Benjamin Button on Criterion too? Yes!

Wow. Pretty rare for a new-release title to debut on the Criterion label (except of course for Wes Anderson's movies), but I'm extremely happy that Button's going to be a Criterion release.
This was first reported over at The Digital Bits - visit the site for release info and cover artwork. I must also say I'm really happy with the cover artwork. It's a variation of the original poster, but it's nice and simple. Hope it stays that way.
It only sucks that The Wrestler is stuck over on the Fox Searchlight label. The DVD will only contain a few featurettes, and NO COMMENTARY from Aronofsky. Really sucks.

My Dinner With Andre coming to DVD - from CRITERION!!

Hey guys, I've been busy lately, so I haven't been posting that much. But the next few days you'll see some interesting stuff, mostly some older movies I've revisited lately after having not seen them in a while.
But anyway, the real reason for this post is the news I discovered this evening:
The awesome 1981 film My Dinner With Andre (starring Andre Gregory and Wallace Shawn, and directed by Louis Malle) is FINALLY coming back to DVD via the amazing people over at the Criterion Collection (www.criterion.com). Now, this movie was actually released on DVD before, back in 1998, but then went out of print. It was not uncommon the last couple of years to see a used copy of the DVD selling for over $200 online. I (thankfully) resisted the urge to buy it, and now the best DVD company in the business has it set for release on June 23rd of this year.
I guess this post is really for my brother, Jim - the person who introduced me to the movie years ago...I don't know if you have that DVD (or maybe an old VHS), but damn, man - finally! Great news, right? Anyways, click here for more info on the release specs and whatnot.

The Red Balloon

Boy, do I have a treat for you guys! Below I've posted the entire 34-minute short film The Red Balloon. A French film from 1956, written and directed by Albert Lamorisse, it's about a red balloon that seems to have a mind of its own, and follows a little boy through the streets of Paris.
A total masterpiece, it won the Palme d'Or (Best Picture) at the Cannes Film Festival, and also won the Oscar for Best Screenplay (the only short film to have ever won the award). So sit back with your kids, your grandkids, or just by yourself, and watch this great little movie.

The Best Films of the Year 2008 (in order):

1. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button; The Wrestler (tie)
2. The Dark Knight
3. WALL-E
   
4. Milk
5. Frost/Nixon
   
6. Slumdog Millionaire
7. Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist
8. Vicky Cristina Barcelona
   
9. Zack and Miri Make a Porno
10. Snow Angels

There's still about four major releases I have yet to see, so I may end up changing this list slightly.

Frost/Nixon, and The Reader

Frost/Nixon
An extraordinary film and one of the best "political" films since All the President's Men.
This is a firecracker of a movie. Ron Howard is a director that understands how to take complicated matters and put them into layman's terms on screen (think Apollo 13), and this is no exception. With Hans Zimmer's excellent score driving the film forward, Howard is able to take scene after scene of, well, people sitting in rooms talking, and turn it into some of the most compelling stuff of the year. Excellent cast - right down to the supporting roles - and a great script by Peter Morgan (The Queen), who adapts his own play for the screen. Wonderful movie. Go see it.

The Reader
Wow... where to start? This movie has no business being nominated for Best Picture. It's not terrible by any means, but certainly not worthy of being listed among the other four nominees. The entire first half of the film simply doesn't work. It's even more frustrating because it's nothing you can put your finger on - it just never really "clicks". The second half is another matter - it's a much better movie after the first hour. But because the first half has come and gone with little to show for it, there's little emotional impact to be had. Director Stephen Daldry (The Hours) does his best with the material, but I have a feeling that hardly anyone could have adapted this story for the screen. The screenwriter, David Hare, was committed to adapting Bernhard Schlink's novel without using voiceover. A commendable challenge, but it ends up hurting the picture, as we're never able to get inside anyone's head. There are several montage sequences in which a character is reading aloud from a book - not his own thoughts. These scenes stand out, and the editing is excellent - but that's it in terms of voiceover. These five minutes or so are a rare glimpse inside of his head, but it only serves to highlight how good the movie could have been. Kate Winslet is excellent (is she ever not?) but this is nowhere near her best performance. It looks as if she'll finally win for this movie, but her other nominations were far more deserved.
"Best Actress" really should have been this film's only nomination, but unfortunately it's right at the top with the four other nominees for Best Picture. Why not The Dark Knight? Or The Wrestler? Or even WALL-E? Oh well... this is the Academy, after all. It's not common sense.

Tomorrow night: My "Top 10 Films" list.

Real Time

Here we have a Canadian film from 2008, which wasn't even given a theatrical release in the U.S., save for a couple of festival showings. It's unfortunate, because it's truly an undiscovered gem of a picture - easily among the best of the year.
I must preface this review by pointing out how astonishingly bad this film could have been. The plot is wafer-thin, and something we've seen many times before: A hit-man (Randy Quaid) gives a compulsive gambler who's $68,000 in debt (Jay Baruchel - Knocked Up, I'm Reed Fish) one hour to live. The movie takes place in "real time" - thus the almost cringe-worthy aptness of the title. So yes, by reading the paragraph above, it seems like an interesting diversion, but not exactly something to put on your must-see list.
But somehow, some way, this movie works. Credit a great script by writer/director Randall Cole and wonderful performances by the two leads for this movie's success. This is a film about dialogue. It's a low-budget picture, and mostly consists of the two men talking to each other in a car. It's sort of what I call the "holy trinity" of independent film. Some people may not be into it, but for my money, if you have two great actors speaking great dialogue, it's just as exciting as a car chase.
In this picture, all three guys step up to the plate and hit immediate home runs. Baruchel is great as lovable loser Andy Hayes, a guy who's most definitely getting what he deserves, but who somehow makes you feel that he deserves yet another chance. Randy Quaid turns in a career-best performance as Reuben, the hit-man who gives Andy one last hour to settle his affairs. Quaid has taken some real chances as of late, playing the homophobic ranch boss in Brokeback Mountain, and now this. In this picture, he plays the role with an Australian accent. What could have been a laughable mistake turns out to be a pitch-perfect and memorable character. People these days remember Quaid from his role as "Cousin Eddie" in the Vacation movies, but I always remembered him most from his early role in Hal Ashby's 1973 film The Last Detail (for which he was nominated as Best Supporting Actor), where he played a quiet, timid Navy man. In all honesty, if you compare these four roles - Cousin Eddie, Brokeback, Real Time, and Last Detail - this guy has some amazing range. Kudos to Quaid for taking these increasingly risky parts.
Last but not least, Randall Cole's script manages to be both funny and somber, at exactly the right moments - all in the span of a scant 77 minutes. And while there's only a few characters to speak of, they're all pretty well-drawn, given their short screen time. His direction is fittingly sparse, letting the actors take center stage.
The movie's not perfect - one sequence taking place at a fried-chicken restaurant (Andy's old job) feels strangely out-of place as it tries to hammer the humor home. But even this isn't a complete failure: I understand what Cole was trying to do, and the ending of the sequence provides a nice moment for the character of Andy. Hey - you can't have everything, right?
There are two moments in the film which I particularly liked. Two brief things which probably take up 10 seconds of screen time. Early in the film, speaking of long lost memories, Andy mentions playing with a Playdough barber shop toy when he was a kid. It's a short, fleeting moment, but it's a nice little detail. Later on, at his grandmother's house, he opens the refrigerator and presents Reuben with a deformed, flattened bottle of soda. As he does this, he explains how his grandmother would squeeze every last bit of air out of a two-liter bottle of soda, in order to maintain its freshness longer. Another nice little moment. A movie can't quite survive solely on things like this, but when they're present, they add just that little bit extra to push a good movie over into being great. I'm still thinking about this movie two days after I've seen it. Who knows if I'll be thinking of this movie two months or even two years from now, but at this moment, I still think it's pretty damn good.

I would just like you guys to compare these two...

Joaquin Phoenix last night on Letterman:

Here's CBS's "official" shortened version, in case they take this one down:


Crispin Glover's infamous appearance on Letterman in 1987:


Déjà vu...
As a side note, I really hope this thing with Joaquin is all an elaborate joke.

Revolutionary Road

I actually saw this about a month ago, but never felt compelled to write about it. I still don't, I suppose. This movie is just.... ehh. I never really cared about anyone or anything in this movie. It's based on an acclaimed novel from the early sixties, and while the content of the book was, well, revolutionary at the time, lots of time has passed since. In the movie world, we've seen lots of similar films covering similar subjects, and while this picture is definitely solid work from everyone involved, it's just all been done before, and better.

Lux Interior (1946-2009)
Lead singer of The Cramps

James Whitmore (1921-2009)
Actor (The Shawshank Redemption)

Milk

"Society can't exist without the family."
"We're not against that."
"Can two men reproduce?"
"No... but God knows, we keep trying!"

Wonderful, wonderful movie, and one of the best biographical films ever made.
Yes, this is a film about Harvey Milk, the first gay man elected to public office. And yes, he was assassinated in 1978. So, of course, there's lots of drama, trials and tribulations and what-have-you. But this film doesn't wallow in sadness and despair. It's celebratory and joyful, in the best kind of way. This is a playful, funny, and immensely entertaining picture.
Openly-gay filmmaker Gus Van Sant (Elephant, Good Will Hunting) had tried for years to get this film made, ever since he started his career in the 80's. The project was a labor of love for Van Sant, who had endured several failed attempts at making the film since 1992, when he first bought the rights. It was long considered a risky project, even with a comparatively low budget of $15 million dollars. Only when 2005's Brokeback Mountain was successful, was this film greenlighted. It's the film that - for lack of a better word - he was "born" to make.
That passion is evident in every frame of this film. Van Sant - who recently went the much more experimental route with Gerry, Elephant, Last Days, and Paranoid Park, is no less innovative here, relying heavily on archive footage to create a sense of time and place with his low $15 million budget. One sequence in particular is shot in the reflection of a metal whistle lying on the ground (it'll make sense when you see it). Brilliant stuff.
First-time feature screenwriter Dustin Lance Black (writer/producer of HBO's Big Love) did his own three years of personal research for the project, and it shows. The film has some of the most well-drawn characters of the year. And thankfully, Black doesn't fall victim to the frequent first-time writer syndrome of telling his story in some crazy narrative fashion. Everything is pretty straight-forward. Black knows he has enough going for his story and doesn't feel the need to try and "pump it up" one bit. It's refreshing.
And last but not least, I must point out the acting. It goes without saying that Sean Penn and Josh Brolin are great, and both were Oscar-nominated for their work. But everyone in the movie is amazingly well-cast and pitch-perfect. (I've long thought that the Academy needs a "casting" award. Good casting is really 3/4 of what makes a film anyways. The closest thing to this award is the Screen Actors' Guild "Ensemble Cast" award, but why give another award to the actors? Casting directors - the unsung heroes of the film business. But I digress...) Special mention should be made of James Franco in a small but pivotal role, and Emile Hirsch - who in my opinion completely steals the show.
Well, anyway... Great movie. Check it out (if you can find it in theaters... Focus Features really screwed the pooch on this one).

Final Bill Hicks performance to finally be broadcast tonight

Hey, I'm going to chime in again in a few hours with my review of Gus Van Sant's Milk, but I just wanted to give people a quick heads-up:
Tonight (Friday Jan. 30) at 11:35 PM eastern time on CBS, David Letterman will broadcast Bill Hicks' final performance, taped for the Letterman show in 1993, but never broadcast. Hicks's mother will also apparently be a guest. Hicks died from cancer six months after it was shot.
For those of you that don't know, Bill Hicks was one of the greatest stand-ups of all time. Some truly dark stuff - especially in his later career - but absolutely brilliant just the same. Just a heads-up to you guys.

The Wrestler

Wow. Brilliant, brilliant filmmaking.
Darren Aronofsky (Requiem for a Dream) has accomplished something magnificent here. Lacking the polish, resources, and budget of Danny Boyle's Slumdog Millionaire, Aronofsky has created something completely different from a similar underdog-sort of story. While Boyle goes the flashy route with camera moves and dozens of cuts per-minute, Aronofsky favors long, lingering takes and a somewhat reserved handheld camera. Now, of course, this is a huge change of course for the way Aronofsky usually does things. Requiem was frantic and methodical, mimicking the lives of the drug-addled characters. This is a completely different kind of film. You know what that shows? Maturity as a director and storyteller. It's hard to find a voice as a filmmaker, but it's even more difficult to change that voice to suit the needs of a particular project. The Wrestler feels grungy, dirty, and thrown together... and it's perfect.
Aronofsky made the choice to shoot in Super-16mm with this film, and it was a great choice. The harsh film grain and hard shadows give it a documentary-like feel and heightened intensity. Also worth mentioning is the fact that not only is this a Super 16 film, but a Super 16 film presented in a Scope aspect ratio of 2.35:1. Film fans will probably know what this means, but for those that don't, basically it means you're blowing up an already grainy picture to a very wide theater screen. Film grain and imperfections are heightened and more visible. A bold and wonderful artistic choice by Aronofsky - perfectly fitting for the story he's presenting.
Now, there's all sorts of stories going around about this production. People say that Mickey Rourke believed so much in the project, that he didn't accept an acting fee. Neither did Bruce Springsteen for the closing song he contributed. Aronofsky apparently was given the chance to make the picture with Nicolas Cage for a budget of approximately $25 million. He turned it down to make the film with Rourke - for only $6 million, and a short 35-day shooting schedule. Like the story we so often hear with independent film, the many limitations on the production have combined to produce something magical. Everything is down-and-dirty, in the moment, and feels about as real as cinema can get.
I guess that's about all I can - and probably should - say. Rourke is simply amazing. If it seems like a simple case of stunt casting, don't worry... It's an iconic performance that in my opinion ranks right along side DeNiro in Raging Bull... A study of an imperfect man, perfectly realized on screen.
Do not miss this. Benjamin Button was an amazing major-studio picture. This film is equally as amazing - it was just made under much tougher circumstances. Whether that makes it more or less worthy is a matter of opinion. All that really matters is if it's worth your time - and it certainly is.

Slumdog Millionaire

This is one of the best-reviewed movies of the year, and the odds-on favorite to win Best Picture after its several wins at the Globes on Sunday. Is it as good as everyone's saying? Well, yes and no.
There's a lot to like about this movie. Danny Boyle's (Trainspotting) direction is as strong and assured as anything I've seen this year. Relative unknown Dev Patel gives an amazing leading performance. The editing is masterful. The picture is wonderfully photographed by the always inventive Boyle and his DP Anthony Dod Mantle (in no less than five formats - 16mm, 35mm, analog and digital video, and still photography). The movie is always watchable, mostly entertaining, and sometimes enthralling. So what's my beef with it, then?
Listen, guys... I love Danny Boyle. Trainspotting's one of the best movies of the 90's. I like almost everything he's done. But you have to admit, he's really a style-over-substance sort of filmmaker. And this screenplay doesn't really help matters. I mean, we have a GREAT framework for a story here. The whole gameshow thing, discovering how he knows each of the answers through his life experiences... all good stuff. But mostly everything else in the story... I don't know, man. I've just seen it all before. Nearly half the picture involves a love story/long-lost girl situation... and I'm really sorry to say... I just didn't care. I didn't give a shit. I'm not sure what it was. I was usually totally into the rest of the picture, but whenever that storyline picked up again, I just tuned out. Like I said, I've seen it all before, but what really matters - I've seen it done better. Perhaps most people will come out of this movie feeling a different way. But I've seen City of God (dangerous childhood in impoverished area) and Cinema Paradiso (adult looking back on long-lost love) and this felt like a stylized melding of those two stories.
I know that by now this seems like an attack of some sort, but it's really not. This is a very solid movie. Easily one of the best of the year, and I really did enjoy about 80% of it. It's both exhilarating and beautiful, with some wonderful sequences (a scene set to "Paper Planes" by M.I.A. is particularly good). It just never hit home for me in the way that it seems to for most people. It gets a solid recommendation from me, even though I only have lukewarm feelings about it right now. Although I do want to see it again... perhaps that means something.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

A masterpiece. No two ways about it.
Not only one of the best movies of the year, but one of the best films I've ever seen. People know that I rarely go to such lengths in praising a film, but this one crept inside me, shook me up, and left me with a feeling I've rarely had: total satisfaction.
Rarely is a movie both grandly ambitious and heartbreakingly intimate, but that's the case with this picture. It succeeds at everything it does, everything it tries, and everything it thinks about doing.
Just about as good as you can get. Nearly perfect.

Robert Prosky
1930-2008

Dark Knight score ineligible for Oscar

Damn, this sucks. I know this happened a few days ago, but I wanted to bring it to the attention of people who might have missed it:
The musical score for The Dark Knight (composed by James Newton Howard and Hans Zimmer) has been disqualified by the Academy. You have to prove that the main composer(s) composed at least 70% of the score... something they were unable to do. That really sucks. For my money, it's the best score of the year, and one of the big reasons The Dark Knight worked as well as it did (that and the editing).

Here's a link to an article at Variety

Zack and Miri Make a Porno, and Changeling

Zack and Miri Make a Porno
When I first heard about this project, two names caught my eye: Kevin Smith, and Seth Rogen. I've always had a sort of love/hate relationship with Smith... Clerks is a great little movie, and Chasing Amy is one of the best films of the '90s, but everything else he's done has either been really bad (Dogma - I know some people love it, but I just can't stand it) or just a flat-out comedy with little substance (Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back). I thought we'd lost Kevin to mediocre films forever. My hope was restored after seeing Clerks II, a picture I had little interest in seeing until I finally caught it a year later on video. It was a great companion piece to the original, with a lot of heart and great Kevin Smith dialogue. People said he had finally grown up. To be honest, I saw evidence of this two years prior in Jersey Girl. Granted, it's not that great of a movie, but I really liked the first ten minutes - it was all high drama, and handled well. Ben Affleck turns in some of his best acting in that opening, and George Carlin is terrific all throughout the picture, in a rare dramatic role (and his last live-action role before his death.) Yes, everything goes downhill amazingly fast after that opening sequence -it's formulaic in the worst way - but I saw potential. Clerks II delivered on that potential, and I anxiously awaited his next movie. When I heard Seth Rogen was in it, I was sold. Thankfully, it was every bit as good as I'd hoped. And even though I doubt it will appear on many year-end best lists, it was, quite honestly, one of my favorite films of the year.
Obviously, this is a crude comedy. But it strikes that balance between laughs and sentiment that so many films strive for, yet fail to achieve. It's the best film of its kind since The 40 Year Old Virgin, and like that film, which was a surprise nominee for a Writers Guild of America screenplay award, I'd like to see the same thing happen here. It's a great film with memorable characters and strong direction from Kevin Smith. One scene in particular has some use of slow-motion in a dramatic context, and it's very effective.
It's unfortunate that this film wasn't a runaway hit. It was released on Halloween night, and I think had it been given a summer release, it would have fared better. But it's well worth a look. It's been given polite praise by the critics, but I have a feeling that if this $25 million dollar picture had been a $5 million independent production, we'd be seeing a few raves here. But it's no matter - Zack and Miri is a great movie, and Kevin Smith's best to date.

Changeling
Oh, no. Here we go again. A Clint Eastwood movie. Let me try and contain my sarcasm.
Most people who know me know that I'm not a big fan of Eastwood's films as director. I think he's incredibly overrated and out of everything he's ever done, Mystic River and Flags of Our Fathers are probably the only pictures he's ever done that have been deserving of the praise he seems to get consistently. I think Million Dollar Baby was one of the biggest pieces of shit ever nominated for Best Picture, and it was a crime that it won the award in a year that saw films like The Aviator and Sideways (one of the best American films of the last 10 years) released. But, as always, I try to go into a movie with an open mind. Even with the abortion that was Million Dollar Baby still fresh in my mind, I was able to go into Flags of Our Fathers and come out seeing that it was a pretty good movie.
But now we come to Changeling. This movie is overlong, overbearing, and overblown. I've never known Eastwood to be a subtle director, and this is clear evidence of it right here. People in this movie are either "good" or "bad", with no shades of gray. Each and every point is hammered over our heads, and then hammered down again, to make sure we've gotten it. The film proceeds to drag everything out over a two-and-a-half hour span, and as we think we've gotten to the end, it keeps going on - one, two, and three times over - until we just want to get the hell out of the movie theater. This movie could have easily been less than two hours.
People cheer in the courtroom and the judge never calls for "order in the court", the chief of police is horribly miscast - with a terribly fake Irish accent, and John Malkovich is wasted in a thankless role. Thank God the critics seem to have actually seen the movie this time, as the picture has gotten below-average reviews. I mean, listen: It's not a horrible movie. It's actually on-par with most of Eastwood's work - meaning, of course, that it feels like a film from the 40's: it feels scripted and it feels calculated. That's the way he does things. I guess my problem with it is that I don't feel his type of films have any real place in the film world of today. There are people out there who actually have something to say, and here comes Eastwood, still stuck in the past. It's a tried-and-true formula, but it's unrealistic. And I didn't buy any of it.

Michael Crichton
1942-2008

This is possibly the best day in the history of the United States.
Everybody can wake up tomorrow, and feel a little bit better about the human race.

Movies You May Have Missed - #4 Night on Earth (1991)

Jim Jarmusch is one of my favorite filmmakers. With a highly original style, deadpan tone, and interesting characters, Jarmusch is one of the most celebrated independent filmmakers of all time. I have yet to see a Jarmusch film that I didn't like, and one of my favorites is his 1991 effort, Night on Earth. The film is basically split up into five short films, or vignettes (a technique Jarmusch frequently uses):

The first story, set in L.A., concerns a tomboy cab driver (Winona Ryder) who picks up a Hollywood producer (Gina Rowlands) from the airport.

The second (and probably my favorite) story is set in New York. An East German immigrant cab driver (Armin Mueller-Stahl) picks up a streetwise New Yorker (Giancarlo Esposito) who teaches him how to drive his cab.
Note: this clip features strong language. NSFW.


Third story is set in Paris, where a blind passenger (Béatrice Dalle) is picked up by a West African cab driver (Isaach De Bankolé). Differences in personality and culture prevent them from getting along.

Fourth story is set in Rome, where an eccentric cabbie (Roberto Benigni) picks up a priest (Paolo Bonacell), and insists upon confessing his sins.


Last story is set in Helsinki, where three workers are being picked up from a bar after a night of drinking. One of the group is passed out; he drank he most, having been laid off just that day. The other two proceed to tell the cab driver (Matti Pellonpää) about it. The cabbie responds by telling his sad story.

This is a great movie. Anyone who has enjoyed any of Jarmusch's other films (Stranger Than Paradise, Down By Law, Mystery Train) should get a kick out of this. Great characters, memorable situations, and pitch-perfect dialogue. The last story in Helsinki even manages to wrap everything up in a wonderful melancholy tone, just as the sun begins to rise at dawn. One of the best films of the 90's.