Elizabeth (1998): Grade: A-

Is this film available for rent on Netflix Watch Instant, the iTunes Store, and Amazon Prime? Elizabeth is not available for rent through Netflix Watch Instant, but it is available for rent through the iTunes Store and Amazon Prime.

Starring: Cate Blanchett, Geoffrey Rush, Christopher Eccleston, Joseph Fiennes, Richard Attenborough, Vincent Cassel, & John Gielgud

Directed by: Shekhar Kapur

Screenplay by: Michael Hirst

It would be a mistake to regard Shekhar Kapur’s Elizabeth as historically accurate, but I can see why people would be upset by the fact that it is not. Unlike a film like Inglorious Basterds, which is obviously not meant to be historically accurate, Elizabeth clearly gives audiences an impression that everything you see in the movie is true. I am pretty much ambivalent about the responsibilities, if any, a filmmaker has to his audience when it comes to depicting history. Oliver Stone received a lot of flack for JFK and how he presented his theory of who killed John F. Kennedy. Stone claimed that he never intended to make viewers think that his film was factually accurate, but I don’t think Stone had any obligation to his audience to explain whether or not his film was truthful. The film remained an engrossing conspiracy drama with great performances and a solid script. With the exception of documentaries, people should not expect movies to give them a definitive account of a historical event. For that, there are books and the internet.

Despite the liberties the filmmakers took in telling the Queen of England’s story, you should not allow this to prevent you from enjoying this engaging and entertaining biographical drama. Nominated for 7 Academy Awards (including for Best Picture and Best Actress), Elizabeth chronicles the ascension of Queen Elizabeth I of England (Cate Blanchett). The film opens with a young Elizabeth, who has been imprisoned by her half-sister, the Roman Catholic Queen Mary, for being a Protestant and thus, posing a threat to the Roman Catholic Church’s hold over England. Queen Mary then dies and, having produced no heir to the throne, Elizabeth becomes the Queen of England. However, the Queen soon finds that she has many enemies loyal to the Pope who desire to see her dead. Being inexperienced in dealing with the political machinations of the Pope’s friends as well as France and Spain, Elizabeth turns to the mysterious Sir Francis Walsingham (Geoffrey Rush) to help her consolidate her power and root out her enemies.

In 1998, director Shekhar Kapur presented us with a new and fresh way to make a biographical movie. Elizabeth is told from a more contemporary standpoint that instead of simply stepping through the Queen’s life from birth to death, a single period of her life is focused on and her story is fashioned into a dark  and lavish conspiracy thriller with a strong feminist theme. Kapur and his screenwriter Michael Hirst eschew the dry, boring style of a typical costume drama where the focus would be on stately rituals and civilized grandstanding in favor of showing us melodrama, violence, and political intrigue.

Above all else, Elizabeth is a showpiece for the astonishing performance given by Cate Blanchett, who turned into an overnight star with this film. Blanchett effectively pulls off the Queen’s transition from a politically naïve girl to a woman who rises to the occasion and takes control of her destiny. In the film’s final scene where Elizabeth marches to her throne, Blanchett is stunning in the unspoken power she exudes from her sheer presence. Elizabeth is Cate Blanchett’s movie to own and she does so magnificently among a company of formidable peers such as Geoffrey Rush, Richard Attenborough, and Christopher Eccleston. Blanchett has a physical grace and eloquence that is truly admirable. I am still shocked that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences decided to go with Gwyneth Paltrow for Best Actress instead of Blanchett. 15 years later, Blanchett’s performance still resonates while we have all forgotten about Shakespeare in Love.

The film’s other great performance is from one of my most favorite actors, Geoffrey Rush. Here he plays Elizabeth’s adviser and the mastermind behind Elizabeth’s entry into power politics, Sir Francis Walsingham. Machiavellian and worldly, Walsingham has no allegiance to any church and does not seem to believe in God so he does not have the moral scruples that Elizabeth does against killing those who may get in the Queen’s way. I love the strange relationship between Walsingham and Elizabeth as the Queen turns to Walsingham out of reluctant necessity. One of the best scenes in the film and where we get to see Walsingham’s cunning mind at full display is the secret meeting between he and Mary Queen of Scots where he seduces and then kills Mary.

I was less impressed by Joseph Fiennes’ character (NOTE: Both Fiennes and Geoffrey Rush also appeared in Shakespeare in Love, which came out in the same year) of Robert Dudley, the Earl of Leicester. Dudley is a cocky Romeo who has a romantic relationship with Elizabeth despite the fact that he is married. I was never able to emotionally connect with this relationship because the film begins with the two already together and so we don’t see the two characters grow into the relationship and see what it is that attracts one to the other. Fiennes seems to rely more on his good looks than his acting skills and consequently, his performance feels flat and two-dimensional.

If you have not yet seen Elizabeth, I highly recommend you check the film out on Blu-ray or in 1080p. Shekhar Kapur has put together a stunningly lavish production that should only be seen in the highest quality of picture. The film is beautifully shot by Remi Adefarasin (he also shot 2005’s Match Point, another beautiful looking film) and Kapur imbues the film with an Eastern influence thanks to Alexandra Byrne’s costume designs and John Myhre’s production design. Eye-candy fills every frame of the film and Kapur does a good job creating a claustrophobic feel throughout the story that complements the plot’s shadowy political intrigue.

Elizabeth generated quite a bit of controversy upon its release for being “anti-Catholic” and it was condemned for this reason by the Catholic League. I am not familiar enough with British history to know whether the actions the Pope takes in the film is what really happened. However, even though I am not a big fan of the Roman Catholic Church, I immediately noticed how every Catholic in the film is portrayed as being cruel and devious whereas the Anglicans are shown to be rational and caring. So for those devout Catholics out there who have not seen this film, I would probably recommend you stay away from Elizabeth if you tend to get a bit bent out of shape over criticism of the Church.

Star Trek Into Darkness (2013): Grade: C

Starring: Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Benedict Cumberbatch, Karl Urban, Simon Pegg, Zoe Saldana, John Cho, Alice Eve, Anton Yelchin, Bruce Greenwood, & Peter Weller

Director: J.J. Abrams

Screenwriters: Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman, & Damon Lindelof

In one sense, it is rather appropriate that J.J. Abrams has been handed the reins to the Star Wars universe. That once-spectacular franchise became tarnished in one fell swoop by unimaginative storytelling under the direction of George Lucas. Similarly, J. J. Abrams was given the responsibility of taking over the Star Trek film franchise and although he was given the job because the franchise was already floundering, he did not make it much better. Abrams’ interpretation of Star Trek may have achieved huge box office success, but creatively, Abrams has sucked out everything that made Star Trek great and has resorted to tried and true formulas to tell his stories rather than expand on the Star Trek universe created by the late Gene Roddenberry.

In this latest entry to the Star Trek franchise, we begin the story with Captain Kirk (Chris Pine) and Dr. McCoy (Karl Urban) running away from a tribe of a primitive alien race and an erupting volcano. Meanwhile, Mr. Spock (Zachary Quinto) beams inside the volcano to stop its eruption and save the alien race from imminent extinction. After barely escaping with their lives, the crew of the Enterprise returns to Earth. However, instead of receiving a commendation for his efforts like he expected, Captain Kirk is stripped of his captain duties, loses his ship, and is demoted down to a First Officer for his cavalier disregard of Starfleet regulations. While all this is going on, a terrorist attack occurs in London and the attacker is identified as Starfleet Commander John Harrison (Benedict Cumberbatch). After a second attack that is directly aimed at high-level Starfleet commanders, Kirk is reinstated to Captain, handed back his Enterprise, and ordered to hunt down Harrison and kill him. However, Kirk and crew soon discover that Harrison is not who they have been led to believe and a far more sinister plot is underway.

Based on his past films, J.J. Abrams strikes me as someone whose entire universe of sources and inspiration consists of modern pop culture and whatever has gone mainstream. He seems to differ from the likes of Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry, whose inspiration for and development of Star Trek was inspired by real scientific theories and America’s exploration of space. Roddenberry was not looking to create a swashbuckling, action-oriented sci-fi series in the vein of Star Wars, Flash Gordon, or Buck Rogers. His approach was more intellectual. In sharp contrast, Paramount and Abrams have cast this approach aside and have remolded Star Trek into a hip, youth-oriented action series that is almost indistinguishable from Star Wars. It foregoes plot development and logic in favor of spectacle, humor, and a constant recycling of past tropes that have proven successful with fans.

I was not a big fan of 2009’s Star Trek. I grudgingly accepted the new, brighter and more colorful visual aesthetic that Abrams adopted for the series, but I was happy with the casting decisions he made for the core crew of the Enterprise. However, my biggest gripe about the film (and my biggest gripe with practically all of Abrams’ films) was the lackluster script and the easily forgettable villain who seemed to have been conceived as an afterthought when the screenwriters realized at the last minute that the story needed an antagonist. Worse, the film resorted to the oft-used device of having time travel incorporated into the story and having Leonard Nimoy return as the future Mr. Spock, presumably in order to attract die-hard Trek fans who were suspicious of this dumb-downed looking version of their beloved series. So with that said, I was not particularly enthusiastic about this sequel.

Star Trek Into Darkness is an improvement over the last effort and I don’t know whether or not that is due to the addition of screenwriter Damon Lindelof (Lost, Cowboys & Aliens, Prometheus). But as you can tell from the credits I just listed, the possibility that he lent added quality to the screenplay is as likely as the possibility that Bigfoot is real. So what works better this time? Two words: Benedict Cumberbatch (Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Into the Univere with Stephen Hawking, the BBC’s Sherlock). This is the first time I have noticed this rising British star and I can now see why he has gained such a cult fan following. With his sinister voice and mannerisms, the icy-eyed Cumberbatch makes a strong impression as Khan (if you are interested enough in reading a blogger’s review of this film, then you are most likely already aware of the worst kept secret of the year), who has been reimagined as a terrorist.

The sequel has also improved on building the relationship between Kirk and Spock. Screenwriters Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman had already done a commendable job developing this relationship in the first film, and here they develop it further by having Spock understand and appreciate what it is to have a friendship with someone. As an aside, I noticed that Abrams employed less lens flare this time around. It still exists in copious amounts, but at least you don’t see it in every single frame of the film like you do in the last movie.

As with the first film, the two best characters to watch continue to be Spock and McCoy. Zachary Quinto and Karl Urban perfectly capture the most memorable characteristics of these characters and I only wish that McCoy was given more to do in the film.

Aside from this, Star Trek Into Darkness is a disasterious mess. Let us begin with the title. What the hell does “Into Darkness” mean within the context of this film? That the crew of the Enterprise is going to get into some nasty shit against Khan? In that case, shouldn’t every movie with an antagonist have “Into Darkness” placed after its title?

When J.J. Abrams took over the Star Trek re-boot, his plan was to reimagine the series in a fresh, new way that would not be beholden to what had come before. Although I think his decision to tie in the new films with existing Star Trek continuity was a bad one, I was somewhat encouraged to see what Abrams would be able to bring to the table. Instead, we have basically seen nothing but a retread of what has come before. In Into Darkness, we are reintroduced to Tribbles, Neutral Zones, Harry Mudd, and Carol Marcus (Kirk’s eventual wife and the woman who gave him a son). However, the two most egregious and headshake-inducing moments are the Leonard Nimoy cameo (again) and the recreation of the famous death scene from Wrath of Khan. I honestly could not understand how Old Spock was able to suddenly appear onscreen on the bridge of the Enterprise and give Young Spock advice. Isn’t Old Spock supposed to exist in a parallel universe? So if that is the case, how did he appear like that? Magic? More importantly, what the hell was the point of this cameo anyway?

The Wrath of Khan re-enactment deserves its own paragraph. As this scene began to unfold, my eyes began to grow bigger and bigger in stunned astonishment that the filmmakers actually thought that re-enacting one of the most memorable moments in Star Trek lore would be a good idea. Notwithstanding the fact that this scene was entirely unnecessary, the whole scene falls completely flat on its face. For one, Chris Pine is just simply not a good enough actor to pull off dying. Watching him die was like watching some After School special where the kid with the leukemia goes through a long progression of closing and opening his eyes before finally succumbing to his disease. Also, the scene is SO self-conscious that, unless you have never seen Wrath of Khan (and in that case, shame on you), it is impossible to separate yourself from the Nimoy/Shatner interaction and watch this without referring to it. Consequently, you don’t feel the emotion that came with watching Spock die in Wrath of Khan. Compounding the lack of emotion is the fact that this is only the second film we have seen Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto together so that familiarity with their relationship is entirely absent. Finally, Spock’s yelling of “KHAAAN!” comes off as totally corny and hilarious, which I somehow doubt the filmmakers intended for me to feel.

As I stated before, I really enjoyed Benedict Cumberbatch and he is the best thing about Into Darkness. Unfortunately, the script does him a great disservice by underutilizing his character and by not knowing what to do with him. The film does a good job building up a mystery around the motives of his character and a sense of dread. We are continually reminded that Khan is physically and intellectually superior to everyone else. However, when Khan finally reveals himself to be the bad guy, he is quickly outwitted by Spock and defeated (temporarily). The audience is totally cheated out of seeing a long, drawn-out battle of wits between Khan and the Kirk/Spock. Where were the ship battles? Abrams is obviously not against recycling the same old shit from before, so why not also give us ship battles? When Khan resurfaces later at the end, we are treated to a lame chase and fight sequence across San Francisco that for some random reason ends up on what appear to be flying garbage trucks. In short, Khan’s use of his superior intellect is barely displayed and it should have been the central conflict rather than the convoluted conspiracy plot involving a corrupt Starfleet Admiral, played horribly by Peter Weller.

Star Trek Into Darkness aims to be crowd-pleasing at the risk of not being original. The plot is confusing and poorly developed and J.J. Abrams eschews Gene Roddenberry’s utopian vision for Star Trek to instead deliver a simplistic, popcorn action movie that is more style than substance. Abrams has decided to bombard us with an exhausting procession of high-note action pieces instead of building any sort of suspense or momentum that gives us an impression of the high stakes involved.

The Names of Love (2011): Grade: B-

Is this film available for rent on Netflix Watch Instant and/or through the iTunes Store? The Names of Love is available for rent through both Netflix Watch Instant and the iTunes Store.

Starring: Jacques Gamblin & Sara Forestier

Directed by: Michel Leclerc

Screenplay by: Baya Kasmi

The Names of Love marks the first film I have seen that practically requires the viewer to be familiar with the history, politics, and culture of the film’s nationality, which in this case is French. The winner of two Cesar Awards (the French Oscars) for best female lead and best writing, The Names of Love is a romantic comedy that satirically deals with very heavy issues concerning anti-Semitism, anti-Arab prejudice, and French politics. Although you don’t have to be French or Algerian to understand what is going on in this film, an understanding of these issues, which have beset France from World War II to the present, helps to appreciate the many nuances present in the story.

The film’s wacky premise takes the popular slogan of “make love, not war” and applies it literally through its main character, Baya Benmahmoud (Sara Forestier), a hippie free-loving French Algerian in her 20’s who believes that she can change the world for the better by sleeping with right-wing “fascists” and converting them through sex. Baya is the daughter of an Algerian refugee (Zinedine Soualem) and a French hippie heiress who rebelled against her wealthy family. Baya is a firm believer in having sex on the first date – the sooner the better to convert those misguided fascists. On the other extreme end of the spectrum is Arthur Martin (Jacques Gamblin), an ornithologist middle-aged single man. His parents are a nuclear scientist and Algerian war veteran (Jacques Boudet) and a Jewish mother (Michele Moretti) who lost her parents to the Nazis camps and has since then chosen to forget her Jewish roots. Baya meets Arthur in the beginning of our story and she decides he is a worthy challenge and pursues him. What follows is a roller coaster of a romance that is full of quirky situations that one can describe as being decidedly French.

The new “It” girl in French cinema, Sara Forestier initially comes off as extremely obnoxious and naïve. Baya seems aimless, irresponsible, and manipulative. During the course of the film, however, her idealistic fervor and burning desire to help people rubs off on you. She has a winning spirit of innocence and her reckless behavior is well-meaning. At the same time, Forestier’s performance, although good, is not as exemplary as I would expect any winner of a Cesar for best performance to be. I suspect that the film’s ideas about anti-Arab prejudice and anti-Semitism influenced Forestier’s peers to vote for her.

As for the leading man, Jacques Gamblin does nothing but stand around for the entire film looking flummoxed. He is simply a witness to Baya’s inspired madness. To be fair, Arthur Martin is supposed to be a boring and reserved man who holds no opinions about anything other than being a big fan of former French Prime Minister Lionel Jospin (who makes a cameo appearance, which presumably will mean absolutely nothing to most American audiences). Except for his physical appearance, you do wonder what could have attracted Baya in pursuing Martin.

For you film history buffs, you may notice that director Michel Leclerc employs a lot of Woody Allen style devices in the film. For example, adult characters narrate childhood flashbacks (but in a clever twist on the device, Arthur’s father, as a young man, is portrayed as an old man because Arthur cannot imagine his father as ever being young). Another example is Lionel Jospin’s cameo appearance, which recalls Marshal McLuhan’s appearance in Annie Hall.

An interesting aspect of The Names of Love is the juxtaposition between its broad, farcical comedy and the film’s dealing with the serious issue of long standing racism in French culture. France has long endured racism against both the Jews (as evidenced with Arthur Martin’s mother, a Jew who escaped persecution under the Nazis and who decided to change her name so that people would not know she was Jewish) and the Arabs (as seen with Baya’s Algerian father who saw his uncle and other family members innocently massacred by French soldiers during the Algerian War). I liked that the film boldly decides to tackle this issue, particularly within the context of a light romantic comedy. No American studio would have the balls to do something like this. At the same time, the film clearly does not concern itself with explaining to its international audience the particular brand of racism in France. It is almost as if Leclerc made his film solely for French audiences. I was able to glean from the film the nature of these racisms in France, but I think the film would have benefited greatly with some additional background information.

The Names of Love could have also benefited from not beating its audience over the head with its social and political message about racism. Some of the most effective films have dealt with such serious issues and conveyed their message in an allegorical way. For example, in Night of the Living Dead, director George Romero used zombies to represent racism rather than deal with the subject more literally. In this way, the audience does not feel like it is being lectured to and it is less likely to tune out whenever a character launches into a diatribe about how racism is bad. The beauty of cinema is that you can use different and more effective devices to convey the same message in such a way that audiences can better relate to it. What we get instead is a dinner scene in which the two sets of parents (Baya’s and Arthur Martin’s) meet for the first time. The setup for the scene feels shoehorned in and the way that the parents meet is implausible (Baya impulsively invites her parents over to meet Arthur’s parents even though she by now obviously should know that the two parental couples will not get along).

Director Michel Leclerc’s inexperience as a filmmaker is apparent in the constant tonal shifts of the movie. The film bounces around from being light and comedic to dealing with serious political issues. Leclerc begins the film on a weak foot as he drags us through a long-winded opening in which we meet our two main characters through a series of cleverly told flashback sequences that take us through each character’s family history. The sequence feels too long and it lacks enough interest or humor to make you care for the characters. On the other hand, although I did not care whether or not these characters would ever end up together, I was interested in the trajectory of these characters’ lives separately and together. I mentioned Annie Hall and this film’s style and narrative can best be described as a Gallic Annie Hall. It is playful and farcical like Annie Hall, but it lacks the intellectual sophistication of Woody Allen’s masterpiece. Leclerc intended his film to be like Annie Hall (there is even a crab scene that is substituted for the lobster scene in Annie Hall) and he is quoted as saying, “I secretly hope he’ll [Woody Allen] end up suing me for plagiarism, which might give me a chance to actually meet him!”

The boringly titled The Names of Love is not funny most of the time and its integration of a wacky romance with its various political ideas smacks more of pretentiousness than being smart and sophisticated. Many of the situations in the film are so off-the-wall that you either chalk it up to French sensibilities that are totally foreign to you or you find them too implausible to accept. However, Sara Forestier’s energetic and angry performance keeps you interested enough to stick with the movie and see where her unlikely romance with Arthur Martin will take them.

The Great Gatsby (2013): Grade: C-

Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Tobey Maguire, Carey Mulligan, Joel Edgerton, Isla Fisher, Jason Clarke, Elizabeth Debicki, Jack Thompson, & Amitabh Bachchan

Directed by: Baz Luhrmann

Screenplay by: Baz Luhrmann & Craig Pearce

The Great Gatsby director Baz Luhrmann (Strictly Ballroom, Moulin Rouge, Australia) has sadly turned into the Michael Bay of high-class dramas. If your idea of a good movie is glossy visuals cut together as if you forgot to take your ADHD medication, then you may actually enjoy The Great Gatsby. Admittedly, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1925 classic novel about the decadence and excess of the Jazz Age is not an easy novel to adapt and an argument can even be made that it is unadaptable. However, the problems of Luhrmann’s gaudy and overblown The Great Gatsby extend beyond the novel’s adaptation and include the director’s signature style that would have been in this film even if the novel was easily translatable. For this film, Baz Luhrmann’s style is not appropriate and a far more subtle approach should have been used. What we get is a fake looking production that washes up ashore like a bloated dead whale of a movie that is virtually devoid of any emotion.

The Great Gatsby is one of my all-time favorite novels. It is less about the mysterious Jay Gatsby (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his love affair with Daisy Buchanan (Carey Mulligan) than it is about the excess and decadence of the Jazz Age and the dark side of the American Dream. Both the book and the film are narrated by Nick Carraway (Tobey Maguire), a young Yale man who has just moved to New York City to get into the lucrative bond market on Wall Street and who finds out his next door neighbor is Jay Gatsby, a self-made millionaire who has insinuated himself into the upper crust of Long Island society. Nick’s cousin is Daisy, a New York socialite who is married to the wealthy and brutish Tom Buchanan (Joel Edgerton) and who lives directly across the bay from Gatsby. After finally being invited to one of Gatsby’s lavish parties and meeting the man himself, Nick soon discovers that Gatsby met Daisy 5 years ago and the two were in love with each other before Gatsby was shipped overseas during World War I. During his absence, Daisy married Tom. Gatsby now wants to rekindle his romance with Daisy and has Nick set up a meeting where the two will reconcile. Daisy becomes reunited with Gatsby and they begin an affair that eventually leads to a whole lot of trouble. With the exception of an unnecessary narrative framing device (Nick Carraway writing his story in a sanitarium), the screenplay keeps very closely to the novel.

The best thing going for The Great Gatsby is Mr. Gatsby himself, Leonard DiCaprio and Baz Luhrmann should thank his lucky stars that he at least had the wherewithal to cast a great actor for the leading role. Comparisons may be made between DiCaprio’s Howard Hughes in The Aviator and his portrayal of Jay Gatsby, but I regard this role to be the greater of the two. I regard DiCaprio as easily among the best actors working today and his performance in The Great Gatsby reinforces my belief. As he successfully brings the character to life from the paper to the screen, DiCaprio is outstanding as Jay Gatsby. He mixes the boyishness we saw in Titanic with the temper he displayed in his recent Django Unchained. DiCaprio does ham it up a bit, but given the hyper-stylized tone of the film, can you blame him? My only critique of DiCaprio is that the actor seems lately drawn to roles where he plays confident and worldly men who fail to overcome a character weakness (The Aviator, Blood Diamond, Inception, J. Edgar, and to some extent Shutter Island). Gatsby is cut from that same cloth and although I very much enjoyed the performance, DiCaprio is becoming a tad too familiar in playing these roles.

The same cannot be said of Carey Mulligan (An Education). Otherwise a fine actress, Mulligan is overmatched by the part of Daisy Buchanan. In this film, Mulligan is just a stand-in who has nothing to do for most of the film except look troubled in her beautifully tailored costumes. Reportedly beating out Natalie Portman and Scarlett Johansson for the role, Mulligan’s performance is devoid of substance and she fails to embody her character’s beguiling charm and sophistication. The Daisy character is a complex woman who is able to bewitch Jay Gatsby. Gatsby has bought his house in Long Island for the sole reason to be near Daisy and to reunite with her. However, in the film, we cannot understand why in hell he would go for someone like her.

The rest of the supporting cast does not help either. Joel Edgerton as Tom Buchanan has one of the meatiest roles in the film, but he spends most of the film just sneering like some two-dimensional stereotypical villain. I kept expecting Edgerton to begin twirling his mustache to keep with his performance. I was hoping for him to get more screen time, which would have allowed his character to become a weightier adversary to Gatsby. As for Tobey Maguire (Spider-Man), he might as well not exist. He is a complete non-entity and watching him made me wonder how his career would have progressed (or not progressed) had he not starred in the Spider-Man films. Instead of being a sharp-eyed observer, like he is in the novel, Maguire comes off more like a wide-eyed, eager beaver doofus who spends the entire movie sidelined.

Obviously Baz Luhrmann has a penchant for stories about unlikely romances. Strictly Ballroom was about a ballroom dancer who partners up with a frumpy looking girl for a dance competition and they end up falling in love. Romeo & Juliet…unless you are totally cut off from civilization except for an internet connection to my blog, I won’t insult your intelligence explaining this one. Moulin Rouge is about a poor writer who falls in love with the headlining star of the Moulin Rouge and who is engaged to be married to a ruthless Duke. Australia is about a rich and proper English woman who falls in love with a rugged Australian rancher. We again have the same thing in The Great Gatsby. Jay Gatsby is a self-made millionaire who falls in love with a former girlfriend who is now married to another rich guy.

A good love story has to pull your heart strings so that you root for the two characters to end up together. Unfortunately, Luhrmann fails to generate any palpable chemistry between his two leads for you to care about whether or not they will end up together. Furthermore, the film’s sub-plots are briefly introduced, but they are never fleshed out. For example, Nick and Gatsby’s friendship and Tom’s romantic affair with Myrtle (Isla Fisher) are barely developed. However, what makes the novel stand out is F. Scott Fitzgerald’s social commentary on the 1920’s. Although Luhrmann captures most of the novel’s story beats, he fails to dig into the cautionary theme of the book in which Fitzgerald had seen the emptiness and moral rot of the American Dream. Then again, when a director decides to present you with a 3D version of the Great American Novel, it would be a stretch for anyone to expect a deep literary adaptation.

Like it or not, Baz Luhrmann’s films have always been about the spectacle rather than the story and this is why he reminds me so much of Michael Bay. Like Bay, Baz Luhrmann emphasizes style over substance and he panders to audiences’ basest sensibilities. If The Great Gatsby was a theme-park attraction, it would look very much like this movie. Luhrmann falls into the same trap that marred the novel’s 1974 screen adaptation starring Robert Redford and Mia Farrow. Both get too bogged down by the clothes, cars, and architecture of the time period, but this latest version commits the further sin of looking fake. Everything in this film looks and feels fake. So much CG is used to render the environments that the film borders on becoming an animated film. Its amazing that even with an enormous budget, gorgeous costumes, beautiful actors, 3D, and a virtual camera that can show anything from anywhere, the film is still a bore to sit through. On a smaller note, what the hell was the point of having key phrases from the book appear on the screen as Tobey Maguire voices them? Do we really need the director to beat us over the head that we need to pay attention to a piece of important text? Thank you, we get it.

Music also plays a critical role in the film. Once again, Luhrmann uses modern music in a period picture. Unlike Moulin Rouge, where the modern tracks were appropriate for a musical that seemed to transcend the time period it was set in, putting in Jay-Z here is ridiculous and embarrassing. When Gatsby and Nick drive by a neighboring car on the Brooklyn Bridge and the driver is blasting “Izzo (H.O.V.A.)” by Jay-Z, it ruins the entire moment. It may have been the Jazz Age and rap owes some of its roots to jazz, but rap does not blend well in this time period. By the way, I am not against the use of modern music in a period film. Django Unchained also used modern music, but it was done right in that film. Here, Luhrmann’s use of Jay-Z feels more like an advertising campaign to get young people to see this film.

Baz Luhrmann’s candy-colored orgy feels like a dull Cliff Notes examination of a great American classic. The novel’s important themes are subsumed by Luhrmann’s flash and dazzle and what we ultimately end up with is a soulless film that is cold and empty.

Leap Year (Ano Bisiesto) (2011): Grade: C+

Is this film available for rent on Netflix Watch Instant and/or through the iTunes Store? Leap Year is available for rent through both Netflix Watch Instant and the iTunes Store.

Starring: Monica del Carmen, Gustavo Sanchez Parra, & Marco Zapata

Directed by: Michael Rowe

Screenplay by: Michael Rowe & Lucia Carreras

First, do not confuse this film with the 2010 American comedy of the same name starring Amy Adams. The one I am reviewing may cause you to hang yourself out of sheer depression whereas the other film is only likely to lessen your IQ. Please also dispel any notions you, my faithful readers, may have about my attitude towards small, indie and foreign films. It would be a mistake to assume I do not like these types of movies based on my recent reviews where I have given high recommendations to big-budget Hollywood films and harsh critiques to smaller, more obscure films. In fact, I usually prefer watching independent and foreign films over bigger budgeted films. It is purely coincidental that my recent viewing habits have resulted in the more mainstream films being better than the less mainstream ones.

So with that long disclaimer, let us proceed. Living in a big city (and by big city I mean a BIG city such as New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago and cities that feel big like San Francisco and Washington, D.C.) can be a fun and exciting experience for any young, single person. Such cities generate an in-the-moment vibe that makes you feel like you’re experiencing the best life has to offer and that you are living in a sort of cultural and intellectual epicenter. At the same time, for all that they have to offer, life in the big city can also be epically lonesome, especially if you move to the city without really knowing anyone or having any family members.

Leap Year (Ano Bisiesto) is about one such lonely person, a young journalist named Laura (Monica del Carmen). Living in a cramped and rundown apartment in Mexico City, Laura leads a banal life in which she has no friends or family living near her. Laura vicariously fills her empty life by observing the lives of her neighbors. When her family calls to see how she is doing, she falsely paints them a picture of a busy and cheerful lifestyle – a lifestyle she fantasizes of having. At nights, Laura fulfills her sexual desires by bringing home strange men to have one night stands. Until one night, she meets Arturo (Gustavo Sanchez-Parra), an aspiring actor who has a penchant for S&M. The two of them develop a strange and troubled relationship in which the sexual encounters increasingly become more disturbing.

The winner of the 2010 Cannes Film Festival’s Camera d’Or (this award is given for the year’s best first feature film that is presented in one of the Cannes’ selections, which are Official Selection, Directors’ Fortnight, or International Critics’ Week), Leap Year is Australian director Michael Rowe’s first feature film. Although he is Australian, Rowe has been living in Mexico for the past 16 years so presumably he has developed quite a bit of insight into Mexican culture. Aspiring filmmakers take note: Rowe was 37 years old when he made this film so any bullshit about how film distributors won’t bat an eyelash at you unless you are in your 20’s is just that – bullshit.

With the exception of the opening sequence, the rest of the film is shot entirely in Laura’s small, claustrophobic apartment. Michael Rowe’s intention behind this film was to shoot a low-budget (the budget was approximately $700,000) ‘two-people in a room’ kind of film with a sexual element in order to attract Mexican audiences. Does it work? I had no interest in the film’s S&M element. Once Laura meets Arturo and they begin their disturbing sexual relationship, the story devolves into just another sex film in which the main character resorts to kinky sex to fill some void in her life. We have seen this character motivation in a countless number of movies. It no longer has the shock value that it once had and using a “tried and true” trope ignores the vast possible number of other ways a character like Laura can deal with her solitude and loneliness. Basically, I don’t think that introducing a sexual element in your story just to hook in audiences is a good enough reason to have it in your film. I like to give audiences a bit more credit than to assume they only want to see films with sexual content.

A film like Leap Year heavily depends on strong performances. You only have three characters in the film and the film mostly takes place inside a small apartment. So your focus of attention is primarily on the characters, especially on Laura. Monica del Carmen gives a good performance. I do not know whether she is a professional actor, but she is natural in the role and appears to fit right into her character. She does not have an attractive face or body, which made me wonder how in hell she was able to bring home a different guy night after night (then again, perhaps my American-influenced ideal of an attractive woman differs from what is considered to be attractive in Mexico). It is depressing and sad to see how her character just goes through the motions of her daily life without seeming to make any concerted effort to get herself out of her situation, whether it be career-wise or socially. She goes through these motions automatically as she sits in front of her TV every night and watches whatever is on and goes through the same line of ‘how-are-you-everything-is-fine’ questioning every night on the phone with her family back home.

When Laura meets Arturo, we see her alive for the first time. Arturo’s sadomasochistic desires turns Laura on and she begins to look forward to what sort of sexual adventure Arturo will present her with upon their next meeting. It is almost heartbreaking when Laura finally asks Arturo to commit the ultimate sadomasochistic act, which is to kill her and essentially put her out of her lonely existence. Monica del Carmen conveys Laura’s desperations, loneliness, and general ordinariness very bravely because these attributes are not ones that make an actor look attractive in any way. In addition, the actress is overweight and the role requires her to be completely naked in many scenes. I admire the actress for taking on a role such as this in which she has to be so plain.

As for Gustavo Sanchez Parra, who plays Arturo, we do not learn very much about him other than that he is an aspiring actor. Most of the scenes the actor is in are dark (because Arturo usually appears at Laura’s apartment at night) so we also do not see his face very clearly most of the time. I wanted to learn more about the character. I wanted to specifically know why he is into sadomasochism and generally what his background is (does he have a wife, kids, etc.). There is not very much for the actor to do here based on what was written for him and I felt that he was merely just a device for the audience to learn more about Laura.

Leap Year ultimately lacks purpose. By the end of the film, there is no strong understanding of who the characters are. For example, Laura has marked February 29^th on her calendar as a special day. We know that her father died on that day, but we never understand what significance this holds for Laura or what sort of trauma she is experiencing because of it. She is clearly depressed and presumably part of her depression has something to do with her past family history involving her father. However, we don’t know what that and so we cannot sympathize with her. The director tells his story at a slow burn (Arturo is not even introduced until about an hour into the movie), but once we reach the end, the payoff at the climax is too little and Laura does not arrive at any revelation other than the small fact that Arturo is not going to come anymore and he is certainly not going to help her die. What we learn at the end is the same as what we knew at the beginning and for that, Leap Year becomes an uneventful portrait into a lonely and depressed woman’s life.

Iron Man 3 (2013): Grade: A

Starring: Robert Downey, Jr., Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, Guy Pearce, Rebecca Hall, Stephanie Szostak, James Badge Dale, Jon Favreau, Ben Kingsley, & Ty Simpkins

Directed by: Shane Black

Screenplay by: Shane Black & Drew Pearce

If my comic book obsessed 14-year old self was told that in the future I would see all of my favorite comic book superheroes coming to the big screen on an annual basis and they would be given the kind of respect they deserve instead of the schlocky, low-budget Roger Corman treatment they were given during my childhood, I would have soiled my pants and invented a time machine to forward me to the future. The superhero genre is the most fascinating genre from both an artistic and business perspective. Initially, superhero films were self-contained stories just like any other movie that, if they succeeded financially, they spawned a sequel.

Marvel Studios changed all that. Starting with Iron Man in 2007, Marvel did the unprecedented by creating a film universe for its superhero properties to exist within that was modeled after the comic books. In the comics, each superhero character like Iron Man, Thor, The Incredible Hulk, etc. has their own monthly comic book series in which they have self-contained adventures, but that which still exist within the Marvel Universe. Alongside these individual series of books, some of these superheroes gather together and have additional adventures as a team (i.e. the Avengers) or they participate in a storyline that runs through all of Marvel’s comic books (i.e. Civil War).

For movie studios, the ideal film is one that will generate sequels and merchandise sales (i.e. action figures). Marvel Studios (and its parent company, Disney) recognized that with the use of their comic book model, there was the potential for an endless number of sequels that, if done well, would increase merchandise sales (that already existed from the popularity of the comic books). So far, Marvel Studios has not taken any serious missteps in translating their properties unless you count Iron Man 2 (which despite its unpopularity with fans, it still earned an ungodly amount of money at the box office). The studio has been very careful to stick with established Marvel mythology and only change what it feels will not translate well cinematically. As a result, Marvel fanboys have been overall pleased with how Marvel’s Phase 1 (which ended with the release of The Avengers last summer) turned out.

Iron Man 3 marks the beginning of Marvel’s Phase 2. Without giving or hinting anything away, I will only provide spoiler-free information in this synopsis . In this sequel, Tony Stark (Robert Downey, Jr.) is struggling to deal with his recent adventure with The Avengers by experiencing sleepless nights and anxiety attacks. In the meantime, the world faces a terrorist threat from a man named The Mandarin (Sir Ben Kingsley), who has been bombing various locations around the world. In addition, an inventor/entrepreneur named Aldrich Killian (Guy Pearce) develops a method to regenerate missing limbs and the ability to generate extreme heat. He has an organization he calls AIM in which he uses his method to help soldiers regenerate limbs they lost in battle. Back in 1999, Killian, then a poor, struggling scientist, tried to meet with Stark to discuss his invention, but Stark blew him off. Killian is now back and he presents Stark with a new threat.

I do not know whether Jon Favreau left the Iron Man franchise voluntarily because he wanted to pursue other projects (like the trainwreck Cowboys vs. Aliens) or he was booted out after the perceived unpopularity with Iron Man 2. Regardless, the franchise has received a rejuvenating boost with the hiring of acclaimed action writer-director Shane Black (Lethal Weapon and Kiss Kiss Bang Bang). My biggest issue with the two Iron Man films had always been poor action choreography and setups. Favreau is not an experienced director and other than Zathura, his writing and directing efforts were limited to comedies (Swingers, Made, and Elf). I can probably speak for everyone when I say that I never understood why Marvel hired Favreau to helm Iron Man in the first place. His lack of experience with action/sci-fi/adventure films became glaringly obvious in the lackluster action sequences in both Iron Man films. What saved those films was mainly Robert Downey, Jr.’s magnetic performance and a strong supporting cast of actors.

With Iron Man 3, Shane Black has come to the rescue and shoved Favreau aside to present us with how a true Iron Man action film should look like. I have been a huge fan of Shane Black’s work ever since he sold his first screenplay (Lethal Weapon) back in 1987. Black brings to the table the same level of quality as someone like Joss Whedon with a similar talent for sharp, humorous dialogue and character development and an even stronger talent for writing action. Iron Man 3 has three big action sequences (one of which, seen in the trailers where the crew and passengers of Air Force One are dropping from the sky, is my favorite) contain the perfect blend of fun and exciting action and humor. The final action set piece is set in a shipyard, a type of location that is used way too often in action movies and at this point just screams of excessive cost-cutting and lazy screenwriting. However, it attests to the strength of Black’s screenwriting skills that despite its location, Black manages to come up with some very creative uses of the shipyard that I have not seen before and ends up with both an exhilarating and humorous finale.

As always, the centerpiece of Iron Man 3 is Robert Downey, Jr., who at this point has convinced audiences to think he actually plays himself in these movies. It has been rumored that Downey Jr. may not return for Iron Man 4 and if this is true, then Marvel needs to do everything in its power to return Downey Jr. to the role. The actor defines the role to the same extent that Christopher Reeve did with Superman. The appeal of the first two Iron Man films rested primarily on Downey Jr.’s performance rather than the story or the villain and many fans actually did not even like the Iron Man films except for the actor’s performance. Here, Downey Jr. has to compete for the first time with a good story and great villains.

Speaking of villains, although the relationship between inventor/entrepreneur Aldrich Killian and the Mandarin reminded me a lot of the relationship between entrepreneur Justin Hammer (Sam Rockwell) and Mickey Rourke’s Ivan Vanko, the relationship in this film works better and it contains a surprise that works brilliantly, which I will not spoil because its reveal is one of the film’s best moments. Guy Pearce does a fantastic job as Killian. Ambitious, ruthless, as well as very charming, Killian’s goal of a super-powered race of soldiers/terrorists presents a more formidable threat against Tony Stark than Justin Hammer’s robot army did. In the last couple of years, Pearce has been adding an impressive list of performances (Animal Kingdom, Mildred Pierce, The King’s Speech, The Hurt Locker) to his already noteworthy repertoire (L.A. Confidential, Memento) and he can add this performance to that list. As for Ben Kingsley, all I will say about his performance in this film is that you will see him in a role that you have probably not seen him do before and the only other film that comes to mind in which he has given us a performance this different is Sexy Beast.

The rest of the supporting cast also does a wonderful job playing their roles. Although Jon Favreau drops out of the film early on, Shane Black has given the remaining regulars  (Pepper Potts and Rhodey Rhodes/Iron Patriot) more to do in this film, especially in terms of being involved in the action. I was especially impressed by the development of Pepper Potts character and she presents the audience with another of the film’s biggest surprises.

Given the high failure rate of third sequels (Superman III, The Godfather III, Spider-Man 3), it is a huge relief to not only see how well Shane Black has done with Iron Man 3, but he has even managed to make the film the best in the series. Aside from the improved action, Black has also taken Tony Stark out of his comfort zone where he is surrounded by his technology and money. Just like in the first Iron Man film when Stark had to MacGyver a suit from scratch in an Afghani cave, Stark is again forced to use his intellect in a similar environment (redneck country). We actually don’t see much of Stark inside the Iron Man costume until very late in the movie. Up until that point, Stark works on his own with the help of a precocious little boy (Ty Simpkins), whose interactions with Stark are comedy gold.

If there is one thing I could have wished for in this movie, it would have been to allow Shane Black to write/direct an R-rated version of Iron Man 3. Black is known for the excessive amount of violence and profanity in his movies and I would have loved to have seen it done with this film. I completely understand why Marvel would not have gone with this because it would have been a suicidal business decision and it would have considerably affected the film’s box office numbers. In a few scenes, you can tell Black tried to push the envelope as far as he could without sacrificing his PG-13 rating (there are scantily clad women and a high kill count).

Iron Man 3 elevates the franchise to a new height that I hope will continue with Shane Black at the helm and Robert Downey, Jr. as Tony Stark/Iron Man. The film kicks it up a notch on every level, including a rousing film score by Brian Tyler, who replaces John Debney. You will not enjoy this film if you already don’t care for comic book movies, but if you do and even if you have not seen the past Iron Man films or any of the other Marvel movies, I think you will dig this successful opening salvo to the Summer 2013 movie season. By the way, stick around for the end of the credits as you will see who Tony Stark has been narrating his story to.

(SPOILER ALERT): If my suspicions are correct, the Mandarin will return.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ue43ALt_s-Y

A Love Affair of Sorts (2011): Grade: F

Is this film available for rent on Netflix Watch Instant and/or through the iTunes Store?  A Love Affair of Sorts is not available for rent at Netflix Watch Instant or at the iTunes Store. It is not available for DVD rental either, but you can rent the film streaming at Amazon Prime.

Starring: David Guy Levy, Lili Bordan, Ivan Kamaras, & Jonathan Beckerman (as himself)

Directed by: David Guy Levy

Screenplay by: David Guy Levy & Lili Bordan

A Love Affair of Sorts was publicized as the first film that was made entirely through the use of the Flip camera. Although I recognized the camera in the film, I had to look up what a Flip camera was on Wikipedia. Somehow this distinction is not as enticing as the first 3D film or the first digital film, especially for a technology that has already been discontinued by Cisco (its parent company owner) and one whose recognition and popularity in the pop cultural zeitgeist was never high enough to warrant any sort of publicity.

Co-writer, director, and star (and founder of distributor production company Periscope Entertainment) David Guy Levy debuts his first film, which is a DIY (Do It Yourself) indie romantic film set in Los Angeles (and you know you’re in L.A. because everyone talks about doing Buddhist chanting) during the Christmas holiday season about a painter (Levy himself) with a Flip camera who meets a Hungarian nanny, Enci (Lili Bordan) in a bookstore (anyone who knows the name of this bookstore, please feel free to drop me a line). He convinces Enci to take part in his experimental movie project that he hopes will allow the two of them to get to know each other. He will film Enci and she will film David. The two of them begin to develop a vague sort of relationship that gets complicated when David discovers that Enci has a boyfriend (Ivan Kamaras). The film also features David’s friend, who is played by Jonathan Beckerman, who in turn does not play a character but instead was led to believe that David Guy Levy and Lili Bordan had a relationship in real life. It was only after the film was complete that Beckerman was told that he participated in a fictional film.

A Love Affair of Sorts is the sort of movie I would expect to see in a beginner video production class. It is poorly shot (to be fair, that is probably intentional because the two main characters are shooting their own movie), it lacks any narrative structure, and with a few exceptions, the characters are not interesting, which is especially true of David Guy Levy. Despite its intentional low-tech shooting style, the film should have still strived to visually elevate itself above a typical YouTube video and it would not have taken much effort to give the film some semblance of an aesthetic style (for example, both The Blair Witch Project and Paranormal Activity, albeit both are horror films, effectively use low-tech techniques to establish a mood). Instead we are left with hideous looking shots that illustrate just how ugly modern technology can and often does capture reality.

The film is beset with problems, but the biggest one is that of our main character, David Guy Levy. I do not know whether he is playing a character or simply being himself. Nevertheless, Levy lacks screen presence throughout the film. Whenever the camera is pointed at him, Levy looks bored and he never has anything significant to say except for one scene where he breaks down at a park and laments the fact that he spends most of his time not thinking about anything. I could never understand what Enci could have possibly seen in David to attract her to him. I found it implausible that Enci would leave her far more charming Hungarian boyfriend for someone as uninteresting as David.

As for Enci, she is slightly more fascinating to watch. She is given more dialogue and most of the scenes seem to revolve around her life. Consequently, her character is better developed, but even so, I didn’t learn enough about her background (nor did I learn enough about David’s background) to establish any connection toward them. The parameters of these characters’ relationship and what they want from each other is so vaguely established from the beginning that I didn’t know what I should want these characters to end up doing with each other. Should they become friends, lovers, acquaintances? Moreover, David and Enci remark how empty their lives are, but aside from any further insights or commentary on the state of their lives, we the audience are forced to watch how vapid (AKA boring) their lives are. Other than literally watching paint dry on a wall, there is nothing more mind-numbing a filmmaker can put on screen.

The film’s best scenes involve characters that I wish received a lot more screen time. One of the best scenes in the film is when Enci meets up with her boyfriend and they go out on a dinner date with David accompanying them. In the short amount of time he is on camera, the boyfriend exudes charm and a strong screen presence that neither David nor Enci could pull off during the entire film. The second interesting “character” is David’s photographer/artist friend. What makes him so interesting is really not his “character” but really the fact that he was playing himself and he was unaware that David Guy Levy was making a fictional movie. So what you see is his friend’s real and honest reactions to David’s relationship with Enci.

I could not tell from the film how long David and Enci spent making their little movie, but it would have been nice to have seen what these two people do for a living and how they pay the bills, rent, mortgage on the nice digs they live in. The film’s final act delves into being a film-within-a-film as the actress playing Enci decides to move in with David and stop playing Enci. Their relationship then takes a wrong turn after David supposedly screws up and Enci leaves him. None of this sheds more light on our characters and I was confused as to why David and Enci continued to film themselves after their “break up” and after their film was over.

A Love Affair of Sorts is an exercise in self-indulgence that is supposed to be an example of “reflexive cinema.” However long was spent planning this movie out, the end result is sloppy and forgettable immediately after the last frame of the film flashes by.

Hang ‘Em High (1968): Grade: B

Is this film available for rent on Netflix Watch Instant and/or through the iTunes Store?  Hang Em High is not available for rent at Netflix Watch Instant, but it is available for rent at the iTunes Store.

Starring: Clint Eastwood, Pat Hingle, Inger Stevens, & Ed Begley

Directed by: Ted Post

Screenplay by: Leonard Freeman & Mel Goldberg

Clint Eastwood seems to have had many rebirths. He has done Westerns (both here and overseas), action cop movies, comedies, dramas, and he has been an Academy Award-winning director (oh, and a mayor). Hang Em High is one of many watershed films for Clint Eastwood. Until the release of this now-classic film, Eastwood had been mostly known to American audiences for his 8 seasons as Rowdy Yates on the popular cowboy TV series, Rawhide (you can read my review of the show’s first season here: http://voiceofcinema.wordpress.com/2010/02/22/rawhide-1958-tv-series-season-1-4-out-of-5-stars-starring-clint-eastwood-eric-fleming/). He was not yet a film star and Eastwood desperately wanted to discard his Rawhide image so he took a big chance and signed up to star in then-unknown Italian director Sergio Leone’s foreign spaghetti western, A Fistful of Dollars. This and other Leone films made Eastwood into a huge film star in Italy and he became one in the U.S. as well once those films were later released in the U.S.

The Spaghetti Westerns were influential toward the characters Eastwood created in his later American westerns. Although now cliché, the Spaghetti Westerns popularized the anti-hero, loner persona embodied in Eastwood’s The Man With No Name character. Quite different from his white-hat Rowdy Yates character in Rawhide, The Man With No Name was a man of few words. His actions and gestures spoke for him and very little was known of the character’s past. Eastwood correctly predicted that offering such a spare character would be more enticing to the audience and it would allow our imagination to fill in the details of the character.

The Spaghetti Westerns were influential in another way for both Eastwood’s American Westerns and the entire Western genre. Up until Sergio Leone’s classic Western trilogy, the West was mostly portrayed as a friendly frontier where basically white people sought to create a new life for themselves and the only enemy they had to beware of was the Native American or the occasional gang of bandits that would run through town. However, America’s growing cynicism over its involvement in the Vietnam War bled into its mythology of the American West. Western films depicted an environment that was harsh, desolate, and every man was for himself. The difference between good and evil was no longer cut and dried. Even the lawman had a self-interest and looked out only for himself. Corruption pervaded all aspects of society, including law enforcement and the government.

This is the background for Hang Em High, Clint Eastwood’s first U.S. Western after doing the Leone trilogy. Eastwood plays Jed Cooper, a former lawman who is mistaken by a group of vigilante citizens, led by Captain Wilson (Ed Begley), as a thief who murdered a rancher and his wife and stole their herd of cattle. Despite his protestations that he bought the herd fair and square, the gang of vigilantes hang Cooper for his “crime.” However, Cooper survives and he is appointed by Judge Fenton (Pat Hingle), known as “the hanging judge,” to be a deputy marshal for the Oklahoma Territory. Cooper wants to find Captain Wilson and his gang and bring them to justice. However, Cooper soon finds out that his sense of fair justice conflicts with Judge Fenton’s harsher brand of justice.

Hang Em High is basically a revenge film, but a decidedly more Hollywood version than the grittier and darker Leone trilogy of films. Director Ted Post and writers Leonard Freeman and Mel Goldberg seem to have blended some of the episodic and lighter aspects and narrative elements of the Rawhide TV show with Eastwood’s Man With No Name character and the grayer morality and harsh landscape present in the Leone films. The result is not as strong as Sergio Leone’s films, but Hang Em High still manages to be a memorable Western about injustice and revenge and it delivers some very strong performances.

No punches were pulled in pulling together a great cast for this film. Many of the actors in Hang Em High are regular staples of the Western genre and many came from television. The strong supporting cast includes Bruce Dern, Pat Hingle (Commissioner Gordon in the Tim Burton Batman films), Ben Johnson, Ed Begley, Alan Ladd Jr. (the Skipper from the Gilligan’s Island TV series), Inger Stevens, and a very brief appearance by Dennis Hopper, who is seen very early in the movie and plays a crazed “prophet” who is gunned down by a deputy marshal.

Especially noteworthy and interesting is Pat Hingle’s Judge Fenton character and his uneasy relationship with Eastwood. The judge believes it of paramount importance that the Oklahoma Territory be granted statehood and toward that end, he feels it necessary to convince the federal government that law and order exists in his jurisdiction. The judge is perfectly willing to sacrifice peoples’ legal rights for the higher purpose of gaining statehood. With the recent Boston Marathon bombing and the call for suspending the bombing suspect’s Constitutional rights in the interests of securing justice, such a belief is not far-fetched. Also toward that end, the judge does not believe that the residents of the territory deserve the same full rights that U.S. citizens do and so he is free to mete out his own brand of justice on those who are alleged to commit a crime. The judge has earned his nickname “the hanging judge” due to his tendency to sentence criminals to a hanging. Eastwood’s Jed Cooper opposes this viewpoint, believing that everyone, including criminals, deserve a full and fair trial.

What makes the judge and Cooper’s relationship so complex and fascinating is in how it resolves itself by the end of the film. When Cooper quits and hands over his marshal badge to the judge, the judge seems to convince Cooper to reconsider and to accept his point of view. I don’t know whether this resolution is meant to illustrate the corruption in our government and its power to corrupt even those whose intentions are noble. Or perhaps the filmmakers were attempting to make a liberal point about capital punishment. The film’s message is unclear on this point. Or maybe this resolution was not meant to mean anything and it was simply a conclusion that the writers felt appropriate to end the film on.

A big problem with Hang Em High is that it feels episodic. This is not at all surprising considering that the director Ted Post (Gunsmoke, Rawhide, The Twilight Zone) and the screenwriters Leonard Freeman (creator of Hawaii Five-O) and Mel Goldberg all came from television. I wanted to see Jed Cooper methodically plan out how he would exact revenge on Captain Wilson and his gang and then see him carry it out. Instead, we see Cooper begin to find the vigilantes only at first and really only by accident when Cooper just happens upon them. Afterwards, Cooper is wrangled into a completely different assignment to find a trio of cattle thieves and murderers. The film rambles through this sub-plot before Cooper is again returned to his original mission of finding the vigilantes. Even then, the scenes are set up almost like self-contained sub-plots rather than a flowing succession of scenes that build upon each other.

Given Clint Eastwood’s matinee looks, it must have seemed ridiculous to not have a love interest in each of his movies. In Hang Em High, the love interest is Inger Stevens, a widow whose husband was killed by a couple of bandits who were never found. The love story between Stevens and Eastwood completely fails to work. Inger Stevens drifts in and out of the movie and for no apparent reason, she decides to nurse Jed Cooper back to health after he is shot up by the vigilantes. The one romantic sequence that follows isn’t really romantic at all because she explicitly tells Cooper to stop trying to kiss her (because of her continuing grief over her husband’s murder), but he does so anyway.

Hang Em High presents us with a dichotomy of legal law versus natural law. Its message is confusing and contradictory, but you are not meant to judge the film based on its message. Hang Em High is Eastwood’s introduction to the American Western (on film at least) and it is his introduction to American audiences of his (and Sergio Leone’s) vision of the Western genre. The film is not without its flaws, but it still remains a thought-provoking and entertaining gem that belongs in any Clint Eastwood personal collection. You might also recognize the film’s theme, composed by Dominic Frontiere, and which I have posted below. It is one of the best Western theme music and unfortunately it is not used as much as I wish it should have been in the film.

Ricochet (1991): Grade: D

Is this film available for rent on Netflix Watch Instant and/or through the iTunes Store?  Ricochet is not available for rent through Netflix Watch Instant or the iTunes Store.

Starring: Denzel Washington, John Lithgow, Kevin Pollak, & Ice-T

Directed by: Russell Mulcahy

Screenplay by: Fred Dekker, Menno Meyjes, & Steven E. de Souza

The 80’s and 90’s were a wasteland of bad action movies. For every Beverly Hills Cop, First Blood, Lethal Weapon, and Die Hard, you had vile crap like Commando, Tango & Cash, Terminal Velocity, and just about any Jean-Claude Van Damme and Steven Seagal movie. The action genre of the 80’s and 90’s were what superhero films are to us today. Like superheroes, the protagonists of these films were nearly invincible and they always prevailed against whatever odds were stacked against them. Frequently, but not always, our hero was a cop or in some type of law enforcement (Die Hard, Lethal Weapon, Tango & Cash, The Last Boy Scout, Striking Distance, Beverly Hills Cop).

Released in 1991, Ricochet is an example of the action genre that blends in elements of the thriller genre that was also popular during this time (Fatal Attraction, Basic Instinct, The Hand that Rocks the Cradle, & Cape Fear). The film was made by renowned music video director Russell Mulcahy, who earned his stripes with the popular cult fantasy film, Highlander (1986). The star of Ricochet, Denzel Washington, was still a fairly new actor whose stock had risen considerably a few years back with an Academy Award for his work in Glory (1989). Opposite the actor starred John Lithgow, who was in his pre-3^rd Rock From the Sun days and had earned himself a reputation for playing badass, ruthless villains (Cliffhanger, Raising Cain).

Ricochet starts off in 1983 when Nicholas Styles (Washington) is a young law student and rookie cop. While on patrol one night, he and his partner (Bay Area native Kevin Pollak) come face to face with professional hitman Earl Talbot Blake (Lithgow), who has just finished a job. Styles apprehends Blake, which earns Styles considerable media attention, a promotion to detective, and a promised position in the District Attorney’s office. Meanwhile, Blake gets sent off to prison, where he plots his revenge against Styles. Fast forward to the present day and Styles is now a rising star in the D.A.’s office, a well-respected member of his community, and a hopeful candidate for the mayoral position in Los Angeles. With the help of his Aryan Brotherhood cellmates, Blake finally escapes from prison and fakes his own death so no one will know he is on the loose. Blake then puts into motion his plan to ruin Styles’ career and family. Through a series of planned events, Styles goes from renowned attorney to a disgraced man who loses his job and is about to lose his family. In the face of widespread scrutiny, Styles decides to fight back and bring Blake to justice.

The basic premise of Ricochet is not a bad one. Hero has everything because of villain. Villain takes everything away from hero and hero fights back to restore his name and reputation. However, what makes Ricochet not ultimately work is (1) how unlikeable Denzel Washington’s character is, (2) the number of implausible situations that take you out of the film, and (3) how cheap and low-budget the film looks.

We see Denzel Washington as a very ambitious and successful cop, attorney, and family man who experiences a meteoric rise in his career. However, he is so preoccupied with his career that he leaves little time for his family. In developing the protagonist, it is difficult to straddle that line between showing the character as being overly ambitious to the point of not paying attention to his family while also siding with him against the villain. The danger is in portraying the protagonist in such an unfavorable light that even when he demonstrates remorse, you remain unsympathetic to him. Ricochet does not pull this off. Nicholas Styles comes off as being arrogant and smarmy. He does not seem to really care about anyone, including his friend/partner (John Cothran, Jr.) after he is killed by Blake. When everyone has forsaken Styles and he is all alone, only then does he turn to his drug dealer friend (Ice-T, who I wish was in the film for much longer, especially after the great performance he gave in New Jack City, which also came out in 1991) for help. Before his luck turned, Styles would not have anything to do with him. Despite how ruthless he is, there were moments during the film that I actually sympathized with Blake more than with Styles.

Ricochet also suffers from an excessive number of implausible setups that take you out of the film. While in prison, Blake engages in a vicious fight against his Aryan Brotherhood cellmate (an unrecognizable Jesse Ventura) with swords and makeshift armor. The fight ends with Blake driving his sword into his cellmate and killing him. Its well known that prison guards turn a blind eye at times when a prisoner is about to get killed, but to stage an elaborate swordfight in the prison mess hall where a prisoner ends up killed that results in no consequences is too far-fetched. Similarly far-fetched is the seemingly lax restrictions Blake has to move about the prison (e.g. when he is photocopying Styles’ face in what looks like a copy room). These implausibilities would probably be unnoticeable had the film been stronger, but when the film fails to entertain you, you begin to notice all the small inconsistencies.

For a music video director, I was very surprised how cheap and uninspired Russell Mulcahy makes Ricochet look. Granted, I saw the film on an early generation DVD version and the picture looked one step removed from VHS quality. However, you can still discern the poor aesthetic quality and style of the film. Overall, Ricochet has a flat look, albeit colorful, that reminded me of a straight-to-video action film or a TV movie. The sets look generic and uninteresting and the action choreography lacks any energy or creativity.

A recurring element in all of Russell Mulcahy’s films is a clearly defined struggle between the protagonist and the villain. The villains in Mulcahy’s films are not complex in the sense of having any redeemable qualities. They are evil through and through and they want nothing more than to destroy the hero. By far, the best thing about Ricochet is John Lithgow’s performance. He is intelligent, cold, crude, and very ruthless. Lithgow has some great lines, one of which is in the clip I have provided below.

Ricochet is certainly over the top and it often times bleeds into being ludicrous. With well-known proven talent such as action producer Joel Silver (Lethal Weapon, The Matrix), action writer Steven E. de Souza (Die Hard), composer Alan Silvestri (who composes a great opening score in this film), and a talented cast of actors, this film sorely needed a talented director. In my opinion, Russell Mulcahy is the kind of director who only had one good film in him and that film was Highlander. Otherwise, I have yet to be impressed by his work except for maybe The Shadow and that is only because of the source material and Alec Baldwin’s performance.

By the way, its interesting to note that one of the news reporters in this film is named Gail Wellans, who is the same reporter character in Die Hard (also written by Steven E. de Souza).

My Top 5 May 2013 Picks

Summer is finally upon us again and the studios are about to unleash their big-budget potential franchises on the public. With each year, I become less and less interested in the studios’ summer offerings, but this summer seems to offer more than its fair share of promising films, with Man of Steel, Iron Man 3, Monsters University, This is the End, and Elysium all looking pretty fantastic. Of the 5 films I have just listed, 3 of them are already generating very positive buzz.

Iron Man 3 (Walt Disney Pictures/Marvel Studios) – Release Date: May 3

Marvel Studios’ Phase 2 begins with the release of Iron Man 3. Many fans were disappointed with the second installment of Iron Man and I would not be surprised if that figured into director John Favreau’s departure from the series. I did not find Iron Man 2 to be nowhere near as disappointing as others did, but I also had an issue with the film’s poorly choreographed action sequences, which also plagued the first film. Enter writer-director Shane Black (Lethal Weapon, The Last Boy Scout, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang), who is regarded as one of Hollywood’s most talented action writers. Black previously worked with Robert Downey, Jr. on Kiss Kiss Bang Bang and developed a friendship with the actor. The buzz on the film has been very positive, especially the reports on the action and the villain, the Mandarin, played by Ben Kingsley. The trailers have so far been impressive and it appears that the stakes have been raised significantly.

The Great Gatsby (Warner Bros.) – Release Date: May 10

This is going to be a tough adaptation to pull off. What makes the book so great is not really its plot, but F. Scott Fitzgerald’s style of writing and the picture he paints of that era. The trailers seem to indicate that director Baz Luhrmann completely understands the style over substance nature of the book. If you saw the the director’s Moulin Rouge, then you know The Great Gatsby is perfectly suited to Luhrmann’s style and his taste. This film was originally slated to be released this past Christmas, but it was officially delayed due to an overcrowded release schedule. Hopefully that is the real reason and not that reshoots were needed. The film is going to be shown in 3D, which I think is a stupid idea given how incompatible this gimmicky format is for this type of film, but I guess commerce over art, right?

We Steal Secrets: The Story of WikiLeaks (Focus World) – Release Date: May 24 (limited release)

The WikiLeaks scandal is one of the most fascinating news stories in the past decade. The information that was leaked by activist and journalist Julian Assange was eye-opening and if it was not for this footage, the sort of information that was revealed by the news leaks would have otherwise been dismissed as conspiracy theories. Wikileaks sheds light not only on the dirty secrets our governments withhold, but the ineptitude of the mainstream media in gathering important news stories.

Hannah Arendt (Zeitgeist Films) – Release Date: May 29 (limited release)

There have been many films about the Nazis and their capture following the end of World War II. I have not seen all of them, but the only recent one that has impressed me has been Steven Spielberg’s Munich and the reason it did was that Spielberg did not sugarcoat Israel’s motivations and methods for hunting the Nazis (unlike the film, The Debt, which came off as feeling almost like propaganda). The titular character of Hannah Arendt was a German-Jewish philosopher and political theorist, who was assigned to cover the 1961 trial of ex-Nazi Adolf Eichmann for the New Yorker. Arendt’s coverage of the trial and the depiction of Eichmann and the Jewish councils stirred a lot of controversy and criticism of Arendt’s loyalty.

The Kings of Summer (CBS Films) – Release Date: May 31 (limited release)

This film generated a lot of excitement at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival and based on the trailer, I cannot wait to see it. It is the perfect summer film to see because its a coming-of-age story set in the summer and its about teenagers who want to be free from their parents’ tyranny so they spend their summer in the woods building a summer house. The humor is hilarious and it reminds me of other great summer coming-of-age films like Stand By Me and last summer’s Moonrise Kingdom.