thoughts on Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut

dark, brooding, magnificent. the character anguish is so deep. you can see the anguish and torment, the jealousy and break heartedness on Tom Cruise's face. And Nicole Kidman to. She puts on such an innocent veneer that those salacious shots of her with the sailor are so tawdry. It's too bad this film wasn't so well received when it was released. I remember renting it from Blockbuster video. They were still around then. And, of course, being a 19 year old, I was so taken with the sex scenes. I had never seen anything like it. This was the days before internet porn when you can google anything and get a video in return. I read somewhere that Republicans are trying to resurrect the debate about porn. That's another topic. But the question does raise itself about what Kubrick really wanted to say with this film? Is it nothing more the voyeuristic pleasure? Seeing Nicole Kidman nude many times? Or Tom Cruise in his underwear? Or the occult orgy? What was the point? Just to take pleasure in watching nudity or sexual intercourse? I didn't see much of a theme to the film. Certainly not as deep as some other Kubrick films like Barry Lyndon.

Yet, perhaps, there is some similarity to Lolita. The film Kubrick made based on a Nabokov novel. It to delves into forbidden sexual desire.

I can't say enough about the acting. I was totally taken in by Cruise and Kidman. They were both such high profile actors and husband and wife to take on such a project like Eyes Wide Such. At the time of release they were criticized for doing such a film. In hindsight I think they need to be commended for putting aside projects that might be more enriching commercially, but, perhaps, not as rewarding artistically. The film is a triumph. And I do believe it was Kubrick's last film that he worked on from start to finish.

I suppose some of the context could lend itself to the harsh criticism when the film was released. This was around the same time when the Lewinsky scandal was dominating headlines. So, perhaps, films that were provocative attracted more attention than if the media wasn't so focused on sex scandals, particularly in the Clinton White House. I guess they fed on each other. Would the film have garnered much attention if it had just been AI? Or a military film like Full Metal? Perhaps, perhaps not.

Anyway it was a great effort by all those involved. I'll have to catch it again sometime.

thoughts about Stone's JFK

this film was a tour de force. So evocative of the late 60's and 70's when it seemed like another assassination would happen every other day. I found myself days after I had seen the film mimicking Kevin Costner in his role as Jim Garrison. The scene I think I liked best was when he was talking to the former black ops guy Donald Sutherland. When he starts talking about the government conspiracies and the covert operations of this country it almost makes me want to give up screenwriting and work in the CIA or the State department. It even creates the emotion of regret; maybe I should have majored in political science and done something with that. You practically need a degree in government to comprehend what Sutherland is saying. But it seems on the level.

The best thing about JFK might be it's editing. There are so many cuts to the imagined past that one starts to think how much liberty Oliver Stone took in depicting some of the events of the film. For example, how did the bullet get on the gurney? Or who was the general in the operating room? These are questions that don't get answered and were criticized when the film was releases as being too hard to prove and too much poetic license exercised by Stone. Yet the editing is incredibly good. Fast cuts, slow cuts, flashbacks, jump cuts, the entirety of the film editors weaponry is unleashed in JFK.

Stone has said that JFK was when he was at the top of his game. He might be right. It is an excellent film. Full of intrigue, action, and drama. I couldn't tear my self away the first time I watched, and the second time went by very quickly, but it lost none of it's intensity. I enjoyed every minute.

Thoughts on The Lobster, facebook, and being proud to be single

I thought this film was very unique and funny and dramatic. Some of the dialogue was just hilarious. In fact I tried to see it twice but the Art house theater near where I live hasn't gotten the film and I fear it won't get it. That's too bad. It's such a good film. It has good shots and is well written. And the music is great too. The use of the French cafe music, sounded a lot like Edith Piaf, really adds another dimension to watching the film. That's to say nothing of the acting which is very well done. Colin Farrell is just great as the restrained single man who wants to be a lobster as an animal if he has the choice.

The film's premise of society gone mad against single people was an enjoyable one. It was unlike I've seen before. Perhaps Brazil by Terry Gilliam has as loony as a theme. The alienation of man now being policed and sequestered by authorities. In the film it was illegal to go in public as single which I found so unsettling. I'm a single guy and I go to a lot of films by myself. Sometimes I feel odd at doing so. Other times it's not such a big deal because I'm the only one in the theater. Or there are a few other singles or just a couple.

I was watching a talk show on HBO and the host Bill Maher said that the US has become a majority single country. With facebook becoming so much a part of social activity it does seem that being single is a disease or some kind of disorder. So many people I know are married and have children and they post pictures of their kids online. I guess it's good to some degree, but, like someone at my creative writing residency said "it's like Christmas cards everyday" something that I found exhausting. I can't keep up with everyone. I can't like every single thing someone posts. It's just not going to happen. I don't even like people for their birthdays, unless it's someone of the immediate family. I guess it brings people closer to together. I also guess that I'm a loner. I'd rather sit in a dark room and watch films than go out to bar where there's people. I don't think I'm missing much. The bars seemed more like boxing rings than social gatherings when I was living downtown. Every night I went out there was some kind of violence. Someone got punched in the face. Another jumped by several people. Is it really worth it? Am I just overreacting? Perhaps that's why there are so many lawyers. All of the court cases need defense attorneys. It seems that that is a distant life to the one I live now.

That was years ago in the second Bush administration. The war with Iraq was going full blown and I was working as a stockbroker in downtown Binghamton. I had a small two bedroom apartment. It had an upstairs and downstairs. I lived there for about six months before I left for China to teach English as a Second Language in mainland China. I guess I missed out on a lot of things I took for granted. After I went to China, two of my closest friends acted funny to me. We were still friendly, but never quite the same. The had come over to the apartment a few times. We partied a little. Then I fell to in between jobs. I didn't make it in financial sales. My family, particularly my Father and Brother, told me it wasn't for me. I was so confused and lost at the time. I didn't know what to do for a living. It seemed like I never had any money and all I did was study. But I wasn't studying for a degree of any kind. I just read for pleasure, mostly. Then my friends got married and I hardly see them. One moved to Maryland. We got into a row over gay people. He said he hated faggots. I said in retort that I hated crack heads. Everything got real silent after that. Since that time he has never returned my phone calls. I guess we're not as close as we once were.

In those days I would get so upset about not getting the job I wanted. It was like I was a little kid again and couldn't have the toy I wanted. I couldn't cry anymore. I just had to work hard and hope for the best. Graduate school was tough too. All those Bs and B+s. It was hard for me to accept that I wasn't going to get an A. I wasn't as smart or gifted as I had once been told. So reeling from those setbacks I had to find something to pay the bills. All the more I kept thinking how alone I was. How I never seemed to connect with anyone deeply since High School. For some reason I thought that High school was the place which meant the most to me socially. I guess that's true of most Americans. As much as I read and wrote I still had the same feeling that I was terribly alone, melancholic, different, standing on the outside. It's getting to the point where I don't think I'll find what I'm looking for. It seems like when I go out to get some dinner or see a film I'm always alone. I don't find people with similar interests. I am sorely out of the mainstream. I hadn't watched Game of Thrones since last month. I don't know who the anchor is on CNN. And I'm losing touch with the NYTimes. I used to read it more. Now it's always go to the films. See whats playing, read the reviews, watch the film in Binghamton, or Ithaca, maybe NYC,

I guess it's better, but it's also more of the same. I don't know if I want change, because I'm afraid to lose. Life seems to be an endless struggle which, thankfully, has an end.

Thoughts about Oliver Stone's Vietnam Trilogy- Platoon, Born On the Fourth of July, and Heaven and Earth

Each of these films is brilliant. Each one tells a story of the Vietnam War from a different angle. The first is an autobiographical account of Stone's experience of the War. The second is about another military man, only this time he becomes a disabled veteran. It is a film that is often overlooked, as is the third installment which I rarely hear mentioned when people talk about Oliver Stone's films.

Tom Cruise puts in one of his best performances in Born on the Fourth of July. And Willem Dafoe is great as the other drunk in a wheelchair stranded somewhere in Mexico. That scene might have been the best in the film. The Republican National convention scene was great too. Cruise's character takes to the floor and is escorted out of the building by security. Outside the building he is rescued by other veterans. After that he goes to visit a fellow soldier whom he killed with friendly fire.

Heaven and Earth takes a radically different view of the Vietnam War. A Vietnamese woman is the protagonist in the film. She is raised during the crucial years of the end of French rule and the beginning of the American presence. She works on a small rice farm and earns a meager living. By the end of the film she is a prosperous woman who has three sons and lives in California.

Yet, the man who loved her, who brought her to America as a refugee, ends up committing suicide. It is a very emotional scene when Tommy Lee Jones puts a rifle in his mouth. It is a sad affair when a serviceman can't seem to cope with life as it is. It seemed he was always wanting something more, always believed so much in the American dream which he was fighting to protect. I guess he just couldn't accept the fact that his dreams didn't work out like he wanted. It was a very sad end, indeed.

Platoon is a great first film. It was Stone's directorial debut. And he knocked it out of the park. For all the battle scenes and rivalries I found that Berenger's monologue about killing and death was so dark and brooding. The platoon had just got back from the jungle where Berenger had left Dafoe's character behind to be killed by the NVA. Berenger appears in the bunker where all the pot heads hang out. And where Elias partied too. He shows up with a bottle of Jack Daniels in his hand. The light was silouetted on his face to reveal his battle scars. He ruminates about death, killing, and dying. He challenges anyone in the room to a fight, Yet they are all hesitant to stand up to Berenger. Charlie Sheen finally mounts the courage, but is quickly put down.

The conflicts in Platoon seem to mirror the conflict over the war at home. One faction for the war and willing to commit atrocities to win. The other questioning why the country was in Vietnam and the methods soldiers were using to fight the war. Clearly the American conscience was not made up about Vietnam. For a conflict that ripped so many lives asunder, the 1980's was a time when many Americans came to terms with Vietnam. There were many films, these three being some of the best, that depicted the Vietnam War in American film. And with time came perspective.

Many changes were made and war came back to America. Instead of Tricky Dick we got the Bushes. I don't think there was a member of Congress who wasn't for the first or second Iraq War. On the contrary there were probably a couple. A sad few. Like the Spanish-American War many people have heard the drum beat to aggression. And again the country finds itself in peril. What are we doing in Iraq? Afghanistan? Are we building countries? How can we stop fundamentalism from reaking havoc the World over? It seems the threat of Communism has abated and in it's place is radical Islam. What should be done? War in Syria? Boots on the ground? Who knows?

Shogun by Clavell in miniseries format

I'll pretty much watch anything about Asia. I'd even look at a campy low cost production from the early 80s like Shogun for entertainment. The TV series was pretty campy. It didn't get any noms or awards. And a lot of the set pieces, like the boats, were pretty crappy. This was back in the days before CGI and such. So actual boats had to be used with a simulated sea. It might've worked back then, but it looks pretty bad nowadays. And the overt references to politics and religion really strain the viewer to recall the 100 years War and the discovery of East Asia.

I think back to the current political state of affairs when this TV series was produced. TV was still a big market, really the only one. There was no internet. And Thatcher and Reagan were in office with the bluster of election wins, proclaiming a revolution. Japan was a driving force in World affairs. It seemed like the Japanese were going to take over the World. In fact they didn't. But a film like Shogun shows how interest in Japan was at a fever pitch during the 80s. The Japanese even have a statue to commemorate the decade of the 80s in Japan.

I thought all the talk and conflicts about religion and race really indicative of the time period the film was made. I thought it could be a artifact about the 80s. In the US, the religious right was a major force in the 80s. Reagan used it to his advantage. The film makes much about the conflict in Christianity between Protestants and Catholics. There is also much talk about the West and East. All of it stays surface level. Things never get that dramatic.

It's TV, what do you expect? Yet the series is still compelling as a story about the discovery of Japan and the opening of it's culture. Although it would close it doors to the World for centuries, eventually it opened up. Thats another long story. It would be interesting if there was a film made about the Meiji Restoration period. Most Japanese films, that deal with History, are usually focused on the Empire period and the Wars that happened in the early 20th Century.

Somewhat entertaining. Not as good as something by one of the countless Japanese auteurs.

Russian Films

I was reading film comment two nights ago and I started to get ideas about watching film. Last week I went to Stupid Fucking Bird which is based on a Chekhov play. The play was good. I felt like the main character was going through playwriting class during his monologues. It also seemed to be a reflection of current times. It was good. I enjoyed it.

Afterwards I started to think about a class about Russian Literature and Film. Of course I don't speak Russian and I've never been there, but I entertained the thought anyway. I've taken some Russian History classes and I've been interested in Russia as a place through films like Dotocr Zhivago and some early Soviet filmmakers like Eisentstein and Dziga Vertov. And further along came Zvaganinstsev's Leviathan which I thought was great. Too bad it missed best foreign language film in the oscars race. I thought it should have won.

Anyway I thought about War and Peace and it turns out there's been numerous adaptations of Tolstoy's classic. My plan was to buy or rent all of the copies of War and Peace and then compare them to find out which one was the best. There is the Audrey Hepburn edition from the 50's which seemed good, but perhaps a little short. I had watched it years ago when I was reading a book about World Cinema. I thought that I should watch it again years later to see if it's any good. It didn't win any major awards, but any rendition of War and Peace deserves a look. Then there is the Sergei Bondarchuk edition which is in Russian and features an all Russian cast. I bought the DVD and I'm hoping that the film has subtitles because I don't understand Russian. After the 60's Russian version which won best Foreign Language film Oscar the year it was released comes a BBC production starrring Anthony Hopkins at a very young age. I'm up to episode 11 in the series of 20 episodes. I've got to write a paper for my MFA, then I'm going to immerse myself in War and Peace and write about which film is the best in my judgement.

There is also a current release of the film from 2015. It's a miniseries. It looks like War and Peace in the digital age. I should probably take a look.

Similar to War and Peace is Tolstoy's other well known novel which has been adapted for the screen numerous times. It is Anna Karenina. I read the Tom Stoppard script to the Keira Knightly starrring film from a few years back. After doing some quick searches on amazon, I found out that the role of Anna Karenina is a popular one among actresses. Not only Knightley, but also Sophie Marceau, Greta Garbo and Vivien Leigh have all played the doomed adulteress. I'd like to make a similar plan for Anna Karenina. And then decide which one I like the best.

Of course in an exercise like this one, budget and time are the most important things. War and Peace and Anna Karenina were written at a time when authors released their work in segments. So the longer they wrote the more segments they would have in publications. Which is why Tolstoy and Dostoevsky wrote such long novels. Charles Dickens too wrote really long books like Bleak House.

Well it looks like I have a project for the Summer break. We'll see how it goes.

thoughts about Boogie Nights.

Boogie Nights is one of Paul Thomas Anderson's early films. Is it as good as There Will Be Blood, probably not. Yet it is a very entertaining film. I watched it for the first time tonight and it flew right by. I read the screenplay yesterday and it was a very quick read. Especially the first fifty pages or so. The action, the story, and the characters make it compelling to read and watch. I so wanted to know what was going to happen to Dirk Diggler. Was he going to get killed? Was he going to OD? He was an interesting character. The whole film is interesting. I don't think there has been a serious film made about the adult film industry. I saw a documentary about the porn industry a few years ago. It made me look at the adult industry differently. And this film brings up those issues in a dramatic narrative. The drug problem is obvious, the other problem that affected the adult industry during the years of the film doesn't get mentioned, and the problem was HIV/AIDS. Many adult performers died of not only cocaine overdose, but HIV/AIDS. It's a recurring problem in the adult industry. Recently there has been some legal cases about whether the adult industry should be regulated more. For example having adult performers be tested for STDs and have women where goggles during performances.

So far there hasn't been a resolution. In the next year a committee in CA will rule about what measures the adult industry should be required to take to stop the spread of STDs.

Well, back to the film. The film is rather straight story about a kid with a "donkey dick" who is discovered by Bert Reynolds' character. He becomes a big star and his ego gets the best of him. He falls from stardom to poverty. The film makes quick work of his decline. Several pages and scenes are omitted from the film. There is little mention of his time as a male stripper or his corvette being wrecked around a pole. Perhaps it would have been more exposition for the scene where they try to rob the guy with fake coke. I felt like that scene is just kind of added on similarly to an early Tarrantino film. It's entertaining, but I felt the scenes to build up that scene should have been built up more. It makes more sense.

I will watch the film again before I write the critique for the paper. Perhaps I'll get a big idea? Maybe not.

thoughts about Son of Saul

Son of Saul is a holocaust film. It is not a comedy by any stretch of the imagination. It is similar to Schindler's List in many ways. Both films depict the horrors of the concentration camps. Perhaps even more so in Son of Saul. The main character goes through several near death situations until he is finally killed.

The story is strong, but it is the style of the film which is most entrancing. The camera is totally subjective. It follows Saul around Aushwitz past dead bodies, fires, incinerators, everything. Somehow he maintains his composure. I guess he felt numbed to it all after getting there and realizing what was going on. At times I felt like it was a first person shooter game you could find on the PS4. Anyway it was excellent.

The holocaust should not be taken lightly. It was something that killed 4 million Jews. And there have been people who denied the Holocaust ever happened. Those people should see this film. With the rise of authoritarianism in Eastern Europe this film is more informative than ever. It should be a warning sign, to the leaders in those countries about what horrors can happen if power is left unchecked.

Good film. I liked it immensely.

Thoughts about Standing Tall at the French Film Festival at Lincoln Center

This film was another French film about adolescent life in France. It follows a young man who had no father figure and who's mother was reckless. He starts out in a home and ends up turning it around apparently with the birth of his child. I guess it would end alright. But who knows? Wouldn't his problems come back? Perhaps he really was over his issues, yet I detected that they would come back.

Catherine Deneuve plays a, what in America we would call a family court judge who is on the case of the juvenile dilinquent. She tries everything, but nothing seems to work. Only when he finds love and has a child does he seem to calm down. Yet, I thought the film got to wishy washy, too melodramatic. I could see it playing on TV or something, but it wasn't such a good film. It was personal. In fact the film made me recall somethings in my own adolescence that I hadn't thought about in years.

The film has a lot of melodrama. I couldn't believe that this kid was so out of control. Then I remembered a friend of mine from graduate school who deals with kids like the one from the film. I'm sure glad I didn't go into special education. I wouldn't have been a very good counselor. My friend said he often took punches from crazy kids. The kid in this picture was definitely out of control. I guess I just found it hard to believe some of his emotions or actions. I don't know how it could have been made better. It just seemed to go on forever with no end in sight.

Bang Gang from the French Film Festival at Lincoln Center

This film was shocking in it's portrayal of youth gone wild. On thinking about it later I thought to myself it is somewhere between traditional softcore porn and hardcore porn. During the film two people got up to leave and exited the theater. I was eager to see how it would end. Eventually it reached the point where the lead actress, who reminded me of Helena Bonham Carter, got sick and had to go to the doctor. It eventually it was revealed that all the lude behavior by the young adolescents caught up with them. They were diagnosed with syphilis and a few got pregnant. Not to mention their parents were disappointed. It was a display of pure youthful energy gone wild. I was entertained, but I felt dirty while watching the film. I wondered if this was a true story or something someone made up?

The performances and production were spot on. I wish I had been this free when I was sixteen. It makes me recall my sexual activity when I was 16. Which I can say was nowhere nea r these kids level of pleasure. Plus they were doing cocaine and smoking way too much. But I guess your only young once, right?

This was an interesting film. I liked it for it's brashness. For pushing the envelope further about adolescent sex activity. I mean it isn't illegal to show some of the scenes if the actors were still minors? I don't know. The crowd was mostly older people. Which makes me sad about film culture's future. If there aren't many young people going to the movies than what does the future hold for film? Perhaps it's just the venue and the film. Lincoln Center is pretty high brow for film. The theater was big enough for about a 100 people. And the film was French and in subtitles.

Well I liked it immensely and it was a great film to start off my French Film Festival visit to Lincoln Center.

thoughts on Kazan's On the Waterfront

On the Waterfront is a powerful film about working class conflict on the docks of Manhattan or Brooklyn, I wasn't sure about which one it was. The drama is searing. I was taken into the film the whole way through. I wasn't bored or distracted throughout the action. And, of course, Marlon Brando makes the film. His passion is incredible. His method acting style is something of legend. Terry Malloy is one of the most memorable characters in film history. I still can't get over his legendary speech to his brother when his brother is supposed to kill him but ends up dead himself. "I could a been a contender, I could a been somebody." So memorable. One of the most famous lines in film history. And the film is great too. The class conflict, the struggle for survival, it raises so many questions; why don't the docker workers leave the docks? Isn't there a better life somewhere else? Why do they keep coming back to work at the docks? It also reveals Capitalism's faults. The union which is supposed to act on behalf of the workers is absolutely corrupt. And anyone who gets in their way is murdered. It's all hopeless. But the hero becomes Terry Malloy. he testifies against union boss. And, we are led to believe that it leads to his downfall.

Under the major conflict between Terry Malloy and the union boss is a love story which is fraught with tension. Terry was the last person to see his love interest's brother who was killed by the union. Terry wants to help her, but at first she resists. It is only when Terry breaks down her door and they go searching for Terry's brother that they truely consummate their love.

It's a great finish, but it leaves open ends. What does happen to the union boss? Do the workers ever get fair work? It seems like they never will. I remember Guliani cleaning up the docks from the mob years ago. But did that do anything? Do doc workers still work for peanuts with bad working conditions? My grandfather who had only a 6th grade education worked in factories his whole life. He was one of the lucky ones. His wages put my father and my uncles through college and they have all gone on to better lives. But what about the multitude of others who weren't so lucky?

Kazan named names at the HUAC committee meetings and he drew flack for it. It was only years later that he was rehabalitated and given a life time achievement award by the academy. It's too bad it wasn't earlier.

thoughts on Fellini's 8 1/2

Fellini is great. This film about filmmaking is a very cerebral gaze at how films get made. I've seen the film several times and this is the first time which some of the meanings became very clear to me. It seems that Fellini shows a filmmaker and the trials and blocks he goes through to make a film. The flashback sequences seem to be windows into the filmmaking process. When I was writing my screenplay or reading about film theory, history, and practice I often had flashbacks which Fellini makes very clear. He thinks about his parents, his childhood at school, the lovers he's had, all are stories within the story about his struggle to make a film with a giant spaceship in it. And he doesn't make the film. I suppose it's a warning to filmmakers about the stresses you could encounter while trying to write a film and then trying to make it.

I often catch myself in blocks or dream like flashbacks to my childhood or to lovers I've had, or when I was back in school, or when I just couldn't think of anything, and I questioned what I was doing and if it really mattered that I wrote a film. In the scene where Fellini goes to see the Bishop or Cardinal to confess his sins was informative to me. It seemed that Fellini needed some kind of direction or clarification. Some way out of his block that he was stuck in.

Yet he returns again and again to his past. What was he trying to discover? What was he looking for in his past that might make him write the film? I guess it is a writer's problem to constantly relive life to write. Someone said that was how writers operate. They go over life again and again, reliving the pain and joy until it's empty and they feel unblocked enough to write or shoot. Yet the yearning returns. The search for life or a story something that explains things or makes life livable.

I should watch it again. This film was after La Dolce Vida which turned Fellini into an international phenomenon. It also singled the end of the Italian neo-realism movement. After Fellini Italian film lost much of it's momentum. Of course there was Pasolini and Bertolucci, but in terms of a movement things didn't progress as much after Fellini. He was the apogee of the neo-realist movement. And 8 1/2 is his magnum opus.

thoughts on Where to Invade Next

I wasn't overly joyed by the end of this film. I watched it and I felt like most of the information which Moore imparts I already knew. Perhaps it's because I majored in European History and follow Europe more than I do the US. Still a lot of his points are shallow and merely made to drum up a dislike of America. The film juxtaposes images of people in Norway with images of police brutality in US prisons. It makes a point, but there is no nuance. It is completely one sided. Yet, that is how Moore operates. He is a partisan. He takes a side and argues for it without referencing opposing arguments which might prove him wrong.

Moore seems to be drumming up support for Bernie Sanders. He points out how much Europeans have, while Americans seem to have it so bad. He fails to mention all the taxes that Europeans pay for the benefits he describes. When he show an Italian couple living the "dolce vida" in Italy, he doesn't mention the Italy has high unemployment, and anemic economy and fears being taken over by the Chinese. Things aren't so rosy in Europe as Moore leads us to believe. I really didn't like the images of the prison violence as they were presented. As violent and shocking as the appear it only perputuates a stereotype of African-Americans as prisoners and felons. It doesn't show any of the accomplishments of African- Americans and how they are accepted and work in American society as equals in many ways. Yet I would caution my own statement with evidence which shows the American prison system as overwhelming African- American and the stories about police violence which is directed disproportionately at young, black men. If Moore wanted to use the images from police brutality, why not make a film about just that? Why not make a film which is sorely in need? Instead he goes of to Europe and shows alternatives which are probably not feasible for a country like the US which is incredibly more multi-cultureal than a place like Iceland or Norway.

Still it is clear the America needs reforms in many areas. And Moore is out there, seemingly alone, carrying the flag, sparking debate and hopefully causing change for the better.

thoughts on Roermer's Postermodernism and the invalidation of traditional narrative

Roemer's book is a deep and incredibly well thought out book. It's views about story and storytellers are very insightful. It ranges from the classics like Oedipus Rex to structuralism in it's discussion of literary theory. There is a lot to digest from the book. It's most memorable statement is the "every story is over before it begins." That writers of films know the ending. What is in question is how the filmmaker gets to the end. I have heard to this idea before in film class. That with the star system and audience polling, etc. It becomes obvious that the big star is going to be the hero. What isn't know is how the star is going to get to the ending. That is where creativity comes into play. Writers must keep audiences paying attention and entertained until they get to the ending and return to stasis. I was watching The Revenant by Inarrutu and this theory held true. The audience knows that Dicapprio is going to win in the end. It wouldn't be right if he didn't. He probably wouldn't take the role if he was going to lose or come out somehow harmed in the end. So we have to watch and see how he gets the bad guy and comes out triumphant by the end of the film. We see it all the time in films. It's what we expect and if it didn't happen there would be a lot less box office.

Roemer quotes everyone from Nieztche to Levi-Strauss. Another idea he had was the film is more than just an escape. We are drawn to stories because they explain how things are. We want to understand ourselves and the World around us and to do that we resort to stories. Films, plays, novels, etc. they all seek to explain who we are and why the World is the way it is. The book is great. Much better than some of the other books I've read about film and writing.

thoughts on Easy Rider

this is the classic counterculture film from the 1960's. The film was made in 1969 and was a big success. The first time I saw it was in High School in the late 90s. It was a tremendous experience. It was the first time I had seen anyone smoke weed on camera. The film is short, it runs about 90 minutes. When I watched it tonight the first hour went by very quickly. There isn't much dialogue either. I read the screenplay and it has a lot of camera directions such close up, etc. Yet the dialogue that comes through is meaningful and does have some weight. The two scenes I thought that expressed the films theme were when Fonda and Hopper are at the hippie commune and when they pick up George and take him along heading to Mardi Gras. For all it's hippie sunshine, the film is brutal and has a very pessimistic ending. I read where Paul Schrader criticized the film for demonizing Southern racists, and the film is true to that criticism. Yet the one sided portrayal of Southerners as all racists and haters of the counterculture does have some merit. At the time America was divided over serious issues like desegregation, the Vietnam War, and people, like hippies, who wanted something different then the strict conformity in which much of the county lived in at the time, and definitely in the South.

As they drove through the Southern town I was wondering what state they were in? Was it Texas or Arkansas? I guess it was a generalized depiction of a small Southern town claiming that they were all the same. And what the small town Southerners do to the hippie bikers is brutal. The murder of George is a violent and bastardly act. Before George dies he talks about why the townsfolk don't like Hopper or Fonda. He says it's because the hippies represent freedom. Freedom is easy to talk about, but harder to live when your being bought and sold in the marketplace. I took this as the writers of the film saying the Capitalism overruled any notions of democracy that the US had during that time. It is an idea that holds true to today. We see culture today as commodified and delivered to consumers. Mainstream culture is a Capitalist enterprise that seeks profit, but doesn't take into account humanity. This film shows a counterculture, hippie culture, that seeks to exist outside the legal marketplace where everything has a price, even democracy can be bought and manipulated to become a perverted form of government. So I guess the question which grows out of George's monologue is are you really free? And that seems to be what hippies were seeking. To be free.

Thoughts on The Treasure of the Sierra Madre

I've started watching films from a suggested film list that came along with orientation for my MFA degree in screenwriting. So far I've watched Citizen Kane, Casablanca, Gone With the Wind, The Treasures of the Sierra Madre, Psycho, and The Third Man. The Treasures of Sierra Madre was a film about obsession with gold. The character played by Humphrey Bogart becomes so obsessed with Gold that he finally goes crazy and resorts to violence to take all the gold. Bogart's character is much different than his character in Casablanca. Rick is smooth and suave as an expat bar owner in Casablanca. He is willing to risk his life so that his former lover can escape with her scientist husband to the US. In Sierra Madre he is a low life. He begins the film by begging for money on the streets of Tampico in Mexico.

Bogart and his friends head to the mountains after coming into a little sum of money to mine for gold. They find a small haul and mine it. Yet the story really begins after they decide to head back to civilization. Here the group splits up and Bogart tries to kill his partner. His partner lives and Bogart is murdered by bandits. In the end no one gets the gold.

Yet it's the obsession that stays with the viewer. The image of Bogart's bearded face with his crazy eyes; obsessed with gold, willing to kill his partner for his share. The length humanity is willing to go for wealth becomes a moral tale that instructs us to head the warning of the old man in the film. I try to live my life not obsessed with money. But it is difficult. Money is what makes the World go round. This film is a reminder to me to not be so obsessed with money or posessions. Life is too short.

Brooklyn, not the place, the film!

This was a romantic comedy set in 1950's Ireland and Brooklyn. It's based on a Colm Toibin novel that was a New York Times bestseller. I saw the film twice. When I went the second time I saw it with my Father and my aunt. My aunt is Irish. She has been to Ireland, so I thought she would really like the film. It is a film that is told from a woman's perspective. And many of the characters and situations deal with women.

The film centers around the choices the lead character has to make; does she stay in Ireland? Does she marry Tony or Jim? Does she leave her mother in Ireland? Which place does she prefer, Ireland or Brooklyn? I suppose the title answers the last question.

I really liked how the film taps into that feeling of wanting to go to another place and start anew because where you are isn't working out. Ellis had no full time job and no marriage prospects when she was in Ireland. Yet she moves to Brooklyn and has a full time job, night school, and a love interest. Initially she is homesick. After she meets Tony she isn't homesick anymore.

Where I live you heard it a lot. This place has no jobs. There isn't anything to do. It's out in the middle of nowhere. I've left and returned. I don't know if I will leave again. Only to return. Are we really free to choose our fates? Are we just atoms bouncing around in a predictable, fated pattern? Or can we choose of our own free will? Do we really know where we will end up? Who can say? Is it God's plan? Or does man, or in this case woman, have a choice over what happens to our fate?

I think this film is a good example of the development of character. It's story was strong. I can't wait to get the book and read it, and watch the film again.

Trumbo, a great film

Trumbo is a great film. Especially for film historians. It delves deep into the HUAC committee and it's affect on Hollywood. Trumbo is it's lead character and biggest star writer. This was back in the Golden Age of Hollywood where stars meant some, but not as much as they do today. Studios also played a bigger role. They made film after film until TV came along and caused a restructuring in the industry. Anyway numerous characters from film history grace the screen in this picture. Trumbo himself, like so many screenwriters, is little known even though he penned some of the best films of his era. He never aspired to more then a screenwriter and lived a middle class life.

After Trumbo gets out of prison for contempt of Congress he has to figure out how to make a living as a screenwriter even though he is blacklisted. He manages to make living from writing by using other screenwriters to submit his work. He even wins an Oscar for Roman Holiday and someone else has to accept his golden statue. The pressures that Trumbo and his family had to endure during the time he was on the blacklist were great. In the film you can see the hardships the McCarthyism wrought on so many people. Screenwriters, teachers, and others were all effected by McCarthyism.

I thought Bryan Cranston did a hell of a job on the film. Trumbo is an odd character, and Cranston shows Trumbo at his best and his worst.

It's too bad McCarthyism ruined so many lives. It didn't have to. There could have been some other way.

Thoughts about Cheech and Chong's Up in Smoke

This film is hilarious. I was laughing all the way through. And I was sober! The jokes work well. The pot humor is especially funny. The cops are very much keystone cops. I was left wanting more. Too bad it was only an hour and a half film. Cheech and Chong are great characters. They play every moment well. The story was good too. Every sequence plays up some kind of joke.

I watched this film in my living room. It was on a big TV. I bought the copy of a double feature DVD from amazon.com. Afterward I realized I could have rented it for 3.99. I don't think it made much difference in price. At numerous moments in the film I wanted to toke. Yet I had to wait until the next day and even then, I only had some burritos and taco salad which is a poor substitute for weed. All the talk about weed in the movie really gave me a big craving for a joint. I'd sure like a joint like Chong smokes in the film. Big, round and full of some great strain from Cali. It's too bad New York is so lame when it comes to legalization. Only recently has the government in Albany started to de-criminalize weed. There is a medicinal store now open. In LA I read that there is a "speedweed" distributor that delivers weed like a pizza. Well, in NY we are just starting to legalize the weed.

Yet it's films like Cheech and Chong that paved the way for acceptance of weed as recreational drug like alcohol. I can't remember a film which pokes so much fun at the drug culture and the cops which are out to control it. The scenes of people being stoned are in stark contrast to the people in Reefer Madness. There isn't any violence in Cheech and Chong. It doesn't make people crazy or violent. It's just about smoking up and getting a mellow feeling. Now I'm not too blind to say the weed doesn't have negative side effects, but films like Up in Smoke show that it isn't anymore harmful than hard liquor.

I'm currently writing a paper about Hollywood on Drugs and this is the first film in the "weed" category. I'm looking to see how "weed" has been depicted in films from the beginning of films about it to the present day. I started by selecting numerous films and have committed to watching each one, perhaps several times, and then seeing how films with weed in them have changed.

I think it's a relevant topic considering the current wave of legalizations in the US.

More posts to follow.

Leo in a struggle for Life and Death.....and revenge

This was the top of the "serious season" for the movies. With the Oscar race looking more like The Revenant and the rest, I can only wait to find out if it comes through with the lion's share at the awards ceremony on February 28th. It should take the award for best cinematography. Those shots of the great West are just breath taking. I think it will be Lubezki's third in row, if he does win. And the big question of the night will probably be, aside from the heated talk about there being no people of color in the acting categories, will Leo win for best actor? I think he should. He puts in an incredible performance. It is full of emotion and restrain. After all he spends much of the film recovering from being mawled by a giant bear. And the ending is just as compelling. I knew Leo was going to get Tom Hardy, but I didn't know how. It was bit by bit. A little piece of finger, a hatchet chop to the stomach, and finally letting him go to the Indian Chief to be cut in the throat. Great drama.

I saw the film twice. And on the second time I really started to hear Ryuichi Sakamoto's soundtrack. It is pulsating, yet subdued. I really enjoyed it. It being in the theater made it that much more enjoyable. The fight scenes were also something to be commended. The opening sequence shows the brutality of a hunt gone wrong like something out of Dances With Wolves or Last of the Mohicans. How Innarutu staged it is something that would be worthy of a good documentary.

An instant classic if there ever was one. I'm sure I'll watch it again when it comes out online.

A bunch of John Wayne's for 13 patriotic hours

13 Hours was a jaw clenching film which shows American security contractors fighting to stay alive. It doesn't get into the burning question that will come up if Hillary gets the Democratic party nom for President; how much did she know? What was she doing when the Ambassador was dying? I guess the film was made to present those questions and honor the Americans who gave their lives in defense of State Department and CIA personell who couldn't otherwise defend themselves.

The action is top notch. Explosions, firefights, car crashes, it's non stop for two hours. Yet it does have a John Wayne mentality to the whole film. These guys, the ex-special forces are all about firepower and they know they can't be beat. The kill ratio between the security forces and the fighters who storm the embassy, then attempt to take the secret CIA compound is incredibly slanted to the favor of the Americans. Their bravado flies in the face of the buearacratic wrangling that takes place over whether to use soldiers against the street fighters, or to wait. Of course the film leaves us thinking why did they wait? The Ambassador could have been saved. Shoot first and ask questions later. It is a very pro-military film.

I'm certain that  supporters of the RNC were loving every moment of the film. And, it is calculated that the film is released during an election year which Hillary is running for President. How many people will see the film who's opinion will change? Probably not so many. I think the film just confirms what many in the Republican party want to hear. Diplomats can't solve problems. Hillary screwed up royally. And we need a stronger military.

Yet for all it's blowhardness, the film does commemorate the dead soldiers who stationed there to protect diplomats and other personell. Why they were there is a question that hasn't been answered. Why did the government need to station a secret CIA base in Libya? To what purpose did the Ambassador go to Benghazi when he had to have known that it was such a hot spot? It would have been a better film had some of these questions been answered. Perhaps there will be a documentary which seeks some of these answers.

Latest screenplay that I'm reading

So I'm reading, perhaps, the most difficult screenplay written in the 20th century. It is the screenplay to Last Year at Marienbad. It was written by Allen Robbe Grillet who was a proponent of the "noveau roman" a literary movement which championed a rebirth of the novel form in France. It went right along with the French New Wave film movement. In fact the screenplay is by Robbe Grillet, but the film is directing by Alain Resnais (that's re-nay). It's been sometime since anyone has written about Resnais. I guess Jean luc Godard and Francios Truffaut are more popular topics to write about. It's too bad that Resnais gets overshadowed by the other Cahiers critics turned directors. He is the most complicated and avant garde of the group which I have encountered. I suppose Jacques Rivette might be more avant garde.and I've only seen Pari Nous Apartient. So I don't really know his work. Too bad I don't live near Lincoln Center since they are doing, or did a retrospective of his work along with David Lynch's. A comparison of two very formalistic directors. I can't wait to get my hands o the Out 1 by Rivette. It looks long and complicated.

Anyway back to the screenplay. It has no character names. It has the hardest to follow camera direction. And it's set in some kind of New Year's Eve party at a hotel in Germany. So far I haven't really encountered the plot. I've seen the movie once before. And I got the gist of what happened. We'll see after I read the whole script what more I missed on my passive watching of the film. And I will watch it twice. Not once. Twice.

The Resnais film that is famous is Hiroshima Mon Amour. I first heard about the film when I was reading a book about film producing. I bought the film and watched it. In fact I think I had it or had lost it and had to buy it again. It was an excellent film. Yet, before I had read the script I missed a lot of the plot. Reading the script really gets me to catch all the details in the film. Before, with a complicated movie like Hiroshima Mon Amour, I usually get the major theme and able to follow the plot. Yet, somethings, like the fact the Riva's character was with a Nazi soldier at the end of the war eluded me. I totally missed it. Picking up on her character reveals a deeper theme to the film about war and memory. Watching the first part of the film really jarred me with images of Japanese people suffering the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. Was the bombing really necessary? Couldn't the US have threatened Japan with the bomb? Then if they didn't surrender used it on a desserted island to show how powerful it was?

And Riva's character was so innocent. So young. How could she be blamed for going with the Nazi Soldier? I think it was absurd the way she was treated. Furthermore I find French history deeply unsettling. How could they treat Riva's character so bad and proclaim the Nazis as the ultimate evil after the occupation, then go right back to oppressing Vietnam and Algeria? I still get no answer to this question. I suppose the response was the 1968 demonstrations. I should really look for a history book that delves into the issues of French Imperialism after WWII. Even to this day the French are very sensitive to Nazism. But where is the sympathy for victims of French colonialism? Where are objections to France's actions in Algeria? I guess I should recall, like I was when I was reading the New York Times the other day, debates about human nature. Is man naturally evil or good? It seems the more I read about the World, the more I think man is naturally evil and needs to reigned in. I recall Jean Jacques Rousseau, "man is free, and everywhere he is in chains."

hiroshima mon amour, the last time I watched this film? Can I remember?

I've seen this film several times. I think this viewing was my fourth. The first time I saw I didn't know what was going on. And it is such a short film if you don't know whats going on, it will go right over your head. This time around I read the screenplay. The script is about 80 pages with a short introduction. The end is abrupt and it leaves the viewer wondering if Emmanuelle Riva stays in Hiroshima or goes back to Paris or Nevers? I think it is one of the best cinematic endings in film history. Throughout the entire film the two characters are only referred to as He and She. They have no names. Finally at the end of the film they give each other names associated with their experiences of war time atrocity. Nevers in France where She had taken up with a Nazi soldier and Hiroshima where the Americans had dropped one of two atomic bombs.

Right away when I began thinking about what the film meant, I thought about war time atrocities. The dropping of the bomb on Japan was a controversial decision by Harry S. Truman. Did the Americans really need to drop the bomb and kill all those innocent civilians? Couldn't something else have been done? I'm familiar with most of the arguments that justify the decision to drop the bomb, but after seeing the footage at the beginning of this film I hesitate to agree with proponents of using the bomb as an alternative to a different outcome.

The other atrocity which is harder to follow in the film is when Riva's younger self falls in love with a Nazi soldier. After liberation she is treated very badly. The townsfolk shave her hair off and throw her into a cellar and don't let her out. She has screaming fits. She licks the saltpeter walls and her own blood. Finally she is released and sent to Paris.

By the time the film's action takes place. Both of the characters have married and are leading lives of contentment. Yet their affair brings up past memories, especially for Riva, that they have forgotten. The ravages of the A- bomb seem like a distant memory for He. While She has totally forgotten about Nevers. Yet it is part of their identity. It is part of their past that they have forgotten. It is their way of coping with past memories that if they didn't forget them, they would probably go nuts. How does one continue to live after the atrocities of war? Especially when you return to normal life?

This might be the best film of the French New Wave. It might be the best post-War European film.