Viddy's Views

The Professionals (1966, Richard Brooks)



Somewhat of a minor classic of the western genre, the first half of the film shines, but once our four protagonists; Lee Marvin, Burt Lancaster, Robert Ryan, and Woody Strode, reach their goal, the film goes down hill. The plot is very simple with the four men for hire going on a mission to rescue a millionaire's "kidnapped" wife (Claudia Cardinale) from a Mexican revolutionary (Jack Palance). I don't usually mind these star ensembles, but this one felt like a bit of a wash with several of the actors having nothing to do. Woody Strode, a western regular during the 60's, has nothing to do once Cardinale is rescue. Aside from a few grimances at the camera and shots of him running around he does nothing, not even getting as much as a full line of dialogue in. Robert Ryan is also wasted as he takes second seat to Marvin and Lancaster who play themselves. Of course Marvin and Lancaster are more screen personalities and presences than full fledged thespians, and God bless them for that, but they need good stories. This ensemble is promising with a nice setup, but it quickly falls to pieces.
Cardinale's character could have been interesting, but she lines seem poorly written. The only good scene she has is when attempting to seduce Lancaster in an effort to sneak his gun away ala Joanne Dru in Red River. Even this is a western archetype. Cardinale is much more interesting and dynamic in Once Upon a Time in the West which came out several years later. Also I noticed a similarity between the themes in this film and The Wild Bunch, with of course the later being a brilliant piece of filmmaking and storytelling. Both films have a nice ensemble of men going on a mission to Mexico toward the end of the western time period who are outgrowing their usefulness becoming anachronisms of their time. Where The Wild Bunch succeeds in being deep and meaningful, not to mention bloody violent, this film comes off as a half-hearted buddy film between Marvin and Lancaster with Marvin playing the straight-man and Lancaster filling in for the goof, even if he is a deadly goof. The film's conclusion feels tacked on and I get a vibe from it that there must've been a last minute rewrite. Even Jack Palance as the sympathetic heavy has little to do except brandish a mustache and his best Mexican accent. Oh and the cliche' bit where Marvin dresses up as a Mexican doning a sombrero and poncho feels like it belongs in another film entirely.

Grade: C

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Do you ever watch movies for what's in them or do you only fill in your own pre-conceived notions to what "appears" on the screen? I realize you review them after the fact, but your agenda is so rigid, it's hard for me to believe that you can enjoy watching any film. Yeah, even Monty Clift flicks.

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My thoughts explain themselves. I'm confused at the comment. I mentioned what was in the film and what didn't work for me. Why do you say agenda? I'm confused. I have an agenda?

Cat People (1982, Paul Schrader)



If anything this film made me appreciate the value of Nastassja Kinski's attractiveness a bit more. How could it not, as she runs around naked the last 30 minutes of the film. It also sparked an interest in finding the original film from the 1940s. Malcolm McDowell is fine in the film, but the role doesn't seem that great playing the jealous brother of Kinski. The premise is a bit silly, but that's OK as this film is somewhat of a horror, love story, and fantasy mix. Cat people are a line of half humans half leopards passed down from the beginning of man when women were thrown to the cats to be sacrificed, but instead were allowed to make love to them and produced offspring. Nice premise huh? I love cats, so it works I reckon. Think wereleopards.
Paul Schrader, who helms the movie, is more of a screenwriter than a director. His work is serviceable here, but is nothing compared to the amazing Blue Collar. This is one of those films that reminded me a bit of The Hunger. Both are interesting exercises in filmmaking and finding eroticism in the genre, but unfortunately both fall victim to the time period - the 1980's in that over baked method of stylizing. Some of the scenes in Cat People feel like they come straight out of a cheesy early music video. The David Bowie song is a bit of a synthesized bore, but without the classic camp value of knowing its camp along the lines of his Labyrinth material. Kinski does her best with the part and plays the role with a good balance of seriousness knowing the material isn't meant to be overly dramatic. Cat People is an interesting flick and well worth a watch, if for nothing else to see some nice red tones and excellent specimens of female human body parts as gorgeously displayed by Kinski.

Grade: C+

The Blind Side (2009, John Lee Hancock)




Here we have another movie where the white saves the colored. I do admit that I appreciate the fact that during the first night the main character Leigh Anne Tuohy (Sandra Bullock) invites the big underprivileged black kid into her house she expresses her fear about her stealing. I appreciate the film addressed this concern instead of skimming over what is on the minds of 99-percent of the viewers at the time of seeing this early scene in the movie. If we are to identify with the protagonist then we ask ourselves what prevents us from bringing our own gigantic black kid into our house. My only hope is that after seeing this film, rich white bitches across the nation will adopt their own black kid. This too was addressed somewhat in the film, when an NCAA investigator questions the motives of Tuohy. Did she adopt the football talent in order to simply get him to play for Ole Miss? In real life, possibly, but the film doesn't want you to believe it.
I wonder if people watching this film realize how racist it is? I imagine most of the people at the screenings of this film were white. Sure it's an inspirational true story about a young black man from the projects of Memphis, Michael Oher played by Quinton Aaron, comes into the care of a white family who nurtures him into a football standout. But what is the demographic of our society who can pay $10 to go watch this film in the cineplexes of the suburbs which they drove to in their expensive SUVs? Not the coloreds the Oher would have hung with in Memphis.
I find this material to be extremely offensive and racist for many reasons.
One, it shows that blacks are ultimately in need of saving and have little else to offer society than sports.
Two, it shows a positive outlook on sports, when the fact is that at colleges throughout the nation professors are making roughly $60-$100 k salary on average while coaches are signing multimillion dollar contracts.
Three, a black man's greatest gift to society is through sports.
Four, what would have the story been about if a puny black kid who's all of 5'5" with no athletic talent wants to play football, but sucks at that as much as he sucks at school.
Five, a scene where big Mike takes little white riding into the hood and says "I'll protect you," again perpetuating the age old concept that all blacks want to ram their huge anaconda penises into petite little white vaginas. Why doesn't he protect her at the shopping mall?
I could go on and on.
Skip this trite and go watch Hustle and Flow, that shows the second and only other good thing blacks can give American society: rap. Note the sarcasm. But in all seriousness at least Hustle and Flow shows an interesting side of black culture in Memphis. Not to mention the brilliant ending. I wonder if Dee Jay would have hung with Big Mike!

Grade: D

NOTE: Toward the end of the film there's a horrible line where Sandra Bullock says something along the lines of, "If you get a girl pregnant, I'll cut your penis off." I wonder, if she made good on this threat how would he pee? Why not just castrate him? Also she said "pregnant" not "have sex with." I wonder how rich matriarch Tuohy would have felt if Oher fell for her daughter while living at home and snuck up to her bedroom and had sex with her. Could have he fell in love with his step-sister... weird. Just random thoughts. I feel this would have been a much better movie. But alas, we get the Disney stuff, and real life concerns and emotions go by the wayside.

I don't think you can call it "racist" because this is more or less how it actually happened. The man's gift really was through sports. But then again, some of your "points" seem tongue-in-cheek to the point of absurdity, so I'm not sure if I'm wasting my time saying this.

Anyway, I'm sure it's quite schmaltzy, but if most of it's true, I'm not sure that we can hold that against it.

But why is it that in our culture we typically see blacks as entertainers. If you watch a sporting event, most of the athletes are black, but who fills most of the stands? Whites?

I'm sure the film does portray it how it happened. I call it offensive because it continues the idea that a black man's greatest gift to society is through athletics.

Also I dislike the concept of "white guilt," lending the helping hand. I onced work with a teacher who was all about black culture as some kind of catharsis for the fact that she had a racist family and came from small town Iowa. The woman was a complete phoney and she used the whole anti-racism thing, not because she cared about the human being, but rather to ease her own guilt and to make herself feel more multicultural.

Have you seen the film?

And whether or not the film is true to life is a mute point to me. That's not where my criticism is coming from.

I'm not sure I grant the premise that "we typically see blacks as entertainers." I'd say most popular singers are still white, and the demographics of sporting events vary from sport to sport. There are almost no black men in the NHL, for example. But I'm really not sure what you're getting at here, anyway.

I have not seen the film, but I would be very surprised if it actually clearly implies that Ohr's "greatest gift to society is through athletics." If anything, one could now say that the sharing of his inspirational story is more significant, given the level of success it's had.

But more importantly, I don't see how something can be called offensive simply because it can be misconstrued to feed into an existing stereotype. How can we be offended that Ohr is, in fact, very good at football? It seems to me that something is offensive when someone assumes this sort of thing about someone without knowing it to be true, or assumes it about a character they have wholly constructed. How can it be offensive when it's true? Who is doing the offending?

I dislike the concept of white guilt, too, but a white person helping a black person isn't necessarily an example of it. If anything, it's more interesting that you would read that into it.

I'm saying that whites are the main spectators that fill the pockets of black entertainers by going to the sports games and buying the $10 movie tickets. Exceptions in everything of course. I'm trying to look at the larger trends. And yes I agree there are more white entertainers than blacks, but that wasn't at all the point I was talking about.

Also why do you not see a lot of blacks in sports like Tennis, Golf, Hockey, and those sorts of things? The reason is because of demographics. Those are sports which require land/space/membership fees/lots of equipment to play. Basically upper middle class playground sports.



You need to watch the film. The character/role of Oher has very little to do in the film. He exists soley to support Bolluck's character and reaffirm her "savior" role. It's really shameful. Watch the film and notice the almost zero dialogue that Oher has. It reminds me of one of those performances where the character comes from outer space and has to be taught the ways of Earth through a host family character. There's really little difference. And it's not inspirational at all. Oher does nothing to control his own destiny, which is the problem, because there are forces that act upon him, and he simply receives them. Essentially the character in the film is a puppet.


I'm not offended that Oher is good at football. I'm offended that the story is told in film. Period. I'm offended that this white woman is portrayed as a hero. I'm offended that poor people "need" rich people to raise them up in life. I'm offended that we live in a society where there are people who have nothing while others have more than they could ever wish for.


That's the way the film comes across. And white people can help blacks without it being "white guilt" of course. This film doesn't come across to me as an example of that.

Watch the film. I'm curious to hear what you think about it, after you see it.

Well, in that case I don't think I know what you were talking about. You said that white people "view black people as entertainers." The only way I know how to interpret this statement is to mean that white people generalize about blacks and their value to society, and/or discount their ability to do something else of value. But if the evidence of this is that "whites are the main spectators," then the fact that there are more white entertains than black ones is a relevant counterpoint. As is the fact that white spectators are probably more common than any other race the moment.

Perhaps it wasn't meant to really mean anything, but to me, saying that white people "view black people as entertainers" is basically an accusation of racism, albeit of the more muted variety. Please let me know if you were trying to convey something else.

I'm sure this plays a role. There's clearly more going on, though. Basketball still requires a court, which isn't always easy to come by and isn't something you can just build or improvise. Football and baseball are far simpler.

And of course, the simplest and most accessible of all sports -- soccer -- was absolutely dominated by white kids when I played it as a child.

Why can't a character be talented and timid? Why can't a black character need help? If Oher was really like this (and, correct me if I'm wrong, but you don't seem to be disputing the film's general accuracy), then aren't you trying to critique reality in ways we normally critique fiction? Complaints about Oher's passive attitude only strike me as valid if they're not accurate. Otherwise, it's just biographical.

Well, there it is. You're offended at the mere fact that these things happened and a film was made about it. I have no idea how to respond to such a criticism, because it's not really a film-related criticism at all.

There's a great movie called The Counterfeiters that depicts Jews during the Holocaust forced to make horrendous moral choices that balance their own survival against their desire to assist the Allied effort through their resistance. I'm certainly offended that the things it depicts happened, but that's not the same thing as being offended by the film itself, and it's not something I can (or would) fault the film itself for.

Even if she may have acted heroically? Shouldn't it only be a problem if it inflates her importance or heroism beyond what it was in reality?

Whatever disagreements I have aside for the moment, this is a social critique, not a cinematic one.

Sure, I absolutely will. But keep in mind that almost everything I'm saying is already presupposing that your description of it is accurate. I'm mostly disagreeing with you conceptually, and not factually.

For the record, I don't expect to love it all that much. But I suppose we'll see.

Give it a watch, let me know what you think Yoda.

Anyways...


The Blues Brothers (1980, John Landis)



By no means am I a huge John Landis fan, but The Blues Brothers is a funny and feel good movie to be sure. It was released before my birth, so I hold none of the nostalgia or sentimental feeling that has garnered this film somewhat of a cult classic status. The opening shots of the film are amazing, an early morning aerial over what I presume are the steel mills of Gary Indiana, or somewhere near the banks of the southern portion of Lake Michigan. There's very little dialogue in the opening minutes as it sets up a mood. How odd for a film that is a musical.
Like most musicals the story takes second seat to the pace of the dialogue followed by music and then repeat. One of my major complaints of this film is that the premise is setup to have the Blues Brothers save the convent, but little else is mentioned of it through the film and certainly they never travel back to where they begin. The Blues Brothers does feel to be more than a series of SNL skits, but at the same time, the movie never feels complete. The best moments are the opening sequence, the car chase through the mall, and of course the chase under the elevated train toward the end. Dan Akroyd and James Belushi are both fine in their stoic black-suit and sunglasses clad roles, but the film does not resonate with me the way it does with so many others.

Grade C

The Hurt Locker (2009, Kathryn Bigelow)



The EOD (Explosive Ordinance Disposal) units must be one of the more tense jobs in the United States military. Their job is to uncover, disarm, and then safely detonate improvised explosive devices (IEDs). This film is quite remarkable in the documentary style it's presented through. The screenwriter of The Hurt Locker is Mark Boal, who spent time in Iraq as a journalist with several bomb crews. That first hand experience from the writing perspective tends to shift the film toward a more realistic and somber fair and away from an action and bells and whistles type of war-film. The film was extremely refreshing and tense and will certainly rank up there in my mind with the great war films; Paths of Glory, All Quiet on the Western Front, The Thin Red Line, Apocalypse Now, and so forth. Now we finally have a great film about the struggle in Iraq.
There is no huge story to be found here. The Hurt Locker follows the last 30-some days of Bravo company after their team leader (Guy Pearce) is killed in the amazing opening 10 minutes of the film. The replacement team leader is Sgt. James played to perfection in one of the great performances of film by Jeremy Renner, a relatively unknown actor. Certainly the fact that director Bigelow filmed the movie in Jordan and in horrible conditions right next door to Iraq, helped Renner and the other actors achieve that sense of tension and somberness in their parts. There's no glory to be had, or any message in The Hurt Locker, just a small group of men doing their job to save lives. Renner has some excellent moments, and as they say embodies the part. He smokes, jokes, and doesn't follow the rules because the rules are in part meant to protect him, whether it's wearing a cumbersome "protective" suit or setting a time limit to the detonation. He ignores the rules when the rules don't help him get his job done. There's no bravo or machismo hint in his performance whatsoever. This is one of those films that you watch and you believe the actors are their character. Anthony Mackie plays his second, in charge of having his back and covering him while in the open. Brian Geraghty plays the third member of the small crew, as a jaded and death-phobic shooter. None of these "stock" war-film parts drift into parody or cliche'.
The cinematography is excellent, The Hurt Locker is simply a beautiful film to watch, and the amazing action sequences kept me at edge for the films two plus hour length. Certainly one of the best films of 2009, and it breathes new life into a stale genre of film. There's no sentimental musical score telling us to feel nervous. We simply watch and that's enough. The editing is pitch-perfect, we know exactly what is going on and when and this isn't sacrificed in the name of fancy and frantic Michael Bay-esque camera work. This is simply an amazing film and amazing story-telling with little undermining manipulation to the viewer.

Grade: A

Finally caught up on all your Reviews Thanks for them

Can't believe you gave The Dude a C I this movie

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I reckon the love/like divide with Blues Bros is always gonna hang on the music. If you like the music on top, then the whole thing becomes a double treat. (I'm no great fan of musicals as a whole, but stick Aretha, Ray Charles and the like in there, and things are looking up )

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Moon (2009, Duncan Jones)



Amazing how a viewer can be captivated by a movie with very little action in it. Moon takes a page from 2001: ASO, Solaris, Alien, and Silent Running, all of which are brilliant science fiction films with an objective of thrilling with ideas rather than intricate action sequences ala Star Wars. Avatar got all the hype in 2009, but was a failure of a film... failure if movies should be good and not sucky. A couple years ago there was a nice little sci-fi flick from Danny Boyle called Sunshine, that started off remarkably but fizzled into cliche' suspense and filth.
Moon is a film that is good from start to finish with very few wasted moments. Every image bursting from the screen is pure gold. Moon is largely a one man show with lead actor Sam Rockwell playing a scientist on a three year contract to operate a moon station. The moon station is the command center for a mining operation extracting helium-3 which presumably solves Earth's energy crisis. GERTY, Sam's only companion is a AI program, that resembles Hal-9000, but certainly doesn't copy him. I admire the way the story went with this relationship between man and his computer.
The slow revolation the viewer sees coming, but it's amazing and the predictability of the situation added dread for me as opposed to boredom. Minimal is the way the filmmakers went with this film. There is more cerebral matter in this film than most science-fiction pieces today. Of course while Moon is true science fiction, a flick like Avatar is not science fiction. The backdrop may be sci-fi but the spirit of the film certainly is not.
Watch Moon in a big dark room on a big bright screen with a nice cup of coffee and no distractions... soak it in. One of the best films of 2009, likely the best sci-fi of the year, and viewed from a certain perspective it is probably the year's best horror film.

Grade: A

Black Hawk Down (2001, Ridley Scott)



Quite a rush of a film. Ridley Scott brings a small degree of film-snob cred to this Jerry Bruckheimer production about a US Army Black Hawk helicopter that is shot down in the middle of the Somalia civil war. The following rescue ensues in which hundreds of Army Rangers fight to survive against thousands of Somali militia toting AK-47s and rocket propelled grenades.
This film is all about action. Of course there's a rogues gallery of actors involved; Tom Sizemore, Josh Hartnett, Ewan McGregor, Sam Shepard, Eric Bana, and other up-and-comers from the early 2000's. The ensemble cast works well, as no one actor is truly a star. It follows different squads of men as they are separated and attempt to regroup. The music heightens the tension, and there are fewer films better than Black Hawk Down when it comes to sustained battle sequences. Much to the credit of the editing and directing, it is very possible to follow the action of events and what is going on within the frantic pace and movement of the film.
There's really not a whole lot of commentary on war itself. The film doesn't seem to take a stance, but there are a few moments of dialogue that got me slapping my head. Eric Bana's character being one of them toward the end. Very few complaints however. Great action film.

Grade: B+

Thanks Viddy for the review

Go Tigers! (2001, Kenneth A. Carlson)



This is a documentary that follows an entire season, 1999, of a high school football team in Massillon, Ohio. The town of 30,000 is obsessed with the school's football program, and essentially it is the focal point of the entire community. Parents, grandparents, friends, and so on head out to the gridiron on Friday nights in the fall to support their beefed up football squad. The documentary is quite involving as it tells the progression of the entire season and follows the head coach, several players, parents, strength trainer, and administration of the school.
The documentary succeeds in showing how the football team's record corresponds towards a property tax levy on the upcoming ballot. The school is in financial trouble and the idea is that if the football team wins, the community will vote for property tax increase, but if they lose... well, no dice. The photography is excellent and gets right in middle of the football's action. The director captures the zeal of the town to the point of insanity and how the players get away with things most students wouldn't.
Essentially the town's obsession can be seen as pathetic and an example of the priorities of athletics over academics, especially in these rural communities. The director hints at this by interviewing an English teacher who comments on how the school holds back players so they can be older. Also interview are a couple of outcast kids because they aren't good at sports. This is nothing new of course, but I would have liked to have seen the film go further into this aspect of the town. Surely not everyone in the town lives, breathes, and sleeps Tigers. As I work at a high school in a somewhat similar demographic, I can relate to this film slightly. I enjoyed watching the documentary, but it doesn't go far enough into the obsession and fandom of the blue collars community's obsession and appears more interested in telling the play-by-play of the team's season. It would be nice to see how many of these star football players are successful and how many are stuck in the town which made them heroes.

Grade: B

Thanks Viddy nice review sounds interesting

Forrest Gump (1994, Robert Zemeckis)



Of course this film is a modern classic. Is has a star, stellar pacing, instantly quotable. I regard Forrest Gump as an entertaining romp through the 60's greatest hits, but of course I wasn't alive back then so I'm sure the film failed to resonate with me on a nostalgic level as it has done with many others. I don't really need to bother with the story. Yes, it's the ultimate "tard-card" Oscar bait picture. I don't think the story is as political as some might make it out to be. Naturally no one human, especially a mentally challenged human would accomplish what Forrest did given his circumstances. I don't read the film as an after school special claiming that if a retard can do this, imagine what a normal person can do! Rather I see the plot device of having the main character as retarded serve to explemplify his innocence and naiveity to the harsh world around him whether it be the Civil Rights movement, AIDS, of the Vietnam War.
Yes the film works, but I would say it's shallow and slightly gimmicky. The film follows the same structure as an infinitely better film, Little Big Man. Whereas that film has heart and a point, Forrest Gump's message gets muffled and by taking the viewer through the 60's greatest hits, the viewer tends to forget how little story there really is. The best parts of the film are clearly the scenes in Vietnam and those involving Lieutenant Dan (Gary Sinese). It seems to me that the TV show "The Wonder Years" did the same thing with the nostalgic voice over narration vibe, but to much better effect and "The Wonder Years" had characters I cared for. So does Forrest Gump, ala the title character, Lt. Dan, and to a lesser degree Jenny. The rest were basically props.

Grade: B-