Reviewer: Jonathan Poritsky
Rating (out of 5): **

I don't really know what to make of a film whose strongest moment is its closing credits (although lifted conceptually from Kyle Cooper's Se7en opening, they really do pack a wallop). Orphan, directed by helmer Jaume Collet-Serra (House of Wax), spends seventy minutes poking around for a purpose, only to pick up the pace just before the third act shows up out of nowhere. It's a real shame because the film's ultimate revelation is conceptually strong.

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All I ask of a film like Orphan is that it be one of three things: 1) thought-provoking; 2) entertaining; or 3) gut-wrenchingly horrific. Unfortunately, Collet-Serra's film fails on all three fronts. The gore is second rate, the visuals are of the "been there, done that" variety, and the theoretically tense editing falls flat after about the fifth reveal/non-reveal parlor trick. I will admit that the film's big reveal is quite good and clever, but it comes at the wrong time and is trumped by a few other moments that have no bearing on the plot whatsoever. (Non spoiler question: the black light art from the opening credits is great; why is it not capitalized upon?)

The disc has your standard fare deleted scenes and alternate ending. Hilariously, before you get to the menu there is a PSA about adoption, giving the disclaimer that the film is mere fiction and you should not be afraid to snatch a kid up from your local orphanage. I could understand this logic only if it were actually easy to adopt a grown child in this country. But it in reality there is a great deal of red tape, which begs the question why a couple of pushovers like the Colemans would choose that route. Had they adopted a baby then we either don't have a movie at all, or we have a psycho-baby-on-the-lam movie (See It's Alive to quench that thirst). Win-win if you ask me.

Reviewer: Jonathan Poritsky
Rating (out of 5): **

I don't really know what to make of a film whose strongest moment is its closing credits (although lifted conceptually from Kyle Cooper's Se7en opening, they really do pack a wallop). Orphan, directed by helmer Jaume Collet-Serra (House of Wax), spends seventy minutes poking around for a purpose, only to pick up the pace just before the third act shows up out of nowhere. It's a real shame because the film's ultimate revelation is conceptually strong.

Continued reading Orphan...

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Comments on this Entry:

(Erin Donovan on Nov 4, 2009 1:15 PM) Great review, Jonathan. I had a totally different experience with this film, thought it was beautifully shot and a great splice and dice on buji paranoia. In fact I think it's probably the best horror film of 2009 in terms of coming up with an ending that fulfills the potential in the set up.

(Jonathan Poritsky on Nov 6, 2009 5:28 AM) Thanks, Erin! Well, I can agree with you that it may be best horror twist of '09 in that I really didn't see the ending coming. However, I think I didn't see it coming because the setup is long, boring, and unrelated to the reveal. My last GC review used the word MacGuffin, so I didn't want to bring it up again, BUT, there are two hugely wasted MacGuffins in this film that really let me down: [semi-spoiler] Esther's ribbons and her paintings. There was a lot of weight put on these, especially her mysterious neck and wrist flair. Even though her backstory turns out to be a surprise, these setups turn out to be status quo. In other words, she's just another nut job. As for buji (if we're talking about the same word, I usually spell it bougy) paranoia, I guess I'm just over sad yuppies. If there was a stronger focus on physical redemption for Kate, who lives in a world of intangibility, then maybe I could have been swayed. But what we get is too little too late. And the visuals, well, we won't see eye to eye on that. Thanks for the input Erin. Sorry to write a supplemental review in the comments!

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

For anyone who suffers from the occasional bad back, a new to DVD film The Answer Man -- the first from writer/director John Hindman -- should be a must-see, if only to revel in the facial expressions of its star (a sublimely funny, nasty and so-real-it-hurts Jeff Daniels), as he suffers the moment-by-moment degradations of a spine askew. But there's a lot more going on in this light, bright--if also sometimes quite sad --romantic comedy, too.

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The writer/director is on record as a fan of Frank Capra, and while his movie reflects this, it is certainly no slavish imitation: There's enough originality -- and specificity -- to the characters, situations and themes to separate it. From the "answers" Daniels offers Pucci during their sessions on the brownstone stoop, it's easy to understand why the former's book is such a success. And, as much as we come to care for our three protagonists, Hindman also makes it clear how they consistently manage to undercut their own very real possibilities.

Hindman chose his actors carefully and wisely, and sure enough, everyone here, stars to supporting players, including a terrific Nora Dunn and an underused Kat Dennings and Olivia Thirlby, comes through in top shape. Daniels has a gift for physical comedy (Dumb & Dumber), including its rubber-faced mode, of which he makes fine use; when called upon, he's just as impressive as a dramatic actor. Graham brings reams of her usual warmth and ability to be sexily maternal (be sure to catch her work in the under-rated and under-seen Flash of Genius). There's a scene in Daniels' living room during which she cradles the Pucci character that is as moving as anything we've seen all year. Regarding Mr. Pucci, who continues to mature and grow with each new role, he would steal the whole movie, were not everyone else so on-target.

The Answer Man's not perfect. As it winds along to the finish line, the love story begins to play second fiddle to the bookshop, and Hindman appears to have used more of his originality toward the beginning than the end. Yet, the movie builds up such a bushel of good will, and so engaging are its characters, that I think you'll have little problem embracing the Capra-corn of its conclusion. The Answer Man is a lovely beginning to what I hope will prove a lengthy, if late-blooming, career for Mr. Hindman.

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

For anyone who suffers from the occasional bad back, a new to DVD film The Answer Man -- the first from writer/director John Hindman -- should be a must-see, if only to revel in the facial expressions of its star (a sublimely funny, nasty and so-real-it-hurts Jeff Daniels), as he suffers the moment-by-moment degradations of a spine askew. But there's a lot more going on in this light, bright--if also sometimes quite sad --romantic comedy, too.

Continued reading The Answer Man...

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(Erin Donovan on Nov 3, 2009 11:03 PM) hey James, I just watched this one too and really adored it. More comedies should be this sad!

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Reviewer: Jeffrey M. Anderson
Rating (out of 5): *****

In his autobiography, filmmaker Samuel Fuller wrote that he did not speak a word for the first several years of his life, and then suddenly, at age 4 or 5, he blurted out the word "hammer!" The abruptness of this word, and its punchy imagery, practically defines Fuller's work.

He was a hard crime reporter as a teenager, and then a dogface soldier in World War II. He wrote books and stories and screenplays -- he called them all "yarns" -- filled with hammer-like dialogue and phrases and ideas. Due to the lurid subject matter and low budgets of his films, he rarely earned the respect and admiration he deserved (he never received a single Oscar nomination). Many of his films are still AWOL on DVD, but Sony Pictures Home Entertainment has taken a major step toward righting that wrong with The Samuel Fuller Collection, their extraordinary new seven-disc DVD box set.

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The first major film is The Crimson Kimono (1959), which is mostly a hard-boiled cop thriller, but also manages to make a defiant anti-racist statement without ever getting on a soapbox. Detectives Joe Kojaku (James Shigeta) and Charlie Bancroft (Glenn Corbett) are old war buddies and partners; their friendship runs deep and is seemingly invulnerable to racial tensions. (They share an apartment, and Charlie even carries a pint of Joe's blood around in his veins.) When they begin investigating the murder of a stripper, they meet Christine Downs (Victoria Shaw), who painted the stripper's portrait. Both men fall in love with her, but she only has eyes for Joe. Tensions rise between the trio, and Joe can't help seeing race as part of the issue. Aside from playing out these powerful emotions, Fuller keeps up equally with the tricky murder case, never faltering or failing to provide a gut-punch of a scene. (Martin Scorsese, in an extra feature on this disc, describes each of Fuller's scenes as big headlines.)

The next Fuller-helmed feature is Underworld U.S.A. (1961), which Fuller crafted as a kind of anti-gangster film; his logic was that if the hero was a loner, then by definition, he could not be a gangster. As a kid, Tolly Devlin sees his father murdered by four thugs and identifies one of them. But before he can get his revenge, he learns that the murderer has gone to jail for life. Tolly gets himself thrown in jail and spends years trying to get to him and finally does; he also gets the names of the other three men. Released decades later (and played by Cliff Robertson), he learns that his three remaining targets have become powerful crime lords and will not be easy to get to. He begins working for one of them, and teams up with the District Attorney on the side, making plans to take down the others by playing them against one another. The character names in this film are priceless: Tolly meets a girl called Cuddles (Dolores Dorn), and the three crime lords are named Gela (Paul Dubov), Gunther (Gerald Milton) and Smith (Allan Gruener) -- no first names. Even more so than its plot, the film is notable for its very stark, sharp black-and-white look; each shot almost feels like a paper cut. It's closer in spirit to the films of the French New Wave than anything that was going on in Hollywood at the time.

Another notable film is Shockproof (1949), on which Fuller gets a full "screenplay" credit (alongside Helen Deutsch). Oddly, the director was Douglas Sirk, who would go on to a renowned career as a masterful maker of full-color "women's pictures" or "weepies" (pretty much the exact opposite of Fuller's career). In the black-and-white Shockproof, a beautiful murderess, Jenny Marsh (Patricia Knight) is released on parole. Her parole officer Griff Marat (Cornel Wilde) tries his best to turn her life around, which includes getting her to stop seeing her no-good boyfriend and benefactor Harry (John Baragrey). To keep her safe, he brings her to his own home and hires her to look after his blind mother (Esther Minciotti, Marty's mother). Of course, they fall in love and begin a downward spiral that threatens them both. In his own way, Sirk emphasizes the complex, intense emotions of the lead characters, which helps guide the film over some of its plot hurdles.

Fuller had very little good to say about Scandal SheetPhil Karlson, Scandal Sheet is actually quite good. Broderick Crawford stars as Mark Chapman, a crusty newspaper editor who has turned a New York newspaper into a vulgar, popular tabloid rag. His star reporter, Steve McCleary (John Derek) worships him; together they hope to buy out the paper and get rid of the namby-pamby board members who complain about the paper's new direction. Steve's gal pal Julie Allison (Donna Reed) more or less agrees with the board and doesn't like writing exploitation stories just to sell papers. Things take a turn when an unwanted piece of Chapman's past turns up and he becomes a murderer; then McCleary starts investigating the case! Karlson's work isn't as hard or as explosive as Fuller's, but it's still pretty tense and entertaining. Fuller actually directed his own newspaper movie the same year, the superior Park Row, which is still not available on video in the U.S.A.

The other three films are fairly inconsequential, though they may provide some low-key distraction. Fuller is credited as a "story" writer or a co-writer on all three of these low-budget items, each running around 60 minutes. It Happened in Hollywood (1937) is perhaps the most notable for the casting of King Kong star Fay Wray, and for tackling a story that Billy Wilder would take on years later in Sunset Boulevard. In it, a cowboy movie star (Richard Dix) of the silent era faces a difficult change when the talkies come in and he has trouble making the transition; he must decide between keeping his career going and staying true to his legion of good-hearted fans. Adventure in Sahara (1938) tells the story of a mutiny in a French Legion outpost, and Power of the Press (1943) is about another corrupt newspaper editor. Sony could probably have squeezed these three onto one or two discs, but it says something about their dedication to quality that they awarded each little film its own disc.

As for DVD extras, several Hollywood filmmakers and Samuel Fuller fans -- Scorsese, Curtis Hanson, Tim Robbins and Wim Wenders -- as well as Fuller's widow Christa turn up on a short documentary as well as other short featurettes to discuss Fuller's work. Even if this were only a two-disc set that included The Crimson Kimono and Underworld U.S.A., I'd say it was one of the year's most essential video releases, but the five other discs and films put it right over the top.

Reviewer: Jeffrey M. Anderson
Rating (out of 5): *****

In his autobiography, filmmaker Samuel Fuller wrote that he did not speak a word for the first several years of his life, and then suddenly, at age 4 or 5, he blurted out the word "hammer!" The abruptness of this word, and its punchy imagery, practically defines Fuller's work.

He was a hard crime reporter as a teenager, and then a dogface soldier in World War II. He wrote books and stories and screenplays -- he called them all "yarns" -- filled with hammer-like dialogue and phrases and ideas. Due to the lurid subject matter and low budgets of his films, he rarely earned the respect and admiration he deserved (he never received a single Oscar nomination). Many of his films are still AWOL on DVD, but Sony Pictures Home Entertainment has taken a major step toward righting that wrong with The Samuel Fuller Collection, their extraordinary new seven-disc DVD box set.

Continued reading Samuel Fuller Collection...

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Reviewer: Jeffrey M. Anderson
Rating (out of 5): ****½

Fados shouldn't have worked; veteran Spanish director Carlos Saura (Cría cuervos, Tango) assembles a collection of fado singers and films them singing in front of colored backdrops. Sometimes the backdrops become more elaborate (such as a nightclub) and sometimes dancers accompany the music. These famous Portuguese ballads (currently undergoing a revival) have a long history, and are specifically related to poor and urban artists who expressed their yearnings in the most bittersweet ways. There is a certain structure to the songs and certain rules that must, more or less, be followed. Any lesser filmmaker would have traced the history of the music, dissecting it and trying to burrow inside all the songs.

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Among the most notable singers present, there is veteran Carlos do Carmo, the heartbreaking Lila Downs and sexy newcomer Mariza. There are also homages to fado legends Alfredo Marceneiro and Amália Rodrigues. The performers' ages and styles range drastically, but Saura ties it all together and captures a coherent mood.

Newcomers to fado may be put off by such a daunting primer, but the opportunity to get to the heart of the genre, rather than inside the head, is too gorgeous to pass up.

Zeitgeist released the new DVD, after a brief 2009 theatrical release. It comes with a 25-minute behind-the-scenes featurette, a photo gallery and trailers. Saura provides some personal liner notes as well. Best of all, it comes with a more comprehensive performer and song title guide; it's still possible to get lost in the music, but now viewers can reference the names of their favorite performers. One quibble: the DVD might have included some more factual and historical information for more literal-minded viewers.

Reviewer: Jeffrey M. Anderson
Rating (out of 5): ****½

Fados shouldn't have worked; veteran Spanish director Carlos Saura (Cría cuervos, Tango) assembles a collection of fado singers and films them singing in front of colored backdrops. Sometimes the backdrops become more elaborate (such as a nightclub) and sometimes dancers accompany the music. These famous Portuguese ballads (currently undergoing a revival) have a long history, and are specifically related to poor and urban artists who expressed their yearnings in the most bittersweet ways. There is a certain structure to the songs and certain rules that must, more or less, be followed. Any lesser filmmaker would have traced the history of the music, dissecting it and trying to burrow inside all the songs.

Continued reading Fados...

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

Goodness exists! You'll find it in a documentary recently released to DVD entitled Dr. Bronner's Magic Soapbox, directed by first-timer Sara Lamm, which not only made me a fan of the film but of the product itself -- a line of castile soaps -- that originally put the titular Dr. Bronner on the map. I would not be surprised to find other viewers, if they finish the film and watch some of the equally fascinating DVD extras, becoming fans of the docs (the documentary and the doctor), and of the soap.

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The film tells the history of the maybe-not-so-good doctor, one very weird duck, and his early "organic" cleaning product. We also meet his children and grandchildren, who are continuing their progenitor's legacy (the doc himself has gone to his reward). This group is a fascinating bunch, as was Dr. Bronner, with his German accent and tendency toward screaming while speaking. (He brings to mind Adolph Hitler: another irony, given his Jewish heritage, but perhaps it goes with the territory). His sons, daughter and grandchildren are interesting, too, as is their commitment to keeping his soap (and religion) alive. The opportunity to witness one son's encounter with a musician/skateboarder in an economy-level, New York City hotel and how this initial meeting evolves into a relationship that is surprisingly moving, the movie is quite rewarding. Later we see this same son (one who, sadly, never found favor with his father) trying his hand at performance-art theater.

For me, the documentary proved once again that practically any subject can become an interesting one -- provided the filmmaker knows how to explore it properly. Lamm is all-over-the-place in her approach, yet there's hardly a moment in her movie that does not capture our attention and add to our understanding. Watch the DVD extras for updates on the family and firm -- particularly what they are doing in the Israel/Palestine area.

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

Goodness exists! You'll find it in a documentary recently released to DVD entitled Dr. Bronner's Magic Soapbox, directed by first-timer Sara Lamm, which not only made me a fan of the film but of the product itself -- a line of castile soaps -- that originally put the titular Dr. Bronner on the map. I would not be surprised to find other viewers, if they finish the film and watch some of the equally fascinating DVD extras, becoming fans of the docs (the documentary and the doctor), and of the soap.

Continued reading Dr. Bronner's Magic Soap Box...

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

Rich, inventive, black-and-white animation (of the sort that puts to shame the neither-fish-nor-fowl, million-dollar color stuff that makes Robert Zemeckis's Beowulf such a bore) gets a go-round in Fears[s] of the Dark (Peur(s) du noir). This most interesting compilation of stories - some are self-contained while others wrap around the movie in strange and witty ways - is artful, often gorgeous to look at, and clever in the manner in which it makes its points and ties things together.

What it is not is scary. At all. Which is fine by me. I'll take my scares in live-action movies, thank you. Perhaps I am no longer able to be frightened by animated films. I recall being so by Disney's Fantasia when I saw it as a very young boy, but the flat, two-dimensional artwork on view in this movie will appeal more to animation connoisseurs than to folks looking for a fright. Yet there is plenty to enjoy for ancillary reasons.

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Marie Caillou and Romain Slocombe offer their take on needles, imprisonment and Japanese samurai, among other fears. The animation here is airier and more bizarre. Fears are tapped but more glancingly, I think, than in Mr Burns's installment.

In their rich and all-over-the-place contribution, Italian artist Lorenzo Mattotti and Jerry Kramsky (who works closely with Mattotti and lives in Italy) deal with fears of monsters, dreams, magic and... oneself. I must admit to drifting off somewhat during this installment, which had a kind of hypnotic effect on me. I'd like to see it again after downing a large cup of coffee.

The section that comes closest to the title moniker belongs to Richard McGuire and Michel Pirus. This duo track a poor fellow who wanders from a snowbound landscape into a dark house, occupied by a perhaps not so friendly female and from which there appears to be no escape. The use of black and white is in some ways the most stunning - witty, bizarre, clever and creepy - of all the segments.

The two other installments come and go throughout the movie, wrapping around it and offering, in the case of Blutch (a pseudonym for artist Christian Hincker), fear of canines - particularly those of the killer kind. You might call this section "gory," except, as animation, it comes off much less so than any number of "slasher" movies many of us have seen. The animation is quite interesting, however, with a nearly-complete gray-scale spectrum that only the Mattotti/Kramsky section approaches elsewhere in the film.

Wittiest of all are the wrap-around/on-and-off bits provided by Pierre di Sciullo, who mixes very funny text/narration (dealing with the everyday fears of our modern times: social, political, environmental) with equally witty black-and-white geometric visuals. One can, it seems, be just as afraid of what lies ahead in broad daylight, once we've gotten out of bed in the morning, as of those other, more obvious and clichéd fears.

One more artist is mentioned in the press book for the film: Etienne Robial as artistic director. I don't think Robial is responsible for any individual segment, but more likely, he helped bring the movie together. In any case, if you are an animation aficionado, I don't imagine you'll want to miss this black-and-white feast. Even if you're only so-so on the subject, there's enough in the 78-minute running time to warrant a visit.

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

Rich, inventive, black-and-white animation (of the sort that puts to shame the neither-fish-nor-fowl, million-dollar color stuff that makes Robert Zemeckis's Beowulf such a bore) gets a go-round in Fears[s] of the Dark (Peur(s) du noir). This most interesting compilation of stories - some are self-contained while others wrap around the movie in strange and witty ways - is artful, often gorgeous to look at, and clever in the manner in which it makes its points and ties things together.

What it is not is scary. At all. Which is fine by me. I'll take my scares in live-action movies, thank you. Perhaps I am no longer able to be frightened by animated films. I recall being so by Disney's Fantasia when I saw it as a very young boy, but the flat, two-dimensional artwork on view in this movie will appeal more to animation connoisseurs than to folks looking for a fright. Yet there is plenty to enjoy for ancillary reasons.

Continued reading Fear(s) of the Dark...

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Reviewer: Erin Donovan
Rating (out of 5): ****½

Mira Nair's Monsoon Wedding, just out in a new 2-DVD set from Criterion, is the India native's contribution to the unofficial canon of directors' final works from the homeland before emigrating to the United States. Like Milos Forman's Fireman's Ball, Louis Malle's Murmur of the Heart or Susanne Bier's After the Wedding, Monsoon presents the complex story of a multi-faceted, changing nation through a single tight-knit community. The community here being an upper-middle class Punjabi family converging in New Delhi for an elaborate wedding.

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But the most resonant moments in the film belong to the tender moments between bride-to-be's parents Lalit and Pimmi. Nair takes exquisite care to show a relationship, years drained of passion, based on companionship and respect. It's this emphasis that gives a viewer leery of the situation hope for Aditi's future.

Lensed by acclaimed cinematographer Declan Quinn (Rachel Getting Married, Vanya on 42nd Street, Leaving Las Vegas) the film unfolds over the course of the big day. As the ceremony approaches tempers flare, old customs clash with the rapidly changing culture of mid-90s India and the titular rainstorm looms.

Nair delights in presenting us with scenes that make light of opposing forces: an elderly woman sings a traditional wedding song while beepers and cell phones hum in the background; the groom-to-be is a modern man who's made a small fortune branching out his family's company to Texas but has a charming romantic flush about whenever in the room with Aditi; and one of the funniest scenes in the whole film takes place between the harried father of the bride to be and a wedding planner over whether the colors of the outdoor tents are reading "hip" or "funeral." Nair and Quinn use a mostly handheld camera in the way that was the intended effect, to create a wonderful intimacy within the chaos. And there's not enough that can be said about the color palette of the film except to say that it does a Punjabi wedding justice.

Criterion has given the film a typically dazzling treatment with its color transfer. Shot for $150k, Nair's film looks like such an explosion of Technicolor one half expects Judy Garland to leap out of a marigold flower.

The film won numerous prestigious festival awards (including the top prize at the 2001 Venice Film Festival) and was the top-grossing foreign-language film of all time in the States until Alfonso Cuaron's own treatise on geopolitical encroachment, government corruption and illicit sex, Y Tu Mama Tambien, came out a month later.

DVD extras include commentary by the director (wherein over the final credits she cops to hating weddings!), interviews with actress Naseeruddin Shah, Quinn and production designer Stephanie Carroll and theatrical trailer. More on the bonus disc separately.

More like this: Phantom India, Gosford Park, Rachel Getting Married, Sweetie, Bend It Like Beckham.

Reviewer: Erin Donovan
Rating (out of 5): ****½

Mira Nair's Monsoon Wedding, just out in a new 2-DVD set from Criterion, is the India native's contribution to the unofficial canon of directors' final works from the homeland before emigrating to the United States. Like Milos Forman's Fireman's Ball, Louis Malle's Murmur of the Heart or Susanne Bier's After the Wedding, Monsoon presents the complex story of a multi-faceted, changing nation through a single tight-knit community. The community here being an upper-middle class Punjabi family converging in New Delhi for an elaborate wedding.

Continued reading Monsoon Wedding (Criterion)...

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Comments on this Entry:

(Shubhajit Lahiri on Oct 22, 2009 9:31 AM) That's an absolutely terrific review of a movie worthy of every praise bestowed upon it. In fact, after reading your review I just can't seem to wait to watch the movie a second time.

(Erin Donovan on Oct 22, 2009 10:43 PM) Thank you, Shubhajit! I hadn't watched the film since seeing it as a double feature with Royal Tenenbaums back in 2001. It's a great one to revisit.

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

Design is all around us, as anyone who has ever been responsible for creating a design realizes early on. While many of us most often think about design in terms of the art we observe –- paintings, magazines, movies, home interiors -- it is present and every bit as important in the everyday things we use: toothbrushes, computers, potato peelers and the like. Gary Hustwit, the guy who gave use the fine documentary about typeface called Helvetica [review] (after the famous font), is back again with an equally wonderful example of the genre, Objectified, that turns our attention to the many objects we encounter in our daily lives and then shows us how vital good design is to how these objects work -- and how they affect us for better or worse.

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I grew up learning that form follows function, a premise that seems to work well with much of what is on display in the film because every object we see has a function –- often an important one in our lives. But Objectified may also make you question, perhaps healthily, many of the over-designed objects you see around you and use (or try to): say, salad servers so ornate that it’s uncomfortable to grasp the handles. Art Nouveau, it turns out, may not be the best style in which to sculpt something functional.

In this film, as you might imagine, most forms are sleek -- pared down to their minimum, their essence. While you may question whether the Apple Corporation is really the sine qua non of fine design, as one talking head posits here, you’ll find plenty else to agree with. And even the arguments the film provokes are worth having.

Objectified, a mere 75 minutes long, is the kind of movie you’ll want to share with every alert filmgoer on your list.

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

Design is all around us, as anyone who has ever been responsible for creating a design realizes early on. While many of us most often think about design in terms of the art we observe –- paintings, magazines, movies, home interiors -- it is present and every bit as important in the everyday things we use: toothbrushes, computers, potato peelers and the like. Gary Hustwit, the guy who gave use the fine documentary about typeface called Helvetica [review] (after the famous font), is back again with an equally wonderful example of the genre, Objectified, that turns our attention to the many objects we encounter in our daily lives and then shows us how vital good design is to how these objects work -- and how they affect us for better or worse.

Continued reading Objectified...

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Reviewer: Jonathan Poritsky
Rating (out of 5): **½

Give Atom Egoyan 110 minutes and he’ll give you a handful of unrealized MacGuffins and a whole big piece of his mind. Adoration, just out on DVD, spends more time dabbling in the soft art of misdirection than actually resolving a plot. In fairness, the film does portray our current technological moment (and the teenagers who are its biggest beneficiaries) quite accurately. If only the film's overarching message of our tech-induced de-sensitivity weren’t so 1995 (hello The Net).

The skeletal plot takes off at a saunter as orphaned high school student Simon (Devon Bostick) begins telling his friends a tale of his father’s supposed terrorist tendencies, which resulted in the near-bombing of an airplane and the death of his mother. Living with his financially strained Uncle Tom (Scott Speedman, The Strangers, Underworld), Simon’s story attracts an ever growing internet audience of kids, pundits, intellectuals, ideologues and other talking heads. Can fundamentalism be legitimized? Humanized? Are the people who survived the non-plane crash victims in their own rite? These questions and more grow alongside a confused plot regarding Simon’s family history and his mysteriously doting French teacher, Sabine (Egoyan's wife and frequent star Arsinée Khanjian).

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The DVD release is chock full of deleted scenes, making ofs, trailers (some good ones), and a lengthy interview with Mr. Egoyan. Unfortunately, his talk is overly simplistic, and he drones on a bit about the role of the internet in society and why he is so interested in it. At one point he pulls out an oft-quoted Godard-ism which got me thinking that maybe those well-read and disaffected kids’ rants are more personal than I first imagined.

Whatever its flaws, the film is still worth a watch, and will certainly incite meaningful conversation on your way to gym class.

Reviewer: Jonathan Poritsky
Rating (out of 5): **½

Give Atom Egoyan 110 minutes and he’ll give you a handful of unrealized MacGuffins and a whole big piece of his mind. Adoration, just out on DVD, spends more time dabbling in the soft art of misdirection than actually resolving a plot. In fairness, the film does portray our current technological moment (and the teenagers who are its biggest beneficiaries) quite accurately. If only the film's overarching message of our tech-induced de-sensitivity weren’t so 1995 (hello The Net).

The skeletal plot takes off at a saunter as orphaned high school student Simon (Devon Bostick) begins telling his friends a tale of his father’s supposed terrorist tendencies, which resulted in the near-bombing of an airplane and the death of his mother. Living with his financially strained Uncle Tom (Scott Speedman, The Strangers, Underworld), Simon’s story attracts an ever growing internet audience of kids, pundits, intellectuals, ideologues and other talking heads. Can fundamentalism be legitimized? Humanized? Are the people who survived the non-plane crash victims in their own rite? These questions and more grow alongside a confused plot regarding Simon’s family history and his mysteriously doting French teacher, Sabine (Egoyan's wife and frequent star Arsinée Khanjian).

Continued reading Adoration...

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Reviewer: James van Maanen
Rating (out of 5): Trick R' Treat ***
The Children ***½

Halloween is just around the corner so queue up now for a couple of U.S.-debut creep-fests, both of which, provide enough shivers to have deserved a better fate than to have gone straight-to-DVD. Their styles could not be more different, however: The Children adheres to a strict British mode of seemingly realistic, near-documentary verité that’s long on suspense-filled tracking shots (and, yes, they’re quite suspenseful), while Trick r' Treat goes the comic book route, complete with animated credits, primary color palette and terrific, juicy cinematography (by Glen MacPherson) – with performances to match.

You may remember, more than a year ago, theatrical previews for Trick ‘r Treat appearing on various DVDs and, I believe, in theatres, too. Yet the film was never released. Rather than being the bomb some might have expected from that, the movie is quite entertaining, as it links separate stories of townspeople in a small hamlet that, yearly, celebrates Halloween in a big way. These tales deal with both the supernatural and the natural (but very evil).

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The Children is the work of adapter (from a story by Paul Andrew Williams, of the great London to Brighton) and director Tom Shankland, who manages to take a very slight story – a family gathering for the Christmas holiday during which something horrible happens – and stretch it out to 80 minutes via many suspenseful scenes in which characters walk toward things: the woods, a yellow tent, the bedroom upstairs, etc., which we've seen a thousand times before, but Shankland, using a tight, often handheld camera and bright colors scattered amongst the drab, makes it seem spooky and awful anew.

Part of the reason for this is that the villains here are, no surprise, the children of the title. We’ve seen this before, too – in the interesting Spanish film from the 1970s, Who Can Kill a Child?, in The Omen series, more recently in Orphan, and elsewhere. But Shankland takes things farther into no-no territory than anything I’ve yet viewed, and the result is singularly disturbing.

The director gets fine performances all around, from the adults -- including Eva Birthistle, Stephen Campbell Moore, Rachel Shelley and Jeremy Sheffield – and especially from the children, who go from ordinary (sweet and sour) to appalling killers who use their own vulnerability to ensnare the adults, whose normal reaction, of course, is to protect them.

Perhaps the most interesting character is the teenage daughter (played very well by Hannah Tointon) stranded somewhere between child and adult, whose reactions and actions change in the course of the film, just as do those of the viewer toward this girl. No substantial reason is ever given for the children’s behavior, though clues are certainly dropped. Lack of explanation only adds to the creepiness.

Reviewer: James van Maanen
Rating (out of 5): Trick R' Treat ***
The Children ***½

Halloween is just around the corner so queue up now for a couple of U.S.-debut creep-fests, both of which, provide enough shivers to have deserved a better fate than to have gone straight-to-DVD. Their styles could not be more different, however: The Children adheres to a strict British mode of seemingly realistic, near-documentary verité that’s long on suspense-filled tracking shots (and, yes, they’re quite suspenseful), while Trick r' Treat goes the comic book route, complete with animated credits, primary color palette and terrific, juicy cinematography (by Glen MacPherson) – with performances to match.

You may remember, more than a year ago, theatrical previews for Trick ‘r Treat appearing on various DVDs and, I believe, in theatres, too. Yet the film was never released. Rather than being the bomb some might have expected from that, the movie is quite entertaining, as it links separate stories of townspeople in a small hamlet that, yearly, celebrates Halloween in a big way. These tales deal with both the supernatural and the natural (but very evil).

Continued reading Seasonal scares: Trick r' Treat and The Children...

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Reviewer: Jeffrey M. Anderson
Rating (out of 5): **½

Don't you hate it when your parents go away for the weekend and you accidentally open up a portal to hell in the backyard? But it's always good when your best friend has a special heavy metal album (imported from Europe, of course), complete with liner notes filled with helpful information and spells. And when all else fails, it's good to have a model rocket to launch at the bad guys.

If only The Gate knew how silly it really is, but as directed by Tibor Takács, it plows straight through its ridiculous story and dialogue as if it were an "After School Special." It seems vaguely interested in following in the footsteps of hits like Poltergeist (1982) and Gremlins (1984) -- focusing on kids and families rather than sexually exploratory teens -- but instead it comes across as unsatisfyingly tame. The movie's most interesting character, the older sister "Al" (Christa Denton), must eventually decide between the love of her pesky younger brother or the teenage hunk she wants to make out with, but the movie fumbles this potentially emotional situation.

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I saw this movie in the theater in 1987 and thought it was pretty bad back then; it's still pretty bad, but the visual effects hold up well. The creatures, ranging from an army of scrambling, biting pint-sized beasties to a huge one, look great. There's also great use of backdrops and light, as well as oversized moths and a misplaced eyeball.

Lionsgate has re-issued a 2009 "Monstrous Special Edition" DVD for no apparent reason; it comes with a new commentary track and a couple of pretty dull little featurettes (all talking heads and no clips). Director Tibor Takács went on to direct the much more interesting I, Madman (1989) next, as well as The Gate II (1990), which nobody asked for. Amazingly, he's still working today, and his new muddling feature Lies and Illusions was just released on DVD.

Reviewer: Jeffrey M. Anderson
Rating (out of 5): **½

Don't you hate it when your parents go away for the weekend and you accidentally open up a portal to hell in the backyard? But it's always good when your best friend has a special heavy metal album (imported from Europe, of course), complete with liner notes filled with helpful information and spells. And when all else fails, it's good to have a model rocket to launch at the bad guys.

If only The Gate knew how silly it really is, but as directed by Tibor Takács, it plows straight through its ridiculous story and dialogue as if it were an "After School Special." It seems vaguely interested in following in the footsteps of hits like Poltergeist (1982) and Gremlins (1984) -- focusing on kids and families rather than sexually exploratory teens -- but instead it comes across as unsatisfyingly tame. The movie's most interesting character, the older sister "Al" (Christa Denton), must eventually decide between the love of her pesky younger brother or the teenage hunk she wants to make out with, but the movie fumbles this potentially emotional situation.

Continued reading The Gate...

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Reviewer: Dylan de Thomas
Rating (out of 5): **

Famed, multiple-Academy Award-nominated animator Bill Plympton made his second live-action film, Guns on the Clackamas, during the early-90's boom of mock documentaries -- which included such notable features as Bob Roberts, Fear of a Black Hat and Forgotten Silver. The latter, Peter Jackson's faux-doc about a long-lost New Zealand filmmaker, a good, and superior, reference point for Plympton's movie which focuses on Holton P. Jeffers Jr., a famed Western director making a cursed movie, the titular "Guns on the Clackamas."

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Guns is chock-full of Hollywood in-jokes, which Plympton details in the enjoyable commentary track. Unfortunately, the film itself is not all that funny. The deft touch he has as an animator is entirely not in evidence here, with obvious jokes falling flat right and left, while stilted acting and awkward filmmaking evident in every scene.

For Plympton and Western mockumentary completists only.

Reviewer: Dylan de Thomas
Rating (out of 5): **

Famed, multiple-Academy Award-nominated animator Bill Plympton made his second live-action film, Guns on the Clackamas, during the early-90's boom of mock documentaries -- which included such notable features as Bob Roberts, Fear of a Black Hat and Forgotten Silver. The latter, Peter Jackson's faux-doc about a long-lost New Zealand filmmaker, a good, and superior, reference point for Plympton's movie which focuses on Holton P. Jeffers Jr., a famed Western director making a cursed movie, the titular "Guns on the Clackamas."

Continued reading Guns on the Clackamas: A Documentary...

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

Another in Film Movement's seemingly endless array of worthwhile movies, The Window, a co-production of Argentina and Spain, is the second fine film I’ve seen from Argentine-born Carlos Sorin (Intimate Stories being the other) that tells a small tale quietly and exceedingly well.

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The setting is Patagonia, which I had always imagined as pretty desolate. The section shown in this film may be cut off from civilization (a short wave radio stands in for the telephone) but it is a simply gorgeous spot: arid and dry but full of fields and flowers. The old man's abode is equally beautiful, standing alone as it does on the plain. Nature is ever-present and seems relatively benign. Nothing much happens in the film, and yet not a moment is wasted. Everything we see fascinates, due to so many well-chosen details of everyday life. Some, but not much, of the back story is filled in, so we can piece together bit and pieces of the past. Conversations are had, a walk is taken, arrivals and departures made. In the process "civilization" intrudes but is put promptly and charmingly in its place.

At the end of this wonderful day (the movie takes place in but a 24-hour period and lasts only 85 minutes), we feel as if we've experienced something major, primal -- quiet and unhurried though it was. This is Sorin's gift: to create a film so relaxed and genuine, that it is, in its humble way, almost startling.

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

Another in Film Movement's seemingly endless array of worthwhile movies, The Window, a co-production of Argentina and Spain, is the second fine film I’ve seen from Argentine-born Carlos Sorin (Intimate Stories being the other) that tells a small tale quietly and exceedingly well.

Continued reading The Window...

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