Been getting behind, so I'll dump what I've been seeing
instead of while looking for a new job over the past couple of weeks:
The Good Thief -
½
The Brattle Theater (which is right up there with Fenway Park on my list of indispensable Boston places) has been running a "50 years of French Cinema" series, starting with a group of New Wave classics. Even if
The Good Thief wasn't a direct remake of
Bob le Flambeur (which I haven't seen), I'd still associate it with those movies; it's got a lot of the same structure, where we just sort of watch the characters for a while as they meander off onto side plots before they actually get on with their plan in the end.
And
The Good Thief is adequate when it comes to that. Indeed, I probably enjoyed it a lot more than many "actual" New Wave movies. It's got a lead performance by Nick Nolte that is either some of Nolte's best work or him being cast in just the right part (or a little of both). And yet, it's only in the end that this movie becomes really noteworthy, and the final sequence in the casino does achieve a sort of hypnotic quality. It's ridiculous and random, but also strangely compelling.
Divine Intervention -
½
I just don't get
Divine Intervention. At least, not as a whole. There are sequences, and moments, of delightful absurdity, comedy, and sadness. But the movie seems to be so random as to never gel into a whole; it's not like
What Time Is It There where there's a thread of loneliness connecting all the scenes, or
Gerry which works as a demonstration of filmic composition and rhythm.
It might just be cultural, though.
Divine Intervention was infamously spurned from Oscar consideration for Foreign Language Film because it has no country; it's a Palestinian film without a Palestine to submit it. And it is very specifically about a certain time, place, and culture; it may come together beautifully for someone from the Palestinian sections of Jerusalem. That's just not me, though.
Winged Migration -
Has IMAX spoiled the nature documentary for everybody else? I wonder. I've gotten so used to seeing movies like this with the stunning clarity of large-format film surrounding me, either at the Museum Of Science's dome or in 3-D at the Aquarium that seeing it on a flat 35mm screen at a regular movie theater is sort of underwhelming.
Don't get me wrong - this is a beautiful film, presented in such a simple and straightforward was as to add to its beauty. The filmmakers have done a lot of innovative things to capture birds in flight without them fleeing the camera, and
Winged Migration deserves a place beside their previous stunner
Microcosmos. I especially liked how the movie didn't wholly condemn humanity as an entirely destructive force; the movie shows birds as resourceful creatures, adapting to man's cities and ships in addition to being crowded by them.
(But, man, what this would have been like in IMAX...)
The Dancer Upstairs -
I liked this one. Not groundbreaking, by any means, but director John Malkovich does a good job using the structure of a police procedural to ground a movie about terrorism, fanatacism, and an honest man trying to do right by his country. It is kind of odd to see a movie about a contemporary Latin American story, with Spanish and Latin actors, filmed almost entirely in English.
City Of Ghosts -
¼
You know, there really isn't much in Matt Dillon's filmography to indicate he's capable of something this good. He's not a bad actor, but I've never thought of him as exceptional, either - certainly not
auteur material.
But he's pretty sure-handed here. He makes good use of his Cambodian locations, tells an interesting story of fraud, family, and crime, and gives a good performance. I think perhaps he's a little guilty of going to a foreign land and then focusing almost exclusively on the white expatriots there, but that's a sort of community that would be connected.
"Ghosts Of The Abyss" -
¼
The most interesting parts about James Cameron's return to the Titanic are those that aren't, specifically, about the Titanic. It could be any sunken wreck that Cameron, actor/buddy Bill Paxton, and a team of scientists are investigating and it would still be an interesting trip thanks to the nifty submersibles, robots, and 3-D cameras they've brought to check the place out. The visuals are spiffy, and Paxton's narration is actually enjoyable despite how it occasionally sounds like bad poetry - the man is legitimately enthused and awestruck, and that comes across.
The parts where they're talking about the details of who was on Titanic and what a grand ship it was - feh. Cameron's already done one three-hour movie on that, and while I'm sure there's an audience for it, it's not nearly as interesting, to me, as the gee-whiz stuff the team is using to explore it.
Only The Strong Survive -
½
This movie wants to be Memphis's
Standing In The Shadows Of Motown, but pales in comparison.
Shadows knew what it wanted to do - introduce you to the unknown men behind the Motown sound and demonstrate that they made it - but
Only The Strong Survive is more scattershot; it doesn't have a central theme. It has interviews with various Stax Records recording artists and shows them at work, and alludes to their history, but never comes together. It's a shame, because there's glimpses of good stories about how these guys who had huge hits bottomed out, disappeared, or persevered, but it's never developed.
And, man, it's sad to say this, but the performances are kind of sad. Only Isaac Hayes comes off as still really vital; the rest feel like old men and women kidding themselves. And I don't think that's the point the directors and producers are trying to make; the narration is enthusiastic without a hint of irony.
Man Without A Past is gone so I missed my chance to see it. I think it was only here 1 week.
Good one Michael.