allan825 Reviews

Avengers: Endgame (2019)

crowd-pleasing but full of holes

[6/10 · 29 April 2019]

"Endgame" starts out well, presenting a credible atmosphere of doom and gloom in the wake of our heroes' colossal failure at the end of Infinity War. Much of the first act concerns grief and coping strategies, and Thanos creator Jim Starlin aptly gets a cameo as part of a support group, much to the delight of long-time Marvel fans.

Then Ant-Man somehow pops out of the quantum realm and everything soon falls apart, in terms of a coherent narrative. If you're in this mainly for sheer emotion and fan-pleasing gestures, you'll still love it. But if you give the plot twists much thought, you won't.

The characters make fun of time-travel movies such as "Back to the Future" ... but then go on to set wholly new standards for convoluted, improbable, and paradoxical time conundrums that no amount of explaining can address, and appealing to "alternate realities" splitting off is just hand-waving here. Nebula kills her earlier self but is unaffected? Thanos from 2014 is killed in 2023, so Infinity War is erased ... along with everything that this movie is supposed to be correcting. Most grievously of all, Cap goes completely against character and decides to lead a normal life in the past (irresponsibly neglecting the threats of the Red Skull, Hydra, etc.), thereby erasing his solo trilogy of films and much more. And so on.

In addition, Thor is treated miserably, having been turned by the writers into a fat slob wallowing in self-pity and despair, even though early on he avenges the Snap he had just barely failed to prevent. This is the same guy who showed up in Wakanda? And Thanos, after Brolin's brilliantly nuanced portrayal in Infinity War, is pretty much reduced to a cardboard villain as well as in stature.

Throughout, stuff just happens without adequate preparation or internal logic. I loved the scene in "Age of Ultron" when Cap was barely able to budge Thor's hammer, much to the thunder god's momentary chagrin. But now Cap can suddenly wield it effortlessly in combat? How convenient. And how exactly does Stark get the Infinity Stones from Thanos and do so all at once without being disintegrated, or at the very least majorly stunned, by their titanic power? Even if we accept the improbable sleight-of-hand here, recall how stunned Thanos himself was each time he acquired just a single gem. But Stark can acquire all six at once and not blink an eye? I guess we're supposed to be too caught up in the moment, loving the "poetic justice" of situations, to think about these improbabilities and internal inconsistencies. But a better version of this film would have been written in such a way that it both pleases and makes sense, at least in its own established fantasy terms.

Frankly, you could easily navigate a space shuttle through the gaping plot holes in this narrative, and that's a serious problem. I could have focused more on some of the movie's strengths, such as some of the performances, the epic effects, and Silvestri's powerful score, but for me, this was certainly not the satisfying final act I had been hoping for.

There Will Be Blood (2007)

Shakespearean

[10/10 · 29 January 2008]

An uncompromising, Shakespearean drama of titanic passions and their consequences, There Will Be Blood is anchored by Daniel Day-Lewis's volcanic performance as an obsessive, ruthless, satanic oilman. Also highly notably are the cinematography and the often ultra-dissonant score (composed by Radiohead's Jonny Greenwood), both of which help carry a riveting, nearly wordless opening sequence that announces this will be anything but a conventional film experience. (The use of the buoyant finale from Brahms's Violin Concerto at two points as a supplement to Greenwood's searing string writing, which shows he knows his Ligeti and Xenakis, is deliciously incongruous.)

The film doesn't strive to explain much, which is one of its great strengths; it presents and leaves it to viewers to find connections between events and later actions on the part of characters. A more conventional film would underline motivations more clearly through dialogue. That makes certain scenes--such as when H.W. sets his father's sleeping quarters ablaze or when Daniel threatens to slit the throat of an oil executive--seem strange and incongruous. But never implausible. A second viewing (which I highly recommend) really clarifies the structure and the subtle handling of motivation and psychology.

I am haunted by the intensity of Lewis's performance, particularly the firelit scene in which he announces his misanthropic character (again, Shakespearean: think of the opening of Richard III, etc.). The way his face splits into a malicious grin as he contemptuously utters "these...people", followed by incongruous laughter, gives me chills (a scene unsurprisingly highlighted in the film's trailer). We all, no doubt, have a certain measure of Plainview in us--avarice, misanthropy, corruptibility, a potential for explosive violence; things most of us strive to overcome. But Plainview never becomes "civilized", not even after acquiring great wealth. He sleeps on the floor of his bowling alley, as if he were still out prospecting in the wild and forced to rest on the hard earth. Seeing him let all his untamed, misanthropic rage boil over in the conclusion is exhilarating and horrifying--but, in light of what has gone before, a seemingly inevitable denouement. Like Macbeth, Plainview is a man who had talent and potential but was corrupted by his passions. A flashback shot, just after the decisive rejection of H.W., says it all: We see Daniel walk away from the boy who has become his son, toward the derrick: That's the choice that has shaped who he has become.

Coming as it does toward the end of the Bush era, the picture could certainly be seen as an allegory of destructive forces that have shaped much American history and currently form integral parts of the Republican party: evangelical chicanery and unbridled corporate greed. The Nietzschean will to power behind both leads to an uneasy alliance--to say the least. This is by far Paul Thomas Anderson's best and most penetrating film to date, and you'd have to go back to something like Raging Bull to find such a tour-de-force collaboration between a filmmaker and an actor of genius.

Solaris (2002)

miss...miss...

[4/10 · 27 November 2002]

Tarkovsky's adaptation of Lem's novel takes quite a few liberties, jettisoning, for instance, the brilliant satirical elements and re-creating in its own potent terms the story's fascinating strangeness. But Tarkovsky does remain true to the novel's central sci-fi premise: that life elsewhere in the universe may have evolved along lines so different from life on Earth that we could never fathom it. Lem's novel, then, is an extraordinary rebuttal of all the ridiculous, anthropomorphic sci-fi scenarios in which aliens appear as strangely familiar humanoids (often demanding to be taken to some leader, in English). The new Solaris strats from the original in a far more fundamental way than Tarkovsky did, shifting the focus from the mind-bending sci-fi premise to something far more predictable and far less interesting: a rather conventional tale (told largely through flashbacks) of love, regret, and redemption. Instead of Lem's world-wide sentient ocean, we get a few shots of some neon clouds--and virtually no explanation at all of what Solaris is. In fact, Solaris itself becomes so peripheral to the story that one almost wonders why the filmmakers even bothered to use the name. The film will probably come as a major disappointment to fans of the original (or of the earlier film version, with its unique `Tarkovskyan' style and atmosphere). It will also disappoint the casual cineplex viewer who expects that since Cameron's name is linked with the project that it must be some rip-roaring rollercoaster ride rather along the lines of another Aliens or Terminator II. (Thus "miss...miss...") Yes, the film's quite slow, but the slowness is not enigmatic and compelling as in Tarkovsky; it's mostly boring and often unimaginative. And the performances certainly do not redeem the picture. One in particular (the `dude' who plays Snow) is almost fascinating in its sheer badness. The difference between Lem (and Tarkovsky) and the new version is nowhere more apparent (or disappointing) than in the ending. In place of the fathomless ambiguities of the novel's conclusion (`I persisted in the faith that the time of cruel miracles was not past'), we get a rather saccharine, allegorical happy ending. `Cruel miracles': no, there's nothing remotely to compare with that. The shift toward allegory is strongly reinforced by an iconic (and rather pedestrian) visual allusion to Michelangelo. At the same time, I suppose, one could see the scene as an allusion to Kubrick's `Star-Child'. Throughout, the film's visual style and sudden fits of Ligeti-like music owe much more to 2001 than to anything in Tarkovsky--and to say that the invited comparison is not in the newer film's favor is a bit of an understatement. The filmmakers seem to depend on the beautiful stars to carry the viewer's interest, in lieu of the braintwisting thematic substance of the original(s). Yes, I enjoyed watching Natascha McElhone's high-cheekboned face--in fact the main reason I stayed to the end was to find out the actress's name (since there are no opening credits). But that's candy rather than nutrition. I strongly recommend--especially to those who have yet to encounter Lem or Tarkovsky--that you stay home and either read the novel or rent the earlier version. Having done both a couple of times, I still wished I had made that choice.

Sansho the Bailiff (1954)

Luminous

[10/10 · 23 November 2002]

Luminous...painterly...haunting...devastating...in terms of both substance and style, a cinematic achievement of the very highest order. Like all great works of art, it is incomparable, although it would not be misleading to place it in the company of the very best of Renoir, Ford, and Kurosawa. It has the same kind of compassionate humanism, high-caliber storytelling, and effortless-seeming mastery of the medium...the same generosity.

I prefer this film even to the great (and much better-known) Ugetsu. And I know now why Welles once said that Mizoguchi "can't be praised enough, really." I hope one day this film will be as well known as it deserves to be.

Black Rain (1989)

terror and pity

[10/10 · 29 July 2002]

The opening of Imamura's masterpiece avoids mere sensationalism in its depiction of the unfathomably horrifying events of August 6th, 1945, in which 90% of Hiroshima and tens of thousands of lives were annihilated in an instant. Instead, Imamura emphasizes the unprecedented strangeness of the catastrophe, focusing on such portentous images as the diabolic mushroom cloud louring silently in the distance and the black rain that spatters a beautiful young woman's face. The rest of the film traces the ramifications of the latter incident, bringing the atomic holocaust and its aftermath (over 100,000 people died of radiation poisoning) down to the intelligible level of the plight of Yasuko (Yoshiko Tanaka) and her small "community bound by the bomb."

The survivors strive for normalcy and continuity, most notably by attempting to find a suitable marriage for Yasuko, but the imminent possibility of radiation sickness shadows every aspect of their lives. Yasuko's potential suitors, naturally enough, shy away from a young woman, no matter how attractive, who might suddenly grow sick and die. Genuine love, when it finally does appear, does so unexpectedly and ambiguously. We are left wondering if love across class lines is more a token of Yasuko's status as "damaged goods" or of a common humanity, thrown into bold relief by harsh circumstances, that transcends class divisions.

The film's classically restrained style intensifies the impact, the spare, eloquent interior shots reminding us that Imamura began his career as an assistant to the great Ozu. Imamura's mastery is evident, for example, in the paired scenes of Yasuko bathing, the first emphasizing her lovely back and legs, the second how her hair is falling out. The shots stand almost as bookends to the narrative's trajectory, distilling its tragic essence. The film's documentary-style realism is violated for expressive purposes several times, perhaps most notably in a scene that lays bare the troubled interior life of a shell-shocked veteran. Both the score by the renowned avant-garde composer Toru Takemitsu and the stunning black and white photography contribute greatly to the film's brooding atmosphere. When, in the final shot, Yasuko's uncle (Kazuo Kitamura), the film's laconic narrator, looks to the vacant sky for a rainbow as a sign of hope and regeneration, the black and white imagery suddenly becomes so poignant that it is almost unbearable. Few films from Japan (or anywhere else, for that matter) could be compared to the great, humanist Japanese masterpieces of the 1950s. This film is one of them. When I finished viewing it for the first time, I sat stunned, unable to move for at least five minutes, overwhelmed as I was by the emotions great tragedy should inspire: terror and pity.