For a change of pace

I don't usually focus on music here on this blog unless it relates directing to cinema, but this year, I made a decision to, if not follow music more closely, at least create a best of the year list from my limited range of listening. I seem to spend so much time with film that I rarely get the chance to actively seek out the latest bands and such. Also, my musical appreciation is not the most broad (by choice) - so, with the exception of the occasional pop album I might throw on the list (remember, Kylie Minogue is supposed to have a new album this year!), my choices this year will likely be as expected by those who know me. For those who don't, here's a rundown of some of the albums that will likely take position come December.

PJ Harvey - White Chalk
Arcade Fire - Neon Bible
Montag - Going Places
Feist - The Reminder
M.I.A. - Kala
Peter Bjorn and John - Writer's Block
Interpol - Our Love to Admire
Animal Collective - Strawberry Jam
Justice - Cross

There were a number of albums that excited me earlier in the year that have fallen off my playlist: notably Modest Mouse's latest, We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank. And, as pop tends to do, Hilary Duff's Dignity died shortly after impact (for those not convinced, Duff's album was as close to a Kylie record that anyone has made... which is a compliment). PJ Harvey seems the only sure-bet for making the list, but I thought I'd throw the others out there as well.

CORRECTION: Bad news: it looks as though Kylie's new album won't hit the shelves until February 2008. Imagine a sad face emoticon here.

Harvest Moon

Away from Her - dir. Sarah Polley - 2006 - Canada

When embarking on making a film that focuses on people over the age of 50 (not counting Bruce Willis, Harrison Ford, or Susan Sarandon films), an age group often pushed into supporting roles, the word “mature” would almost be essential in critique. Actress Sarah Polley, here directing her first feature film, is in her 20s (as most people reviewing the film will point out) and could have been wholly unfit to create a film about a married couple, together for nearly forty-five years, dealing with the heartbreak of Alzheimer’s. That she chose Away from Her, based on a short story by Alice Munro entitled “The Bear Came over the Mountain,” to be her first film would seemingly require a closer look to determine whether or not “mature” could both describe the film and its subjects.

Thankfully, for us, Polley’s direction is so assured that a closer look would be unnecessary. She handles the movie-of-the-week premise of painful disease and makes Away from Her far more complex. Away from Her is, instead, a film about memory, not losing it but dwelling upon it. As Fiona, Julie Christie is fantastic, a smart woman, living with her husband Grant (Gordon Pinset). As her memory begins to leave her, she makes the decision to go to a home, causing distress and anxiety in her husband, whom she’s never spent more than a month apart in their forty-four years of marriage. When the film chooses to follow the struggle of Grant instead of the pain of Fiona, one might assume a cop-out; however, it’s in this decision that makes Away from Her a poetic piece of cinema and not a Miramax-produced biopic like the awful Iris with Kate Winslet and Judi Dench.

What Polley truly has working for her is that she seems hardly the sentimentalist. The emotions in the film are both authentic and grounded, and the course of events never feels dramatically-fueled, but instead richly realized and naturalistic. The film is cut between Fiona’s attachment to a fellow patient and the memories washing away of her husband and Grant’s pleasing with the patient’s wife (Olympia Dukakis) to allow Fiona and Dukakis’ husband to be together. The answers are never easy, and Polley has the advantage of working with seasoned actors who can pull it off. Though the final Vertigo moment where Fiona recognizes Grant after many failed attempts and the dreadful coffee-shop wench song that closes the film ring loudly as mistakes in an otherwise flawless film, Away from Her may stand as Polley’s finest achievement so far in her career, which is saying a lot coming from someone who’s admired her since she was a pre-teen in Exotica by Atom Egoyan (who also serves as producer here).

Caution, maybe not...

Ang Lee's Lust, Caution has taken the top prize at this year's Venice Film Festival, just three years after he won the top prize for Brokeback Mountain. Brian de Palma won the best director prize for Redacted, and Todd Haynes' I'm Not There and Abdellatif Kechiche's La Graine et le mulet. Babel co-stars Cate Blanchett and Brad Pitt took the acting prizes for I'm Not There and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, respectively. You can find the rest of the award winners here at IndieWire.

Yes, There Will Be Blood

Just because I'm obsessed with her, I might as well mention that Béatrice Dalle's new film, À l'intérieur, is having its North American premiere at Toronto during the festival's run. The film is directed by first-timers Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury, and is showing in the festival's Midnight Madness program. The film also stars Alysson Paradis, sister of Vanessa, and Nicolas Duvauchelle, husband of Ludivine Sagnier. So if Trouble Every Day wasn't enough blood and Dalle for you, The Weinstein Company will release this early next year.

Despair and the glory of Tilda Swinton

Stephanie Daley - dir. Hilary Brougher - 2006 - USA

I suppose everyone has those actors that will make them watch the dumbest shit just because of their presence. As you probably already know, Parker Posey is one of them (and, yes, I did see Josie and the Pussycats, thank you); well, Tilda Swinton is another. Here, Swinton stars as forensic psychologist with a little bun in her oven. She’s asked to take on the case of the town’s infamous Ski Mom, or the title character played by Amber Tamblyn, who threw her baby in the dumpster after giving birth at three months. The film has a very Atom Egoyan feel, particularly in its wintery setting, reminiscent of The Sweet Hereafter, and like The Sweet Hereafter, the film unfolds in a non-linear fashion, with Swinton and Tamblyn’s sessions being the backbone of the film. As usual, Swinton is phenomenal, an actress who always gives you more than you think is expected of her, from simple glances to astonishing reactions and gestures. She also has this icy beauty about her that makes it quite difficult to take your eyes off. Though she played the Snow Queen in that shitty Chronicles of Narnia film, Swinton still embodies a rich humanity that such “respected” actress (like Nicole Kidman or Jodie Foster, for example) could barely muster. Tamblyn is a surprising match to Swinton, in case you’re wondering; she’s far more gifted an actress than, say, Ellen Page or Evan Rachel Wood. Regrettably, Stephanie Daley falls for the shitty Perfect Murder “meat thermometer motif” (which my father coined, in reference to that dreadful remake of Dial M for Murder, where, in one scene, a seemingly useless meat thermometer is placed annoying in center frame and later used as a murder weapon). Thankfully, it’s subtle ironies and coincidences resonate to a certain level that’s beautifully unexpected.

Funny Ha Ha - dir. Andrew Bujalski - 2002 - USA

Though I hate the genre-label “mumblecore” that’s been coined for Bujalski’s breed of Cassavetes/Woody Allen Jr. cinema, I can safely say that he’s probably one of the most talented young filmmakers working in America today. Funny Ha Ha, his first film, falls slight of his later Mutual Appreciation, which is as close to perfection as any film I’ve seen in the past year, but not grudgingly so. As the lead Marnie (probably not a coincidental nod to Hitchcock), Kate Dollenmayer is hypnotic, a girl both awkward and charming in her own right. Though Bujalski’s characters lives take place at the same time as those of Chicago’s Joe Swanberg (Kissing on the Mouth and LOL), his films exceed Swanberg’s by acknowledging the humor of the characters’ overwhelming despair. Whereas Swanberg is whiney, Bujalski is celebratory in the numbing mind state of the post-collegiate. Every evening is a box of mystery and potential excitement, wandering around the streets of Boston, stumbling across a party of some guys you think are friends of your other friend’s girlfriend, and waking up, miserable, regretful. Watching Bujalski’s films unfold is like a small revelation, finding beauty in the confused path of his characters and allowing their misery to transpire, if only because it makes for brilliant humanity and, sometimes, exquisite comedy.

The Boss of It All (Direktøren for det hele) - dir. Lars Von Trier - 2006 - Denmark/Sweden/Iceland

Office comedies aren’t the hardest to come by, and if you’re like most people I know, you’ll probably judge any one you see on either Office Space or the US Office (if you do either, we probably don’t see eye-to-eye). Not surprisingly, I have a closer affinity to the BBC Office and that Toni Collette/Parker Posey film Clockwatchers, but regardless, an office comedy isn’t simply that when it’s coming from Lars von Trier. I may reprimand him for abandoning his USA Trilogy for this, but I can’t complain too much when he provides me with a film like The Boss of It All. Perpetual “nice-guy” Ravn (Peter Gantzler) hires inept actor Kristoffer (Jens Albinus) to pose as the boss of the law firm he secretly owns to push the blame of the company’s selling off on someone else. Kristoffer, unaware of what’s really going on, serves as the so-called “boss of it all,” interacting with the core members of the staff, clueless to who exactly he’s supposed to be. The film is hilariously high-concept, but the narrator (voiced by Von Trier himself) allows the questionably sincere apology at the end of the film: “Sorry if you expected more or any less…” I think it’s gotten to the point that even when Von Trier isn’t on top of his game (Manderlay), I will still revel devilishly in his sadism. Iben Hjejle (High Fidelity, Mifune), as a woman convinced she can cure “the boss of it all” of his false homosexuality, and Jean-Marc Barr (Dogville, Don’t Let Me Die on a Sunday), as a team member who apparently doesn’t know how to speak Danish, are both wonderful in supporting roles.

Princesas - dir. Fernando León de Aranoa - 2005 - Spain

Other than maybe Pedro Almodóvar, melodrama is not something that contemporary filmmakers can pull off. In Princesas, we get the story of a down-on-her-luck hooker Caye (the phenomenal Candela Peña, of All About My Mother), who’s saving up her money to get a new pair of tits, perhaps in order to compete with the growing number of illegal immigrants selling their ass for half as much. Though she keeps it a secret from her fellow Spanish-bred whores, Caye befriends South American hooker Zulema (Micaela Nevárez), a woman saving up money to bring her mother and young son to Spain. What’s refreshing about Princesas is that it’s what I like to call a sunshine melodrama. The majority of the film takes place during the day, with the sun shining over the area where all the hookers convene. Certainly, awful things happen, but the director handles them lightly, shying away from gratuitous violence and close-up agony. The two women cry a lot, but they do so in a way that makes you wonder if what’s coming over them isn’t just a mixture of emotions and overwhelming confusion. What also makes Princesas so lovely is that the major benefactor in Caye’s dejection (her mobile going off at the most inopportune times) could be completely avoided by one small factor: if she learned how to put her fucking cell-phone on silent. We allow this error to slide, because it provides for the stunning despair of our two exceptional actresses.

Fine Dining

The Last Supper - dir. Stacy Title - 1995 - USA

File this one under “Films You Barely Remember Seeing 10 Years Ago.” I’m not sure what inspired me to revisit The Last Supper, but as I’m thinking of it now, I’m not sure what possessed me to find it in the first place. Perhaps Roger Ebert liked it, or maybe it just looked lonely in the section Blockbuster designated for their single-copy VHS, which is also where I stumbled upon Welcome to the Dollhouse and Freeway. Thus, I visited The Last Supper tonight for nostalgia, I suppose, not that I had a fondness for it the size of Dollhouse or Freeway. The premise was simple and dark, which I liked: five liberal grad students decide to invite right-wingers to Sunday dinner in order to bicker and then poison their guests. Sounds appealing, no? I guess what I didn’t remember was that the film relied entirely on its own, albeit clever, idea. How are intellectual liberals supposed to fight against the powers that oppress them and the world?

The premise is absurd, naturally, but the film is surprisingly gristly enough for thought. It could quite easily fallen into the case of “preaching to their choir,” for how many pro-lifers really would find this a good Friday evening view? Yet when our characters learn the lesson we’re so anxiously anticipating, things don’t end up quite as easy as we may have thought. Perhaps, now, watching it again after just about everyone else has forgotten, it’d be easier to see The Last Supper as an HBO program, as the realms of cinema seem to pale in comparison to the station’s phenomenal programming. The film itself is serialized, as the students invite one bullheaded Republican after another to the dinner feast, and lacks a certain timing (not in its humor) that would have proven far more beneficial to its purpose. Most of the characters exist only as loose sketches of what we all know to be grad students. Courtney B. Vance is the stern black man studying political science. Ron Eldard is the obnoxiously pussy trust fund baby on his way to law school. Jonathan Penner is the art student, who, on more than one occasion, takes the opportunity to show off his divergently sculpted torso. Annabeth Gish is the girly-girl, and Cameron Diaz (easily the strongest of the bunch) is the smart and sexy one. Any college student could probably say they’ve had class with all five before, but seldom could say they “knew” them. I’m not sure the director or the writer knows them any better than a bystander classmate (aside from their predictably liberal leanings)… which leads into my thoughts that The Last Supper would make for a much juicier television program than a film.

I may allow The Last Supper to start a trend in my film viewing, a revisit of those films that so touched me as a preteen on my way to high school. A recent rental of All over Me proved exceptionally beneficial to this feeling of nostalgia that I’m, not craving but, looking toward. Unfortunately, I didn’t get around to writing about that film, but there’s always tomorrow (or next month). I may not get anything out of this non-assignment other than a rekindling of passed feelings, but perhaps the formation of a timeline, as related to my own film history (you can scroll back to sometime last year to see my list of the 100 movies that shaped my appreciation for the art of film). Anyway, I think I’m going to pitch the idea to HBO… and you’ll say you knew me when.

Hell on Earth

I would love to tell you whether Rob Zombie’s sort-of remake of John Carpenter’s horror classic Halloween was worth your time and money. I’d also love to tell you that I had a fun time watching it. But, this just isn’t the case. Instead, I got to endure my all-time worst theatre experience and, for the first time, actually asked for my money back. Rumor has it: the film blows, but would I know? Nope. Such rude distractions of stupid teenagers voicing, at a high volume, what they thought of what was transpiring onscreen and a real-life embodiment of Regina Hall’s Shakespeare in Love death scene in the first Scary Movie (unfortunately without the death) kept me from even processing what little I saw in front of me. Aesthetically, it’s exactly what you’d expect from a Rob Zombie remake; it’s smutty, greasy, and vulgar: a trailer-trash remake of a rather classy and scary original. But that’s all I can say.

I probably should be blaming myself for this fiasco, for I chose seeing a gore-fest on opening night at 9:30 pm at the teenyboppers’ mall instead of seeing Once with a bunch of Jewish old ladies on caffeine at the Landmark theatre. Neither sounded pleasing, but I made my decision, and it was the wrong one. So, I ask now, do people actually go to the theatre to see films any more? Or has the theatre-going experience turned into a $9-entry fee to your own fucking living room? I thought of telling the fifteen-year-old brats behind me that the Weinstein Company would be calling them later for work on the DVD commentary, but I decided a more concise “shut the fuck up” would fare better. Sometimes, I’ve found that the theatre experience can be a wonderful one, all with interruptions. When I saw A History of Violence, the film’s quieter moments were laughably offset by the roaring praise music of The Gospel, which was showing in the big theatre. When I saw Grindhouse, the other theatre patrons seemed to be enjoying the film as much as I was (except for the guy who didn’t get the memo that Planet Terror was only half of the film), and it actually felt nice. Now I wasn’t expecting church silence when going into Halloween, but it became my grudge that expecting common decency was a huge mistake.

I suppose I’m kind of glad that I avoided the crowds with both Neil Jordan’s The Brave One and Paul Greengrass’ The Bourne Ultimatum, two films I would have paid to see if I weren’t assigned to review them before their release. Sure, The Bourne Ultimatum was loud enough in parts that I might not have noticed a couple behind me asking each other who the bad guy was. But still. I guess I’ve learned my lesson the hard way… and I thought going to the DMV was tedious.

Release Updates

Todd Haynes' hotly-anticipated Bob Dylan film, I'm Not There, which stars Heath Ledger, Christian Bale, Cate Blanchett, Richard Gere, Ben Wishaw (Perfume), and Marcus Carl Franklin as Dylan, will be released by the Weinstein Company on November 21st in limited release. The film also stars Charlotte Gainsbourg, Julianne Moore, Bruce Greenwood, Michelle Williams, and David Cross (who plays Allen Ginsberg). Too bad the rumors that Haynes wanted to cast either Beyoncé or Oprah Winfrey as one of the Dylans fell through.

IFC Films has picked up Catherine Breillat's Une vieille maîtresse, releasing it as The Last Mistress, for early 2008. Asia Argento stars, along with Fa'ud Ait Attou and Breillat regulars Roxane Mesquida, Anne Parrillaud, Sarah Pratt, Amira Casar, and Lio. The film is based on the novel by Jules-Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly.

There Will Be Blood, Paul Thomas Anderson's first film since Punch-Drunk Love, will make the Oscar cut-off in New York and Los Angeles just before the new year. The film is based on an Upton Sinclair story and stars Daniel Day-Lewis and Paul Dano. Paramount Vantage and Miramax will co-release the film.

Vincent Paronnaud and Marjane Satrapi's Perespolis, which won the Grand Prix at Cannes this year, will also do the Oscar cut-off business from Sony Pictures Classics. This animated film about an Iranian girl's upbringing features the voices of Chiarra Mastroianni, her mother Catherine Deneuve, and Danielle Darrieux (which will mark her fifth time playing the mother of Deneuve, after 8 femmes and The Young Girls of Rochefort, among others)... though it looks like the film will be overdubbed by American actors for its U.S. release, including Sean Penn, Gena Rowlands, and Iggy Pop.

IFC Films has acquired the rights to two Cannes entries, Christophe Honoré's Les chansons d'amour (Love Songs) and Gus Van Sant's Paranoid Park. Both don't have set release dates, but it looks likely that they won't be around until early 2008. Tartan also acquired Kim Ki-duk's Breath, which also debuted at Cannes this year.

Zero Gravity

Oh, please let the rumors that Robert Rodriguez is going to cast Rose McGowan as Barbarella in his upcoming remake be true. Granted, the original, with Jane Fonda, is quite bad... but Planet Terror was such a joy that I can't imagine Rodriguez would have difficulty adding some spunk to the remake. And, with Rose (whom he's currently dating), the deal has been sold... at least to me.

Adults Only

It looks as though Ang Lee's latest, Lust, Caution, will be the first NC-17 rated theatrical release since New Line released John Waters' A Dirty Shame in 2004. It's a risky move for Focus Features, but they apparently believe in the strength of Lee and the film (plus it's Lee's first film since Brokeback Mountain). This could be a good move for the studio system and its fear of the NC-17 rating, but time will tell... we probably thought the same thing when The Dreamers came out.

Up with Dead People

My friend reminded me with a text this afternoon to check out the production stills of Bruce LaBruce's latest film, entitled Otto; or Up with Dead People, a self-described post-gay zombie film. LaBruce sure has a lot to live up to after his previous The Raspberry Reich, which was truly his finest hour. The film features the wonderful Susanne Sachsse of The Raspberry Reich as Hella Bent, German pornstar Marcel Schlutt, and a nineteen-year-old French boy named Jey Crisfar as the title character. You can check out the official website for more information; LaBruce says he's about to start editing it... so hopefully this Sundance, we'll be able to see Otto.

(S)he's Lost Control 2

Riddle me this: Is anyone finding it troublesome to return to Inland Empire? It seems to be selling well on the Internet (with multiple covers for those Lynchian losers who felt the need to own both the Naomi Watts and Laura Harring covers of Mulholland Drive), but I'm concerned. I revisited the film (or, the DVD) over the weekend and couldn't even get a fourth of the way through it. I also attempted More Things That Happened, a companion piece to Inland Empire that runs about the same length with stuff Lynch cut out (I know, you're surprised anything was cut out as well), and found it to be even more troubling than Inland Empire. Did Lynch really go as wrong as I was afraid he had? Should we be thanking all those French producers who've breathed over Lynch's shoulder in the past for not allowing him to give us this?

I get the feeling that the die-hard Lynch fans are jumping on the Inland Empire bandwagon out of guilt for initially rejecting Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me. I think, now, most people see FWWM as one of his finer endeavors, something completely unexpected and thoroughly unsettling. Lynch's weirdness in IE makes FWWM pale in comparison, but is that the reason why it has such a high IMDb rating? I think it's quite obvious, when viewing IE, that he had no idea what he was doing, with parallel storylines that almost scratch the surface of another just enough to make people think, "maybe it does make sense." And, in a grand scale, IE does make sense, but you have to trim all the fat to get to just a meager understanding of what exactly is going on.

And, really, for the most part, IE isn't so much to look at in its digital format. A beautiful image or two barely justifies three hours. Please, share your thoughts, particularly if you have revisited the film since its theatrical release.

Sit and Spin, Motherfucker

Thanks a helluva-fucking-lot, Lionsgate, for your shitty Doom Generation "re-release." Instead of giving us fans a widescreen version of Gregg Araki's second installment in his Teen Apocalypse Trilogy, Lionsgate simply repackaged their old, shitty-transfer disc that actually still has a Trimark intro. Lionsgate acquired Trimark nearly 7 years ago. I'm outraged and might actually consider writing the studio a rather scathing e-mail.

In better news, Fantoma has announced the second volume in the collected works of Kenneth Anger, set for October 2nd. The collection will include Scorpio Rising, Kustom Kar Kommandos, Invocation of My Demon Brother, Lucifer Rising, and (apparently) a new version of Rabbit's Moon, though I thought they included the extended version on Volume 1. The disc will also include a 2002 film from Anger, entitled The Man We Want to Hang.