling “I’ll kill all of you…to the break of dawn! To the break of dawn baby!” Read about more craziness and how this does and doesn’t relate to Abel Ferrara’s 1992 BAD LIEUTENANT here.

Spillover:

The ones that didn’t quite make the Top Ten grade but were still good, sometimes great flicks – click on the title for my original review.

STAR TREK (Dir. J.J. Abrams)

THE INFORMANT! (Dir. Steven Soderbergh)

ZOMBIELAND (Dir. Ruben Fleisher)

THE ROAD (Dir. John Hillcoat)

IN THE LOOP (Dir. Armando Iannucci)

A SINGLE MAN (Dir. Tom Ford)

WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE (Dir. Spike Jonze)

AN EDUCATION (Dir. Lone Scherfig)

AWAY WE GO (Dir. Sam Mendes)

OBSERVE AND REPORT (Dir. Jody Hill)

BIG FAN (Dir. Robert Siegel)

(500) DAYS OF SUMMER (Dir. Marc Webb)

MOON (Dir. Duncan Jones)

ABEL RAISES CAIN (Dirs. Jenny Abel & Jeff Hocket)

TWO LOVERS (Dir. James Gray)

I didn’t write reviews of these but they are also strongly recommended:

SUMMER HOURS (Dir. Olivier Assayas)

GOODBYE SOLO (Dir. Ramin Bahrani)

WORLD’S GREATEST DAD (Dir. Bobcat Goldthwait) Yep, that’s right.

More later…

Nick’s Un Caged Fury

BAD LIEUTENANT: PORT OF CALL – NEW ORLEANS
(Dir. Werner Herzog, 2009)

So is this a remake? A re-imagining? Is it connected to Abel Ferrara’s 1992 corrupt cop cult classic in any way than the title? The answer is that it is and it isn’t. Both films concern a police detective summed up by the first film’s tagline: “Gambler. Thief. Junkie. Killer. Cop.” Herzog claims that he never saw the ’92 version and that the title is a marketing ploy. Whatever the Hell it is, this is for certain: It’s a weird wild ride through the cracked psyche of, well, a very bad lieutenant and it’s Nicholas Cage’s best work in nearly a decade.

Unlike Harvey Keitel’s character in Ferrara’s film, only credited as “The Lieutenant”, Cage is given a name: Terrence McDonaugh. He is also given a new location – post Katrina New Orleans. His first case after being promoted involves the brutal slaying of five Senegalese immigrants. He follows the leads sometimes with his partner Val Kilmer, but mostly alone abusing his power at every opportunity, shaking down almost everybody for drugs and seeing iguanas and alligators that aren’t there in light fractured shots that are as disturbing as they are wickedly funny.

Take away the crazy Cage character and this would be a routine cop drama going from one witness to another on the trail of the killer, but this is completely about the crazy Cage character with the plot a hazy afterthought. You wouldn’t expect or want a standard cop thriller from Herzog, but this doesn’t exactly qualify as a genre deconstruction either – it’s more like genre destruction. There are no high speed chases or violent fist fights and when the story circles back on itself in the last reel it feels surreal – a satire of dream logic almost.

Though Kilmer barely registers in a walk through of a role there is a strong supporting cast aiding Cage. Eve Mendes (a former Cage costar in GHOST RIDER) is on hand as Cage’s strung out hooker girlfriend, Brad Dourif puts in a sharp turn as a cranky bookie, and Jennifer Coolidge (Stiffler’s Mom!) has an uncharacteristic part as Cage’s father’s (Tom Bower) partner. Also look for Michael Shannon, Fairuza Balk, and Xzibit as a drug kingpin aptly named “Big Fate” if you can actually take your eyes off Cage.

Cage’s outrageously off kilter performance fills the screen with kinetic energy that wonderfully erases the horrible memories of such dreck as the NATIONAL TREASURE movies and the other crappy commercial fare that has plagued his career of late. It’s a gutsy gripping piece of acting that made me giggle throughout. He takes hits from what he calls his “lucky crack pipe” and spouts such baffling bat-shit insane phrases as “I’ll kill all of you. To the break of dawn. To the break of dawn, baby!” He engages in the kind of sordid behavior that makes Harvey Keitel’s take on the character look positively subdued.

BAD LIEUTENANT: PORT OF CALL – NEW ORLEANS (a horrible title whatever its reasoning) is an intoxicating surprise, but I’m sure it’ll rub many moviegoers wrong. It makes no apologies and has no moralistic message so it really stands out in this otherwise saccharin season. It’s an unruly and unhinged work by a master of obsessed cinema. It’s an experience that will linger long after like a vivid nightmare and while that might not sound like a recommendation – believe me it is.

More later…

Young Genghis Khan, Steroids, And A Cagey New DVD Release

MONGOL (Dir. Sergei Bodrov, 2007)

Appropriate alternate titles for this film could be THE ADVENTURES OF YOUNG GENGHIS KHAN, THE REAL WRATH OF KHAN, or perhaps most aptly GENGHIS KHAN BEGINS. At first I was just happy that this wasn’t like 300 – a videogame aestetic with not one foot in reality but despite some CGI (mostly in the spraying of blood) this epic thankfully has an old school naturalism to it. Unfortunately it is a trial to sit through with long sequences that go nowhere and characters that fail to stir any emotional connection.

We first meet Khan, born as Temudgin, as a young boy played by Odnyam Odsuren. When his father is murdered he becomes hunted because he may grow up to avenge the death GODFATHER: PART II-style. He survives capture and torture and skirts across the endless mountain terrain inspired by thoughts of his young bride Börte (Bayertsetseg Erdenebat). The pace picks up a bit when he emerges as an adult in the form of Tadanobu Asano whose grace and stern focus provide the film with much needed power. He returns to the arms of Börte now portrayed by Khulan Chuluun but their reunion is short-lived as she is kidnapped by a rival clan and Temudgin goes against the advice of his best friend Jamukha (Honglei Sun) who stresses “What Mongol ever went to war for a woman?”

Several battle scenes full of slow motion slicing and the before mentioned digital blood are the most entertaining parts of MONGOL but they do not save the movie from the long uninvolving stretches that toyed with my patience. The photography of the infinite landscapes of Inner Mongolia and Kazakhstan is breath-taking much of the time but the lack of narrative drive and the detached handling of the myths of these historical figures as well as the lackluster love story left me cold. At just a little over 2 hours (but feels much longer) MONGOL moves like a bloated beast trying to find a place to sleep but still lashing half heartedly out at swirling flies. The word is that this is the first part of a trilogy – a Mongolian LORD OF THE RINGS if you will, with director Bodrov promising the rest of the tale of the legendary conquerer for your Oscar consideration (MONGOL was nominated for a Best Foreign Language Film Academy Award). Well if the future installments lumber like this one in such uninspired stupor over the tortuous and tedious terrain, count me out.

BIGGER, STRONGER, FASTER (Dir. Chris Bell, 2008)

Fancy this – a documentary about an obvious hot-button topic i.e. anabolic steroids and their impact on our national society which contains actual insights personal, political, and pop culture-wise. Take that, SUPER SIZE ME! Director Bell and his 2 body building brothers (Mike “Mad Dog” and Mark “Smelly”) have all used steroids and relate tales of near stardom in the shadows of their heroes – Arnold Swartzeneger, Sylvester Stallone, Hulk Hogan et al. Taking its name from an oft repeated line from The Six Million Dollar Man, BIGGER, STRONGER, FASTER is chock full of clips of their role models in their pumped up prime – RAMBO, ROCKY, THE TERMINATOR, as well as satirical swipes at the world of performance enhancing drugs from the likes of The Simpsons and SNL. Filling out the solidly structured footage is interviews with experts pro and con on the steroid issue but the real crux is the Bell brothers’ back stories. Chris Bell cops to doing steroids (in an especially emotional dinner table scene with his parents) when he was younger and stopping because of feelings of guilt but his brothers are still users. Their confessions under the scrutiny of their brother once one of them but now a questioning documentarian are compelling and surprisingly sincere sounding: “I love steroids and will probably be on and off them forever” Mark admits matter of factly.

Bell keeps coming back to Swartzeneger who he calls “the poster boy for steroids” and reasons that the Govenator, as he’s often called, wouldn’t be where he is now if not for the controversial compound. The director even tries to get an interview with Ah-nold a la Michael Moore’s attempted Roger Smith ambush but he doesn’t bog the film down with the pursuit – it’s just an amusing sideline. Examining not only the public personas wrapped up in the use or abuse debate but statistical data and health risk misinformation (depending on who you listen to) Chris Bell has made a superlative documentary that deftly balances its viewpoints and never loses its thesis thread. BIGGER STRONGER FASTER earns its tagline: “The Side Effects Of Being American” and should be seen by everybody with even just a passing interest in its subject. It’s one of the most honest and absorbing portraits I’ve ever seen of a complicated problem with equal parts humor and pathos. With hope it won’t be forgotten when the awards season comes around again.

Newly released on DVD:

NATIONAL TREASURE 2: BOOK OF SECRETS (Dir. Jon Turteltaub, 2007)

The first NATIONAL TREASURE was a direct lift of “The Da Vinci Code” (the book mind you – it beat the film adaptation by 9 months) imposing an American action formula on the bestsellers puzzles and distortion of history. It was as stupid as it sounds with Nicholas Cage’s wise-cracking protagonist leading his small crew (including the supposed to be funny but isn’t Justin Bartha as his partner and Diane Kruger as the love interest) through contrived unexciting movie mechanisms but it made a ginormous amount of money; enough money to warrant a sequel apparently so here we are again with more of the lame same. I was planning on skipping this until I saw a trailer that promised the premise of a book known only to the President of The United States that contains the secrets to the nation’s greatest mysteries – the J.F.K. assassination, Area 51, and the alleged faking of the Apollo Moon landing. I’m a lover of conspiracy theory cinema and am writing a book on the subject so I felt obligated. I still shouldn’t have bothered – these famous theories or urban legends, as some would call them, are just mentioned and never used in any interesting or even amusing way. As I should’ve known the book of secrets is just a McGuffin * in another round of running from one wickedly easy to open crypt to another cipher or another implausibly placed code.

* For you non-film geeks – a McGuffin is a plot device that motivates the characters or advances the story, but the details of which are of little or no importance otherwise (Wikipedia).

Anyone who doubts the quality of the latest INDIANA JONES movie should see NATIONAL TREASURE 2 because its lack of genuine wit and graceless tone makes that ole Spielberg/Lucas/Ford re-union special look like TREASURE OF THE SIERRE MADRE! The addition of Helen Mirren as Cage’s mother and Voight’s bickering ex-wife brings nothing new to this lame wannabe franchise though it is kind of cool to see her in plain duds with scraggly hair and no grand make-up for once. Then again with Mirren and other such solid respected actors as Harvey Keitel (reprising his role from the first NT as a sympathetic cop in pursuit) and Ed Harris (as the villain – uh, I guess) running around it feels like this overly slick enterprise exists to glorify cinematic slumming it.

Nicholas Cage has drifted so far from doing compelling vital work with such dreck as this and GHOST RIDER, NEXT, THE WICKER MAN et al that it is getting harder to remember how interesting and talented the guy once seemed. Since these movies make money his return to worthwhile cinema looks like it may be delayed indefinitely. I loved his performances in ADAPTATION, RAISING ARIZONA, WILD AT HEART, and various other non-action roles in his canon so this long detour into sell-out formula crapola is pretty puzzling. Though to make sense of this movie mystery wouldn’t take a cryptic McGuffin with a code to decipher unless it leads us directly to Cage’s bank vault or just gives us his bank balance statement.

More later…

The Film Babble Blog Top 10 Worst Movies Of 2007

Oscar season is now officially over and we’ve basked in the glory of a great year for film for long enough so now it’s time to look at the not so great movies of 2007. Actually “not so great” is being too kind – these were wretched evil slabs of celluloid sent from Hell to taint our collective unconscious and will make us all pay a higher psychic price than we can possibly imagine (as the late great comedian Bill Hicks would say). So let’s warm our hands on the fire as we throw these movies back to from where they came one by one:

1. WILD HOGS (Dir. Walt Becker)

Hard to believe this was one of the biggest box office hits of the year. It’s a CITY SLICKERS-ish mid-life crisis tale with motorcycles instead of horses padded out with bathroom humour, gay-panic jokes, and tired stupid sitcom plotting. We’re used to seeing Tim Allen, Martin Lawrence, and even John Travolta slumming it in such unfunny cinematic crap but why did William H. Macy and Marissa Tomei have to be dragged down with them? Read my original review here.

2. REDACTED (Dir. Brian DePalma)

This has been a really bad year for films about the Iraq war with audiences staying away from both documentaries like NO END IN SIGHT and dramas like LIONS FOR LAMBS. Of course it doesn’t help the cause when the movie is actually really bad like DePalma’s misguided horribly named unaffecting mess REDACTED. Through the conceit that the fictional (though based on a real incident) tale of a troop in Samarra who are involved with the rape and murder of an innocent 14 year old Iraqi girl and the killing of her family is told by one of the soldier’s hand held videocams, fake cable TV footage, and simulated YouTube clips we just get the same old bottom line: War Is Hell. Worse yet this obnoxious exercise comes across like it’s more down on the troops than the war.

3. Tie: GHOST RIDER (Dir. Mark Steven Johnson) / NEXT (Dir. Lee Tamhori) A Nicholas Cage double whammy! Actually if I had seen the sequel to the awful NATIONAL TREASURE that came out last December this may have been a triple whammy. In NEXT a clever Philip K. Dick short story is awfully adapted into a boring by-the-numbers action movie formula while GHOST RIDER takes its comic book source and well…also awfully adapts it into an equally lame action movie. Come on Cage! We all know you have another ADAPTATION or WILD AT HEART in you, so why do you have to keep giving us this pap? Read my original review of GHOST RIDER here.

4. THE NUMBER 23 (Dir. Joel Schumacher) This is the stupidest film in Jim Carrey’s entire career and with a filmography that includes the ACE VENTURA movies and especially DUMB AND DUMBER that is really saying something. As a wise-cracking dogcatcher who starts seeing the number of the title everywhere and they start piling up as clues to a long unresolved murder. Wait! It gets stupider – read my original review here.

5. FACTORY GIRL (Dir. George Hickenlooper) A vicious disapointment in the department of biopics of C-List celebrities. Sure, model and 60’s “It girl” Edie Sedgewick (played by Sienna Miller) was a wasted vapid Warhol groupie but she deserved better than this putrid portrait. My review is of course, right here.

6. 1408 (Mikael Håfström) John Cusack in a hotel room from Hell. That’s pretty much it. Want more of a description of the Stephen King derived suckitude contained within? Click on this.

7. SHOOT ‘EM UP (Dir. Michael Davis) At one point Clive Owen says: “You know what I hate? I hate those lame action movies where the good guy calls just one person who ends up betraying him.” Me? I hate lame action movies like this. Even one in which ace actor Paul Giamatti (talk about slumming it!) plays the bad guy. After CHILDREN OF MEN Owen must have hesitated to do another ‘save an important baby from evil forces’ movie but maybe he just decided that the price was right. I never reviewed this bombastic blockbuster wannabe for good reason.

8. YEAR OF THE DOG (Dir. Mike White) I like former SNL cast member turned film lead actress Molly Shannon. I like the supporting cast including Regina King, Peter Scaarsgard, John C. Reilly, and Laura Dern. I like screenwriter/director Mike White. Also I like dogs. But I really didn’t like this awkward indie comedy and by the end of it wanted to put it to sleep. Read about how it rubbed me the wrong way here.

9. BUG (Dir. William Friedkin) A ridiculous conspiracy minded thriller with hammy overacting and silly twists. Normally I love ridiculous conspiracy minded thrillers with hammy overacting and silly twists but Friedkin really doesn’t bring it here. Read my review of the DVD here.

10. THE TEN (Dir. David Wain) A sketch comedy film without a single laugh. Paul Rudd, whose smug detachment helps him walk off unscathed from this dreck, is the presenter of 10 vignettes ostensibly based on the morals of the 10 commandments featuring the usually reliable members of comic ensembles from the TV cult favorites The State and Stella who have all done good funny work before. WET HOT AMERICAN SUMMER this ain’t. My original review? Never wrote one – in fact this is the most I ever want to write about this mean minded offensive unfunny doggerel. Next time I won’t mince words.

More later…

Film Babble’s 100th Post!

“It’s too cerebral! We’re trying to make a movie here, not a film!”
– Kit Ramsey (Eddie Murphy) BOWFINGER (Dir. Frank Oz, 1999)

No special features or self congratulatory crap for my 100th – just some good ole fashioned movie reviews. A couple of new movies I caught at the theater and a few new release DVDs – nice and simple. So let’s get going –

DEATH AT A FUNERAL (Dir. Frank Oz, 2007) After one of the most misguided remakes in history THE STEPFORD WIVES, a film Nathan Rabin in his excellent My Year Of Flops column (The Onion A.V. Club) would most likely call a “fiasco”, Frank Oz brings us a funeral farce. Set in and around a countryside house during what should have been a stiff-upper lip service – a cast of mostly British mourners all with their own agenda or issue clash, argue, and fret over many outrageous obstacles. Obstacles such as money matters that are driving rival brothers (Matthew Macfadyen, Rupert Graves) apart, a misplaced bottle of LSD tablets labeled as Valium, and a dwarf (little person? Trying to be PC here) played by the wonderful Peter Dinklage (THE STATION AGENT) that has a family shattering secret. There is some cringe-inducing slapstick and unnecessary scatological nonsense but through its economical brevity (it follows the unwritten rule that comedies should be 90 min) the mixed bits are happily reigned in. DEATH AT A FUNERAL contains a number of genuine big laughs and while it may never be considered a comedy classic it will be most likely fondly remembered for many seasons to come. Oh yeah – it also more than makes up for THE STEPFORD WIVES.

ROCKET SCIENCE (Dir. Jeffrey Blitz, 2007) So the first non-documentary by director Jeffrey Blitz (SPELLBOUND – 2003) is another adolescent angst movie in the tradition of Wes Anderson and Todd Solondz (especially RUSHMORE and WELCOME TO THE DOLLHOUSE respectively). Unfortunately it’s nowhere as good as those touchstones with its self conscious screenplay filled with forced humor and standard grade quirkiness. Stuttering student (Reece Daniel Thompson) is a debate club star wannabe but his speech impediment gets in the way of his academic career and love life. He pines for a cold condescending classmate played by Anna Kendrick who is way ahead of him in the debate game and also way out of his league. A huge miss-step of many is the voice-over narration by Dan Cashman which in tone and context sounds to much like Ricky Jay’s opening MAGNOLIA spiel. Not able to surpass or be the equal of its influences and peopled by characters which are hard to care about ROCKET SCIENCE misses its mark by a movie mile. It simply should have had more moxie.

Some new DVDS I’ve recently seen :

THE LIVES OF OTHERS (Dir. Florian Henckel-Donnersmarck, 2006)

“He knows that the party needs artists but that artists need the party even more.”
– Minister Bruno Hempf (Thomas Thieme)

This is an amazing and affecting wire-tapping tale set in East Germany (GDR) in 1984. A time when artists such as playwrights who were thought to have subversive tendencies are bugged and blacklisted by the secret police (Stasi) in the remaining years before the Berlin wall came down. One such playwright Georg Dreyman (Sebastian Koch – who was one of the only highlights of BLACK BOOK) has a actress girlfriend (Martina Gedeck) who has some too close for comfort ties to the Stasi. The real star of this piece though is the character of Captain Gerd Wiesler (Ulrich Muhe) who develops a protective sympathy for the people he’s assigned to spy on. More of a drama with tense moments than a thriller, THE LIVES OF OTHERS fully deserved the Best Foreign Picture Oscar that it won this year and should go right to the top of your ‘must see’ list or your Netflix queue which I guess is the same thing.

Postnote : This movie is going to get the American remake treatment by Sydney Pollack set for 2010. Whatever makeover they give it I hope it doesn’t have that damn thriller thunder dubbed on top of it.

GHOST RIDER (Dir. Mark Steven Johnson, 2007) I honestly can’t remember why I ordered this one up. I mean I like Nicholas Cage but hate his action movie crap (CON AIR, THE ROCK, NATIONAL TREASURE, etc) and I successfully dodged the bullet that was THE WICKER MAN remake – not really action I suppose but still looked like crap so I’m drawing a blank right now as to why I added this to my queue. I am completely unfamiliar with the comic book (sorry – graphic novel) that this is based on and I didn’t hear anything good about it when it was released in theaters earlier this year so go figure. Cage plays Johnny Blaze – “a badass stunt cyclist” (Netflix’s envelopes words not mine) who makes a deal with the Devil, played by Peter Fonda no less – who I guess shows up whenever the pitch “it’s a motorcycle movie” is made. The Devil’s son Blackheart (that charismatically creeply kid from AMERICAN BEAUTY – Wes Bently) wants to take over for his dad and destroy the creation made from the contract – the Ghost Rider of the title that Blaze can change into at will. “Oh, and his face was a skull and it was on fire” says a punk clad Rebel Wilson credited as ‘Girl in Alley’ and I couldn’t say it any better. This film is supremely stupid but oddly not severely sucky – I mean as mere pop entertainment goes you could do worse with a couple of hours than watching it. Then again, that blank white space on the wall over there is looking mighty appealing.

Okay! I didn’t think the word “crap” would show up 3 times in my 100th post but otherwise all is good. Hope you stick around for my next hundred posts.

More later…

10 Definitive Films-Within-Films

We’re talking meta-movies here this time out! In particular – movies that contain sometimes just an inkling, sometimes an almost fully formed movie of its own inside their film framework. Fictitious films abound through cinema history – a fake title mentioned here, a fabricated clip seen in passing there but these examples cited below are unique in that their film within a film is practically their sole reason for being.

1. “Mant” in MATINEE (Dir. Joe Dante, 1993) A comic valentine to the end of the 50’s sci-fi B-movie era MATINEE is set in Key West, Florida, during the Cuban missile crisis in 1962. This is the perfect setting for schlock meister showman Lawrence Woolsey (John Goodman) to unveil “Mant” billed as “Half Man…Half Ant…All Terror!” and presented in Atomo-Vision and Rumble-Rama. Woolsey (who was supposedely based on like-wise schock -meister William Castle but his silhouette and appearance in his trailers are pure Hitchcock) gets his girlfriend played by Cathy Moriarty to dress as a nurse to get patrons to sign “medical consent forms” in the theater lobby, rigs the seats with electric buzzers, and even hires a guy to dress up as a giant ant and appear at a pivotal moment to scare the audience. All these gimmicks are employed to enhance the experience that is “Mant” – a black and white spoof of vintage monster movies in which a man mutates into a giant ant.

Appearances from veteran actors Kevin McCarthy (the original INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS), Robert Cornthwaite (the original WAR OF THE WORLDS, the original THE THING) and William Shallert (CRY TERROR! – ’58) give it creature feature cred while Moriarty does double duty as the actress playing the Mant’s distressed wife. As the high price on the Amazon ad to the right indicates MATINEE is sadly out of print but it must be noted that the original widescreen version laserdisc (circa ’94) has a stand-alone extra of the entire “Mant!” movie, running about 20 min. With hope a DVD re-release with this bonus will arrive some day and give this under-rated gem its deserved due.

2. “A Fistful Of Yen” in THE KENTUCKY FRIED MOVIE (Dir. John Landis, 1977) At just over 30 minutes this is the longest film within a film on this list. Sandwiched inside a hodge-podge of TV commercial parodies, movie trailer send-ups, and other media mocking mayhem, “A Fistful Of Yen” is a savage satire of 70’s Kung fu cinema in general but mostly it takes on the seminal Bruce Lee vehicle ENTER THE DRAGON (Dir. Robert Clouse, 1973). As KENTUCKY FRIED MOVIE was the first feature by sketch comedy trio the Zucker bros. (David and Jerry) and Jim Abrahams, this extended piece was essentially a warm-up piece to AIRPLANE! and a introduction to their joke-a-second sight gag style. Evan C. Kim plays the Lee stand-in who accepts an assignment by the Government (U.S.? British? Does it matter?) to infiltrate Dr. Klahn’s (Master Bong Soo Han) island fortress of extraordinary magnitude, foil his destructive master plan and “kill fifty, maybe sixty people”.

3. “Habeas Corpus” in THE PLAYER (Dir. Robert Altman, 1991) – Major Spoiler! – Andy Civella (Dean Stockwell) and Tom Oakley (Richard E. Grant) pitch a premise to slick but sleazy studio exec.Griffin Mill (Tim Robbins) – a dark thriller about an innocent woman sentenced to death. Oakley insists that the project be done with no stars and no happy ending – “she’s dead because that’s the reality – the innocent die” and “when I think about this – this isn’t even an American film” he stresses. When “Habeas Corpus” emerges a year later we see its final scenes in a studio screening room as the creators and execs look on. It’s now completely populated by stars (Bruce Willis, Julia Roberts, Susan Sarandon, Peter Falk, Louise Fletcher, Ray Walston, etc) and has a contrived feel-good one-liner ending – “traffic was a bitch” Willis retorts after rescuing Roberts from the gas chamber. Why was this vision so disgustingly comprised? With dollar signs in his eyes Oakley responds “what about the way the old ending tested in Canoga Park? Everybody hated it, we reshot it now everybody loves it – that’s reality!” SNAP!


4.“Je Vous Presente, Pamela (Meet Pamela)” in DAY FOR NIGHT (NUIT AMERICAINE (Dir. Francois Truffaut, 1974) The making of “Meet Pamela” is the entire premise of the Oscar Award winning DAY FOR NIGHT. Truffaut plays a director much like himself who is consumed with every detail of his latest production. His cast and crew, all seemingly playing versions of themselves toil and plod through the never ending chaotic shooting schedule. The beautiful American actress Jacqueline Biset (who is one of the only actors that has a few lines in English) plays Pamela who in the mist of movie passion gets caught up in a romance with Jean Peirre Leaud (Truffaut regular and alter ego in the ANTOINE DOINEL series) who continually asks everyone he meets “are women magic?”

The first scene shows a busy Parisian street with dozens of people walking, children playing, a bus passing, and a man (Leaud) walking up the stairs from a subway tunnel to confront another man on the sidewalk then slap him. The director yells “cut!” and we have a unit director through a bullhorn – “the bus was 2 seconds late, the background activity was late too!” We are immediately inside both the film being made and the outer film about making it. And so it goes throughout the whole picture – we get a sense that “Meet Pamela” is a cliched melodrama far less interesting than what goes on behind the camera – which of course is in front of the camera in this film but before I blow my meta-mind out I digress…

5. “Chubby Rain” in BOWFINGER (Dir. Frank Oz, 1999) Another movie about the making of a fictional movie but this one is so uniquely American in its con-artistry. BOWFINGER has many detractors but I consider it the best Steve Martin movie of the last 10 years. Granted that’s not saying much – I mean CHEAPER BY THE DOZEN, BRINGING DOWN THE HOUSE, PINK PANTHER – uh, anybody? The movie being made was chosen by Martin’s not so wild but at times completely crazy small-time movie-maker wannabe Bobby Bowfinger character from a sci-fi script by his accountant (Adam Alexi-Malle) about aliens who come down in the raindrops hence “Chubby Rain”. After a cursory script skimming by slimey studio exec Robert Downey Jr. Bowfinger finds that his project would get greenlit if he gets self proclaimed “biggest black action star in the world” Kit Ramsey (Eddie Murphy). So when Ramsey is uninterested in the doing the film, especially after meeting Bowfinger – the cast and crew (including Heather Graham, Jamie Kennedy, and Christine Baranski) stalk him shooting film of him without his knowledge to star in “Chubby Rain.”

The hoax works for a bit but Ramsey being extremely paranoid and a pawn of a Scientology-like organization called Mindhead goes ballistic at the movie manipulations surrounding him. In the end though a deal is struck and the completed “Chubby Rain” is a pure crowd pleaser from the unknowing participation from Ramsey and the knowing participation from his geeky twin brother Jiff who serves as his double (of course also played by Murphy). A glimpse at another ficticious film “Fake Purse Ninjas” starring Bowfinger and Jiff is seen at the end. Sure “Chubby Rain” as a film within a film is silly beyond belief but even in its fake truncated form when we see a montage of scenes from it at its premiere it looks more valid and a more solid credible film than say DADDY DAY CARE, I SPY, HAUNTED MANSION, or even NORBIT for Christ’s sake!

6. “The Purple Rose Of Cairo” in THE PURPLE ROSE OF CAIRO
(Dir. Woody Allen, 1985) Since the Woodman is a fully functioning film historian himself, the idea that he would construct a completely realized movie to be watched and worshipped during the depression especially by domestically abused Celcelia (Mia Farrow) is not far fetched at all – in retrospect it seems natural as all get out. It’s just harmless escapism involving dapper dressed witty socialites on a Egyptian expedition before enjoying “a madcap Manhattan weekend” until protagonist pith-helmet wearing explorer Tom Baxter (Jeff Daniels) walks offscreen into Farrow’s life and a world of trouble. Then the actor playing the character – Gil Shepherd (also Daniels) has to appear to talk his alter-ego back onto the screen so the movie can play out.

The other characters in “The Purple Rose Of Cairo” remain on the screen squabbling about their predicament and sometimes ridicule the few audience members while Cecelia is torn between the two men – “I just met a wonderful new man. He’s fictional but you can’t have everything..” One of Allen’s greatest lines ever in his entire cinematic canon is spoken by an extra – credited as “Moviegoer” an irrate old lady (too lazy to do the full research on this one – several women are listed as “Moviegoer” on IMDb) complains at the box office – “I want what happened in the movie last week to happen this week; otherwise, what’s life all about anyway?”

7. “Codename Dragonfly“ in CQ (Dir. Roman Coppola, 2001)

So the story goes, this movie about a movie is a pastiche of the movies BARBARELLA (Dir. Roger Vadim, 1968) and DANGER: DIABOLIK (Dir. Mario Bava, 1968) – that is it’s a nod to Italian knock-off spy thriller/cheap “it came from outer space” spoofs. Jeremy Davis plays an idealistic 60’s film-maker in Paris in 1969 whose ego gets in the way of his artistic ambition when he works as an editor on “Codename Dragonfly“. In the commentary cinematographer Bob Yeoman says “it’s actually 3 movies within a movie” – the first being the black and white documentary that Davis’s Paul character is self indulgentely making, the second – the sexy sci-fi “Dragonfly” project, and the third being I guess the entire CQ (“seek you”) project surrounding it – I think that’s it – maybe I need to watch it with commentary again. Anyway “Codename Dragonfly” is available as an extra on the CQ DVD in 2 different versions each running roughly over 10 min. – one is Paul’s (Davis) the other director Andrezej’s (Gerald Depardieu) compromised cut with fake “scene missing” bits and incomplete matte paintings.

8.“Home For Purim” (later changed to “Home For Thanksgiving”) in FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION (Dir. Christopher Guest, 2006)

As one of Guest’s lesser ensemble comedy works the film within a film here is actually pretty funny. The plot of the movie being made is about a daughter’s confession of her lesbianism to her ailing mother upon coming home for a traditional holiday. Such issue driven content must be Oscar rewarded, right? So goes the premise here – funny in spurts – some of which spurts have studio exec Martin Gibb (Ricky Gervais) suggesting that they should “tone down the Jewishness” – hence the title and holiday change. Insinuated online Oscar buzz goes to the heads of the cast of “Home For Thanksgiving” particularly to unfortunately and cruelly named Marilyn Hack (Catherine O’Hara) and pretentious veteran actor Victor Allan Miller (Harry Shearer). From the evidenced quality (or lack of) in said film within film we can see way in advance how their fortunes (or lack of) will turn out.

9. “The Orchid Thief” in ADAPTATION (Dir. Spike Jonze, 2002)

It could be argued that this entire movie is a movie within a movie here – it is hard to see where the screenplay Charlie Kaufman (Nicholas Cage) is writing ends and his brother Donald’s (also Cage) begin. Hired to adapt Susan Orlean’s (Meryl Streep) bestselling “The Orchid Thief” Kaufman sweats bullets on how exactly to make a story out of a story-less book. He declares “I don’t want to cram in sex or guns or car chases or characters learning profound life lessons or growing or coming to like each other or overcoming obstacles to succeed in the end.” His brother Donald is working on a populist thriller called “The 3“. When Charlie realizes that Donald may have the accessible keys to making his work adaptable they collaborate and the movie concludes with sex, guns, a car chase, characters growing, coming to like each other, learning profound life lessons, and overcoming obstacles to succeed in the end.

Charlie: “I’ve written myself into my screenplay.”
Donald: “That’s kind of weird, huh?”

10. “The Mutants of 2051 AD” in STRANGE BREW (Dirs. Rick Moranis & Dave Thomas, 1983) SCTV‘s beloved beer-swilling Canadian spokesmen Doug and Bob McKenzie introduce their new movie at the beginning of STRANGE BREW. It’s a cheapie sci-fi epic set in the future after a worldwide holocaust. We see Bob (Moranis) drive their beat-up van suspended on very visible wires through what he calls “the forbidden zone” – “I was kinda like a one man force, eh? Like Charlton Heston in OMEGA MAN. Did you see it? It was beauty.” The film breaks down, the audience revolts wanting their money back and STRANGE BREW regresses to a regular comedy setting. Too bad – if they kept the non-existant budget sci-fi thing going through the whole movie we might have really had a classic here.

Honorable Mention :

“The Dueling Cavalier” (later changed to “The Dancing Cavalier” in SINGIN’ IN THE RAIN (Dirs. Stanley Donen & Gene Kelly) We see little of this film within a film but its production meeting brainstorming makes the concept take on a life of its own. Especially as Wikipedia notes – “The film “The Dueling Cavalier” is probably a reference to THE CAVALIER (Dir. Irvin Willat, 1928) a largely silent picture notable only for its poorly dubbed songs that were thrown in when it became clear talkies were popular”.

“American Scooby” in STORYTELLING (Dir. Todd Solondz, 2001) The second half of STORYTELLING entitled “Non-fiction” details documentary film-maker Toby Oxman (Paul Giamatti) filming Scooby (Mark Webber) – a high school student and his family (including father John Goodman * and mother Julie Hagerty) through the college application process. The film that results – “American Scooby” with its title, identical soundtrack and right on down to the “straw wrapper blowing in the wind” (a substitute for that plastic bag of course) is obviously a huge dig at AMERICAN BEAUTY. Apparently this is because Director Sam Mendes put down Solondz’s work so file this under pay-back time.

* Goodman, again. He is surely the meta-man to go to for fictional film appearances!

“Stab” in SCREAM 2 (Dir. Wes Craven, 1997) Robert Rodriguez filmed the film-within-a-film here that dramatized the events of the first SCREAM. Also it should be noted that SCREAM 3 which was the series concluder also featured the fictional series concluder “Stab 3 : Return to Woodsboro“.

“Tristram Shandy” in TRISTHAM SHANDY : A COCK AND BULL STORY
(Dir. Michael Winterbottom, 2005)

“Raving Beauty” in CECIL B. DEMENTED (Dir. John Waters, 2001)

Dishonorable Mention :

S1m0ne (Dir. Andrew Niccol, 2002) Computer generated actress Simone (Rachel Roberts) created by washed-out film maker Viktor Taransky (Al Pacino) stars in 3 fictional films – “I Am Pig“, “Sunrise Sunset“, and “Eternity Forever“. What we see of them is just as unconvincing as she is.

“Jack Slater IV” in LAST ACTION HERO (Dir. John McTiernan, 1993) The less said about this Schwarzenegger dud the better. Don’t know why I even brought it up.

“Time Over Time” in AMERICA’S SWEETHEARTS (Dir. Joe Roth, 2001) Diddo.

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