Guru

Reviewer: James van Maanen
Rating (out of 5): ** (add a half-star if you're seduced by gorgeous scenery)
DVD Quality Rating (out of 5): ****

As an enormous fan of much of the work of British stalwart David Lean, it pains me to say that there is so much wrong with the Lean-directed/Robert Bolt-scripted Ryan's Daughter (though the quality of the DVD itself is excellent) that it's difficult to know just how to begin cataloging it. Let's start with the fact that there is - maximum - one full hour worth of actual content here, yet the film drags on for well over three. The oft-used phrase "What were they thinking?" comes to mind throughout, but I cannot provide any intelligent answer. It's not that the movie lacks for themes, encompassing as it does W.W.I, the British occupation of Ireland, "the Troubles," informers, marriage, adultery and the dismal lack of sex education in the Ireland of this time period (the best of this "education," interestingly enough, comes via a priest). Yet the Lean/Bolt handling of all this, while adhering to the director's perfectly appointed style that combines expansive vistas and restrained emotions (this time, with more obvious sexuality than his movies usually possess), is surprisingly heavy-handed.

Vote early, vote often, and then leave yourself some extra time to watch these films about the American democratic process - which may not always be so democratic, but certainly makes good fodder for filmmakers. Ratings are by GreenCine staff and not subject to a recount (but discussion is acceptable).

Ratings (*s) are out of 5.

To make you more cynical and paranoid:

• American Blackout ***
• Medium Cool ****
• The Manchurian Candidate **** 1/2 (and the halfway decent remake ***)
• Silver City ** 1/2
• Voting in America ** 1/2 (a mixed bag but a few definitely make it worth a rent)
• Unprecedented: The 2000 Presidential Election ****

Campaigns:

• Primary *** 1/2
• The War Room ***
• Last Man Standing: Politics, Texas Style
• The Wire: Season 4 (ongoing)

The Darkly Comical Side:

• Election **** (Out of print but we have for rent)
• Tanner '88 ***
• Ballot Box Bunny ****
• The Candidate *** 1/2
• Bulworth ****
• Primary Colors

Historical Perspective:

Any other suggestions?

Let us know.

Two of us who review for this blog with some regularity have both taken a look at John Sayles' last film, Silver City, and, while I found more fault with it than did James, we both agree it's been unfairly maligned in some circles, and worth a watch in particular this week - with the election coming right up.

My look at Silver City

James Van Maanen's review of Silver City, as seen on GreenCine (see "Talltale").

Reviewer: James van Maanen
Rating (out of 5): ***½

Movies about "outsiders" are perennially popular in both independent and mainstream genres, although the latter tends to see these characters as either troubled (Rebel Without a Cause), "special" (Rain Man) or minority (The Outsider, with Tony Curtis in the role that Adam Beach now essays in Flags of Our Fathers). The Hollywood goal is almost always to have the character win or "fit in," while American independent movies (Junebug and Bubble are good examples), as well as many foreign films, tend to treat their entire cast of characters as outsiders - which is why many of us treasure these movies and their makers. If you're a fan of the "outsider" genre, you might want to add Pizza to your queue because this little-seen surprise offers a double dose of "otherness": a very overweight high school girl (who could beat Welcome to the Dollhouse's "Weinerdog" at her own game) and a hunky, over-age pizza boy whose neon-ized delivery truck and outsized libido (he's got a member to match) are community legend.

Wordplay manages to both teach us about how crossword puzzles are concocted - by the fiendishly clever Will Shortz and Merle Reagle, in this case - while demonstrating how a crossword addict "trains" for a competition in puzzle-solving - rendered here in surprisingly intense fashion. Mix these quirky characters with more famous puzzle addicts like Jon Stewart, Bill Clinton, New York Yankee Mike Mussina and the Indigo Girls, and you have a very engaging documentary. If it at times feels like a lovefest for The New York Times (and, hey, why not?), "the film is made with a lot of style and visual ingenuity," says Roger Ebert, and is "near letter-perfect," adds The Baltimore Sun's Michael Sragow.

Now GreenCine's giving away copies of the new Wordplay DVD (which also includes a few challenging Times puzzles as an insert) to two clever (and lucky) people who solve our latest trivia contest, courtesy of IFC Films. Lucky winners will also receive Wordplay pens and the official companion book!

To be eligible, send an email with the correct answer to contest@greencine.com, including your name, email address and, if you're a GreenCine member, your username in the email, and "Wordplay" in the subject header. Winners will be selected at random from all correct entries. The deadline is Thursday, November 9, at 12PM PST. Winners will be notified by e-mail and announced in future editions of the GreenCine Dispatch newsletter.

The Question: New England city in which the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament, featured in Wordplay, is held. (Hint: _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _.)

See also: Word Wars; Spellbound.

Reviewer: James van Maanen
Fixing Frank: Rating (out of 5): ***½
Hard Pill: Rating (out of 5): ***½

Gay film has come such a distance from the days of not being able to utter its own name (see or read The Celluloid Closet) to the likes of award-winning mainstream movies from Philadelphia to Brokeback Mountain that gay/bi moviegoers, interested women and the very few straight men fearless enough to venture into this realm of entertainment can be forgiven for not always being able to keep abreast of what's happening in this growing genre. Yes, there's a lot of mindless schlock making its way onto movie and TV screens, and sitting through even a few hours of this can be enough to turn off intelligent filmgoers indefinitely. Consequently, I want to call attention to two smart little straight-to-video films - Fixing Frank and Hard Pill - that deserve a look from savvy genre buffs. Neither is a fun-and-frolic camp fest nor a brainless soft-core turn-on. Both address the possibility of changing one's sexual identity from gay to straight, the idea of which is certain to drive heavily politicized gay men to frenzy. Yet, because both movies deal with this subject intelligently - addressing morality (I mean right and wrong, not gay and straight); the importance of filling emotional, as well as sexual, needs; and the desire for inclusiveness (and being included) that haunts all of us - each provides a surprisingly rigorous and thoughtful experience.

It's a good week for fans of the timeless classic Cinema Paradiso; it had gone out of print but returned with a vengeance this week with two editions, both of them loaded with extra goodies. We're giving away copies of the Cinema Paradiso Special Edition, a two disc set, to lucky winners of our latest trivia contest, courtesy of the Weinstein Company. (A very drool-worthy Collector's Edition is now available, as well.) The set includes two new documentaries, "Exploring a timeless classic" and "Little Italy Love Story: Cinema Paradiso Style," commentary featuring director Giuseppe Tornatore and Italian film expert Millicent Marcus, plus both the original theatrical edition and the director's cut. It's magnifico!

To be eligible for the prize, send an email with the correct answer to contest@greencine.com, including your name, email address and, if you're a GreenCine member, your username in the email, and "Cinema Paradiso" in the subject header. Winners will be selected at random from all correct entries. The deadline is Monday, November 13, at 12PM PST. Winners will be notified by e-mail and announced in future editions of the GreenCine Dispatch newsletter.

The Question: In which region of Italy is the film set?

Reviewer: James van Maanen
Rating (out of 5): ***

Could the real gay film niche be the "slasher" genre rather than the romantic comedy? Weird thought, but Hellbent makes you wonder. This better-than-average scare movie offers all the gay-for-straight substitutions but--via a clever script, nice acting, attractive leads and a first-time writer/director, Paul Etheredge-Ouzts, who knows how to use and subvert the genre--it succeeds surprisingly well at being creepy, witty and fun. (And often, as in the film's delicious final moment, all three.) There are the usual unbelievable moments (less here than in many "scare" films, however), but by compressing the action into 48 hours and timing his movie to well under 90 minutes, Etheredge-Ouzts manages to make it both believable and suspenseful. There's not a lot of unnecessary exposition, either, and the identity and motivations of the killer, while hinted at, are left tantalizingly out of reach. Some viewers evidently find this a problem, but for those of us who�ve had our fill of explanation overkill, this may come as quite a blessing. Lead actor Dylan Fergus (of various TV soap operas) makes a glass eye seem sexier that he any right to.

Considered the sci-fi film given a large budget by a film studio, Forbidden Planet (nominated for a Best Special Effects Oscar in 1957, which it lost - to Ten Commandments!) is famous for being "the film with Robbie the Robot" - but there's much more to it than that. The film's plot is actually inspired by Shakespeare's The Tempest, transposed to outer space: a ship, helmed by a pre-comedic Leslie Nielsen, is sent to rescue a lost expedition on desolate planet Altair-4. There they discover scientist Dr. Morbius (longtime MGM star Walter Pidgeon) and his lovely daughter Alta (Anne Francis, who co-starred with Pigeon in Funny Girl a decade later), living alive and well in a utopic existence along side the robotic servant (slave) Robby. But something sinister is also among them...

The new two-disc special Anniversary Edition DVD is a sight for sore eyes: a new transfer with digitally cleaned-up color, image and encoding - a marked improvement over the previous DVD. Extras abound, too: A new documentary rounds up Anne France as well alongside a number of critics and experts such as Dennis Muren, effects guru Phil Tippett and Bill Warren who reveal why Forbidden Planet was such a touchstone for future effects-laden genre pictures; the TCM doc "Watch the Skies!" offers preeminent modern sci-fi directors Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, John Carpenter, Ridley Scott and James Cameron talking about both the film's influence and 50s Sci-Fi; another featurette on the design and construction of Robby the Robot (too bad there's no interview with R2-D2 discussing Robby's influence); and, perhaps most oddly, an entire episode of "The Thin Man" TV series, in which Robby makes a guest cameo (the disc also offers a second feature with Robby, 1957's "The Invisible Boy.") All in all, Forbidden Planet celebrates its anniversary in style with this delightful new DVD package.

Note: I haven't seen it up close and personal, but MGM is also releasing a special "Ultimate Collector's Edition" being released at the same time as the above. It's got the same two discs, but apparently also comes in a special collectible tin box, and comes with a Robby the Robot figurine along with other goodies. Geek out!

A primer on James Bond that I co-wrote with Walt Opie is now up on GreenCine. Some (well, many) would say I got stuck with the bum half of the franchise's history - writing about the more recent films - but it was still a kick to, for the first time, revisit those in an analytical frame of mind.

Meanwhile, seeing the latest incarnation of James Bond, Casino Royale, on the heels of watching all these other recent 007 films made it easier to see clearly how superior it is to most of them.

I do hope that any of those who carped ad nauseum about the casting of Daniel Craig - "he's a blonde!" (gasp!) - are quieted within ten minutes into the film. Craig's a fine actor - Layer Cake in particular must have put him in the sights of the Bond casting agents - and here he manages to give Bond both humanity, vulnerability and prone to paroxysms of violence. With his imperfect but appealing features (and also a chiseled physique that the filmmakers show off several occasions), Craig holds sway in every moment he's on screen.

The film starts with an incredible - in both senses of the word - chase sequence that reveal Craig's Bond as one capable of making the occasional tactical error, and also as one who can keep up with a ridiculously agile criminal (they both manage to jump, run and climb impossibly). It's an unforgettable scene and the film offers quite a few other spasms of violent action, but unlike many of the other Bond films in which the quiet moments - either romantic or character-revealing - make us want to cringe or head to the snack bar, in Casino Royale these scenes, too, hold our attention. Judi Dench, returning as M, finally has a great actor to play off of and her scenes with Craig have a dramatic zing rare for the series, and striking actress Eva Green (with mesmerizing eyes that match her name), takes  a "Bond girl" to near tragic levels and her scenes, too, with Craig have sparkle. Some credit should go to the script, above average for a Bond film, by Bond regulars Neal Purvis and Robert Wade, along with Oscar-winner Paul Haggis, as it deftly takes the franchise in new directions while also referencing with sly one-liners the franchise's previous history. Mads Mikkelsen, a highly regarded actor in his native Denmark (check him out in the Pusher trilogy), makes for a creepy enough villain (his glassy eye and its tears of blood are a memorable touch); the torture scene between he and Bond is a memorable, even funny, bit of sadistic interplay.

If the film suffers from the same overlength tendency and complicatted plotting that characterizes most of the more recent era Bonds, and if it seems a little laughable that Bond would so swiftly declare his love for Eva Green's Vesper, the film overall is hard to rag on. The pacing is better than most recent Bond efforts, and the very ending is perfect.

All in all, Casino Royale admirably earns its way as a great action film - not just as another Bond. -- Craig Phillips

Reviewer: James van Maanen
Rating (out of 5): ****

A woman's film that men who appreciate the subtleties of women (and the clash of cultures) may particularly enjoy, Fear and Trembling is a remarkably quiet, disciplined French film via writer/director Alain Corneau (Serie Noir, Tous Les Matins du Monde). He has collaborated here with Amelie Nothomb, who wrote the original novel based upon her experiences as a young Belgian woman working in Japan. From the first frame, beauty via composition and minimal color is foremost. As the film proceeds, this beauty remains present, abetting splendid performances from the entire cast, who, with the exception of the fine lead actress Sylvie Testud, are all Japanese. Ms. Testud - who has brought her playful charm and odd gravitas to many other films (Murderous Maids, The Chateau, I'm Going Home) has here perhaps her best role as the cowed but un-conquered foreign worker at the very bottom of the Nippon corporate food chain.

GreenCine has a lot to be thankful for this year, but in our film geeky way we are feeling especially thankful about the home video release of a bunch of great films that had formerly been missing in action on DVD. We've compiled some of our picks for the best films to finally see a DVD release in 2006.

Top 10 Formerly MIA DVDs of 2006 >>

Reviewer: James van Maanen
Rating (out of 5): ****

War is not a subtle subject nor is Joyeux Noel ("Merry Christmas" to us non-Frenchies) a particularly subtle film. But it's a beautiful one: intelligent, heartfelt and perhaps as pure as a relatively mainstream movie on this subject can manage. Writer/director Christian Carion (The Girl from Paris) begins with a shock: nothing bloody, mind you, but something I have not previously encountered in a film. This sets us up nicely for what follows: a worthy addition to the canon of films that are anti-war, anti-government and anti-organized religion. This story of an impromptu "truce" that occurred between battling armies (Germans, French and Scots) on a Christmas Eve during World War I is full of joy, beauty, sadness, irony - and only a little carnage (but what's there does indeed make its point).

I begin my countdown of favorite character actors you have seen on DVD this year, performers who cause many of us to exclaim, "Who is that guy/gal?!" every time they appear.

10.

Okay, so he's been dead for 23 years. But the marvelous character actor William Demarest made a return of sorts, in the guise of the just-released (as part of the new, long-awaited Preston Sturges box set) classic comedies: Hail the Conquering Hero (pictured above, Demarest with Eddie Bracken and Ella Raines); The Great McGinty, in which he played a bouncer; and Christmas in July, in which he played a judge in a coffee slogan contest. He may have been at his best in Sturges' Miracle of Morgan's Creek, where he played the irascible patriarch of a clan of daughters, including Betty Hutton's Trudy Kockenlocker, who gets knocked up by a soldier. Demarest's scenes with Eddie Bracken and with his household are absolutely priceless. He also appeared in my favorite Sturges film, Sullivan's Travels. Cantankerous, flustered, often grouchy, Demarest was at his best in screwball comedy, with a particular knack for doing slow burns in reaction to the madness around him. He was well contrasted in particular with the prissy Franklin Pangborn in those Sturges films. His career went way back, too, all the way to 1927's The Jazz Singer and Howard Hawks' 1928 film A Girl in Every Port, and including Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, What Price Glory? and It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.

Also known as: Uncle Charley on the TV series "My Three Sons" (replacing an ailing William Frawley in 1965). -- Craig Phillips