Category: (by verdict)

Ning Hao’s 2006 heist film was shot on dv for a song, but damn the film sings. The low-rent production and high-concept pitch (it’s Ocean’s Eleven in China) both fade from memory a few moments in. Yes, it’s a heist film–but it’s also a parody of heist films. Where Soderbergh’s slick cons run elaborate, high-tech scams on gangsters with deep pockets, here a rare jade (found during digging at a small-time factory) is guarded by a dedicated but woefully unresourced security chief, and sought by a couple of crews of generally half-assed thieves. (There is one high-profile expert jewel thief, and his smarts get him nowhere.)

The film is also technically devious–Ning often shows us an event, then cuts to another scene which we slowly realize is a rewind, bringing us back into the earlier event from another angle. There’s split-screen play, some loopy and glorious foot-chases. The filmmaking is joyous, the acting just as playful. I can’t recall how I came upon this, but it was great good fun, and I’m going to watch Ning’s earlier film and keep an eye out for those coming….

Based on a novel by Christopher Isherwood, A Single Man follows one day — it is not a spoiler to say: the last day — in the life of George Falconer, a professor of English at UCLA (I think) in 1962. George is originally English, is gay, and the film opens with the death of Jim, his lover of sixteen years. Eight months after Jim’s death, George remains distraught, though it is now something that he has buried from the view of outsiders. Continue reading A Single Man

so, mike and i are passionately active on goodreads (in our different ways — mike is a superstar). goodreads, if you losers don’t know what it is, is this website where people talk about books. the wonderful thing about it is that discussions end up being pretty damn good and people bring to your attention books you would never have considered picking up. so i thought, how about we open this here blog a little, send an invite to those bonzer people over at goodreads we have come to know and like, and ask them to contribute to our threads and start threads of their own? this would involve:

1. removing the absurd block on commenting to people arnab hasn’t registered as legit commenters (arnab, wordpress is really, really good with spam).
2. giving people an easy way to register as contributors (arnab, wordpress has a contact box you can script in)
3. opening the website to search engines (hi arnab).

i realize that this also requires more administrative work, but since it’s not my problem i don’t care. please discuss.

I watched Collapse, Chris Smith’s latest documentary about the debbie-downer Michael Ruppert. The film suffers from a serious Errol-Morris fixation, right down to its Glassesque soundtrack–and such parroting aggravated me no end. (I love Morris’ docs, so there are worse crimes than mimicking excellence, but Smith is no newbie. Why?)

And the film itself is all one chain-smoking rant after another, interwoven with portentous blackout interludes (works), feverish archive footage underlaid over the rants (works), and a typewriter clacking out various key terms or ideas (doesn’t work). I’ve read some very credulous reviews–Roger Ebert, who should know fucking better–raving about the film’s horrifying predictions. But I was engaged, primarily by how the film keeps its object “collapse” a question–is it the world’s economy, peak oil, modern technology . . . or is it Michael Ruppert’s?

I read a lot of conspiracy theories in doing my graduate work, and that intense passionate fury and worry is all too familiar to me. But I still find it so compelling: how and why do various personal experiences and traits find meaning–and a purchase for securing identity–in visions so all-consumingly dark and destructive?

Which is not to simply dismiss Ruppert’s predictions. His corrosive critique of the unsustainability of our oil-driven economy is, indeed, a compelling horrorshow … It was so horrible, I decided not to eat any ice cream today, in solidarity. But I’m more interested by the film’s portrait of the believer than by the sermon itself.

I haven’t gotten out to any of the “big” films yet this summer, and aside from reliable ol’ Pixar every option sounds like a gamble. I did take a contractually-obligated trip to the new Karate Kid, which I ended up liking quite fine–almost as much as the two boys who I took–and mainly because Jackie Chan is such an affecting, engaging Miyagi replacement. But, while a reboot, it ain’t horror.

Vincenzo Natali’s Splice,however,is horrific, in (alas) too many ways. Continue reading Horror reboots

Mystery Team seems like a great 4-minute sketch–three intrepid kid detectives grow up but never grow out of their roles. Smack ’em down among your typical foul-mouthed contemporaries, play up their naivete against risque shenanigans. And you can imagine this great sketch going horribly wrong at feature-length — fading into a coma from fatal whimsy, or yukking it up with the yucky yuks. But MT manages to have its chocolate milk and drink it, too. Despite the occasional twee or arch bit, despite a willingness to sink their hands deep into the muck (and to dig out some great laughs), this is a character-driven comedy — and about as idiosyncratic and winning as I’ve seen in some time. The first 20 minutes drag — it seemed like that high-concept sketch — but as the characters develop, the cast gets increasingly good at selling strange jokes, and the film delights in unforced delivery of very funny lines.