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Reviews
Tart (2001)
A Quiet, Well-Made Film
For me this movie is about losing things and being lost. And it makes the observation that when you're lost you can end up losing things that you didn't know you had much less that you wanted to keep.
Cat (Dominique Swain) doesn't know who she is, which ironically doesn't keep her from not liking who she is. And in the people around her -- family and friends, adults and peers -- she finds varying amounts of belonging, rejection, hope, and disillusionment. In other words, Cat is just 17 in a way that should be familiar to us.
That's one of the strengths of Christina Wayne's quiet, mature film is the feeling of verite. I've never been young and rich in NYC (or near-rich, or formerly-rich, or trying-to-keep-up- with-the-rich) but Wayne's portrait seems so detailed it makes me really curious to know if she has been. Far from being "Just another spoiled rich kids film - _Kids_ meets _Metropolitan_!" Wayne shows us Cat trying to "fit in" and a diverse number of reasons -- from financial to social to emotional to behavioral -- why you can cast out of this insular, cannibalistic sub-culture.
Another strength is Wayne's direction and writing. The film is well-constructed with strong characters, with images and (Yeah, I'll say it ...) motifs that appear once and then quietly reappear in different contexts. And all throughout Wayne shows a really nice eye for pictures.
Plus she's got really good people doing good work. I mean, everyone is in this movie: Swain, Renfro, Phillips, Zehetner, Chabert and Barton (before they had to try to be smoking hot), Scott Thompson of _Kids in the Hall_ fame. She even gets Melanie Griffith to do a walk-on.
One thing the film has going against it is the marketing. Looking at the trailer and the film poster, it's clear that Lions Gate or whoever didn't know how to pitch this film. It seems like they wanted it to be naughtier or rowdier or ... brighter than it is. But it's not a melodrama. There are no simple heroes and villains, no moralizing on right and wrong, no suspense- ridden plot. It's the type of character-based, even, sad, dramatic storytelling that seems to go down better in Canada that here in the States.
I like it, though. If you've got a quiet morning and some time, it deserves a try.
Gigli (2003)
When does it get bad?
I swear, people are sheep. They are 100%, died in the wool, that wool pulled over their eyes sheep. Honestly, I don't think anyone really looks at how easy it is to sway public opinion. Look at how many people STILL believe that our attack on Iraq was part of the War Against Terror when everyone, even administration who wanted the war!, said that Iraq was not a terrorist state and that there was nothing between Hussein and militant fundamentalist Islamic cells other than hostility. But point people to something and tell them it's "Baddddd" and they'll move right along, "Baddddd!" (<--- Imagine sheep noise for full effect.) "Yay! Something we get to pick on! Yay! Something we get to throw stones at!"
Case in point ... _Gigli_. I watched it recently, waiting for it to suck. "It's supposed to suck," I said. "When't it going to start sucking?" Now, I'm not saying it's _Citizen Kane_ or anything, but it's far, far from being the laughable Crap Fest that everyone says it was. It seemed like a decent Romantic ... I don't quite know what genre to put it in. It's not a Romantic Comedy because it's not trying to be funny. It's kind of a softer _Out of Sight_ or a _Get Shorty_ with a more even pace that's not trying to be a hip satire. Maybe it's just me. Maybe I have no taste. But more likely people wanted to jump on the "Dump on the Hollywood Couple That Everyone Loved to Hate" Bandwagon.
Look, _Gigli's_ not fabulous, but it's not bad. Get over yourselves. Oh, and to the guy who thought the yoga scene was overlong ... you may be right. So to save you more torture, the next time Jennifer Lopez chooses to do contortions in skin tight workout clothes while languidly discussing the wonders of the vagina, give me your ticket. Straight up, I will sit in for you. No, no. Don't thank me. It's the least I can do.
In Like Flint (1967)
Oh boy, they don't make sexism like this anymore!
*SPOILER ALERT* THIS COMMENT CONTAINS SPOILERS*
Oh boy, they don't make sexism like this anymore! These days we have more than enough opportunity to be familiar with the degradation of women, the objectification of women, the infantilization of women, the marginalization of women, the belittling of women, and even the downright hatred of women, but this movie gives us the died-in-the-wool FEAR of women! It's amazing!
The plot is simple. *SPOILER* A secret group of women (operating in the Virgin Islands of course. I kid you not!) plot to take over the world by conspiring with a high level army general, replacing the president with a look alike, and swaying the world's women to their cause through brain washing hair dryers. The underlying idea is also simple. Men are great, but our one problem is our uncontrollable attraction to beautiful women. Damn them and their curves! They're like our kryptonite. Why one of the first things our evil pulchritudinous plotters say about Flint is that they've been studying him, and he has three 'weaknesses', meaning the three women who live with him. So what better as our only hope against those women we can't ignore than the man whom women find irresistible, Flint! Good thing there are no homosexuals of either kind in this universe. Although, the awesome Lee J. Cobb (See his work in _Twelve Angry Men_ and remember that he originated the role of Willy Lowman in _Death of a Salesman_ on Broadway.) does a baffling turn as the bumbling, emasculated head of intelligence. Though far from effeminate, he does end up the movie in a dress.
So much does the movie fear women that its women are all eroticized beyond any reality: pale, china doll skin; heavy make up; over styled hair that has been mostly bleached and blonded within an inch of its life. I swear, at times Jean Hale and her clones (not actually clones in the film) either look like dolls or animated corpses. It's too much! I'll say one thing; standards of beauty then were more forgiving in at least one way in that these women looked like they were at least allowed sit down to a decent meal every once in a while.
So live it up! It's 1967 and all we have to fear is nuclear devastation and an attack force of gorgeous, Caucasian women in bikinis and sailor suits. Kick back and remind yourself why there was a cultural revolution in the late 60s and early 70s. Oh yeah, Coburn's Flint is great
but he runs like a girl!