Street Fight

Cory Booker, you might be my new hero. Booker is the subject of this tintillating documentary that follows his campaign for Mayor in 2002 in Newark, New Jersey against a guy who has been in office for over 15 years and done nothing for a city with a high murder rate and increasing number of crumbling projects and out of work people. It's called 'street fight', because thats what the incumbent James Sharpe turned it into. Sharpe, who is a fast talking bastard of a politician makes all kinds of horrible claims against Booker, who tires to run a clean campaign. Among the most ridiculous are that he (Sharpe) is blacker than Booker, that Booker is secretly a Jew, and that Booker is probably a terrorist.

It's not that that frustrates you though, its all the sneaky stuff that happens to his campaign. Signs get torn down by police 'on official business', businesses get fined for no reason when they support him, his office is broken into, and even the documentarian starts to fear for his well-being. And mind you, this is a DOCUMENTARY, as in, true facts. Most of the claims that Sharpe makes are shown coming out of his own mouth.

Its really a shock-umentary, about how horrific politics are, but also how amazing some people are. I think the film resonates more now, after Obama's campaign. I definitely saw some Obama like hope campaign feelings watching it.

Best part though (SPOILERS!!!) is that even though he didn't win the election THAT YEAR, he won the next one as Sharpe retired. And since then, Booker has done FRIGGIN INCREDIBLE STUFF for the city, just like he said he would! Check out his "25 accomplishments in 25 months" brochure http://www.corybooker.com/docs/25Accomplishments.pdf. He is seriously a good guy. And though they don't always come out on top at the beginning, they do on the end. Cory Booker you bald genius, what more can you do?

The Joy of a Mediocre Movie

I found a great article about the joys (and the frustrations) in watching a mediocre movie. I am ashamed to say that I too rented "Meet the Spartans" for mindless entertainment: http://www.avclub.com/articles/in-praise-of-mediocrity,24315/

Sometimes you just need to watch some bland badness. Tonight, I watched "Conspiracy Theory", that awful-great movie with Mel Gibson and Julia Roberts that plays on TNT all the time (that alone is a symbol of its mediocracy). Did I think it would make sense? NO! Did I think it would have a really clever ending? NO! But did I think it have some great Mel Gibson, yes, and it delivered. Did I think it would try to make Julia Roberts the smart young ingenue who breaks gender stereotypes (seems like thats all she used to do), YEAH, and it delivered. I don't expect to remember the details of the plot tomorrow, but I appreciate that they took the time to make that crappy film so I could spend 2 hours enjoying myself.

So heres to mediocracy. May you live forever and fill our extra hours with fake sugary goodness.

Oscars Review

Overall, it was a pretty good Oscar night. The right people won, in my opinion, there were some tiny surprises, and there were a few laughs.

THE WINNERS: I'm very happy that Slumdog sweeped the night, getting 8 out of its 10 nominations, and providing some interesting acceptance speeches. A little surprised that Sean Penn won, but I'm glad, he was equally as good as Rourke and deserved it too. I was pleasantly surprised Penelope Cruz won, her role in "Vicky Christina Barcelona" was fabulous, she brightened up the whole movie. Overall, awesome.

BEST SPEECH: Writer of Milk, who gave an emotionally wrought speech about how inspiring Harvey Milk had been when he moved to CA, and said something about all LGBT people being "beautiful creatures". It was a great script, and he deserved it.

WORST SPEECH: The director of the Japanese film that won best foreign film, for saying 'domo arigato mr roboto' at the end of his speech.

WORST IDEA: Hugh Jackman singing with Beyonce.

SECOND WORST IDEA: Zac Efron/Vanessa Hudgens and Amanda Seyfried/Dominic Cooper backing up Hugh Jackman/Beyonce.

BEST IDEA: Ben Stiller presenting an award dressed up like spaced out Joaquin Pheonix, and wandering around stage while the nominees were presented. I think it officially means that Pheonix can never work in Hollywood again, lol.

CRINGE INDUCING MOMENT: Sophia Loren's 70 year old face/body. It's ok if you look old now Sophia, you have been alive longer than my grandparents, so stop with the makeup and cover up the boobs.

GREATEST MOMENT: Werner Herzog randomly popping up and starting to ramble, then realizing they were presenting best doc as the next person came up. Heard of a transition?

GRADE: B

Ordinary People

In my undying love for Robert Redford, whom I feel like I know personally after he came to Pitzer twice, I've been watching all the movies he's directed, most of which have been pretty excellent. So I decided to watch his directorial debut, the 1980 film "Ordinary People" which won for best picture, director, screenplay, and supporting actor for Timothy Hutton (though really i think it should have been best main actor). It was so good!!!! I can't remember a film like it that had such realistic portrayals of parents in a while. Not that my family is like that at all, but Mary Tyler Moore and Donald Sutherland were so good, they really deserved to have won something for it too.

So, the story is about this suburban family, where the favored older son died in a accident that he younger son witnessed, and then the younger son (Hutton, looking mighty fine) tried to kill himself and was committed for four months. So, the film starts after he's been home from the hospital for a month, but he is clearly still working through a lot of stuff, and has not really figured anything out. His parents are trying to get on with their lives, his mom through focusing on domestic suburbany things, and his father by worrying all the time and doting on his remaining son.

A big part of the drama came from when the son goes to therapy with Judd Hirsch (I wish he was my therapist). Apparently, it was one of the first times that therapy was shown in depth in a good light (not Nurse Ratched style). Maybe I was just in a mood to be emotionally wrought, but wow, i was so wrapped up in hoping the son could figure out his problems. And hooray, he did! Not that that makes for a happy ending, but it was resolved as it should have been.

I think a film is truly great when it makes me sympathize and feel like I understand a situation which I clearly have never encountered. I don't know what its like to lose your brother and be hated by your mother, but I understood Timothy Hutton's character, and I understood how Mary Tyler Moore was trying to cope with it by ignoring it. Thanks Robert Redford for another gem. You totally deserved beating out Scorsese for "Raging Bull" for this.

Oscar Predictions

It's T minus 3 days to the Oscars, the holy day of film. After long consideration I have decided upon my predictions.

Best Picture: Slumdog Millionaire- It just has so much going for it, its winning everything, I think everyone in the Academy loves it too. While "Milk" and "Frost/Nixon" were excellent, I think this has a big edge.

Best Actress: Kate Winslet- It is time! I don't think the Academy is enough of a fan of nuns to vote for Meryl Streep, and Kate has been deserving of one for a while.

Best Actor: Mickey Rourke- This is my riskiest pick. It's neck and neck in predictions against him and Sean Penn. See my earlier post about this face off.

Best Director: Danny Boyle- Most of the time, director and picture are the same, Boyle is a safe bet.

Best Supporting Actress: Viola Davis- She was really emotional, those looked like real tears as the mom of the boy in question in "Doubt", she really brought the force to that movie right when it needed it. Also, the other nominees are not that strong

Best Supporting Actor: Heath Ledger- No doubt. I can't wait to see tiny Matilda Ledger accept his award.

Best Documentary: Man on Wire- While I am pulling for Herzog's "Encounters at the End of the World", I don't think it has a chance against this awesome doc, about a guy tightroping illegally across the WTC towers. The grandeur of the towers hit home for too many people, its gotta win.

Fahrenheit 451

Based on the Ray Bradbury book that I could never quite get through, this adaptation of the classic sci-fi book was excellent. Thanks in large part to master French director Francois Truffaut (though I have to ashamedly admit I've only seen 1/2 of one of his films), it was tight, it was scary, it was thought provoking, and it had great style.

One of the most important things to me as a sci-fi film fan is the look of a film if its set in the future. You have to put a lot of thought into it, because if it looks gimmicky or silly, its going to be forgotten in 10 years. Though this one had a few silly things (doors that open when you stand near them?! Incredible!), for 1966 this was pretty good. They had a monorail, they had fireman poles that would take send you up them like magic, and they had some pretty cool clothes.

But of course, its the story that counts. This movie/book is about a future where books are banned because they have too many ideas/cause unrest, and fireman are the people who burn them. There was the required witty exchange where some little kid says something like "didn't firemen used to put out fires?". The main character, Montag (they all call him by his last name, even his wife) is a fireman who starts to get curious about books....The cleverest part of the movie was in the credits, though it took me a few minutes to figure out why. In this future world, there is no print (except for numbers; some things you can't do without), no signs, no writing, nothing. So, instead of showing the credits in a montage before the movie really starts, the credits were READ OUT LOUD so nothing shows up on screen. How clever! Great film, great dystopian future, holds up well over time, see it.

Things I Refuse to Watch

I've got a bit of a cold today, so I've been alternating between reading and watching crappy movies on my computer. I decided to watch this strange thing on my Netflix Queue called "Winter Passing" that looked kinda interesting because it had Zooey Deschanel, Ed Harris and Will Ferrell. I started watching it, it was alright though kinda depressing, weird seeing 'good girl' Deschanel doing coke, but I didnt have the energy and it wasn't quite bad enough to turn it off. But then, a crime against film viewers happened. Poor little Zooey finds out that her kitten has feline leukemia, and she decides she can't let the cat go through with that. So she takes a cab to an abandoned dock, with a kitten and a bag, AND STARTS PUTTING THE KITTEN IN THE BAG....And I turn off the movie. I rush onto IMDB.com and look at the message boards, and yup, there are about 50 different threads about how unnecessary drowning a cat was.

Now, I don't think I'm a light weight about movies. I can take the blood and the gore no problem, I can even usually handle some gnarly "Little Children" like stuff if its appropriate. BUT, sometimes, isn't it just as powerful to imply something? Weren't you just as freaked out by almost seeing a guys ear get cut off in "Reservoir Dogs" as if you had actually seen it? So here's my list of things that should never be seen onsreen. Ever.

1. Throw up; So gross. I can handle hearing it, if you really think its necessary, but don't show it!
2. Killing babies. Animals included; This is just mean. Why can't you just say you took it to the vet to be euthanized?
3. Poop.
4. Throw up. Not even a little. Don't even think about it.

A Wrestler vs. Harvey Milk

I found an amazingly enlightening article written by my hometown movie critic Mick LaSalle that really had a lot of insight. It talked about 'chameleonic' vs. 'apotheotic' roles in film, using for example, the Oscar race this year which looks to be pitting Sean Penn's chameleonic performance in "Milk" against Mickey Rourke's wrenching 'apotheotic' role in "The Wrestler".

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/02/06/DDQO15G3T3.DTL&type=movies

I read the article this weekend, and had seen "Milk", but since I just saw "The Wrestler" tonight I didn't want to fully judge it, but now I can. First of all, "The Wrestler" was incredible. SO emotionally wrenching, SO draining to follow this guys story, and SO relatable even though I am clearly not a middle aged messed up pro-wrestler. I know very little about Mickey Rourke, the only other thing I've seen him in is "Sin City", and the rest I found out from wikipedia this afternoon, but he is friggin' incredible. He fits exactly what Mick LaSalle was talking about.

The article really was talking about roles where an actor completely disappears into a role so they are unrecognizable (Chameleonic), and roles where an actor seems to be playing out some major part of themselves onscreen (apotheotic). Sean Penn does not act like Harvey Milk normally, or in any other film he's done, so when he did it well, it was crazy and awesome. Mickey Rourke, though an equally fine actor, really has lived the life of 'The Ram' wrestler, and you can see it. LaSalle argues that it is usually chameleonic roles that win the Oscar (Day-Lewis in "There Will Be Blood" last year, Nicole Kidman in "The Hours", Charlize Theron (uck) in "Monster"), and goes on to list a lot of evidence in his favor

Will it be true again this year? It seems hard for me to believe that the Academy is not going to reward Rourke for this awesome film, it really seemed to be his swan song. But, on the other hand, I kind of believe LaSalle. Otherwise, how could Nicole Kidman have won for just putting on a fake nose? I liked both the films, I can't decide which i would want to win, but my bets are going to go against this article and go for Rourke.

Revisiting Jurassic Park

The theater on campus was playing the dinosaur masterpiece "Jurassic Park" this weekend. I texted a friend when i found out and said we definitely had to go. She thought I was kidding, but I definitely was not! It is one of my favorite movies, and though there have been sequels and some lame attempts to make other dinosaur movies, nothing comes close to this Spielberg classic.

What I really enjoyed about seeing it again was watching it on a big screen in a theater. I was too young to see it (came out in 1993, i would have been 5), so I had only seen it on a small screen. T-rex was scary on my little tv screen, enough to give me nightmares, but he was WAY scarier on a big screen. It is a film that really really benefits from the big screen. Spielberg knows how to frame shots really well, so you feel a part of the action, and that also made it a really good movie to see on the big screen.

Another thing I appreciated in this viewing was a lot of the subtler story lines in the film. It had been a year or so since I'd seen it last, and I usually only see it on TV, so I'm doing something else while watching it, and don't pay attention to it all too well. In a theater, you really pay attention to every detail sitting in the dark. All the witty little comments that crazy old Mr. Hammond makes about 'sparing no expense' on all the new fangled technology were better appreciated in this viewing. And Jeff Goldblumes crazy stares and crazy hair was better noticed as well.

In sum, its always great to see a good film in a theater, whether you've seen it a million times or not. And especially with giant scary t-rex's and velociraptors, the film benefits from looking physically taller.

Transsiberian

So you're traveling across Russia on the Transsiberian railway, and you try to be polite and make conversation with your random cabin mates. Well, turns out they're drug runners, and the guy kinda wants to rape you, and the girlfriend has gotten mixed up with this guy. What do you do? The plot of this movie is not clear from the get go. I have no idea whats going to happen with this naive American couple looking to find some adventure by taking a safe railroad trip. I have no idea what these crazy cabin mates are going to do. That's what made this a good movie, well that and the actors.

The acting was fantastic. The first half of the movie was incredibly engaging and drew me in because of the chemistry between the American woman (Emily Mortimer, not playing the nice girl for once) and the mysterious Spanish(?) cabin mate played by the charming and creepy Eduardo Noriega. As I described it to someone, he is fantastic at playing someone who sucks you into his character but at the same time kinda looks like he might wanna rape you. He played Tom Cruise's character in the original "Vanilla Sky", called "Abre los ojos/Open your Eyes", which was millions times better than the American version, but you can get a sense from that what kind of creepy/engaging he is. The second half of the film is much more action filled and lost a little from that, but once Ben Kingsley shows up it picks up speed again.

Here's a pic of the cabin mates, played by Kate Mara (heavy on the eye makeup) and Noriega.

The ending was not my favorite, it was just predictable that it was heading that way, but it was solid and it made sense. But for the cinematography, the acting, and for the first two acts of the story, this is a must see thriller that I recommend.

Looking at the blog, I've been watching some good movies lately. I swear, I don't always like every movie as much as I liked this or "Taken" etc., lol.