The All Movie Staff Presents: What We’re Watching
July 25th, 2008 | 1:00 pm est |
One week goes by and another sneaks up on us here at All Movie. As the sweltering summer eats up our sweat as well as our precious time, we’ve found that there’s still room to cram in a few flicks here and there that we figure you, our dear readers, would like to hear our take on. Thus, we present another installment of What We’re Watching, a weekly look at what’s on our editor’s tubes at night when the big blazing lemon in the sky goes down and our remotes come out. As always, enjoy — and be sure to let us know what you’re watching as well.
The Dark Knight
I really like it because in many ways it plays like a classic Warner Brothers crime film dragged by the satisfyingly cerebral Christopher Nolan into this decade – both stylistically and thematically. Imagine Humphrey Bogart as Batman, James Cagney as the Joker, Edward G. Robinson as Gordon, and Richard Widmark as Harvey Dent and you might see the film like I do.
Mad Men Season 1
The great accomplishment of Matthew Weiner’s award-winning show is its reliance first and foremost on character and behavior. Very little happens in given episodes, yet the writers and the actors seem to understand the people who populate this fictional world so completely that it’s easy to become absorbed in their lives. And rarely has smoking been used so persuasively as a metaphor for self-destruction.
Kit Kittredge: An American Girl
If you love your kids take them to see it before it slips out of theaters. A handsomely produced, well acted, and old-fashioned (in the best sense) family film.
Space Chimps
If you love your kids, and you love yourself, stay away. Far away. Maybe a galaxy far, far away.
Radio Days
Woody Allen’s warm-hearted but clear-eyed ode to nostalgia marks the last time he did something close to his pre-Annie Hall comedies, and the only time he managed to get Diane Keaton and Mia Farrow into the same movie.
What’s Up Tiger Lilly
Even though the folks at Mystery Science Theater 3000 improved on this concept exponentially, Woody Allen’s redubbing of an Asian gangster film may be the least funny comedy he’s ever been involved in – and I’ve seen Curse of the Jade Scorpion.
The Bank Job
I love Jason Statham because, on screen, the man runs very believably. This is no small accomplishment, and it makes him one of the most entertaining action stars around.
Dark City: Director’s Cut
1998 was a great year for New Line Cinema. Not only did they pump out the original Blade, which legitimately cross-pollinated comic books and hardcore horror, but the studio also unleashed Dark City – Alex Proyas’ amazing mix of sci-fi noir that continues to impress to this day. With this expanded DVD release, viewers are now given a choice of which version to pull off the shelf – do they take the red pill (ala: the theatrical cut) or the blue pill (ala: the expanded Director’s Cut)? The differences are not drastic on first viewing. I can say that I enjoyed this cut’s added mystery that came with excising the opening narration. Add in a few new CG sequences here and there, mixed in with what I figure are extended scenes, and you get a final product that feels just as good as the original version, albeit 11-minutes longer. One thing is for sure – this is a DVD worth digging into, simply to learn the ins and outs of the new cut. As a plus, they were able to mine Roger Ebert for yet another audio commentary before he lost his ability to speak, which is just one more reason to head out and snag this sucker up while you can.
Lost Boys: The Tribe
The YouTube/Jackass generation grows fangs in this lame straight-to-DVD sequel that rehashes much of the first film, while dishing out little to make it its own. Packed with “bro” talk and seemingly endless movie references (including Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Goonies, The Warriors and The Big Lebowski), this is one production that will rarely be gobbled up by anyone other than whom the filmmakers have deemed their target brain-dead audience. Only Corey Feldman really shows up to work here, though even he is given no one else to play his shtick off of. And that long-rumored Corey Haim cameo, along with the return of the other Frog Brother? They’re nowhere to be seen in the final cut – relegated to the 2 alternate endings on the DVD (which end up being better than the whole flick). Utterly worthless to anyone other than bleach blonde bimbros that have awaited extreme sports acceptance in trashy knock-off sequels, Lost Boys: The Tribe deserves to be lost in time forever.
Starship Troopers 3
Pound for pound, the third outing in the Starship Troopers franchise is easily the most politically charged straight-to-home market feature of its time. Lampooning everything from extreme consumerism to society’s love for mass marketed pop sensations all the way to allegories attacking unwavering patriotism in the face of ill-defined policies; this is smart b-movie filmmaking from writer/director Ed Neumeier that takes no prisoners. Stepping behind the camera for the first time, the Robocop scribe does a fair job of doing a whole lot with a small budget. The effects aim just as high as its writer/director’s ideas, yet this admirable production still has a bit of trouble reaching the heights created under the perverted eye of mad genius – and producer on this feature — Paul Verhoeven. Still, Neumeier delivers a whole mess of action, all the while managing to sneak a good amount of sly societal satire within the constraints of what is essentially a glorified sci-fi channel production. Oh, and the franchise finally brought in power suits – thereby fulfilling the promise of author Robert A. Heinlein’s original stories and giving Casper Van Dien a reason to step back into the shoes of Johnny Ricco to riotous applause of unapologetic sci-fi fans everywhere.
Financial experts always offer the tip that you should save a little money every month by paring down your TV or satellite plan, since most people don’t watch all the extra stuff anyway. But, for me, the joy of buying the Encore movie channels is in watching mediocre crap I’d never otherwise sit through. More often than not (though clearly not more often than I care to admit), these are movies that I saw years ago and at no point felt the subsequent need to actively seek out ever again. Case in point: the movie I found myself totally engrossed in this past week: Interview with the Vampire.
I was 13 when this movie came out, and way too young and dumb to watch super-pretty men wear velvet frock coats and act emo with any real cinematic perspective. I remember hearing about Tom Cruise being considered a weird choice to play the little-bit-foppish, little-bit-evil Lestat, but I was just a bit too young for his roles in Top Gun and Cocktail and all that to have left a really immovable impression with me about his on-screen persona. (Incidentally, the first movie I was old enough to associate Arnold Schwarzenegger with by name was Twins, so I initially thought the Governator was a comedian. I had it figured out by Total Recall.) Watching this movie now, however, I have more than enough frame of reference to understand the weirdness in seeing Cruise play this kind of role. Brad Pitt and Antonio Banderas seem perfectly cast – especially Antonio, who despite being from Spain, always plays the Latin card when it comes to suave sophistication. There’s a certain kind of guy who can who can gyrate his hips in feverish dance moves and zero in on the camera to relate his character’s every subtle expression of refined, sensual experience – all while seeming 100% hetero. Cruise, however, was not that guy. He was the blunt-at-the-edges all-American leading man, who wins the ladies with raw, unpretentious animal magnetism rather than with highly cultured, poetic and probably nefarious seduction.
I have to admit though, Cruise really nailed it. He walks and talks with that ephemeral “undead in the 1700’s” charm, and he even affects the right urbane, sophisticated manner of speech, rather than reciting the lines of yet another script with that same slightly-congested, highly-Midwestern dialect. It was pretty surprising, considering that his apparent refusal to blend in with his cast by tempering that signature stuffy-nose cadence with some Mid-Atlantic annunciation makes the Valkyrie Trailer balls-out hilarious.
Broadway Danny Rose
Woody Allen’s modest 1984 outing fell short of the acclaim of its immediate predecessor (Zelig) and successors (Purple Rose, Hannah and Her Sisters), but it’s a fine little character comedy built around one of Allen’s most memorable creations: New York-based theatrical manager Danny Rose, representative of some of the worst acts in the world – from a blind xylophone player to a one-legged tap dancer. Allen creates a wonderful sweetness at the movie’s core that springs from Rose’s unrelenting devotion to all of his acts; Mia Farrow does acclaimed work as a mob moll, Tina Vitale; and the movie introduces one of the funniest supporting characters from Allen’s long career: Barney Dunn (Herb Reynolds), a children’s ventriloquist so horrendous and pathetic that 5-year-olds boo him out of the room. (It’s a bit that, for some reason, always hits me so hard, I’m doubled over laughing). And the movie is loaded with top-notch dialogue. My personal favorites:
“May I say one word? Might I just interject one concept at this juncture? You’re looking for somebody for Memorial Day Weekend.
“I don’t want to badmouth the kid, but he’s a horrible, dishonest, immoral louse. And I say that… with all due respect.”
(pointing to a woman who plays water glasses as a musical act) “She is the Jascha Heifetz of this instrument…! You gotta see this, Philly, it’s absolutely incredible. Never took a lesson! She’s self-taught!”
“My Aunt Rose, take my Aunt Rose… Not at a beautiful woman at all… she looked like something you ‘d buy in a live bait store.”
Limelight
I have a poor record for making it all the way through one of Chaplin’s final features. It isn’t a great movie, or even very good for that matter – Chaplin begs for sympathy too much, the narrative veers into icky self-gratification, and the whole thing is about an hour too long. But I’ve never been able to shake the feeling that the movie has greatness within its grasp. If only Chaplin’s character had been a little less pathetically needy, a little bit crustier and more difficult to warm to, and if the humor had been a little sharper, that might have saved it. (Claire Bloom and Buster Keaton are both so wonderful that they almost rescue the picture from its pitfalls). As produced in the early 50s, it’s definitely worth a look as an elegy to the passing of vaudeville and the then-autumnal career of one of world cinema’s real visionaries. ”
Madsion Davenport, Ruthie from Kit Kittredge, is in a new film, The Attic Door. Check it out at www.theatticdoormovie.com Madison is featured in a behind the scenes webisode talking about being an actress and working in Utah!