KILLING THEM SOFTLY

We can blame it on RESERVOIR DOGS, I think, the spate of self-aware indie gangster movies with glib, pop culture savvy criminals double- and triple-crossing each other in a comfortably shady milieu. These things are as thick on the ground as low-budget zombie movies, all trying to capture the same lightning that Tarantino did with his startling (and, it should be said, still effective) debut. But the problem with all of these fan-made films is that they're too mired in other movies - set in a world made up of established types rather than people, all of these gangster movies fail to ultimately be about anything more substantive than other gangster movies.

Andrew Dominik is just as aware of these formulae as we are, and his gangland opus KILLING THEM SOFTLY, from a novel by THE FRIENDS OF EDDIE COYLE scribe George Higgins, is a bracing change of pace. It's by no means a perfect film; though of course all films should be About Something, Domink's sledgehammer insistence on underscoring the economic desperation of his milieu in every scene is somewhat tiresome (every dive bar in Boston seems to have their TV tuned to CNN). And yet Dominik's not above juicing his action with forays into high style: the ironic juxtaposition of a romantic ballad with an extreme-slo-mo gangland execution, pretty as it is, is nothing we haven't seen before. (The scoring of a drug trip scene with the Velvet Underground's "Heroin" is a particularly lazy choice.)

In the end these are quibbles. For all of the film's strident symbolism, Domink's characters all live in something recognizably close to our world. They deal with tangible concerns, their dialogue refreshingly real with a noticeable and welcome absence of cod-Tarantino glibness. Some of our finest characters actors (many of whom I suspect worked for scale simply to be involved) step up to the plate and run with the fine, literary dialogue. And its glorious final scene, in which the nigh-unstoppable, status-quo-enforcing hitman played by Brad Pitt is finally rendered vulnerable (in lovely counterpoint to the message of solidarity and hope that's been blaring from all screens everywhere) is a perfect capper.

RIP Michael Winner

(from the archives, a piece written in mid-2005.)

So now I'm at home, watching AMC's OVERKILL DOUBLE BILL, Charles Bronson shooting the hammiest packs of 80s street punks you ever saw in DEATH WISHes II and III. Both were directed by Michael Winner - he directed the controversial and interesting DEATH WISH a decade prior (and worked with Bronson prior to that on the lean and gripping THE MECHANIC before that), but by this time he really was slumming. Indeed, it was during the 80s that he unleashed the sleazy, wrong-headed and hilarious teen-in-peril schlock-a-thon SCREAM FOR HELP, the only movie I still love for totally wrong reasons (Time Out raved: "Will cause Winner fans to re-view earlier work to reassess a hitherto unappreciated comic talent."). The films viewed tonight are pretty unrelenting - the world seems to consist solely of victims, badly dressed street punks, and Bronson. II is a bit more raw and painful (though a great deal of the nauseating violence has been cut out), as the remainder of Bronson's family are killed, and he sets off on a vendetta against the bastards who killed them. They belong to a larger gang, so Bronson kills the rest of them, too, as long as he's there.



The movie takes itself very seriously, though a young Laurence Fishburne wears goofy new wave shades and dances while licking a switchblade. The urban grime is piled on so thick you gotta wade through it - and holy God, I don't believe that a) Laurence Fishburne was the dude who tried to hide behind the ghettoblaster during the big gunfight about 90 minutes in and b) AMC actually kept in the bit where his eye falls out. It's like I got my own little grindhouse right here in my apartment. Right on.

(NOTE: Jimmy Page composed and performed the score to DEATH WISH II. John Paul Jones composed and conducted the score to SCREAM FOR HELP. What hold did Michael Winner have over the members of Led Zeppelin that enabled him to use their talents in such twisted service? And what excuse can be made for Jones' berzerk and overwrought symphonic score for SCREAM FOR HELP [Time Out again: "...soundtrack so far removed from the action as to be positively existential."]?)



DEATH WISH III's a great deal sillier and schlockier, with only friends of Bronson getting hurt or killed this time out. Anarchy reigns to a ludicrous degree - we don't see a woman walking down a street carrying a purse without watching some punks run up and snatch it. A whole neighborhood is terrorized by these troublesome jerks, but with the blessing of a corrupt police lieutenant (Ed Lauter, natch) Bronson shows up to set things right and avenge the violence inflicted on his friends. He gets into it, too, and is seen doing things like wasting a couple of punks with an elephant gun for fucking with his car radio. But they keep coming after his friends, and even throw buddy Martin Balsam down a fire escape in probably the most half-assed Hitchcock homage ever committed to film. Soon the violence escalates and you have a full-tilt battle royale, as Bronson takes a big Browning machine gun and mows down legions of punks, and the good citizens of the neighborhood take their guns out of their bureaus to help take back the streets. The leader of the street punks (who, it must be pointed out, sports a spectacularly asinine reverse mohawk) is dispatched in an effective and hilarious manner, and Bronson, empowered and absolved by Lauter's manly nod of endorsement, packs his bags and walks down the street into the sunset. Fantastic.



Due respect to the late Michael Winner, who entertained even at his sleaziest.

THE HUNGER GAMES

Winter break means getting caught up on some movies I'd missed during the year. I'd been curious about this, from the YA novel by Suzanne Collins. What I'd read about it made me suspicious of the nerdmob's knee-jerk allegations that the book (and, by extension, the film) was a ripoff of Battle Royale, but I kept sleeping on chances to watch it and gauge the similarities for myself.

Ultimately the story (of a young woman's fight in a gladiatorial battle televised throughout a futuristic dystopia) is a distinctly American take on its familiar subject matter. It is as awash in direct references to Greek & Roman cultures as it is in similarities to Battle Royale or other hunting-humans stories, but its take on the specifically American aspects of a media-saturated culture (and the attending desensitization to both violence and the more systemic suffering of others) makes it A Young Person's Guide to Class Warfare, Volume One (of Three). The story's focus on protagonist Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence, as assured as ever) further muddies any comparison to other, similar stories. Is it the most effective treatment of this kind of story? Perhaps not (and, yes, I do believe that BATTLE ROYALE is a stronger film), but for better or for worse it is its own story, with its own agenda, its own strengths and weaknesses, and ultimately its own power.

the top tens, 2012

"Best"? No (that would be presumptuous - I didn't see everything released this year, here or anywhere else), but these are the movies I valued more than the others this year.

The Top Ten, in order seen:

ONCE UPON A TIME IN ANATOLIA
I WISH
PATIENCE (AFTER SEBALD)
BERNIE
MOONRISE KINGDOM
THE MOTH DIARIES
COSMOPOLIS
PARANORMAN
THIS MUST BE THE PLACE
HOLY MOTORS (my favorite film of the year)

The Other Top Ten, also in order seen:

THE GREY
HAYWIRE
THE HUNTER
THIS IS NOT A FILM
HOW TO SURVIVE A PLAGUE
GOLDEN SLUMBERS
CHASING ICE
MAGIC MIKE
THE MASTER
ALMAYER'S FOLLY

Undervalued: JOHN CARTER, DARK SHADOWS, HYDE PARK ON HUDSON

Overvalued: THE DAY HE ARRIVES, BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD

HOLY MOTORS

The movie's a wonder - following Monsieur Oscar (Denis Lavant, one of cinema's greatest special effects) across Paris for nine different and increasingly abstract performance assignments, HOLY MOTORS registers both as pure cinematic thrills and a more personal, dialectic look at how digital forces are increasingly shaping our world. Director Leos Carax happily isn't a polemicist; indeed, in a film rife with references to the work of his countrymen (the episodes and interludes recall Feuillade, Renoir, Demy, Truffaut, Franju, and probably others - hell, Carax even references himself with a short sequel to Merde!, his segment of the omnibus film TOKYO!), the strident political diatribes of Godard are mercifully absent. What remains is a celebration of the possibilities of cinema, a potentiality undimmed (though certain, Carax reminds us, to be changed) by the prospects of a digital future. Like all great films, its surface pleasures are more than enough to hold our interest, but it contains multitudes and myriad deeper meanings that unfold and intensify as it lingers in the mind. Even the movie's melancholic moments seem to juice the exhilaration of it. It's one of the most gripping statements of total cinema I've ever experienced, and after seeing it twice I doubt I've exhausted it.

And fuck me if it doesn't look better in digital projection than 35mm.

THE FRIGHTENED WOMAN

A journalist travels to a faraway house, expecting to pick up some documents for an article on male sterilization. She finds that the lord of the house has a yen for imprisoning women, and many means of tortures (psychological and otherwise) at his disposal. But he soon finds that she's not quite all she seems, either.

If there's a finer, crazier, deeper film on the ongoing battle between men and women than this one, I need to see it. Balancing frank discourse with gorgeous visuals and mounting suspense (and more than a dash of knowing comedy - the final reckoning in a swimming pool is scored and shot like the showdown in a Western), director Piero Schivazappa (aided immeasurably by the confident performances of Philippe Leroy and Dagmar Lassander) turns a psychedelic and lurid genre piece into something smarter than anyone probably wanted it to be. The movie is rife with the gloriously bold sleaziness that makes late 60s/early 70s erotic cinema so refreshing. And yet there's intelligence at work here, as the film unpacks the baggage of the male id and ego (and the toll they take on women), counterbalancing it with soft (but ultimately dangerous) femininity.

It's braver and deeper (and a lot less predictable) than its contemporary counterparts - the basic storyline and themes manifest these days in tepid psycho-sleaze like CAPTIVITY and P2 or dreary work like the oeuvre of Neil LaBute. The accumulated years are evident in THE FRIGHTENED WOMAN, but its remarkable how much intelligence it credits us with, even as it titillates our darker sides. Would that those intent on crafting another cinematic unpacking of the male id take a cue from this film instead of shallowly aping Cassavetes yet again.

(I'm grateful to the San Francisco Cult and Psychotronic Film Society for giving this thing another airing in 35mm. Yeoman's work, ladies & gentlemen.)

Election Night in Silent Hill

I was going to go third party, I really was. California was always going to be solidly in Obama's corner, so I felt it would be useful to throw my presidential vote toward the Green Party. But then Donald Trump had to double down on his bullshit, offering a $5mil donation to charity if the President would release his college transcripts or somesuch, even going as far as to petulantly suggest that the President didn't want to support charity by ignoring the offer. (Obama was, of course, busy with other matters at the time.) Since I couldn't will, say, a giant spider to shit in Trump's mouth, I gave Obama my vote out of spite Tuesday morning.

But the day was tense. Though I had some reservations about Obama, I felt that a Romney presidency could hold some truly dire consequences, given his willingness to ascribe personhood to corporations (and deny it to gays and lesbians), his interest in privatizing disaster relief, his ever-shifting positions on just about any topic put in front of him, his brazen ability to lie in front of millions of people. I couldn't bear the prospect of sitting in front of the television listening to pundits blather as the decision drew near. So I headed to a suitably off-the-beaten-path destination.

I'm a soft touch for the Silent Hill games, though hardly a veteran. (In fact even now I'm stuck on the second nightmare sequence in Shattered Memories, which has been kicking my ass for days - no combat option? Really, Konami? Shit.) And though I only caught it on video, I found the first Silent Hill film an evocative translation of the games' story and aesthetics. And so Silent Hill: Revelation
, a 3D adaptation of the third (many say the best) in the video game series, was a film I couldn't miss.

The story follows Heather Mason, a young woman plagued by visions of her barely-remembered past, as she is drawn to the mysterious town of Silent Hill. Her search for her missing father draws her deep into the town's dark heart, where she's beset by ghoulish creatures and terrifying events that may well offer clues to her real identity.

The film (much like its predecessor, it must be said) is a wildly disjointed affair. It offers but rushes through exposition, too faithful to its source, perhaps, to make it truly cinematic. So heavily does it rely on knowledge of the previous film (or at least a basic familiarity with the series of games) that I imagine newcomers will be lost, and the action will be abstract at best to these viewers. And yet the abstraction does turn into a dreamlike labyrinth, with much of the beautiful/grotesque imagery and music of the series rendered lovingly, from the freakish modern dance gestures of the blind nurses to the ashen transformation from reality to Silent Hill's underworld (and a quiet transition back that's simply lovely). A willingness to lose oneself in such headlong, even clumsy, grotesquerie is a must, but it is rewarded by the film (which culminates in a weirdly moving about-face for one of the series' major menaces that took at least this casual but knowledgeable fan by pleasant surprise).

After the film I couldn't not check my messages. My girlfriend was elated. My fellow San Franciscans were overjoyed by Obama's imminent victory. My Twitter feed was exploding with some funny motherfuckers reporting a spectacular meltdown on FoxNews. Just as Heather Mason leaves Silent Hill to stride more confidently into the real world, so did I emerge into a joyous, warmly embracing night.