DISTASTEFUL

DIRECTED BY DARREN ARONOFSKY

STARRING: NATALIE PORTMAN, VINCENT CASSEL, MILA KUNIS, BARBARA HERSHEY, BENJAMIN MILLEPIED AND WINONA RYDER

Back in home territory after a break in form of his 2008 film ‘the Wrestler’, director Darren Aronofsky looks to further upon his ‘Requiem for a Dream’ footing, with this inept interpretation of the Tchaikovsky classic ‘Swan Lake’. A minor replacement of a similar-looking Jennifer Connelly with a more convincing tragedy queen and a cunning extrapolation of the already-thriving sensuality of a certain Mila Kunis, Aronofsky goes to show once again how no one can leech on actors’ potential than he can, building a psychological drama on the ruins of a so-called script, unimpressive music and disengaging cinematography that is only too real to be dealing with a subject as this.

Having said that, I cannot help but let two icons go headfirst upon each other with an unlikely film-comparison which, I feel, is not entirely inappropriate. ‘Black Swan’ to me felt like an over-dramatized and yet underdone a version of Atom Egoyan’s 2009 film ‘Chloe’. Natalie Portman reminded me only too much of Julianne Moore in the latter and I couldn’t help but sense a trigger. Let me also do another odd but worthy comparison of the kid-interns in the two flicks – Amanda Seyfried versus Mila Kunis. And I see no big difference, with both of them having portrayed roles that people could walk away with (which is predominantly why they both were able to do them and well!) and I seriously do not understand the credit received on either’s part. I mean, I could even sympathize with Seyfried’s titular role of ‘Chloe’, but lauding a mere figment of imagination? I thought the world could do way better than that, I’m sorry.

Here, Aronofsky shows the dancers to be vengeful, spiteful and what not – maybe he could inspire the very same in them, a sort of reverse-osmosis. As ever, he champions the knack of stripping the experts of their clothes and basks in the feat of exposing their nakedness to the world, well, he only takes a step further when it comes to ballerinas. And yet, he finds himself most strongly backed by a fired-up Natalie Portman, who looks determined to grow out of her body as Miss Kunis finds herself at home doing the same. Vincent Cassel, another one of grace and finesse although he goes overboard at times, joins the force in this actor-driven, joke of a film that is as shameless as its maker in hiding behind the skirts it’s supposed to bring to light. Perhaps the intention is contained in self, in Thomas Leroy’s advertisement for seduction than substance; perhaps that is what genius is all about but quite frankly, I don’t care.

Incessant theme, indistinctive voiceover from stage to set, ill-deployed homosexuality, cheap thrills? The black swan would be bored to death with this stereotype of cacophonies and let me tell you something – the whites won’t like to do too much with it either. And I’m just talking about swans, mind you.

AN AFFLECK SHOW - NEED I SAY MORE?

DIRECTED BY BEN AFFLECK

STARRING: BEN AFFLECK, JEREMY RENNER, REBECCA HALL, JON HAMM, BLAKE LIVELY, TITUS WELLIVER, PETE POSTLETHWAITE, SLAINE AND CHRIS COOPER

In only his second feature film as director (having previously shared writing credits with Matt Damon for the 1997 Gus Van Sant venture ‘Good Will Hunting’), Ben Affleck looks to take the place of the undisputed crime lord of Hollywood and could even land it in the time to come, what with the pace he’s cruising in. With a reputation to do whatever he does in a way that might not necessarily be called ‘characteristic’ (although there are fingerprints all over this film), he still manages to thrust a level of intelligence and emotional intensity, a deadly combo when it comes to the avid film viewer – one that can potentially turn a remote action thriller to an incredibly substantial crime drama.

But is ‘the Town’ just that? I mean, Hollywood has forever been the place for felons, multiple takes on heist-movies and has seen the likes of Scorsese, Coppola and De Palma. What more does this film have (other than being an intense revisit to the genre) to substantiate itself as a film to remember? Well, the packaging, for one. Subtly written, never boring and gripping one through the 124 minutes that constitute it, ‘the Town’ also finds itself empowered by its actors. At the front is a certain Jeremy Renner, never hear before a year before and now he carries a film on his shoulders, what does it matter if he’s got support! Rebecca Hall leaves a convincing mark on the viewer’s mind with her ‘not so new’ portrayal of Claire Keesey, a bank manager who’s shaken to the bone by the disturbing incidents of the crime in question. Jon Hamm leads the opposition as Agent Adam Frawley, strongly set, has a head on his shoulders and there’s the ever-dependent Chris Cooper who’s given the role of a father this time – if ever a person can stun with a phonecall from the other side!

As successor to the crushing ‘Gone Baby Gone’ that he directed in 2007, Affleck opts to dabble a little more this time with his directorial skills, upping activity levels with sheer rawness in his action sequences, achieving required emotions through audacity. There’s immense set-detailing, more on the metal front and an awful lot of cars getting crushed to drive it in. But where I felt ‘the Town’ to succeed the most is in the fact that it takes a hold of its loose ends and ties it into a loop. Like Krista Coughlin (Blake Lively) for example, who is cheekily intended to be a reminder of Doug Macray’s tragic childhood and of the ruins of his now-broken father. And then there’s the refrain that leaves one with a smile on his face and a thought in his head that’s crystal clear and says, “Damn. This guy knows his stuff!”

One of the best wide-releases of 2010 in an armoured tin-can with a heck of a heart. And not to mention, a promise for more.

A FILM THAT'S FUNNY AND A FILM THAT'S NOT

DIRECTED BY JUDD APATOW

STARRING: ADAM SANDLER, SETH ROGEN, JONAH HILL, JASON SCHWARTZMANN, LESLIE MANN, AUBREY PLAZA, IRIS APATOW, MAUDE APATOW with AZIZ ANSARI and ERIC BANA

It’s a typical dark-side-of-the-moon venture. Think of a Doctor who prescribes for anyone but himself or his family. Of an ascetic who draws sexual favours. Of a Peace-Corp representative goring it on ‘Battle Royale’. George Simmons (Adam Sandler), big time stand-up act and an A-list movie star – a life-sized replica of Sandler himself, in short – takes the stage on a nostalgia trip in the bar where he used to perform. “You people are so un-amusing that you have to pay another person to amuse you!” he says to an audience so quiet that you’d hear a clock ticking if there was one. The crowd is baffled – they don’t know if they’re supposed to laugh or feel offended. It’s the same with you. This is one among those people who have always derived humour from insults, so is it any different this time? Judd Apatow thus extracts the rudeness out of stand-up comedy and extends it at its rawest best. It’s bitter, but not distasteful. And the scene itself is key to a murky film that attempts to show what’s behind the poker-faces so reinforced to earn some laughs.

George Simmons is dying, or so he thinks. He has the wisdom of an aging man and yet the heart of a boy, for he looks for a shoulder to lean and a bedside conversation so he could talk himself to sleep. Adam Sandler loads him further with quirks of his own, particularly the determination to stay old-fashioned. “No one wants to hear about how you masturbate”, he counsels Ira Wright (Seth Rogen), his trainee-cum-creative-source. No ‘ASAP’. No ‘Just Chilling’. Sandler in the first hour of ‘Funny People’ gives a kingly performance in familiar territory, one that compares with the likes of Jack Nicholson (in ‘About Schmidt’) or Paul Giamatti (in films as ‘Sideways’ and ‘American Splendor’) except he’s not as down-to-earth. His purgatory is not devoid of perks, he still lives lavish, has his pick of women though he feels he’s got his heart out for none but one. He’s a satire on remorse, purely by virtue of unlikelihood. He wants to be sad, but he’s not. The closest he gets to sadness is dry irony, that which peaks in the song he renders at half-time – the point where the film peaks as well, only to fall back down to ‘usual’.

A biography on stand-up comedy as an organic whole diversifies into a less-impacting bonding venture that concludes that there can be none. Apatow’s super-saturated ‘family film’ turns to a moderately-convincing melodrama even though it doesn’t compromise on comic relief. It’s a lot of things, a lot of different kinds of things, different mindsets to laugh about, which is so taxing that I wished for a simpler, straighter sketch!

So ‘Funny People’, as I saw, was a patchwork of two films with George Simmons. In one, it’s a fame-crazy bunch of youngsters, the next generation that’s all about betrayal, lies and last laughs. In the other, he joins the crowd. Woody Allen as Harry Block in ‘Deconstructing Harry’ remarks, when on a road trip, that his immaturity gives him a boyish quality to match his girlfriend’s age. A similar trip in this film shows its two overgrown boys in Simmons and Wright, trying to reconcile with their own selves. And then it’s back to square one with nothing drastic having happened. It’s not a happy ending. It’s not sad either. It’s just real and inspires empathy, in which it leaves us strangely dissatisfied. The latter half of the film serves to make one forget the first, for the film is awfully long. And in its course, we find ourselves sodden with misery to be dried in indifference with a lean period in between that haunts too much.

For the first time, a mainstream Hollywood comedy shows us that the best of laughs is where you don’t try too hard. And it’s a shame that it had to turn defensive against its own discovery, resorting at times to instances for the sake of humour than vice-versa. Nevertheless, for Adam Sandler, it’s a revelation; a role where for once you take him  seriously. For Judd Apatow, this is yet another, but with a little more maturity than usual at the expense of some. A welcome change that gives reason to hope.

ACTUALLY, WORKS

DIRECTED BY RICHARD CURTIS

STARRING: LIAM NEESON, THOMAS SANGSTER, HUGH GRANT, BILL NIGHY, EMMA THOMPSON, ALAN RICKMAN, LAURA LINNEY and a whole lot of others

Hold your thoughts around, this is a one-minute review that took two (and a little more) hours to come about, so that means I’m not going to be taking much of your time. A kind of staunch opposite of Richard Curtis, who not only wants his audience to slack around until the very end where he has some violins he’d blast and some pipes and saxophones he’d let to flare for the full effect of a ‘finale’ to sink in, but also shows to be cheeky enough to laugh at it through a very depiction of ‘far-fetched’ness in form of the aptly-performing Thomas Sangster.

Inevitably comparable to such peers (or ‘soon-to-come’s) as ‘Paris Je T’aime’ and its New York mimic, or so I felt – I’m doing this not as a quality check or a judgement on entertainment quotient, but as a highlight of the fact that the tales are pretty much disconnected and not interwoven, resulting in the effect of a bunch of films with a Christmas connection thrown in, with a school play being the rehearsal room. What is disheartening (and also, ironically, enchanting) about this film is that there is no effort, not even the slightest assurance from the makers’ side to close-in on the gap that so clearly demarcates the conventional romantic comedy from anything else that’s remotely equivalent to a piece of cinema.

Does that make ‘Love Actually’ worthless? Absolutely not. It gladdens, it helps bring yourself together, it’d probably help bring people together – heck, it definitely did spring up quite an exquisite cast! – the music is good (central song plus sprightly additives) and all this along with a whole show of faithfulness to an existing formula means ‘Love Actually’ could be ‘the’ classic example for a romantic comedy, coming from the man who once helped spice the grammar of it by the very act of writing one of his own. And with his directorial debut, he’s gone on to make the moments stick out to take you through the hours, his attempt at making an anterograde amnesiac out of the avid viewer a considerable success.

I only remember the twinkly-eyes that’s Colin Firth, Laura Linney, Liam Neeson and the Portuguese temptress whose name I do not know. Now, would you blame me for that?

HOLY IT IS

DIRECTED BY ROB EPSTEIN & JEFFREY FRIEDMAN

STARRING: JAMES FRANCO, DAVID STRATHAIRN, ALESSANDRO NIVOLA, BOB BALABAN, JON HAMM, MARY-LOUISE PARKER, TREAT WILLIAMS, AARON TVELT AND JEFF DANIELS

‘Howl’ is the kind of film that makes you want to hear the opposition – the tone of the defence is so empowered and mighty with respect to your contemporary viewership that, perhaps out of pity or out of sheer curiosity, you want to hear what people could actually back their accusations upon when regarding contemporary literature and the acceptance (if not rejection) of the same. It’s like one can’t build something enough to beat the might of a new movement, one that not just reaches out for the masses but also endears, moves and has auditory intercourse with them, the perpetrator being a legend on the rise by the name of Allen Ginsberg (James Franco).

It’s easy playing Ginsberg, if you count the manner of speaking and the homosexual icing off. Agreeable that he isn’t the most celebrated, even in today’s cosmopolitan ambience where people had taken the pains to invent art out of profanity, vanity and insanity, and that’s not negative criticism on my part. But what hooked me in was the idea of a man of today stepping into yesterday’s shoes without a sign of being mortified about the very idea of it, if not shattered out of his senses and sentimentally regressive to be doing it in the first place. Yes, I speak for Ralph McIntosh, (David Strathairn) and more importantly for the actor himself, and in that context I was quite overwhelmed by his personal conviction that probably helmed the essaying of the role. But McIntosh definitely has to be enacted, for ‘to be lived’ is to be identified as alien – a Ginsberg equivalent in the world of now.

All said, James Franco does come up with a performance that helps grab a substantial chunk of the year’s acting potential, although the dimensions are in no way boggling. It’s neat, but not magnificent although it definitely was as lethargic as it’s meant to be, succinct with its depiction of superstardom and most importantly, a level of intensity that suggested that he was indeed having fun. The recitations are dynamite, animations repetitive, which, although helping enhance the psychedelic quotient, acts detrimental to the pace of the film that needs to be thankful to its sonorous backing track (not to mention the stirring score by Carter Burwell). But, with all its commendable thrusts of opinion and conventional standpoints on the idea of poetry, I would settle to view ‘Howl’ as a courtroom drama, a keyhole opening to distinctive reality that asserts itself with a failure to negate. Plus there’s wisdom, with Judge Clayton Horn contributing most of it – reminds me to look out for more of Bob Balaban.

A riveting drama that deconstructs dramatic acting to documentary proportions, thus making it far more endearing, ‘Howl’ necessitates itself with the viewer’s inclination to watch it, where it’s only clear that one’s decision to watch ‘Howl’ is not just an empowerment, but a guarantee to subsequent appreciation. 

It’s 80 minutes of Jizz and Jazz juxtaposed. Work it if you've a feel for it.

DRAWING-BOARD STUFF

DIRECTED BY EDGAR WRIGHT

STARRING: MICHAEL CERA, MARY ELIZABETH WINSTEAD, ELLEN WONG, KIERAN CULKIN, ANNA KENDRICK, ALISON PILL, MARK WEBBER, BRANDON ROUTH AND JASON SCHWARTZMANN

Why does a film like ‘Scott Pilgrim vs. the world’ deserve a review? I mean, this is a film that’s somewhere between a video game and a comic book (I prefer to use this term, thank you) – it’s actually a comic book about a video game, and where does that leave it on a level of seriousness that could actually provoke even the remotest need to be analyzed critically? Well, it doesn’t, but that’s not the end of the story. There’s still the originality element and the extravagant mood it creates by being what it is and that unavoidably made me to retrospect on its effectiveness as an entertainer.

Pretty effective, in short. Michael Cera stands there being himself with his awkwardly loose muscles that simply can’t get up in the air unless they’re hoisted, and as hilarious and laugh-worthy as that is, he definitely has to come up with something better in the immediate future to 1) break the cliché and 2) to actually get down to doing something. The dumb-cool guy look might suit him, but it’s still tiring. And the additives are enjoyable, this film discusses a girl who actually could inspire ‘like-at-first-sight’, something one cannot help but relate to the effect that Kate Winslet produced in one ‘Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind’ – there’s actually infinite number of resemblances, and I do not know if it’s actually a basis. From what I saw, there appeared to be some faith.

The duels with the ‘ex-es’ are enjoyable, the visual effects mind-manipulating, making one think twice about passing this off as yet another slipshod effort at invoking humour, something that makes ‘Scott Pilgrim’ stand midway between a 12 year-old show stealer (like ‘Spy Kids’ or its dubious sequels) and a signature flick that’s solely meant for the eyes. What’s pleasant, moreover, is the fact that it doesn’t defy itself. There’s absolutely no intervention from anyone who shouldn’t be in the movie in the first place (like Anna Kendrick in this wasted role of miss ‘phonecall sister’) and thus when I see Scott Pilgrim, I see a metaphor for one that’s trying to prove his love along with trying to prove himself and all said, the hilarity definitely takes the grit away from the intention, despite the fact that that hilarity serves to entertain by itself. It complicates the critical eye for this is a film that does not reach the mind with the wildest of its efforts, and what can one do if he’s been left eye-dazzled?

Well, then that person has fifteen minutes to wake-up in this ‘nothing’ of a climax that helps one get back to square one. To understand the no-brainer, laugh at Mr. Schwartzmann after a howl at Mr. Routh, have a smile on the face for ‘Monster vs. the Dragons’, a reluctant acceptance of Michael Cera for what could be the very last time considering tolerance levels and last but not the least, hope that no one – NO ONE – ever attempts to bring to the screen such infantile comic strips such as this, no matter how great the effort or the CGI team.

A PRELUDE; A TRIUMPH

DIRECTED BY WOODY ALLEN

STARRING: MICHAEL CAINE, MIA FARROW, BARBARA HERSHEY, CARRIE FISHER, DIANNE WEST, MAX VON SYDOW AND WOODY ALLEN

It is an unavoidable thought that tells me every time I deal with a Woody Allen film that I am up against a man who knows quite a lot of things, which is why the mind decides to probe beyond the film itself, seek for analogies, excerpts from quite a bit of life that he happens to have lived to find the phase that could probably have inspired the same. And the reason, I suspect, why I liked ‘Hannah and her Sisters’ so much is because it somehow completed the puzzle, which, I happened to be attempting to solve in the wrong direction in the first place.

But I’m not saying that this would revive my interests in my (personally) lesser-liked films of his like ‘Crimes and Misdemeanors’ (1989) or its 2005 replica ‘Match Point’, I had my reasons for the developed distaste that sugar won’t solve but I still managed to piece them into his life and I find that to be reassuring. To me, it is like knowing the man by knowing his phases so I can get myself to understand which phases of his I could (or should) actually like citing congruousness. And it is this congruousness that I found in ‘Hannah and her Sisters’, which easily serves to be the prelude to a disastrous chain of events, possibly a downfall of thought that he happened to revive only after years of stabilizing himself post-1997. ‘Vicky Cristina Barcelona’ is the gem that I’m talking about, following a couple of retraces he took to find his way.

It’s been 25 years, so I guess I’m alright with spoilers. ‘Hannah and her Sisters’ is essentially (as I saw it) a story of three sisters and three men, two of whom are (or have been) involved with more than one. And the course of things is not exactly an ethical dissection, as was the case with the then-forthcoming ‘Crimes and Misdemeanors’, but a basic pursuit of frames of mind and those lines that could possibly lead to the same. The King, as powerless as he stands by himself, is played by Michael Caine, a soft-spoken bureaucrat whose anxious moments are almost entirely correlated with his actions with the contrary being true too. The Queen (Mia Farrow) has princesses one too many associated with both her husbands in what appears to be an underdone amount of screen space and emotional scope, and then there’s Allen himself, the jester who was once a crown prince and gets there again towards the end. With him there’s his wit around, and also a level of tranquility that one associates with his more serious role like ‘Annie Hall’ – I could almost see shades of Alvy Singer or may I be deluded if I didn’t.

For a man who’s been around for almost a half a century, what could make ‘Hannah and her Sisters’ one of the most crucial films of his career? Well, for one, it’s clarity, something that he achieves not just by quoting Tolstoy but also sufficiently through even his lesser characteristic pawns on screen: like Holly (Dianne West) for instance. Maybe it’s that period when the train slows down to make the ride look a little longer, maybe it’s because of the three distinctly monotonous thanksgiving atmospheres that Allen manages to create, maybe it’s the dewy-eyed Elliot who sees what he sees in exactly the way he likes to see it. Or maybe it’s just the best of Bach that’s been extensively utilized to fill the canvases. Either way, I could convincingly say that despite all the references, all thematic elements dealt and all kinds of loud thoughts that Allen promises the viewer, ‘Hannah and her Sisters’ is one film where he’s had his words underplayed by the voice of heart and that, for once, helps appreciate its resilience.

In other words, this is a film about the women, where the men do a ‘come and go’. And that’s oddly strengthening, as a thought.