The Library of Babel

52 Films For 2012

2012-01-02T23:09:00.000-08:00

Last year was my least successful endeavor so far. I managed a meager 28 out of 52 films, though in fairness many fell through simply for availability issues. Some I've carried over to this edition, but not many. However, there's a a reason for that, as I've decided to stick with a theme. I've reached a point in my movie knowledge where the glaring gaps simply aren't so glaring any more (that gigantic cinematic bible you may know as 1001 Movies to See Before You Die - I've seen some 830 of them). That's a sign that it's time to buckle down and start getting really good at something, so from here on out, my new year's lists will be increasingly specific. I toyed with the idea of some ridiculous genre (giallo, pre-code musicals, pink films) or even just a movement (German expressionism is where it's at) but given the availability nightmares I've been plagued with in years past, I settled for something slightly more accommodating.

East Asian Cinema

Specifically, that of Japan, China, South Korea, Hong Kong, and Taiwan, with some being better represented than others. Needless to say, I've tapped many of the key auteurs, past and present, of the region, and found room for a few long over-looked titles. And I've still found a way to satisfy my genre fix, with the most essential categories: anime, samurai, wuxia, horror, and yes, pink films, all making appearances. And with that long-winded intro out of the way, here you kids go. 52 films for 2012.

The Grandmasters
Red Beard (Kurosawa)
Stray Dog (Kurosawa)
I Was Born, But… (Ozu)
An Autumn Afternoon (Ozu)
The Empress Yang Kuei-Fei (Mizoguchi)
The Crucified Lovers (Mizoguchi)

The Classics
The Sword of Doom (Okamoto)
Crazed Fruit (Nakahira)
Blind Beast (Masumura)
Harakiri (Kobayashi)
The Human Condition (Kobayashi)
Tokyo Olympiad (Ichikawa)
An Actor’s Revenge (Ichikawa)

The Coolest Kid On The Block
Tattooed Life (Suzuki)
Story of a Prostitute (Suzuki)
Youth of the Beast (Suzuki)

Horror
The Face of Another (Teshigahara)
Chinese Ghost Story (Ching)
Kuroneko (Shindo)
Jigoku (Nakagawa)

Wuxia/Martial Arts
Come Drink With Me (Hu)
Dragon Gate Inn (Hu)
Killer Clans (Yuen)
Zu Warriors From the Magic Mountain (Hark)

Pink
Porno Jidaigeki: Bohachi Bushido (Ishii)
Female Prisoner 701: Scorpion (Ito)
Female Prisoner Scorpion: Jailhouse 41 (Ito)

Anime
Ninja Scroll (Kawajiri)
Ghost in the Shell (Oshii)
Lupin III: Castle of Cagliostro (Miyazaki)
Pom Poko (Takahata)
Origin: Spirits of the Past (Sugiyama)

South Korea
Attack the Gas Station (Kim)
Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance (Park)
Sympathy for Lady Vengeance (Park)
Poetry (Lee)

Contemporary Favorites
Green Snake (Hark)
Once Upon a Time In China (Hark)
Tampopo (Itami)
Hardboiled (Woo)
Police Story (Chan)
The Actress (Kwan)
Ichi the Killer (Miike)
Visitor Q (Miike)
Zatoichi (Kitano)

Other Auteurs
Black Rain (Imamura)
Vengeance is Mine (Imamura)
A Brighter Summer Day (Yang)
Vive l’Amour (Tsai)
The River (Tsai)
A City of Sadness (Hou)
Goodbye South, Goodbye (Hou)

Greatest Tracks of 2011

2011-12-31T02:09:00.000-08:00

The second installment of my music musings from the past year wastes little time getting down to business with the 15 definitive tracks of 2011. Look closely now and you'll observe certain patterns emerging. Two songs have carried over from my opening tracks list, and another few artists make a second appearance. Signifiers, perhaps, of my forthcoming list of great albums? Or maybe not. I'm still not sure I've got that one all worked out.

I nearly went with 10. I was there, so I thought, until another indispensable inclusion occurred to me, at which point I was more than willing to cheat and declare a tie for 10th place. That's about when I thought of a 12th, the 13th. And perhaps you'll forgive my lack of creativity, because this is the third time I've redrafted my intro to accomodate these choices, but I've settled in on a top 15 that I'm really rather pleased with. One very deserving artist even snagged two spots, and many of the rest could have easily done the same. But I think 15 is inclusive enough, so there will be none of that honorable mention silliness that would only demean this declaration of the greatest songs 2011 had to offer. They're ranked, which is a hard thing to stand by since the order could change by tomorrow morning, but that's what I do, even without a number one a decisive as "Sprawl II" was for me last year.

And here it is, friends, for your listening pleasure.

15. "Little Cup" by Thao & Mirah (Thao & Mirah)

Quiet. Unassuming. Infectious. Staggeringly beautiful.

14. "Elijah" by Alela Diane (Alela Diane & Wild Divine)

Apologies for the poor quality. There's not a song this year with more soul, but I sure plucked it from the depths of obscurity.

13. "Shake It Out" by Florence and the Machine (Ceremonials)

If "Elijah" has soul, then "Shake it Out" has had the soul ripped straight out of it. It's gothic gospel with one of the greatest vocalists currently working.

12. "Bizness" by Tune-Yards (WHOKILL)

A contender for music video of the year, no doubt, but the quirky highlight of the quirky highlight reel that is WHOKILL cannot be ignored. It was love at first listen for me.

11. "Midnight City" by M83 (Hurry Up, We're Dreaming)

Funny enough, "Hurry Up, We're Dreaming" has done more to remind me that "Saturdays = Youth" ranks among the greatest albums of the last decade than it has to secure it's own place in my pantheon, but it's a mighty fine effort, and that all stems from the electronic epic of "Midnight City."

10. "Video Games" by Lana Del Rey (Born to Die)

Sleepy, but not dreamy, and yet that's entirely a compliment. Lana Del Rey could crank out ten thousand songs all the same, and I would happy drift along with every one of them.

9. "Get Some" by Lykke Li (Wounded Rhymes)

Ferocious, that's what this song is. It should probably be higher, if only because it could eat most of my remaining selections alive. Pop perfection.

8. "Cruel" by St. Vincent (Strange Mercy)

As opposed to pop confection, which despite its indie rock veneer, is essentially what St. Vincent's "Cruel" is. And I love it for that. Did I mention the delightful music video?

7. "Only If For A Night" by Florence & The Machine (Ceremonials)

Well, you knew this was coming. It's miraculous, really, and if Ms. Welch really has taken up that mantle of a modern day Kate Bush (which, in itself, is a bit of a paradox). She can belt out a song like no one's business, but what really fascinates is how she seems to spring from another age entirely. Evocative doesn't even begin to describe it.

6. "A Real Hero" by College featuring Electric Youth (Drive soundtrack)

Either the most obvious of choices or one from well outside the box, there was no way I was ignoring the most significant song from one of the most significant films of the year. It shines and sparkles, but it also glides, and...hell, what do these words even mean? Just watch the damn movie.

5. "Afternoon" by Youth Lagoon (The Year of Hibernation)

Glorious, hitting the heights that M83 aspired to this year (and very very nearly hit). What it does better than anything this year is escalate, and that's got to be my most prized trait in any song. Or better yet, album, but we will get to that soon enough.

4. "Cats & Dogs/Coeur D'Alene"by The Head & The Heart (The Head & The Heart)

The release and subsequent re-release makes this perhaps a dubious choice, but it was a band I firmly discovered in the summer of '11, and at least one of the multiple release dates falls in my favor. Like "Afternoon," there's a tremendous build to this two-part album opener, which is still one of the greatest packages of indie folk I've ever laid ears on, Fleet Foxes be damned.

3. "The Words That Maketh Murder" by PJ Harvey (Let England Shake)

"What if I take my problem to the United Nations?" We were long overdue for a album bursting with political fury to emerge from the UK. Here, then, is blustery core of Let England Shake, and my oh my does it rattle.

2. "The Bay" by Metronomy (The English Riviera)

My most played song of the year by a country mile, though that may be due to the strange power it has to evoke paradise in the most unlikely places. It's a song that transports you, perhaps to the south of England as the album title suggests, or maybe to some equally unlikely paradise.

1. "Desire" by Anna Calvi (Anna Calvi)

A total vocal explosion with the force of a hurricane. It sits nicely on top, if only because it seems more singular than so many songs before it. Most artists, there was at least some debate in my mind as to which song of theirs felt most at home on this list, but to listen to Calvi's self titled album is to instantly gravitate to the deeply hued "Desire." There were no easy choices across these rankings, but if a number one had to emerge (and that is the point, is it not?) then this is as fine a choice as I could have hoped for.

Opening Tracks of 2011

2011-12-24T22:34:00.000-08:00

It's always list season here at the Library of Babel, but were there an official list season, it would now be in full bloom, what with the imminent end of 2011 a mere week away. Now while it's true that the past month or so has been largely spent overdosing on Oscar bait, the movie list will have to remain on the back burner, as I bide my time, once again, to upstage the Academy and their silly little ceremony. Yet somehow, I've actually found the time to take in an album or two, and the result is the paltry series of notable tunes to follow.

I'm by no means an expert here. I've listened to a fraction of what was great in 2011, and stumbled upon more than a few favorites thanks primarily to the generous recommendations of friends, both real and existing only on the internet. Given my impaired scope, I had thought to limit this to a simple Best Tracks/Best Albums kind of deal, but low and behold, a trend emerged.

2011 was a damn good year for the Opening Track.

You can probably name a few off the top of your head. The year's most memorable single, for one. Or the opening teaming of two pillars of rap, right alongside a rapidly rising star. Or the title track off the year's most timely, politically charged album. And what better way to launch into awards season than with a tribute to the album opener, presented here as 10 tremendous tracks that proved to be tough acts to follow (at least half are the best songs on their respective albums). Some will resurface later on my Best Tracks of '11 list, others mark the only appearance by their artist this time out. All can be proud to take part in these opening ceremonials. Commence the fanfare.

10. Perth - Bon Iver (Bon Iver)

9. Don't Carry It All - The Decemberists (The King is Dead)

8. Youth Knows No Pain - Lykke Li (Wounded Rhymes)

7. To Begin - Alela Diane (Alela Diane & Wild Divine)

6. No Church in the Wild - Kanye West & Jay-Z featuring Frank Ocean (Watch the Throne)

5. Rolling In The Deep - Adele (21)

4. Let England Shake - PJ Harvey (Let England Shake)

3. Intro - M83 (Hurry Up, We're Dreaming)

2. Only If For a Night - Florence & The Machine (Ceremonials)

1. Cats & Dogs/Coeur d'Alene - The Head & The Heart (The Head & The Heart)

Hugo: Or, Young Scorsese in Love

2011-12-04T01:55:00.000-08:00

Oh, hello. I swear I didn't mean to set down the pen for so long. It's actually been a very eventful few months. There was much frolicking around the New York Film Festival, and my extensive foray into the films of '11 has kept pace ever since. I've even managed to work in some revival screenings of favorites - the exhilarating Raiders of the Lost Ark, the mesmerizing Red Desert - so suffice it to say I've been having a good year. And yet it's telling that it took a film like Hugo to inspire me to reopen the Library after what has been my longest absence since I first got it up and running. Hugo, you see, is my favorite kind of film, a movie fueled solely by a burning passion of movies, and as such, it's a movie about falling in love. That is was made by the reigning cinemagician of the day was just too perfect. And now, awestruck and inspired, I've returned to recount what dazzling sights I've now seen.

You likely only know the vaguest details about Hugo, Martin Scorsese's first sojourn into the family film, and perhaps more significantly, the current 3D craze. Residing within the walls of a Parisian train station is a mischievous waif who embarks on what's sure to be a wild and magical adventure. So the trailer indicates. That it reveals little else is just as well, for it allows even those who get a whiff of what's coming derive not-insignificant wonderment from the artfully handled reveals. But I've already made up my mind to lay the cards on the table, so while this is not a film which hinges on any grand twist, should you prefer to remain in the dark, now is the time to turn away. Just do so with my most enthusiastic endorsement on your mind.

Down to business. Movie about movies come in all colors. There are the clever, insider baseball kinds (The Player), the ones who take rapture in the creative process itself (8 1/2), and the one's that do or die based on your tolerance for name-checking (hi Quentin!). And on the rarest of occasions, there are those that lovingly crafted odes to the medium itself, which without fail win me over every time, whether they're maudlin (Cinema Paradiso), erotic (The Dreamers), or practically perfect in every way, which I may prematurely be stating, is how I'm feeling about Hugo. I mean, this film gets quite literally to the core of the medium, what with a budding cinefile stumbling upon the aging George Melies in (of course) a fucking train station. And no one but no one was better suited to bring this story to the silver screen than Marty Scorsese, as not a director alive (save Godard...perhaps) possesses a better command of film grammar, nor a more deeply rooted love for his chosen profession.

And we're back again to love (or have we ever left the topic?). Here it's a quantifiable object emanating from every frame of the film, though how much of that translates to each member of the audience will vary considerably. While in no way inappropriate viewing for kids of any age, I suspect many will find the first half especially an exceptionally nice nap. More than a few adults will sympathize with this as well, but I don't doubt that those who have a genuine love for movies will find within Hugo the ultimate validation for their obsession. Here we get an automaton reminiscent of Metropolis, and our hero hanging Harold Lloyd style from a clock hand, and a runaway train breaking off the rails (and through the 4th wall!) as it careens through the station. And of course the great Melies himself, illuminated late in the film though the most magical and heart-wrenching flashbacks you'll ever lay eyes on. The honest devotion of Scorsese's achievement is enough to silence any cries of pretension, and those who find it overlong, my reasoning is that I'd rather spend a slow hour in a world as enchanting as Hugo's than a quick one anywhere else. The movie isn't too long. Your attention span is too short.

I haven't even scratched the surface, have I? Perhaps some specifics then. The cast populating Scorsese's Parisian snow globe circa 1930 is an absolute dream. As Hugo, Asa Butterfield makes the ideal mirror image of any young artist or dreamer, not the least of whom would be Marty himself. Chloe Moretz provides a nice foil, what with her literary aspirations aligned to counter his cinematic ones, and she delivers with great relish a handful of precocious adjectives ("clandestine" being my favorite). There is Christopher Lee in a marvelous brief turn as a bookseller and Michael Stuhlbarg nearly stealing the show later on in full film preservationist glory. We all could have used a little more Emily Mortimer, Richard Griffiths and Frances de la Tour, but their parts were the minor details that really elevated the show, and love him or hate him, Sacha Baron Cohen has all the mannerisms of the stars of silent cinema in his bones, and nowhere has this daring been put to better use. Ben Kingsley and Helen McCrory are better still. They're situated right at the emotional crux of the only film this year to bring tears to my eyes (three times, but who's counting?) and they breath such humanity into Georges and Jeanne, but also sadness, fear, and eventually wonder.

Technically, Hugo is no less an achievement. Scorsese's use of 3D is never flashy, and if not absolutely crucial to the viewing experience, here marks one of the few instances where I've found it add to, as opposed to cheapen, the overall impact. Thelma Schoonmaker's editing reaches new heights in the artfully constructed flashback sequences, Robert Richardson's photography thrives from being ever curious of its surroundings, and Howard Shore's score may even top his exceptional work in A Dangerous Method.

But my superlatives are starting to sound silly. It's abundantly clear by now that I love movies that love movies, and that Hugo is practically my new gold standard. But while I'm here telling, Scorsese is out there doing a bang up job of showing, and you really won't find a better argument for why movies can mean so much to people than this film here. And so that's what brings me back to this site, hopefully with a little more frequency, but certainly with a reignited passion for the medium I'm writing about.

Ten for the High Road

2011-09-21T00:03:00.000-07:00

Scottish films are for lovers. Also drunks. And junkies. And feverish pagans with a torch to bear for law enforcement. Since I identify with most of these categories, I feel a list coming on.

Top Ten Films Set in Scotland

The idea came to me last week as I exited the theater from a revival screening of the Powell and Pressburger classic, I Know Where I'm Going!. Those who know me are well familiar with my belief that The Archers can direct circles around every filmmaker you hold dear, so little wonder that I left the theater that night in love all over again. With Wendy Hiller, with P&P, and with the mystic Scotish Hebrides, a strong contender for my favorite cinematic backdrop. Hence, I decided to cull together a little list. Exactly what you were hoping for, I know.

Top 10 Films set in Scotland is what I chose to dub this. Note that I didn't say Scottish films, though nearly all qualify for that distinction as well, but I didn't feel it fair to exclude several excellent foreign flicks that so beautifully capture the spirit of the land, nor did it seem right to make room for a (terrific) Scottish film like Morvern Callar, which spends much of its time abroad, when so many others would be equally deserving. You will also notice the absence of Braveheart. If this seems an oversight, then it pales in comparison to Mel Gibson's complete disregard for Highland fashion and historical fact. And quality cinema. The eviscerations abound.

Finally, a few honorable mentions, because there's a few other classics who's absence would not go unnoticed. First, there's Andrea Arnold's modern surveillance drama Red Road, which truth be told, I didn't love as much as Fish Tank, but deserves a mention nonetheless. Next, perhaps the definitive Scottish comedy, Whiskey Galore!, which treats a community's debilitating alcoholism with precisely the lack of gravity that it should. Most drastically, I've just narrowly left off the heartwarming and hilarious Gregory's Girl, which perhaps I can only justify with another inclusion later on. I was astounded that there wasn't room for this one in my top 10, but I do think the other inclusions make up for it. Perhaps even more egregious is the lack of any adaptation of That Scottish Play, but we all know that the prize on that one goes to Throne of Blood, and feudal Japan is hardly the Scottish highlands, now is it?

And it's go, lassie, go.

10. Ratcatcher (Lynne Ramsay, 1999)

As atonement for my omission of Morven Callar, I threw Lynne Ramsay a bone with Ratcatcher, which admittedly, is a pretty fantastic inclusion itself. Hands down one of the best depictions of youth in the last twenty years, and the exquisite framing and stunning photography are hard to resist.

9. The Wickerman (Robin Hardy, 1973)

Long before Nicholas Cage donned a bear suit and kicked the crap out of some women, The Wickerman had a reputation as one of the creepiest horror films of all time. The original taps religious fanaticism for some truly terrifying situations, culminating, of course, in the disturbing and inevitable bonfire. And Christopher Lee has the uncanny ability to make everything creepier, so more points for that.

8. Trainspotting (Danny Boyle, 1996)

The one you were no doubt waiting for. Trainspotting more or less lives up to its reputation as the British film of the 90s (though it will always be Mike Leigh's decade to me), and it certainly made it abundantly clear that Danny Boyle was a force to be reckoned with. The film is slick and cool and a total rush of blood to the head, and must-see viewing for any aspiring film buff.

7. Breaking The Waves (Lars von Trier, 1996)

Between this and Trainspotting, 1996 marked a great rebound for the Highlands, with Western culture still in the thrall of a Scottish history that never quite existed. True, Lars von Trier is hardly on home turf here, but the breathtaking exteriors and Emily Watson's decade defining performance are so affecting that there's little else to notice. Warm and fuzzy this film is not, but that's nothing new for fans of von Trier, who at least seems well suited to the Scottish fog and gloom.

6. The Edge of the World (Michael Powell, 1937)

Ye-gods, what a gorgeous film. The single greatest argument for location shooting to come out of the 30s, with vistas as menacing as they are breathtaking (though curiously, Powell and Pressburger's Black Narcissus ten years later works equal wonders for the Himalayas, all on a studio lot). This is a true labor of love for Michael Powell, and a unforgettable, endearingly pastoral movie-watching experience.

5. The Illusionist (Sylvain Chomet, 2010)

So this one's French. Maybe, just a little. And no less unconventional of a pick for being just shy of a year old. That doesn't change a thing though, as The Illusionist was easily one of the great films of 2010, and not insignificantly thanks to the character that the brilliantly animated culture of Scotland lends to the proceedings. The Edinburgh cityscape is something to marvel at, and the misty Scottish isle that the titular magician travels to is enchanting, but it's the local character that define the film, all lovingly drawn frame upon frame, for what may well end of being the animated film of the decade.

4. The 39 Steps (Alfred Hitchcock, 1935)

Though well-known enough in name alone, The 39 Steps remains one of Hitchcock's most underrated films, especially considering this belongs near the top of his top tier. Any spy story that detours at length through the Scottish mores, and works in a train journey alone the way, is precisely my kind of movie. The chemistry between Robert Donat and Madeleine Carroll is staggering, and so their adventures across the countryside amuse and thrill in equal measure.

3. Shallow Grave (Danny Boyle, 1994)

Well look who's back: Danny Boyle and Ewan McGregor, in what comes dangerously close to the best thing either have done (better than Slumdog and The Pillow Book respectively? the jury's still out). What is certain is that Shallow Grave is a thunderous debut feature, a film that evolves from an above average apartment comedy to a disarming tale of suspicion and betrayal. Shit gets real, and fast. And Boyle's lively direction never lets our attention waver. The guy's energy is remarkable, especially considering he has yet to slow down.

2. I Know Where I'm Going! (Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, 1945)

The inspiration for this impromptu top 10 clocks in at last at #2, though on another day, it could land not only at the top, but near the top of my all time favorite films list. I Know Where I'm Going! is one of the great movie romances, and certainly one of the most relatable of them. And so much of that romance stems from the land itself, which is why this is for many the definitive Scottish movie. It features a cadre of local flavor that could only exist on the mythic Hebrides, and the central romance is bound at the end to the very mythology of the isles. It's a film of immeasurable beauty, one which has been proven to reduce a grown man to tears, though on that subject, I'm afraid I will have to keep mum.

1. Local Hero (Bill Forsyth, 1983)

There can be only one, one film to define my entire fascination with the people and culture of Scotland, and that film is the magical Local Hero. Maybe it's that I find my love mirrored by the Western protagonist, sent to the fictional seaside town of Ferness as an emissary from Knox Oil and Gas, who falls truly, madly, deeply in love with the land he's been sent to develop. It's a very simple film, but one with deeply endearing characters and the occasional well-deserved laugh, and it's a reminder of just how much mileage can be gotten from quality storytelling alone. Without benefit of showboating that the Paddy Chayefsky's and Aaron Sorkin's of the world rely on, Bill Forsyth has here one of the greatest screenplays of all time. Overflowing with local color, basking in the gray Scottish seaside, and knee-deep in tradition (is there a more rousing dance than a Ceilidh?), Local Hero is the one film I would steer and Celtophile to in a heartbeat, and one that's near and dear to my heart.

The Top 10 Movie Musical Numbers

2011-08-29T23:16:00.000-07:00

Let's not drag this out any longer, I say, on day 29. I'll cut to the chase (preferably jump cut, because those are the most fun) and foist upon you my picks for cinemas grandest musical numbers. A rush job? Or the lingering effects of the week mid-month where I inexplicably disappeared? Whatever the case, I couldn't wait any longer, and if you know me, then you know there is nothing I like better than a good top 10 list. Included under "nothing" are vitals such as sex, Ben & Jerry's ice cream, murder mysteries, and oxygen. I have yet to find a way to combine all these things.

Crafting a list of 31 is easy. It's just long enough to fit in all the concessions you would possibly care to, and yet the total number of entries is small enough to be fathomable. Meaning, your list doesn't appear so exhaustive that an omission (intentional or otherwise) is offensive. I could have easily gone to 50, and a slew of other classic numbers would have reared their fabulous heads, but that's just more reviews, more justifications, and more time stalling before the grand spectacle of any "Best" list, the Top 10.

And Top 10s are hard. Lemme whip up a fancy analogy here and say it's not unlike creating a signature recipe. There's not necessarily a right or wrong way to make a dish delicious, but certain ingredients help, and there's nothing quite like concocting something they've never tasted before. And in being unique, you often have to go a ways out on a limb, and yet there still has to be something cohesive about the whole thing, otherwise it just won't taste right. End lame metaphor.

Where was I? Right, griping to myself about the significant mental anguish I expended for the sake of this neatly package Top 10. Is it diverse? To a point, although seven of the ten entries come from within two decades. And four of those seven are divided (by decade, naturally) between two directors. That points rather definitively toward my preferences as a film-lover, specifically my longstanding status as an Auteur Theory bannerman. And while I usually vehemently deny any bias against contemporary films, there is some truth to that within the genres where the peak productive periods exist in days gone by. This would cover westerns, noir, epics, and of course, musicals.

And yet, I do consider this an exciting, even eclectic mix, with nearly 50 years between the earliest entry and the latest, some of which have directly beget others within these ranks. All are pivotal in one way or another to the history of the medium, or at the very least the genre, though as many as three of these will strike the musical purist as unfair play. But I'll leave the justifications for a little later down the line. For now, let me proudly present:

10. "Remember My Forgotten Man" from Gold Diggers of 1933

Musicals rose to prominence in the 30s because they were the ultimate form of escapism: wild, joyous fantasies that allowed audiences temporary reprieve from the ever-present Depression that was consuming them. Busby Berkley was the grandmaster of such spectacles, and yet here, in a musical that includes the oft-cited Depression classic "We're In The Money," the film closes its curtain on a number that forces audiences to reflect not only on their current sorry state, but specifically on the inelegant fall of veterans of the Great War in these lean times. To put it mildly, it's kind of a downer.

Well, as far as musicals go, that is. I'd be hard pressed to think of a song with a stronger build to it, mounting on Joan Blondell's poetic lament until it reaches the astonishing closing setpiece. It's the kind of song that sends chills down your spine, and with years removed now from the immediate critique present in the song, it feels no less effective, just less personal. That makes it a rare musical number that deals with a social issue, and rarer still, one that feels relevant for when it was (oh, silly Hairspray, you untimely thing you). Considering also, that the haunting music is one of the great tunes of classic Hollywood, "Remember My Forgotten Man" earns its lofty place on this list no problem.

Next, for those familiar with my tastes, the least surprising inclusion on this list:

9. "Bye Bye Life" from All That Jazz

I'm gonna repeat this again, All That Jazz is the high point of an entire genre, the last bona-fide masterwork in the history of movie musicals, and as I'm bound not to let you forget, the greatest of them all. Opinions differ, but packed in here is everything there is to love about musicals. Yes, it's relentlessly self-indulgent, but if you have any affection for this most self-indulgent of genres, then you'd better be used to that by now.

Why I chose "Bye Bye Life" shouldn't mystify anyone. Few films have drawn to a close on such a spectacle as this, a song and dance farewell to the mortal coil on an ethereal stage that could only have existed between 1977 and 1980 AD. Central to it all is Roy Schieder, wrapping up the performance of his career and proving that actors in musicals can mine real emotional depth from their roles. Lending ample support is the one-of-a-kind Ben Vereen, who would probably also be my choice to MC my last moments on earth.

So the song ends up being by turns surreal and spectacular, devastating and divine. Were it not for that chilling endcap, I might request this played via video projection at my funeral. But those last two seconds are just so frighteningly...final...that it might be viewed in bad taste. Well, considering this essentially prophesied Bob Fosse's own impending exit from the stage of life, that only makes this all the more unnerving.

Upswing, Fosse will always live on through my eternal listing. Small consolation, you say? Well I say Fred Astaire never found it in him to complain...

8. "Girl Hunt: A Murder Mystery in Jazz" from The Band Wagon

Poor Fred Astaire was one of the casualties of my early list-cutting, back when I hoped to find room for something out of glory days alongside Ginger, probably from Swing Time or Top Hat, but while my whims didn't fall that way, at least I knew he'd be making one hell of a lasting impression with this final, spectacular number from The Band Wagon.

Right from the wicked-cool title on the program within the film, "Girl Hunt: A Murder Mystery in Jazz" promises some unprecedented union of two of my favorite genres. What results is a sleek noir-ballet, and my pick for the best choreography on the silver screen this side of an Errol Flynn movie. Rightly, this is Astaire's greatest triumph, though the film itself looks back fondly on his earlier days.

The number, however, owes itself to more contemporary influences (at the time), including the imaginative resurgence in the genre propagated by Donen and Kelly, not to mention a certain unparalleled achievement that we will be getting to in due course. Yes, I will continue to be cryptic while there is still time. This crazy-cool feast for the senses pushes the limits of what you might think of as a musical number, but I'd like to see any argument why it doesn't belong. It essentially amounts to little more than a violent ballet set to voice-over narration, yet the motion and the music are perfectly at one with each other, and if this isn't a musical number, I don't know what is. Certainly not this next entry...

7. "Hot Voodoo" from Blonde Venus

There's a scene in Bernardo Bertolucci's The Dreamers where Eva Green, decked out in the sexiest painter's apparel you've ever seen, wielding a makeshift spear, pays glorious homage to this number. It's just about my favorite scene of the last decade, and it owes nigh everything to what happens to be just about my favorite scene of the 1930s. Coincidence? Yeah, probably.

"Hot Voodoo" comes at the midpoint of the great Josef von Sternberg's obsession with Marlene Dietrich, the stage just before that obsession turned to madness, madness which incidentally resulted in one of the greatest films of all time, The Scarlet Empress. I think I've already exceeded my superlative quota for this review, so I'm going to back off a bit, but suffice it to say that this to me plays as so much more than a cabaret act or musical number. "Hot Voodoo" isn't in the traditional sense a spectacle, but there is something special about it, if I can only put my finger on it.

There's the obvious. The beauty and the beast dynamic is kinda fun, and the whole thing reveals itself to be one phenomenally cool entrance (not into the film, but the scene) for one of Hollywood's most untouchable goddesses. It's also quite the catchy beat, and while perhaps not wholly politically correct, you'd have to be looking for a fight to deem this offensive.

But for me there's some deep kind of movie magic at work here, the kind that's imminently tied to an icon's defining image. For Dietrich, she was never more electric than when under Sternberg's lens, and this is the perfect encapsulation of his pageantry. In this cabaret-act-cum-musical-number, she scarcely has to do a thing, but that's because Sternberg has created her not as an entity unto herself, but as one in perpetual contrast to her surroundings. Odd how with minimal exertion one can so effortlessly command one of the great nightclub acts in cinema, but that is the magic of movies for you.

6. "Isn't It Romantic?" from Love Me Tonight

I spoke vaguely of three musicals that could vie for the title Greatest Ever, the breathless Umbrellas of Cherbourg, my personal favorite All That Jazz, and the third, at long last revealed, Love Me Tonight, hands down the most influential and important movie in the entire genre, the one without which I could not fathom everything to follow existing as it does. Have you heard of it? No? Get on that.

It feels good to finally, all the way down at #6, work in a Maurice Chevalier song. I mean, I knew this one was a shoe-in for the upper ranks, but I'd have loved to include something from Gigi (which I love, and will defend to my dying day) or from the marvelous early Lubitsch musicals that made Chevalier a Hollywood name in the first place. But I will settle for a little Love Me Tonight, by one month the oldest movie on this list (just ahead of the aforementioned Blonde Venus), and yet prophetically more akin to modern musicals than anything to come out for the next dozen years.

"Isn't It Romantic" is a song of soaring ambition. We start with the affable Chevalier himself, chirping wistfully about joy of true love, infectiously enough that the tune begins to carry. Therein lies the marvel of the song, as our mouths hang agape in wonder while the simple song carries itself from flat to cab to traincar and well beyond. The artist and the soldiers and the gypsies keep the song alive and bridge the countrywide gap between Chevalier and the lovely Jeanette MacDonald, who at long last emerges on the balcony singing the song that her future paramour began some time ago. Lovers united by song. What a novel idea.

Ugh, blogger is doing that thing again. The thing where it won't let me embed certain videos. One3 of those videos being our next entry. I considered, briefly, uploading a version performed on The Muppet Show, but nifty as that may be, it was not directed by Bob Fosse, so instead we'll just live with a picture and a link.

5. "Willkommen" from Cabaret

First impressions are so important, right? And by logical extension, so are opening numbers. No discussion of these is complete without mention of the sexy and surreal "Willkommen" from Cabaret, the highest ranking adaptation of a stage number on this list.

Joel Grey is sensational. This is not the kind of performance that wins Oscars, except that it did, and in doing so trumped a gaggle of Godfather goons, Under any other circumstance, that would have earned Grey the scorn of movie history, but his MC is one of the defining characters of 70s cinema, and even to the detractors, the win is not as egregious as it may seem. Personally, it's one of my favorites in the entire category.

But things are not as they seem: this number is a two man show. Grey's magnetic weirdness has us at hello, but Bob Fosse's staging of the whole spectacle is no less memorable. Grey had previously won a Tony for this very role. but from the opening reflection, we can tell we're not in for a standard stage adaptation. The camera never settles into place, while the editing exposes every nook and cranny of the Kit Kat Club (exactly what you wanted to picture, I know). There no better example of a musical adaptation moving beyond the theatrical and into the cinematic than Cabaret, and it is first in "Willkommen" that we understand what kind of a ride we're in for.

And now for something completely different:

4. "Haan Jab Tak Hain Jaan" from Sholay

Everything about Sholay is downright mythic, the essence of the American western cloaked in the guise of a Bollywood musical. Heroes, anti-heroes and villains loom larger than life, and from early on it's perfectly clear that this is a battle of white hats and black hats. Unlike so many American westerns, however, Sholay succeeds in making its leading lady no less fascinating than the boys.

"Haan Jab Tak Hain Jaan" comes well into the film's roughly 3 hour run time. After the hero has been taken captive by Gabbar (who is one bad dude), his lover Basanti is offered the chance to prolong his execution, so long as she continues to dance. Rarely has Bollywood needed a reason to launch into a musical number, but never was there a more opportune time than here. Her song is a plea of love and desperation, and one of the most beautiful numbers I've ever witnessed on film. Her dancing, nothing short of mesmerizing.

Then Gabbar and his bandits up the anti, smashing bottles and scattering broken glass across the ground. The dance for life itself becomes a dizzying fight of perseverance for Basanti, bleeding all across the dust, her strength rapidly failing her. Everything about the number exists on such a grand scale, with love and devotion and justice all at stake in a battle of good vs. evil. What makes it all the more special is the realization that this is what art and entertainment in the world of globalization can achieve: a distinctly Indian movie that nonetheless owes a debt to American cinema, across multiple genres no less. Then again, I could reduce the discussion of this song's merits to the hypnotic movements of Ms. Malini and this would still be deserving the estimable rank of fourth on this list.

3. "Shanghai Lil" from Footlight Parade

I'm gonna have to ask that you take my word on this one. You'll notice the lack of video above. I did provide a youtube link, which offers a nice prelude, but that's maybe a third of the whole song if that, hardly enough to justify its rank as the third greatest movie musical number of all time. I would say youtube dropped the ball on this one, but the likelier culprit is society's waning interest in classic film. There's no good excuse for a masterpiece like Footlight Parade to be falling through the cracks. The clip above may be enough to pique your interest (if "By a Waterfall" hadn't already), but this is one you'll have to seek out on your own.

Lament over. Here's the substance. I think it only appropriate that one of the first great musical numbers in movie history would be directly inspired from the number one box office hit of the year before (that film is Sternberg's Shanghai Express, and it is marvelous). That is, of course, merely what enticed me to Footlight Parade in the first place, and the number itself, which closes out the film in spectacular fashion, is anything but an homage. It starts with the brilliant lead in of the multi-talented James Cagney literally falling into a musical number, where he promptly assumes the lead role. That's a pretty grand entrance, wouldn't you agree? It only gets better, moving along from a familiar bar song to a rousing dance routine before coming to a head in a triumphant march, all set to one of the catchiest songs in Hollywood history. Alas, I'm stranding you without proof on this one, but if you consider yourself an advocate for this strange and improbable genre, then you'll be wanting to catch up with Footlight Parade sooner than later anyway. When you do, kindly remedy this little youtube travesty for me.

2. "Make 'Em Laugh" from Singin' in the Rain

Never has one man expended so much energy in such a short space of time.

The titular song of "Singin' in the Rain" gets all the credit, but nearly any fan will point to "Make 'Em Laugh" as the film's signature track. If Donald O'Connor's reckless abandon can't make you a believer in the power of musicals, then there is literally no hope for you, and your very existence has already ceased to interest me. There's a hint of desperation in the performance here, the kind where one man throws literally everything he's got against the wall and hopes it will stick. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't, but mostly, it just crashes right on through. That's the moment you realize you're in the company of greatness.

Best of all though is the song's function as a whacked-out defense of the entertainment industry, one which neatly sums up the role of musicals in general. It's not strictly about laughter per se, but there is definitely something to the saying "give the people what they want." This number is the beating heart of a movie that's a fantastical celebration of show-business, and a love-letter to those who've fallen under its spell. To watch O'Connor run amok here is to completely forget oneself if only for a moment, and that is the kind of escapism that entertainment at its finest can offer. Even such a skeptical film viewer as myself can appreciate that sentiment. To bask in the hilarity of "Make 'Em Laugh" is one of the great wonders of cinema.

1. The Ballet from The Red Shoes

A relentless excursion into the dreamspace that exists at the crossroads of artistic modes of expression. This is equal parts stage and sound and dance, packaged in a way that could be described as nothing but cinematic. Don't let the drawing of the curtain fool you, no traditional staging could possibly replicate the wonders of The Red Shoes and its central ballet. Yes, this is a musical number. No, there's really not anything else quite like it. If it stands a measure apart from the other entries on the list, that's only because it belies comparison. This, friends, is the genuine article.

It shares all the essential ingredients of the other musical numbers ranked before it. The star of the show, Moira Shearer, turns in a transcendental performance, her hair afire as she dances from backdrop to backdrop, confronting her demons both onstage and off. There are elements of surrealism at play here, but the influences are more firmly rooted in artistic mediums than anything else. Only through the magic of movies is such an onslaught of art and dance and music possible. Time falls by the wayside as one image merges with the next, with Shearer's intrepid Victoria Page commanding every frame with her effortless poise.

This could only be the work of The Archers. No directors, save perhaps Peter Greenaway many years later, can boast a grander commitment to the assessment of the place other artistic mediums have within cinema. The Red Shoes ballet is a summation of their devotion to this subject, and within these frames the cinematic artistry knows no bounds. The camera itself might a well share a billing as it grants us access to angles of the stage we would never be privy to, and the hypnotic effects owe directly to the hand of a master editor. The tricks are little different than the other landmark musical numbers, but the illusion burrows miles deeper. We're I a man prone to hyperbole, I would call this more than the greatest musical number of all time, I'd decree it the greatest scene ever captured on film.

But of course, I am a man prone to hyperbole, and so I will pronounce with significant enthusiasm that art simply doesn't get any better than this. And on that bit of extravagance, it's time to bring this spectacle to a close. Good night. See you next month.

11. "Singin' In The Rain" from Singin' In the Rain

2011-08-26T22:53:00.000-07:00

Hey look, it's the greatest musical number of all time! If this is what it's like being number 11, then surely the top 10 must have some trick up its sleeve. At any rate, the pressure is on. I'm afraid I didn't just set the bar high, but in fact tossed it onto the roof. Seriously, what could be better than this?

"You'll see" is the answer, but fact is, this could have been swapped out with any of the nine numbers to follow (not #1 though) and I'd have called it a fair trade. As to why not, I had my reasons, which may or may not have had something to do with spreading the wealth in the top 10. Was that a giveaway? Whatever. Carry on.

There's a reason why this song is the defining moment of one of the greatest films of all time. I don't bandy with that label lightly. Among the top 10 or so films AFI considers to be the greatest ever, Singin' in the Rain is for me the one that most delivers on its classic status. It's the one that most fully delivers on the hype, and every ounce of the fulfillment is readily apparent in the titular song. Crucial, too, is the presence of the genre's leading man, Gene Kelly, singing and dancing in his finest hour. In a genre that truly plays to the strength of star persona, there was never a finer face than Kelly, and could I fall into the shoes of any Hollywood star, he'd be my choice in half a heartbeat. Well, him or Lee Marvin, but poor old Lee's adventure into musicals was somewhat less successful.

Also, lest we forget, "Singin' in the Rain" is the greatest song about being in love ever. Or rather, it captures that giddy feeling of romance on the horizon - how you see beauty in any situation because you're just so damn overwhelmed with the desire to be alive - and right from the "doo-doo-doo-doo-doo..." he hums on the sidewalk you realize that you've been in that situation before and wish that you lived in a society where it was socially acceptable to burst out into song on the street corner. You have done that, right? Because that can't just be me. Can't.

All that's to say, this song is total cinematic bliss. A musical tour-de-force that is crucial viewing whether you're a film lover or not. And if you're not, why then then this right here could be the beginning of a beautiful relationship.

12. "By A Waterfall" from The Footlight Parade

2011-08-25T23:31:00.000-07:00

It pains me, wounds me deeply, to leave this one out of my top 10. Because when I talk about spectacle, well, there ain't no musical number that can hold a candle to this here. It could teach the kids these days a thing or two about putting on a show. Think musicals have only gotten better? Bitch please, this is the bee's knees.

We've already established that Busby Berkley is the man, right? I mean, aside from commanding a seemingly inexhaustible arsenal of synchronized swimmers, the guy was responsible for the greatest cinematic gymnastics of his day. "By a Waterfall" as a song is a bit too drawn out, too brassy even, for my tastes, but that's just fog on the glass of the greatest window dressing of all time. This is surrealism on a Hollywood sized budget, the kind of epic scale event that might as well have been born from an early improbable union of Salvador Dali and Ernst Lubitsch. Berkley achieves transcendence here from going where no theatrical spectacle could possibly go, training the camera in on birds eye views and dreamy poolscapes, bombarding the senses with an array of visuals that are his and his alone. To be immersed in a Busby Berkley number is to drift temporarily from your body and hover above a world of his creation. Time stops, only sound and image exist. It's a trip worth taking again and again.

13. "I've Seen It All" from Dancer In The Dark

2011-08-25T23:04:00.000-07:00

You want some Bjork? Well here's your Bjork.

From time to time, a director strays from his own beaten path and does something entirely unexpected, and for a great many filmmakers, that unexpected something would be making a musical. Woody Allen, Sidney Lumet, John Huston and Martin Scorsese have all tried their hands, but more successful (and surprising) than them all is Lars von Trier. Whether thanks to him, or his most unlikely leading lady to date, Dancer In The Dark is a modern cult classic, and the consensus is generally strong enough that you could probably drop the cult label all together. Thus far, at least, it seems to have held ground as one of the more important European imports of the last decade, and really, was there a better musical in all that time. I think not. Ok, I secretly think 8 Women, but the technical mastery of Dancer is hard to argue with, and its emotion impact is earth shattering.

And then we get to the best song and dance of the show, the melancholy, but not-overwhelmingly depressing slice that is "I've Seen It All." Credit for the music goes to the Icelandic songbird herself, while von Trier taps into ethereal greatness for the dreamy locomotion that moves the music along. It also fulfills my suspected hypothesis that no great genre of cinema is without at least one memorable train scene. Yes, I guess we got a bit of that with The Umbrellas of Cherbourg as well, but here we get train dancing, and train dancing is infinitely more uplifting than train farewells. A shame the rest of this film isn't. If you thought Umbrellas was a tear-jerker, than Dancer in the Dark will probably make you walk into traffic. "I've Seen It All" is an emotional high in a film that relishes every emotional low. Soak it up.

14. "42nd Street" from 42nd Street

2011-08-24T22:39:00.000-07:00

This deep into the list and the legendary Busby Berkley makes his first (far from last) appearance with the film that landed him on the map. Like a few other numbers to miss out on my top 10, "42nd Street" is one of the obvious choices for greatest musical numbers of all time. I'd prefer to think of it as Berkley's warm-up act.

That's clearly not meant to devalue this spectacle, when in fact on the magnetism of the great Ms. Ruby Keeler's alone, this stands as one of the great set-pieces of the genre. She casts out those opening verses so effortlessly that it seems anyone could step into her shoes, but like all born hoofers, she made a career of being light on foot and in verse. That classic opening launches us into Berkley's first masterful orchestration, a gritty odyssey through the streets of Mid-Town, by turns both tragic and comic, with the artful deception allowed by camera laying groundwork for his spectacular triumphs to come.

It also may well be the best song of the whole batch. The lyrics stay on point and never feel the least bit forced, and the interludes offer ample opportunity for Berkley's legendary choreography to take the stage. 42nd Street has worked its way into the annals as his finest hour, and beholding this climactic production, that's not exactly surprising. Here though, is where I'd pull out the ole, 'you ain't seen nothing yet,' because grand as this all is, one of the hands-down most important directors of classic Hollywood was just getting started. Hopefully one or two of my selections still to come will inspire some further viewing. Until then, watch the clip above and remind yourselves of what Hollywood at its most ambitious was once capable of.

15. "Do-Re-Mi" from The Sound of Music

2011-08-24T12:02:00.000-07:00

Surely you've been expecting this.

I've never been over the moon for The Sound of Music, but classic status I cannot deny it, and it does some things very very right. Those things would include the casting of Julie Andrews, and of course the stunning on location scenery, both of which come to a head in the film's best song, the indefatigable "Do-Re-Mi." Is there a more infectious tune in musical theater? Doubtful. Or even a more joyous one? I'd argue not. Simple in nature, but it banks its energy steadily becoming the grand musical romp that it is. By the time Maria leads the children through the gardens and fountains of the ancient estates, something special has transpired.

It's a feeling that doesn't come across the same in the stage show. This is where location shooting and sweeping camera motions can make all the difference, and there's almost no other movie adaptation that can boast such successful ascension over its musical theater roots. To love musicals is to love this song, though it helps, I'm sure, that it's one deeply rooted in childhood nostalgia too. For many, it's like a gateway to the genre, and I think that's why I love it so much. Hearing this as a child may well determine whether you'll grow up to be a fan of musicals, so I feel I'd best lend it my endorsement.

16. "Belle" from Beauty and the Beast

2011-08-23T22:23:00.000-07:00

First of all, isn't that gorgeous in HD? Everyone needs to buy this on Bluray, then invite me over to watch it.

That aside, this one probably demands more explanation than most other selections, because why, you ask, out of dozens upon dozens of worthy Disney (and other animated) musical numbers would I settle on this as the best of the best. It is from one of the all-time great animated musicals, so that probably makes it easier to swallow, but even then, why not "Be Our Guest" or "Beauty and the Beast" or even the glorious "Gaston?" What about the Jungle Book and The Lion King and The Little Mermaid? I would chalk it all up to personal preference, but were that the case, I'd have gone and snuck "I Won't Say I'm In Love" from Hercules into the top 10 (and that is, incidentally, far and away my favorite Disney song).

But consider these points. First, "Belle" sets the pace for everything to follow, and it does so much the way a classic musical would. The song drives the plot, a lot of plot, and by the time it has played through, we're so thoroughly immersed in provincial France that we feel we've known it all along. The music never plays as a distraction, not as something to hold the kids attention, nor does it squeeze maudlin pop songs in just for the pleasure of eroding our souls (coughTarzancough). The song is intricate to the story in a way few other Disney songs come close to being. This is one of the many reasons why I'll always go to bat for Robin Hood and Hercules - both also make the most of their musical roots.

Did I mention Belle is also Disney's best character, and on such a list Gaston would surely factor in somewhere as well. If you're going to use your songs to tell your story, it's most welcome to have characters of this caliber strolling and strutting about. And while we're at it, the song itself is pretty marvelous, not quite a showstopper, but I maintain you could ask for a better scene setter.

17. "I Will Wait For You" from The Umbrellas of Cherbourg

2011-08-23T21:53:00.000-07:00

Unlike so many of the entries on this list, The Umbrellas of Cherbourg is a film that is more than the sum of its parts. That explains why arguably the greatest movie musical of all time (and it's one of only three films I'd consider for that title) makes it's first and only appearance at a middling #17 on this list. To those who know and love the film - and if you love movies, this is a non-negotiable - you'll understand just how hard it is to excise any section from Jacques Demy's cinematic valentine, though the main love theme which comes to a head with "I Will Wait for You" is the elegant emotional crux and the most obvious selection.

Still, I fear the clip loses much of it's power out of context. If it doesn't feel particularly like a spectacle itself, that's because the entire film is a wall-to-wall spectacle, and an emotionally draining one at that. Dancing doesn't factor in here, though you can get an excellent dose of that by watching the film's spiritual successor, The Young Girls of Rochefort, but the gorgeous music, the teary melodrama, and the candy-colored palate spirit you away to the realm of musicals just the same.

18. "Ain't There Anyone Here For Love" from Gentlemen Prefer Blondes

2011-08-22T21:18:00.000-07:00

Because it's just about the strangest thing to ever emerge from the annals of classic Hollywood.

If you've watched the clip - or are already familiar with the movie, which is worth every ounce of its reputation - then there's nothing much I can say as a follow up. Your take on it may vary based on gender or orientation, but I find it interesting how sterile the field of flesh constantly on screen feels, whereas Jane Russell's sexual magnetism is untouchable (and her costar is Marilyn Monroe!). That she navigates the gymnasium in such a blasé fashion is kind of the point, but it's almost a feat in itself how mechanical Howard Hawks managed to make the athletes. Russell is easily the life of the most bizarre party ever held on a studio lot. Ok, so probably no where near the most bizarre, but if you happen to hear about these parties, please pass along the info.

Mostly, I'm just impresses that this exists. I believe this was a song created specifically for the film, which had been a stage musical beforehand, but doesn't seem to use most of the original music. Anyway, I don't know who thunk this one up, but it belongs to the ages now, and over 50 years later, it still has the power to raise a few eyebrows.

19. "Everything Old is New Again" from All That Jazz

2011-08-22T20:32:00.000-07:00

Sidelined for a week, but I'm back and this will still be up and finished by the months end. I'm planning to unveil the top 10 all at once, in what surely will be the movie musical event of the season. First, though, are nine almost as amazing selections, starting with one I'd call a personal favorite, moreso even than many of the more spectacular numbers to follow.

All That Jazz is the apogee of the movie musical, or at the very least, the last landmark of the genre, directed by one of the definitive filmmakers in that particular field. Bob Fosse was one-of-a-kind, and it's only fitting that the film which served as his cinematic autobiography would be his greatest.

The film's musical numbers are few and far between, but they all leave an impression when they roll around, but although there are grander and stranger things to follow, I've always been totally fixated on the simple routine performed by Fosse surrogate Joe Gideon's (Roy Scheider) daughter and girlfriend. "Everything Old is New Again" is a musical number as a labor of love, and there's more genuine emotion in these few minutes than in the genre's next 30 years all together.

Fosse was one of the few directors who understood stage and screen in equal measure, which meant he also played to the strengths of his medium. His own patented brand of choreography is on display here, but of no less importance is the way he uses the camera to frame it all. This right here is a classic slice of 70s cinema, when it could easily have been little more than a filmed dance routine. I suppose it also helps that no one before or since could move like Ann Reinking. I mean, I know she pulls it all off so naturally, but that ain't easy. And I can't look away.

20. "Springtime for Hitler" from The Producers

2011-08-12T19:21:00.000-07:00

That turning point where movie musicals finally learned that anything goes.

I'd be tempted to dock points from this for being a largely standard filming of a stage performance if the whole scene wasn't so damn influential. Also catchy (is that bad), maverick, and entertaining. Entertaining as hell. A thousand numbers of musical comedy have come and gone and still this remains near the top of the heap, an ode to the offensive like cinema had never seen.

The Producers remains Mel Brooks' finest achievement, and this number is the moment you've all been waiting for. The remake never really taps into the tawdry greatness of the original, but here's the only version that matters, perhaps the greatest comedy number of the movies.

21. "The Sorcerer's Apprentice" from Fantasia

2011-08-12T18:25:00.000-07:00

I'm prone to outside the box choices. Rarely, though, am I prone to ones you're not doubt familiar with. Fantasia was a staple of my childhood, and odds are you've at least crossed paths with this one once upon a time.

Ah, but is it a musical number? Well, it is musical, that's clear enough, but there aren't lyrics, nor is there dancing in any tradition sense. My justification though is that the story itself seems to serve the music, and actions on the screen transpire in great, glorious time to the cascading sounds. Everything from the march of the brooms to the sweeping gestures of Mickey and the magician match every rise and fall in the music, and with image and sound in such perfect union, I wouldn't know what else to classify it as.

My decision becomes easier when considering the context it plays in. "The Sorcerer's Apprentice" is but one of many threads within Fantasia, and while some have more abstract relationships with their accompanying music, others such as "The Dance of the Hours" and "The Nutcracker Suite" full on embrace their roots in performance art. My selection in question falls somewhere in between, but in my infinite wisdom, I've deemed it appropriate. If not a musical number, what else is this? What fun are musical numbers anyway if you have such a narrow definition of them.

And yet, "The Sorcerer's Apprentice" wouldn't even come close to my favorite segment out of Fantasia (I adore "The Rite of Spring" and I have a soft spot for the "Pastoral Symphony"). It is, however, the most iconic, and in many ways, the most cinematic, especially with early cartoon folk hero Mickey Mouse finally coming into his own here (it's his finest hour). It also challenges our conception of the musical more than "Dance of the Hours" and I like that about it. I think it fits, and not even merely as a fringe entry. Alas, I don't think any of my other choices are from as far left field, though this should set up nicely for some of the other more...symphonic....entries still to come.

Also, not the last animated number.

22. "Rififi" from Rififi

2011-08-10T23:04:00.000-07:00

No surprise that one of the great European noir flicks would produce such a slick and sexy nightclub number. Rififi is a Parisian heist film and damn near the finest of its genre ever made. And since it was directed by the king of the naked city himself, Jules Dassin, the film itself is neck-deep in noir, and all the better for it.

And so we're treated to this song of shadow play, an ominous moment in the film as the characters gather before the big heist. It wears a richness that could only exist in black and white, and a sensuality almost foreign to modern audiences. It feels both sexy and dangerous, and its timely placement serves to romanticize the job ahead, driving our expectations absolutely wild (and oh boy, does Dassin deliver). The song itself bubbles over with energy, and doesn't seem to mind sticking in your head. It's the first time in the movie where you realize you literally can't look away, and it only gets better from there.

23. "Wig in a Box" from Hedwig and the Angry Itch

2011-08-10T22:35:00.000-07:00

I lied. Or changed my mind. A little from column A and a little from column B. I had went as far as to swear this song hadn't made the cut and yet here it is, well, that would be because after considerable deliberation, I booted one song from the list because it just seemed too much the odd man out. And I was feeling a bit bad about not squeezing in anything from Hedwig and the Angry Itch and low and behold, it's even from the same year as the film which I kicked to the curb (yes, I'm going to make you guess).

"Wig in a Box" is the obvious choice for me from the movie, and while it may have ranked slightly lower had I pulled the switcheroo earlier on, there's certainly no shame in it crawling all the way up to 23. It's an indie musical through and through, and I love how inventive the number is with its sense of space. And clearly the whole thing exists on a shoestring budget, but from within those confines it produces one of the more dynamic musical numbers of the last decade. There's innovation at work here, and that, along with the ability to sing and dance, is all that separates us from the animals.

Oh, and another hint for the song I dropped. It was one of my nightclub act picks, and while undeniably landmark (and one of the coolest scenes ever), it just never quite fit in, even with the others of its ilk. Ah, well, I will no doubt find plenty of other opportunities to rave about it in the future (and yes, you still have to guess).

24. "Ghar Aaya Mera Pardesi" from Awaara

2011-08-08T23:54:00.000-07:00

It has all the makings of a dream.

I admittedly don't know nearly as much about Bollywood as I'd like to. I've dabbled, you might say, and this won't be the last song and dance from the subcontinent to land a spot on my list, but the Bollywood musical is a largely unexplored frontier for me, and one I'm just beginning to fall in love with. It may be that I'm just in awe over the sheer surrealist spectacle of this, or even more superficially that I'm an unabashed lover of all things Indian, but this number has an odd kind of hold over me. Tempted as I was to select the volcanic love song from Awaara directly preceding this, I just couldn't shake the otherworldly imagery here. Even more impressive is that this is the only entry on the list that I've seen for the first time this year.

It may well be that this has more in common with Busby Berkley than with modern Bollywood spectacles. It's certainly nothing like the other number still to come, nor does it fall much in line with any other example I can think of. But I think it's a fascinating specimen from an industry just beginning to cultivate it's own inimitable brand of cinema, and an experience that's proved truly hard to shake from my head.

And regrettably, the link above only contains the second half of the number. Which at least may leave you something to look forward to.

25. "Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life" from The Life of Brian

2011-08-07T23:02:00.000-07:00

The gall these guys had. I mean really, who would dare try to stage a musical number in which all the participants are literally tied in place. There's no movement. Nothing happens. They just sing. Way be weird, Pythons.

If Life of Brian claims the title of my favorite Monty Python outing, then it's got to be because this number so magnificently seals the deal. They've had a lot of fun with musical numbers over the years - and I was very tempted include the sidesplitting "Every Sperm is Sacred" on this countdown - but here's the one the one that caps their magnum opus, their most cohesive and satirically charged film as a troupe. Religion is serious stuff, and it's no easy task mining jokes from the rather gruesome idea of crucifixion, but that's all the more justification for this relentlessly infectious ditty. For films that are inherent lightning rods for controversy, and no way could Life of Brian be excluded from this, it's pivotal to stick the landing, and settling on a tone to go out on isn't easy. All the more reason why this final scene is so impressive. While not shying away from the taboos that the Pythons played with throughout the film, it goes out with a song in its heart, but kudos to them for coming up with one so utterly uplifting, not to mention the brilliant juxtaposition. Because all satire needn't aim to offend, and while you're never going to please anyone, this to me is the perfect example of how to get that recipe just right. Even the detractors won't be getting that tune out of their heads any time soon.

26. "The Worry Song" from Anchors Aweigh

2011-08-06T14:07:00.000-07:00

Ah, the magic of movies.

Gene Kelly departs the world of Anchors Aweigh and heads off into a storybook land, where Jerry the mouse sits on a lonely throne with a case of the blues. Turns out it's nothing a little song and dance can't cure. This was huge. The mingling of live action and animation is pure movie magic, and this number right here heralded the rise of Kelly and the man behind the curtain, Stanley Donen (the number was his brainchild), not to mention setting the bar for what movie musicals could achieve ridiculously high. Musicals and animation already had a long shared history together, but this effortless merger with live action almost single-handedly ushered in a golden age for the genre that would eventually be overtaken by the rush to adapt every stage musical on Broadway. Again, this was huge.

Truthfully, Anchors Aweigh isn't all that spectacular. The plot is tedious and few of the songs really stick in your head. But there's no denying Kelly's magnetism, and people seem to like that Sinatra guy too. When it rolls along, "The Worry Song" is a welcome break from the rest of the film, but regardless of everything before it, this pulls you back in. And in retrospect, it's probably not nearly high enough on this list, but Gene Kelly is already the best represented actor on here (that is, in the most films, not numbers), and I had to fight the temptation to include even more.

27. "Put The Blame On Mame" from Gilda

2011-08-05T16:17:00.000-07:00

The first of a handful of nightclub chanteuses to grace the list is probably the most famous cabaret performance in all of classic cinema. And is there any wonder why? In the late 1940s, Rita Hayworth was a goddess among mortals, her image so explosive that it adorned the nuclear bomb tested at Bikini Atoll. And give or take a Lady From Shanghai, she never has a finer hour than the sultry noir Gilda, and therein no scene seers itself into your memory quite like "Put the Blame on Mame."

What was that? Oh, sorry, I was drooling. That hair! Those gloves! This could top any list of the most seductive scenes in cinema and I wouldn't bat an eye. It's as transfixing as a musical number can get, and don't even try to tell me there's no spectacle in this. Her figure is so effortlessly arresting that one can take for granted how rare that kind of talent is. Her's is the warmest kind of glamour, the kind that ice queens from Garbo to Kidman could never pull off. And did I mention she can sing? It's all one perfect package, and if ever a career deserved to be summed up in a single scene, this would be the one.

28. "America" from West Side Story

2011-08-04T22:03:00.000-07:00

To know me is to know I hate West Side Story.

That's a critique aimed specifically at the movie, where miscasting abounds and too many a song falls totally flat, although there's something about the very concept of finger-snapping gang members that does a number on my suspension of disbelief. Yes, I know it's a musical. That doesn't mean it's allowed to be stupid.

Wait, this was not meant to be a diatribe. See, for all the things that drive me batty about that damn movie, Robert Wise at least got one thing very right: "America." Even terrible musicals can have a great song or two - take Aida or Paint Your Wagon - just like terrible films can on occasion stumble into a great scene. Whatever my complaints about West Side Story, the exuberant "America" has got nothing to do with it. It's rightfully considered one of the unimpeachable classics of musical theater, and considering the track record of other such greats, it's a marvel that it survives the transfer to film unsullied.

And that's kinda why I picked it. When I think of the greatest of all musical theater songs, "America" is right up there with "Anything Goes" and "Sit Down, You're Rocking the Boat" and a mere handful of others considered the best of the best. "If I Were A Rich Man" might have made the cut, but there's one I feel plays just as well on stage, provided, I suppose, that you have Topol waiting in the wings. But unlike those others, "America"'s cinematic counterpart ups the ante. Credit Mr. Wise if you will, but it's the camera's love affair with Rita Moreno that electrifies the production. She's funny and fierce, and she plays it to the camera and not the auditorium. Stunning is what it is, enough to shake the torpor of the movie before it, alas, not enough for complete redemption.

29. "Wise Up" from Magnolia

2011-08-03T22:40:00.000-07:00

What the hell, right? The surprise musical number, totally out of the blue in an otherwise non-musical movie, though granted, one that stretches suspension of disbelief a tad farther with scenes like the infamous plague of frogs. Now, it helps that I'm a self-avowed Aimee Mann fanatic, and her contributions are probably the best thing going for this impossible object from the mind of Paul Thomas Anderson, but I'll maintain that this is a rare moment; for Anderson, for musicals, and for ensemble driven narratives everywhere. Sobering and monotonous, it's somehow exactly what the narrative calls for at the time, an abstract (and vital?) strand to draw together the fragmented stories of PTAs many wayward souls. There's no "Aha!" moment here, but it does serve as some neat stitching between these patches of life, a common harmony that everyone, old or young, on edge physically or mentally, can all seem to agree on.

If "Wise Up" violates my sacred rule of the Spectacle, I clearly don't care. I'd still argue it is, though in a quiet way, and if for no other reason than its unlikely juxtaposition in the narrative. There's a better, fresher, lesson to be learned here for movie musicals than in nearly every staple of the genre since at least the late 70s. The musical, as a genre, need not be something a film must fully commit to. Rather, to songs (and actors) to effective use, one that serves the larger purposes of the story - that's the greater challenge. This one here may be a better song than a dance number, but like any great musical set-piece, it moves the story, and like any great movie scene, it moves me.

30. "Elephant Love Medley" from Moulin Rouge

2011-08-02T22:05:00.000-07:00

Tread lightly, I've learned, where Moulin Rouge is concerned. Pending on whom you ask, this is either the greatest musical of them all or the genre's gaudy nadir. I take a less definitive stance, but I surely admire the spectacle, and if the songs aren't original, who exactly cares? It won't be the last entry on this list to incorporate time-tested classics, though it's clearly the most unapologetic about it.

Why "Elephant Love Medley" though? Precisely because, I think, it's the make-or-break number of the film, the point where the proverbial scales tip to one side or another and you either completely give up or are totally in its thrall. It's the movie's entire musical shtick condensed into one madcap love ballad, and despite anything else you might fault it for, it's at least too damn fun to be sappy. Ok...fun, tedious, your mileage may vary, but I think it's a sensational showstopper that reminds us that there's no shame in reinventing the old. Now if only most other contemporary directors could grasp the concept that reinventing and remaking aren't the same thing, we'd be all set. Final verdict, a number both fresh and nostalgic, gorgeous and vivacious, and something that only could have sprung from the spectacular mind of Baz Luhrmann.

31. "New York, New York"

2011-08-02T00:07:00.000-07:00

Are you srsly not letting me embed the youtube video, blogspot? Not cool, old friend, not cool. Then you leave me no choice but to whip out my shiny new...

LINK

"New York, New York" from Stanley Donen and Gene Kelly's On The Town.

As lively a way to kick off this project as I could have hoped for. Here's the scoop. It's 1949. The golden age of Hollywood musicals has been over for a decade, and the rise of the modern stage musical is already well under way. It's do or die for movie musicals, and they might well have keeled over were it not for the two whip-smart kids on the block, Stanley Donen and Gene Kelly. They had already amply proved themselves by this point (and we will return to that soon enough) but in On The Town, an adaptation from the stage, they became the first to prove that movie adaptations were very capable of elevating the original material. Three words they understood that might have saved many a future musical mishap: On, Location. Shooting.

That's why On The Town's morning wake-up call is simply movie magic. The clock strikes 6 am and the ship comes alive and all of a sudden, we're like, "This is not my beautiful studio. This is not my beautiful set." You're there, in New York City, dashing out for a day with Gene and Frank and Jules, and it's like seeing the city for the first time. Actually, imagine this: it's 1949 and you've never been to the Big Apple, and in all these movies you've no doubt seen, the streets of New York only look as golden as the studio lot can afford to make them. And then On The Town washes over you and you're suddenly seeing movies in a whole new light. You're letting the cinema take you places, which is something I feel we almost take for granted now.

Better opening numbers (not many) have come and gone over the years, but none carry the spirit of adventure that "New York, New York" wears so effortlessly. Alas, if only that trend had been heeded sooner, imagine how many horrors of future stage adaptations we could have been spared.

Month of Movie Musical Moments

2011-08-01T23:05:00.000-07:00

Wilkommen. Bienvenue. Welcome.

August. Gosh, where have I been? Did I not even bother dropping by here to complain about Transformers: Dark of the Moon? Was my last post really about Weird Al? So many questions. So many answers I don't want to dwell on.

Point is, I'm back, and making a conscious effort to breath some life into this blog. That's why I'm launching a month long project that ought to keep me (and you, right? right?) coming back on a daily basis. Inspiration struck when I realized just how often my bored self ended up on youtube, revisiting my same favorite movie musical numbers time and again. So I got to thinking what one might consider the greatest musical numbers on film, which lead to an entirely new debate of exactly how to define a musical number.

I've got some thoughts on each, and based on the criteria below, you'll be getting from me one full Month of Movie Musical Moments.

True to my favorite compulsion, this will be in list form. A countdown from 31 to 1, saving, of course, the best for last. Long and drawn out as this project is, that ought to ensure a healthy amount of speculation.

My thought process started out simple enough. The chief criteria I had in mind from the outset was that these were first and foremost movie musical numbers. That wasn't to say that stage musical adaptations had no place in the countdown, but it would surely be an up hill battle, especially with how lazy most theatrical imports are and have always been. That brings us to rule one.

1. The Musical Number Must Be Cinematic.
Difficult, perhaps, to distinguish from face value. A number could take place on the stage (as a few of the songs to come surely will) and it could still feel like it belongs in a movie. But by contrast, simply importing stage songs to a studio set and pointing the camera does not a classic number make. Original movie musicals fair much better on my list, and indeed, in history itself. So much can be accomplished through the lens of the camera and the eye of an editor, and the great movie musical doesn't take these tools for granted. That being said, one of top 5 songs on my list comes straight from a stage musical, and it's a case where a director's singular vision actually elevates the stage number into something far greater.

2. Diegetic Music Only
That is to say, the music must be occurring within the world of the film. This is done to eliminate montages from the running, which, honestly, could be a list for an entirely different month. Granted, there are some murky cases (specifically when lyrics aren't involved), but my general rule is that so long as anyone is dancing in time to the music, then they must be hearing something in that cinematic world of theirs.

3. It's All About The Spectacle
While not every song calls for synchronized swimmers, we are talking about musical numbers here, and spectacle counts for something. It's not about pageantry, although pageantry has produced many a movie marvel, but more for the spark, the spirit of adventure, the wonder, the glamour, and the general fascination with the fantastical. Because that's what musical numbers are at their heart, flights of fancy, and cinema has means to carry these moments to heights impossible in musical theater. Spectacle, or the unexpected, all the same to me.

4. When In Doubt, Opt For Inclusion
The final rule, in which I give myself free license to undo or ignore everything previously mentioned. In attempting to draw lines in the sand to aid my in my selection process, things just kept getting murkier and murkier. There's not a musical fanatic out there who could make a case against Bob Fosse's Cabaret, but does that not open the door for all night club acts? If Liza and company are fair game, then why not any of the other great cabaret performances of cinema, some of which have a lethal dose of spectacle themselves. I've made room for a few among these ranks.

Or dance sequences. True enough, these are a hard sell, rarely rising above the category of filmed performances, but I simply can't see the difference between a beautifully photographed ballet sequence and the light-as-air Astaire/Rogers romps. What of animation? Does it have a place here? Naturally, though narrowing a selection of those proved one of the most trying tasks of this whole project.

The only category that I seem to have shied away from are the more stripped down performances, the kind that appear to arise organically from their films, and thus feel natural, rather than fantastic. My reasoning, feeble though it may be, is that they're not musical numbers in the sense that I've defined them. They're instances of song breaking out quite naturally in the world, and (unlike the Cabaret example) they don't feel like performances, or at least not of the caliber that would admit them to these esteemed ranks. Or maybe the truth is that with only 31 slots available, I simply couldn't cram any more in. Some stellar examples of what I'm talking about here would include "Falling Slowly" from Once, "Take Me Home (Country Roads)" from Whisper of the Heart, "Moon River" from Breakfast at Tiffany's, "Whale of a Tale" from 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and even "The Rainbow Connection" from The Muppet Movie.

If I weren't so anxious to get this up and running, I might spend some time with honorable mentions. But it's getting later, and I still want to get down to business on the first of my selections, so I'll just leave off with the lament that so many great showstoppers will be inevitable falling by the wayside. Three movies will be gracing us with two spectacular songs, while countless others will have none, including one entire decade (from the 30s to the 00s), though honestly, that one shouldn't be too hard to guess. Overall, I'd consider it a diverse mix, peppered with any number of numbers that are going to require some explaining on my part. But therein lies the fun, while you roll your eyes and I swallow my pride, or as I prepare to dodge the dishes broken in outrage of my exclusion of several beloved classics.

Shall we dance?

Ladies and Gentlemen, if I may, Weird Al

2011-06-28T00:22:00.000-07:00

Though frowned upon in socially adjusted circles, Weird Al has never been less than an endearing presence in my itunes library, a reminder of a time before I stumbled upon the wide world of popular music. Many artists, in fact, I directly owe my introduction to the eternal Mr. Yankovic, and so it was no surprise that I was mildly anticipating his latest album, first in five years, Alpocalypse. The album, well, it was ok. "Perform This Way" neatly skewers the worst Gaga song to date, though even that was hardly a highlight. "Party in the CIA" fares much better and gets a few laughs in the process, and there's better still (as you will see, oh so shortly). But mostly I'd count this as minor Al, a far cry from his highs in 80s, or even the all-around solid Running With Scissors.

But as an Al-fanatic, loyal enough to share a few words, though not enough to muster a full-on review, I thought instead I could muster up a list. A list, of course, of my favorite Weird Al tunes to date, parodies, inspirations and originals alike, and accompanied where possible with video links. A top 10 seemed too little, a top 25 too arbitrary, so I settled on 15, though feel free to refer to the bottom five as honorable mentions. Nope, fuck that, there can only be one honorable mention on a list of Weird Al songs; the one I'd secretly love to mention but can't bring myself to speak of, "Albuquerque."

So, starting at number 15, Tristan's top 15 Weird Al events.

15. Bob (Poodle Hat)

A brilliant send of of Bob Dylan's "Subterranean Homesick Blues" sung entirely in palindromes. Kind of genius, actually.

14. Headline News (released as single)

Some of his most morbid lyrics, but they're put to excellent use considering the subject matter. It may seem dated, but it still gets laughs, and is infinitely more interesting than the song it's parodying.

13. Skipper Dan (Alpocalypse)

Spot on, Al, spot on. This one is funny, but no less is it depressing, at least for the many creative souls out there toiling away under the harsh realities of the real world. And also, totally the highlight of his most recent release. The guy's still got it.

12. Dog Eat Dog (Polka Party)

Less well loved are Al's many style parodies, the ones that don't tackle one song in particular, but instead ape a band's entire style. Most successful are the ones that latch onto bands with a sound entirely their own, and there's no mistaking "Dog Eat Dog" for anything other than Talking Heads. His cries of "this is not my beautiful stapler!" have me in stitches every time.

11. Jurassic Park (Alapalooza)

Ha! "MacArthur Park" is such a bizarre song in its own right (and pretty obscure too unless I'm mistaken), but Al totally gets this right. It's one of the best of his many movie parodies, and major points for the unconventional choice in source material.

10. Why Does This Always Happen To Me (Poodle Hat)

Yet another from no one in particular, though Ben Folds is backing up Al on piano and that's surely only adding to the fun. And man, those lyrics, they're easily some of the bleakest, funniest the guy has ever concocted.

9. I Think I'm A Clone Now (Even Worse)

This one's almost too easy, isn't it? Al takes disposable pop fluff and amplifies the disposable ten-fold. And somehow, it amazes me. I don't particularly love the original, though I suppose it's a bit of a guilty pleasure, but this makes it seem all the most frivolous, and I have a soft spot for frivolous things.

8. The Night Santa Went Crazy (Bad Hair Day)

Certainly my favorite Al song as a child. "Bad Hair Day" was the album that first fell into my hands all those years ago, and while I don't actually think it's as strong on the whole as many of his others, there were some crazy highlights and this was one of 'em. It's so gloriously violent, and was exactly what second grade Tristan wanted to rock out to. And still, I can't help but be amused.

7. Everything You Know Is Wrong (Bad Hair Day)

And let's stick with "Bad Hair Day" for a while longer, because like I said, it had some crazy highs to it. This one's an original, done ostensibly in the style of They Might Be Giants (certainly kin to Al in many ways already) but it also seems so quintessentially Al to me. It's wacky and breathless and a total blast, with lyrics that are more amusing than laugh out loud hilarious. Always been a favorite.

6. Money For Nothing/Beverly Hillbillies (UHF Soundtrack)

My obligatory nod to UHF, but it's a damn fine parody even aside from that association. One of Al's most polished pieces to date, though it helps that the original song is killer too. I've been trying to just these songs aside from the merits of their music videos (or "Fat" would surely have placed) but this one is just oozing with 80s nostalgic goodness.

5. Smells Like Nirvana (Off The Deep End)

Another perfect music video, but even better is Al's take on Nirvana's most beloved song. One of the rare examples of the parody directly referring to the source material itself, and it works so well of course because of how iconic this one was instantly. But that only makes this funnier, no? I mean, I'm always giving Nirvana a hard time, and this even makes me smile. A pitch perfect send up of the song of a generation.

4. The Saga Begins (Running With Scissors)

The movie isn't even very good, and I'm no great fan of Star Wars in general, but that's how sure I am that this is one of Weird Al's finest hours. It's fittingly epic, and more than just a rehash of the plot, it works in some genuine laughs, many by the sheer amusement of seeing Al tackle Don Mclean.

3. Like a Surgeon (Dare To Be Stupid)

And at last we get deep into some classic 80s Al, which on the whole is so much stronger than his recent stuff, even if the true classics seem fairly evenly dispersed across his career. Anyway, this one holds a special spot in my heat, because at my 6th grade Junior High All-Night Lock In, I stood up in front of everyone an did karaoke to this gem. And though it went over well, I haven't returned to the stage sense.

2. Nature Trail To Hell (Weird Al in 3D)

Although this marks the first and only appearance of Weird Al in 3D on this list, I maintain that on the whole, it's Al's strongest album of all. It ends on this glorious note, an Al original that is epic, intense and hilarious, and anything, anything but lazy. The backwards vocals are a nice touch, though I actually like the darkly comic odyssey just fine as it is. Did I say like it? I mean love on some weird, socially inappropriate level. Love it like I love Starship Troopers, or maybe Ernest Goes to Jail.

1. Amish Paradise (Bad Hair Day)

Could it have been anything else? Coolio, quite frankly, can suck it, though I do see where his hatin' was coming from, considering how this is ten thousand times better than his beloved original. Clever concept, fantastic production, and spot on delivery make for what may be perhaps the definitive parody song ever, and surely Al's finest hour. It was the first song of his I ever laid ears on, and I've yet to hear him top it.

Terrence Malick's Party at the Dawn of the Universe

2011-06-07T20:56:00.000-07:00

Terrence Malick's Tree of Life is going to either enthrall or infuriate you, and for the sake of laying all my cards on the table, I'll say I fall into column B. The divided reaction has been par for course since the Cannes premier, and in retrospect it should come as a shock to no one, since Malick's films have hardly played to the widest demographic. And yet it never occurred to me that my reaction would be anything short of awe, which could be on account of the hype, but I think more likely is because his last film, The New World, I'd proudly count among my 50-or-so favorite films of all time. Nevermind that of his other three films, I only love Badlands, I was blindly certain that Malick wouldn't let me down.

Thing is, I'm hardly bitter about it. Frustrated expectations don't equate to poor cinema, not in my book, and hopefully not in yours either. Tree of Life was somehow everything I thought it would be, and yet not at all how I thought it would feel. My opening pronouncement wasn't a pan so much as an attempt to chisel away at the wall of hype surrounding the film (an example of such excesses: Landmark Century was showing the film on four screens, mid-afternoon). Of course, considering the scope of the film, from 1950s family tragedy back to the dinosaurs and out to the cosmos, hype was unavoidable, and let's not forget that at the helm sat the most mythically reclusive of directors. Terrence Malick's fifth feature film in nearly forty years, Tree of Life is both his most ambitious and most personal, which oddly may be the very two things keeping me at a distance.

Ambition works in funny ways. It's something I'd never want to curtail, and I'd rather watch an over-zealous misfire than something safe and lazy any day, but it can get to a point when there's just too damn much on the plate. It's unfair to measure this simply through the amount of existing footage, but a correlation often exists there, and it only amplifies as things drift further and further away from linear narratives. Somehow knowing scenes of a film are infinitely re-arrangeable takes away from the experience for me, not unlike the disappointment of grappling with various directors cuts and alternate versions of films. That's not to say great successes can't emerge in this fashion, but Tree of Life never quite justifies its prehistoric tangents and other flights of fancy. Makes for some breathtaking imagery though.

The deeply personal story at the film's core has more substance to it, though how resonant that will be probably hinges largely on your own upbringing. Aside from the common ground of growing up with two brothers, very little here felt familiar to me, and I'd like to think that was why it never struck a chord. For better or for worse, Brad Pitt and Jessica Chastain are more embodiments of ideas than actual characters - to no fault of the actors, who are marvelous - because as the narration spells out all to clearly for us, they symbolize the way of nature and the way of grace respectively. It's a dynamic that actually comes through magnificently with little help from dialogue whatsoever, save for the largely unnecessary voice-over, but again, it makes everything exceedingly hard to map onto most familial relationships, which are just a shade more complex.

But caveats aside, Tree of Life was still a very fine film, and that it's so obviously a labor of love isn't lost on me. That's why when carefully considering what films, if any, this may have a counterpart in, I arrived at one and one alone, made of another mythic director of minimal output: Andrei Tarkovsky's Mirror. Both are unabashedly personal journeys that we the viewer are asked to come along on, and while I get the sense that Malick, like Tarkovsky, got more out of his film than I did, it was still an expedition I was proud to come along on. And with that, I hope I've found a way to sufficiently swing this review into the positive camp, because I really did like The Tree of Life, however miffed I may be that it didn't change my entire perception of cinema. So, ladies and gentlemen, check your expectations at the front desk, but please, do give this film a chance. I've got a feeling we'll be debating this one for some time.

Fear and Loathing on the Oregon Trail

2011-05-19T22:39:00.000-07:00

There are a handful of reasons why Meek's Cutoff has attracted a trifle bit more attention than the average indie release. Most notably, it's a Western, which in the current cinematic climate is like being the albino buffalo in the herd. It also boasts a pedigree of indie film royalty, with a cast including Paul Dano, Bruce Greenwood, Shirley Henderson and the belle of the low-budget ball herself, Michelle Williams, who re-teams with director Kelly Reichardt after their critically lauded collaboration, Wendy and Lucy. Notice that Williams takes the central role and, well, do the math from here, that makes Meek's Cutoff a female driven Western, albeit one that's low on dialogue and high on ensemble. The results may bore casual viewers, or even offend fans of the genre's classic entries, but one could make the argument that Reichardt's film is a milestone for Westerns much in the same way McCabe and Mrs. Miller was forty years ago.

I don't know that I'd go quite that far. Meek's Cutoff arrives in a year where female protagonists have taken almost as many beatings as they've given, but it plays out in a genre that practically doesn't exist anymore, and could make its point in a quieter way. That sounds like a complaint, but it's actually a great strength of the film, and I wouldn't dream of holding against it all the problems in Hollywood it will fail to right. What I love most about the film is the way it gradually assumes the female gaze, taking root early on as the important conversations of menfolk are observed at length from the road-weary wives. Halfway through, William's character Emily has slid comfortably into the protagonist role, at one point even holding a gun to the titular Meek, the rugged, cocksure, and slightly bamboozled symbol of manliness in an outmoded genre. The end, in one of those gloriously vague parting notes that will take some viewers time to come to terms with, is essentially a passing of the baton, and while it won't satisfy those looking for old western thrills, it perfectly fulfills the narrative Reichardt sets out to tell.

I suppose I can muster some sympathy for those seeking more excitement. The stakes in Meek's Cutoff are clearly high, but I don't think they're raised sufficiently throughout the course of the film. Fear exists in many shades on a trek across the Great Plains, but while Reichardt does a superb job establishing the dreaded threat of Indian attack, the cruel indifference of nature rarely resonates like it should. But this is a minimalist Western, and since I did my homework, that's exactly what I went in braced for. The nine characters of the film might as well exist in their own universe, and even the slightest hints of civilization are nowhere to be seen. The barren screen still leaves a few things to marvel at, such as the postcard-worthy photography and lively costume design, but this is a film defined at first-glance by its pace. If the thought of that turns you off, though, consider for a moment the second-glance, which through inverting the gaze of classic Westerns, has something valuable to offer cinema in 2011.

Cave of Forgotten Dreams: or The Crocodiles Who Look Back Into The Abyss of Time

2011-05-13T22:09:00.000-07:00

As summer blockbuster season comes fully into bloom, the most prolific superhero of the last decade also returns to theaters, this time, wouldn't you know it, in 3D. I'm talking, of course, about Werner Herzog, the maverick madman of German cinema, and recent usurper of Morgan Freeman's reign as documentary narrator extraordinaire (Encounters at the End of the World is, after all, the anti March of the Penguins). And while Herzog's narrative features of late have had mixed results, it's in his most recent documentaries that the reckless spirit that characterizes earlier masterworks like Fitzcarraldo and Aguirre: The Wrath of God most fully comes through. His latest is a three-dimensional journey into the prehistoric Chauvet Cave in the south of France, and bears a name befitting any Herzog meditation - The Cave of Forgotten Dreams.

Here's your 30 second background lesson. Rediscovered in 1994, Chauvet Cave contains the world's oldest known cave paintings, some of them dating back over 32 thousand years. Fearing human damage such as that in Lascaux, the French government has greatly restricted access to the caves, limiting traffic to a handful of archeologists, anthropologists, and lastly, surprisingly or not, to Herzog and a minuscule film crew. They were granted one week and a mere few hours each day, and it's from those short visits that the lion's share of the footage in Cave of Forgotten Dreams comes from.

The 3D element is bound to pique the most curiosity, as this is really the first we've seen of the technology popping up somewhere other than a special effects extravaganza. Herzog's justification is that the extra dimension was necessary to capture the contours of the cave walls, upon which the drawings rely, and upon beholding every bulge on every bison, there can be no doubt that his instincts were correct. The previous images of cave art I have in mind seem to exist on a flat canvas, but these drawings gain motion from the curvature of their surroundings. A 3D skeptic if there ever was one, I can take some comfort in knowing that in the right hands - a Herzog or a Cameron, say - it's a technology capable of elevating the medium under the right circumstances. Considering how easy it would have been for an old dog like Herzog to dismiss 3D as a childish gimmick (which, granted, it often is), his open-mindedness is commendable, and the results are to everyone's benefit.

That's not to say that he has a total grasp on the technology just yet. While many of the cave shots are mind-numbingly majestic, there's a fair share of clunkly camerawork, probably just as much a fault of the time constraints as any differences in shooting. He also succumbs later on to the temptation of having objects dart at the screen (in this case a spear), and one researcher's mustache gains particularly vivid life thanks to 3D capabilities. The other barrier standing between this and Herzog's greatest films is the loose structure, again, a likely product of the rushed shooting schedule. The cave drawings a mesmerizing, and one could conceivable gaze at them for hours on end, but the film is light on content, and Herzog's philosophical musings are even more speculative than usual.

Alright, that last point isn't really a complaint. In fact, there's plenty of fun to be derived from the batty half-theories, such as the improbable closing line that we somehow arrive at, "Are we today the crocodiles who look back into the abyss of time in Chauvet Cave?" Yes, somewhere in the postscript, he brings crocodiles into the equation, and like only Herzog can do, makes them not seem entirely out of place. Much in the same way that certain individuals seems drawn to him, whatever the film, whatever the subject. Take, for instance, the French perfume expert who looks like he walked out of a Jean Rollin film, or the scientist decked out in reindeer fur who actually pulls out the replica of a primitive flute and begin to play terribly. Did Herzog goad him into this, or was the man already so caught up in the director's past obsessions that he voluntarily went there? Or is it that even when chronicling the history of a room unoccupied for thousands of years, Herzog can't help but find common threads to all his past work? Whatever the case, Cave of Forgotten Dreams is a must see for fans of the director, and it may just be the 3D event of the summer.

2011-05-13T22:05:00.000-07:00

Top 30 Films of 2010

2011-04-26T22:19:00.000-07:00

Otherwise titled, Tristan's 2010 Films Awards, Part 3.

I'm going to run some commentary as I go along so I'll keep the upfront talk to a minimum, but just to reiterate, 2010 was a pretty darn good year. Hell, I could probably have stretched it to 40 with the likes of Please Give, Inception, True Grit, Easy A, Restrepo, How To Train Your Dragon, and even the totally bizarre Wild Grass. But instead you get 30, which is a totally arbitrary number, though it does allow me to give shout outs to a few other films that I couldn't fit into the rest of the nominations, but are still worth a look. But since this is has accidentally turned into the Old Country Buffet of awards lists, I'm going to be forced to make my cinematic ruminations similarly indigestible. So be warned, little actual insight ahead.

Shall we proceed?

30. Map of the Sounds of Tokyo (Isabel Coixet)

Maybe it's not a good way to start a list with a film that I would call a mild disappointment, but I've been impressed with both Coixet and Rinko Kikuchi before and given the premise, I thought this tale of a Tokyo assassin has a lot of potential. Turns out it was just good, enough to land a spot in my top 30, but then again, barely. It's lovely to look at, and I can't fault the performances, but until the very end, it's a bit lethargic.

29. Alamar (Pedro Gonzalez-Rubio)

Here's another gorgeous film to behold (look at that frame above, and if this suffers from anything, it's from being too fleeting. It's a tranquil blend of documentary and fiction, and an insightful look into a culture that from a city-dweller's perspective seems full of simple pleasures.

28. Let Me In (Matt Reeves)

Egads, a remake! And of the most sacred of all vampire movies no less. Sorry purists, I liked this one better, maybe not a lot better, because Let The Right One In was good too, but it is soooooo not even in the top 20 best vampire flicks ever. And yes, I do hate puppies.

27. Secret Sunshine (Lee Chang-dong)

Some truly impressive, heavy Korean drama, the kind that cycles through 360 degrees of emotions in its nearly two and a half hour running time. It's anchored by not one, but two terrific performances, and though future generations of film buffs will debate what year it actually garnered a release, it's down in my book as 2010.

26. Night Catches Us (Tanya Hamilton)

One of the better surprises of last year for me was this underrated gem from first time director Tanya Hamilton. Sure, it helps that we get the always dependable Anthony Mackie and Kerry Washington, and a killer score by The Roots, but even the direction feels surprisingly assured for someone right out of the gate. Looking forward to seeing more from her.

25. Micmacs (Jean-Pierre Jeunet)

It's no Amelie, but it probably rivals that as Jeunet's most fun film, which is to say it's never too bogged down by weirdness not to be simply enjoyable. The main character lacks the spark of most Jeunet regulars, but the supporting crew is top-notch and a true delight to observe.

24. 127 Hours (Danny Boyle)

Funny that I still can't decide how whether I love this film or just really like it. I do love Boyle's kinetic direction and A.R. Rahman's soaring score, but it's also the kind of film that without these elements I would otherwise want nothing to do with (see Castway). Rest assured, any obstacles to the grueling human survival story are more than overcome here, and I really have no complaints to lodge whatsoever, but I also know that there are several other Boyle films I prefer to this one, including the far more uneven, if no less ambitious, Sunshine.

23. Fish Tank (Andrea Arnold)

Another great surprise, and one that I kept putting off all year because I wasn't sure I'd like it. Wrong. It seems to particularly hit its stride when dealing with the problems of love in all the wrong places, and Michael Fassbinder gives a terrific performance alongside amateur Katie Jarvis.

22. Around a Small Mountain (Jacques Rivette)

Alright, I cheat. I saw this film back in 2009 at the New York Film Festival and even included it on my yearly awards last year. But it didn't get a theatrical release until 2010, so in an effort to course correct, I'm considering eligible once again. It also may very well end up being Jacques Rivette's final film, so how could I not include it twice?

21. Blue Valentine (Derek Cianfrance)

A bit of a downer, this one is, but thanks to two fantastic performances at the center, a beautiful downer through and through. The flashback sequences and the central scenes in the sleazy motel with a "Future Room" were highlights.

20. Red Riding: 1974 (Julian Jarrod)

The start of murder mysteries are always so much more fascinating than the conclusions, aren't they? That's why this first chapter in this saga of investigative journalism and police procedurals is the best of the bunch. It also stars Andrew Garfield, Sean Bean, and a bloody fantastic Rebecca Hall. Worthy a look? Absolutely.

19. A Prophet (Jacques Audiard)

A superbly taught prison film that probably demands I justify why it's not higher on my list. Well, I personally consider it a victory for prison films, a genre which I have very little interest in, that I could love something as much as I did this. Tahar Rahim is a force to be reckoned with, and his transformation over the course of the film is surely one of the best performances of last year.

18. Animal Kingdom (David Michod)

One of the best written films of last year is this terrific Aussie crime drama of a family on its slow and steady way out. A handful of great performances across the ensemble bring each character into the picture and wisely not all at once. It's fantastic storytelling, and totally deserving of the supporting actress nod for Jacki Weaver, playing the menacing matriarch of the clan.

17. The Social Network (David Fincher)

Count me in the Social Network should have won camp, although I don't really hold a grudge against The King's Speech, which was perfectly enjoyable Oscar bait. Here's a film that's certainly not without a few flaws, but it's timely as hell, and ambitious to boot. The writing is sharp, if sometimes too clever, but thanks to Fincher's totalitarian hand in it all, everyone is playing to their strengths. I'm eager to rewatch it, and I can see it gaining in my ranks even more, but suffice it to say, I'm impressed. Fincher and I haven't always agreed in the past, but I'd call this a great success.

16. White Material (Claire Denis)

Claire Denis is probably the finest female director working today, and while I don't always love her films (though some, some I love unconditionally), I always leave them feeling totally familiar with her very regional approach to filmmaking. Here she returns to Africa, the continent of two of her greatest successes, Beau Travail and Chocolat (no, not that one) and with the incomparable Isabelle Huppert at the front, she creates her finest film since Friday Night. Beautiful and brutal at the same time.

15. Terribly Happy (Henrik Ruben Genz)

Best described as a Danish Hot Fuzz with the stakes upped considerably (Miles, I think you get credit for that), this was still one of the most entertaining movies I saw last year, and probably one of the best written. Great performances - wish I could have singled some out - and I really loved the ending. And with this one being instant-watchable, there's no excuse to miss it.

14. Winter's Bone (Debra Granik)

Given how much I hated Frozen River, I worried that I would be in for more of the same with Winter's Bone. Couldn't have been more wrong. As Ree Dolly, Jennifer Lawrence gives a tremendous performance, and she's tenacious enough to make a compelling protagonist out of. The assist from John Hawkes only makes things better.

13. Vincere (Marco Bellocchio)

It's good to see the Italian movie industry on the rebound after a long and mostly unremarkable period following the passing of Fellini and the heyday of Giallo. Marco Bellocchio's Vincere is a great feat of directing and a bold look into a side of Mussolini's life most are not familiar with.

12. The American (Anton Corbijn)

Here's one you probably have heard of, though that unfortunately doesn't mean this fantastic old-school, art house action film had been seen enough. If you're wondering why, my description above should clear things up for you. The American was just insanely good on a level I never expected of it, while Clooney doesn't have to do anything but carry himself like the classic movie star he is, I for one could use a little more of that in movies these days. Unfortunately, he's one of the few who can pull that off.

11. Tangled (Nathan Greno and Byron Howard)

OK, here's one you've definitely heard of, and also the highest ranked film on the list not to show up in my previous nominations. Tangled was exactly what I was looking for after finally having grown disenchanted with the unstoppable reign of Pixar. Here's a film aiming specifically to recapture the glory of Disney's 90s era and damn near almost achieving it. That's fucking impressive, and if it's still no Beauty and the Beast, it does so much right that I feel comfortable calling it a return to form. The music was merely good, but the voice-work was fantastic and the art direction was stunning. See above.

Which leaves us right on the doorstep of the top 10. Drumroll, please.

10. The Ghost Writer (Roman Polanski)

Speaking of return to forms, here is Roman Polanski, at nearly 80 years old, turning out a most assured and masterful thriller that only just falls short of his masterpieces of ages past. It helps that it goes out on such a memorable note - the final shot is picture, and jesus does it stick with you - but I knew right from when I saw it in March of '10 that it would remain one of my favorites of the year. Plus, Olivia Williams gets to be awesome, and that alone will win me over every time.

9. Carlos (Olivier Assayas)

Carlos the Jackal gets an epic 6-hour feature film (or depending on your viewing platform, miniseries) from the multi-talented European art-house extraordinaire Olivier Assayas. It's a monumental undertaking and easily one of the great cinematic achievements of the year, which makes it seem almost unfair to stack it up against these other measly two-hour features. But my awe at the ambition of the project aside, I think it looks good right here in spot number 9.

8. Never Let Me Go (Mark Romanek)

Here's one where I won't spoil any surprises, because part of my love for this film was from how off-guard the turn in its premise got me (I haven't read the book, though now I know I must). What I will say is that this is an overwhelming tragedy, and on a list with quite a few of those already, it handily trumps them all. It's also got a trio of terrific performances from Carey Mulligan, Andrew Garfield and Kiera Knightly (who we can all stop hating now, right? because she's awesome), and some gloriously gloomy visuals. Must see melancholia.

7. Ondine (Neil Jordan)

My, my, what a beautiful movie. More than just turning his career around midway through last decade, Colin Farrell has actually grown into one of the finest working actors we have, and that he can take time so make such a stunning modern day fairy tale as Ondine is testament that he's finally got things figured out. In fact, this could very well have made my top three except the script kind of fumbles the third act, but not nearly enough for me to turn against it.

6. Mother (Boon Jong-ho)

Here's the other film that appeared on my awards last year, garnering a similarly respectable placement. Actually, considering that it's former inclusion probably influenced my ranking slightly, Mother would be totally deserving of a place in the top 5, and it was agonizing to decide between these. There's really nothing I would change about this thriller, which from all I can tell is flawless from top to bottom, all stemming, of course, from Kim Hye-ja's phenomenal performance. It's also a great entry point to Korean cinema, and just happens to be one of the best I've seen so far as well.

5. Another Year (Mike Leigh)

The film from last year that proved most impossible for me to shake, and it just steadily rose in my rankings the more I contemplated it that it settled all the way here at number 5. Another Year is really just a continuation of Mike Leigh's career long probing of the UK working class, but it rings so true and delivers a brutal punch in the gut that could only ever happen from realizing how human these characters are.

4. Bluebeard (Catherine Breillat)

Bluebeard is important because it forced me to challenge the preconceived notion that I hated Catherine Breillat and her approach to filmmaking. Granted, this bears little resemblance to the odious Fat Girl, but I still put this off for some time for fear of repeating past mistakes. But instead, she's gives us an exquisite fairy tale (a recurring genre for me this year, like, really really recurring), executed with a minimalist touch that no one save Robert Bresson could have done better. Quite and enchanting, it's everything I love in a movie, including its ability to confound my expectations.

3. Enter The Void (Gaspar Noe)

The stuff of dreams and nightmares. If you dig Gaspar Noe and his self-indulgent cinematic explorations (as I tend to), this may trend more toward dream, but for those not on board, it's going to be an interminable few hours. At least the visuals are gasp-inducing, and even if I thought they were empty (which, nope, I don't) then they would still elevate the entire film to the level of something, well, something on the far left field of cinema.

2. The Illusionist (Sylvain Chomet)

Here's a recurring theme across every list of Tristan's favorites: I love animation. Love it. More than my unborn children (one of which who will almost certainly be named Nausicaa). And what a coincidence, I also love Jacques Tati, the late, great master of French comedy. So ever since I got word that Sylvain Chomet, of Triplets of Belleville fame, was adapting an unfilmed script of Tati's, I knew I would be there opening night. It turned out to not quite be opening night, but I was there sure enough, and to use the most obvious term, it felt magical. There's so much love and affection behind these characters, and such breathtaking animation surrounding them, not to mention that it made for the perfect love letter to one of the greatest directors of all time. And even with a heart-breaking turn of events at the end, it's still never less than enchanting, and without doubt one of my favorites of the year.

1. Black Swan (Darren Aronofsky)

"It was perfect."

Much like Inglourious Basterds last year, Black Swan attempts off the bold feat of ending the film on a singular line that doubles as a self-appraisal. And like Inglourious Basterds, against all odds, this somehow works. No, the film isn't perfect, or not in the seamless sense that most will take it. There are rough edges, a few inconsistencies, and a few lines of dialogue that just don't ring true, but whatever, perfection in that sense can often translate to boring, and I like my films a little rough around the edges.

I also like them, from time to time, to be batshit insane and not give a tinker's damn about the overrated concept of subtlety. Black Swan is so committed to its indulgences that I can't help but stand in awe of Darren Aronofsky for pulling it all off, and that goes especially for the spectacular climax, the year's most superbly orchestrated scene by miles and miles. Throw in a career defining performance by Natalie Portman and you've got what's sure to be one of my favorite pictures of the decade, let alone year.

Thanks for dropping by everyone! Looking forward to the year ahead, with a few great films already under my belt and some promising ones on the nearby horizon in Tree of Life and Melancholia.

And I don't know exactly how soon this is happening, but I have an exciting side-project along with a cinematic wiz-kid friend of mine that I can't wait to unleash on you all. In due time though.

Cheers!

2010 Film Awards: Part 2

2011-04-25T21:08:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the flashy and star-whorey portion of the program. Yes, it's time for the acting awards, where I'll count down the 10 best performances of the year in each category, always wearing my biases shamelessly. Watch as I consistently opt to recognize the young and pretty people, like Jacki Weaver, Barry Pepper, and that guy who plays Filch in the Harry Potter movies (his name is actually David Bradley, and he's awesome). What you should know is that is was a phenomenal year for actresses. One of the best ever, possibly, and everyone in my top eight would have been a deserving winner in any other year. The rest of the categories, I was less enthusiastic overall, but that shouldn't demean the nominees one bit, and certainly not the superb batch of winners. This will all be followed by tea and refreshments, or at the very least, the countdown for Best Director.

Here's a teaser for you. I hate ties, but in the case of one category below, I saw no other option. It wouldn't have been possible for me to decide one way or another. I also may have cheated by ranking one actor according to not one performance, but three. The alternative was nominating him three separate times and Ryan Gosling and his shaky #10 spot would so not have approved of that.

Speaking of teasers, here's a few for the Top 30.
1. Out of the 30 films, 6 will have received no prior nominations at my awards.
2. The highest of these clocks in at #11.
3. That being said, the films with the most nominations aren't necessarily clustered at the top. Several films in the top 10 have only 2 other nominations.
4. 6 films out of 30 were directed by women.
5. 9 films are Oscar nominees.

That's something for you to sip on while we move onto tonight's main event.

Best Supporting Actress
This is the odd year where Lead Actress is commanding most of my attention. The truth is that Supporting Actress is usually my favorite category. This nice mix of the young and up-and-coming ladies with a few seasoned vets shows why. They range from scene-stealers with limited roles to glamor icons doing far more with a glance than any dialogue they're given. Topping the list are two women who I've been dying to award for a while now, with the winner in particular giving one of the best performances of her career. And runners up? Sure, I can think of a few. How about Mia Wasilkowska for The Kids Are Alright and Barbara Hershey for Black Swan? Speaking of which.

10. Mila Kunis in Black Swan

9. Jacki Weaver in Animal Kingdom

8. Blake Lively in The Town

7. Marion Cotillard in Inception

6. Kristen Scott-Thomas in Nowhere Boy

5. Rooney Mara in The Social Network

4. Kiera Knightly in Never Let Me Go

3. Alison Barry in Ondine

2. Rebecca Hall in Red Riding: 1974

1. Olivia Williams in The Ghost Writer

Best Supporting Actor

Here's a usually fun category that's looking quite serious this year despite a couple of oddball turns mixed in for good measure. 2010 was a terrible year for comedy, so there's very little of that, but it sure was a great year for character actors to rise to the occasion. Out of the 10 actors listed here, only one of them has much mainstream acceptance, the rest are by varying degrees obscure, foreign, forgotten, or from the magic land of TV. And once again, I couldn't be happier with my winner. A great performance from a truly under-appreciated actor. Runner up: the guys in Micmacs and also Armie Hammer. Wish I had room for him.

10. Stephen Rea in Ondine

9. Ben Mendelsohn in Animal Kingdom

8. Kieran Culkin in Scott Pilgrim vs. The World

7. Niels Arestrup in A Prophet

6. Barry Pepper in True Grit

5. Geoffrey Rush in The King's Speech

4. David Bradley in Another Year

3. Vincent Cassel in Black Swan

2. Peter Wight in Another Year

1. John Hawkes in Winter's Bone

Best Lead Actor

Gentleman, I can't think of a single thing you all have in common, except that I somehow still preferred you all to James Franco despite liking 127 Hours a lot. That is definitely the big head-scratcher omission here, although I did still find room for one of the Academy's nominees. Oh, and this would be the category were I cheated and combined three performances into one slot. And a very respectable spot that is. Runner up: James Franco.

10. Ryan Gosling in Blue Valentine

9. Michael Fassbender in Fish Tank

8. Jim Broadbent in Another Year

7. Jessie Eisenberg in The Social Network

6. Song Kang-ho in Secret Sunshine

5. Anthony Mackie in Night Catches Us

4. Tahar Rahim in A Prophet

3. Colin Farrell in Ondine

2. Andrew Garfield in The Social Network/Never Let Me Go/Red Riding 1974

1. Edgar Ramirez in Carlos

Best Lead Actress

What a year for actresses, huh? Even the Academy put together its best lineup since 1996 and that's with the inclusion of the so-so Bening. Hell, I found room for three of those ladies here, a handful of terrific foreign performances, and even a surprisingly great turn in a genre series nearing its end. Oh, and there's clearly something amazing happening in Korean film right now, so I kinda couldn't help but notice that. My top 3 all would be winners in any just world, and yes, one of them technically already is, but we all know that my awards carry just a little more prestige than the Oscars. As for the winner, I probably should have seen it coming, since this is not the first time this director has lead his leads to all-time list. Runner's up: Ruth Sheen in Another Year, Nicole Kidman in Rabbit Hole

10. Emma Watson in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1

9. Michelle Williams in Blue Valentine

8. Isabelle Huppert in White Material

7. Jennifer Lawrence in Winter's Bone

6. Giovanna Mezzogiorno in Vincere

5. Carey Mulligan in Never Let Me Go

4. Jeon Do-yeon in Secret Sunshine

3. Natalie Portman in Black Swan

2. Kim Hye-ja in Mother

1. Lesley Manville in Another Year

Best Director

The best indicator yet of what my Top 30 list is going to look like, below are the 10 directors responsible for some of the greatest cinematic feats of last year. All have excelled in very different ways, from animation to working class realism, from minimalism to, well, maximalism. And all capped off with two singular visions that find the respective directors at the absolute peak of their powers. That's why there's a tie here for first place. Not only could I not choose between them, but I would never expect either director to create something so remarkable ever again. That's not an expression of doubt, since I was never expecting something so extraordinary in the first place. In light of that, I thought it only fair to declare a tie. Runners Up: Claire Denis for White Material and Neil Jordan for Ondine.

10. Sylvain Chomet for The Illusionist

9. Danny Boyle for 127 Hours

8. Roman Polanski for The Ghost Writer

7. Catherine Breillat for Bluebeard

6. Bong Joon-ho for Mother

5. Marco Bellocchio for Vincere

4. Olivier Assayas for Carlos

3. Mike Leigh for Another Year

Tie:
1. Darren Aronofsky for Black Swan

and
1. Gaspar Noe for Enter the Void

And that should tide you over until tomorrow night, when the grand spectacle of the Top 30 is unleashed on the world. Thanks for watching.

2010 Film Awards: Part 1

2011-04-25T03:12:00.000-07:00

That's right, part one.

This year, my annual film awards have been delayed and put off and just plain forgotten about, which is why I find myself here in the not so timely time of late April with nary a reflection on my part on the best that last year had to offer. And come to think of it, last year turned out all right, despite whatever reservations I was still having in the fall. Turns out that I spent the first half of the year watching all the wrong films, and between some stellar year-end releases and a few I was foolishly holding out on from earlier, things came together very nicely - almost too nicely - and I'm still in denial that 2010 may have been one of the better year for film in the last decade (still got nothing on 2007 though). In fact, I went from initially planning to downgrade my usual Top 25 to a Top 20, but found that nothing short of 30 was going to cut it.

Top 30. Out of how many, you ask? I counted 67 for certain, but it's possible that a few others slipped through the cracks. And so maybe it's excessive that almost half the films I saw last year are making my countdown (and more still will manage nominations in other categories), but what can I say, they were all worth mentioning.

Not quite yet with the Top 30 countdown, though. We're saving that for the epic finale of Tristan's 2010 Film Awards: Part 3. There's a lot of ground to cover before we get to that, although I'm doing my part to keep things interesting by judiciously choosing which categories are actually worth keeping around.

There are 13 in all. Part 1 covers the technical awards - Editing, Cinematography, Score - as well as Ensemble, Screenplay (original and adapted combined) and Scene. Oh, and a personal favorite that I like to call: Films That Weren't Supposed To Suck (But Totally Did).

Part 2 will follow shortly (really, I promise) and consist of the acting awards - Supporting Actor, Supporting Actress, Actor and Actress - and I'll work Director in there somewhere.

Part 3 is all about Best Picture.

Oh, and in an effort to distance myself from every awards show ever, these categories will all unfold in list format, counting down from 5, 10, or in the case of Best Picture, 30 nominees. So no more guessing who came in second or who barely made the cut. My thought process is an open book.

One last note: I'm considering two films that I saw in 2009 (and listed, in fact, in my awards last year) as being fairly in play. This is in an effort to synchronize my awards to US releases, so there's a very very small amount of repetition on my list from last year. We cool with that? No? Oh, you don't care. Shall we begin?

Films That Weren't Supposed to Suck
(But Totally Did)
It's too easy to pick on the true disasters of 2010. Alice in Wonderland was terrible. Clash of the Titans didn't fair much better. But this we all know, and seeing them show up again and again on worst lists just becomes redundant. How about instead we have a round of applause for these films that aimed for something, whether that something was art or heart or social commentary, and failed spectacularly. Okay, maybe not spectacularly, because that implies there's some joy in watching the catastrophe. No, these films just didn't cut it for one reason or another, and while I only have outright contempt for my winner, I won't be revisiting this lot any time soon. Runners up: Life During Wartime and Four Lions.

5. Shutter Island

4. I Am Love

3. Dogtooth

2. Somewhere

1. The Fighter

Best Ensemble

Not a weak category per se, but one where the choices were all pretty obvious to me right away. All of the following films pulled in multiple acting nominations in my awards (one has four!) and I'm sure I could have worked in more members for every cast had I a few extra slots. If I had to stretch this, I'd have included Black Swan and Carlos.

5. Ondine

4. Never Let Me Go

3. Animal Kingdom

2. The Social Network

1. Another Year

Best Editing

There's a few different approaches to the art of editing covered in my choices below, and I certainly had to make a few judicious cuts just to make it to these respectable five. One selection brilliantly depicts the passage of time along with a growing cult of personality through nearly every trick in the book. On the other hand, I've also chosen a rare minimalist masterpiece, the cuts never flashing, but extremely important to the overall mood. Next comes a picture superbly cut in time to the grandiose score, followed by a trippy, kinetic comic book style adventure. In all, editing was crucial to success. But the winner, there's a case where editing (not performance, contrary to what you've read) carries the entire film on its shoulders. I can't imagine any film last year being more deserving. Runners Up: Mother, Carlos, A Prophet

5. Vincere

4. Bluebeard

3. Black Swan

2. Scott Pilgrim vs. The World

1. 127 Hours

Best Score

Original/Adapted/Whatever. I very rarely can think back on a film and recall the score. It's rare. I can count three times in the previous decade where this happened and that's about it. That doesn't mean that I don't absolutely adore some compositions, and leave little notes to remind myself which ones are worth revisiting. In the case of last year, I wrote five such notes, and from that am confident that these are the five scores most worth celebrating. Runners Up: The Illusionist, The Social Network

5. Vincere

4. Night Catches Us

3. Black Swan

2. White Material

1. The Ghost Writer

Best Cinematography

Always my favorite of the technical categories, probably because I'm attracted to pretty pictures and shiny objects and things in general that distract me from boring, unimportant stuff like plot and content. There were lots of stunning looking films last year, more than I could find room for fairly on a runners up list, but forced to narrow the field down to five, it would look something like what follows. My winner here is one for the books.

5. The Ghost Writer

4. The American

3. Black Swan

2. Enter The Void

1. Ondine

Best Screenplay

Here's a category that I do think is a bit weaker than in most years. Which isn't to say any of these is less than great, but it was an odd year where I found most of the landmark films owed very little of their success to the screenplay. So, here's the ten I came up with, though the last few could probably have been swapped out for other favorite films of mine from last year just as easily.

10. A Prophet

9. True Grit

8. Carlos

7. Mother

6. Winter's Bone

5. Animal Kingdom

4. The Social Network

3. Terribly Happy

2. Another Year

1. Never Let Me Go

Best Scene

Finally, our last category of Part 1 will countdown my 10 favorite scenes of last year (a few of them boasting quite a length). There were definitely films that I wish I could have worked in here - and honestly I tried, but short of mentioning the entirety of Enter the Void, I just couldn't break it up - but I'm totally content with the 10 I came to choose and I hope you'll see why. There's a lot here that come at the end of their films, and so I solemnly swear not to include anything approaching spoiler territory. And I technically cheated with my winner, because it's really a set of two scenes, but they're thematically connected and in fact bookend the entire film.

10. Mary bonds with Ronnie - Another Year

9. Dean & Cindy sing and dance - Blue Valentine

8. Evil Doctor Porkchop - Toy Story 3

7. Passing the note/the end - The Ghost Writer

6. Target practice - The American

5. The extended O.P.E.C. takeover - Carlos

4. The Magician leaves a note and skips town - The Illusionist

3. Teardrop and the Sheriff have a standoff at the truck - Winter's Bone

2. The climactic performance of Swan Lake - Black Swan

1. The dance sequences bookending the film - Mother

Not bad, huh? Part 2 will be along before you know it, so stay tuned kids.

Archer: Season 2

2011-04-22T14:32:00.000-07:00

I've not found much love for cartoon TV since the heyday of Adult Swim, so it was only appropriate that Adam Reed's FX spy show Archer would be the one to bring me back into the fold. I caught up late on the first season, taking it all in over the course of a week (at 10 episodes, hardly an accomplishment) but was ready to go by the time season two kicked in this past January. Season one was a winner, enough to hook me on the concept and characters, and it managed a handful of truly hilarious episodes on part with some of Aquateen and Sealab's better work. What I was fully expecting going into season two was more of the same: more of Archer's oedipal workplace struggle with Mallory, more of Cyril's pathetic freefall, more of Cheryl's erotic asphyxiation urges. What I wasn't expecting was the drastic deepening of plot and character that makes season two of Archer one of (if not the) best seasons of comedy since Arrested Development was on air.

That's right, I skipped over comparisons to Archer's fellow animated shows and right straight for the AD mention. Yes, it's an easy one since Jessica Walters, Judy Greer and occasionally Jeffrey Tambor are all on board, but no show since (and much as I liked them, I'm including 30 Rock and Community in this) has been more consistent in its hilarity week in and week out. It's gotten even better this season, and that's because rather than being content with strictly standalone episodes that aim only for laughs, Archer has allowed the complexities of its character relationships, and the often drastic ramifications of its plot turns, to accumulate, creating not only stronger punchlines, but just plain good storytelling.

It's something that happened several times this season. The introduction of the Wee Baby Seamus turns out to be something that Archer is going to have to live with, and instead of finding a way to disregard the little bundle of joy, the show finds a way to make it a recurring part of his character experience. Same goes for the developments of "Stage Two" and the even better followup, "The Placebo Effect" - Archer is saddled with some serious baggage this season, and while it is never less than fucking hilarious, it's also not just going to be written off.

Same goes for the entire cast. It was a treat this season to watch backstories unfold for the majority of the supporting cast, and nearly all of them (save for Cyril's undercooked father issues) really deepened our insight into what makes these characters tick. Krieger, who this season overtook Cheryl as my favorite character on the show, turns out to have a rather dark and horrific past, but it all seems to so perfectly define who he is that it doesn't seem cooked up just for laughs. We even got a much welcome expose on Woodhouse and his lifelong relationship with Archer. These kind of stories are balanced out by the handful of world-traversing missions that Archer, Lana and Gillette embark on with usually mixed success. Those episodes trade in some of the hearty laughs for amusing action set-pieces, but they are rarely a letdown and keep the show from slipping into a weekly routine.

Character development and plot aside, Archer is still at its heart just a very very funny show. Jokes comes in all colors here, and can range from physical comedy (often out on missions) to repulsive humor (Pam) to the myriad out of nowhere pop culture references. Then there are stunts such as Archer's gut-busting Family Feud interrogation of some warehouse goons all while hooked up to chemo, or Krieger's bizarre antics, especially the creation of his digital bride, and his unfortunate mishap with Len Trexler and Rabbert Klein. If none of that makes much sense to you, then I envy you, because you clearly have a lot of Archer to catch up on.

Hanna

2011-04-10T20:09:00.000-07:00

So here's my beef with action films - and as a 20-something male I feel obliged to speak up here - it is a broken genre, indifferent to the interests of half the audience while fooling the other half into thinking this is as good as it can get. These films have lately devolved into simulacra of simulacra (when Bond starts copying Bourne that's a cry for help) and even some of the more ambitious outings recently have fumbled the through-lines on their stories because they're trying to be just too damn complicated. You know the system is broken when they try to fix it just by rearranging the same pieces in a different order. I really don't care to ever see another action flick with Jason Statham or Sylvester Stallone, and especially not when the story and direction take a backseat to serving star power. The other problem here is the near total void of female-centric action films. Sucker Punch you say? Sucker Punch doesn't fucking count, and if you imagine what the porn on a 13-year-old's computer looks like, it will occur to you why. Action heroines defined so shamelessly by the male gaze are neither progress nor worth any of your time, juvenile males excepted.

Ok, rant over. Here's why Hanna is the remedy.

After a decade's worth of action films that feasted on the regurgitated remains of their former selves, it was high time for something fresh. So here we have Joe Wright - as in, director of Atonement and Pride and Prejudice, Joe Wright - stepping up the the plate, and what do you know, he finds an even better home for his somewhat untethered stylistic extravagances. Because much as I adore Atonement, flashy camerawork and period romance don't go hand-in-hand for many, but his impulses are perfectly suited to Hanna's modern day fairytale, with roughly equal measures of guns and Grimm.

His casting is another welcome sight. Saorise Ronan, who's previous work with Wright is not so secretly one of my favorite performances of the last decade, is certainly not who jumps to mind when you imagine the next great action heroine. Hanna may not quite be Ripley or The Bride, but she could hold her own against either, and frankly, the competition lately has been scarce. She aces the role, quite apparently a physically demanding one, but not without some subtle emotional strain too. The supporting players do exactly what fairytale characters (or, why not, action characters) ought to, each leaving a significant mark on the story as they intersect it. Cate Blanchett plays a big bad wolf of a villain (seen earlier sharpening her teeth, figuratively, and later in the maw of a wolf, literally). She relishes the part and it's a wonderfully devilish turn, far more threatening than her Soviet shtick in Indiana Jones and the Stupid Alien Ship. There's also Tom Hollander, playing totally against type as an ambiguous German hitman with a song in his heart, and a terrific newcomer in Jessica Barden as Hanna's first and only friend, who hasn't quite figured out what lesbians are. Eric Bana, as Hanna's rogue huntsman father, is fortunately not forgotten by Wright after his significant role in the opening scenes, and he's treated to a few nifty ambushes later on. With so many actors - Bana excepted - playing against type, Hanna never once feels like something you've seen before.

But, mind you, I did say it's an action film, and a damn great one at that. There's a simple, but more importantly unflawed storyline to carry any entertainment-hungry audience from thrill to thrill. There's nothing needlessly complicated and no big surprise waiting at the end (the twist that does come is neither preposterous nor played up for wow-factor). There's also a lot of fantastic action set-pieces, a few small ones that play out with the secondary characters, and a handful of epic chases that send Hanna across a futuristic underground holding center, a shipping yard under cover of night, and a decrepit theme park, among others. What makes these sequences such thrills - on top of Ronan's unflappable presence - is the brilliant fusion of Wright's kinetic direction and the spot-on compositions by The Chemical Brothers. The main theme in particular - which Hollander's character adapts into his own demented whistle after hearing it in a bar - is the kind of infectious tune that you actually don't mind getting stuck in your head.

And just for those wondering, the comparisons to last year's Kick Ass are totally misguided. Despite embracing the idea of a fairytale, Hanna appears to exist in the real world, one where characters, however exaggerated, still behave with some kind of logic. It's also well aware of the moral ramifications of a teenage killing machine, and yet never resorts to the equally off-putting attempt to attach a message at the end. It's not destined to be some great box office success, but my hope is that it can at least hold up against...I don't know, the greasy double-threat of Russell Brand...or whatever ever else it was that I've been staying clear of these last few weeks. I don't know where it will rank among my favorites come the end of the year, but if I didn't see a better action film all year, I'd hardly be surprised...but to be fair, nor would I be disappointed. And I think I'll sleep safe at night quite sure that they won't be attempting a sequel.

Certified Copy

2011-03-20T21:14:00.000-07:00

One of the tragic realizations in the early stages of my movie fanaticism was the precious lack of great films that I had the chance to see in the theaters. For years, the only film that met that criteria for me was the Lord of the Rings trilogy, but I'd call that a small consolation compared to what it must have been like to watch, oh, say Chinatown or The Third Man or The Red Shoes when they first hit the town. But I don't know if it's because of my move to Chicago (most likely) or that movies in general are just on the upswing (entirely possible) but the last few months in the theaters have been the best stretch I've ever had.

Yesterday's feature was Certified Copy, and those who know anything about my taste in film won't be surprised that this one's been on my most anticipated list for a very long time (for those who don't, the short and sweet of it is that I could watch Juliette Binoche remake Jeanne Dielman as an 8-part miniseries and stare wide-eyed every minute of it). Bias prevailed - as it often does - and already as soon as March, 2011 has a film to rival the three goodness-to-gracious masterpieces that 2010 produced (which ones those are, you'll have to wait a few weeks for my yearly awards to find out). But if I know I loved it, I'm not entirely sure why, and it's telling that the primary thought on my mind as I strolled out of the theater was "I've got to find time to re-watch this." That's not happened yet, so bear with me as I stumble through this dicey recap.

There's a few things you need to know about Certified Copy and a whole mess of things you don't. The former are the facts, just the facts, and the later I will skirt around as much as possible while attempting to persuade you to find out for yourself. It's a very international film. Director Abbas Kiarostami, widely regarded as the greatest Iranian director of all time, has not only made his first film abroad, but also his first with an actress of professional caliber, and they don't come much more professional than Ms. Binoche. She's of course French and her onscreen partner James is played William Shimell, a British opera singer by trade. Their story (if it's really their story at all) plays out on an afternoon tour of Tuscany, a little in French, a little in Italian, and fair share in English too.

The result is something more accessible than I imagined, but I mean this more in the sense that I was never bored and I don't think most interested moviegoers would be either. Sure, there's a lot of intellectual debate on the nature of originals and copies raging on throughout the film, but Kiarostami seems to find amusement in undercutting these dry points whenever possible, so the conversation continues to play on while the camera (or, more often, Binoche) finds something new to preoccupy her attention. The result is that instead of blasting us with some cosmic point to it all, these ideas of duplication quietly lodge themselves in our subconscious, continually breeding reassessment of character dynamic as it morphs from one thing into another entirely.

A lot of people have been comparing this to Before Sunset, but that doesn't sit right with me. Spoken with due respect to the Linklater film (which I love), there's just a whole lot more going on in Certified Copy. Maybe if Before Sunset collided with Last Year at Marienbad while it had its nose buried in Walter Benjamin's essay "Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" we'd be somewhere closer to the truth. What that makes this is a member of the elusive genre of puzzle films, albeit a rarity even there because this is largely an emotional, not an intellectual, exercise. My desire to revisit it pronto has less to do with walking out befuddled than with the knowledge that there is definitely more here to be gained by repeat viewings.

All this has totally sidestepped what makes Certified Copy so intriguing. Suffice it to say that it's a very dynamic film, one in which the characters are not necessarily what they seem. This would almost certainly not work with a lesser actress than Binoche, who bears the full emotional heft of the movie squarely on her shoulders. I'm not kidding around when I tell people she's the greatest actress alive, and I can't fathom anyone else hitting the same joyous and tragic notes she delivers, all while being able to throw blind trust toward her director and screenplay. In that sense, I'm reminded much of Naomi Watts in Mulholland Dr., and this may just be the best performance since that perfect-storm ten years ago.

I'll wrap by reiterating that I'm dying to see this again, but also that I'm dying to sit down with someone else who's seen it and bounce thoughts off each other until new meanings and interpretations begin to eclipse everything I initially imagined. It's just that kind of film, and if that sounds intimating, I apologize, because all this analysis trash that I'm talking is ultimately irrelevant. The film, however, is not, and it deserves to be seen. This cannot be stressed enough.

Film Review: Jane Eyre

2011-03-07T21:00:00.000-08:00

The European Film Festival is currently in bloom at the Gene Siskel Center and last night (the festivals 3rd) was a singular showing of the upcoming release Jane Eyre, starring a brooding Michael Fassbender and the lovely Mia Wasikowska, who I might just think is even more lovely for her presence, along with director Cary Fukunaga, at the post screening Q&A. I'd been looking forward to the screening all week and made sure to catch both Fukunaga's directorial debut, the lush and harrowing Sin Nombre, as well as a few of Wasikowska's episodes on In Treatment in preparation for the event. The one thing I didn't attempt, however, was to read Jane Eyre, one of many literary classics that I've never crossed paths with in any way; not the novel, not any film adaptation, nor even The Wide Sargasso Sea. Whether that put me at an advantage or disadvantage, I'm not sure, but it's always nice to approach an adaptation without the inevitable comparisons to the source material weighing on your mind.

Through some artfully arranged chronology, if a bit confusing to those unfamiliar with the book, the film opens with a fantastic flight across the countryside, a series of visually arresting landscapes that seem practically to swallow Jane whole. After this gorgeous opening, the film briefly holds an uneven pace while cutting back and forth between her early life and her time spent later with St. John Rivers (played by Jamie Bell, who has spent the last five years growing gigantic muttonchops instead of acting). When we at last arrive at Thornfield Hall, the story settles down as the famed romance between Jane and Mr. Rochester begins to take root.

Wasikowska rightly emerges as best in show. Jane Eyre is her vehicle all the way, and a much better one than either of her 2010 films can claim to be. A definitive role it's not, but she finds the perfect measure of strength within Jane, and her conflicted longings for Rochester are entirely believable. It's the kind of performance that Abbie Cornish couldn't quite pull off in Bright Star, so I'm glad to see Wasikowska nail it here. I've got no complaints about the rest of the cast, save for the stray observation of how underused Judi Dench and (especially) Sally Hawkins were. Honestly, between this, An Education, and Never Let Me Go, it's like she's good for two scenes tops and then clears out completely. C'mon, she only gave the best performance of the last five years. Let's not let talent like that go to waste.

As for Fukunaga, it seems crazy to compare a film like Jane Eyre to Sin Nombre, and in the Q&A he made a point of saying that he wants to go out of his way to never make the same film twice, but I think it's in his approach to location that the similarities shine through. A quick look at both films an you'll be overwhelmed by his landscape shots. He frames his vistas like Bruegel frames paintings, the lush landscapes surrounding the senses, making you wish you could linger on just to study them. The long stretches of the film that play out in the flickering candlelight of Thornfield Hall drag somewhat without the eye-popping visuals to captivate, but every now and then Fukunaga seizes on a window, and his eye for natural light makes us long to escape from the manor. He also manages to avoid sensationalizing in many of the areas you'd expect. In this regard, I imagine he drove the producers mad, but it was an interesting choice to downplay the both the fire and the dark secret of Thornfield Hall the way he did.

Much like in 2010, I started my yearly movie watching with a Mia Wasikowska movie, only this one was actually quite good (disclaimer, I don't blame her in the slightest for Travesty in Wonderland). This year though, I learned a valuable lesson: don't pass the first few months of the year watching trash. It's what happened last year, and by the time summer came around I was overrating half the releases I saw just because they didn't suck. Not so, 2011, I'm starting the year right and don't intend to be fooled by any of your mind-bending blockbusters come summertime.

Academy Awards Predictions

2011-02-27T09:02:00.000-08:00

This is really coming in under the wire, but my week has been surprisingly busy since last Tuesday and time budgeting cuts had to be made. As a result, my yearly awards will not be debuting alongside my predictions, as the graphics (and even some viewing) are still in progress. But I wouldn't miss these predictions for the world, so with only a few hours to go, which I need to spend tabulating ballots for a mock-awards ceremony and concocting a Winter's Bone inspired dish, I've found time to consult my magic 8 ball on the plausible outcomes of tonight.

Two important points:
1. I've seen the majority of the nominees, but not nearly all. However, I've seen everything in the big 8 categories save Javier Bardem's performance in Biutiful and all the animated films, but I've only seen two of the docs (Restrepo and Exit Through the Gift Shop) and one foreign nominee (Dogtooth, and there's a greater chance of the show ending on time than this going anywhere). Some notable films I'm missing include Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1, Inside Job, Incendies and In a Better World.

2. To avoid the allure of hopedicting (ie. the inclination to elevate the chances of personal favorites), I'm also including my thoughts on what deserves to win, unlikely as that may be.

And the winners are...

Best Picture
The King's Speech

It was The Social Network's to lose for the longest time until The King's Speech proved that the academy members don't give a hoot what the critics are saying. It has dominated the late season awards, the ones which prove a pretty accurate litmus test for the big award on Oscar night just because of overlapping voters.

Should win: Black Swan

Best Director
David Fincher, The Social Network

Here's an actual race, though I bet in retrospect we won't think of it as such. Yes, Hooper's film is going to win the big prize, but he's a relatively unknown director and Fincher has found mainstream acceptance over the past few years. I think we're looking at our first Picture/Director split since Crash/Ang Lee and it's certainly one I can live with.

Still, my personal pick would be: Darren Aronofsky, Black Swan

Best Actor
Colin Firth, The King's Speech

Because it just makes since. Eisenberg is too young and his film couldn't pull any other acting love. Bridges just won last year. Franco is definitely in right now, but I don't think many will be checking off the name of the host on their ballots. Bardem has some ardent support, but I just don't think that can stop the guy with the stutter. Plus, Firth still has some carry over love from A Single Man. He takes it.

Should win: Jesse Eisenberg, The Social Network

Best Actress
Natalie Portman, Black Swan

So no shit, Portman is poised to win and I don't buy Bening's odds for a minute. But instead let's take a moment to reflect on this best actress lineup, easily the strongest the Academy has pulled together since 1996 (McDormand/Watson/Scott-Thomas/Blethyn/Keaton). Jennifer Lawrence and Michelle Williams are particularly great choices, and even if Bening is my least favorite, she's a pretty darn good fifth favorite.

Should win: Natalie Portman, Black Swan

Best Supporting Actor
Christian Bale, The Fighter

The supporting categories are where I need my hopedicting guard on, because I'm still refusing to believe that the trashiness of The Fighter can translate into any golden statues. Geoffrey Rush is definitely in the game, and if The King's Speech is really on fire, he may very well prevent this imminent disaster, but I won't bet on it. Starting tomorrow you'll have to call him Oscar winner, Christian Bale.

Should win: John Hawkes, Winter's Bone

Best Supporting Actress
Helena Bonham Carter, The King's Speech

The toughest category in the big 8, and the one where I'm going to buck the general consensus. Melissa Leo has the edge here, but she's done a lot to sabotage her own campaign lately, not to mention she couldn't even get in at the BAFTAs, which surely hurts more than anything. Suince my favorite (Jacki Weaver) has little to no chance, it's down to the category fraudulent Steinfeld and the respected Brit in the BP favorite. I'm going with Helena.

Should win: Jacki Weaver, Animal Kingdom

Adapted Screenplay
The Social Network

There really was never any question of this whatsoever.

Should win: 127 Hours

Original Screenplay
The King's Speech

Damn shame that the screenplay categories are so boring this year.

Should win: Another Year

Animated Film
Toy Story 3

Should win: The Illusionist

Foreign Language Film
Incendies

Should win: Haven't seen the others, but Jesus Christ not Dogtooth

Documentary (Feature)
Inside Job

Should win: I've only seen Exit Through the Gift Shop and Restropo, but I overwhelmingly prefer the later.

Art Direction
The King's Speech

Should win: Uh, none preferably. Actually, I'll say True Grit.

Cinematography
True Grit

Should win: Black Swan

Costume Design
I Am Love

Honestly, weird shit happens in this category all the time. I think this is between I Am Love and The Tempest.

Should win: Honestly, I didn't like I Am Love at all, but I could support a win in costumes.

Makeup
Barney's Version

Should win: I've not seen any of these, so, yeah.

Original Score
The King's Speech

Should win: 127 Hours

Original Song
"We Belong Together" - Toy Story 3

Should win: "If I Rise" or "I See the Light" are both solid choices

Editing
The Social Network

Should win: Black Swan

Sound Editing
Inception

Should win: Inception

Sound Mixing
Inception

Should win: why not, The King's Speech

Visual Effects
Inception

Should win: Inception

Animated Short
The Gruffalo

Should win: I've seen 3 of the 5 and The Gruffalo was my favorite as well, but I could certainly imagine liking one of the others better.

Documentary Short
Killing in the Name

Live Action Short
God of Love

That's all, folks. I'll assess my accuracy either late tonight or tomorrow, and hopefully get my own awards up next weekend.

Watching the Best Picture nominees - All 485 of them

2011-02-15T11:29:00.000-08:00

I need to get this post out of my system now, because come February 28th, we'll be back to cursing the relevance of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences the way we always do. And let's not kid ourselves, the way we love to.

It's always been a love/hate relationship. Those with limited movie experience look in from the outside with sneers about how they've "not even heard of most of those films!" Egads! Pretension must be afoot! But it's the very same group that lends a surprising amount of credence to the winners, simply by virtue of caring so damn much what does and doesn't win or even get nominated. I mean, who care that The Dark Knight didn't get a Best Picture nomination. It's hardly in bad company. Far greater works of cinema have missed the cut as well, many of which never even had a fighting chance (ie, a rigorous studio campaign) to begin with.

Cinephiles, jaded curmudgeons that they are, care about the Oscars too. Most will deny this, and for a few this may be a genuine sentiment, but deep down, most hold out some hope that every once in a while the Academy will get something right. It's a rare and welcome opportunity to gloat, but more importantly, it means that some deserving film will go down in the record books, maybe even get a bump in renown. It could be a mere Best Costume Design win, but hell, us curmudgeons will take what we can get.

In the spirit of being generous though - because, after all, 'tis Oscar season - I think it's worth appreciating all the things they have gotten right. Forget whether a film is the 'best' of a year, or what else should have been nominated/won, the Academy has managed to preserve, through the time-honored format of the checklist, many many films that I'm better off for having seen, plenty of which I may never have come across without these accolades from ages past. On a smaller scale, that of the Best Picture winners, this was instrumental in my indoctrination to the world of movies. There's a real rush when you're first checking off Casablanca, On the Waterfront and Lawrence of Arabia from your to-see list.

With this in mind, I'm declaring the start of a new mission, the viewing of every last film nominated for the Best Picture award. Technically, it's a goal I've been working toward for years, and we even do regular yearly BP lineup rankings at Culturish, but over the last month I've found a surprising amount of resolve to actually do this. I've watched at least 20 nominees during the last month and what I found was that despite a few total duds, there was a handful of amazing mixed in. Yeah, I had to sit through The Robe (a contender for the bottom 10, to be sure) but I also got to see criminally overlooked films like Fanny, Decision Before Dawn, A Touch of Class and A Room at the Top. Those four alone have honestly made whatever mediocrities I've had to indulge more than worth it.

485 films are currently in the esteemed ranks of Best Picture nominees. This means that assuming the Academy holds onto its current 10 nominee stunt for just one more year, come nomination morning in 2013, we will hit (possibly surpass, again depending on the nominee count) the 500 milestone. Therefore, I declare my intent to have viewed every single film nominated for Best Picture by that very morning, date of which as yet to be determined. And I have every intent of finishing far sooner than that. There is one insurmountable hurdle in the way, the 1928 Ernst Lubitsch film, The Patriot, is considered lost. Barring that though, I'll be ready for a complete top to bottom ranking of the nominees come 2013.

So where do I stand now? To be honest, I haven't counted, and that's a number that I don't really want to see. I'd be intimidated, especially by the significant number I still have to see from the pre-1944 years where the nomination total was 10, and on two occasions as many as 12 nominees. I do know that there are many years where I have seen all nominees, probably close to 30, so my task ahead is far from impossible. There's yet to be a decade that I've seen everything from, but I'm down to three from the 2000s (Ray, Letters From Iwo Jima, and The Blindside), six from the 80s, and seven each from the 70s and 90s. Put in that perspective, I should breeze through this. But again, the 30s are starring me down, and I'm kinda petrified.

Funny enough, after all the viewing over the years to get as far as I have, I've still not seen all the Best Picture winners. The Broadway Melody, Cimarron, and The Great Ziegfeld are the final three winners I've not caught up with, the only films separating me from finishing the original list I set out to complete. I'm in no rush though. I've got nearly two years.

The Leopard: An Appreciation of the Theatrical Experience

2011-02-09T21:30:00.000-08:00

"Something will have to change, for everything to stay the same," or so the rough translation goes. It's a thought repeated twice throughout Luchino Visconti's The Leopard, and the second time it's uttered, here by Burt Lancaster's majestic Prince Don Fabrizio Salina, it's with a whimper of dignified resignation. He has come to understand that the life of decadence his class has been privileged must end and make way for a new order, even if the new will ultimately resemble the old. Indeed, by the end of the film, we meet the new boss, who is born in a lavish ballroom wedding that doubles as the funeral party for the old aristocracy. Fabrizio has time to come to terms with his fate, but that doesn't make his heartbreak any less palpable. Once more, he is a good man, a great man even, and it's devastating to watch Garibaldi's revolution make him a kind of sacrificial lamb. Yet as breeding and birthright compel him, he weathers it with grace. That is what the regal leopard does.

Lancaster is the princely model of physical strength, yet fraught with fragile emotion that will from time to time bubble to the surface. His presence in a foreign production (even of this caliber) is atypical for an American actor of the time, though soon to become a bona-fide trend, one that he, along with Ingrid Bergman and George Sanders a decade earlier, helped pave the way for. But his talents truly show here, and his interpretation of the proud and wounded Fabrizio stands as one of the ten best performances ever put to film (dubbing be damned, proof this can still be the universal medium). And it's not as if he's the only one pulling his weight. There's Claudia Cardinale, who heaves and quivers more convincingly than any actress I've ever seen, and is treated, as are we, to the greatest entrance among the cast. Romolo Valli's Father Pirrone racks up one hysterical moment after another, Rina Morelli's aging Princess conveys with volume the fears the Fabrizio so carefully restrains, and Lucilla Morlacchi successfully carries the burden of justifying, to both the audience and her father, exactly why it's time to put the old aristocracy to rest. Lastly, there's Alain Delon, displaced like Lancaster and at the top of his game, though the difference here is that the dashing Frenchman makes it all look easy. Adorned in the most opulent costumes ever captured on film, the cast comes together in a cinematic epic for the ages. Visconti was never better, and you'd be mad to think anyone could be.

Ah, time for context. Not that I'm not allowed to extol the virtues of any film I damn well please from this little pulpit I built for myself in this largely unexplored swatch of the internet jungle, but it's not been that long since I covered Visconti's masterpiece as part of my Top 100 Films countdown. But this was the occasion, a newly restored print of The Leopard screening at the Gene Siskel Film Center, and there was no way I was going to pass up the opportunity to see one of my favorite films on 35 mm (An opportunity that was unheard of while I was in Michigan, but I'm going to have to get used to now. The Siskel is also showing Repulsion, Cache, and Eyes Without a Face, and that's just this month!). In short, nothing could have kept me away from the theater tonight, and I'm immeasurably glad that I went. To all film lovers out there, never pass up a chance to see a favorite (or perhaps a classic you've never caught up with) on the big screen, especially if we're talking celluloid. If you think some time that you could never love a film more, then just wait till you see it projected in a black box, surrounded by dozens of other lifelong students of cinema.

I sound like I'm romanticizing the experience, but there's a genuine rush from the communion of viewers, not just in this theater, but across every theater showing the film (in this case, The Leopard) stretching all the way back to its premier (in this case, in 1963). Put less arduously, tonight I watched The Leopard as if for the first time, regardless of the fact is was my third. The colors and costumes exploded like they never had before (credit to the marvelous restoration for that) and the panoramic Italian vistas were never more breathtaking. And here I found proof that some films just haven't been seen until they've been beheld at the cinema. From my 17 inch computer monitor, I could recognize the brilliance of The Leopard, and even fall hard and fast for its scope and performances, but tonight I felt the electricity of one of the great films of all time, and that's something only a handful of my favorites can boast. If you'll pardon the ridiculously obvious (groan-inducing, even) comparison, it was the difference between seeing a leopard caged up at a zoo and observing one free in the wild. The moral of the story: let's never forget that the place to see movies is the theater, because that will be the day that cinema drops dead.

Prediction Wrap-Up

2011-01-25T06:30:00.000-08:00

To quote Jeff Bridges, "That didn't pan out."

Actually though, my predictions weren't that off. Black Swan under-performed, but so did Inception which I was counting on. And I'm glad John Hawkes beat the odds and got in because he's fucking fantastic in Winter's Bone. Jacki Weaver? Michelle Williams? The Illusionist? Yeah, they definitely got some things right.

I went 5/5 with Actor and Director. 9/10 in Best Picture. 3/5 in Supporting Actor, 4/5 in Actress (except my other nominee ended up in supporting, which I will rant about shortly) and 4/5 in Supporting Actress. I think I was 3/5 in both screenplay categories, regarding which I'm trilled for Mike Leigh, rolling my eyes at The Fighter, and a little sad over Black Swan.

But how about Hailee Steinfeld, huh? Clearly the Academy saw True Grit, because they showered it in nods, most of them deserved. But honestly, she's in every single scene of the damn movie. She supports no one. Jeff Bridges fucking supports here (splendidly, I might add). This may just be the worst case of category fraud in the Academy's history, far more egregious than Casey Affleck in supporting for Assassination of Jesse James... And by being placed in supporting, Steinfeld probably booted one of the Black Swan ladies from their spot while simultaneously saving either Kidman or Williams' hide.

Also
1. Dogtooth: cool, weird
2. I Am Love in costumes: called it!
3. The Illusionist really deserved that nomination
4. Sol Star is an Oscar nominee
5. IMDB must be losing their shit since their golden god failed to get nominated
6. There's always one bad apple. This year it's totally The Fighter

I may crunch some numbers and figure out how I did over all, but right now I'm going back to bed.

Tristan Predicts The Oscars - Part 1, The Nominations

2011-01-24T20:01:00.000-08:00

It's Oscar Eve around the Library of Babel because as you may be vaguely aware, The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences gets to decree tomorrow what the undisputed best films of 2010 were, and then history shall be written and we all will rejoice. This is clearly a more important event than the awards ceremony itself, because it will not feature lame dance numbers, Twilight actors jealously handing off awards they will never possess, and long-winded faux-inspirational speeches (oh wait, never mind).

It's also the one day of the year I look forward to waking up early.

I'll save my critiquing of the year in general until my 2010 awards go live in another month, and I'll even try to restrain my contempt for a few of the possible contenders, although honestly, it's a perfectly acceptable bunch, far better than the motley crew we got saddled with last year. I will however attempt to explain myself where necessary, because as always, this is a juggling act of educated guesses, instinct and wishful thinking.

Also, not even going to attempt the shorts categories, but if I could, I would totally nominate David Lynch's Dior commercial with Marion Cotillard.

All nominees lists alphabetically, not in order of likelihood.

Best Picture
Black Swan
The Fighter
Ghost Writer
Inception
The Kids Are All Right
The King's Speech
The Social Network
Toy Story 3
True Grit
Winter's Bone

Just so we get this out in the open, I think having 10 nominees is stupid. It's one of those give-all-the-kids-a-gold-star moves that is simultaneously motivated by ratings greed and shameful kowtowing to a bunch of IMDBtards. The wisdom this season has been that the final 10 would come out of a preordained group of 11, two of which you may notice I have left off (that would be 127 Hours and The Town, films I liked more than a handful I included). The Boyle film I struck from the record for flagging support outside of James Franco, while Ben Affleck's opus I believe will suffer from being relegated to ballot-filler.

That doesn't mean I'm certain of the rest. Black Swan, The Social Network, The King's Speech, and The Fighter seem certain, and the Coens will get their film in on box office and pedigree, but the others all come with reservations, particularly The Ghost Writer which is my left-field pick in this category. The reasoning is that most will have seen it since it came out way back in March, and Roman Polanski's name may have negative connotations in middle America, but Hollywood still loves the guy, and this is his best film since at least Tess. I suspect it will play especially well with the older crowd, who otherwise have very little on their plate this year except for The King's Speech. Methinks it gets both a handful of high ballot placements and a lot of filler votes, which I think will be enough for it to beat 127 Hours and The Town to the cutoff.

And I'm clearly still predicting it to get in, but I think we've been grossly over-estimating Inception. Moving on...

Best Director
Darren Aronofsky - Black Swan
Joel & Ethan Coen - True Grit
David Fincher - The Social Network
Tom Hooper - The King's Speech
David O. Russell - The Fighter

Continuing on that last thought, here's where I'm going to eat my words. Where's Chris Nolan? Buried under Aronofsky and Fincher, I say, because I think a lot of the same voting contingent will be going for those three films, in which case Inception is going to lose out. Now, these are voted on by the director's branch, which has a respectable track record of welcoming new nominees into the fold, but Aronofsky and Hooper are already making that leap for sure this year. The weak link though is Russell and his unfavorable reputation, which I could easily see give way to a Nolan nomination.

Best Actor
Javier Bardem - Biutiful
Jeff Bridges - True Grit
Jesse Eisenberg - The Social Network
Colin Firth - The King's Speech
James Franco - 127 Hours

Bardem is the one with a big question mark hanging over his head, but the only other viable options would seem to be Robert Duvall in the forgotten Get Low and Ryan Gosling in wild-card Blue Valentine, a film which I have no idea whether the Academy is seeing or not.

Best Actress
Annette Benning - The Kids Are All Right
Jennifer Lawrence - Winter's Bone
Natalie Portman - Black Swan
Halie Steinfeld - True Grit
Michelle Williams - Blue Valentine

Portman is lockety-locked. Benning is in business. Lawrence seems likely. Steinfeld, despite being placed elsewhere, is clearly the lead of her film and I think she works her way in here. Unfortunately for Nicole Kidman, Rabbit Hole died a cold, hard death and I don't think she's making the list. Who does that leave? Michelle Williams is my best guess.

Supporting Actor
Christian Bale - The Fighter
Vincent Cassel - Black Swan
Andrew Garfield - The Social Network
Mark Ruffalo - The Kids Are All Right
Geoffrey Rush - The King's Speech

This has forced me to disregard Jeremy Renner and John Hawkes (and it pains me to leave Hawkes out since it was such a great supporting role) because I think the former's interest has waned as enthusiasm for The Town has likewise, while the later remains largely unknown to movie folk. We know that Bale and Rush are in, and I picked Garfield and (more surprisingly) Cassel because I think the ardent fans of their respective films will throw support there wherever they can. So even though I should be most worried about the Cassel nomination, I think it's Ruffalo who's on shakier ground. Still, I say, he's in.

Supporting Actress
Amy Adams - The Fighter
Helena Bonham Carter - The King's Speech
Barbara Hershey - Black Swan
Melissa Leo - The Fighter
Jacki Weaver - Animal Kingdom

I love how much room for error there is in this category. You've got two ladies from The Fighter vying for spots and the one who just won the Globe got left out of the BAFTA noms! Then there's the Black Swanettes, Barbara Hershey and Mila Kunis, both deserving, but I don't think the Academy is ready to embrace one of the stars of That 70s Show, awesome as she was. Bonham Carter has turned up just about everywhere so I wouldn't bet against her, but the role also lacks the dynamism usually associated with awards, so who knows. There's Lesley Manville, who was certifiably amazing in Another Year, but if Sally Hawkins couldn't get in for the much more beloved Happy-Go-Lucky, then I just can't see this happening. Who else? Julianne Moore perhaps if she's dumped here (when she's definitely lead) for The Kids Are All Right or Olivia Williams if The Ghost Writer proves more successful than we think. My instinct though is Jacki Weaver, singled out for her imposing matriarch in Animal Kingdom, a film that was on top of sending screeners to the academy, which certainly will help.

Original Screenplay
Animal Kingdom
Another Year
Black Swan
The Kids Are All Right
The King's Speech

Adapted Screenplay
The Ghost Writer
The Social Network
Toy Story 3
True Grit
Winter's Bone

Animal Kingdom I think will be this year's In Bruges or In The Loop (both which I predicted to get in when most others didn't). Another Year will be another Leigh film recognized by the writers even when it gets ignored everywhere else. Inception is just not a writer's movie.

But Original has The Fighter and Blue Valentine as spoilers. In Adapted, I'm more confident in those 5, unless 127 Hours creeps in, but that one just feels like more of a director/actors' movie than a writer's one.

Animated Feature
How To Train Your Dragon
The Illusionist
Toy Story 3

Foreign Language
Biutiful
Confessions
In a Better World
Life, Above All
Tambien la Lluvia

Documentary
Gasland
Inside Job
The Lottery
Restrepo
Waiting for Superman

Art Direction
Alice in Wonderland
Black Swan
I Am Love
Inception
The King's Speech

Cinematography
127 Hours
Black Swan
Inception
The Social Network
True Grit

Editing
Black Swan
The Fighter
Inception
The King's Speech
The Social Network

Costumes
Alice in Wonderland
Black Swan
I Am Love
The King's Speech
The Tempest

Makeup
Alice in Wonderland
The Way Back
The Wolfman

Original Song
"If I Rise" - 127 Hours
"I See The Light" - Tangled
"Shine" - Waiting For Superman

Original Score
The Ghost Writer
Inception
The King's Speech
The Social Network
Toy Story 3

Sound Editing
127 Hours
Black Swan
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1
Inception
Toy Story 3

Sound Mixing
127 Hours
Black Swan
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1
Inception
Alice in Wonderland

Visual Effects
Alice in Wonderland
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1
Inception

The Misery Mile

2011-01-22T12:36:00.000-08:00

Three 2010 releases I caught up with over the past week were a marathon of miserable, although in only one case did that apply to my state of mind rather than the characters themselves. The other two films, in fact, were the kind of soul-draining cinema that I gravitate toward like a child to downed power lines. After all, what doesn't kill you only makes you stronger, or in the case of film number three, makes you contemplate killing something else. With that in mind, let's run through my week in movies, chronologically as luck would have it.

Blue Valentine
The pairing of Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams, two of the best actors of their up-and-coming generation, felt significant even before the first trailer came around. Through love and through loathing, their chemistry is palpable, and the only excuse you need to check out this film. The movie itself is amazingly bi-polar, cutting between the glorious romantic highs of first love to the ruins of a marriage run into the ground. There's such true passion and joy emanating from the flashback sequences, especially the heartfelt scene that frames the trailer, but this is ultimately a film for the cynics. It's excruciating to watch romantic bliss die a cruel death without any causation of the middle years, and the cards here are stacked against the former lovers. A few moments, including an embarrassingly melodramatic hospital confrontation, stretch the drama too far, but I mostly found the film's pessimistic duality enormously effective, if hardly pleasurable. The flashes between past and present weren't handled idly, and so the gradual reveal of the plot served, as it should, to deepen the characters with each passing cut. That's just good film-making.

Another Year There's a fascinating compare and contrast piece waiting to be written on Blue Valentine vs. Another Year. The former finds misery within a marriage still a far cry from maturity by any standards while the later uses a long-standing unshakable marital bond as the locus around which a handful of personal lives crumble. Both films cut between emotional trainwrecks and the sunny side of life at will before ultimately allowing the futility of such struggled to take over. But Another Year marginally less cynical, because worn down as they Jim Broadbent and Ruth Sheen's happy couple appear by the end, their love for each other never appear shaken.

So what's the cause of such anguish? That would be Lesley Manville's Mary, a single woman of maybe 50 years, and a basket case of emotions stemming from her failures past, present and future. She's clings to Tom and Gerri (the affectionately lighthearted duo of Broadbent and Sheen) while there's no doubt that they only keep her around out of pity. Mary's smitten with their unmarried son who regards her more as a crazy aunt than an option in love, and yet remains staunchly repulsed by bloated bachelor friend Ken and his many advances. Yet her options run increasingly thin, and her time spent in the shadow of Tom and Gerri's model couple only drives her further into depression. She strikes out with desperate justifications and ploys, and in the film's bleak final act, shatters her carefully constructed mask of happiness and turns a noteworthy performance into a truly great one.

As usual though for a Mike Leigh film, the entire ensemble comes through. Broadbent and Sheen are as much leads as Manville, even if she runs away with all of the many scenes she's in, and the dependable supporting players include David Bradley (Argus Filch!), Peter Wight (who is perhaps still suffering the aftermath of David Thewlis tearing down the walls of his world in Naked), and a limited engagement by Imelda Staunton. It's a typically terrific film from Leigh and if you're not adverse to emotionally draining experiences, one of the better films of the year.

Somewhere
So what happened here? My hopes, I will not lie, were up quite a bit. Blame Tarantino leading the Venice jury to the coveted Golden Lion, or blame Sofia Coppola's pedigree, which is bound to set expectations unrealistically as it is. Somewhere hops around between hotel rooms and lobbies, but the script features only the vaguest sketch of character development. Steven Dorff and Elle Fanning are a reunited father and daughter, daddy's a movie star and she's a little spoiled, but they get along and spend some time together and that's, well, about all. Because the problem with Somewhere is that no one progresses, they just stay in idle and they're not even interesting to watch while they're stagnating. There's the sense at the beginning that Cleo doesn't spend much time with her father, but you'd never know it based on Dorff and Fanning, who's relationship has all the warmth in the beginning that it does when he finally sends her off to camp. The film hangs in a pleasant but dull sort of stasis for the entire duration, and slowly I began to find this infuriating, more so than I would have had Coppola attempted even the slightest bit of character arc. Or it honestly could be the fault of the actors, neither who I have much confidence in to find nuance in thinly written roles.

I will say that I appreciated some of the brief moments of insight behind the scenes of the movie business, from the press junket to the elevator ride with Benicio del Toro, but they hardly made up for a mostly trying movie experience. Disappointingly inert, but I remain on team Coppola. Even here her insights prove valuable, if not put to the best use.

Tomorrow, barring unforeseen disasters, I should have an exciting review posted. And I've got an ongoing project planned to launch later in the week, which should be a welcome variation from the typical reviews/listing.