ABOUT SCHMIDT

     It takes about 1 second for Jack Nicholson to elicit the first laugh in Alexander Panyne’s About Schmidt, and to remind us why he’s one of film’s all-time greats. Nicholson’s ability to emote enormous amounts of information without saying a word is one of the central tools Payne uses to tell his story; and it’s one hell of a powerful tool. Nicholson plays Warren Schmidt, an Omaha actuary who, upon retirement finds himself in an existential crisis. Essentially, the film is about the meaning of one man’s life; it’s a tough subject matter and one that Payne and Nicholson handle confidently and effectively.

At the age of 65, Warren Schmidt finds himself with nothing to do but write hilariously overly detailed letters to his African foster kid, Ndugu. When his overbearing wife of 42 years dies suddenly, Schmidt decides to take a cross-country trip on the way to his daughter’s wedding. Warren doesn’t really have a good idea of what he’s looking for on his journey and the trip itself is less than exciting (like Schmidt himself). But watching Nicholson inhabit this drab little man is a wonder. When he does eventually arrive in Denver and meets his future in-laws, the film becomes relentlessly hilarious. Kathy Bates is brilliant as the boozy “free-spirited” mom of Dermot Mulroney (giving a great little performance himself), Schmidt’s dimwitted future son-in-law. And Howard Hesseman – due for a comeback – is very funny as an overly laid back aging hippy. But it’s always Nicholson’s reactions to these characters that really brings out the comedy here… and the pathos as well.

About Schmidt is not a perfect film. The pacing is slower than it should have been and the first two acts drag on a bit too long. Frankly, without Nicholson’s high-wattage brilliance, none of this would have been nearly as effective as it is. But with all the pieces where they are, About Schmidt succeeds more often than it fails and, in the end, presents one man’s quest for meaning as both funny and surprisingly moving.

ANY GIVEN SUNDAY

The game of American Football is, in many ways, a perfect movie sport. First of all, the game progresses in fits and starts, giving plenty of opportunity for dramatic buildup and suspense. Second, the offence and the defense take turns on the playing field, allowing the filmmakers to cut away to active players on the sidelines. Third, and probably most important, football is a sport that closely resembles an ancient battlefield; tight formations of armored men violently advancing and retrieving. This has been the stock and trade of action cinema from Birth Of A Nation to Braveheart.

Oliver Stone’s ANY GIVEN SUNDAY is certainly an action film. It throws you right on the field in the very first sequence and keeps you there for a good forty minutes of it’s near 3 hours. Yet somehow, you get very little feeling for how the game is actually played. Sure, there’s the controlled chaos, the violent hits, and the occasionally acrobatic intensity of the running game… but the game is somehow lost. Too bad because all the elements seem to be there.

Al Pacino plays Tony D’Amato, a legendary head coach of the Miami Sharks. James Woods sinks his sharp little teeth into the team’s sleazbag doctor. And Cameron Diaz, somewhat against type, is the bitch-on-wheels team owner. On top of that there’s quarterbacks Jamie Foxx and Dennis Quade, Jim Brown, L.L. Cool J, Matthew Modine, and Ann-Margaret in a wonderful cameo. Oliver Stone is the ringmaster, and who could be a better choice? Someone who’s both played the game (in college) as well as seen the battlefield (in Viet Nam). ANY GIVEN SUNDAY, unfortunately, is somewhat less than the sum of its parts; failing to live up to its promise as the “ultimate football film”.

Now, don’t get me wrong, ANY GIVEN SUNDAY is full of fun touches. The performances are uniformly terrific and the action is often spectacular. But the film gets so caught up in cliché that it gets difficult to take by the time it’s over. Of course, all sports films rely on a certain amount of cliché; it’s really just a part of the package. But do we need to see all of the sports film cliches packed into one film? There’s the over-the-hill quarterback looking for one more shot, the young star learning how to be a team player, the evil money-grubbing owner who doesn’t give a damn about the players or the integrity of the game, and the idealistic coach trying to hold the team together and to take them to the playoffs, etc, etc, etc.. All this, as always, culminates in the “big game” finale that miraculously solves all dilemmas and resolves all conflicts. The film’s biggest surprise (such as it is) comes over the closing credits, by which time I couldn’t care less.

Here’s a couple more small gripes. One: all through the film everyone is referring to Coach D’Amato as an “old dinosaur”. Huh? Who are they talking about? Pacino looks great, not a day over fifty! Compared to some of the geriatric geezers coaching in the NFL now, he’s a youngster. Two: not a single field goal is kicked in the entire three hours. Come on! Show one field goal! Just one. How hard is that? Otherwise the European audiences won’t understand why the game is called “football”.

BLOW

Ted Demme’s Blow is a film so utterly lacking any originality or individual voice, it’s  amazing that I’m giving it a positive review. A decade-spanning story of George Jung, a man responsible for introducing Columbian cocaine to the US, Blow is a virtual homage to Scorsese’s Goodfellas and, to a lesser extent, PT Anderson’s Boogie Nights. Of course, “homage” could also mean “rip-off”… and that’s what Blow feels like for the majority of it’s 2 plus hours.

            Johnny Depp is good as George, but frankly I could think of 5 or 6 young actors who would have been just as good. Why? Mainly because George doesn’t quite have a character per se. He’s a man completely lacking in any morals, who simply takes advantage of his circumstances to become the drug kingpin of the ‘70s. This lack of morality is also the main feature of the film’s viewpoint. In fact, any character who’s in any way judgmental of George’s lifestyle is shown as an evil hypocrite. Don’t get me wrong: we’ve all seen too many of these clichéd turkeys in which all the drug dealers are scummy thugs and everybody who tries a line or two ends up face down in the gutter. That’s a crock of shit. But Blow’s lack of opposing viewpoints limits it intellectually and makes is so much less than the films it so desperately tries to emulate. That’s too bad since the subject matter is so damn interesting. Unfortunately Blow doesn’t even deal with the mechanics of its subject matter. Unlike Goodfellas, which gave us a fascinating glimpse into the day-to-day workings of the Mob, Blow tells us virtually nothing new about the details of the drug trade. There’s almost a feeling that drugs sell themselves, as though people aren’t even in the equation. All of the film’s focus is devoted to George’s self-centered pursuit of wealth and happiness.

            Yet, somehow Blow manages to pull off being a pretty enjoyable film. All the performances are strong, especially Ray Liotta as George’s existentialist father. And as George’s life spirals further and further down the toilet, the emotional blows the character takes are quite effective. Demme brings a lot of energy to the proceedings, but the screenplay is a bit weak. The film moves to its inevitable resolution without providing any surprises. I’d even say that many plot points are telegraphed in ways that are almost amateurish. And the predictable classic rock soundtrack is, well… predictable.  Blow looks good, it sounds good, but its complete lack of originality keeps it from being a good film. If you set your expectations low enough, you might enjoy it anyway.

DIE ANOTHER DAY

The new Bond film is a bit of the old “good news, bad news” scenario. The good news is, this is a vast improvement over the previous 007, The World Is Not Enough. That installment was long on concept and short on execution; the stunts felt tired, the adventure seemed old-hat, and the drama was forced. The new film addresses most of these issues by jazzing up the formula, amping up the action and mixing in a solid villain and a top-notch leading lady. Yet the ingredients don’t quite add up to an altogether satisfying picture. And, this is the bad news, there’s a bit too much goofiness here for the film’s own good.

Pierce Brosnan returns as Bond for the fourth time, and what can you say about him. His Bond is nearly as good as Sean Connery’s, so accepting him in the role is not really an issue. Frankly he had the character down in Goldeneye. In Die Another Day the opening sequence puts Bond in the hands of the North Koreans, who spend 14 months (and the whole title sequence) torturing him for information. Exactly what information they want from him is unclear, but scenes of Bond getting trounced to the techno beats of a Madonna song are bizarre, to say the least. This is, hands-down, the nastiest title sequence in the franchise history.

Of course, Bond does get released, but M. in what seems for her to be an uncharacteristic bit of malevolence, suspends Bond’s “license” and effectively fires him. Why? I’m not sure. Anyway, Bond escapes from his own people, and in the film’s first bit of ludicrousness, swims all the way to Hong Kong. He then spends the next hour in an unmotivated pursuit of a diamond-studded Korean goon. Along the way Bond meets (and instantly beds) Haley Berry, blows up a genetic clinic, and smokes some stogies. None of this feels like a real Bond film, but it moves along at a good clip.

Then Bond gets back to England and the real movie begins. We finally meet the main baddie, Gustav Graves (nicely played by Toby Stevens), the bad girl (or is she?) Miranda Frost, and Madonna - in the film’s second bit of ludicrousness - as a fencing instructor. Actually the duel between Bond and Graves is the highlight of the whole film; long and brutal. It’s almost hard to believe that the franchise never had a real sword fight, and this one doesn’t disappoint. John Cleese as the new Q is another highlight; his interactions with Bond are dead-on and funny. Obviously Bond gets re-instated, is given new gadgets and sent to Iceland. That’s where the remaining set-pieces take place and they’re fun. Haley Berry’s Jinx comes back to the action and Bond gets to try out his dumbest gadget to date, an invisible car. Now I don’t know who would insure an invisible car, but for all the use Bond gets out of it, it hardly seems worth the R & D. Thankfully this goofy gimmick is not overused. The final showdown takes place on a cargo plane and it’s probably the best finale of the Brosnan films, as our heroes confront their adversaries while the plane disintegrates around them.

Die Another Day is the first Bond film of the 21st Century and it’s the first one to rely heavily on digital effects. This is a departure and I’m not sure a welcomed one. Bond movies always had this stunt-heavy, hands on quality to them. Seeing a computer-generated Bond parasail down a computer-generated glacier is a bit under whelming. I was also annoyed by the overuse of digital slo-mo; if they wanted a John Woo vibe, they should have just hired John Woo to direct. There’s also an ending bit with Miss Moneypenny that’s completely out of left field and is, frankly, a pathetic grab for laughs. But overall, this mixed bag is still worth it. Haley Berry is good, the villains are good, the references to past Bond films are mostly cute, and they even throw in Michael Madsen as Jinx’s boss; what’s not to like about that? So it’s probably safe to say that if there is a world 40 years from now, James Bond will still be around to entertain it.

FIGHT CLUB

            David Fincher’s FIGHT CLUB is easily one of the best films of the year. An original, inventive, and provocative picture that hits upon feelings of Millennial unrest better than any film in recent years. Of course, Fincher’s previous films have all dealt with issues of apocalyptic isolation and madness. THE GAME in particular, tried (not very successfully) to provide a sort of sensualist solution for modern ennui. But the material here is stronger. So is the tone.

Adopted from Chuck Palahniuk’s breakthrough first novel, FIGHT CLUB is a comedy. And a funny one at that. A razor-sharp satire that viciously skewers new age self-absorption, anarchism, romance, and then turns around and smacks you on the face with your own egoism for missing the point. Of course, most of the critics seemed to have missed the point as well. The film’s detractors accuse it of neo-fascist leanings. They call it brutal, sexist, void of ideas. One review I read called the film “irresponsible”! It may be that, but only in the way that art should be irresponsible.

FIGHT CLUB opens with Edward Norton’s character sitting on the toilet, leafing through an Ikea catalogue. It is an indelible film image of the late ‘90s. Modern man: passive, impotent, vulnerable, consumed with consuming. Norton spends the rest of his free time going to various support groups and sharing made up sob-stories with the sick and the terminally ill. It gives him an emotional outlet, but it’s not nearly enough, and he feels like a fraud in the process.

Enter Tyler Durden (Pitt), a slick soap peddler who seems to know Norton better than he knows himself. The two men stumble on the idea of a “fight club” and it catches on quickly. The point of the fight club is not to defeat the other guy as much as it is to defeat your own lack of direction; to beat yourself.  In fact, Norton’s character does exactly that in one very funny scene. This scene, in effect, becomes the main metaphor of the film as Norton struggles to come to terms with Durden’s peculiar philosophy. In order to overcome fear, inertia, and the catatonic state that most of us live in, the men of the fight club beat the shit out of one another in basements of seedy bars. But instead of finding their identities, they seem to lose them, becoming faceless soldiers in Durden’s anarchist militia. Eventually for Durden, the fight club isn’t far reaching enough. He wants to destroy the whole materialistic system. The masked anarchists in the Seattle riots had the same idea when they tore apart Starbucks and Nike stores. And whether you cheered or were repulsed by their actions may determine your view on the film. But if your feelings were conflicted, you have a lot in common with Norton’s character in FIGHT CLUB.

FIGHT CLUB is an infuriating picture. It’s a work that refuses to follow an established story pattern or to provide easy answers. It dazzles you with its over-the-top visuals, surprises you with its intelligence, and finally pulls the rug out from under you. It’s this relentless punk esthetic, the “we don’t give a fuck if you don’t like us” attitude that I found so refreshing about FIGHT CLUB. What other film have you seen lately, that is so willing to piss you off? Kubrick’s A CLOCKWORK ORANGE comes to mind from nearly thirty years ago. That’s it. I can see why some people really hated this movie. All the magazines called it “a bomb” or “a disappointment” both in terms of box office and critical praise. No surprise there: it fails to live up to expectations of genre and provides no emotional resolutions. And it’s certainly no action film. The fights themselves are shot in flat, unglamorous, long takes, without a hint of violence fetishism that characterizes American cinema.  Pitt and Norton give excellent performances. So do Helena Bonham Carter and Meatloaf. But their characters aren’t very likable; frankly they’re all freaks. And if, like me, you really like this film, maybe you’re a freak too.

           

GLADIATOR

It’s been about 35 years since a good gladiator film came along. I’m not counting futuristic gladiator films like Running Man or Rollerball, but classic Roman period pieces. That’s probably why Ridley Scott’s Gladiator was so anticipated. Was it worth the wait? Yes and no. In a nutshell, Gladiator should have been a better film, or at least more balanced and intelligent one, but it isn’t. It’s a standard action epic that reaches for Braveheart but falls short.

Let’s get something out of the way first. Spartacus is the greatest gladiator film ever made. Still. So forget Spartacus. Gladiator shoots a lot lower; focusing on characters rather than social issues, action rather then emotional impact. It succeeds for the most part, specially on the action front. This is a very exciting and violent film with massive action pieces that are nothing short of unbelievable. It’s too bad, though, that Scott didn’t expand on concepts that make gladiatorial combat such an interesting subject matter. Mental slavery, the stupefying effect of mass entertainment, the moral bankruptcy of a waning empire. These are all very relevant ideas that deserve a day in the arena and would certainly make for strong drama. But that’s another gladiator film that’s yet to be made. Gladiator just wants to tickle your eyeballs and it does so rather brilliantly. Everything else, unfortunately, is by the numbers.

The story is as linear as it gets. Noble General Maximus is betrayed by evil prince Commodus, his family executed and he – inexplicably – finds himself a slave in Morocco. Proving himself in the arena Maximus, now known only by his ethnic nickname Spaniard, goes to Rome and becomes a superstar gladiator. His success eventually leads to Commodus’ complete mental breakdown and results in a fifth column that eventually de-thrones the despot. The script is so dry and lacking in irony that the only memorable line from the entire 3-hour film is one that was obviously improvised by Juaquin Phoenix. There’s some seriously stilted dialogue here that proves challenging even for great actors like Crowe and Richard Harris. On top of that, the movie plays it so damn straight and takes itself ever so seriously that the script’s total lack of a viewpoint becomes even more damaging by the time it’s all over. I left the theater wondering what the fucking point was. (I also didn’t buy much of the final sequence.)

It’s not all bad of course. The acting is good all around. Russell Crow rocks, Juaquin
Phoenix is surprisingly menacing, and Oliver Reed delivers a great final performance.
The cinematography by John Mathieson is wonderfully lush. The CGI effects are good and serve the story in an adequate, non-intrusive fashion. The highlight of Gladiator are the action sequences which are truly original and exciting. If you don’t expect too much more, you’ll probably enjoy the film, warts and all. But I for one, am still waiting for a truly great gladiator film. I just hope it doesn’t take another thirty years.

MAGNOLIA

There’s a dizzying feeling one gets watching P.T. Anderson’s new opus, MAGNOLIA. The constantly flying camera, the plethora of characters, making sense of what the point of the whole thing is, and… the frogs. The fact that it actually works is a testament to Anderson’s talent. It is that talent along with a good deal of artistic audacity that makes MAGNOLIA one of the best films of 1999.

There’s no question that Anderson has bitten off more than he (or anyone, really) can chew, here. There are way too many characters and story-lines, some weaker than others. What ultimately carries the film, though, is its energy and heart. MAGNOLIA opens with the recounting of several urban legends; some of which we’ve all heard. All these tales deal with the ironic and sometimes divine intervention of fate. “Why do these things happen?” the film asks, “What’s the point?” These questions could never be answered of course, but they relate heavily to what eventually happens in the film.

MAGNOLIA follows several characters who are dealing with death, loss, lack of love, and the sins of the past. The wonderful cast includes the usual P.T. Anderson suspects William H. Macy, Philip Baker Hall, Philip Seymour Hoffman, John C. Reilly, and Julieanne Moore. Plus there’s Tom Cruise in the scummiest (and finest) role of his career and Jason Robards as the most realistic dying man I’ve seen on film. All of the acting is superb here with Reilly and Moore delivering performances (frankly) too brilliant for Oscar recognition. Love him or hate him, Anderson knows how to work with actors. But that’s not all he knows.