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jordandw
Reviews
Millennium: Luminary (1998)
IMO, the most memorable episode of a great series
Like X-Files, I thought Millennium was best when it strayed from the "conspiracy" episodes (while they never turned me off, I just found them way too overbearing and self-important) and just developed characters and story in a single episode. For that reason, IMO, this was the best Millennium episode of all. I suppose it works well because we know Frank Black and can relate to his obsession with a mystery and the macabre (which requires a knowledgeable viewer), but given that background, this episode was a visionary and fantastic excursion into the kind of obsession we all struggle with to one extent or another -- plus it had the added bonus of mostly taking place in a remote northern wilderness that only added to dissonant juxtaposition of an impersonal and unforgiving natural beauty against an intensely personal struggle of a man against the world. Great script, great acting, great episode. I remember it well ten years later -- good enough that I'm tempted to buy the complete series just to be able to view this one episode again.
21 Grams (2003)
10/10 on the sheer basis of outstanding acting
I saw that this film was ranked #249 out of 250 on the IMDb all-time list, and felt compelled to add a 10 vote to keep it on the list. This is a very troubling and difficult film to watch (a la Requiem for a Dream) but, like that film (also excellent), it is the riveting characterizations of the lead actors that just sends the film over the threshold of greatness. I can never think of Naomi Watts and Benicio del Toro again without remembering their outstanding jobs in this film. Melissa Leo, a lesser role, but a great contribution also. And as much as I grapple with the question of how good Sean Penn is an an actor, he forces a nod here in a tremendous job of acting that, I believe, overshadows his role in Mystic River that year that landed him the Oscar. This is the better acting job. Small time hood with violence near the top of his repertoire is not that much of a stretch for him, but terminally ill math professor for whom violence is unwelcome but seemingly made inevitable by the onslaught of life's turns (Straw Dogs, anyone?) certainly is. Difficult subject matter, masterfully done, and with a tremendous line-up of acting talents that carry it off memorably.
Signs (2002)
Come on, everyone, get real
[Yeah, there are spoilers. Many.]
This film is far from the cinematic watershed many blindly proclaim. In fact, it's a mess, quite silly, and in so many ways derivative. Think "Night of the Living Dead," "Independence Day," and all the hints of coming mediocrity that Shyamalan gave us in his two previous films -- The Sixth Sense, which I thought was a great film, and Unbreakable, which began to hint at his talent for making the banal overly self-indulgent and pretentious. This film leads us further down that road.
Sure it's well done. Cinematography effective. And in the beginning scenes you begin to think there's going to be a Sixth Sense treat in store. The little girl's a scene stealer. The early emotions alluring if predictable. But this film never delivers, and instead goes from silly to ridiculous. Come on, it really IS just an alien invasion flick, and laughably. I mean where do we come off fantasizing that an alien intelligence that is prima facie so far advanced over any technological level we can claim, has as its loftiest purposes, hiding in cornfields, signalling with crop circles, running around looking like George Pal's Morlocks on a strict diet. Hey guys, get in there and eat a few more humans! You can navigate through space but you need a symbol in a cornfield to tell you where to land, be, or whatever. When a human raises a bat in retaliation, blast that sucker out of existence with a hand phaser before he gets to strike two. And if a little moisture is going to spell your doom, don't choose a planet that's two-thirds water. And if you're going to spend years planning this invasion with surreptitious abductions, then just take those few specimens you need and breed the crap out of them in holding pens on your ships for soylent green.
And if all that Mel Gibson needs to overcome the loss of his faith due to his wife's demise is the trivial epiphany "see ... then swing away," then we've really reached the nadir of human self-indulgence. And all we need to do to thwart the alien invasion is lock them in a closet, or spit at them? Dorothy did it better and more convincingly in Oz.
You want "spiritual enlightenment and redemption" without having your brains batted out by it, see Contact, or go back and see 2001. But don't see this mess of a movie. Shyamalan needs to abandon the maudlin and macabre and make a comedy or two. This movie sure made me laugh.
Signs (2002)
Come on, everyone, get real
[Yeah, there are spoilers. Many.]
This film is far from the cinematic watershed many blindly proclaim. In fact, it's a mess, quite silly, and in so many ways derivative. Think "Night of the Living Dead," "Independence Day," and all the hints of coming mediocrity that Shyamalan gave us in his two previous films -- The Sixth Sense, which I thought was a great film, and Unbreakable, which began to hint at his talent for making the banal overly self-indulgent and pretentious. This film leads us further down that road.
Sure it's well done. Cinematography effective. And in the beginning scenes you begin to think there's going to be a Sixth Sense treat in store. The little girl's a scene stealer. The early emotions alluring if predictable. But this film never delivers, and instead goes from silly to ridiculous. Come on, it really IS just an alien invasion flick, and laughably. I mean where do we come off fantasizing that an alien intelligence that is prima facie so far advanced over any technological level we can claim, has as its loftiest purposes, hiding in cornfields, signalling with crop circles, running around looking like George Pal's Morlocks on a strict diet. Hey guys, get in there and eat a few more humans! You can navigate through space but you need a symbol in a cornfield to tell you where to land, be, or whatever. When a human raises a bat in retaliation, blast that sucker out of existence with a hand phaser before he gets to strike two. And if a little moisture is going to spell your doom, don't choose a planet that's two-thirds water. And if you're going to spend years planning this invasion with surreptitious abductions, then just take those few specimens you need and breed the crap out of them in holding pens on your ships for soylent green.
And if all that Mel Gibson needs to overcome the loss of his faith due to his wife's demise is the trivial epiphany "see ... then swing away," then we've really reached the nadir of human self-indulgence. And all we need to do to thwart the alien invasion is lock them in a closet, or spit at them? Dorothy did it better and more convincingly in Oz.
You want "spiritual enlightenment and redemption" without having your brains batted out by it, see Contact, or go back and see 2001. But don't see this mess of a movie. Shyamalan needs to abandon the maudlin and macabre and make a comedy or two. This movie sure made me laugh.
Powder (1995)
The worst screenplay I've come across in a long while
Granted, I saw it on TV, and it was no doubt butchered. (Why language gets recast in TV dubbing is beyond me when sitcoms now include some of the raunchiest allusions imaginable. But, of course, they never get right down into the gutter with George Carlin's "Seven Deadly Words." Heavens, say F***, S*** or C***, and you get bleeped, but describe the activity in puerile detail and we can't get enough. Go figure.)
But we would all have been better off if the entire movie were bleeped owing to the ridiculous screenplay this film foists upon us. The scenes were so predictable and the stereotypes so obvious that dialog wasn't necessary. Fill in the blanks. Your choice of words would have been every bit as convincing and emotionally uplifting as the nonsense many other reviewers here seem not only to ignore, but enjoy. A fatal flaw for this film as far as I'm concerned. I like Mary Steenburgen, and Lance Henricksen, and most of the rest of the cast were credible, too, given allowances for the mess they had to work with.
As for the child molestation business, and the claims of ripoff -- both irrelevant when this banal, derivative film sinks itself in its own morass of cliches.
I was led to expect more. I got much less. Go see any number of other films that do so much a better job of putting the outsider among us to reveal our prejudices and fears and irrational reactions to the unknown. Start with Tarzan, finish with Mighty Joe Young. Most will leave you more satisfied than Powder.
Never Cry Wolf (1983)
A Mystical Lyrical Movie Experience
This is a wonderful movie. In some ways it reminds me of all those great 50's Disney award-winning nature films which made Disney much loved in my family during my early years.
This one is feature length, with minimal dialog and action, a mystical ambiance which carries very nicely from beginning to end, and helped along beautifully by a magical film score by Mark Isham, one of the master film composers working today.
The juxtaposition of three points of view works well, avoiding the heavy-handed black and white, good vs bad that could have made this film easier to dismiss. The addition of the native Inuit perspective, while perhaps a contrived plot device (what little plot there is), worked for me -- reminding us that a simple scientific versus exploitative view of the wilderness doesn't tell the whole story. The Inuit (in this film redolent of Peter Weir's Australian aboriginals) view the Alaskan wilderness as a sometimes subtle but always powerful presence to be respected and revered, or ignored at your peril. Tyler never comes to completely understand their motivation or their connection to their world (in which he remains an outsider), but certainly comes to respect them. And it's hard not to draw a parallel between his awakening knowledge of the wolves as mirrored in his knowing the Inuit family, and especially the ageless father -- these are all the real spirits of the land.
There's a lot to learn and like in this film, and it's a captivating and enjoyable story throughout. It's Disney after all, so see it with your kids -- a gem deserving of a warm place in your heart.
Being John Malkovich (1999)
Let Him Be
IMHO, this is one of the most overrated films of '99. Broken down into constituent elements its got a lot going for it: a certainly original story and a well-crafted telling of it; interesting characters well-played by all; and principals we all like to like (the two central Johns especially for me).
But what I was quickly left with in this film is: so what? When you put together all these elements, at the end of the experience are we left with anything that really means anything to anybody? Not for me. Frankly, I'm tired of all the nihilism that comes out of Hollywood and tries to pass for art and entertainment -- American Beauty and Pulp Fiction come readily to mind -- go ahead and blast away. We fool ourselves into thinking that these kinds of films show a maturing of the audience, when, in fact, its only the dumbing down of the audience and vastly lowered expectations that allow these things to be made in the first place. Just because a movie never could have been brought to an audience only a few years back, because the audience wouldn't have stood for it, doesn't mean those audiences of the past were lacking sophistication. They just had a finer appreciation for the real meaning of drivel. You know, it's OK to say something's crap when it is, and even better to be able to say so when just about everyone else says otherwise.
The best I can say is that, fortunately, John Malkovich will go right on playing compelling characters in movies hereon out, and I'll be able finally to forget this one.
I didn't like this movie very much.
High Noon (1952)
A High Morality Play Set In The Old West
I won't belabor the plot details discussed ad infinitum here -- read too many of those and I wouldn't blame you for not wanting to see this film. But do!
Yes, it's black and white (which is how you MUST see it). Yes, it was made in the starkly moralistic post-war period when we questioned little about our self-righteousness (hey, we had won the war, hadn't we?) Yes, it's a western (in only the most superficial way). And yes, if you don't like the cowboy's lament sung by Tex Ritter in the film you're going to throw up by reel two. (But this isn't a tune really -- moreso than in any other film I can think of, the song is a character on the screen.) But these are really just details about a film that transcends any label you think you want to put on it. This film brings us to an immediate confrontation of very personal and inescapable truths which test and define our humanity.
It gets harder and harder these days to know what it is to be courageous enough to live free, because in our sterile, politically correct and homogeneous world there is very little to really test our mettle (why else this obsession with "extreme sports"). In the early fifties' this wasn't the case. Many of those contemporaries had had more occasion to stare down their demons than most of us will ever know. And without a Conradian moment of truth to overcome, we all get complacent and lethargic, our lives get soft, we lose touch with our neighbors and our community, and can't easily see how our liberties are being threatened by erosion to our humanity.
Not so for Marshal Wil Kane in High Noon. Though not at all by choice, he is faced with his moment of personal truth, and decides he has no alternative but to meet it head on. This isn't just a test of courage for him -- it is life defining. His near breakdown just prior to the final shootout is testimony to his fear and anguish over the rightness of his decision. But he doesn't give in to the doubt. He overcomes it, despite his being forsaken by all he holds dear to him (his town, his friends, his wife). At that moment, all he has is his belief in himself and the knowledge that to run is to die a worse death than possibly being overcome by his demons.
This theme has been used many times (Four Feathers, Straw Dogs, and Outland -- a transparent retelling, come immediately to mind), but none ever to better effect than in this film. It is timeless. It is why we love movies so. There's a reason so many put it in their top whatever lists. As a film it is as close to perfect as I've ever experienced in any genre. As a lesson for life, it is one we all need to stare down. I bet you'll think so too.
Blade Runner (1982)
One of the watershed SF movies
There are a handful of SF flix that, when they hit the theaters, raised the bar for science fiction in cinema against which all others had to be measured: From the Earth to the Moon, Metropolis, King Kong, The Day the Earth Stood Still, 2001: A Space Odyssey (my vote getter for all time most influential and visionary) and Star Wars (begrudgingly said, but has to be acknowledged). I certainly count Blade Runner (and Alien, the predecessor Ridley Scott opus that has to be compared and contrasted) among them.
FTETTM gave us science fiction, Metropolis gave us special effects, King Kong gave us a grand scale, TDTESS gave us a conscience, and 2001 gave us mysticism and a vision beyond our world. Alien gave us one hell of a scare, and Blade Runner gave us alternative art and mystery in so many media. The marriage of film noir and a bleak and grimy FUTURE was a masterstroke, and, I believe, undeniably changed the look and feel of science fiction in all that followed.
Elsewhere the comment is made how Blade Runner is "blown away" by The Matrix. IMHO, The Matrix is a special effects masterpiece that unfortunately fails in most other respects. I also contend that The Matrix never would have been made if it weren't for the vision provided by Ridley Scott in BR.
The ability to marry set design with story line has NEVER been demonstrated better than in BR. The story is so well supported by the setting that it is developed without the need for action or dialog (although both are done superbly). The bleak emptiness of the human condition is magnificently reflected in the cloying closeness of urban decay contracted with the huge empty living spaces occupied by the Tyrell Corporation and the ruined apartment building of the penultimate scenes. That the only true longing for life and beauty is evidenced by androids gives the ultimate expression of the effete condition to which mankind has fallen.
Hey folks, this is art. It ain't pretty, and it ain't what you're used to (or at least what we weren't used to back in '82). But it is a compelling statement which demands a response. Ignore it if you think you can, but I guarantee you it was not ignored by the generation of SF cinema storytellers who have followed.
[Not to belabor the point: but has anyone noticed the eerily similar juxtaposition of movies between Kubrick and Scott that is evident. Kubrick did 2001, A Clockwork Orange, and Barry Lyndon in order, while Scott did The Duellists, Alien and Blade Runner. Coincidence? Probably. But worth a comment, I thought.]
Gunga Din (1939)
One of my father's favorite movies immediately became one of mine
Among my father's favorite movies that I remember were High Noon, Four Feathers (both Korda's and the silent version), and this one. Not surprisingly they've all become favorites of mine. They are certainly the "guy flicks" of their day that wouldn't stand a chance of being made that way today. But I guess that's what makes them classics never to be forgotten, because, although all are classic stories, destined to be told again and again, they'll never be recreated in the original ways that made them classics.
Gunga Din has it all, and all, although dated and unapologetically un-PC, great stuff. To all the on target comments written about this movie, let me just add, the scenes leading up to and including the final battle are among the most moving in cinema. A gem of a movie. I can't hear the stir of (undeservedly unappreciated and maligned) bagpipes without remembering the thrill of this picture. It's timeless and wonderful.