I like to write about movies of all sorts: old and new, good and bad, mainstream and obscure, local and foreign.
Warning: some articles in this blog may be offensive to fans of James Bond, Jean-Luc Godard, and Andrei Tarkovsky's Solaris.
After my experiences with Oblivion I felt I needed to see a much better science fiction film. Naturally, this turned out to also be a great opportunity to look at something I haven't before, and I don't think a lot of people have covered (at least, I'm not aware of any scholars or bloggers who have covered this area): Swiss cinema. Yes, it seems Switzerland does in fact have a film industry, and produce its own movies. This has a bit of significance to me, seeing as I actually spent a portion of my childhood in Switzerland, though so far I've only seen one Swiss movie (though I have seen a few Swiss TV shows, Pingu perhaps being the most iconic).
That film was a 2009 science fiction movie titled Cargo, originally released in German but also available with English and French dubbing. I was first introduced to this film in high school when one of my teachers recommended it. Funnily enough, this was not actually my film teacher, but I received a number of recommendations from him and pursued most of them. I saw Cargo with an English dub years ago, and naturally it seemed like perfect material to revisit, but this time around I made sure I heard it in its original German (though I will confess the subtitles don't do it justice). My exposure to Swiss cinema may be limited, but Cargo is definitely a great first impression.
In the year 2270, the Earth has been rendered uninhabitable due to pollution. Most of the remaining population of humanity is confined to the crappy environments of orbiting space stations. It's a miserable life for most, living in confined and crowded places just trying to find some way of getting by. Fortunately there is hope in the form of a distant planet called Rhea, which has apparently been the site of successful colonization, but getting there requires money, something a lot of people still don't have. This is the case for Dr. Laura Portman (Anna Katharina Schwabroh), a young woman desperate to reunite with her sister Arianne (Maria Boettner), who successfully moved to Rhea years ago. Hoping to get the money, Portman manages to get a job working as a medic aboard a cargo ship Kassandra.
At first, it proves to be a lonely life, during which most of the crew is in cryosleep, taking rotating shifts to maintain the ship during its automated flight to a space station. However, that all changes when Portman has an unexpected encounter, leading to an investigation of the cargo hold that ends in the unexplained murder of the ship's captain (Pierre Semmler). Suddenly it becomes clear that the mission was not as simple as the crew initially thought. Something much bigger is going on, some members of the crew are not who they appear to be, and flight lieutenant Anna Lindbergh (Regula Grauwiller) seems to be in on it and doing everything she can to keep them from finding out. Now it's up to Laura Portman and security officer Samuel Decker (Martin Rapold) to get to the bottom of this strange mystery before Kassandra reaches its destination.
There is definitely a lot of influence on this film from earlier, perhaps better known, works of science fiction. The basic structure of the narrative definitely has some resemblances to Alien, and some of the aesthetics used in the worn-down style of future technology call to mind the likes of that film and Dark Star. There is even one supporting character, Claudio Vespucci, who I can't help noticing has a vibe that reminds me a bit of Dave Lister from Red Dwarf. A lot of the space visuals probably draw from the likes of 2001: A Space Odyssey, though at the same time I find myself wondering if Gravity might have borrowed some ideas from Cargo's climactic extravehicular sequence. That said, Cargo should not be considered a rip-off of any of these films. Part of the charm with this film is that it takes those ideas and does its own thing with them. There is a rather unique feeling to Cargo that does not come with other science fiction films.
The visuals are incredible on so many levels, be it in the vast long shots of outer space or in the shots of the grimy interiors of Kassandra. Outside, some incredible work is put into the designs of the space stations and space ships, as well as the exterior shots of planets and the one scene where the characters have to step outside. Inside the ship, there seems to be a balance of remaining creative while also trying to make things look real. There is a "used future" aesthetic reminiscent of Alien and Dark Star in just how everything seems to be decaying (there's even an airlock door that doesn't close properly). It makes for some very curious environments, especially for the scenes dealing with the cryochamber and the cargo hold.
The film's story is also fast-paced and easy to follow. I never found it to get confusing at any one point. I think the only flaw I could note was that perhaps the romance between Dr. Portman and Decker may have happened a little too quickly, but even that wasn't a huge issue. In fact it might even be justified by the simple fact that the characters were under an extreme amount of stress at the time and probably not thinking clearly. I would definitely say that Laura Portman is a strong character for the lead, seeing as she is the one who does a lot of the investigating, and ultimately goes on to play a crucial role in the film's final moments. Decker makes for a suitable partner. Lindbergh also serves as an interesting antagonist, and I'll admit it was interesting to see a female protagonist going against a female villain without any apparent intent to arouse the viewer to play it off as attractive.
I would recommend looking at Cargo if you get the chance. It is definitely a better movie than Oblivion, seeing as this one actually does have some strong female characters and a far less predictable narrative. Science fiction is not something one would normally associate with Swiss filmmaking, but they guys behind Cargo really pulled it off, taking the ideas of classic science fiction films and putting their own spin on them. It is a really unusual science fiction film, and unique among the genre. It also should not be too hard to find, so I would say check it out.
This week, the theme for Wanderer's Thursday Movie Picks Meme is workplace movies. If you haven't taken part in this event, the gameplay dynamic is really quite simple. Each week she picks a different theme, and participants have to list three movies that fit that theme. It's pretty straight forward in theory, though in practice sometimes deciding on the movies can prove difficult, as was the case for this week's theme. The workplace can be a very effective setting for movies, but what exactly defines a "workplace"? She never gave any specific definitions for what qualified, so I would assume it means films that deal with the everyday pressures of the "workplace" in the form of a specific job. I was never given any specific rules about what sort of jobs were acceptable for this list, so I'm just going to pull out some unusual choices, two of which highlight jobs I don't expect any of the other participants will think of.
Living in Oblivion (1995)
Well, here's something that one might not normally think of when they envision the "workplace", but it is still a place where people work and one that can be quite tedious: filmmaking. As someone with experience in this area, I can say that many of the amateur films I've made with literally no budget were extremely stressful to make. I've already got more than a few stories about the difficulties I faced when filming my high school short film In the Line of Duty. Of course, that was a film in which I had to do everything (I had to be the director, writer, cinematographer, editor, and camera operator) with very little experience using actors who had even less experience making movies, and I had virtually no budget. You'd think with a group of professionals who actually knew what they were doing it would be easier, right? Wrong. Living in Oblivion is all about that side of filmmaking, showing the stress and difficulties faced by a film crew just shooting a single scene, let alone an entire movie.
American Splendor (2003)
Okay, if you really want to be technical, this one isn't necessarily about the workplace itself, but it is a curious look at how one man is affected by it. In this case, the film is inspired by real events, even going as far as to emphasize it by having some of the real people the characters are based on appear as themselves sometimes. The central character of Harvey Pekar is an everyman who has a boring office job, but he manages to find one... unusual way of coping with it: by writing comics. Basically, Pekar has this philosophy that real life makes great fiction, and he made a surprisingly popular series of comics that were literally just about his boring job.
End of Watch (2012)
Yes, there is sort of a sub-plot about angry gangsters but really this film is about the side of police work that movies often overlook. Often being a cop is seen as an exciting job with lots of action, but that's not all it is. After all, while police are expected to show up at crimes and address the criminals appropriately, there are other aspects of the job, such as the extensive amount of paperwork involved. End of Watch hardly skips on the action but what makes it interesting is that it emphasizes the boring side of being a cop, seeing as a large portion of it is just the two main characters sitting in their squad car basically waiting for something to do, as well as their day-to-day relationships with each other and their fellow officers.
I've realized recently that I haven't watched a lot of science fiction in a while. It's always been one of my favorite genres and last year I found myself writing about it a lot, but I haven't touched on it much in a while. Naturally I got to thinking that I should try watching some more science fiction films, and while looking for popular options I happened to find Oblivion through HBO on Demand. I didn't have super-high expectations but I do recall finding the trailers interesting when I first saw them back in 2013. I never got a chance to see it, something not helped by the fact that it came out around the same time as the similarly-themed After Earth, which I understand was not a very good movie at all. I decided to give Oblivion a watch and see if it was anything worthwhile. I'm not the biggest Tom Cruise fan but I know he can do good sci-fi/action if Edge of Tomorrow was anything to go on. Sadly, Oblivion doesn't live up to what made Edge of Tomorrow such an interesting experience.
It is the year 2077, and there has recently been a war between humanity and an alien race. Humanity won the war, but the Earth was destroyed so now Jack Harper (Tom Cruise) and Victoria (Andrea Riseborough) have to serve as a "mop-up crew" to destroy what's left of the aliens and deplete Earth's remaining resources before going to Titan (because, you know, a freezing cold moon orbiting one of the furthest planets from the sun with an atmosphere of nitrogen and methane seems like the perfect refuge for what remains of humanity). Unfortunately, it turns out there is something weird going on when Jack discovers that the "aliens" are actually humans led by a mysterious survivor named Beech (Morgan Freeman). Along the way, he also encounters his ex-wife Julia (Olga Kurylenko, who between this and Quantum of Solace really needs to find better action roles). Some stuff happens and it turns out that he's actually been working for the aliens and then Jack tries to make a stand while Victoria refuses to get involved and Julia keeps getting pushed aside.
Really, the treatment of the women here is probably the one of the biggest problems in Oblivion. Both Victoria and Julia end up being little more than a cheap love triangle when they each had potential to be interesting characters. Instead, Victoria just seemed too annoyingly stubborn. I wouldn't have minded the romance between Jack and Julia if they'd just given her more to do. Most of the time she's just following Jack around and being told to wait for him. Julia had potential to be a strong female character, and she even gets and opportunity once to get tough only to fail miserably and get saved by a male character who has almost no personality beyond being distrustful of Jack. It even got to the point where during the climax, the script seemed to deliberately keep her from playing any useful role. Unlike The Rock, I'm not sure this is any active sexism and more just bad writing, but it's still a load of wasted potential. The rest of the cast isn't all that much better.
The story itself I found also to be full of interesting ideas, but overall very weak. There is some suspense at first but after a while the twists start to become obvious, at least until the end when things just get confusing. Suddenly there's a big action scene and a bunch of people we don't know get killed but Jack has some sort of plan to thwart the alien invasion. The plan makes very little sense and ends up being a convoluted mess. Even the aliens, when they are finally encountered, don't turn out to be all that interesting. The one thing I can give the movie credit for is it does have some very good visual effects, but that's not really enough to save it.
However, even with the effects there was something weird that seemed to be going on. Oblivion was obviously influenced by 2001: A Space Odyssey in many ways. That should hardly come as a surprise, seeing as the majority of contemporary science fiction borrows something or other from that film. The weird part is how it is constantly incorporated into the visuals, to the point where the "drones" seem to be heavily modeled after the pods and there is even a series of shots depicting figures in a position very suspiciously reminiscent of the "Star Child" from the end of 2001. It felt a lot like Oblivion was just trying to be 2001, which didn't make sense since it was clearly not even remotely in the same area of science fiction.
My advice? If you really want to see Tom Cruise stop an alien invasion, just watch Edge of Tomorrow. It's a far better film with interesting ideas that are actually used and it even has a strong female lead. Admittedly I've seen far worse than Oblivion, but I still wouldn't recommend it to anyone. There are some amazing visuals but that's about all you're going to get, since otherwise it's just a bunch of dull characters, some of whom have absolutely no personality, getting involved in some convoluted plot to overthrow some race of aliens that never really feel like a serious threat.
I've made no secret on my blog of the fact that Stanley Kubrick is one of my all-time favorite directors, but until very recently there were still two of his movies that had eluded me. These were his second and third films: Killer's Kiss and The Killing. Both naturally seemed like logical choices for the 2015 Blindspot Challenge, but ultimately it was The Killing that made it onto the final list. I saw Killer's Kiss last week, so this was the last Kubrick film I had not already seen, at least out of his feature films (I still need to see his early documentary work), and now I can say I've seen them all. So far, the only other director for whom I could make the same claim is David Lynch, who I might know better than Kubrick now as I've not only seen all of his features but also most of his shorts, a large portion of his television work, his paintings, and his various bizarre web shows like Dumbland and Rabbits that sometimes get even weirder than his movies.
The Killing was Kubrick's third feature, after presenting an unusual war story in Fear and Desire and somehow getting away with quite a few violations of the Production Code in Killer's Kiss. Johnny Clay (Sterling Hayden, who would later work with Kubrick again in Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb) is a criminal mastermind who has planned a brilliant heist on a local racetrack. He has assembled a crew of tough men, including corrupt cop Randy Kennan (Ted De Corsia). He has an in-depth understanding of how the race track works and has figured out every angle necessary to steal a large amount of money, with every person having a role to play. However, one of the participants, George Peatty (Elisha Cook Jr.) accidentally mentions it to his wife Sherry, who much to his frustration refuses to be submit to him and be a typical 1950's housewife. What George doesn't know is that Sherry is having an affair with another criminal named Val (Vince Edwards), who she informs about the planned heist. The job goes off perfectly, but afterwards complications turn what would have been a successful heist into a bloodbath (and a pretty gory one for 1956).
So how did I feel about seeing this film? I'm not entirely sure. This post has actually proven to be very hard to write since I don't really have a lot of specific comments related to the film. It's okay, but Kubrick would go on to do far better (2001: A Space Odyssey being a standout example). Personally I would say I enjoyed Killer's Kiss a lot more. Sterling Hayden delivers a reasonable performance that makes his character interesting enough, and Sherry makes for a decent femme fatale antagonist. However, the rest of the cast isn't really all that memorable. For one thing, I didn't feel like Marvin's role in the whole operation was very well explained; he was apparently supposed to be financing the heist somehow... but they were planning to steal money so spending money to steal money seems a bit redundant, and I'm not sure why he was helping them either since he seemed to be doing okay for himself.
The actual heist was still fairly well-executed. Kubrick really defied the Studio System this time around by presenting a narrative that jumps back and forth through time (though a voice-over narration helps to establish when everything happens in relation to each other). Taking this approach, he is able to spend time focusing on each individual involved with the crime and illustrate their role in the heist. Once it's done, it makes sense why each person was involved and what they contributed (except Marvin, who I still feel they could have explained better). It also gives time to focus on developing each of the individual characters, and in some cases the problems they encountered (one guy ends up in the awkward situation of having to pretend to be racist to get a parking attendant to leave him alone; this strategy also ends up backfiring in an unexpected way). Still, as interesting as all this was, I can't say I ever felt emotionally invested with anyone in particular.
In addition to that, I think the ending may have been a little contrived. They set up a plot thread with Val, but he only shows up in two scenes. He appears near the beginning when he finds out about the heist and decides to get involved, and then they forget about him until he suddenly shows up again at the very end and there's a shootout that somehow ends up killing everyone. It didn't seem clear from the editing so when everyone suddenly turned up dead it was a bit confusing. There is a bit of comedic value to how Johnny Clay is eventually caught, but even that seemed a little contrived. I get why it ended this way: it wasn't unusual for noir films of the time, especially those centering on criminals, to have a "crime doesn't pay" message at the end (usually involving the deaths of said criminals), I just wonder if there might have been a better way to do it.
The Killing is an interesting experience, and I'm glad I saw it, but I don't think this really strikes me as Kubrick's finest work. Of course, even a great director has to start somewhere, and Kubrick seems to be doing his best with the source material and working under the Production Code, but this is probably a very good example of Kubrick's biggest difficulty in his early career: he always needed complete control over everything, and he probably did not get that here. Still, The Killing does have its merits and it isn't that long a film so I'd say it is still worth looking at if you get the chance.
It's been a difficult week. My first week where I haven't had to worry about exams and it's tricky adjusting. I haven't had much room for writing. Every time I get ideas I'm in some situation where I can't write. When I finally get the chance to sit down and write, it starts to hurt. Makes it hard to work on scripts and short stories. I get ideas but have trouble organizing them. I wouldn't mind getting back into science fiction at some point. It's occurred to me that Saturn would be a really good setting for a science fiction story. The planet alone lends itself to some powerful descriptions, the only trouble is what kind of story could I put it into. I've already done a story with Venus, and another with the moon. I've also touched on Mars before. That still leaves Mercury and the four Jovian worlds. I should find something to do with those.
I finally managed to see Frozen. This was an unusual choice for me but everybody's been talking about it and I found it available through HBO on Demand so I figured why not see what all the fuss is about. I'm going to be honest here... I actually kinda enjoyed it. It's not your typical Disney fairy tale, which I would say is a good thing. In fact if anything Frozen spends a lot of time poking fun at all the absurdly common characteristics of fairy tales. My favorite would have to be how it deconstructed the classic cliché of love at first sight. I was pleasantly surprised when Elsa actually points out how foolish it was for Anna to literally be engaged to someone she just met, and it also helps that it demonstrated precisely why that isn't always such a good thing. Of course, that said, I'm still not sure I understand why the song Let it Go became such a huge hit compared to the numerous other songs in the film.
One thing that I somewhat foolishly did was buy a ticket to see The Age of Adaline. It sounded like an interesting premise and I really wanted to like it. Unfortunately, I couldn't get into it. There was a great idea for a premise but not much else. You'd be better off with a film like Orlando, a film which explores a similar idea (a woman who is unable to age and has to live through different time periods) far more effectively. The Age of Adaline started promising, with just the introduction of the titular character being compelling and setting her up as a strong lead, but then it seemed to go the route of Fifty Shades of Gray as soon as Ellis appeared.
Okay, maybe it's not as bad as 50 Shades of Gray, but the film tried to build Ellis up as a perfect romantic partner for Adaline except, to me at least, he ended up coming off more as a stalker. After all his first meeting with her is literally forcing his way into the elevator she's standing in to talk to her and then finding every excuse he can not to stop following her out of the building. He then goes on to track Adaline to her workplace and presses her into going on a date with him. He even goes behind Adaline's back to get her address and show up at her house. I think after that Adaline was right to walk away from him, but no, her daughter has to convince her that this guy is a "good man". I found nothing likable in this character, the first time I saw him I was pretty much hoping this wasn't the love interest. First Fifty Shades of Gray and now this. Why are we getting so many movies that try to depict a horrible person as the ideal romantic partner? If this was made in the 1950's maybe it would be somewhat understandable but shouldn't people already know better by 2015?
The other thing about The Age of Adaline: what was Harrison Ford doing in this movie? I get that money probably had a hand in his agreeing to working on The Age of Adaline and I'd imagine he was paid well for it, but was he really the filmmakers' best choice for the role? His character didn't really strike me as someone who should be played by a guy like Harrison Ford. I can understand him not wanting to be typecast as action heroes but he just really didn't seem to fit this character for some reason. Maybe it's just bad writing but he honestly felt out of place, and I feel like there should have been someone else cast here instead. In any case, I eventually found I just couldn't take The Age of Adaline anymore and ended up walking out in the middle of it.
I finally got to see the season finale of The Walking Dead. It was intense, and to be honest I sometimes wonder how much more of that show I'll be able to take. On the bright side, at least it ended on an optimistic note, or at least as optimistic as you can get on a show like this. Alexandria didn't get destroyed, which I guess is a good thing, and it looks like Deanna is finally starting to understand the severity of the situation. Some reconciliation is in order. The trouble with shows like this is that the bleak endings start to become predictable after a while. Every time some little glimmer of hope for humanity pops up, you know something is going to happen. When Eugene first showed up and we were told he had the cure I thought for sure something was off, since the show would never go the route of ending the zombie apocalypse.
The sad thing is I actually think that could have been an interesting twist on the zombie phenomenon. Maybe if I can ever get my touch for horror back, I could try writing a story based on the concept of a post-zombie apocalypse. The idea would be that it would begin just at the end of a zombie apocalypse, and with the characters successfully finding a cure or some other way of getting rid of the zombies. The twist would be that by this point society has broken down so much getting rid of the zombies doesn't make all that much of a difference. The heroes might no longer be in any immediate danger of being devoured by malevolent reanimated cadavers, but there would still be the far greater threat posed by other survivors.
On Game of Thrones we got some odd developments. Arya Stark is now living in the House of Black and White trying to become "nobody". Apparently this involves casting away every trace of her former identity (though she couldn't bring herself to lose Needle). It was weird seeing her suddenly in a dress. I'm also still not sure what is going to happen because I understood she was supposed to be going to the wall and now she's in this place instead. Meanwhile Sansa Stark has found herself locked into an engagement with Ramsay Snow, and just barely missed a reunion with Theon Greyjoy. On the other hand, there does seem to be a few peculiar components to Greyjoy's attitude. He seems to be listening in a lot more on conversations. Perhaps he is starting to break free of Ramsay's control?
Tyrion finally got out of that "wheelhouse" and tried to find a sexual encounter, only to be surprised when he couldn't get pleasure in it. We've also encountered a familiar face that we haven't seen in a while: Jorah Mormont's back, if perhaps not in the most ideal way. We haven't seen this guy since part way into season 4, when Daenerys banished him after finding out he started serving her as a spy (in her defense, it would have been hard to confirm that Jorah had indeed changed sides and joined with her since then). Considering his whereabouts it looks like he didn't collect that pardon after all, and he kidnapped Tyrion. He told him that he was going to take him "to see the queen". The big question is which queen he is referring to? Daenerys seems like a logical choice, perhaps Jorah is hoping to bring Tyrion to her to regain her favor. However, I suppose it's possible that he is actually talking about Cersei Lannister (who did offer a price for anyone who successfully delivered him to her).
Meanwhile, things have gotten heated on Hannibal. Will Graham has started going through therapy with Hannibal again, but it doesn't seem to be so simple. In fact, for a while it almost seemed as though Will was himself starting to become a psychopath, who delightfully ate human flesh with his psychiatrist. He even went as far as to murder andthen eat local ace reporter Freddie Lounds... except he didn't. It turns out Freddie's murder was staged (and done so well that it even had Alana Bloom convinced), and evidently someone else's corpse was used in her place. Will is actually trying to get evidence against Hannibal by acting as his patient, and so far has not been successful. Still, it looks like there might be a chance of getting Hannibal convicted, except of course from what I remember of Silence of the Lambs being incarcerated may have reduced his meals of human meat but did very little to end his status as a psychological threat.
The other thing that happened was I got to experience being on a real film set, or at least as real as one can get when working with practically no budget. I've mentioned this project before. It's a 10-15 minute short film currently titled Dead Inside, originating from a short script I wrote originally under the working title of Moving On. It's a strange surrealist film I wrote for a class about two years ago which combined the feelings of my disastrous college experience with watching a few too many David Lynch films. There's even a character who borrows heavily from the "Mystery Man" depicted in Lost Highway (though she appears to be a more benevolent figure), and we looked at the party scene from that film for inspiration.
I was getting a chance to work with experienced professionals who actually had some idea of what the were doing and I often found myself wishing I'd known people like these back when we were making movies in high school, where often I was the only person who had even the faintest idea of what I was doing (quite a few people didn't understand that there were other positions in filmmaking besides acting and directing, and everyone always wanted to be actors so I'd have to do everything else myself). I remember when we did that b-movie in my high Grade 12 film class and nobody listened to my advice on how we could actually make it good.
For this production, we had a three-day schedule, the film being shot over the weekend. There were some disagreements on precisely how to execute each scene, but we worked through them okay. I can't give out names just yet, but the actress we got to play the lead was really good, and very much what I'd envisioned for the part when I first wrote the script. We got along really well. Her co-star was also really good, and I got to spend some time helping her get into character, even in putting together her costume (she even changed part of it from the director's intentions to fit better with my original script). We had some interesting discussions as well about writing.
My role in this production was mainly as a consultant. I left the specific technical choices to the professionals, but offered advice on how each scene should play out and the general tone. I also had some advice in terms of costuming but ultimately it was up to our costuming expert to get that done. She was also very good at what she did. I was present for the shooting of all but one scene, and that was only due to timing and the specifics of it: it was to be shot at 10:00 PM and inside a car, I figured I'd be getting in the way. I also got to play an extra in several scenes, perhaps when the film comes out you can try and spot me the same way 1950's audiences always tried to spot Alfred Hitchcock's cameo when watching his movies. Admittedly it was stressful, mainly due to the long hours and uncertain duration of shooting, but at the same time it was really exciting.
So there's been a few things going on this week. I'm also hoping to get back into making some LEGO animated films at some point, but first there's a whole bunch of software problems to be resolved. Hopefully that will all get worked out okay, and maybe one of these days I'll even be able to do some more writing, which has proven to be very difficult.
This week, the theme for Wanderer's Thursday Movie Picks Meme is father-daughter relationships, with the catch that they have to be biologically related. If you haven't taken part in her activity yet, it's simple: each week there is a new theme. You have to compile a list of three movies that fit that theme. Now there are plenty of films that could fit the description of centering on the relationship between a father and daughter, along with plenty that don't. Still, it was hard to decide, so I've decided to find three unlikely choices that would be the last thing anyone would expect which have some element of the father-daughter relationship, if one handled unconventionally.
Contact (1997)
Yes, Robert Zemeckis's adaptation of Carl Sagan's hard science fiction novel is in large part about the social and political consequences of making contact with intelligent extraterrestrial life, but a major theme of the film involves the backstory behind its protagonist, Eleanor "Ellie" Arroway (Jodie Foster). The relationship between Ellie and her father is crucial to the story, at it is a significant motivation for her joining SETI in the first place. They also play on this relationship during the climax, when Ellie is approached by an alien taking on the appearance of her father in a computer simulation.
Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (2001)
When you think Tomb Raider, you don't normally expect to deal with family issues, but that is actually a big part Lara's character. In the context of this film specifically, Lara has to deal with the unexplained disappearance of her father. She eventually has to go on to follow in his footsteps in order to prevent the villains from taking advantage of a powerful artifact, and even gets to track down the man responsible for his murder.
Interstellar (2014)
Yes, it is a story about humanity's struggle to survive on a dying Earth, but let's face it: the core of the film is the relationship between Cooper and Murph. This is also a rather curious one as far as far as father-daughter relationships go, due to the circumstances that interfere with their interactions. After all, it's hard for a father and daughter to stay close when they are literally seperated by lightyears and have to deal with extensive time dilations to communicate and the father suddenly sees his own daughter at his age despite barely aging himself. It's like a father-daughter version of the classic "Twin Paradox" often discussed in astronomy.
Every director has his or her own unique style. This is where the whole concept of auteur theory, first pioneered by French critics such as Francois Truffaut and, somewhat unfortunately, Jean-Luc Godard, originates. While it is debatable whether the director should in fact be considered the "author" of a film (one could make a good case for why that label should instead go to the screenwriter), there are patterns to be observed among a director's work. No two directors are the same (though often they may influence each other), and once you know their style it becomes easy to recognize.
In the case of these early critics, they learned to see patterns in the films of Hollywood directors like John Ford, Howard Hawks, and Alfred Hitchcock. Today, anyone well versed in their films could easily distinguish a John Carpenter film from a movie by David Lynch or Quentin Tarantino. What those patterns are will vary. It may be in terms of the content of their films, such as Tarantino's use of gore. It could be in the environment such as Carpenter's love for claustrophobic environments. It could be in terms of narrative, such as Tarantino's trademark of non-linear storytelling. It could be in terms of themes, such as Lynch's habit of making films about seemingly ideal communities that turn out to have a hidden darker side. It might even be as simple as the director having certain actors they routinely cast, such as Tarantino and Harvey Keitel or Lynch and Laura Dern.
However, for every director, their style has to develop. For this reason, it is often interesting to look back at their earlier films and compare it to their later work. In some cases it is more obvious than others. Reservoir Dogs is more clearly a Tarantino film than Dark Star is a Carpenter film. Still, there is one director who has eluded such easy categorization: Stanley Kubrick. Kubrick was such as versatile director that his style is almost impossible to clearly define. He had ideas that occasionally popped up, certain forms of iconography that would become trademarks, such as the use of long and narrow spaces and the famous "Kubrick stare". However, this does not start to appear until fairly late in his career.
Killer's Kiss was Kubrick's second feature film. Prior to this one, Kubrick's only feature film had been the independently-produced Fear and Desire (a film he would later try to disown to the point where it would not see a legal DVD release until over a decade after his death). Killer's Kiss is a bit more straight forward compared to Fear and Desire, and was made with better production values. It might not be Kubrick's strongest film, but it was the movie responsible for bringing him into the mainstream and launch a directorial career that would last for 44 years.
Davy Gordon (Jamie Smith) is a washed-up boxer trying to figure out what he wants to do with himself. He still takes parts in fights from time to time (leading to what would have been a very daring fight scene for the era). He is thinking about going home to see his parents on their ranch, but then he hears his neighbor Gloria Price (Irene Kane) screaming after an encounter with her boss Vincent Raphello (Frank Silvera), who is basically committing sexual harassment (at a time when that sort of behavior was easier to get away with). Davy finds himself sympathizing with Gloria, who has had a difficult life, and decides to help after quickly falling in love. However, Vincent does not take kindly to this development, and tries to pull them apart, even going as far as to frame Davy for murder.
It is definitely hard to spot any of Kubrick's early trademarks here. It certainly does not look like a film by the man who would go on to direct films like 2001: A Space Odyssey, Barry Lyndon, and Eyes Wide Shut. There isn't much of the narrow corridors, the bathroom scenes, or even the famed "Kubrick Stare" that would become associated with his later films. There is, however, one thing about Killer's Kiss that does resemble Kubrick's other films, if a very general aspect: it demonstrates his constant refusal to conform to standard filmmaking practices. In that sense, this film is actually quite impressive.
Fear and Desire was first released in 1953, with Killer's Kiss following two years later. At the time Kubrick was getting started, the Hollywood Studio System was still in full effect. It would not be for much longer; the Production Code had already been relaxed with America's entry World War II and a series of legal cases over the following years would bring it to an end, but when Killer's Kiss first premiered the rules were still in place. Hollywood had very specific rules about how to structure a film, this being the "Classical Model" that is still dominant today (story comes first). The Motion Picture Production Code might not have been as strictly enforced as it was during 1934, but there were still rules about what could and could not be depicted. There was more lenience towards violence, but not so much regarding sex.
Kubrick was never the kind of man who liked to stick to rules. While he would have had to work within the rules of Hollywood filmmaking, he also liked to take chances. Beginning in the 1960's, there was more room for him to do his own thing, but in the 1950's, he had to follow the rules. Killer's Kiss can certainly be considered a classical film, but for 1953 it would have actually been quite daring. The one scene in which Davy is shown boxing is very intense for the era in which it was made (and it wouldn't be far-fetched to assume Martin Scorsese took some inspiration from it in Raging Bull). There is also the fact that the plot is basically about a female dancer being sexually harassed by her boss (even if the words "sexual harassment" are never used), at a time when sex of any kind was forbidden (the Production Code included a long list about how filmmakers were not allowed to address "illicit sex"). The fact that said boss is cast as the villain because of his actions could also be seen as fairly progressive for the era. Then there are other odd stylistic choices, such as juxtaposing shots of a ballet performance over Gloria's narration of her troubled childhood, which seem peculiar but simultaneously make it interesting.
Perhaps the most daring element is the climactic fight scene between Davy and Vincent, which happens in a mannequin warehouse. The warehouse in question is filled with nude mannequins; many of them women with exposed breasts. Kubrick would later go on to show plenty of living nude women (perhaps most notably in A Clockwork Orange and Eyes Wide Shut), but nudity was frowned upon even before the Production Code was in place. Most of the "controversial" films it aimed to suppress only hinted at sex through innuendos. The Production Code itself even states that "Complete nudity is never permitted. This includes nudity in fact or in silhouette, or any lecherous or licentious notice thereof by other characters in the picture." Despite all this, Kubrick was able to shoot a scene in a room where the characters are literally surrounded by fully-naked (if artificial and unmoving) bodies. This was an extremely daring move that could have easily gone wrong, and the fact that Kubrick even had the nerve to consider it is admirable.
Ultimately, Killer's Kiss isn't Kubrick's greatest achievement, but it is still worth seeing. As an introduction to Kubrick, it works, as it shows just how creative he could get and how he never wanted to let anything interfere with his vision. The story might be simple compared to his later work, but it is impressive just for how daring it would have been during the 1950's. The fact that Kubrick had the nerve to take as many chances as he did is admirable.
I've been hearing a lot about this blogathon hosted by Lady Sati over at Cinematic Corner. The idea is straight forward enough, it's about examining duality within a specific character. The title of course refers to this element in the Oscar-winning film Black Swan. This was a tricky one to come up with material for but I think I've finally found a good choice: Evelyn Salt from Salt. This is also a strange example as it involves potentially three sides: white swan, black swan, and grey swan. Technically, the colour of a swan really doesn't indicate it's allegiance. White swans look graceful from a distance but up close they can get pretty vicious, but that's beside the point. Here is what I have found on Evelyn Salt:
White Swan
When we first meet Evelyn Salt, she seems like a decent woman doing a service for her country. She is an expert CIA interrogator and very good at uncovering information. She is also married to a man who seems like a really nice guy and things are going great. At least, that is until a mysterious "defector" accuses her of being a Russian spy...
Black Swan
After being accused, Salt immediately goes on the run, and it turns out she isn't all we thought she was. While her capability to defend herself was not unclear beforehand, she shows how vicious she can be. It turns out she actually is a Russian spy, trained since birth to pass off perfectly as an American. She is part of a conspiracy to overthrow the American government, and shows her true colours when interacting with the Russians. However, they have not told us everything just yet.
Grey Swan
Turns out Salt's cover as an American was too good, so effective that she practically became one. Salt is still being chased by the Americans, but she's simultaneously working to sabotage the plan of the Russian agents. In doing so she is ruthless, and more than ready to kill them in brutal ways, but at the same time she does not do so without good reason. She's like the old western hero: torn constantly between two worlds and never really fitting into either one. She isn't truly good, but not truly evil. She's somewhere in between. Her only real goal: preventing World War III, is a neutral one not specifically aligned with either party, and she is ready to do everything in her power to achieve that end..
Things seem to be going good now. I had one last exam this week, and I've finished it. It was hard, and stressful, but I go through it. I just hope I did okay. Now I have one take-home exam which I'm handing in today and I'm done! I've also managed so far to stay off the IMDB boards, though I've still been using the website itself to get basic information on the films I discuss. Everybody was saying that I need to get out of those message boards, but then who's going to call out all the films that have an all-male cast when there is no reason for it? Maybe I need to start a new series on my blog, I can call it something like "Movies that Could Have Benefited from Greater Gender Diversity". That, or perhaps I could just make a post here if I encounter any more trailers like Black Sea or Alien Outpost. Then here I can comment on the lack of female characters and it can spark an intelligent discussion instead of everybody getting mad at me with the rare poster trying in vain to explain to them why I might actually have a point.
Maybe that would be a good idea for a blogathon: take a male-dominated or all-male film and make a case for how it could have worked with greater gender diversity. Then again, I seem to be the only one who gets bothered by these kinds of things. I mean everyone else talks about how great a movie Snowpiercer was. I seem to be the only one who says that it had some great action but could have used more female characters. I still find it hard to believe that these rebels who need all the help they can only got two women: one only joining in because her son was taken and the other only as a condition to get a man to co-operate. Really that seems to be the case with a lot of male-dominated films. You are after all talking to the only person in the blogging community who will criticize a film for not having female cops in the background of a single scene, not to mention the only person with the guts to even attempt to defend the planned all-female Ghostbusters reboot on the grounds of sexism in the original. Maybe I am crazy.
Speaking of films that are in desperate need of gender diversity, I never got a chance last week to share my thoughts on the new Star Wars trailer. I'll admit when I first heard they were rebooting Star Wars, I was debating with myself over whether I'd actually go to see these films. My first thoughts were mostly indifference. I left Star Wars behind a long time ago (which is weird, considering I've done at least three articles on those films). I used to be a huge Star Wars nerd back in Grade 6, and I'm talking extreme. I remember being super-hooked in the Knights of the Old Republic games.
Granted, that was also at one of the worst points in my life, when I was at a horrible school and nearly everyone hated me for one reason or another. I had next to no friends and I was bullied mercilessly for just about anything that people found out about me. I even used to get teased for liking Doctor Who (this was back when the revival was just starting with Christopher Eccleston, and the show hadn't firmly established itself in Canada yet). Looking back on it now, it's not hard to see how my obsession with Star Wars came about, since it offered an escape of sorts. It gave me a way out of my crappy life and allowed me to live in a world where I could be the hero and save the Galaxy. Then eventually I transferred to a far better school and the obsession gradually faded. Then for a while I was "enlightened" by the scientific realism of 2001: A Space Odyssey (finally realizing how blatantly George Lucas ignored basic science) and turned my back on Star Wars by becoming a Trekkie.
In any case I'd started to see my obsession with Star Wars as being like alcoholism. I thought of myself as being "on the wagon" for years, and I was afraid to go near anything even remotely Star Wars-related out of concern that I would relapse. Eventually I worked up the nerve to watch A New Hope Again and found I didn't hate it as much as I thought, though I won't call it a favorite or anything. I was pretty much in a position where it was just the movies: no prequels, no expanded universe. That's where I've been ever since. Naturally when I heard the news of episode 7 I was indifferent and unsure if I should take the time to see these new installments. I think my verdict was that I would wait until they came out and then see what the reviews were like. I'll admit I'm not the biggest J.J. Abrams fan. His take on Star Trek is alright. However, seeing this trailer actually did somewhat arouse my curiosity on a few levels. I do find myself wondering where exactly they intend to go with this new film.
This excitement has recently got me thinking about this idea I once had for a Star Wars fan fiction. The concept I had was that it was set somewhere just before the prequels and centered around an aging Jedi Master who is disgruntled with the order. Then there was an incident in which Yoda refuses to investigate the apparent rape of a teenage student who was already being pushed to her breaking point for no other reason than because she had midichlorians in her bloodstream. The whole thing would have essentially been a deconstruction of Star Wars, with this Jedi Master defecting and trying to get the unfortunate student to safety only to be relentlessly pursued by some very pissed off Jedi. Taking the deconstruction even further, there would also be a Sith apprentice who gets taken as a companion (eventually engaging in a lesbian romance with the student) and ultimately proves to be a far more noble person than any of the Jedi. In that sense it would flip things around, with the Jedi becoming the villains and the Sith becoming slightly more sympathetic.
There was one other component to the story, that did spark some controversy among some of the Star Wars fans I showed my outline to. The final act of the story would have involved a dark revelation about the Star Wars universe: the Force is actually a Lovecraftian abomination that feeds off the constant fighting between the Jedi and the Sith. I was even considering having it be established that Palpatine's real intentions were to basically starve the Force by wiping out both sides, and Luke went and started the New Jedi Order messing everything up.
As for the film itself, it does look like we'll be getting the original cast back in action. Luke provided some voice-over narration and we saw what looked like him handing a lightsaber to Leia (perhaps she finally becomes a Jedi?) Han Solo and Chewie are also returning. We also have a new group of characters, and from what has been shown this is the one area I can definitely give these movies credit. I've discussed this before. The Saga has an absurd male-female ratio. I mean there are so far six movies, with big budgets and huge casts, and only two major female characters, who aren't on-screen together for more than a few minutes. Even that doesn't really count considering one was a baby at the time and the other "lost the will to live" and then died somehow because her boyfriend turned out to be a genocidal maniac.
That whole thing was ridiculous in itself. I mean, Leia's line in Return of the Jedi was "She died when I was very young". That seems to imply that Leia would have been at least a toddler, old enough to even remember those "images" of her mother. The movie seems to claim that Leia remembers her mother because she saw her die moments after she was born which makes no sense. I could understand her having some psychological issues that might need to be addressed but would she really be suicidal after a bad breakup like that? You'd think she would at the very least want to think about what will happen to her children. Maybe it would have made more sense if she was involved with starting the Rebel Alliance and perhaps died during its early years, maybe in a heroic sacrifice. Perhaps now that George Lucas isn't running things anymore we should get someone to remake all three prequel films and try to fix all the absurd problems within them.
One thing I can definitely give the new films credit for is that it looks like they are going to diversify the cast a bit more. There are some similar issues to gender with race in the original Saga as well. The only significant non-white character in the original trilogy was Lando Calrissian, who doesn't appear until fairly late into The Empire Strikes Back, where he is forced to double-cross Han before getting his redemption in the following film. In the prequels, there is Mace Windu, who is really more of a supporting role. The Force Awakens seems to feature a black protagonist (who may or may not be a stormtrooper) and several strong female characters. Daisy Ridley is apparently playing a tough girl, but there are a few others listed on IMDB whose roles have yet to be revealed, including Lupita Nyong'o of Twelve Years a Slave fame.
There is one theory I've had about one of those actresses, Gwendoline Christie. Her character's name has yet to be revealed, and she still has not yet appeared in the trailers... or has she? The villain (I presume this character is the villain or at least a villain) seems to have a fairly androgynous figure and is always shown with a mask. I find myself wondering if it could in fact be Brienne of Tarth under that mask and that armor. It could be interesting to see a female villain take the center stage this time around, and Gwendoline Christie certainly has the right kind of build for this character.
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. brought out some peculiar developments this week. Skye has been reunited with her mother, which raises a few questions about how she survived being vivisected by Whitehall, who presumably consumed some part of her as well (specifically the secret to why she doesn't age). Apparently she did not actually die, and was pieced back together by psycho Dale Cooper. I presume somewhere in the future this will all make sense, but then there's this weird place where Skye has ended up. Everyone seems to maintain that it's good, but it feels a bit like when we visited Alexandria in The Walking Dead. I just couldn't shake off the feeling that something was not quite right. They seem okay compared to the actual villains, but I'm willing to consider the possibility that there is something they are not telling us. Also, it seems there is distrust in the ranks. May and Simmons seem a bit less certain where their allegiances lie, since Coulson seems to be up to something secret but they don't know what. On the other hand, it looks like Coulson will be in a position to save the world, which I guess is a good thing.
On Game of Thrones, the season is starting to get moving. Brienne is getting her act together and going after Sansa. While I won't deny that Sansa has a few reasons to be paranoid, she probably would be better off with Brienne. I know that Petyr Baelish isn't exactly trustworthy. He has stabbed half the show's cast in the back at least once, and knowing him taking Sansa is probably nothing more than a means to an end. Fortunately, Brienne is going after them and hopefully will rescue Sansa. Meanwhile Arya is busy tracking down that guy who helped her kill those other guys. She was led to the "house of black and white" where she was told he did not live, then found out that he was lying. I was a bit surprised by this development, since I understood she was trying to get to the wall, but the environment was pretty neat. It reminded me a bit of Venice, with the canals in place of streets. I wonder if that's where they borrowed some ideas from.
Daenerys is also busy struggling with some difficult decisions. Her desire to end slavery is noble but that is proving to be a lot harder than she anticipated. The former slave owners are doing everything in their power to reclaim their old property, but some of the former slaves are taking matters into their own hands as well. One unfortunate slave decided to take the law into his own hands and impart vigilante justice on one of the former slave owners, when Daenerys wanted to give him a fair trial. That slave was executed in public, to the uproar of many of her subjects. Also, Drogon is back, and he is all grown up. It looks like he might get pretty nasty, though he still seems to hold some affection towards Daenerys, so perhaps there is still some hope that she can control him.
Now let's check in with our good friend Dr. Hannibal Lector and see what he is up to. Will Graham has had to do some time because he has been framed for murdering Abigail Hobbs, though technically there's no real evidence that she was murdered. Her severed ear was found in Graham's sink, I don't recall any definitive confirmation that she was not alive when it was removed. Graham's delusions are causing a lot of trouble and he has had to reside in a psychiatric ward for a while, but he has started to figure out that Hannibal is not trustworthy. Then Beverly found enough evidence to convict Hannibal only to get murdered in the most gruesome fashion imaginable. Her body was literally sliced into several thin strips, with each one put on display in an observatory (amusingly, that observatory where all the bodies keep turning up is the David Dunlap Observatory in Toronto; I've actually done volunteer work there). Beverly's death was brutal, and hard to deal with. I liked her, and I feel like I'm going to miss her.
On the bright side, my suspicions that Miriam Lass was not dead after all have been confirmed. Jack managed to find her trapped under a condemned building, minus an arm. Unfortunately, it also seems like Hannibal may have gotten into her head and scrambled her brain. After all, in addition to the (understandable) trauma of being abducted and held in a cellar for two years (along with having your arm removed, even if it was as painless as Miriam claimed), her kidnapper probably conditioned her to be unable to identify Hannibal as the real killer. We also lost Dr. Chilton, who was killed by Miriam when she thought he was the one responsible for abducting her. This is all very touching but I also can't quite shake off the fear that something is going to happen to Miriam. At least there is reason to be suspicious of Hannibal at this point, so hopefully they'll get him by the end of the season. Hannibal's psychologist also apparently believes Graham is innocent so... yay? Then again, if Silence of the Lambs was anything to go on Hannibal might not be any less of a threat in prison.
I've also got my short film Dead Inside entering production next week. This should be exciting. I'll confess that the filmmaking process can be a bit stressful, and I'm still trying to learn how to mange when you don't have complete control over everything. I wrote the script but my friend is directing, and he definitely knows what he is doing. I've seen some of his other work, this guy is really good. The hard part is dealing with changes to the script. I had a certain vision for it, but then he tells me he wants to change certain details and I'm not always 100% sure if he is making the right call. I end up at a crossroads. Part of me realizes he has a point, the other can't quite let go of my original concept. It's a tricky balance of emotions to work with, but perhaps experiences like this will be useful once I finally get funding for one of my features.
Still, the pre-production phase has gone along fairly well. We've got an official cast list together. I'm scheduled to make a cameo in one scene, and I also intend to help with the shoot whenever possible. I'll admit, this seems to be the hardest part of filmmaking for me, but understanding the process is important. After we're done shooting, the film will obviously have to enter the editing stage, and while there are no certain release dates yet we're hoping to have it finished some time in June. My director even has some plans already for distribution, so I think we have a chance at making something amazing.
You know, casting a movie is an interesting experience. It's an interesting mental exercise as a screenwriter to try and figure out which actors are the best fit for the characters you have written. It's not easy. I've got a few possible picks for some of them, like my screenplay adaptation of At the Mountains of Madness. My two choices for the leads are Kurt Russell and Mary Elizabeth Winstead (which is somewhat ironic considering that I otherwise went out of my way to keep the script from resembling The Thing). In the project I'm currently working on, it's been a bit easier, but even so these are suggestions at best, and there's no guarantee I could actually get these actors for the final movie. Some people that I've wondered about in this one include Jessica Chastain as the protagonist, with Rosario Dawson, Aidan Quinn, and Amy Jo Johnson as police officers, Sam Neill in a supporting role, and Cillian Murphy as one of the villains. In the Line of Duty proved even harder to cast, especially one role for which I eventually settled on Gwendoline Christie. Has anyone here ever written a script and tried to cast it? I can't be the only screenwriter in the blogging community. If so, who would you want to cast in your film?
In the meantime, I need to find some movies to watch, and I desperately need to reduce my intake of action films. I'm thinking about taking it in steps, perhaps next week spending some of my free time watching some old film noir. I've got some in my drawer I still haven't seen yet. Perhaps I should do something with that. Maybe I should do a film noir week instead of my general non-action week. That could be interesting. I'm also wondering about doing something on directorial debuts. I've got a few on hand: I just re-watched John Carpenter's cult classic Dark Star on Wednesday, plus I have access to Kubrick's Fear and Desire, David Lynch's Eraserhead, and Quentin Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs. I think it could be interesting to look at some iconic directors' first features and examine how it compares to their later films on a stylistic level; spotting early manifestations of their various trademarks.
I have also recently found myself wondering about possibly giving The Departed another go. I saw it like four years ago so perhaps I should give it another chance, or maybe I'll just end up feeling the same way I did then. What do you think? Do you think a film like this might be deserving of a second chance? One thing that I have realized recently is that The Departed actually might make a pretty good TV series. You could flesh out the story, and have each episode focus on a small group of characters at a time. Then there could be some episodes about the crooks, some about the cops, and perhaps some that focus on a few characters from both. That way there would be more room to develop everybody. Somebody get Martin Scorsese on the line, but make sure I'm on the writing team. That way I can work on diversifying the cast a bit more. I mean, all these characters and the only woman they could fit in was the love interest? I find that hard to believe. I think we'd need to add in some female cops and female crooks. Maybe if I'm feeling really crazy I'll even write Leonardo DiCaprio's character as a woman, which could bring out some interesting new dynamics.
Classic Film and TV Cafe is hosting "My Favorite Classic Movie" Blogathon. These things seem to be everywhere. How will I ever decide which ones to participate in?
This week, the theme for Wanderer's Thursday Movie Picks Meme is Superhero films, or films about superheroes. That's pretty self-explanatory. Generally superheroes are characters (often but not always originating from comics) who have extraordinary abilities and use them to fight crime. There are a lot of superhero films to choose from, especially now with the success of Marvel's superhero franchise and the various (so far unsuccessful) attempts by D.C. to compete with them. Now, I figure the Marvel films are too obvious, plus they're all in the same continuity, so I'm going to refrain from including any of those in today's list. Instead I am going to pick some less obvious choices for superhero films.
Tank Girl (1995)
Oh boy, talk about a weird but insanely entertaining film, if only just because of the bizarre directions it goes. I mean, this is a superhero film that even has a spontaneous musical number at one point. The title character is quite possibly the ultimate logical extreme of the "wise-guy" action hero. Say what you will about John McClane, but he at least understood the danger he was in. This girl seems to treat everything like it's a party, even when storming the enemy base. It also has a pre-Mulholland Drive- Naomi Watts as Tank Girl's best friend Jet Girl, and a psychotic Malcom McDowell delivering an over-the-top performance as the villain. It's campy, yes, but one you really should see, if only just because of how insane it can get at times.
Mystery Men (1999)
You wanted superheroes? Well, too bad! All we have are... these guys... and girl. Mystery Men is a film that shows another side to superheros, namely the rejects. This 1999 superhero parody involves a group of superheros who all have the most seemingly useless powers imaginable such as hitting people with a shovel, throwing forks, getting angry, being "mysterious", and being able to turn invisible but only if no one else is looking. They're not so much superheroes as they are superhero wannabes that are not really all that good at fighting crime... except of course they ultimately turn out to be far greater heroes than the one "superhero" who actually gets anything done in this world.
Dredd (2012)
Okay, whether Dredd himself is a superhero is somewhat debatable, but after the disastrous 1995 attempt to film the cult comic book character of Judge Dredd with Sylvestor Stallone in the title role, this attempt makes him work. It's a curious combination of several action movie trends with elements of urban vigilantism, hardbodied action heroes, the buddy cop film, Hong Kong action cinema, and the "Die Hard on an X" formula. There are also some similarities to The Raid but that's total coincidence (they both came out around the same time), and at least this one has two strong female leads, including a female villain which is an unusual touch for a superhero film. It's definitely a great experience and worth the watch.
Last week I finally got a chance to get back in the action of the Thursday Movie Picks Meme hosted by my friend Wanderer. This time around, the theme was police movies, and she had a lot of people contributing, myself included. When I was reading the other submissions, I quickly started to notice a few patterns. There were some films that seemed to be especially popular and kept showing up on various lists. Perhaps the most popular was The Departed (seriously, why am I the only one who didn't get the appeal of that film?). Hot Fuzz also proved to be an extremely popular choice as it kept popping up in several of the submissions, my own included. The other one I noticed seemed to be popular was one I'd never heard of: End of Watch. Everybody else seemed to like it and it just so happened that it was on Netflix, so I thought I'd give it a watch and see if it was any good.
End of Watch is certainly an unusual cop film, but in a way I found that actually worked to its advantage. The basic setup is pretty straight forward: there are two cops, Brian Taylor (Jake Gyllenhaal) and Mike Zavala (Michael Peña) who are paired together and much of the film is about their friendship. In that sense, it's like a typical buddy cop movie, only in this case a bit less linear. The typical structure of a buddy cop film goes something like this: two characters, usually men though exceptions like The Heat (two women) and Dredd (a man and a woman) exist, are unwillingly paired together by a stubborn chief.
These two buddy cops are polar opposites, usually one being the "wild" cop who doesn't play by the rules and the other being the uptight by the book officer. They can't stand each other at first but over the course of the film they have to work together to solve a crime leading to the gradual development of a mutual respect for each other and eventually a close friendship. Also, in many cases (exceptions like Dredd notwithstanding), the dynamic between the buddy cops replaces the role that might usually be filled by a love interest, meaning that from some angles buddy cop films can be read as homoerotic. Hot Fuzz had a lot of fun exaggerating that last part.
End of Watch isn't quite so simple in its structure. The two buddy cops are great characters but not always so easily distinguished. You don't have a clearly identified "wild" cop or "by the book" cop. You just have two cops who have their own strengths, weaknesses, personalities, and anxieties. That's also really what a lot of the film is about, just how these two guys interact. They don't bond together as find themselves working together to overthrow some drug kingpin. They just become closely aquainted because they have to spend so much time together. If anything, though, the relationship is not exclusive to these two, even if they are the main focus. Really, it's about a sense of camaraderie among the police force in general.
That's another thing that made this film interesting to see. End of Watch shows a whole other side of police work that you don't often see in other films. Hot Fuzz liked to emphasize the paperwork, but still put a lot of focus on the action. End of Watch hardly skips out on the action either, but those moments are spaced out and the focus is instead on the dull side of being a cop. A lot of being an officer is basically sitting around waiting for something to do, and it's not always going to be exciting. It's hardly that unusual for cops to receive prank calls, just look at the absurdly popular practice of "swatting", which is literally based around dorks prank calling 911 so that some YouTuber gets attacked by SWAT officers live on camera. Sometimes they're false alarms or strange cases that leave you wondering what the people involved were thinking (that one woman who reported her kids being "missing" when they were bound in duct tape in the closet certainly raised a few questions), and sometimes they're just so messed up that even the cops can't take it.
This is the side we see in End of Watch. There is a sub-plot involving a group of criminals, but ultimately it's really about the day-to-day life of being a cop. Brian and Mike sit in their car waiting for some report to come in, then respond. Often they have to rely on other cops as well, and frequently get help from fellow officers Orozco (America Ferrara) and Davis (Cody Horn). In one instance they even get into trouble because they accidentally interfered with another group of cops trying to take down a drug cartel. If there is a lesson to be gained from this film, it's that cops are human beings just like everyone else.
Honestly, I thought it was interesting to see this side of being a cop, instead of the more action-packed angle movies often take. These aren't the kinds of guys who will point a 44 magnum at your head and ask if you feel lucky, or who will fire their guns up in the air while screaming "ah". They're ordinary people given a specific responsibility and who often have to make difficult decisions and then deal with the consequences. It's often a boring job and they try to make the best of it, all while trying to accommodate their personal relationships. Jake Gyllenhaal makes for a very good lead in a film like this. In any other film he might have been the tough grizzled veteran but here he is shown to be far more human.
The rest of the cast is also very good as well. Ferarra and Davis might not have as much screen time compared to the two leads, but when they do show up they are a welcome addition. They seem to make quite a pair themselves, and I find myself with the sense that they are probably going through very much the same sorts of situations that Gyllenhaal and Peña are experiencing throughout. There is also Gyllenhall's girlfriend Janet, who for a love interest actually has a fair bit of depth, and Peña's equally interesting wife Gabby.
Adding to the non-conventional elements is the semi-documentary style that drives much of the film. It offers practically a first-person look into the life of a cop, and does actually manage to add a sense of realism (even if it can at times be disorienting). End of Watch is a very interesting experience and one that I think is worth recommending. As a police procedural, it offers something very unusual, and the kind of side to being a cop that you don't see in a movie like Dirty Harry or S.W.A.T.. The action is there and it is intense, but ultimately it's all about how being a police officer can be as boring as any other job. It's not all about stopping the crooks, it's also about making those tough calls and knowing when to act.
