Tuesday, August 05, 2008 - 18:27:35
Arkansas native David Gordon Green directs "Pineapple Express," the latest from the Judd Apatow crowd. It opens on Wednesday. "Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2" makes the rounds at the big theaters while Matt Smith's Market Street Cinema gets "Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson."
I've been a bit occupied on other stuff, but last week brough "Swing Vote" and a few international indies to Little Rock. "The Dark Knight" continues to dominate the box office.
August is usually a bleak film month. The rest of the calendar doesn't look all that interesting, although I'm excited for "Tropic Thunder" starring Robert Downey Jr., Jack Black and Ben Stiller, "Vicky Cristina Barcelona" from Woody Allen and "Elegy," an adaptation of Philip Roth's novel "The Dying Animal" starring Penelope Cruz and Ben Kingsley.
I'll be on and off the blog for the next few weeks. Regular content will pick back up after Labor Day. If I'm not here, you can probably catch me over at InContention.com talking about the Oscar race.
Wednesday, July 30, 2008 - 15:05:26
New York Magazine has a good piece on the diverging careers of Philip Seymour Hoffman and John C. Reilly who once starred opposite each other on Broadway and in the films "Boogie Nights" and "Magnolia."
Monday, July 21, 2008 - 18:59:35
MOVIEGOER REVIEW: "THE DARK KNIGHT"
In 2005, Chris Nolan did a wonderful thing: he brought Batman back to life. After a series of miserable films, including the unwatchable “Batman and Robin,” Nolan, a relatively inexperienced director, decided to take the franchise in another direction. Gone were the days of lazy storytelling, silly villains dressed like cheap carnival acts and popcorn-fed one-liners. Pulling from Frank Miller’s 1987 graphic novel “Batman: Year One,” Nolan delivered a darker, more authentic Batman, much to the satisfaction of audiences and critics alike.
“The Dark Knight” picks up where “Batman Begins” left off. Wayne Manor under reconstruction after being burnt to the ground, and billionaire Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale) is living in a penthouse apartment and working out a makeshift workshop that might once have been an incinerator. Alfred Pennyworth (Michael Caine) remains by his side, as does Lucious Fox (Morgan Freeman) and Lt. Jim Gordon (Gary Oldman). His love interest, Rachel Dawes (this time played by Maggie Gyllenhaal), has fallen for the new district attorney, Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart). Gotham City is being terrorized by a clown-faced madman known as The Joker (Heath Ledger). He graduates to the big time when he promises the mob that he can kill Batman for half of all of their money.
In any other film, and, arguably, with any other villain, this might seem like boring and idle nonsense. After all, doesn’t every crook make promises they can’t keep? But with The Joker – I’m sorry – Heath Ledger’s Joker, you believe he can live up to it, especially when he smashes a pencil through a mobster's face and calls it a magic trick.
The opening sequence sets the tone for the film. Smartly, he avoids credits and gets right to it: a swiftly conceived bank robbery reminiscent of “Heat,” Michael Mann’s superb cop drama of 1995. And from then on, mayhem ensues.
The Joker and Batman chase and fight and beat each other a pulp all across Gotham. The Joker doesn’t have a plan; his goal is to wreak enough havoc that Gotham loses its faith in humanity along with its soul. Sound familiar?
Mr. Bale’s role in this film is limited, which is a shame. No one has been better as Bruce Wayne or Batman. Mr. Caine and Mr. Freeman, veterans that they are, bring their charm to their roles. Mr. Eckhart is picture perfect as the all-American Harvey Dent, and Ms. Gyllenhaal is a far more grown-up (not to mention sexy) Rachel Dawes than was her predecessor, Katie Holmes.
But the film belongs to Mr. Ledger; his interpretation of The Joker is something to behold. He slouches about with his face smeared white face paint mumbling words and scaring the hell out of people. Bright red lines highlight two nasty scars on either side of his mouth. Black circles surround his eyes, and filthy green hair hangs down like the worn-out end of a moldy mop. He is a terrifying sight.
Mr. Nolan along with his brother Jonathan devised an interesting plot with only a few minor distractions. The action sequences (and there are many) are finely orchestrated, although I wish Nolan would take a play from Mr. Mann's book and widen the lens from time to time. Still, when he, without the use of computer generated images, flips over an 18-wheeler, my mouth dropped in wonder. And no one should gripe about the cinematography; watching Batman fly through the air will leave you breathless.
“The Dark Knight” is a wildly ambitious film for which Mr. Nolan and the entire cast should be commended. In the hands of lesser talent, this might have amounted to nothing more than a flimsy, stupid re-take of a tired story or, “The Incredible Hulk.” Instead, Nolan serves up a though-provoking and morally complex tale about a man striving to find good in a city overrun with evil. The result is filmmaking of the highest order.
Thursday, July 17, 2008 - 12:52:31
Little Rock born film director and writer David Gordon Green gets a retrospective at BAM in New York. Nick Pinkerton of Village Voice previews the event and notes that Green's in line to direct a remake of the horror film Suspiria followed by a Grisham true-crime adaptation ("The Innocent Man"?).
Thursday, July 17, 2008 - 11:14:22
Friday. Like it matters what else is playing. But for those of you that are curious, "Mama Mia" and "Space Chimps" open at the big theaters while "The Fall" opens at Market Street Cinema.
Thursday, July 17, 2008 - 10:58:32
New York magazine film critic David Edelstein is catching hell for his negative review of "The Dark Knight." Rather than absorb it and move on, he's posted this response on the magazine's website. He writes, "The fanboys can’t make up their minds: They attack you for snobbery, for treating films like The Dark Knight as unworthy of serious discussion; then they call you a pretentious for engaging with those films beyond the level of “Wow!” (There’s nothing wrong with the level of “Wow!” by the way. I was wowed by the bat-flights in The Dark Knight.)"
More critics are weighing in. Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gives it four stars. Kyle Smith of the New York Post and KyleSmithOnline.com gives it three and a half stars. Michael Phillips of the Chicago Tribune loves it. Claudia Puig of USA Today gives it four stars. Both of the Los Angeles trades, Variety and Hollywood Reporter, score it near perfect.
12 hours, 45 minutes and counting . . .
Wednesday, July 16, 2008 - 11:54:13
It's "The Dark Knight" week here at the Movigoer. We're only a day and a half away from the first screening, an 11:59 showing in Little Rock, which is sold out at the IMAX.
Scott Foundas of Village Voice released his review of the film. It's tasty. He writes of Ledger, "By now, of course, you know that the Joker is played by Heath Ledger in the last role he completed before his death, this past January, at the age of 28. And it is perhaps the best compliment one can pay to this gifted young actor to say that his performance here would have cemented his legend even if he'd lived to see the film's release."
Of the film's director, Chris Nolan, he notes, "I should add that Nolan also delivers the kick-ass goods, from an opening bank heist à la Michael Mann to a climactic episode of vehicular mayhem à la William Friedkin."
And this from Maryann Johanson, the Flick Filosopher:
"Everything about this is wrong.
"It’s wrong that Heath Ledger is dead, that he’s gone and will give us no more like this, a performance that is so heartstoppingly, terrifyingly authentic that it barely seems like performance. It’s wrong that we’ve lost his promise, that we’ve lost what he might have given us a decade from now, two decades from now. I cried for him, watching this, and for us."
Monday, July 14, 2008 - 13:24:17
The future of the critic from Jay Rayner in The Observer.
At least those of us in Britain who make our living from our opinions are still gainfully employed. Across America it's a different story. Paid newspaper critics from a number of disciplines are being laid off or redeployed, their judgment deemed superfluous to requirements in the age of the net. Book review pages are becoming increasingly skinny. Television sections are disappearing. In April, Sean Means, the film critic of the Salt Lake Tribune in Utah, used his blog to publish a roll call of his movie-reviewing colleagues who, since the spring of 2006, were no longer in the opinion business: 'Steve Ramos, Cincinnati CityBeat, position eliminated ... Jami Bernard, New York Daily News, contract not renewed ... Michael Atkinson, Village Voice, laid off ...' At that point it ran to 28 names across the US media but since then it has stretched inexorably on.
Others soon started taking notice, with both the entertainment industry journal Variety and the Los Angeles Times publishing large pieces on the death of the critic. As Patrick Goldstein put it in the LA Times: 'Critics are being downsized all over the place, whether it's in classical music, dance, theatre or other areas of the arts. While economics are clearly at work here - seeing their business model crumble, many newspapers simply have decided they can't afford a full range of critics any more - it seems clear we're in an age with a very different approach to the role of criticism.'
Monday, July 14, 2008 - 13:17:49
Devin Gordon of Newsweek talks to Chris Nolan, director of "The Dark Knight." On Heath Ledger he says,
I'd met Heath a couple times over the years about different projects, but nothing ever worked out. One time he gave me a speech that a lot of young actors have given me, where they basically say that they haven't achieved, as serious actors, what they want to before they're pushed into being movie stars. And of all the actors who've given me that speech, he's the only one that I would actually want to pay $10 to see give that kind of performance. And he did it in "Brokeback Mountain." The stunning lack of vanity, the sheer loneliness of that character—it's a staggering performance. So when I heard he was interested in the Joker, there was never any doubt. You could just see it in his eyes. People were a little baffled by the choice, it's true, but I've never had such a simple decision as a director.
Monday, July 14, 2008 - 13:01:38
Two weeks ago I was at Movies in the Park and "Notting Hill" was playing on the screen. I don't usually get to enjoy the movies from start to finish because of my work there, but for this particular film, I plopped down in one of the blue harback chairs at the Riverfront Amphitheater and watched it from beginning to end.
There's a particular scene that I didn't remember from the two or three times I'd seen the film. It's when Hugh Grant's character, fresh off a dumping from Julia Roberts' character, is being set up on bad date after bad date by his friends. After after a few of them, we see Grant sitting next to a pretty young girl who doesn't turn out to be odd in any way. She the opposite, in fact, and he declares her to be "perfect."
The charcter, whom we never see or hear from again in the film, quite curiously, is played by Emily Mortimer. In 2005, Ms. Mortimer played the doting wife of Jonathan Rhys Myers in Woody Allen's morality tale "Match Point." She was excellent and, upon watching her in several other films, especially "Lars and the Real Girl" and "Lovely and Amazing," it's hard not to believe that she's an actress on the rise.
Charles McGrath, writing in the Sunday edition of the New York Times, profiles the actress who lives in Brooklyn, NY with her husband the actor Alessandro Nivola ("Junebug"). Writes Mr. McGrath, "In person Ms. Mortimer is funny and charming, without a hint of actorly pretense. She hangs out at Starbucks a lot, and to see her there you could mistake her for yet another attractive, harried Brooklyn mom, trying to steal a moment of peace and quiet." She made a brief appearance in "Redbelt" opposite Chiwetel Ejiofor and her next film is titled "Transsiberian". It's a train thriller "in the tradition of "Shaghai Express"" notes Mr. McGrath. Next year, we'll see her among the impressive cast of Martin Scorsese's new film "Shutter Island," adapted from the Dennis Lehane novel.
Monday, July 14, 2008 - 10:36:04
Let the Oscar talk . . . continue. I've got my predictions up over at InContention.com. Jeff Wells of Hollywood-Elsewhere.com has drafted a list of likely Oscar contenders to go along with the list from Mr. Musical Tom O'Neil and Pete Hammond.
Monday, July 14, 2008 - 09:02:33
David Denby of The New Yorker doesn't much like "The Dark Knight," which he calls "grim and jammed together." But he writes this about Heath Ledger:
Ledger has a fright wig of ragged hair; thick, running gobs of white makeup; scarlet lips; and dark-shadowed eyes. He’s part freaky clown, part Alice Cooper the morning after, and all actor. He’s mesmerizing in every scene. His voice is not sludgy and slow, as it was in “Brokeback Mountain.” It’s a little higher and faster, but with odd, devastating pauses and saturnine shades of mockery. At times, I was reminded of Marlon Brando at his most feline and insinuating. When Ledger wields a knife, he is thoroughly terrifying (do not, despite the PG-13 rating, bring the children), and, as you’re watching him, you can’t help wondering—in a response that admittedly lies outside film criticism—how badly he messed himself up in order to play the role this way. His performance is a heroic, unsettling final act: this young actor looked into the abyss.
David Edelstein of New York Magazine doesn't like it either.
Friday, July 11, 2008 - 07:29:00
The final elements of the viral marketing campaign for "The Dark Knight" - one of the best and most extensive in movie history - is coming to a close. Smartly, the people at Warner Bros. are rewarding fans with a free screening of the film in select cities. They're all sold out of course and, no, Little Rock didn't make the cut for one of the screenings. Still, it's a neat idea and one that will propel "The Dark Knight" into cinematic history - and not just because of Heath Ledger.
Friday, July 11, 2008 - 07:03:41
I can't say that I care anything at all about "Journey to the Center of the Earth" or "Meet Dave," both of which are getting panned by the critics. Of "Journey," A.O. Scott of the New York Times writes, "I have long vowed never to stoop to what I regard as the lowest kind of hackery, which is to describe a motion picture as a thrill ride, a heckofa ride or any other kind of ride. . . If this movie is not a ride, then what is it? One thing it may not be, quite, is a movie."
Ann Hornaday of the Washington Post writes about "Meet Dave:" it "is the kind of bland, generic, high-concept midsummer comedy that drives a critic to the thesaurus in search of new ways to say "vapid.""
"Hellboy II: The Golden Army" from Guillermo Del Toro seems to be faring better. Writes Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times, "The trouble with the current spate of comic-book movies is that their numbing conventionality can make it easy to forget why you loved the original comics back in the day. "Hellboy II: The Golden Army" will help you remember."
"Standard Operating Procedure" from Oscar-winner Errol Morris ("The Fog of War") impressed Dana Stevens of Slate. She notes, "Errol Morris' brainy, meandering inquiry into the origin of the Abu Ghraib torture photographs that shocked the country when they were first published in 2004, is indisputably an impressive piece of documentary filmmaking."
Finally, "Fugitive Pieces" arrives at Market Street Cinema. Kirk Honeycutt of Hollywood Reporter opines, "The film is an impressive and often quite moving tale of emotional entrapment that will connect with festival and specialty venue audiences."
Thursday, July 10, 2008 - 15:05:59
"The Dark Knight" is only a week away. People around here have been buying advance tickets to the IMAX for shows beginning at midnight and beyond. Today, the New York Times reports that because internet tickets sales are so overwhelming, theaters are adding 6:00 a.m. shows to the line-up. Previously, I noted the addition of the 3:00 a.m. show. Check your local listings. So far, in Little Rock, tickets are still available for midnight IMAX screening.
UPDATE: Check that. A reader tells me that the midnight IMAX screening is sold out. I'm not sure whether they'll add a 3:00 a.m. show. According to the website, the next screening is at 9:15 a.m. on July 18th. I'm sure if you call out there and put some pressure on them, they'll get the green light from the studio.
Tuesday, July 08, 2008 - 12:31:05
Last night marked the debut of film critic Elvis Mitchell's television program "Under the Influence" on Turner Classic Movies. His first guest was the late Sydney Pollack. His interview with Mitchell was one of the last he gave before he died this year. The show is short - on thirty minutes - but its incredibly interesting. The focus is the influence of classic movies. Upcoming guests include Laurence Fishburne, Joan Allen, Edward Norton, Quentin Tarantino, Richard Gere and John Leguizamo.
Mitchell currently serves as the host of "The Treatment" on KCRW in Los Angeles. The show is braodcast on Sundays in Little Rock on KUAR FM 89.
The next episode, on July 14th, features Bill Murray.
Mark Bourne of film.com interviews Mitchell on the eve of his show.
Troy Patterson of Slate describes it as a "chat show that's warm, insightful, and only about 30 percent too snazzy for its own good."
Wednesday, July 02, 2008 - 08:02:23
Wednesday, July 02, 2008 - 07:57:10
Wednesday, July 02, 2008 - 07:55:09
Here's another reason why movie reviews matter. From Slate.
