воскресенье, 19 октября 2008 г.
суббота, 18 октября 2008 г.
воскресенье, 21 сентября 2008 г.
Saving Private Ryan
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Directed by: Steven Spielberg.
Starring: Tom Hanks (as Captain John H. Miller), Tom Sizemore (as Sergeant Mike Horvath), Edward Burns (as Pvt. Richard Reiben), Barry Pepper (as Pvt. Daniel Jackson), Adam Goldberg (as Pvt. Stanley Mellish), Vin Diesel (as Private Adrian Caparzo), Giovanni Ribisi (as T-4 Medic Irwin Wade), Jeremy Davies (as Cpl. Timothy P. Upham), Matt Damon (as Private James Francis Ryan).
Opening with the Allied invasion of Normandy on 6 June 1944, members of the 2nd Ranger Battalion under Cpt. Miller fight ashore to secure a beachhead. Amidst the fighting, two brothers are killed in action. Earlier in New Guinea, a third brother is KIA. Their mother, Mrs. Ryan, is to receive all three of the grave telegrams on the same day. The United States Army Chief of Staff, George C. Marshall, is given an opportunity to alleviate some of her grief when he learns of a fourth brother, Private James Ryan, and decides to send out 8 men (Cpt. Miller and select members from 2nd Rangers) to find him and bring him back home to his mother...
It's been over a year since first seeing Saving Private Ryan -- it's a worthy effort by Speilberg--his best since Shindler's List by far. You've probably heard about the amount of violence, blood, and gore and that's all true--it's got the Viet Nam movie style violence (and then some) but it's not gratuitous. Were it sanitized like early WWII movies, modern audiences probably wouldn't take it as seriously.
The movie has that trademark Speilberg style--the structure is all tied up and unified from beginning to end, the emotional symbols abound, the music swelling when he's working at your emotions, the hand held camera that worked so well in Shindler's List to give you a feeling of participation, camera angles and periods of silence to disorient you (like Shindler), suspense techniques learned from Hitch... It's a movie that stays with you for a period afterwards.
Hanks will be the early front runner for Oscar after this flick--Academy members like him AND it IS his best acting job ever. While Speilberg will likely be criticized for attempting to manipulate the audience's emotions while keeping a distance from the inner core of his characters, Tom Hanks reveals a really complex military leader in this story, and does so without overacting--somehow it comes from within. While you may not empathize deeply with many of the platoon, you will still feel something because of the relationship that is formed with Hanks.
After the initial set-up, you will have the opportunity to participate in the D-Day operation and experience the horror of it. Those who have been in a real war can comment about how realistic or not Speilberg captures its chaotic horror in this scene.
In my case I again feel very lucky that my draft number was high, so I never had to face Nam like many of my classmates. Speilberg reminds us brutally in 'Saving Private Ryan' that we All have a debt to pay to the brave souls who have sacrificed so much for us. What Tom Hanks does with his performance is to remind us of this debt in a very personal way.
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четверг, 18 сентября 2008 г.
Memoirs of a Geisha
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Directed by: Rob Marshall.
Starring: Suzuka Ohgo (as Chiyo), Togo Igawa (as Tanaka), Mako (as Sakamoto), Samantha Futerman (as Satsu), Elizabeth Sung (as Sakamoto's Wife), Thomas Ikeda (as Mr. Bekku), Li Gong (as Hatsumomo), Tsai Chin (as Auntie).
In 1929 an impoverished nine-year-old named Chiyo from a fishing village is sold to a geisha house in Kyoto's Gion district and subjected to cruel treatment from the owners and the head geisha Hatsumomo. Her stunning beauty attracts the vindictive jealousy of Hatsumomo, until she is rescued by and taken under the wing of Hatsumomo's bitter rival, Mameha. Under Mameha's mentorship, Chiyo becomes the geisha named Sayuri, trained in all the artistic and social skills a geisha must master in order to survive in her society. As a renowned geisha she enters a society of wealth, privilege, and political intrigue. As World War II looms Japan and the geisha's world are forever changed by the onslaught of history.
Looking over previous comments here, it is clear that this is a very polarizing movie experience, one that seems to put 'Syriana' to shame in that realm. Director Rob Marshall has taken a best selling novel and turned out a feature film that it appears some people love and some absolutely hate. Count me in the first category, but allow me to indulge the critics, too.
First, this isn't a typical Hollywood film. Despite popular western misconceptions about Geishas, there's no sex, almost no violence and beyond that, there's nearly two and a half hours of women's problems that many men may find hard to relate to. This is not 'Desperate Housewives' or even 'All my Children.' This is about deceit, treachery and rivalries as much as it is about a little girl who gets sold into bondage by her impoverished Japanese family. Its also about a lifelong search for love in a society in which people apparently can't just step up and make frank declarations of devotion to one another. This movie is in a word 'complicated' and that is going to turn some American movie goers off.
But not all Asian film fans are raving about this movie either, some thinking it is a very superficial look at Japnese customs and others incensed that a movie that's about an important Japanese tradition should star three Chinese actresses. I cannot comment on either topic, since I know little or nothing about Japanese tradition and I don't know why Ziyi Zhang, Michelle Yoeh and Gong Li were cast. They have been seen before by American audiences, but are hardly film stars in this country, so it wasn't as if they were going to draw in tons of fans on their names alone.
The only thing I can think of is, all three are fine actresses and they more than proved that in this film. If Gong Li does not get a best supporting actress nomination, there's no justice. And Zhang should probably get a crack at best actress for her work, as well.
All three just light up the screen.
But, I can understand in this age of political correctness, how some would be offended by the casting and how others might complain about the handling of the Japanese subject matter.
All I can say is, movie makers face trade offs and one is either targeting your film to a mass audience (and in America, that means a generally poorly educated audience) or 'narrow casting' your film to people very well acquainted with the topic who will swoop down on any flaw. But that, when dealing with a topic like Japanese geisha culture, is a pretty small audience in America, too small to generate the kind of box office a film like this needs to pull in to pay for itself. From a purely Anglo, American, unschooled in Japanese culture standpoint, I think Marshall made good decisions. I hope he has not slighted Japanese culture too much, but I think he has made a suspenseful, captivating, enchanting film that does something a lot of films haven't in recent years.
He gave us a complex central character we can pull for throughout the film and for that, I thank him.
'Memoirs of a Geisha' ranks among my five best films of the year thus far, and deserves a best picture nomination.
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Trainspotting
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Directed by: Danny Boyle.
Starring: Ewan McGregor (as Renton), Ewen Bremner (as Spud), Jonny Lee Miller (as Sick Boy), Kevin McKidd (as Tommy), Robert Carlyle (as Begbie), Kelly Macdonald (as Diane), Peter Mullan (as Swanney), James Cosmo (as Mr. Renton), Eileen Nicholas (as Mrs. Renton), Susan Vidler (as Allison), Pauline Lynch (as Lizzy), Shirley Henderson (as Gail), Stuart McQuarrie (as Gavin/US Tourist), Irvine Welsh (as Mikey Forrester).
A wild, freeform, Rabelaisian trip through the darkest recesses of Edinburgh low-life, focusing on Mark Renton and his attempt to give up his heroin habit, and how the latter affects his relationship with family and friends: Sean Connery wannabe Sick Boy, dimbulb Spud, psycho Begbie, 14-year-old girlfriend Diane, and clean-cut athlete Tommy, who's never touched drugs but can't help being curious about them...
In the aftermath of _Pulp Fiction_, much of the filmmaking of the 1990s thrived upon attempts to appear 'edgy' within the constructs of independent films, or merely to provide empty shock value cliches. And no film ever came close to the sheer cleverness of Tarantino's masterpiece.
_Trainspotting_, however, somehow manages to take the excesses of the mid-90s and rise far, far above the cinematic cliches that it easily could have become. A film that tackles any hot-button social issue can, and usually does, simply become a didactic propaganda piece. Thankfully, _Trainspotting_ is vastly more intelligent in its edginess and its shock.
In order to appreciate _Trainspotting_ fully, the viewer must abandon any preconceptions about what defines truly great cinema, because this film defies convention at nearly every turn. And with the rapid pace of its plot, that's quite a bit of ground to cover.
Though a great deal of the picture's brilliance is derived from director Danny Boyle's consistent rejection of typical cinematic techniques, the most satisfying and _best_ aspect of _Trainspotting_ is that Boyle creates a film that is neither pro-drug or anti-drug. Instead, he maintains a rare objectivity throughout the film, depicting this fascinating array of complex, beautifully acted characters with an honesty that it seldom captured on film. And, given the life that each character lives, it's nearly incomprehensible that a director would refrain from influencing the viewer's impressions in any way, yet that's exactly what Boyle does.
The dialogue-- or at least what portions of the brogue-drenched dialogue American viewers will be able to comprehend-- is alternately hilarious, raw, and brutal. And Ewan McGregor, Jonny Lee Miller, and Robert Carlyle bring a remarkable compassion and depth to their portrayals of characters that could have easily lapsed into cliche.
Despite its sheer brilliance, _Trainspotting_ is not a film that's easy to watch. The viewer is bombarded with images that transcend visceral discomfort in their horror-- this movie contains two of the most graphic, horrifying scenes I've ever encountered. But, amazingly, none of these elements is used merely for shock value. Though the viewer will be mortified by some of the things that happen onscreen-- the well-documented dive into Scotland's most vile public toilet, for example-- these scenes all make _perfect sense_ within the context of a masterfully told story.
In order to notice all of the subtlety that also exists in _Trainspotting_, repeat viewings are necessary, primarily to reduce some of the most powerful shocks ever-so-slightly, though their effects are never lost entirely. Some of the images will likely haunt even the most cynical, jaded viewer for weeks.
RATING: 10 out of 10. Never patronizing and completely unpretentious, _Trainspotting_ is one of the most daring, unconventional films ever made. It inspires a level of discomfort rivaled by very few movies, because, even at its most graphic, Boyle never insults the viewer with mere shock tactics. Brilliantly acted, directed, and written, with a truly rare objectivity that allows each viewer to interpret its story on his/her own terms.
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Northfork
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Directed by: Michael Polish.
Starring: James Woods (as Walter O'Brien), Nick Nolte (as Father Harlan), Douglas Sebern (as Mayor), Claire Forlani (as Mrs. Hadfield), Duel Farnes (as Irwin), Daryl Hannah (as Flower Hercules), Graham Beckel (as Marvin), Josh Barker (as Matt), Peter Coyote (as Eddie).
In a near-empty Northfork orphanage, Father Harlan gently tends to Irwin, a eight-year-old who lies between a dreamstate and death. As orphanage caretaker Harlan reads aloud about Northfork's years-ago forced evacuation to make way for a hydro-electric dam, Irwin's imagination takes flight. While a team of six men evacuate the last remaining citizens of the town, Irwin, too, invents a cast of characters to prepare himself for his own evacuation.
Northfork is not an inscrutable mess. Whether you wish to view the more fanciful scenes as literal or the product of a dying boy's imagination, one strong theme connects all the stories. Change happens. Each sub-story revolves around a profound change. The little boy is dying. The town is being evacuated. The movie illustrates how we get dragged along by changes we are powerless to stop. We should ideally make the best of them and accept whatever heartache they cause. Some look forward towards a new freedom (the little boy) and some obstinately refuse to accept them (the ark family). And Walter has to learn the lesson that there are some changes we think are over and done with that must be relived (reburying his wife). Just because we think we've buried a chapter in life under the ground doesn't make it so. This is shown so clearly by the conversations between Walter and his son Willis. I say that if you really want to know what the movie is about watch the scene that begins in the outhouse. And pay special attention to the Willis's speech about caring for his car. Its a beautiful movie that gains meaning for me every time I watch it.
Here you can see some amazing moments from Northfork Movie:
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John Q
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Directed by: Nick Cassavetes.
Starring: Denzel Washington (as John Quincy Archibald), Gabriela Oltean (as Beautiful Woman), Robert Duvall (as Lt. Frank Grimes), James Woods (as Dr. Raymond Turner), Ron Annabelle (as Tow Truck Driver), Anne Heche (as Rebecca Payne), Eddie Griffin (as Lester Matthews), Daniel E. Smith (as Mike Archibald), David Thornton (as Jimmy Palumbo), Kimberly Elise (as Denise Archibald), Shawn Hatosy (as Mitch Quigley), Barry G. King (as Personnel Manager), Heather Wahlquist (as Julie Bird), Ray Liotta (as Chief Gus Monroe).
John Quincy Archibald's son Michael collapses while playing baseball as a result of heart failure. John rushes Michael to a hospital emergency room where he is informed that Michael's only hope is a transplant. Unfortunately, John's insurance won't cover his son's transplant. Out of options, John Q. takes the emergency room staff and patients hostage until hospital doctors agree to do the transplant.
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