Black Swan - % % % %

Startling and hallucinatory, Black Swan is a psychological horror story. Nina, played with every muscle by Nathalie Portman, achieves her lifelong dream of playing the Swan Queen in her ballet company's production of Swan Lake. Nina is a fragile perfectionist dominated by her live-in mother, a former dancer herself. Nina is already fraying at the edges from the physical pressures of professional ballet, so the elevation to her new role and the challenges, amplified by her director's sexual manipulations, lead her down the rabbit hole.

To succeed, we are told, one must give everything of themselves with abandon. Be free in the full sacrifice to one's craft. The greatest artists, athletes, whatever one admires, completely immerse themselves in their passion and are dedicated to perfection, n'est-ce pas? Nina releases her ego and identity in the complete submission of herself in the role of prima ballerina and she dissolves.

Directed by Darren Aronofsky, the film excels in this dissolution of reality. No other director achieves such a tangible, empathetic form of fear and nausea at the destruction of the human body. I left the theater after seeing Requiem for a Dream, thankful for my arms and for never having been so desperate or tragic in my life to succumb to prostitution. "Black Swan" makes me so grateful for the solidity of my body and my fingers and my bones and the entire thing. He achieves a rare squeamish terror that directors of Saw films should envy.



Furthermore, the disorientation of the climax and finale is complete and unpredictable. Unlike a film such as "Shutter Island", there are no explanations drawn out for the audience. The events swirl around Nina like the hallucinations they are. I've never seen such an accurate portrayal of the effects of Ecstasy on film. That alone is quite impressive. Nina's identity refracts like shattered mirrors as her self becomes her only real human connection and as she disintegrates into her new role.

Her body, her ultimate tool, rejects her and transforms itself, or perhaps she unconsciously transforms herself. Like a neurotic twitch that one cannot restrain, her skin and fingers and blood begin to alter against her will. A ballerina must be a master of her body, and her bulimia enables an illusion of physical and psychological control.

She is fragile and pale, like an egg, and as the pressure increases she cracks in a messy, messy way. It's exhilarating and spectacular and queasy and actually scary.

The casting is fantastic with the former prima, whom Nina replaces, played by Winona Ryder, and the new challenger played by Mila Kunis, who I am delighted to see in a drama. She is fantastic and utilizes her charisma to seduce with danger, rather than self-deprecating humor. The director of the company is slyly portrayed by Vincent Cassel using his sexuality and authority to embody that special kind of manipulative, seductive machismo. Rounding out the cast is Deborah Winger as the mother. She is quite terrifying yet believable. She resists the caricature of the failed mother living through her daughter and deftly plays the mind games of the most brilliant passive-aggressive matriarchs. Nathalie Portman deserves award considerations. She carries the film. Her character is nearly hysterical through the whole film yet she never becomes shrill or irritating. At the open of the film, I was saddened that such a good actress should immediately call to mind the stilted dialogue of Padme from Star Wars. To my relief she obliterated that character from my mind with her passion in this new role.

I will say as a draw back that the sound effects, while effective, were occaisionally over done and comical at first. Such a hallucinatory film is difficult for an audience to transition into at first and the sound effects just felt goofy for the first quarter of the film. Even towards the end, I found them heavy handed.

The pacing of the film was excellent and reminded me of the great psychological thrillers of Hitchcock. I am extremely impressed and thrilled that Aronofsky has returned to such dream-like territory. He is, in my opinion, at his best and most unique when creating a whirl-wind of the mind. His dryer character drama, "The Wrestler" was epic and poignant. But it lacked the joy and magic of creation that Aronofsky holds. If you are capable of extraordinary flights of fantasy, I'm not sure why you would ever tell such a miserable story, no matter how well told or illuminating it is. It'd be like Terry Gilliam directing Erin Brockovich. Why? And I think The Wrestler was a fantastic story of great depth and interest. I'm just so thrilled to get more from Aronofsky's imagination.

There is so much more I could say about the body manipulation inherent in such religious ferocity and the self-destructive commitment to success and work as a form of enslavement. What is success for? Is anyone really remembered in our ADD society? Are professional athletes any different than this woman crushing her toes to be beautiful? Is the drive for success always based in a lack of self-confidence and a frailty of identity?

Awesome. Scary. Trippy. Cool.

You accidentally came to my website and welcome!

I am thrilled by this new addition to the blogger arsenal. Se here's the tracking of where my visitors have been from in the past. Pretty nifty.

Pageviews by Countries
United States 20
India 3
Switzerland 2
Spain 2
United Kingdom 2
Greece 2
Australia 1
Canada 1
Iceland 1
Jamaica 1

Since I don't know anyone in Greece or Jamaica, I'm going to guess that all the other views are also people who wandered here from Google. I hope you found it interesting. Now that I have confirmation that this blog does get some views even with the previously crummy way I've been keeping it, perhaps I shall be better motivated to improve my content. I am having an oddly sincere and probably nonstrategic moment, but I confess that I would like to offer something of value to the internet. I like processing my ideas about films through reviews, which could be useful for others. I'm not sure what will be most appealing for an audience. I'll mull it over, but if anyone has suggestions, I'm open to 'em. Thank you for visiting.

The Road - % % % % %

I have not seen such an engrossing and encompassing film in many months. Something about the intensity of the genre demands the audience's attention, and yet this film was more penetrating in its sparseness and more emotional in its anonymous performances, making none its equal.

Marvelous. It is a miserable story. At its core is the essence of why we live. In creating a truly desolate world, the story from the novel "The Road", by Cormac McCarthy, strips away the other concerns in life that we are cluttered with living in modernity. This leaves the hunt for food, the fear of danger and violence and then the radical question, why live at all?

After an unknown apocalypse of such extreme proportions that all life aside from human has ceased, a father and son head south. Flashbacks expand on their situation, telling the backstory of a wife and mother, Charlize Theron, who finally gives up so completely and, spoiler alert, removes her layers of warm clothing to walk into the dark and cold wild. Alone with the boy, the man, masterfully played by Viggo Mortensen, trudges along fighting to get the boy to an age when he can survive on his own or prepare himself for the likelihood of merciful suicide. The film deftly allows in the most gruesome of realities without reveling in their monstrous power. Many of the surviving people have taken to cannibalism since all of the animals and plants are dead. The horrors of this environment are acknowledged and momentarily explored to establish the extreme danger for the pair, but are not embraced with prurient thrill as is often the case in the apocalyptic genre. The film is filled with fear and allows horror, but is more elegant than a more base thrill or shock. Rather, it holds the suspense of morality at its core. Is this the right decision? Can I live with this choice? What will be the consequence of my decision? And the suspense of these moments does not fade in the resolution of the events because the mind holds the tension of such moments long after they have passed.

This is a story written with a masterful understanding of the human condition at its essence. It is brilliant.

The film is dominated by gray and dirty landscapes of dead trees and decayed society. Interspersed with poignant close ups of hands clutching at tenderness and tears trickling down worn cheeks, the story keeps the man and his son at the center. They don't have names. They are unnecessary in this world since other people are a danger, and everything unnecessary has been stripped away. There are moments of joy interspersed accidentally in their journey. A swim under a waterfall. A discovered can of coke. The embroidered couch cushion with blue flowers in his parents' living room. Some elements of modern life that we occupy ourselves with remain in this wasteland.

The performances are universally real and compelling. I can't imagine how a director was able to elicit such a performance of raw fear, vulnerability and justice from a child. Extraordinary. The scenes involving strangers like Robert Duvall, Guy Pierce and the underused Michael K. Williams
(c'mon and hire this man more, people! He is Omar from the wire and the most extraordinary actor from the whole series! That man needs a better agent!) are filled with fear, curiosity and tenderness. They allow the film to breathe, filling moments with the real grace of life, human connection. And that is what leads to the unexpected happiness of the ending. It seems unimaginable until it finally happens and is in parallel with sparse, barren nature of the film. This visual metaphor, the boy and the man alone in a barren world illuminates the core of the story. Human connection is the reason for life. It's the reason to go on. It is what love is. It is what life is. I am astonished by the profundity elicited by this film and moved by how effective it is in pervading an audience with its story and themes. Magnificent. Magnificent.

Director John Hillcoat's previous film "The Proposition" takes another raw genre centered around survival and the human condition, the Western, and offers a bleak and cruel perspective as well, but not to the same effect. In The Proposition, familial loyalty is tested and the situations never create enough tension to mentally shake the audience into philosophical crisis in the same way that he manages to in The Road. And he's Canadian. I didn't think it possible for a country with a functioning NHS and little poverty to speak of to produce such a morose dude, but I guess those long winters can put one in touch with the power of bleakness. Really a fantastic movie. Brilliant.

Great Migrations - TBD

I am becoming a great aficionado of nature docs. Perhaps the great turbulence of human lives has become too much for me to endure on a regular basis. Nature docs offer a meditative beauty and a sense of scientific assuredness at their core.

Watching my first installment of "Great Migrations", I am struck by the power of the narrator. Don't get me wrong. Alec Baldwin is no David Attenborough. Attenborough's joy and tenderness make him second to none. But I love the poetic turn that Baldwin brings to this new series. I can't imagine Oprah pulling off describing the sun as "the great watch-maker". Instead of the humanizing folksiness attempted in "Life", "Great Migrations" astounds with the drama inherent in the ebbs and flows of the non-human world. The cinematography may not be as staggering as in 'Life', but this is entirely to "Great Migrations"' advantage. Rather than spending all of their money on a few shots and then replaying them in different segments, "GM" seems to be focusing its attention on the stories of the critters and the poetry of the dramatics. The direction of this series is actually quite touching and mesmerizing.

The creation of this series by National Geographic, rather than the Discovery Channel, aids the production in another way. National Geographic rightly should be the premiere creators of nature docs from the US. "Great Migrations" includes a clarifying device that other producers may not be able to produce with as much grace and precision: maps. It is so important to orient the stories. I hate being distracted, wondering where this is taking place.

All in all, I'm impressed and eager for the next installment. I sure do hope that they don't recycle stories and repackage shots like 'Life'. It ruined the entire series, but I guess there wasn't much there in the first place.

And now I'm off to watch Nature on PBS. It's about Wolverines!

American Experience: We Shall Remain - % % % % %

It never ceases to amaze me how little I know about North American Native American peoples. I learned all about Aztecs, Maya, Incas and Nazcas. But I know diddly about Algonquin or Shawnee people and culture.

This series is beautifully constructed of recreated scenes and interwoven interviews with historians and descendants of the historical figures. Watching the first episode I was struck over and over how enlightening this program is. Our children's history books are mediocre and fail all of us.

500 Days of Summer - % % %

Nestled inside a nifty structure, moving throughout a relationship by days from middle to beginning to end, is a romantic comedy of mediocre and flimsy proportions. Zooey Deschanel and Joseph Gordon-Levitt carry the film admirably, but from the very beginning the narration indicates that this film is filled with crummy people who do stupid things and aren't worth our time. Really. The film tells us that these people suck at the beginning of the movie. Joseph Gordon-Levitt's character Tom is shown in flashback as a child and we are told that he sadly misunderstands love, and then we learn that Deschanel's character, Summer, gets everything more easily in life because she is cute. From the beginning we are told not to trust or respect the main characters. Bleck. Why should we want to watch this movie then?

I have a nit-picky problem with this film as well. According to the film, these characters are two years younger than me. There were no eight-year-olds listening to Joy Division when I was 10. I knew who they were because of my brother, seven years older than I. As I pieced together the time-line of Tom's life, I think this screenplay is 10 years old and no one thought to up-date it. In the intro, we see Tom as a child listening to "bad British pop music" while wearing a Joy Division t-shirt. Joy Division was British, but they were neither pop music nor bad. This is a total mis-characterization of the music. This odd misunderstanding of the music indicates a misunderstanding of the main character. If the screenwriter misunderstands this seemingly autobiographical story, how can the audience be expected to connect with the story?

I did get swept up in the the joyous moments, like the choreographed dance sequence following the consummation of the relationship. And while I enjoy a nicely designed set and costumes, this film went into a nauseatingly heavy-handed cutesy-ness of 60's sharp suits and brunette bangs. Heck, they play house in a set of Ikea furnished rooms, as if their romance is entirely an idealized facade. The film, like the furniture, may look cute at first, but it's made of hollow cardboard and won't hold up. A film like "Singles" is a great example of capturing a style or music scene without overloading the film and crushing what little substance it may contain. Perhaps this has to do with the particular style of the film, rooted in child-like illustrations and clean, sharply-styled 60's fashion. Such a style resists a productive outlet for anger or depression. It is meant to evoke nostalgia, innocence and polish. It's exhausting even midway through the movie.

No one seems to have a sense of humor about themselves either. They are all so serious and sincere. Early on in the film we see Tom smashing plates in his kitchen, devastated at the loss of Summer, who just isn't that into him (no better explanation is ever offered). It's ridiculous but no one laughs at it. His precocious little sister speaks sage wisdom in a monotone to him trying to set him straight. A little laughter might release the intense pressure in Tom to hang on to his crummy relationship. A little levity and humorous self-reflection might endear the audience to the characters. In the end, Tom meets Autumn and starts it all over again. Bleck.

The Proposal - % % %

I am genuinely stunned by how well executed this film is. I actually enjoyed it.

I am surprised because most romantic comedies are terrible. It's a genre with very clear rules and it's well worn territory. From the screwball comedies of the 30s and 40s to "When Harry Met Sally" in 1989, the genre hasn't changed that much. We know we want an opposed couple drawn together through circumstances out of their control but compelled by their often opposing desires. We want banter. We want charm. We want self-deprecating humor. And we want penetrating contemplative looks at pivotal moments.

If you've seen the trailer, you know that Sandra Bullock is the bitchy tough boss to Ryan Reynold's dutiful, hardworking, enslaved assistant. She is going to be deported and needs to marry him to keep her job as top editor that she has worked so hard for. They go off to tell his family in order to convince the immigration officer of the veracity of their relationship and of course, her cold exterior is broken by the love of a good family and small town in the beautiful wilderness, and he sees that she's actually a very special woman after all.

The Proposal fulfills the obligations of the romantic comedy and exceeded my very low expectations with a thoughtful screenplay and very charming actors. It develops the characters well, but not so much that the film loses its momentum. Betty White is charming and delightful as Ryan Reynold's Gammy, and as always, Reynolds looks amazing without his shirt on. Wow. Very well executed.

What the film lacks is truly real characters that don't rely on generally held preconceptions about certain people and their relationships. Romantic comedies often fall back on these preconceived notions as shorthand for genuine and well developed characters. So the films feel superficial because they are. While the characters are well rounded, the details that indicate their characters never feel finely drawn, unique and textured. We are told that Sandra Bullock's character has a tattoo that represents her dead parents, but the story is that simple. There's no texture to tell us how they died, how she was told, why she choose sparrows to represent her parents. We just hear the story pat and are meant to derive the meaning for the information from what? Other movies we've seen? Our own lives? It's too ambiguous to be truly resonant and powerful. It's why When Harry Met Sally is fantastic, the subtle details telling us so much about the characters and their lives and environments. And it's why The Proposal is well executed but not super. But with the few surprises that The Proposal works with, it's still charming and well made.

By the way, thank you to whomever encouraged Ryan Reynolds to bulk up. I am really grateful. I even watched Amityville Horror just for the two or three scenes with his steaming torso. Shizzle is riCockulous.

Also. mad-props to Sandra Bullock for not being a skinny, tragedy but a slammin, curvy, svelte woman at 45. She doesn't look tortured like Renee Zellweger or Madonna, nor extraordinary like Halle Berry. (But who does?) I have a lot of respect that she never boobed up like Demi Moore. She is beautiful but not tortured or fake. And that in Hollywood, unto itself, may be reason enough for an Oscar. Well, if not that then some kind of lifetime achievement award at least.

PPPS There's a great moment when Bullock gets down on her knees in her tight, posh suit and stacked heels to propose to Reyynolds and because of her proper attire can barely get back up again. I think there need to be more moments of comedic mockery of women's fashion expectations. What competent woman would wear something that immobilizes her so? Ridiculous.

PPPPS Also Oscar Nunez deserves a frickin Golden Globe for his role as Ramone, the Alaskan small town's caterer, general store manager, exotic dancer and marital officiant. His creepy flirtations are fantastic! He brilliantly meanders across the friendly/sexy line wobbling between endearing and skeevy. I love it!

Breaking Bad - % % % %

Fantastic show built on brilliant acting and witty writing. But I must fault it for a few mediocre members of the cast, such as the wife, and the often pedantic cinematography.

I just watched an episode from the second season in which Jesse, played by Aaron Paul, is thrown out of his house, and then booted from a high school friend's house, and then rejected over a pay phone by another friend and then his bike gets stolen. He breaks into the tow lot where his RV/cook house is being stored and falls into a port-a-potty. It's gross and tragic and while climbing from the blue ooze he cries like a little baby. Once in the RV he collapses on the floor and covers his head with a gas mask to protect from his own stench. It's awesome and brilliant!

It's like a new chapter in Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.

Green Zone - % % % %

Green Zone is the latest film by Paul Greengrass, best known for the Bourne films, but also the filmmaker who created United 93, a suspenseful, dread-filled docu-drama. Green Zone is a combination of these two styles – a tension filled spy action film crossed with a political historical drama. As king of the low-light shakey cam, Greengrass pulls off a twisting turning suspense with incredible shots of helicopters and a taut military procedural plot. But as a historical political film, it indicts the Pentagon and makes the CIA look like noble handlers of the world. Matt Damon’s character, Chief Miller, has just landed in Iraq in March 2003 and leads a team to investigate suspected and empty locations for WMDs. He begins to question the Pentagon intelligence and this leads him on a chase through Baghdad with his new friend, Freddy, played by Khalid Abdalla, from the Kite Runner. As a military procedural it is exciting like Black Hawk Down. But as a drama, it misses. By exciting the audience with semi-accurate portrayals of historical events, almost like a dramatized episode of Frontline, it fails by being a fictionalized account of a very serious issue, the fabrication and falsification of the reasons for the invasion of Iraq. I agree with the sentiments expressed in the film that the American public was lied to and failed by our government officials and the press, but by fictionalizing and generalizing a subject of such massive importance, Greengrass dulls his blade. Matt Damon, who has no character other than wanting the truth and doing his job well, gets to shout condemning statements at the Pentagon official played by Greg Kinnear, but it’s truly pointless with our knowledge of the quagmire that is to come. That is one thing that Green Zone does get right. It ends with a devastatingly defeated feeling that many of us feel about Iraq. It’s a disaster and there’s so little that we can do about it. The come-uppance at the end can’t be satisfying because it’s so tragic.

Shutter Island - % % %

To start with, this is a film about a US Marshall played by Leonardo DiCaprio who enters a mental asylum for the criminally insane to investigate the disappearance of a prisoner/patient. You immediately know that the obvious plot would be some version of insidious hospital torturing sane patients or an insane narrator. We’ve all seen these movies before. And this doesn’t disappoint by avoiding obvious plot expectations. It disappoints by following them and then flushing them out completely until you are bored and then bored again as everything gets spelled out. I don’t need to ruin the “twist” but you know exactly what it is without me saying anything.

It’s too bad because the first hour of the film is beautiful and haunting. There are striking dream imagery and some genuinely scary moments. But this is the problem. The first half of the film is dramatic and filled with action, sets, interesting characters and complex conversations. It starts as a surreal mystery and then the last hour and a half is several boring conversations. There’s an entire scene of at least five minutes that feels interminable in which DiCaprio has a boring conversation with Patricia Clarkson that consists entirely of cutting between a close-up of him and a close-up of her. Back and forth and back and forth. I’m insulted by how boring it was. And then there are another two or three scenes of conversations that explain one way of looking at things and then explain in words another way and then Ben Kingsley who runs the asylum uses a diagram written on a board to explain something else like it’s a class lecture. If you can’t show it with action, do not spell it out like a lecture. That’s not filmic! That’s boring. They should have known that they were doomed when they couldn’t storyboard that scene any better. It feels like Scorcese just gave up directing half way through and then slapped an ending on top of the boring section that follows through illustrating all the stuff they talked about before. Terrible. Just terrible. DiCaprio is good through all of this and I don’t usually like him. And then the very last scene has another twist. But by then it’s too late and you are begging for it to end. All the visually interesting parts have long since passed you by and you are in reality which is totally dull after the spooky, fascinating and trippy first half. A total let down.

Alice in Wonderland - % % % %

Alice in Wonderland is the perfect project for morose, quirky director, Tim Burton. The scraggly trees and fog that greet Alice upon arrival in Wonderland are straight from his repertoire, such as Sleepy Hollow or The Corpse Bride. But along with the shadowy darkness and child-like fascination with death, there is the beauty and charm of the fanciful and vibrant world created by Lewis Carol. And Burton develops this fantasy in beautiful fashion. In Wonderland fire is not just flame colored, it’s got sharp bursts of pink electricity.

Again we have the team of Burton and Johnny Depp, in crazy teeth with a variable accent that jumps around the British Isles according to his mood and eyes that change color accordingly like a mood ring. I am stunned by how many crazy-drunk voices he can create and still establish a unique character.

This is not the usual story of Alice, which is brilliant since we all know the original and it would be difficult to keep the film suspenseful or interesting if one simply followed the book. Instead we meet Alice as a young adult about to be trapped into a marriage with a sniffling wimp. She disappears down the rabbit hole again and discovers that she is not a heroine any longer, because she isn’t much like a hero. She has lost her muchness. This film follows her gaining confidence and muchness through rescuing the Mad Hatter and others and standing up to the Red Queen. The plot is weak in this part and the devices that serve to strengthen Alice are not as innovative or moving as the visual creativity on display in every nook and cranny of the film.

I’m totally impressed by Burton’s creation of a scary fantasy world of beheadings and madness that never becomes too scary for kids or too lame for anyone. The macabre cruelty of the Red Queen is enhanced by the tortured birds carrying her chandelier or the monkey butlers holding up her chairs and tables. And who doesn’t want monkey butlers? Awesome.

In fact one of the most child-like aspects of the film is the deep love of animals from the affection of the delightful monkeys and frogs in the Red Queen’s service to the hound dog who saves Alice and the grizzly Bandersnatch whom Alice befriends. It’s sweet without being bubblegum and it fits so well into a story in which animals are both deceitful and mad, as well as the oracles to wisdom.


It’s really good and although the plot could be more inventive, I think it’s Burton’s best film in years.

The Hurt Locker - % % % %

Why am I not CRAZY over this film? It's wonderfully crafted. The action and scenario are interesting. The characters are well developed. But I think I don't feel moved by them. The acting is very good and they follow revealing lines and interrelations. I really really like it, but... I can't give it 5 percent signs. Too bad.

In the commentary, director Kathryn Bigelow talks about how she felt that the war was under-reported. I think she explains it in a new way. I have been looking to long form documentaries to tell me the stories I want to know or am curious to see. I want to understand more complex aspects than can be told through a 500 word article in a newspaper. I want to understand the war in broad strokes. The small portions that happen in a few hours or in a day are the stories of military movements and deaths. In "The Hurt Locker" we finally get to see the work-relationships and the missions and how the war is being waged. It's fascinating and a great credit to the screenwriter, Mark Boal, who spent time imbedded with a bomb disposal unit in Baghdad.

I'm super happy to see David Morse in a small part. He's always so great. His pudgy eyes belie the deepest sorrows of Saint Elsewhere.

I wonder if it's because I watched it at home. I bet if I had watched this on a big screen, I'd have been as terrified as during "Black Hawk Down", the scariest movie I've ever seen.