Cosmoeticadotcom Reviews

Phantom (II) (2013)

Excellent debut

[8/10 · 3 November 2013]

Soler does not fall into many of the pop cultural traps of a young director, and the two most immediate predecessor debuts that this film most reminds me of are David Gordon Green's George Washington and Steve McQueen's Hunger. Hopefully, as Soler matures as a director, he emulates the arc of McQueen, who seems well on his way to being the chief rival to Nuri Bilge Ceylan as the world's greatest living BIG IDEAS director, rather than Green, whose early promise gave way to one of the most depressing and shocking cinematic sellouts of the last few decades. Like Green's debut film, Soler uses shadow and light, canted angles, and disembodied voices, as well as an odd score, punctuated with silence and ambient noise. Like McQueen, Soler's film dares not to follow conventional narrative flow....

Other influences in the film (or accidental references) include Godfrey Reggio's Quatsi films, in a tunnel sequence; Roman Polanski's Repulsion, in blurred pans of room include mundanities- clothes, books, etc.; Stanley Kubrick's Killer's Kiss in some shots involving mannekins (as well as shots of city streets at night). Other less obvious influences include the email's claims for Chris Marker's Sans Soleil, Alain Resnais's Last Year In Marienbad, and Herk Harvey's Carnival Of Souls- one of the underrated films that deal with loneliness- also shot on a next to nothing budget. Soler not only wrote and directed the film, shot in a 1.78:1 aspect ratio, but produced, shot, edited, and (presumably) scored it.

In short, Phantom is a very good, to excellent film, and a noteworthy debut. It makes me feel guilty that, had the email arrived at a different time, I might have, due to the ego suck of so many bad artists, missed this promising work of art. If Soler can make the leap up from creative pastiching of excellent forebears, and inject more of his own vision- and potential and vision are the two key words here- then his next film could put him in the McQueen-Ceylan range. But, as I don't wanna jinx him into a fate as the Continent's David Gordon Vert, let's just all keep quiet (as a phantom?) about those two words, and wait, and see.

Ssshhh….

Full review at http://www.cosmoetica.com/B1384-DES935.htm

The Turin Horse (2011)

Great

[9/10 · 1 February 2013]

The film is shown in a 1.66:1 aspect ratio, and its subtitles are white on black for the German and Hungarian languages spoken. As for the DVD features, they are solid. The first is s brief 12 minute short film Tarr made in 1978, called Hotel Magnezit which depicts an aging alcoholic who is persecuted by unknown others for alleged wrongdoings. It is not in good shape, visually, and the acting is very poor, to say the least. It's at best, a misfire. Then there is a near 50 minute long press conference at the Berlinale Film Festival, wherein Tarr, his three main actors, and his technical collaborators, answer question from an international group of reporters. While there are a few moments of insight, the stark contrast between the depths of the film and the insipidities of the assorted reporters makes for many awkward moments, where the viewer feels sorry for the questioner and senses the artists' frustrations. There is also the theatrical trailer, and a small booklet with a very poorly written and teeth-gnashingly trite essay, called Brute Existence: The Turin Horse, on the film by American film critic J. Hoberman. Finally there is an audio commentary by another notoriously bad American film critic, Jonathan Rosenbaum, that is one of the worst that you will ever encounter. It truly does seem that the Golden Age of DVD commentaries is at an end. Aside from the fact that the commentary has silent gaps, it also only runs less than half the length of the film because, as Rosenbaum says early on, he thinks the film needs no commentary. So, then why agree to do the damned thing? Let someone with more enthusiasm take over. As for the actual commentary? It's rather pathetic, for Rosenbaum adds almost nothing original, instead mostly reading others' critical opinions on the film, and then even relying on biographical and career information on Tarr from, of all places, the always unreliable Wikipedia. It's truly an astonishing train wreck of a commentary- one which Rosenbaum calls his first solo commentary, and hopefully, for the cineastes out there, what will be his last commentary. Aside from the absolute lack of anything meaningful to say on the film, Rosenbaum's nasal, screechy voice is a turn-off, but even more so is his constant pimping of his own career, and the fact that he is going to be teaching, in 2013 at a new film school Tarr is opening in Croatia. About the only positives that one can say of Rosenbaum's nearly 70 minutes of speaking is that he makes two salient points that few other critics have noticed: 1) that despite being labeled anti-Hollywood, Tarr's films are often shot on sets, and Rosenbaum claims this film was also shot on a soundstage. 2) He acknowledges that Tarr's camera is always doing something interesting to offset the seeming repetition of the activities the characters engage in, and this counterpoint between action and depiction helps craft a grand narrative from what seems to be little material. Other than these two points, Rosenbaum's relentless need to posit himself as an insider into indy film circles, and his utter lack of insight into the film at hand, make listening to the commentary a chore.

While the film was much honored at a number of the international film festivals it was shown at, it did not make the list for best Foreign Picture Oscars in America (surprise, surprise). Yet, despite this snub, The turin Horse is yet another great film in Tarr's canon, at least equal to Damnation and Satantango, clearly superior to The Man From London, even if it likely falls a bit shy of Tarr's greatest film, Werckmeister Harmonies. It is a brutally great work of realism in an oddly closed universe consisting of one windy plain (see the scene where the pair try to leave their home, only to wind up right back in it). Near the end of the film, the unnamed daughter asks of her father, or perhaps rhetorically (it does not matter), What is all this darkness?

Let me answer: it is art, child. Art.

Theremin: An Electronic Odyssey (1993)

Good

[7/10 · 1 February 2013]

While not a landmark in documentary filmmaking, Steven M. Martin's 1993 documentary, Theremin: An Electronic Odyssey, is almost the documentary Kijack's is, as it has a far worthier subject- electronic musical pioneer and inventor Leon Theremin, but a bit more scattershot execution, cinematically. The 83 minute long film mixes traditional biography of Theremin's life, his loves (marrying a black ballet dancer in the 1930s), his political persecution in the Stalin era Soviet Union, details on the history, construction, and musical influence of the theremin, and a summary of it all.

The film features interviews with Todd Rungren, Robert Moog, who discourses on Theremin's role in electronic music, his own influential career, and has a number of lesser known talking heads, and one transcendently silly interview with a literally batshit insane Brian Wilson (of The Beach Boys fame), who speaks wanderingly of how he got the idea to use the theremin for his hit song Good Vibrations. Archival footage and audio only clips of theremin music, as well as clips from many films- including 1940s A films like Spellbound and The Lost Weekend, and 1950s B and sci fi films, like It Came From Outer Space and The Day The Earth Stood Still, testify to the influence of the film.

However, the film's star is not Leon Theremin, but his younger protégé, the great theremin player, Clara Rockmore. And when I state that this woman was great, I mean it. Her handling of the theremin dwarfs all the other players. This virtuoso could literally make the instrument, which could range from producing eerie to barely tolerable sounds, into an instrument of, well, to beg the cliché, genius. In Rockmore's air divining fingers, the theremin could sound like the most virtuoso female singing voice ever recorded. Her talent level, on this instrument, is so staggeringly far above any of the other on screen players that it is akin to watching humans and a cvreature from another species do the same task.

Additionally, this film, unlike the first, is much more dependent upon the technical aspects to cohere it into a narrative and artistic whole. Aside from director Martin, kudos must go out to cinematographer Robert Stone and, especially editor Robert Greenwald. Rare is the film where the editor plays a larger role than the cinematographer, but this is one of those films. By the end of the film, we get to see the long awaited reunion of Theremin and Rockmore- who long feared Theremin was dead, after he was kidnapped in 1938 and forcibly returned to the Soviet Union. The film deserved its many honors at film festivals.

Transcendent Man (2009)

Mediocre

[5/10 · 1 February 2013]

Kurzweil is one of those wannabe prophets of technology that, in their own deluded way, sickly mirror religious prophets in their doom and/or wonder. In Kurzweil's case, his vision of tomorrow is all wonder, but a wonder based on information with no ability to process it. In short, Kurzweil is glaringly void of wisdom (after all, sans trials, intellect cannot advance). He bases this on what he claims (as well his acolytes) to be his near flawless prediction history. Being naturally wary of such claims, it took a less than 60 second Google search to find out that Kurzweil's predictive abilities were far less than perfect, and often so nebulous that one wonders if he secretly made much of his fortune as a carnival seer. Yes, he does solidly in technological predictions, but rather abysmally on softer predictions involving society ad things human centered.

Yes, Kurzweil has invented many useful gadgets, but none of this qualifies him to speak with any authority on any subjects outside his narrow purview. However, Kurzweil is a multimillionaire, which in America means he is a 'genius' of the highest order, even if his mind is almost painfully Functionary as it flails about in its own idees fixe. In one of the film's grand moments of irony, the hypochondriacal Kurzweil discourses about how he once had diabetes, and, through a regimen of taking over 200 pills a day, he has successfully 'reprogrammed' his body into being a lean and healthy machine. Then we hear that the man suffered a heart attack, due to a faulty heart valve, during filming. Does this chasten the man? No. In fact, we get an even deeper delve into what can only be fairly described as the man's obsessive compulsion for his life's work- and that is cybernetically somehow resurrecting his father, who died when Kurzweil was young. Now, one might think such a revelation would add a patina of pathos to the film. It does not, for Kurzweil is just so stupid in his pursuit (as example, to get the most accurate simulacrum of daddy he has saved decades old receipts and financial notations from his father, as if these will, when worked into some magical future algorithm, have any bearing on making as HAL 9000 of his old man). Lunacy unfettered. Instead of praise for Kurzweil, the film actually engenders pity for his delusive pursuit.

Balancing out the man's all too rosy optimism is a panel of gloomy counterparts who revel in their own sci fi fantasies and clichés of the bleak cyberpunk future that awaits us, replete with Terminators, human bondage, cyborgs, ultimate wars between AI true believers and fanatical Luddites, etc. It's all quite laughable, for predictions of the future almost always get some things right and most wrong. As example, in the 1960s of my youth, the 21st Century was to be a Jetsons-like propelled time of flying cars with no idea of the Internet. What these wannabe Nostradami miss is that, in twenty or ten thousand years, people will still be people (bitching of taxes or bad bosses or life's general futility), cybernetically enhanced or not, and technology has always served human needs, and adapted to them, not supplanted them, nor made us adapt to them. Like the two prior films, this one features stellar technical work by cinematographer Shawn Dufraine and editor Meg Decker, as well as one of the better film scores of his hit and miss career by Philip Glass.

Naturally, Kurzweil's claim to fame rests on his idea of The Singularity- the time wherein humans and machines merge, thus allowing immortality to be achieved. Kurzweil claims this will occur before mid-century. One of the few non-extremist talking heads- a medical doctor, William B. Hurlbut, finds the claim absurd, given how little we currently know of the human genome, body, and, especially, the brain. Other than Kurzweil, the oddest of the talking heads is AI researcher Hugo de Garis. This man is so condescending in his views (which are of the gloomy sort) that, while warning of his future hell of billion slaughtered, in what he calls the impeding Artilect War, actually feels he needs to explain that Artilect is a portmanteau of the words artificial and intellect.

At the center of all these would be pundits' predictions is a reality that they assiduously think that, by not mentioning, will be avoided, and that is The Law Of Unintended Consequences. A minor example: the rise of digital information, in the 1980s, was hailed with the claim of being a green technology that would virtually eliminate paper copies of information, thereby saving reckless deforestation. Instead, the near ubiquity of personal computers has seen a mind-boggling increase in paper production and consumption for information, as private citizens and business print up emails and documents as backups for the digital information. More paper is consumed than ever before.

Nonetheless, Kurzweil is an oddly fascinating subject for a film- the ever scared little man wasting his brief time alive on chimeras that are best left for a later time, even if not for the adulatory reasons director Ptolemy intones in virtually every scene of Transcendent Man, for, far from being transcendent, Kurzweil comes off as an emotionally arrested naïf, tilting at a Quixotic future he is wholly unprepared to wean himself from.

Lenny Bruce: Without Tears (1972)

Mediocre

[4/10 · 1 February 2013]

This film is an unsynched nightmare that, somehow, through its selection of Bruce monologues and bits (even when tossed together with random scenes unrelated to the material, still works. But because of Bruce (aka Leonard Schneider- no relation), not Baker. And this is because Bruce was not only a brilliant comedian- influencing comedians as diverse as George Carlin, Redd Foxx, Richard Pryor, Robin Williams, Eddie Murphy, and Howard Stern, but an important advocate of free speech, who was doomed to an early death, via drugs, because of a) his own lifestyle and b) the relentless harassment and blacklisting of him by local authorities who would, literally, have him arrested by police the moment he uttered a four letter word on stage.

But, if one believes that Bruce appreciation is reserved only for the lower depth of society, as a sort of prelude to the rock stylings of Jim Morrison, one would be wrong, for the film provides talking heads as diverse as Paul Krassner, Mort Sahl, Kenneth Tynan, Jean Shepherd, Nat Hentoff and Malcolm Muggeridge, as well as footage from Steve Allen's The Tonight Show, which first exposed Bruce to a national audience. Yes, the bits from television are tame, compared to the audio bits taped from live performances, but even amongst the censorship, Bruce's darting and ferocious wit and satiric nature shine through.

But, near the end of the film, one sees a ravaged Bruce, only 40 at his death in 1966, look like a man twenty to twenty-five years older. If Peter Gatien thinks he had it rough with America's little moralities, he only need sit through Baker's film to see how easily he got off, in comparison. So, if Lenny Bruce: Without Tears can be recommended on any level, it is as a tribute to Bruce's brilliance despite Baker's film's flaws, so many and manifest.

Limelight (2011)

Solid

[5/10 · 1 February 2013]

As someone whose early adulthood was spent in Manhattan at night, I was familiar with the rave scenes, and knew to avoid it for the very reasons the film promulgates. There are the usual over the top clichés, wherein the talking heads of the film proclaim the rave scene as making a youth culture for the world, but, in reality, techno and electronica music died on the vine, and hip hop (the watered down version of hardcore rap) is not exactly known as a progenitor of culture. And if Moby is the best the film can do, in regards to talking heads, you know you're in trouble.

But, the film shines as a police procedural, even if, at 102 minutes at length it often feels like a bloated A&E special on the 1980s. Gatien, deported after being cleared of criminal charges, and nailed on tax charges (ironically just like 1920s Chicago kingpin Al Capone), is not hagiographized, but the film could have done a much better job of fleshing out his personal issues. Likely, given his daughter's role as co-producer, this was a taboo subject for the cameras.

Corben's film is slick and polished, but its lead subject is just not that interesting. Yes, it is fascinating to hear about how routinely the justice system is abused, and why- so that middle class malcontents can feel smugly superior in the little moralities, but, after such gas deflations, what is really left? There are the usual bevy of talking heads (including former New York Mayor Ed Koch), but little of relevance is put forth, outside of the recounting of Gatien's case. Archival video and film footage fill in the rest, but the lesson to be culled is that the pre-9/11 New York was, for all its glory on cleaning up crime under Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, still a cesspool of corruption, only this time of the institutionalized variety. One hopes that Corben returns to this subject in a later film.

Scott Walker: 30 Century Man (2006)

Good

[7/10 · 1 February 2013]

Film director Stephen Kijak's film is to be commended for never descending into minutia on Engel's life. In fact, virtually nothing, after the initial information on Engle's youth, is mentioned of his private life. This is refreshing, for it lifts the film well above any claims of being a vanity documentary. The negative is that Engel's 'art' is simply not good. Yes, he had a deep, powerful bass voice, and it was put to great effect in the early recordings. But, listening to his latest efforts, not only are his lyrics bad (Jim Morrison, Walker is not, even as some talking heads bizarrely link him to T.S. Eliot, Samuel Beckett, and James Joyce)- in a jumbled sense, but they border on PC and the 'music,' such as it is, is random and found noise, not harmonies and melodies. To top it off, Engel's voice is a dim echo of its former glory, often descending into what seems like a parody of some local 1960s television station's late night horror film show host's attempt at singing to a bad B film.

Initially, the film plays out like a mockumentary, but the infusion of vintage television clips dashes that surmise. What is not dashed is the reality of how limited the 'art' of Engel's music. Great art does art well. Visionary art pushes boundaries, as well. But, to push the boundaries back, the artist has to stay anchored to the extremes, at least of the art form. In the case of music, this means non-banal lyrics, damning predictable percussion, varying melodies and other such extensions. Simply going off into a corner and wailing, or grunting, is not an extension of music nor singing, as arts. Of course, that is hyperbole, but Walker's latest efforts smack of a phenomenon known in the arts- that of the spent artist realizing he'll never duplicate his earlier successes, so he just preens and deranges, then hides behind the veneer of his earlier success, as a 'genius,' or the like (and it's no shock to know Engel worships the Beatniks). Engel simply never expands the boundaries of music- pop nor otherwise, even as talking heads damn many of the progressive rock acts of the 1970s that went far beyond Walker's experimentalism: Yes, King Crimson, and others.

Scott Walker: 30 Century Man (the title taken from an Engel song) is a well wrought and exquisitely structured film on an ultimately interesting subject, but that subject is not Engel nor music nor art, but the peregrinations of the spent artist in search of that golden nipple needed to nurse him into senescence's uneasy drool. Now, if only director Kijack can find an artist and subject worthy of his talents, the film will be a landmark in the genre.

The Pleasures of the Flesh (1965)

Solid

[6/10 · 1 February 2013]

There are too many flaws, and Dumbest Possible Action tropes, for Pleasures Of The Flesh to broach greatness, but there are superb moments right next to bad. As example, while the forthrightness of the admission by Hayami is not believable, character-wise, it is one of the bleakest and most searing indictments of the human character ever put on film; and part of that burn comes from the fact that its ascription of human flaws is dead on. And in this it has a far more realistic take on human evil than Crime And Punishment. While a good portion of the film has dated, in terms of conventions of dress and sexual mores, at the gut, human level, the film is till searingly accurate, much like the best episodes of The Twilight Zone. That, plus its many positive qualities, makes this an important film, if not a great one. And that's more than enough to recommend its being watched and, hopefully, understood.

Repulsion (1965)

Great

[9/10 · 1 February 2013]

Narrative is immanent in art. One simply cannot extricate it from any art form. One cannot dispose of narrative, only retard it. Often when one reads an essay about or review of a work of art, and the reviewer cannot get the art work, he will claim it has no narrative. If the work of art is bad it will have a narrative, merely a poor one. But a poor narrative is not a lack of narrative. If the work of art is great, and the reviewer does not get it, he will claim it has disposed of narrative. But it will have a narrative, and a great one; but one that pushes the boundaries of what narrative is. Good examples of this can be found in a film like Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey or Chris Marker's La Jetee.

Then there are films that are superb examples of classic narrative, peeling back a tale in incremental detail, only to, far too often, be called plot less, merely because the plot is not the Lowest Common Denominator sort that involves over the top sexuality, violence or scenery chewing. One such film that fits this bill is Roman Polanski's hour and forty-five minute long 1965 black and white film, Repulsion. Narratively speaking it's as perfect as a film can get. Having known my share of psychotics and psychopaths, I recall being riveted by this film's fidelity to the psychological realism of the irreality that infects the insane the first time I saw it, over twenty years ago. Compared to a film, like Alfred Hitchcock's outdated and pseudo-Freudian Psycho, Repulsion has it all over that film- one it's far too often been compared with, and often in the negative.

Rocco and His Brothers (1960)

Great

[9/10 · 1 February 2013]

Aside from its great portrayal of family life (and, via Rocco, all the hypocrisies and evils therein), the film is also great study in the effects of World War Two on rejiggering the Italian lifestyle, especially with expanded urbanization. In the end, the three older brothers cannot deal with the move from the pastoral life of their youth. Ciro, who is easily the most ethically grounded brother (despite Rocco's constantly being called saintly), can do so, and the film ends with the jury out on young Luca. This is heightened by the fact that we are not shown any images, within the film, of the family's rural roots- not domestic nor geographic. It, as the past always is, is another country. But, many poor critics have mistakenly called the film a 'tragedy,' when it clearly is not, for a tragedy demands a sense of grandeur or greatness, and there are no such people in this film. Instead, Rocco And His Brothers shows us dirt poor 'real' people scraping to survive (in stark contrast to Visconti's campier melodramas on the rich and powerful), and one of the consequences of survival is that only the fittest make it. Thus, Nadia, Simone, and one suspects Rocco, are doomed. But this fact is far more related to the film's Neo-Realist roots than its melodramatic faux 'tragedy.' And that all this is done so deftly, with an economy of narrative setup, is a testament to both the writing and acting in selling what could be a really bad cliché.

Rocco And His Brothers is a great film, which only deepens upon successive viewings (in meaning and complexity) just as its nominal successor (Hannah And Her Sisters) was a quarter century later, but for the same reason, achieved by different means: it takes one into another (past) time and era seamlessly- making any inquiry into what mis-en-scene is seem silly; and in doing so proves it is timeless. And that is usually never too far from greatness.

White Heat (1949)

Good

[7/10 · 1 February 2013]

The film's technical aspects are solid, such as Max Steiner's scoring and Sidney Hickox's camera work, which does not rely on close-ups, rather emphasizing the greater picture; but neither is the compelling feature that one finds in the best films noir; another reason this film fails that claim. The screenplay, by Ivan Goff and Ben Roberts, from a tale by Virginia Kellogg, is good, but not great. Like many of the same era thrillers by Alfred Hitchcock it is larded with too much Freudianism and not enough realism (note how Fallon assumes the role of Jarrett's confessor and benefactor after he learns Ma Jarrett is dead). Still, given that it was coming out at a time when the 1930s gangster film era was fading, the genre had to go somewhere. Also, the film, while it does a good job in setting Fallon up as the mole, meanders too much. The whole Big Ed-Verna romance is overdone because it's obvious that Big Ed has no chance against Jarrett, and the whole Ma-Jarrett relationship, like that, a decade later, in Psycho, is just a bit too forced. In fact, it gets to the point that Ma, not Verna, can be seen as the femme fatale in Jarrett's life that leads him to doom (even as she is dead), one of the few points one can argue in favor of White Heat being a film noir. The best part of the film is the acting. Wycherly, as Ma, is very good, and Edmond O'Brien shows why he was an Oscar caliber actor in a very good portrayal of Fallon/Pardo. But, as usual in his films, Cagney not only is brilliant, but he dominates the screen. It's interesting to note that the 1950s saw the rise of the Method Acting style, yet almost all of the discernible physical inflections of that style were present in Cagney's role here, as well as in earlier roles. In fact, I would argue that Cagney was not only the most influential actor in American film history (for look how much of Method Madness stole from him), but also the most important and nonpareil (if not perhaps the best) for look how many imitators Brando and De Niro have had, but who can do Cagney without falling lamely short? This is because Cagney is not aiming for realism in his performances, but feelism- he aims to make the viewer feel things, not be uplifted.

White Heat is not a great piece of cinema, but it's damned good. It's a bit too reliant upon the formulae of gangster films to break too much new ground, but it is crisp, taut, and there are only a few moments that are lulls. There is no higher ideal being trumpeted, but what little music it plays it plays well, as a great genre piece of cinema. Yet, oddly, unlike Cagney's earlier gangster classic, The Public Enemy, this film, while more realistic, in terms of its science and the politics of crime, is less realistic, in terms of its characters' motivations and development. Still, it's a treat to watch, and far above what passes for action or thriller fare today. In terms of being able to pull off a tough guy role, yet still move a viewer, Cagney was and is is still king!

What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)

Good

[7/10 · 1 February 2013]

The film has some surprisingly good camera work by Ernest Haller, who often makes the most out of scenes that could have been workaday, some exceptional scenes of dialogue between the two screen titans, and some well and judiciously placed scoring, by Frank DeVol. There are some trite scenes and moments, as well as some repetitive scenes. For the former, see the murder of Elvira, where the viewer just knows that when she lays down the hammer she has doomed herself to a braining by Jane. For the latter, see the scenes showing Jane taking Blanche out of their home in a wheelchair- just as she had with Elvira's corpse. Also, the scenes with the sisters' neighbor, played by Anna Lee, add nothing. Another annoyance are several scenes where Blanche and Elvira are 'racing against time' to do things before Jane returns in her car, but are things which would take only a few seconds to accomplish versus the reality that Jane's errands would take her far longer to accomplish. This missynchronicity rents the 'realism' that the film, by and large, hues to.

But, other than that, this film largely succeeds, and rises well above the claims of campiness that have dogged it. What Ever Happened To Baby Jane? is not great filmmaking, but it is not a B film, nor schlock. From the obsquiouusness of Buono's Flagg to the taut fear and control neediness of Crawford's Blanche to unexpected shots that subvert expectations, the film has simply terrific moments that derivative films that followed it, like Aldrich's later Davis vehicle, Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte or Rob Reiner's Stephen King penned ripoff, Misery, cannot touch. My recommendation is that anyone coming to the film, for the first time, avoid reading too much about it, as well as any of the volumes written about Crawford's and Davis's egoistic battles, and just let What Ever Happened To Baby Jane? wash over them. Yes, many people will, like critics and fans, imbue their own misinterpretations into the film. But, for that small group of people with a clear mind and an appreciation for great things, even if sandwiched between mediocre moments, the film will be a revelation whose joys reach into not only one's heart and wit, but also into one's mind, that place where humanity begins and ends. Just ask Blanche Hudson. Da Lady done knows!

Chaplin (1992)

Solid

[6/10 · 1 February 2013]

Every so often, when I look up the historical critical context of a film, I am surprised by what I find. Most often I see films that are schlock get undue praise, but since most of anything in life is bad (lest we'd not notice the good). This is not unusual. Then there are good or great films that are severely dissed. Almost every Stanley Kubrick film, post-1970, falls into this category. But, then there are films which are nice little films, not particularly bad, but also nowhere near great, that just elicit an off reaction from critics. Such a film is Richard Attenborough's 1992 film, Chaplin, on the life of filmdom's first true superstar. Is it a great film? No. It's a rather standard biopic, and pretty much in line with what the director did, a decade earlier, in Gandhi. Like that film, this one features a previously little known actor who 'arrived' via a career-making turn in the title role. In Gandhi it was Ben Kingsley. In Chaplin it is Robert Downey, Jr.

Most of the kvetching revolves around the fact that the film uses a flashback sequence, or that a character played by Anthony Hopkins is fictive, or that the film focuses too much on the personal and sex life of Chaplin. But, let's look at these plaints. First, that a work of art uses a standard technique does not mean that it is trite. It can be trite, or it can be used very effectively. This film splits the difference. It's neither here nor there in that regard. Second, so what that the Hopkins character was not 'real'? Again, it's a standard technique, and like the flashback structure, the use of a fictive character is neither here nor there. Third, a biopic could focus on the art of an artist, if the artist was not a film star, to great effect. But, since Chaplin was a film star, the reason the film exists is because everyone knows who he is, in his art. Therefore, only hints of his personal life are fodder for any extrapolation. And the only nudity the film shows is a rear view shot of Milla Jovovich's buttocks, as she portrays Chaplin's first wife, Mildred Harris.

That said, and despite the assorted sex scandals that littered his personal life, Chaplin's personal life was rather dull. The real flaw of the film is that which haunts most biopics, and that is it tries to do the cradle to grave schtick, instead of picking a specific period of the comedian's life, and expounding upon it. One of the best biopics of all time, Patton, follows this method. The DVD, by LionsGate, is the 15th Anniversary Edition. Despite that honorific, the DVD is not top notch. Yes, the film transfer, in a 1.78:1 aspect ratio, is well done, but there is no audio commentary on the disk. This is an alarming trend on many DVDs, especially considering that the costs for producing them has dropped precipitously in the last decade. There are a few bonuses, but they are meager. There's a brief home movie of Chaplin and Paulette Goddard cruising on his yacht off the California coast. There's a featurette on Chaplin's life and career, on eon his life, and also one called The Most Famous Man In The World, on the phenomenon of Chaplin becoming the first truly global superstar. There's also the original theatrical trailer. The box for the DVD mistakenly lists the film's running time at 135 minutes; although it is 144 minutes long.

The Wildest Dream (2010)

Solid

[6/10 · 1 February 2013]

The Wildest Dream: Conquest Of Everest is a 93 minute long film, directed by Anthony Geffen, that touches at one of the oldest dreams I had; to go rockhunting on an archaeological dig and find something magical and wondrous. As a child, I recall reading in a science book about Luos Agassiz and how he proved the fact that glaciers, indeed, do move, by pinpointing the spot where a mountain climber was lost on an Alpine Peak, predicting that the body would show up at the bottom of the glacier after a certain number of years, only to find the body just as predicted. This film does not open exactly in that manner, but it does open with modern mountain climber Conrad Anker finding the body of Mount Everest legend George Mallory in 1999, 75 years after he and a colleague, Sandy Irvine, were lost and presumed dead on the world's tallest mountain. This pushes Anker to want to try and prove that Mallory did reach the summit three decades earlier than Edmund Hillary. To do so, Anker and a colleague of his own, attempt to reproduce Mallory's ascent in vintage 1920s gear.

The film then alternates between the modern quest, made in 2007, and the original quest of Mallory, via archival films, photos, and letters. What drives Anker is the fact that Mallory seems to have made his descent in twilight, when he slipped and broke a leg, then dies on the slope. This indicates that he must have made a bid for the top before descending, for he was last seen near the top on the morning of June 8th, 1924, just a few hundred feet from the top, but his body was found almost 3000 feet lower. The time of his death is ascertained by the fact that he was not wearing the sun visors needed to prevent whiteouts from ice glare. Also, Mallory had promised to plant his wife's photo at the summit but the photo has never been found. Neither has Mallory's climbing partner, Irvine.

The film has spectacular scenery, but the cinematography, by Chris Openshaw, is nothing great. Geffen does a good job of interweaving the two tales, but far too much time is taken up on the silly and narcissistic modern tale. More time spent on Mallory's plight would have helped the film, while also lopping off 15-20 minutes of fat. The film is narrated by actor Liam Neeson. The film could have used, aside from a tighter focus on Mallory, a greater array of mountaineering expert and historian commentary but, overall, it is well suited to be an introduction to the life of a legendary hero of exploration's Golden Age's final years.

Man on Wire (2008)

Good

[7/10 · 1 February 2013]

Precious little was golden about the 25 year old Philippe Petit's August 7th, 1974 daredevil tightrope walk between the Twin Towers, 50 years after the death of George Mallory. I recall the day it happened, and for a few weeks afterwards, Petit's name had dwarfed that of the legendary daredevil Evel Knievel's. Then, he was forgotten. But, before the 1993 attacks on the World Trade Center and the 2001 9/11 bombings and destruction of the towers, his 'coup,' as Petit calls it, was easily the most memorable event in the history of the two ugly towers.

The film goes in to great detail on how meticulously Petit and his cohorts planned the event, as well as earlier escapades at the Notre Dame Cathedral and a bridge in Sydney, Australia. It charts Petit's obsession with the Towers after reading of their building as a teenager. The film draws a reader n to the main event as well as any 'hesit' or 'caper' film made by Hollywood ever has, and Petit is a fascinating personality, albeit a bit grating. The 94 minute film never makes mention of the events of 9/11 and, on the plus side, this means no restatement of the obvious clichés and bathos. On the negative side- and this is likely the lone negative of this otherwise great film, the film misses a golden showcase for us to get a real 'in' to Petit's psyche, when he is not clearly mugging for the camera. After all, could anyone have had dearer feelings for those buildings than he?

Nonetheless, the film succeeds on almost all other levels, from some truly inventive cinematography by Michael Nyman, to exquisitely edited footage and photographs by Jinx Godfrey, to J. Raph's and Michael Nyman's wonderful musical scoring; the highlight of which is Erik Satie's Gymnopaedies, especially #3, so skillfully employed in scenes of Petit's actual walk, making this film the third member of a trilogy of great films deploying this signature piece; the others being Woody Allen's Another Woman and Louis Malle's My Dinner With Andre. The re-enactments and descriptions of the planning- from fake IDs to the wires to faking invoices to hiding for hours on the top floors of the two towers, then waiting to rig the equipment all up, is fascinating, and Marsh nicely intercuts elements of the training in with the re-enactments so that, by film's end, viewers long familiar with the 'coup' will be seeing it with the awe of those people lucky enough to have viewed the actual walk all those decades ago.

Into the Abyss (2011)

Mediocre

[4/10 · 1 February 2013]

This film lacks even the Herzogian touches that a flawed film like Cave Of Forgotten Dreams retains, if even poorly. On a side note, a quick Googling of the case shows that many of the claims made by people in the film- apart and aside from the two killers, is simply not true. Now, this may be Herzogian, if he actually knew the truths and allowed lies to be filmed, but, given the tenor of the film, and Herzog's anti-death penalty stance, it seems more likely to just be poor fact-checking.

Herzog narrates the film, but the cinematography and music, by Peter Zeitlinger and Mark Degli Antoni, are not up to snuff. Again, very pedestrian, and one sense that Herzog almost feels as if he needs to get a film done, no matter what, including the quality. In the end, Perry fries, and Burkett survives, but the most important point comes from the daughter and sister of two of the victims, who describes the deep sense of peace and satisfaction she got from seeing the vile Perry bite the bullet, and her disappointment that Burkett and his then girlfriend (not seen in the film but at the scene of the crime) did not also get justice meted to them. It is to Herzog's credit as a man and an artist that he allows this sentiment to get out, despite his disagreement with it. Nonetheless, the whole film seems a pointless exercise, and Herzog accords it a similar energy.

Cave of Forgotten Dreams (2010)

Solid

[6/10 · 1 February 2013]

Why Herzog deemed it prudent to film this in 3D is something of a mystery. One supposes he wanted to try and make the paintings, not on flat surfaces, come alive, and maybe they do, in 3D, but in 2D it does nothing. Worse, this film really does nothing. There is nothing essentially Herzogian in it. It's a documentary any filmmaker could do for a cable channel, save for the pointless Postscript to the film, involving albino alligators and mystic mumbo jumbo Herzog finds profound.

The film, at 89 minutes, is probably an hour too long, and while interesting cinematography, by Peter Zeitlinger,, and a nice soundtrack by Ernst Reijseger, enliven the film, they can only do so much. Herzog's narration is not what it is in earlier documentaries of high quality, and one sense the filmmaker gets bored with it all about halfway through the film. Nonetheless, it's a tossup as to which of the two documentaries, here under review is worse. This one is not good, but not bad, merely dull.

My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done (2009)

Good

[7/10 · 1 February 2013]

Shannon is pitch perfect with his madness, starting from a Peruvian kayaking trip he demurs from (the scene of the start of another of Herzog's great films on insanity, Aguirre: The Wrath Of God), which kills his friends, to his assumption of the name Farouk, to his belief that the face of God resides on an oatmeal container, to his calm bizarreness in general. Sevigny is excellent as the clueless and desperately lonely fiancée, while Kier delights as the agog friend- and Herzog makes ironic use of Kier's iconic stature as a horror film actor to rein him in to comment on assorted bizarre things he witnesses, such as the over the top scenes between Brad and his loony and racist ostrich farming uncle Ted (Brad Dourif), which ends in a classic 'Herzog Moment' involving a dwarf. While Dourif chews scenery, it's perfectly apropos to the moment the film unhinges itself, and also given that we see this partly from Brad's POV. Other odd moments occur when we see Brad at Machu Picchu, in a Tibetan marketplace, and seeking to buy pillows for 'the sick, in general, ' at a San Diego military hospital, and often these scenes, retrospectively, are seen as telegraphed earlier, but not in the ham-handed way a Steven Spielberg would do so. The film ends with Brad's surrender, and asking Havenhurst two questions: 1) could he put in his report that it was ostriches running, not flamingos, that were the birds involved, and 2) what happened to his basketball, which, in the film's final shot, we see a small boy pluck out of the branches of a tree.

Herzog's direction is flawless, and cameraman Peter Zeitlinger does his usual sparkling cinematography by making blasé San Diego seem feral. Ernst Reijseger's score is apropos to the scenes, but the weak link is the film's screenplay, written by Herzog and Herbert Golder. It is good, for all it does; the problem is with just a few more moments and scenes, here and there, this 91 minute film, at 100 or so minutes, could have hit greatness. Some critics missed the boat and panned this excellent work, usually bemoaning it as a bastard love child between director Herzog and producer David Lynch, but there is little Lynchian material here. It is all Herzog. And it is definitely NOT a black comedy. Moments of humor do not make a film a comedy. It is straight on drama, and very realistic to the point that its utter lack of real poesy hurts it, artistically. Still, this is a relative claim since Herzog oozes cinematic poesy in almost all his films.

Mister Magoo's Christmas Carol (1962 TV Movie)

Great

[9/10 · 1 February 2013]

The best ever.

Let those words penetrate. I state them in reference to the titular work under review and, mind you, I have seen every film and telefilm 'straight' version of Charles Dickens' classic A Christmas Carol, plus almost every humorous take on it- be it spoof or satire, from lame musical adaptations to modernized updates to the brilliant reworking of the tale in the first season of the great American television sitcom, The Odd Couple. But, the animated Mister Magoo's Christmas Carol is the best version ever of the tale, and that includes Dickens' own often too heavyhanded morality play itself. The reason is that the cartoon takes on all the best elements of the source work, mitigates that work's flaws, deepens its positives, and adds a goodly amount of its own improvements. It is, in short, one of the finest examples of television cartoonery ever made, and, interestingly, try as I might, I cannot find a single objective flaw in it. But, there is a flaw, albeit in my own criticism. I just stated that Mister Magoo's Christmas Carol is 'one of the finest examples of television cartoonery ever made,' and that is incorrect. In fact, it is THE finest example of television cartoonery ever made, with the caveat that I have only a great knowledge of American cartoonery. It is also a great example of pop art made for children that succeeds on other levels, not unlike such films as The Curse Of The Cat People and Godzilla's Revenge.

Tucker: The Man and His Dream (1988)

Solid

[6/10 · 1 February 2013]

Tucker: The Man And His Dream is a good solid film, but, as Coppola himself seems to realize (in his commentary), it's nothing special. Its stylized realism is appealing, but ultimately an empty appeal to nothing of substance. That's too bad, because throughout the film I was thinking that there is gold to be mined in the old adage that not all who think that others are out to get them are crazy. Trust me, I know. But this theme is not really even touched on in the film, and only glancingly so in the commentary by Coppola, when the filmmaker muses that newer Internet technology likely makes it easier to succeed against the powers that be (no quite so, Francis!). Nonetheless, the cumulative positives slightly outweigh the negatives, and even if they did not, the film's historical focus deserves viewing. Just, keep expectations in line (unlike Tucker) and you will likely find something of benefit, whether or not Coppola intended it or not.

She Gods of Shark Reef (1958)

Mediocre

[4/10 · 1 February 2013]

Nothing really makes sense in this film, but then, as it was an obvious B film B film (i.e.- made as a double feature filler for an B film that was top billed (or an A B film?)). But, in such a film, can anything really be expected? I mean, the buff guys are bland, the babes are bland. Even the sharks are bland. On the plus side, the sharks used in this film are much more realistic than the mechanical shark used in Spielberg's Jaws, made nearly 20 years later. Some reviewers have claimed the sharks were real, but dead, yet, even in scenes of the attacks on humans one can see movements of the head that are not done with cords or anything guiding them. So, kudos on this one small point for Corman and company. Of course, given the film's release on a public domain DVD package, there is no quality in the print used. The colors in the film are faded and almost sepia. A cheesy opening ballad plays over the opening credits. Then the music gets worse. The acting is wooden, the screenplay abysmal, and there isn't even much fun exhibited in this atrocity. Yet, I must say I love crap like this. Thankfully, there is not a pretentious moment in this film. Hell, we never even get to know why the hell Lee and the swami guy killed the guy on the dock in the opening scene. Of course, stuff like this always happens in films like this. A few years later, in Coleman Francis's abysmal The Beast Of Yucca Flats, a similar murder opens that film, and goes its length similarly unexplained. Well, on second thought, I guess it's not really unexplained for, as Mahia philosophizes when she pleads, at film's end, to Chris, they must leave the evil on the island behind. So, that's it- Lee was just evil. After all, he made a smart aleck remark to his brother implying he wanted to bring Mahia back with them so he could pimp her. Or was it Pua that was evil? Or both? Well, Lee's dead, so it must be….oh, hell.

She Gods Of Shark Reef is a film that is good for one reason- killing time when one is too lazy or wired to do anything else. On that level, it succeeds as well as….drooling. Ah, but what drools are made of….or something poetic sounding like that.

Mad Men (2007–2015)

Solid

[6/10 · 1 February 2013]

Mad Men, and its 21st Century drenched characters, is about as relevant to the 1960s as The Sopranos was to the real Mafia. But, that does not mean Mad Men is not compelling, and often excellent, television and fiction. It's simply not high art- although one might argue that its memorable opening credit sequence and lyricless musical score, by David Carbonara, are. Nonetheless, its consistent quality, in artistic and technical merits, makes Mad Men one of the best television shows of this century. And, given the narcissistic, deliterate, and self-absorbed state of this reality television era, that is no small compliment.

Slaughterhouse-Five (1972)

Good

[8/10 · 1 February 2013]

While the film falls shy of greatness, it certainly did deserve the awards it won, such as the Prix de Jury (3rd Place) at the 1972 Cannes Film Festival. And, given how many films from the 1960s and 1970s have been pigeon-holed, due to their cultural limitations, it's refreshing to see a film that reflects its era- the 1940s through 1970s, yet does not wallow in it. While one can argue with the film's philosophical posit that everything is connected and predetermined, the presentation, or the art, of the ideas, is excellent. On a personal level, one of the things I find most refreshing about this film is how there is not a single character in it that looks like a movie star. All the main and supporting character roles are played by average looking actors. I sometimes just get tired of looking at films where, even if good acting is involved (such as the films of a Michelangelo Antonioni or Federico Fellini, much less the schlock that Hollywood cranks out), the people all look like perfect mannekins. Another refreshing thing about this film is that it's one of the rare examples of a film (especially considering it was a big studio Hollywood film) set in World War Two era Europe that has nothing to do with the Nazi genocide of European Jews. It's simply next to impossible to make a film on the Holocaust that does not fall into terminal PC preachiness. This film, however, shows the war from a unique perspective; one where humor and the flaws of individuals are on full display, rather than the stridency of a political ax to grind.

Slaughterhouse-Five may or may not be a great film (I vote no), but it is a film worth watching. While it does not break as much ground in its art form as its source material does in its, it is a film that sticks with the viewer, forcing one to cogitate upon what it has imparted, Whether or not that means one is time tripping like Billy Pilgrim is up for debate.

'Poo-tee-weet.'

Giant (1956)

Good

[6/10 · 1 February 2013]

The two disk DVD, by Warner Brothers, is a pretty good package. Disk Two has two hour long documentaries on the film, called Memories Of Giant and Return To Giant. Both are making of films. Both include interviews with surviving members of the cast and crew, mostly minor players like the director's son, George Stevens Jr., and actors like Jane Withers, Earl Holliman, and Carroll Baker, with archival footage of Hudson. There are several theatrical trailers for the film, a TV special of the film's New York and Hollywood premieres, and the Gig Young TV show, Behind The Cameras, about life on the set. Disk One has the film, broken at its intermission, into two parts, the first of which is one side one, and the second on side two. There is also an Introduction to the film by George Stevens, Jr.; a series of interviews with other filmmakers on their thoughts about George Stevens, as a filmmaker; and then an audio commentary track by Stevens, Jr., film critic Stephen Farber, and the film's screenwriter, Ivan Moffat. Of the three, this bland commentary only has moments of interest when Moffat, who was actually part of the film's creation, speaks. Steven, Jr. seems to busy being in awe of his father's work, and Farber just seems happy to be getting recognized as a film critic. Some good points that pop up in the commentary (at over three hours in length, even a few chimps would entertain a few times, eh?) are discussions of why Stevens abjured Cinemascope, so he could have height in his films, as well as width, and why the two Luz Benedicts seem to be obsessive over Jett Rink.

Giant is not a film that will stick long in one's memory, and it is not a film of any real political nor historical import, despite the claims made by many of the people featured in the bonus features of the DVD. It's a well made soap opera, a grand entertainment that has a few moments, in its sprawl, that stand out. In brief, it is that old saw: a good solid movie that one turns to when down, and in need of relief from reality. It will make a lousy, rainy afternoon a little bit more enjoyable. After all, rain does have its charms, even if little of the wet will quench the soul, much less mind.

Fed Up! (2002 Video)

Solid

[6/10 · 1 February 2013]

Fed Up! Is a 2002 documentary that clocks in at just under an hour, and is a mainly fact-based documentary that examines how American agriculture went from, in the early 20th Century, a localized industry designed to serve the needs of small pockets of people around the nation, to an oligopoly of international corporations who have destroyed family farming, profitability for many entities along the 'food chain,' poisoned the environment, and made the worst foods possible the cheapest, due to blackmailing the federal government into subsidizing bad, fast foods and genetically modified foods, while making it next to impossible for organic and local foods to thrive.

Directed by Angelo Sacerdote, this film has the feel of a PBS or cable documentary, but is a serviceable introduction to the whole topic of modern agriculture, not only in the Unites States, but globally. A dozen or more talking heads pop up throughout the film, and these folks must be 'stars' of the forces opposed to the corporatization and commoditization of food because, in almost all the other films I will be discussing in this review, these same folks tend to turn up, saying almost all the same things they say here. Of course, not all the films have all the same experts, but it's interesting to note how many of these films feature the same messages and techniques.

One of the memes that gets going in this film, that all the others pick up on, is the rightful demonization of the Monsanto corporation (along with others, such as Cargill and ConAgra), after the bad Supreme Court decision to allow the patenting of genomes for crops. The consequence has been that small farmers, whose fields are polluted with genetically modified and genetically engineered products, often have to pay 'fines' to Monsanto for the company's pollution of their crop rather than receive reparations and damages for this act of genetic and natural sabotage; a legal oddity that reverses the liability role so long established in English common law.

While the film is a good watch, in terms of substance, artistically, the film has a bit of a slipshod approach to editing, and the use to older, black and white public domain footage. However, it does a good job of tracing the post-World War Two trends of Big Business and the fallacy that the Green Revolution of the 1960s was meant for and designed to end world hunger. No, in reality, it was meant to cheapen production, at all costs- the health and safety of the public, as well as the wages and benefits of the workers in the industry, whose once high paying jobs have given way to dangerous conditions and illegal immigrant workers who are de facto modern slaves. The film also touches on mono-crop fields, and the problems of working against, and not with, Mother Nature. Overall, it is a film as primer into the subject, and that I watched it first was just fortuity.