Sunset Gun

Year Weird--2005 at the Movies

Top Ten of 2005 and other bits of love, hate and confusion:

Top 10 Favorite Movies of 2005 (in no order):

My Summer of Love—A movie to swoon over. Writer-director Paul Pavlikovsky films with a style that's both picaresque and rough—like a Dogme film done by photographer David Hamilton. And the beguiling leads, Nathalie Press and Emily Blunt get teenage girls, or rather, overly intelligent, confused, weird teenage girls. And incredibly cute experimental lesbians.

Dear Wendy—I love how borderline insane Lars von Trier has become when dissecting his vision of America and yet, oddly true and fiendishly funny. And if you don’t see the humor in his films (especially his masterpiece Dogville) then you’re really missing out.  Dear Wendy (which von Trier scripted, Thomas Vinterberg directed) is another great outsider perspective, looking at America’s  love affair with firearms with such fetishistic detail that the movie could win over both a left wing pacifist and a “proud to be an American” patron at a gun show. He’s not simply judging guns—he clearly gets why people like them so much. When the film's kids--"The Dandies" (led by the uber talented Jamie Bell) reveal the names and specifications for their guns, it’s filmed with such wonderful punch (all the songs are by The Zombies) that I became ridiculously giddy. And I love when Bell proclaims that a Glock has no soul. He's right. “Dear Lars von Trier, I love you so much it almost hurts.” How many times can I write "love" for a movie about guns?

Capote—So smooth and precise, the film almost makes one wonder if it’s indeed, “great”--chiefly because it refuses to make a spectacle of itself (a good thing). But thanks to Philip Seymour Hoffman’s take on Truman Capote, what could have felt like an HBO TV movie is enlivened by a brilliant performance that manages to show the range of sadness, exploitation, superficiality, self loathing and genius--sometimes all in one scene.

Old Boy—Old Boy goes over the deep end more than once. And at times you think, why would anyone go to these lengths? But the film isn’t a bit of gritty realism a la Mike Leigh or Ken Loach, it’s a pulpy blast of B-cinema made so artfully you can’t possibly call it B. It just is what it is. Director Park Chan-wook’s kinetic style and way with revenge (also see Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance—which is even better than Old Boy) is stunningly energizing, absurd and deeply sad.

Sin City—Sure, its terribly self conscious neo-noir. And no, it’s not Detour or Out of the Past or Born to Kill or Double Indemnity, it’s something else—a true graphic novel come to cinematic life. Frank Miller’s vision and Robert Rodriquez skills with digital filmmaking recreate the shadow world of Miller's graphic novel with such stunning faithfulness to Miller’s look that it’s bloody gorgeous art. And Mickey Rourke is absolutely sublime.

Grizzly Man— In the words D.K. Holm, Werner Herzog is a “location masochist.” Here he gets to feed off another’s masochism (which makes him a sadist as well) with the story of Timothy Treadwell, a guy who wanted to mutate into a grizzly. Instead he was mutilated. Herzog always paints a compelling portrait, warts and all (and there are some serious warts here) as Grizzly Man showcases the weirdness of a guy who wanted to be some kind of C-list Jane Goodall.   

Last Days—Hypnotic, visually stunning and charged with a powerfully somnambulant performance by Michael Pitt (it’s not just all the back of his head here); Last Days becomes more than a film about the tragedy of Kurt Cobain but a meditation on the reality of depression. I don't think I've ever been this mesmerized by a junkie mumbling to himself while fixing cereal but Last Days is so beautiful and weirdly uneasy, that I felt like I could watch this moment for hours. Many moments. And Gus Van Sant has the balls to make real art films—real art films—without coming off as merely precious or pretentious.

A History Of Violence—Violence could be viewed alongside Brokeback Mountain as another aspect to the, uh, uniqueness stirring underneath the Norman Rockwell veneer of of Americana. Never one to simplify his “message,” David Cronenberg’s take on violence is so oddly perverse yet sweet, tense and unrelenting (admit it, you liked it when Viggo Mortenson rips that guy’s nose off) that it leaves one stunned and jumbled. Or, really just feeling like you want to kill someone.

Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang—A wonderful explication of the tarnished dreams of Hollywood, a loving ode to pulp detective fiction and that other gay movie that depicts a homosexual without sashaying stupidity and cheap jokes, Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang is one of the funniest most entertaining and enlivening Hollywood pictures to come out in a long, long time. In his directorial debut screenwriter  Shane Black (whom I revere for writing The Last Boy Scout and The Long Kiss Goodnight) knocks this one out of the proverbial park with an infectiously jazzy rhythm mingling with the  layered yet hilarious leads (Robert Downey Jr., Michelle Monaghan and Val Kilmer as the bad-ass “Gay Perry”). This is the film Get Shorty wanted to be but so, so wasn’t. For those who missed it—What the hell is wrong with you?

King Kong— I’m going to be real mature on this one but, to all those who told me this was a self-indulgent, boring, Peter Jackson nerd fest, “Fuck all y’all!”   

The Worst of 2005:

Rent—Whaaaattt? I know it’s a beloved, award winning musical but, one, WHY is it a beloved, award winning musical? And two, how could they make this after Team America: World Police?

Best Director:

Tie: Gus Van Sant, Last Days/Peter Jackson, King Kong

Best Screenplay:

Shane Black, Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang

Best Actor:

Heath Ledger—Brokeback Mountain

Best Actress: Tie:

Reese Witherspoon, Walk the Line/Robin Wright Penn, Nine Lives

Best Ensemble:

The 40-Year-Old Virgin

Best Soundtrack:

Walk the Line

Most Underappreciated Film:

Tie: The Lords of Dogtown/Mr. and Mrs. Smith

Biggest Guilty Pleasure:

The Skeleton Key

Best Documentary that Should Have Been Released in Theaters:

No Direction Home

Best Newcomer Breakout:

Nathalie Press and Emily Blunt, My Summer of Love

Best Non Newcomer Breakout:

Terrence Howard, Hustle and Flow

Best Comeback:

Mickey Rourke, Sin City

Best Chemistry:

Tie: Naomi Watts and Andy Serkis/Kong, King Kong/ Joaquin Phoneix and Reese Witherspoon, Walk the Line

Most Disapointing:

Oliver Twist

Funniest Moment:

Vince Vaughn’s “I felt like Jodie Foster in The Accused” scene in The Wedding Crashers

Best Horror Movie:

The Devil’s Rejects (almost made my top ten)

Worst Re-make:

The Longest Yard

Best Re-make:

King Kong

Director best emulating cinematic cocaine:

My beloved Tony Scott, Domino

Best Sex Scene:

A History of Violence

Most Touching Moment:

Brokeback Mountain--When Heath Ledger’s tortured gay cowboy responds to lover Jake Gyllenhaal’s postcard with “You bet.”

Worst Age Makeup:

Brokeback Mountain

Still an Interesting Actor No Matter How Personally Insane:

Tom Cruise, War of the Worlds

My Favorite DVD Releases:

Point Blank

Night Moves

Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia

No Direction Home

Val Lewton Box Set

Bringing Up Baby

The Devil’s Rejects Unrated Edition

Night and the City: The Criterion Edition

L'Eclisse: The Criterion Edition

Raging Bull Special Edition

Movies I regretfully missed/didn’t screen in time:

Munich, The New World, Good Night and Good Luck, Murderball, The Best of Youth and Syriana.

Sunset Gun Christmas

Merry Christmas!

Love,

Santa, Kim and Ray Liotta's brother...

Alternative Christmas: Ten Movies to Watch Instead of It's a Wonderful Life--From My MSN Story

The winter holidays are supposed to be well, traditional. Placing the star atop the tree, drinking too much eggnog, kissing your sweetie under the mistletoe, engaging in the uncomfortable office party and, yes, watching It's a Wonderful Life for the ten hundredth time. Traditions all part and parcel to the holiday spirit and, sorry to say, boredom.

But I don't want to pull a Scrooge and label the cinematic tradition of every angel getting its wings tiresome (after all, I revere It's a Wonderful Life); I'd just like to stir things up a bit, especially for those on movie autopilot. So for those sick of the borderline George Bailey hollering his "Merry Christmas" all over the place, we've got just the list for you. And, honestly, I did check it twice.

10. Elf (2003) First off, there's Will Ferrell as an elf in that costume. But Bob Newhart as his adoptive father? And Ed Asner as Santa? Well, now here's a Christmas movie. Ferrell plays lovably inept Buddy the Elf, who's not really an elf but a large human raised by Santa's elves at the North Pole. When Buddy really understands why he can never fit in (literally -- the lumbering guy can barely walk through a door), he sets off to New York in search of his real father (James Caan). Sadly, however, cynical Dad, along with a lot of other city dwellers, needs extra cups of good cheer during the overtaxed, lost-its-meaning holiday. Buddy is going to see to it that everyone's going to get some, no matter how obnoxious his methods. And he is obnoxious. And yet Elf never succumbs to shrillness or cheap emotions. The film is so genuinely good hearted that at a certain point even the most skeptical simply give in and say, awww ... this is really darn sweet. Even when the dwarf attacks Buddy ...

9. 8 Women (2002) Let's just examine the women first -- Danielle Darrieux, Catherine Deneuve, Isabelle Huppert, Emmanuelle Béart, Fanny Ardant, Virginie Ledoyen, Ludivine Sagnier and Firmine Richard. That many renowned French actresses in one movie is something of a gift in itself. Now, add gorgeous 1950s set design and color that emulates MGM Technicolor at its finest and throw in song and dance numbers. Did we mention this was also a murder mystery? That's almost a side point in François Ozon's tale of eight women holed up in a house one snowy, Agatha Christie-inspired Christmas. Like opening an especially substantive French Vogue only to have the models jump out and sing a Serge Gainsbourg song while shimmying in a particularly stunning outfit, "8 Women" is tres jolie.

8. Eyes Wide Shut (1999) OK, so a movie that features a freaky orgy and a masked Tom Cruise isn't exactly the Christmas cheer grandma's itching to watch (Or is it? Granny?). But when we said alternative, we meant it. And besides that, Stanley Kubrick's swan song is an underrated masterpiece that just happens to pepper its social, sexual, surrealist themes with the very festive, pretty and, in this case, creepy Christmas background. Cruise plays a wealthy New York doctor who's shocked to learn his beautiful wife (Nicole Kidman) has desired another. Upset and on a mission of emotional revenge, Tom wanders around New York and finds himself in a mysterious mansion where an Illuminati-like order of men engage in bizarre ritualistic sex. And that is just the beginning. Bathed in Christmas style, Eyes Wide Shut uses Christmas lights, a ton of background Christmas trees (go ahead ... count 'em) and traditional colors of red and green with almost perverse relentlessness. And perverse relentlessness is really what we'd like this year. Pretty please!

7. Edward Scissorhands (1990) We know, we know. Where's the obvious The Nightmare Before Christmas? That's the Tim Burton Christmas movie. But is that the favorite Tim Burton Christmas movie? Not for us. Edward Scissorhands, which doesn't take place strictly during the holidays, is his most fairy tale Christmas best. Depicting the moving story of an orphaned boy (Johnny Depp) with scissors for hands, the fantasy reveals both the pure intentions of goodwill and human understanding and how quickly it can dissolve into fear and distrust. And its got one heck of a holiday scene in which Edward makes a gorgeous snow angel for his beloved (Winona Ryder) only to be forced back into hiding. A lovely, dark tale, Edward Scissorhands makes the misfit in all of us bawl like little babies.

6. The Thin Man (1934) Though we drain our savings accounts for an Xbox 360 and attempt to ladle big old spoonfuls of good cheer on our fellow man, there are still really two things that happen copiously during Christmastime -- eating and drinking. In the case of The Thin Man, we'll just say drinking, drinking, drinking. Not that the droll, debonair sleuthing of Nick (William Powell) and Nora (Myrna Loy) Charles is just about the booze -- this charming gumshoe screwball does involve a murder mystery. But as the story unfolds during the holiday season, we are allowed to enjoy the dipsomaniac duo in their natural habitat of swanky cocktail parties, here occurring on both Christmas Eve and Christmas day. Frothy, fun and witty, The Thin Man is the perfect tonic for the sometimes saccharine season, especially when Nora, tiring of good tidings, responds to a partygoer's "Merry Christmas" with "The next person who says Merry Christmas to me, I'll kill 'em."

5. Gremlins (1984) A funny, scary creature feature or a cautionary tale about getting last-minute trendy gifts for your kids? "Gremlins" is both. It's also hilarious, clever and oddly, for young ones, amazingly freaky at times. After a father nabs a unique present (the seriously cute Mogwai) for his son, their picture-perfect town is ultimately besieged with havoc-wreaking green monsters. Why? Because the owners didn't abide by the rules: 1. Keep it away from bright light, 2. Don't get any water on it, and 3. Do not feed it after midnight. Let us pray this never happens with this year's popular Bratz dolls.

4. The Night of the Hunter (1955) Charles Laughton's masterful Night of the Hunter is renowned for Robert Mitchum's stunning turn as murderous preacher Harry Powell, but it's also a terrific Christmas story. Two children, Pearl and John, orphaned after Powell murders their mother, escape the certain doom of their new stepfather. They wind up in the household of the kind, elderly woman Rachel (Lillian Gish) who gives one heck of a gift by saving them from the psychotic Powell. But she also gives the film one memorable Christmas. John, so thankful for Rachel but too poor to afford a gift, wraps an apple in a doily and shyly presents it to his new matriarch. It's tough not to lose it when she remarks, "that's the richest gift a body could have." And after John is amazed by the watch Rachel gives him, she delivers yet another one of the movie's most famous speeches: "Lord, save little children. You'd think the world would be ashamed to name such a day as Christmas for one of them and then go on in the same old way. My soul is humble when I see the way little ones accept their lot. Lord, save little children. The wind blows and the rain's a-cold. Yet they abide ... They abide and they endure." Sigh. Required viewing for every spoiled brat on the planet.

3. Shane Black's trinity of Christmas movies: Lethal Weapon (1987) / The Long Kiss Goodnight (1996) / Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang (2005) Either Christmas was the ultimate holiday for future million-dollar screenwriter/director Shane Black, or it served up the most miserable memories of his childhood. Because Black loves setting his cynical/sweet/crazy action extravaganzas during Christmas, we can't decide. There's an insane, bereft, suicidal Mel Gibson partnering up with Danny Glover during the holidays (Lethal Weapon); there's amnesia victim Geena Davis driving home from a Christmas party and hitting her head after running over a deer (to which she puts the animal of out its misery by snapping its neck) only to remember she's an ace assassin (The Long Kiss Goodnight); and there's petty-thief (he's stealing Christmas presents)-turned-unsuccessful-actor Robert Downey Jr. embroiled in a murder mystery with a snarky gay detective played by Val Kilmer (Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang). Again, all set during Christmas and with Christmas music and even, in two films, cute Christmas outfits. We understand that Christmas makes for a good dramatic backdrop. And we get that Black's underrated pictures comment on the real and supposed goodness during the holidays. But we're still wondering why everyone is on the brink and in some cases, completely psychotic so consistently. Really, we want to know. If you're reading, Shane, please illuminate.

2. Die Hard (1988) Sure there's that touching movie about a cynical man at odds with his wife and family, questioning the meaning of life (ahem, It's a Wonderful Life). And then there's that one where a guy does the same thing, only he takes on a pack of German terrorists, worms around an under siege L.A. office tower and throws bad guys down elevator shafts with notes that say: "Now I have a machine gun, ho, ho, ho." You know, the one before the vengeance. Bruce Willis is John McClane, a New York City cop visiting his estranged family during Christmas Eve when his wife's office party is taken hostage by Alan Rickman's nefarious Christmas song-humming gang. No angels are needed for McClane to re-assess his life, just some machine gun fire. Mirroring both the strong bond we should have for family during such special times and the stress we undergo while making everything "special" (some mothers really do feel like they're scaling a tower riddled with terrorists as they elbow through the mall), Die Hard is in many ways, an incredibly thoughtful, message-laden Christmas movie. Yippee-ki-yay, mother ... er ... father Christmas!

1. Bad Santa (2003) Though Ron Howard tried in vain to remake How the Grinch Stole Christmas, it was director Terry Zwigoff who actually got "Seussical" with the ribald, nasty, hilarious Bad Santa -- a movie in which every 10 minutes you think, how did they get away with that? How did this get made? This Christmas fable stars Billy Bob Thornton as a lovable and hateable drunk mall Santa/con man. The film isn't based on The Grinch per say and (as far as we know) we've not read any book by Seuss where a department store Santa makes very vocal whoopee in a ladies' changing room, but its subversive spirit and Thornton's melting dark heart does the Dr. proud. Thornton's Kringle and his dwarf partner (a hilarious Tony Cox) are set to rob the Phoenix mall that employs them. But the bad Santa undergoes a transformation when the unimaginable happens -- he actually feels something for a kid that won't leave him alone. And what an annoying, bullied, chubby little tyke at that (the perfect Brett Kelly). What's so wickedly wonderful about Bad Santa is not just that it dares to be so raunchy (and on Christmas!), but that it really is at heart about a man understanding the importance of a child's inherent sweetness. Without saccharine sentiment, without swelling strings befitting a Tim Allen movie, without uh, sobriety, Bad Santa may be one of the greatest Christmas movies ever made.

Want It's A Wonderful Life? A Christmas Story? Read my MSN Classic Christmas List.

Because I've been Repulsed--Repulsion Revisted

"I hate doing this to a beautiful woman."
--Roman Polanski cameraman Gil Taylor

Roman Polanski knows women because he understands men. He knows both sexes because he understands the games both genders play, either consciously or instinctively. He understands the perversions formed from such relations and translates them into visions that are erotic, disturbing, humorous and, most important, allegorical in their potency. One should not (as so many did with his misunderstood Bitter Moon) take Polanski's films literally, for they are often heightened versions of what occurs naturally in our world: desire, perversion, repulsion.

Film writer Molly Haskell said that at the core of Polanski's work is the "image of the anesthetized woman, the beautiful, inarticulate, and possibly even murderous somnambulate." Her observation is astute, but it's followed by the tired criticism that in all of Polanski's films, including Repulsion, "the titillations of torture are stronger than the bonds of empathy." Of course. Polanski's removed morality is exactly why he is often brilliant: He is so empathetic to his characters that, like a trauma victim floating above the pain, he is personally impersonal. He insightfully scrutinizes what is so frightening about being human, yet he doesn't feel the need to be resolute or sentimental about his cognizance. He is also, consciously or subconsciously, aware of the darkness he explores, especially in his female characters--who could be seen as extensions of himself. 1965's Repulsion proves as much.

Starring ice goddess Catherine Deneuve, Repulsion is one of the most frightening studies of madness ever filmed. Deneuve plays Carol, a nervous young manicurist who shares an apartment with her sexually active sister (Yvonne Furneaux). At first Carol goes about her days in the salon, where she quietly tends to bossy old ladies' fleshy cuticles; walking outside, where she unsuccessfully avoids the leering glances and advances of men; and languishing about the apartment, where, with disgust, she listens to the noises of her sister's lovemaking and silently despises the men who visit. She exhibits a pathological shyness and repression that slowly spiral into madness after her sister leaves on holiday. Carol's dementia creates perplexing hallucinations: sexual acts with a greasy man whom she simultaneously loathes and lusts after; greedy hands poking through walls and kneading her soft flesh; and the moving and cracking of walls. Left alone, she is able to act out what she is so afraid of: the dark sludge of desire.

The obscure, slippery and decayed complexities of such desire are conveyed brilliantly in Repulsion. The diseased atmosphere of Carol's womb is meticulously created with Polanski's use of camera angles, sound effects and images of clutter. Though music is used effectively, Polanski relies more on amplifying the sounds of everyday life--the ticking of a clock, the voices of nuns playing catch in the convent garden, the dripping of a faucet--to convey the acute awareness Carol acquires in response to her fear. Polanski also dresses the film with pertinent details that further exemplify both Carol's madness and the aching passage of time: Potatoes sprout in the kitchen, meat (rabbit meat, no less) rots on a plate and eventually collects flies, various debris of blood, food and liquids form naturally around Carol. The film's inventive use of black-and-white film, wide-angle lenses and close-ups creates an unsparing vision of sickness, and Deneuve's performance is effectively mysterious. The viewer, however, is able to empathize with Carol, which is how she lures us into her web in the first place. As Polanski cameraman Gil Taylor muttered during filming, "I hate doing this to a beautiful woman."

Yet one loves to do this to a beautiful woman, especially one like Deneuve--at first. Deneuve's loveliness makes Carol's madness more palatable (her unfortunate suitor thinks she is odd, but he can't help but "love" this gorgeous woman), but eventually it becomes horrifying. Carol is not simply a Hitchcockian aberration of what lies beneath the "perfect woman," she is the reflection of what lies beneath repressed desire--in men and women. Polanski has a knack for casting women who are nervously exciting (Faye Dunaway in Chinatown is a blinking, twitching mess), and therefore dangerous to desire. He makes one insecure about longing for them. Deneuve is certainly nerve-racking. She is so physically flawless that she often seems half human: An anemic girl, she can barely lift up her arm, yet at the same time she is highly sensual, an ample, heavily breathing woman with more than a glint of carnality in her dreamily vacant eyes. Deneuve makes one feel the confusion of a corrupted child: She is an arrested adolescent who, like an anorexic, cannot face her womanliness without visions of perverse opulence and violence. Carol is the personification of sexual mystery--she is what lurks beneath the orgasms of pleasure and pain. What Polanski finds intriguing and revolting is perceptively female, making Repulsion a woman's picture more women may want to know.

Destroy All Monsters! My MSN Monster Mash

What makes a movie monster? Is it an enormous scaly apparition with the power to sack Tokyo? Is it an off-the-charts intellectual who dangerously mingles blood lust with fine cuisine? Or is it those demons we dream about -- horrible, green women whose cackling laughs taunt you with the tried and true, "I'll get you my pretty!" Of course, it's all of the above and then some. And to everyone there is one "monster" more horrifying than the other. As such, choosing a list of the greatest movie monsters is a difficult, uh, gargantuan process. Alien vs. Predator? Mothra vs. Godzilla? Wolfman vs. Mummy? Liza vs. Oprah? Stupid joke...

Anyway, because we've got Peter Jackson's newest, longest take on King Kong on our minds (and our televisions and computer screens and ...), I'm thinking of those bad boys who've penetrated pop culture in all their unsightly glory. And with exception given to the great finned one, I'm sticking to monsters -- those of the supernatural, uber-natural and unnatural form. No "real" people like, say Hannibal Lecter or Leatherface or Henry Lee Lucas (and they are "real" when standing next to fire-breathing lizards), but extraordinary, legendary beasts. Love them, Hate them, love to hate them and, in the words of Donna Summer (if she were singing to Gill-Man) love to love you baby.

10. Gill-Man, Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954) He may not be as scary and he may not have spawned as many sequels, but I'm partial to the sexed-up webbed one. Gill-Man, as the scientists call him, is a fancy looking reptilian being who appears as a half-human, half-slimy, fish-headed lizard. In Jack Arnold's beautifully photographed film, he's quite the swimmer -- the underwater sequences are famous -- and has a soft spot for the ladies (here, the comely Julie Adams) but deadly if you think of invading his home turf. Though he's supposed to be terrifying and sad, I think he's so fantastic looking (and oddly sexy) that I wonder just what his problem is. Serious about getting the girl, he should have simply maintained his appearance and offered his services to that monster band KISS. He'd never have to fight for a woman again.

Read the rest of the story here.

Genius, Gone--Richard Pryor

One of the funniest of all time.

RIP RP.

Blood Sucking Bore--Marebito

Reading the description of Marebito found me tremendously excited. All my needs for horror, gore and deviant sexuality (in film, in film) appeared to have been met: An alienated Harry Caul-like loner swimming in video and surveillance equipment is obsessed with the concept and epiphany of fear. A naked girl with weird skin is found after a subway ride provides a secret door to a bizarre fantasy underworld. She’s chained to a rock. The obsessed guy takes her to his apartment and attempts to acclimate her to “regular” Tokyo society. She spends most of her time not speaking. Instead, she sleeps and drinks blood.

Limitless possibilities, right? Wrong.

No masterpiece, fine, but I hoped at the very least, an anxious creep-out would emerge from this ghoulish subterranean. Another terrifying panic attack a la Pulse or an abnormal reverie akin to a Takashi Miike shocker. But sadly, Marebito doesn’t fly its freak (premise) flag as high or as powerfully or cogently as it should have. A major shame because, obviously, there’s a lot here to work with—something like Francis Ford Coppola’s The Conversation meets Michael Powell’s still controversial Peeping Tom in Japan. Or, shooting for the less than lofty, William Castle’s pulpy, shock-in-your-seats The Tingler. No such luck.

Directed by Takashi Shimizu, the man responsible for Ju-On and its American version, the entertaining and successful The Grudge, Marebito proves that though he may be one of the more popular J-horror (sick of that term) filmmakers, he’s certainly not one the best.

The film stars Tetsuo: Iron Man director Shinya Tsukamoto as a freelance news photographer who becomes utterly fascinated with terror. After a man’s horrifying suicide, he’s certain that these unfortunate souls see something at the direct moment of total fear (again, I thought of the creepy father in Peeping Tom and hoped this would prove fascinating). Following up on his theory he begins haunting the tunnels beneath Tokyo where he learns the humanoid, blood sucking creatures, the Deros (“detrimental robots”) reside among the homeless. Hmmm… Instead of dealing with the Deros (we think), he finds a nude waif with fierce teeth (Tomomi Miyashita) chained to a rock. As you probably gather, he takes her to his pad and attempts to figure the girl out.

As did I—to no avail. The confusion would be perfectly acceptable had the picture crafted a more compelling portrait of its patent themes—modern alienation, voyeurism and the tricky process of connection—but instead, it’s so bogged down with lame narration cliché and murky scare tactics, that it dragged on to tedium.

Shot in less than ten days and on DV, the picture does display an interesting mixture of hacky looking set design with effectively grungy settings and video camerawork. The look of the film, and the gore, meld into the real and unreal of this hero’s supposed journey. But what journey? And, who cares? Muddled and at times unintentionally funny, Marebito is disappointing for what it could have been. Fear, particularly blood sucking fear, should never be so wearisome.

The Other Morgan

Because I have no movie review today. Have a nice weekend!

Kim Morgan on DVD, Tierney, Collector and Laurette Taylor

A few days after DVD Tuesday and not the greatest release week. But here's some of note: Peter Jackson's The Frighteners: Director's Cut, King Kong vs. Godzilla/King Kong Escapes, March of the Penguins, The Muppet Movie: Anniversary Edition, Murderball and three with Brad Pitt--Mr. and Mrs. Smith, A River Runs Through It and Legends of the Fall (reviews coming). Next week is a lot more exciting with Otto Preminger's Where the Sidewalk Ends starring Dana Andrews and Gene Tierney and two terrific Henry Hathaway pictures--The Dark Corner and Kiss of Death, a film best remembered for Richard Widmark's giggling, psycho performance as Tommy Udo, or, the guy who shoves an old lady in a wheelchair down a staircase.

You can read all my DVD and Theatrical reviews at Strange Impersonation and check out whatever else I'm thinking at Pretty Poison.

As of now, Three Obsessions:

1. Born to Kill (1947) Nasty, mean, disturbingly sexual noir starring the great Lawrence Tierney at his brutal best. Claire Trevor (whom I worship--especially when she cooly discusses how painful it is to die: "A piece of metal sliding into your body, finding its way into your heart. Or a bullet tearing through your skin, crashing into a bone.") plays the black-hearted climber who falls for the similarly ruthless Tierney in a film adapted from the novel by James Gunn. Directed by Robert Wise, the film utilizes everything Wise learned from Val Lewton to stunning effect with, not only gorgeous noir lighting but genuinely nighmarish, violent attack sequences. 

A scene in which Tierney beats up and kills his ex-girlfriend and her lover will shock you much more than your modern eyes would expect. The supporting cast is also stellar (Walter Slezak, Esther Howard and the noir fixture Elisha Cook Jr.) but Tierney, good GOD, is he wonderfully evil here. Known to many (and to too many) as the rough talking oldster in Resevoir Dogs, young Tierney is a man with immense sex appeal, the ultimate alpha male, the ultimate tough guy just dripping with testosterone of the ticking time bomb variety. His flashes of anger are potently scary, intense and real. He's an odd cross between smoothness (his voice is more noir puncuated and level over gravely) and harsh moodiness ready to explode. And nothing he does seems fake--especially killing. But we are talking about a guy who, in real life was arrested more times than the character he played (John Dillinger) and who was knifed in a bar fight. Long live the late Lawrence Tierney.

2. The Collector by John Fowles. Though William Wyler's movie is creepy and well acted, the novel (published in 1963) is another experience entirely. The story--about a man who abducts a pretty student named Miranda and keeps her captive in his cellar--is framed beautifully, first from the collector's perspective and then to Miranda's diary in which she refers to her captor as "Caliban." Gorgeously written, incredibly sensitive to both characters (especially Miranda, but without the stock pity or bravery of a typical victim) and an intriguing look at class politics, it washes over you magically. You will not be able to put it down. On a very large side note--Fowles passed away last month.

3. Laurette Taylor Or rather, never getting to really see Laurette Taylor. During a discussion about the first method actor (as in, who really was the first) with a friend, we started talking about Laurette Taylor only furthering my obsession and frustration. Taylor, the stage legend (who did appear King Vidor's film Peg O' My Heart), is considered by many one of the most influential actor/tress for the future method--someone Clift, Brando and Dean owed a debt to. Her most famous, watershed part was Amanda Wingfield in The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams, a role she inaugurated and a role she would die playing (she died in 1947). She's discussed by many a theater patron and teacher who ever got to see her with breathless excitement about her absolute realness and incredible magnetism. She's also known as a notorious drunk who suffered greatly in life and profession. More must be written and known about her. Here's a poignant piece about her by Tennessee Williams from the New York Times in 1949. I just wish I could have truly experienced the actress.