So, call me the eternal pessimist (lord knows I have my moments) but is anyone else just completely apathetic towards this new Oliver Stone World Trade Center movie? After the quasi-neo-realist United 93 proved relatively ineffectual (which, granted, I also did not see) I cannot imagine the need for a patriotic Nicholas Cage movie about the twin towers. Press so far has been all but insipid. What's more, it's supposed to be desparately safe! Oliver Stone?! And at least I haven't been hearing this, "if you don't see it, you're not American," bullshit that made that drug crazed anti-semite all of that money a couple years back with that whole S/M Jesus movie. I guess it's just Hollywood cashing in on all of that pain. I mean, really.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 06:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Ever imagine a sex scene between classic British actress Helen Mirren and Cuba Gooding Jr? How about a romantic coupling between Mysterious Skin's Joseph Gordon-Levitt with Phat Girlz' Mo'Nique? If you answered yes to either of these questions, then perhaps you could comprehend the perplexing logic which functions in producer Lee Daniel's directorial debut, Shadowboxer. Riding on the shock-value, yet critically successful coat-tails of Daniel's co-produced grimfests Monster's Ball and The Woodsman (you can find my review of the latter here), Shadowboxer strives to achieve a similar level of disquieting gloom. But here, random would seem to be the over-riding goal. Just from the opening credits, a laundry list of notable names causes one to snicker because of their seemingly arbitrary assembly. Helen Mirren, Cuba Gooding Jr., Macy Gray, Mo'Nique, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Stephen Dorff... Costumes by Vivienne Westwood!I've joked already that the whole thing sounding like a game of casting Yatzee - and I haven't even gotten to the plot yet.

Helen Mirren and Cube Gooding Jr. are a duo of assassins. While on assignment, they discover that the woman whom they are supposed to be snuffing is not only 9 months pregnant but inducing labor at that very moment. Mirren, who is slowly dying of cancer, has one of those trite "life - death" moments and believes that God has put her in this moment for a purpose. So, instead of shooting her in the head, she delivers the child and takes the two into hiding. Enter Gordon-Levitt and Mo'Nique (playing a character named Precious) as a doctor and nurse team(yes, you are reading correctly). Of course, Stephen Dorff(who has a gruesomely gratuitous be-condom'd full frontal fuck shot) is the mother's husband and has a nack for nasty murders. Convinced that she is dead, her moves on to her best friend (a debilitatingly drunk Macy Gray). That's the first half, at least. Then, as you may have surmised, the film becomes an idyllic, watching baby grow in a secluded country house movie.

Not a single moment of traditional logic plays itself out in Shadowboxer. Neither does the film create a world in which its bizarre moments make sense. In one scene, a drunk Macy Gray asks the bereft and haggard tranny sitting next to her in an otherwise upscale bar if she wants a drink. 'What is this to' up tranny doing here?' one might wonder. A dramatic draft causes Mirren's kimono to billow in one of the few scenes where we see the pain caused by her cancer (I've never seen a healthier terminal cancer patient - nor one who smoked more cigarettes). Trouble is, she's indoors. 'Where, pray tell, is this interior gale?' Every black character has a substance abuse problem, save Gooding Jr. who is, instead, a masochist. Everyone seems to light their cigarettes whenever the new-born is brought into the room. Rats race Mo'Nique in Gordon-Levitt's doctor's office. You get the idea.

Now, because of all of this absurdity, Shadowboxer is actually a bit of a pleasure to behold. Oh, it's bad alright, and it looses precious steam when Mirren parts ways with the cast, but as a bizarre amalgam of Lifetime Women's movie and TNT style thriller it's rather priceless. The poor decision to theatrically distribute the film will not prove economically fruitful. This is one of those films which may (and I stress may) develop some sort of cult appreciation on DVD. As an almost self-fulfilling act, one scene finds a character watching Susan Hayward and her mobile co-star belt out "I'll plant my own tree" from Valley of the Dolls. The odd mish mash casting proves more desperate here than awkward as it was in Monster's Ball and The Woodsmen. Obviously someone has a bunch of industry ins, but I'm not sure that means they should necessarily use them. Save this one for the last in a alcohol addled marathon evening, but do see it. It's perplexingly sensational.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 06:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Today, in our numbed cultural mores, it is exceptionally difficult to imagine how a film like Jaws could affect a whole era of people, making our parents afraid to go in the water. How Psycho could make their parents afraid to shower. And though this analogy has been used for countless B horror previews, typically without warrant, believe me when I say, 'I will never, for the rest of my life, go spelunking.' The thought of sliding through thick rock tunnels barely larger than your person is enough to get me squirming out of my skin. And I will admit, I am rather susceptible to hype. I ducked my way through 28 Days Later (to later rewatch it and find a deeply flawed film) and was completely traumatized when I saw The Blair Witch Project on a preview screener VHS, more inspired by the petrifying 'Is this true?' website which used the ambiguities of the dawn of internet technologies to sell their one-time-only movie. These sorts of films have become part of a large cultural ritual. But The Descent, I assure you, is one terrifying film. It's the kind of nail biter that, when it finally unleashes its all (which, believe me, is quite a lot), you wonder how much more you can physically take. I'm none too sure I not speaking with a certain bit of swayed hype, but, ultimately, it all comes down to how frightened I truly was, and trust me, I was quite scared.

The premise involves six thrill seeking ladies who, in search of a greater rush, descend into an uncharted cave. Things quickly become very problematic for our tough, while still uber-feminine heroines. Some egos inflame. Someone gets stuck. Someone breaks her leg. A passage collapses. And then, there's the crawlers.

Of course, the film is to its viewers what spelunking is to its ill-fated protagonists. It delivers a rush of exhilaration so extreme that I am hard pressed to find a comparable film with which to liken it. So dense is its tension that, when the women who remain begin to fight back, it arrives with such wanted gratification that I could not help but yelp and holler along with them as they wrestle, hack and gouge at the beasties. The film, impressively sure of its construction, takes great glee in the lavishness of its grostesqueries. In those fantastic moments of frenzy(films like Resident Evil could learn a great deal, here), the viewer, who is so unfathomably wrought with tension that the assaults come at them, just as they do the protagonists(but we, as viewers have the fortune of keeping our intestines, however knotted they may have become throughout the course of the film).

Director Neil Marshall possesses a seemingly casual finesse of the horror genre. Today, a typical horror film seeks more to startle its viewer than to scare them. Tension has become the new foreboding. You know the moment. A girl looks out of the window to investigate some spooky noise. In that relieved moment of calm, an owl beats its wings against the pane and the music crescendoes. You jump. It's a cheap ploy that is not scary. Unnerving, perhaps, but not scary. And though The Descent has its share of jumps, it seldom includes them without excusing itself for patronizing. Here, when you leap only to friend a friend, animal or non-crawler, it is almost always followed by some sort of visual pun, making fun of its own formula.

The establishing sequence, which carries its own load of trauma, starts the film off with an assured confidence, reminiscent of early DePalma. It becomes quite clear that this analogy is self-imposed as Sarah (Shauna Macdonald), resembling a young Sissy Spacek, at one point emerges from a pool of blood in a complete visual homage to Spacek's most famous scene in Carrie. It is Marshall's remarkable knowledge of Horror film history that makes The Descent eligible for inclusion in such a lineage. It is, dare I say, the best horror film to come out of this decade. The Descent is certainly not for the faint of heart, but then, what horror film is?

The Descent hits theaters tomorrow.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 07:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Brothers of the Head is a new offering in a formidably familiar couple of overdone genres. The Rock biopic or merely Rock film has been done again and again, particularly in these recent years. Some, like Van Sant's Last Days and Haynes' Velvet Goldmine get to the heart of the matter in a poetic and essentializing manner. In the former, Van Sant humbles those songs and persons whose mythologies have far surpassed their humanity (and who better to represent this than Kurt Cobain) showing us that those songs which have become anthems to an entire generation merely begin with a man in a room with a guitar. Plain and simple. Haynes' film is a more complex creature which investigates the inflated persona necessitated by the Glam Rock era, basically, personal mythology and how that not only affects the performer but those adoring fans who see in each gesture a world of meaning and validation. Both are grand stories of enormous public acclaim.

Brothers is a quieter film, though one quite indebted to both aforementioned films. Fronting as a documentary, this fictitious retelling of the tale of two Siamese twin brothers who form the front of a cultishly successful punk band called the Bang Bang. It is a film in constant flux, from overtly simplistic (which would seem to be the fate of conjoined twin fiction - really, it is a genre in itself) to surprisingly complex. As a writer, who arrives to condemn the manager for exploiting the twins' deformity observes, instead of finding two weak victims, Tom and Barry are strong and reverent individuals who seem quite comfortable with their circumstance.

Never quite settling on what you expect, the film is at once a condemning parody of the contemporary Biopic, a mutivalent exploration of collaboration, a love letter to the punk era, a visually driven non-narrative experimental film and an all-too conforming doco (even though it's not really). I'm not convinced that it should have presented itself as a documentary. That would seem to be the one great flaw in the film. The "source" footage being so beautiful, one is slightly irked when the camera returns to the talking head which he already knows to be a falsity. This critic, of course already admirously familiar with the cult director Ken Russell was pleasantly surprised at his appearance at the film's opening. Russell, the film would have you believe, followed his (actual) Tommy with a biopic called Two-Way Romeo which the film presents in small segments (though it is quite obviously not a Russell film)

To claim that Brothers was free of flaws would be completely incorrect. They are quite prevalent throughout, but I am hard pressed to recall a film whose aesthetic was as tight and breathtaking as Brothers of the Head. A fictitious documentary film crew shoots the "archival" footage from which this film has been assembled. It is some beautiful footage, grainy and sensual. There's one shot of the brothers bathing themselves in a darkened room. The smoky haze of "dated" filmstock renders the scene with a pictorialist sumptuousness. Light cascades over the lens as the brothers practice in a window-lined sitting room. We never truly believe that the twin actors are conjoined - mainly because of the directors' endless efforts illustrate their dependence. They do cartwheels together. They run together. They play guitar together. Overcompensation works oppositionally. Yet toward the end, you stop caring and give yourself over to the story. It's one that's not terribly original, but so beautiful that I found it difficult to tear my eyes from the screen.

Brothers of the Head opens this Friday in Los Angeles.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 02:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Charlotte Rampling's newest role in Vers Le Sud (Heading South) casts her as a British emigrant/control freak of a professor who, during her lengthy summer months, vacations at an exotic and idyllic resort town in Haiti. Rampling, the haven's self-proclaimed queen bee, is one in a group of regulars who have their pick of the local native boys. It's sexual sightseeing they're after, though the regular balance of things is upset by the arrival of Brenda (Karen Young, herself a facsimile of Rampling). It seems, a few years back, she and her husband took the 15 year old Legba (Ménothy Cesar) under their wing. Then, one unsuspecting night, Brenda yielded to her burning passion of the child and took him on a secluded beach. Now she has returned to reunite with the boy.

Though terrifically critical (at times), director Laurent Cantent (Time Out) allows the viewer to understand the womens' intent. He humanizes them in a way which allows more sympathy than one might expect to find in a story about an impoverished island where wealthy and sexually voracious women have their way with the powerless, penniless men who inhabit it. Vers Le Sud serves as a wonderful document of orientalization and of the internal struggle between personal conduct and private passions(a theme similarly explored in Lars Von Trier's Manderlay). The women comprehend the regression of their gaze, and, as women of culture, this violation of respectable social codes excites them. Brenda could never cum before her Haitian endeavors. Ellen finds all Bostonians dull and trivial. This is true passion - under the sun, in the crystal blue waters, white on black. Taboo.

Vers Le Sud has its remarkably poignant moments, but peppering the film, and in some cases, canceling out the good, some hopelessly trite moves lead to a very heavy handed final act. In a scene which could have come straight out of Crash (albeit, with a far better cinematographer), Legba sits in a shanty's kitchen and looks at the life-worn face of his loving mother who dotes on and chastises him for his shenanigans. Of course, Legba has been saving all of his stud-money for her. It's a bit too simple of a scene for a film which establishes great density in its other climates.

Rampling leaps into her role with a feral gusto while Young leaves a bit to be desired. The physical acting is all there, but her speach is hopelessly theatrical, recalling the weaker moments of Lili Taylor. It's a far better film than either of Cantent's previous ventures and a rather fantastic indictment of culture robbing. But for god's sake, does every black man have to be the purest, nicest angel known to man? I mean, after Crash, I lost all of the remainder of my white guilt. The simpler bits here merely drove the nail in the coffin.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 04:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Please allow me to eat my words. The film which I rolled my eyes over (in these pages, even) when it was first announced turned out to be the best summer film thus far. My Super Ex-Girlfriend never takes itself seriously. I mean, with that title, who could (and is surely cause to its economic underachievement). But had Superman Returns been the success it figured it would have been, this would have been one wonderful little parody. Instead, it had to stand on its own, with no Super craze. Stand alone it does. Thurman, who would be breathtaking even if she were cast to play a serial rapist, is exceptional and Luke Wilson is charming as ever. Eddy Izzard drops by for a fun little villianry (though you really kind of want him to be decidedly more juicy) and Six Feet Under's Rainn Wilson is sufficiently shmarmy. That the entire back-story, premise, plot, build-up (basically the whole falafel) is completely absurd is the greatest strength to the film. From the first few bars of its whimsical score, My Super Ex-Girlfriend establishes itself as one of those really fun films we seem to have forgotten about. Director Ivan Reitman adds his hilarious panache for absurd effects in all the right places. Now, if we could just see one black actress in a film like this who isn't (metaphorically, of course) parading about in black face and mammy-ing herself about, this would be flawless entertainment. But then Wanda Sykes would be out of a job.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 07:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

There's a lot to be said about the cinema of Francois Ozon. His seemingly bipolar array of tastes, from viscous to camp to (almost)neorealist to back again have caused an enticing and varied expectation which arrives with each new film. 8 Women, perhaps his most thurroughly successful film, offered an unparalleled extreme in postmodern melodrama, which, a few years later, functioned in direct contrast to the starkly realistic film structured around a set theorem: an ill-fated relationship told in in five reverse order sequences: 5x2. Because of his earlier, more tempestuous works(Sitcom, Criminal Lovers and the Fassbinder penned Water Drops on Burning Rocks), he was considered France's enfant terrible. Even his more mundane works avoid pure verite by their almost subconscious acknowledgement of the director's Camp tactics and melodramatic tendencies.

That being said, Ozon's recent works have proven, at least to this eye, lackluster at best. Though commercially successful, The Swimming Pool proved too clever for its own good, and most of the director's signature spunk was absent from the aforementioned 5x2. That his newest offering, which opens in theaters today, Le Temps Qui Reste (literally The Time that Remains but bewilderingly mistranslated as Time to Leave) recommences a dance with death previously meditated on in Ozon's magnificent Sous le Sable (Under The Sand) is a step in the right direction. Where Sable starred the statuesque Charlotte Rampling, in a slightly autobiographic act, Le Temps Qui Reste focuses on a startlingly beautiful and successful homosexual, not too far from Ozon's own age. Portrayed by Melvil Poupaud, Romain is diagnosed with terminal cancer. The film follows the brief remainder of Romain's life, how he chooses to cope with his disease and in whom to look for comfort.

Yet Roman is not your typical, sentimental subject. He's quite a bastard, in truth. His vanity and stubbornness prevent him from connecting to his immediate family and young lover. He confides in his grandmother (cine diety Jeanne Moreau) because, "we are both close to death." And Ozon is at no loss to return the favor, Romain's suffering is obviously self-inflicted - of this we are perpetually reminded. He clings to the glorified memories of a simpler childhood from which he incapable of maturing.

The camera lingers mere inches from its present day subjects (blues and greys) and seldom allows for the distance (freedom) of these nostalgic shots - all golden glowing and spaciously choreographed. The most glorious moment of the film, an amorous shot of Romain and Sascha, windblown and smiling against a clear blue sky, is immediately preceeded by a haunting journey into the lowest fuck den of a Parisian gay bar - more a Dante depth than an architectural one. Memory is never what actually happened but instead glorified in how we recall it - and darker times only brighten those memories held most dear.

Cinematically speaking, Le Temps Qui Reste is both a step forward and back for Ozon. Significantly more mature than his previous works, it is the youthful beastly malevolence which leaves a shadow here, one which I as a viewer miss greatly. In past films, Ozon's presumptuousness brought something to the table. It was endeering. Embracing a more A grade cinema aesthetic, a grain which his earlier films more worked against, Ozon has accomplished a more digestible work of cinema. That the provocation usually ascribed to the filmmaker is absent might by excused by the subject, yet there is an air of daring that seems to be on the back burner for this one. Don't get me wrong, Le Temps Qui Reste is a good film. It is also undeniably a film by Francois Ozon. Yet it is neither a great film, nor is it stand-alone within the canon of this auteur. But I would lose sleep if I did not highly recommend it.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 01:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Wow! I thought summer was over. With the dreadful disappointment of the Pirates follow-up and the dull reception of Superman Returns, I though I was going to have to wait for a bunch of pretty actresses to get really ugly just in time for Oscar season, but, low and behold, the coming weekend brings a slew of promising films for my (and of course, dear reader, your) viewing pleasure. First off, we've got the much delayed Heading South. Having recently seen the director's previous film, Time Out, I must say I'm not bursting, but Charlotte Rampling's enough for me. The story is that of a Haitian resort where British women go to escape and indulge in the studly Haitian men. It has been called "searing" and dreadful, so I'll let you know what I think.

I also must admit that, though I critized it at the beginning of the season, I am actually rather looking forward to My Super Ex-Girlfriend. I think both Uma and Luke Wilson are understatedly assured comedians. We shall see...

A rather ridiculous sounding film with Hellen Mirren called Shadowboxer comes out tomorrow. I had the opportunity to see this one a few months back but sadly had to decline in order to see Orlando Bloom sink his way through the as-of-yet-released (and for good reason) Haven. It's the story of a terminally ill hit woman who enlists the aid of Cuba Gooding Jr. to finish one last job. With cameo performances by Macy Gray and Stephen Dorff, how can one say no to this bizarre mingling of what would seem to be Lifetime and TNT original movies.

And finally, Francois Ozon's Time To Leave hits screens tomorrow. I'll post a lengthier review of it then. For now, let's just say that it is a wonderfully crafted look into the human condition and how we value (what would have been a more apt and literal translation of the film's french title) the time that remains.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 05:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Parker Posey is one of those actresses you either love or you hate. Enthusiastically laboring under the former, I am completely in favor of a restart to her career. After a longish break from acting (well, she was still active, though not as prolifically as in the decade past) she seems to be returning to the limelight, with bit parts in large-budget action fare and starring roles in a few upcoming Indie romantic comedies. Her career began with such independent hip flicks, so it would seem a rather astute career move. However, as such productions seem significantly less assured than they used to, it could prove disastrous(with security in the big-budget co-star roles).

Opening in theaters tomorrow, The Oh in Ohio is one such wilted offering. An idea which, to some, must have seemed marvelous on paper proved exceptionally lackluster in actuality. Starring Posey and a dumpy Paul Rudd as a washed up high school teacher, the film totes guest appearances by Liza Minelli (as the vagina worshipping masturbation guru), Heather Graham (as a lesbian sex store clerk) and Danny DeVito (as Wade the pool guy), everyone involved seems to be making cameo appearances, which is rather detrimental when it comes to our leads. Posey doesn't really know what to do with the successful and uptight Priscilla, who has never achieved sexual climax. Her shoe-string budget "haute couture" wears her, rather than the ensembley challenged control wielded by the moll/bitches she recently become accustomed to playing (see Blade Trinity and Superman Returns). Similarly, the concept of "normalcy" seems lost on Posey in Priscilla's more frigid moments. It is when she discovers the joy of sex toys, however, that Posey "unleashes the beast." Her all night hedonistic first encounter with a vibrator is hilarious, as is a business meeting where an inappropriately placed beeper causes her climax before a group of business men.

These moments are rare, however and the rest of the film is stale and tedious. Taking long overdue cues from American Beauty and Election, laced with some $0.99 Sex and the City, the film never really amounts to anything at all - having seen those films oh so long ago. Rudd is completely uninspired and has shed all of his Clueless charm. It's a Parker vehicle, without a doubt. But there's little good that can come from a vehicle as haphazardly assembled as this.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 12:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

For someone who can talk non-stop about nearly anything, every now and again something comes along that needn't be expanded upon, that doesn't really need extrapolation. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest is one such movie. The new Pirates offering is bad. It is boring and bad. But I'm not going to attempt to dissuade you. You've probably already seen it. Having already taken in 132 million dollars in its opening weekend, Pirates, for what it strives, is a winner. What seems secondary these days is good writing, social consciousness, and good old movie magic. It's not there. And what better vehicle to stir up some good old movie magic like a swash-buckling pirate caper? A good picture is no longer a goal. Just money.

Let me inform you, also, Captain Jack is not back. Captain Jack, a bit of a fluke to the first film, sauntered out of a joyless ride adaptation, drunk and fay with a little more than suggested homosexual impulses and a cowardice to match no other. What on earth was he doing in this calculated CGI world? That was the thrill of The Black Pearl. Here, his random characterizations, improvised suggestives and smarmy witticisms are as calculated as the CGI cracken which threatens all those who take to the high seas. Lines slide off of Depp's tongue but, well... the wind is just not in his sails (sorry, I couldn't help it). His originally subversive and perverse humor is replaced by that which you would expect from any PG-13 Disney picture: dick jokes and homophobic double entendres. I don't assume word here will ward you off of this venture. Seeing naff reviews didn't stop me. I thought they could do no wrong, if Depp was down. Sadly, he wasn't.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 01:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So tomorrow finally sees the limited theatrical release of Strangers With Candy which I had the priveledge to attend a preview screening of a couple weeks ago. While it did not live up to the terribly high expectations I held for the film, neither did it disappoint. Strangers With Candy, the show, had about 10 jokes, but they were damn good ones. Embarrassing scenarios repeated themselves with varying results. Mostly, they proved to be some of the more reverent moments of TV history. We see those same jokes played out here, this time on the big screen. They are still funny, but without a serial progression, the film loses something in translation. Scenes of Jerri in prison are funny because those who have followed the show already know Jerri Blank. We know her reputation and are finally treated to the "before" which was always merely alluded to.

The film follows Jerri's release from the state penitentiary and, in an attempt to revive her comatose father (Dan Hedaya), restarts her life from the very moment it went awry - namely Highschool. But shedding 30 some odd years of debauchery and drug addiction becomes more of a challenge that it initially seemed. The original crew is reassembled, mostly. Of course Steven Colbert and Paul Dinello (who also serves as a rather unsteady Director) revive the melodrama of their homosexual affair, though both seem strangely preoccupied. (Dinello's distraction can be pinned on directing, but what for Colbert?) As is usual, Greg Hollimon's Principal Onyx Blackman (you guessed it, he's a tall, deep-voiced black man) nearly steals the show and supplies the best chemistry when pitted against (not with) Jerri. The countless celeb cameos are mostly throw away. Sarah Jessica Parker's grief counselor is a new high in low, as is her hubby, Matthew Broderick, as Colbert's arch nemesis.

Priceless are the moments like the final sequence in which Sedaris dances around in Bali drag while Megawatti Sucarnaputri, in black face with painted-on white beast fangs, writhes in a cage. The film, like the show, is never one to cower in the shadow of political correctness. Quite the converse. The message of the film turns out to be "We're all racist, Think about it. I didn't." and really, wasn't that all that Crash was trying to tell us. I'm not sure whether I want to call Strangers With Candy a parody or a alternative to Crash, but for God's sake, at least the film has the balls to just be, without leading us through every moment. There is an equivalent amount of misses as there are hits in this mostly impeccably written script. A lot of the spunk is gone from the original. But still, when likening it to everything else out there, it's a hell of a good time.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 06:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My mother raised me to understand the workings of our world with one simple aphorism. "Why," she would say "does a dog lick his balls? Because he can." Indeed. In the aftermath which followed the rather favorable reviews of Peter Jackson's King Kong, countless viewers lamented Kong's seemingly endless need for CGI meanies and pseudo-cinematic digital wizardry from T-Rexs and large, man-eating monsters which resembled uncircumcized penises to an attention deficit camera which flits from building to building, enough to make David Fincher motion sick. Having not seen the film, I cannot speak to its meandering digital lavishes. I can only respond to what I had heard/read. Halfway through director Brian Singer's newest incarnation of our man of steel, Superman Returns, I leaned over to the person who accompanied me to the screening and asked "is this what King Kong was like?" I was met with a sober nod.

Much ink has already been spilt (by myself, even) on why we need a Superman. What necessitated his return? Things are bad, yes, but are we, as a people, still capable of believing in a man who descends from the sky in tights to stop falling airplanes and catch crumbling statues? After watching the film, I'm still not certain that we could. We are to understand Singer's Metropolis as a present day city, yet as an homage to the previous films and comics, (which starts with the Seventies style opening credits) our contemporaries don 50's period dress. Basically, though people yammer on their cell phones and watch plasma TV screens, everyone looks as though they've wandered out of an era which understands the modernism which yielded Superman far greater than we ever could. A less jaded time. So much so that I am hard pressed to understand Superman Returns as being a completely contemporary film. Sure there's plenty of terrorist footage on Martha Kent's television, but there's something to be said about the fact that that same television is from the 70's.

Cast in the metallic glow that has come to be Singer's trademark sheen, not a moment passes when you aren't aware of the film's artificiality. There are certainly no characters to convince you otherwise. Superman(Brandon Routh, who in a creepily overt act of cinematic narcissism, resembles Singer) looks like a fuck toy just blown in out of some WeHo workout room. Slight on charisma and heavy on coiffure, he is hardly the strapping man from the comics (a group congregated as I left the theater joked taht he should have been called Supercurl, as, having plummeted from space to land in Central Park, his body was critically wounded but his curly lock of hair was perfectly in tact). But even more deficient is Bosworth's Lois Lane. Missing all of the complexities (and masculinities) of Miss Margot Kidder, Bosworth's vacant femininities do nothing but highlight Routh's. And that's the last thing we look for in our Steely saviors.

But all of the blame cannot be solely heaped upon our leads (though more charismatic casting would have helped a great deal). The writing is dimwitted and the direction painfully tactles. Not a single shot goes by without an educated viewer knowing, full well what will come, not merely in the following scene, but the next twenty minutes. From small touches (Lane's engagement ring - to someone other than Supe - is the same color as the emerald kryptonite which debilitates Superman) to gargantuan ones (the same paper which holds news of Superman's return also informs us of a precious Gems show at the Met. Hmmmm...) the plodding obviousness of the action becomes tediously debilitating. Though not as debilitating as the Rube Goldberg-esque action sequences which encompass the film.

Taking a cue from Kong, not only must Superman save the day, he must save it from calamity after calamity after calamity within a matter of moments. A tremor shakes Metropolis. Someone falls off a roof. Superman catches him. Then a sign falls. Superman catches that. Someone drops a cigarette which ignites a broken gas main. Superman must stop the flames before it hits the supply source, in time to return to his newspaper and catch the statue which is about to crush his sweet fatherly boss (Frank Langella). The absurdity of all of this CGI mayhem never goes unnoticed. Nor is it coreographed to be as fun as any offering by the likes of Besson. Spacey's Lex Luthor is fun and his lady in crime Parker Posey's Kitty have camp fun with their roles, but you slowly watch them realize they got the short end of the stick. Greed has replaced the darker, more brooding evilness of the nineties, and so they stumble about resembling more the nouveau Riche than any real badies.

What could have been an interesting investigation in our cultural needs turned into one more excuse to blatantly flash the capabilities of our visual technologies. All of this without really shedding the shimmer of its computer fabrication process. Just going to prove, yet again, why they unearthed this icon in the first place, well aside from the box office proceeds. Because they can.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 06:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Though this critic yielded to the hype, might I suggest that, instead of partaking in the new doco Leonard Cohen: I'm Your Man you do something a little more productive with your time. That's right! It's time to clean out that linen closet or trim those toe nails. Lian Lunson's dreary doco was insipid and poorly executed. I have no idea what the positive reviews are latching onto, as I found this money maker grating, tedious and exploitative. Exploiting you, dear reader, into spending you hard earned dough to see a concert video interspersed with extremely short snippets of Cohen being sage-y. Those moments are gems, but entirely too few-and-far-between. Instead we have to listen to Rufus Wainwright whine his way through Cohen's back catalogue, his sister squable through another and Nick Cave play lounge singer. I know it sounds tempting, but let me just say, one more time, it is anything but.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 06:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It has to happen, really. Robert Altman has always been an exceptionally prolific auteur who has labored under the hit or miss strategem. Lately, there have been quite a few misses, and A Praire Home Companion is one such film. The slow narrative pull of the film becomes, at times, rather maddening, while the ensemble never quite tickles you the way they should. Sure, John C. Reilly and Woody Harrelson's naughty cowboy routine is eye-rollingly affectionate and Virginia Madsen is (as is usual) stunning to behold, but the whole, quite sadly, does not equal the sum of its parts. And in the film, these parts form a greatly jumbled mess of nostalgia which teeter infuriatingly between working and not. Eventually, as one might have expected (at least I did) it turns into a nostalgic "remember when..." with the key figures meeting for an unspoken memorial in the neighborhood diner ('why hasn't this, too closed?' one might ask themself). Nobody's really a character, more personality which leaves a great deal to be desired. Lili Tomlin lacks any depth quite like Kevin Kline's Guy Noir (a name to match the obviousness and idiocy if his written character). And Miss Lohan, just to counter assumptions, delivers a fine performance. All the actors (save Kline) are good, the script from which they work, however, well, that's another story.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 06:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Like a coked up David Fincher or someone who learned subtlety from Sharon Stone, the (not really) newest native language film to flow from the pen of Luc Besson, District B-13, is a predictably good time with a tad too much purpose in its intent. Don't get me wrong, I will sing till the cows come home when it comes to the Transporter movies. I love me some stupid action. But to actually attempt at moral musings on genocide is a bit too much to ask of an action audience, particularly when it comes to the kind of spectacles that gloss over every opportune moment of Besson's canon.

In this case, the story doesn't work as well as some of his prior creations (Sadly underused here is Besson's absolutely fetishistic adoration of speedy automobiles). Too much exposition leads into a story about as flawed as stories come - which is all near coincidental if those pulse-racing moments of action mayhem deliver. The good news is, for the most part they do, and there's a bizarre amount of homosocial activity going on. Yet, the amount of cause to the film just leaves a taste of ulterior motives that sober the intoxicated glee of something like Transporter 2. In the final act, a poor plot decision cripples the dramatic tension leaving the rest of a film a let rather than come down. Thank god for the French and their Bad musical taste, because, without Da. Octopuss' trashy meth-like score, I don't think the film would have been nearly as good.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 05:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Back in 2000, when X-Men was released, people were worried that one of the best comics with valid social concerns would come out looking like Supergirl. Of course they were excited, too. And that excitement is what will bring people into the theaters to see the third installation in the franchise. As they staved off mediocrity with the first two features, two films which resonated with contemporary social parallels and cultural concerns that made them very valid, the third installment perhaps prophetically titled X-Men: The Last Stand succumbs to the action fiasco that threatened to devour the first two.

What this film ends up doing is set the stage for an X-Men 4 where they won't have to pay so many big stars as, yes, the rumors are true, there are deaths. I won't say who, but in the trajectory of the film, they arrive entirely too soon to have any real emotional impact on us, leaving a mostly new stock of American Idol-esque X-teens. As can perhaps be gleaned by the comparison, none of these newbies have any sort of charisma. Charisma is the last thing on Brett Ratner's mind. Instead, it reads something like this: "Blow shit up! Explosions! Explosions!" And not in a good way. Previous destructive exploits yielded giddy pleasure where these just like fire for fire. If there's no plausibility in the film (and believe me, in this film it is a dirty word) than there are no consequences for any of the explosive action.

The film has entirely too many characters, and Ratner's claim to fame, the Rush Hour movies, are so duo heavy that an ensemble crew goes entirely to waste on him. None of the potentially fantastic new characters are given their moment in the sun - many of the figures on those poorly designed billboards which cover the city have 5 lines of dialogue, tops. Choosing to focus on Halle Berry doesn't help. Even when she's shooting bolts of lightning out of her fingertips, she's boring. Kelsey Gramer's Beast is also quite dull - again, because of this disdain for any plausible storylines. He is meant to be a political representative, but you never for a moment believe that a culture so mutant phobic would take advice from a bellowing furry blue beast.

The script is a succession of "wouldn't it be cool if..."s all threaded together with a very weak storyline. Everything moves along entirely too quickly and, similar to the would-be-critical plot of this year's Ultraviolet, the film never allows its audience to think about the terms of its claims. The premise is ponder worthy, surely. If there was a cure for difference, would you take it? But you can't see through the smoke of all the explosions long enough to think about much of anything. The rest is all parlor tricks. Those slight, cheap visual puns which make an audience snicker once, but leave a great lot to be desired. There's a scene where Magneto fantastically moves the Golden Gate bridge. When all is done, the couple in the car in front of him locks their doors. He shoots them a knowing look. The audience laughs. Snore.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 10:56 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In select theaters, Cineastes are thrilled to welcome Jean Pierre Melville's Franco Noir ThrillerArmy of Shadows. It is the first time the film has come to the United States in any form and is being universally celebrated. So, perhaps instead of filling Tom Hanks' wallet this weekend, might I suggest something decidedly more French than Audrey Tautou who is about as French as Halle Berry is black. Also, Olivier Assayas' Clean is released in LA this weekend to wonderful reviews.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 11:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yesterday, I did the unthinkable. I attended a matinee screening (so as to not let those scientologists get all of my money) of Mission Impossible 3. The film was just what it needed to be. It was a fast burst of adrenaline. It was an around the world sweeping emotional fiasco. Our hardly fleshed out crew of ethnically diverse Impossible missionaries jump from Berlin to the Vatican to Shanghai. Phillip Seymore Hoffman was fine as the baddie, though he could have been a bit more bad. The most fun, however, was watching Tom Cruise play American man. As he has recently been compared to Michael Jackson, Cruise looks lost in the labyrinth of normalcy. 'How did I get here?' Cruise may wonder. And to that there is no easy answer, but nowhere near impossible.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 07:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

If you enjoy watching facsimile films which tear entire chunks from more lively predocessors with an uncompromisingly lifeless vigor, then An American Haunting is your movie. For anyone else who respects those things that seem wholly unimportant these days like script and plot development, sit this one out. True, the film does star horror alumns Sissy Spacek and Donald Sutherland, yet in the wrong hands, these actors might as well be mannequins. Then there would be something original to the film, rather than their stabs like "ghosty vision," which of course whirls about the room and flickers from color to black and white, creepy dead girls (which should really be done away with altogether - especially the ones whom you touch and watch decay in a matter of seconds) and moral add-ons which render the triteness which you are watching unfold insurmountable. There is no mysterious tension which can make even the worst ghost story remotely compelling. Instead you have a blatantly studio set "haunted house" with more reshot scenes than not and a contemporary tie in that shows even less energy than the ahem... spiritless period segments. This film may have singlehandedly made me see far fewer big budget Hollywood films this summer. So, in retrospect, maybe it wasn't all that bad.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 02:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Out this week in theaters we can find good old horror vets, Sissy and Donny, in An American Haunting. I'm sure that the performances will be total auto-pilot. In her most recent films, Spacek has been more an actor wearing a Sissy mask rather than that wonderful dirty pillow wielding hellion of her youth. Sutherland always does whatever the hell he wants. Seldom is this an interesting thing. The last time we saw Spacek in horror, she was telling Naomi Watts to drown her baby in Ring II. Let's hope this is that memorable (with a tad more screen time), though I'm not holding my breath.

And here we have actual footage of Tom Cruise being beamed up into L. Ron's spaceship... Err... Actually, that's a shot from M:I III. Though doesn't that look suspiciously like a spaceship. I wonder if this is going to be the most Scientolerific flick since Battlefield Earth. Oh, I need not ask questions to which I already know the answers. LA Weekly staff writer Scott Foundas just lost all credibility in his review of the film, deeming Cruise "the most graceful physical performer since Burt Lancaster." Guess I'll just have to go back to good old J. Hoberman.

Terry Zwigoff brings us yet another dose of ironic apathy with the insufferable looking Art School Confidential. Perhaps I'm not the best person to listen to in this department. It's just a film that shallowly attempts to uproot everything I spent four years studying and believing in full earnestness doesn't exactly rub me right. And, unlike most of the world, I HATED Ghost World.

And since Ang Lee's to busy watching homos mack, Farewell My Concubine director, Kaige Chen, returns to the screen with the Crouching Tiger looking The Promise which promises (sorry, couldn't resist) to be all too familiar, just by the preview (House of Flying Dragon Tiger whatever)...

And the first worst title of the year nomination goes to Hoot which leads one to wonder, 'if I become an environmentalist, do I have to wear short shorts? One Last Thing... find Cynthia Nixon trying to find life after Sex and the City by manipulating viewers with this inspirational film about a terminally ill teen who wants to date a supermodel. The depth is remarkable. And finally, the Nick Cave penned Australian Western, The Proposition lands in Los Angeles theaters this week. The cast of Guy Pearce and Emily Watson seems somewhat promising if not too typical.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 11:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Anyone who has had the unfortunate displeasure of listening to the soundtrack Björk birthed for Matthew Barney's Drawing Restraint 9 might have had an understanding of what they were getting themselves into entering the theater for the 2:15 minute extravaganza. Furthermore, someone who sat through Barney's 5 part Cremaster Cycle might have known that, while proceeding through the cycle, Barney's narcissitc showmanship began to take center stage - before the alleged subject. And were one to sit down with Mr. Barney and chat, he could make sense of every moment of Drawing Restraint 9, leaving you only moments later to wonder, 'wait, that really doesn't make any sense at all.' In fact, what we have is a contemporary art world Emporer's New Clothes. His sets and periphanalia are fetishitically beautiful, of that we have not doubt, but Mr. Barney as experimental filmmaker (or, as he prefers, a narrative sculptor), leaves a tad too much to be desired.

Without becoming to personable, I went to CalArts, and though majoring in the Fine Art department, the majority of my labors were spent in the Film school. I have seen more experimental films than I care to admit to. I love them. It is truly my primary passion. There is a delivery that must come in demanding experimental works. It is the moment that hits you like a tidal wave, when suddenly you understand why you have been looking at this one thing for 30-odd minutes. You must experience it in order for this work, at least in my mind, to have value. That moment, however, does not come in Mr. Barney's film.

What then, is Drawing Restrain 9 if not an experimental film? It is a love letter from Matthew Barney and Björk to Matthew Barney and Björk. I would say, without trying to be too snyde, that is the primary purpose for this. They both narcissistically pose and move with a lathargically self-important anti-vigor. The camera, ever present in their performative inneptitude. Both have taken their self-indulgences entirely too far - and what is yeilded, however "avant-garde" people might claim, is absolutely mediocre. Avant Garde is not synonymous with bad. Watching Drawing Restraint 9, I exerienced a similar emotion as the first time I listened to Björk's last proper album(Medúlla): embarasssement. I felt embarrassed that these two potentially talented people (I have been fans of both artists' works in the past) yielded such great works of self-love. Barney (and in a lesser way, Björk as well) has created a formula where, since the work is "experimental", confused people = good art. Not always the case. There is a language to such film, one to which this barely abides.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 06:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

United 93 opens this weekend and Scott Foundas (whose opinion I am coming to respect more and more) had nothing but the most positively glowing things to say about it. It sounds, however, as though the typical American moviegoer will find it boring. But hell, if they can sit through The Passion of the Christ there's no telling what they are capable of.

I can't fathom how anyone would ever want to see R.V.. That Robin Williams could possibly think anyone could believe him as a straight father is something. Based on a couple of reviews, this one is more of a stinker than that substance which covers the family in the photo. (I think you can guess what it is.)

A ludicrous Germanic gay film called Guys and Balls recounts the dull story of a gay man who wants to put together an all gay football (remember, this means soccer in American) team. Zzzzzzzz....

Stick It and the Starbuck's marketed Akeelah and the Bee also land in multiplexes across America today. But really, haven't we had enough of the whole spelling bee thing?

Andy Garcia directs and stars in The Lost City. Sounds like fun. (Sense the sarcasm?) Larry Clark's latest offering Wassup Rockers hits screens today. And Olivier Assayas' Cannes Award winning Clean opens in New York. Looks like we Los Angelinos will have to wait.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 12:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Scott Foundas, a staff writer for LA Weekly, perfectly summed up Cate Shortland's debut feature, Somersault, when he likened it to "one of those Joni Mitchell ballads about traveling in some vehicle through an unspecified landscape and trying to find a sense of yourself." Like a Mitchell song, Somersault is hopelessly sentimental, yet its earnestness saves it from the damnation I would normally ascribe to the more emotively pornographic heart-string pluckers prolifically swarming multiplexes everywhere. The film's absolute quiescence humbles the film, preventing it from employing the manipulative tactics of most coming of age films. The shots are a tad too beautiful for the film's own good, but because of the dynamism of the main character(which is the Somersault's irrefutable strength), it is tolerable, at times fulfilling, even. The night shots of a snow strewn Australian resort town are certainly worthy of celebration here.

However, Decoder Ring's tres-cool soundtrack is another potential notch against the film, and though it has its effective moments, its glitches and whirs are nauseously hip and cause cringes where there should be soft mews of affirmation. Where a very similar (and potentially damning, had Somersault not been made in the same year) film My Summer Of Love perfectly melds Goldfrapp's original score with its lush images, too great of a disconnect is present here, leaving one wanting of a moment of silence rather than dampered guitars. A likening to My Summer of Love is truly inevitable. The films are oppositionally-seasoned sisters. Had Somersault followed My Summer of Love, it would be far more suspect. But as it is, I would strongly recommend giving this one a couple hours of your time. You won't leave empty handed.

My experience of the film was certainly one of a kind, as the Sunset 5 in Hollywood has Somersault playing just next door to Abominable, a bigfoot monster flick. During the quietest moments of Somersault, the rumblings of Bigfoot's rampages shook the theater. Rather poignantly, it seemed to occur at all the right moments. Hand holding and emotionally eruptive scenes took on an even greater pertinence. It lead me to wonder, if "quiet film" filmmakers shouldn't break from the mold and start actually using sound (as the film's "Sound Designer" appears in the opening credits) a bit more daringly. But then I suppose it wouldn't be a quiet film, would it?

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 11:57 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Why did Spike Lee make Inside Man? Well, let's face it, it's not as though he's had a whole lot going on recently. I mean did anyone see She Hate Me? I rest my case. I was not really looking forward to it, I must admit, but I am always willing to like something (unless of course it stars Will Farrell, in which case, you won't even get me within 200 feet of the theater). And though I will hand it to the film for delivering some witty dialogue and a clever, grade-A caper twist, Inside Man begins to drag its feet at the end of the first act and never truly recovers. At no point is the hold up even tense, lasting well into the next day (although the scenes of the petrified hostages are sobering - alluding not only to our current war, but specifically to Abu Graib through the use of masks and hoods). And even when the caper proper is through, the film trudges on... and on.

Juggling his poignant racial faux-pas and his heavy handed ones, Lee plods his way through the film without any set style or agenda - catering, one might assume to his whims. This plays out like a severely disjointed effects reel. At one moment, we've got a still Denzel Washington zooming forward on a platform as the crowd around him lurches forward in slow motion. Another pits us birds-eye in the bank, observing the waspily coiffed Jodie Foster "do business" with the hooded Clive Owen, bathed in golden lighting. Capers can be fun, and it would be dishonest to say that this one does not deliver. However, the dull outweighs the clever and you never find your heart racing quite like it should.

Now, I made fun of the movie before it even came out for its use of the most humor deprived actors in Hollywood. Washington does frequently attempt at humor here, though much of it falls very flat. Owen, well... how do you tell a joke with a cloth around your face and a gun in your hand. Owen is suave, but seldom humorous. Ms. Foster, on the other hand, is a complete surprise. Her perfectly named Madeline White is all smug cuntdom (a description at least adapted from the film itself - I'm not just being mean here). She traipses along, confidently swinging her $5,000 bag to and fro. She makes jokes! What's more, they're ones that we laugh at - AND SHE'S LAUGHING TOO! At one point she claims, "Now if you'll excuse me I have to go acquire a Park avenue co-op for Osama Bin Laden's nephew." This is not the humor of Flightplan - where everyone's laughing but her. No! She's a super-bitch and she's loving every minute of it. Critics have argued that her character is unnecessary, and while I might understand this claim, I think it is Foster (surprise of my life) that breathed a greatly needed breath of fresh air into the film.

Though the caper is wonderfully planned, the film bores itself in the details. All of the interesting mysteries that you believe (if only for a moment) that you might be left to chew on are resolved in horrifically blatant snippets of dialogue. I'd say wait, and when there's nothing better to do... TiVo it. Oh, and just for clarifications sake, my title for this review does not refer to the caper itself. Allow it instead to serve as the answer to the question posed in my introductory sentence.

Posted by Bradford Nordeen at 10:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As misanthropic as it sounds, sometimes it's just a hell of a lot of fun watching people get their heads shot off. When done correctly (like in the recent Hills Have Eyes remake) it can be exhilarating, scary, and vindicating. Like contemporary action fare (which most assume to be easy, but allow the countless action dullards to prove otherwise) it is only true bliss placed in the hands of a true connoisseur. James Gunn, writer/director of the new horror/comedy