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Movie Mania!
I've had a bummer week accompanied by some interesting, if bummer, films:
The Lake House
Okay, so it was terrible in one way, but quite touching in another. Two lovers living two years apart communicate via a magic mailbox. They share the same dog and live in the same house (at different times.)
I am really impressed with how much Keanu Reeves has grown up. I first noticed in Thumbsucker a coming-of-age film in which he plays a guru dentist. He is actually one of the more entertaining (and humorous) parts of that film. It made me intrigued to see what else he will do now that he's lost the Bill & Ted mode of delivery and is willing to engage in self-mockery.
In this film, everyone is serious, humorless, and due to the demands of film, appear to write one line letters in order to create a sense of dialogue. But it was beautifully photographed, really captured the loneliness of busy people, and the ache of separation. Anyone who has never carried on a love affair via correspondence doesn't know what they're missing. So, the logic stunk, the screen play was blah, but the filming was quite good, and the emotion was convincing. I was oddly touched by it.
But then I like Sandra Bullock in sad films. Hope Floats really caught the confusion and disorientation of a sudden break up and what it takes to start opening up to relationships, again. And In Love and War, a truly dreadful film that claims to be about the experiences of Hemingway in WWI, also had its heart in the right place. I cried through it, pretending I'd watched an extremely good, but poorly dubbed, film.
Overall, The Lake House really captured the kind of inner dialogue one has with oneself (or with one's imaginary confidante) when one is trying to find one's way back into learning how to love a real person, again. That's something that isn't often discussed in film. If one can overlook the conceit of a magic mailbox and time traveling pets, it's not such a bad thing.
The House of Sand and Fog
This is one of the most devastating films I have ever seen, particularly as I am unemployed and balancing my checkbook while watching it. The film is about a woman (Jennifer Connelly) whose questionable eviction from her house leads to her obsession with regaining it from the new owners: an Iranian family led by the ethnically ambiguous (when are we going to see his Othello?) Ben Kingsley.
It was gorgeously shot, and fabulously told. The attention to detail is exquisite, and the story is told with sympathy for all the characters involved. But is is truly one of the most depressing and distressing portraits of American bureaucracy I've ever seen. It also has some interesting commentary on the immigrant experience, on families (the Connelly character is estranged from her own family, but cared for by the Iranian one when she is hurt), and on the great American tradition of lying about our situations and identity. Everyone is lying in this film and trying to find some way out of impossible situations. It is a really good film; I am definitely interested to see what the director will do next; but I don't know that I could bear watching this film again.
It definitely begs the question: What's the most depressing film you've ever seen?
The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser
Werner Herzog takes on the feral foundling who was found in Nuremberg in 1828 barely able to walk and talk. Later Kaspar revealed that he had been kept most his life in a tiny cell with almost no human contact. Theories abound about who Kaspar Hauser might have been, but Herzog, as usual, bypasses that question to ask, "What did he experience?" Most of the script is based on actual correspondance relating to Kaspar, which makes this movie that much more bizarre.
(When posed the Liar's Paradox: What one question will determine whether the person met on the road is from the town of liars or the town of truthtellers, Kaspar suggests, "Ask him if he is a tree frog. If he says yes he is clearly from the town of liars." An unusual answer to the problem that the logician refuses to accept.)
Herzog's films are always like jumping into a totally different reality where the watcher just has to accept the construction of the environment. To some extent all films do this, but not always as radically as Herzog, who does not pander to the viewer or necessarily expect them to be able to grip his films logically. I watched his Wild Blue Yonder earlier this year. It was one of those sublime experiences that had me crawling in my skin, while simultaneously floating in the ocean with the music and all the fabulous 'alien' creatures.
Wild Blue Yonder is constructed almost entirely of found footage from NASA with a National Geographic shoot of the Antarctic ocean, surprisingly teeming with life, standing in for an alien planet. It's a manipulative film, and some portions are tiring, but I kept wanting to watch that footage of the Antarctic ocean over and over again. It absolutely captured the tedium of exploration, the wonder, and that deep space alienation I find absolutely terrifying, but draws me back to deep space s/f over and over again.
Despite being a costume drama, The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser has a lot of similarities with Wild Blue Yonder. Both are about the exploration of alien worlds, whether it's the astronauts at a new planet, or Hauser coming in contact with the outside world after a lifetime of isolation. It's also about the viewer being alien in the world of the movie. I can't help but feel that's one of the reasons he draws out some of the uncomfortable, or inactive sequences. We need to feel the pressure of difference in order to help us break down the barriers and understand how different, how alien, this experience must be.
Kaspar Hauser is surprisingly moving. There were several points in the film, where overwhelmed by the pressures on his behavior, the confusing questions, or just a profoundly beautiful piece of music, he spontaneously tears. It elicited the same response in me. A sense of how overwhelming this world can be particularly for those people who are sensitive or new to it. It also brings up the question of how we value this kind of innocence, while simultaneously trying to control it. But don't let my right brain description fool you, this is not a sentimental film, and Herzog is not a sentimental filmmaker. The emotions his films evoke are jarring, unexpected, and often uncomfortable.
Escape from Alcatraz
I have finally found probably the only Clint Eastwood film I would be able to watch with my G-rated father. (Who loved The Great Escape and subjected me to it whenever it was shown at the BPL.) Unfortunately, it left me a little cool. It's unquestionably a good film (and I'm guessing highly influential in the genre of prison films, I noticed several similarities to Shawshank Redemption), but I found it kind of dull. The most interesting part of the film was the beginning. By the time we get to the execution of the escape, everything is all shadows. (Though I noted the same architectural framing that you see in Dirty Harry. Is this Don Siegel's signature touch?)
Eastwood is fine, still squinting his signature suppressed rage, somehow more vulnerable, but equally as effective without a sidearm to reinforce the threat. But I kind'a missed the gunplay. Which is something that's changed.
I've noticed I've talked a lot about the following things as a result of Eastwood: an growing interest in firearms and their significance both within the genre of the Western and in the West as a historical reality; a return to an enjoyment and appreciation of action films (which I adored in high school. What happened? I even used to like Tarantino, True Romance was one of my favorite date movies.); and an ability to parse Western films. I'm starting to be able to read the nuance, which is making them a lot more interesting and exciting. (I also had the odd impulse to take Germans shopping at Shepler's, but I squelched that temptation for the time being.)
All my talking about Westerns and the West has gotten other people going on the subject. Marla is watching the Ken Burns' series, which she recommends. (I hated his Civil War, mostly because 12 hours of panning photographs of dour men in beards and (posed) dead soldiers while repeating the same three songs, is a recipe for disaster in my book.) I've got it on hold at the library, so I can watch/reject it for free.
And really, that's what most of these weird (and kind of depressing) films have in common. The library carries serious films. My library is particularly snobbish, which means it has to be one of the following to make it into the collection:
a) British,
b) an adaptation of a book,
c) an award winner, preferably with subtitles
This means there are not very many films with extensive action sequences, fart jokes, or Will Ferrel running around in his underpants in the collection. (Though they do have all of Jacques Tati's Msr. Hulot films, which could be the French 1950s equivalent. Then again, maybe not; Msr. Hulot would never run around in his underpants.)
So, that's my week. If you want to hear about the personal aspects, your going to have to talk to me personally, or wait 'til it comes oozing out late at night under the influence of controlled substances.
The Lake House
Okay, so it was terrible in one way, but quite touching in another. Two lovers living two years apart communicate via a magic mailbox. They share the same dog and live in the same house (at different times.)
I am really impressed with how much Keanu Reeves has grown up. I first noticed in Thumbsucker a coming-of-age film in which he plays a guru dentist. He is actually one of the more entertaining (and humorous) parts of that film. It made me intrigued to see what else he will do now that he's lost the Bill & Ted mode of delivery and is willing to engage in self-mockery.
In this film, everyone is serious, humorless, and due to the demands of film, appear to write one line letters in order to create a sense of dialogue. But it was beautifully photographed, really captured the loneliness of busy people, and the ache of separation. Anyone who has never carried on a love affair via correspondence doesn't know what they're missing. So, the logic stunk, the screen play was blah, but the filming was quite good, and the emotion was convincing. I was oddly touched by it.
But then I like Sandra Bullock in sad films. Hope Floats really caught the confusion and disorientation of a sudden break up and what it takes to start opening up to relationships, again. And In Love and War, a truly dreadful film that claims to be about the experiences of Hemingway in WWI, also had its heart in the right place. I cried through it, pretending I'd watched an extremely good, but poorly dubbed, film.
Overall, The Lake House really captured the kind of inner dialogue one has with oneself (or with one's imaginary confidante) when one is trying to find one's way back into learning how to love a real person, again. That's something that isn't often discussed in film. If one can overlook the conceit of a magic mailbox and time traveling pets, it's not such a bad thing.
The House of Sand and Fog
This is one of the most devastating films I have ever seen, particularly as I am unemployed and balancing my checkbook while watching it. The film is about a woman (Jennifer Connelly) whose questionable eviction from her house leads to her obsession with regaining it from the new owners: an Iranian family led by the ethnically ambiguous (when are we going to see his Othello?) Ben Kingsley.
It was gorgeously shot, and fabulously told. The attention to detail is exquisite, and the story is told with sympathy for all the characters involved. But is is truly one of the most depressing and distressing portraits of American bureaucracy I've ever seen. It also has some interesting commentary on the immigrant experience, on families (the Connelly character is estranged from her own family, but cared for by the Iranian one when she is hurt), and on the great American tradition of lying about our situations and identity. Everyone is lying in this film and trying to find some way out of impossible situations. It is a really good film; I am definitely interested to see what the director will do next; but I don't know that I could bear watching this film again.
It definitely begs the question: What's the most depressing film you've ever seen?
The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser
Werner Herzog takes on the feral foundling who was found in Nuremberg in 1828 barely able to walk and talk. Later Kaspar revealed that he had been kept most his life in a tiny cell with almost no human contact. Theories abound about who Kaspar Hauser might have been, but Herzog, as usual, bypasses that question to ask, "What did he experience?" Most of the script is based on actual correspondance relating to Kaspar, which makes this movie that much more bizarre.
(When posed the Liar's Paradox: What one question will determine whether the person met on the road is from the town of liars or the town of truthtellers, Kaspar suggests, "Ask him if he is a tree frog. If he says yes he is clearly from the town of liars." An unusual answer to the problem that the logician refuses to accept.)
Herzog's films are always like jumping into a totally different reality where the watcher just has to accept the construction of the environment. To some extent all films do this, but not always as radically as Herzog, who does not pander to the viewer or necessarily expect them to be able to grip his films logically. I watched his Wild Blue Yonder earlier this year. It was one of those sublime experiences that had me crawling in my skin, while simultaneously floating in the ocean with the music and all the fabulous 'alien' creatures.
Wild Blue Yonder is constructed almost entirely of found footage from NASA with a National Geographic shoot of the Antarctic ocean, surprisingly teeming with life, standing in for an alien planet. It's a manipulative film, and some portions are tiring, but I kept wanting to watch that footage of the Antarctic ocean over and over again. It absolutely captured the tedium of exploration, the wonder, and that deep space alienation I find absolutely terrifying, but draws me back to deep space s/f over and over again.
Despite being a costume drama, The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser has a lot of similarities with Wild Blue Yonder. Both are about the exploration of alien worlds, whether it's the astronauts at a new planet, or Hauser coming in contact with the outside world after a lifetime of isolation. It's also about the viewer being alien in the world of the movie. I can't help but feel that's one of the reasons he draws out some of the uncomfortable, or inactive sequences. We need to feel the pressure of difference in order to help us break down the barriers and understand how different, how alien, this experience must be.
Kaspar Hauser is surprisingly moving. There were several points in the film, where overwhelmed by the pressures on his behavior, the confusing questions, or just a profoundly beautiful piece of music, he spontaneously tears. It elicited the same response in me. A sense of how overwhelming this world can be particularly for those people who are sensitive or new to it. It also brings up the question of how we value this kind of innocence, while simultaneously trying to control it. But don't let my right brain description fool you, this is not a sentimental film, and Herzog is not a sentimental filmmaker. The emotions his films evoke are jarring, unexpected, and often uncomfortable.
Escape from Alcatraz
I have finally found probably the only Clint Eastwood film I would be able to watch with my G-rated father. (Who loved The Great Escape and subjected me to it whenever it was shown at the BPL.) Unfortunately, it left me a little cool. It's unquestionably a good film (and I'm guessing highly influential in the genre of prison films, I noticed several similarities to Shawshank Redemption), but I found it kind of dull. The most interesting part of the film was the beginning. By the time we get to the execution of the escape, everything is all shadows. (Though I noted the same architectural framing that you see in Dirty Harry. Is this Don Siegel's signature touch?)
Eastwood is fine, still squinting his signature suppressed rage, somehow more vulnerable, but equally as effective without a sidearm to reinforce the threat. But I kind'a missed the gunplay. Which is something that's changed.
I've noticed I've talked a lot about the following things as a result of Eastwood: an growing interest in firearms and their significance both within the genre of the Western and in the West as a historical reality; a return to an enjoyment and appreciation of action films (which I adored in high school. What happened? I even used to like Tarantino, True Romance was one of my favorite date movies.); and an ability to parse Western films. I'm starting to be able to read the nuance, which is making them a lot more interesting and exciting. (I also had the odd impulse to take Germans shopping at Shepler's, but I squelched that temptation for the time being.)
All my talking about Westerns and the West has gotten other people going on the subject. Marla is watching the Ken Burns' series, which she recommends. (I hated his Civil War, mostly because 12 hours of panning photographs of dour men in beards and (posed) dead soldiers while repeating the same three songs, is a recipe for disaster in my book.) I've got it on hold at the library, so I can watch/reject it for free.
And really, that's what most of these weird (and kind of depressing) films have in common. The library carries serious films. My library is particularly snobbish, which means it has to be one of the following to make it into the collection:
a) British,
b) an adaptation of a book,
c) an award winner, preferably with subtitles
This means there are not very many films with extensive action sequences, fart jokes, or Will Ferrel running around in his underpants in the collection. (Though they do have all of Jacques Tati's Msr. Hulot films, which could be the French 1950s equivalent. Then again, maybe not; Msr. Hulot would never run around in his underpants.)
So, that's my week. If you want to hear about the personal aspects, your going to have to talk to me personally, or wait 'til it comes oozing out late at night under the influence of controlled substances.