Flight (2012)

Last night I watched Flight, a film that I’ve intended to watch for months now, but never had that absolute feeling of wanting to watch.

I knew I had to get around to it eventually. It was one of the only major films from Awards season missing from my “Have Seen” list.

Flight stars Denzel Washington as a boozing airline pilot who freakishly averts a plane crash with a rather spectacular aeronautical move that had me gasping, laughing and, really, in emotional turbulence.

It’s an awesome sequence. But at some point over the nearly 90 minutes of movie that follow, Flight changes its tone. Over that span, it becomes something else, very character-centric and heavy on a particular theme (addiction, Addiction, ADDICTION).

I’m reminded of Castaway, Zemeckis’ other single-character drama. That film had greater suspense. However, like Castaway,  I believe Flight required an A-list movie star to tell effectively.

In a time where most movies don’t need A-list, I consider Flight a classic. It could have been made 20 years ago, 10 years ago. It has that universal, time-spanning appeal.  It contemplates celebrity and heroism and puts Denzel at the center of every frame.  You see the Oscar winner in tight close-ups, weathered and parched.  I can’t think of many actors who can do what he’s done with this role.

It’s a brilliant screenplay, in my opinion. I understand exactly why is was nominated for an Oscar.  The characters are clear, organized.  The story is human and each scene is very well-structured.  To think John Gatins, a writer with credits that include Summer Catch and Hardball penned this screenplay is impressive to me.  I’m reminded of a documentary I saw on screenwriting called Tales from the Script where some very successful screenwriters revealed they have written 10-20 scripts that will probably never see the light of day.  From that, I surmise that a lot of quality writing gets overlooked for budgetary, commercial concerns.  Meaning in Hollywood, a Summer Catch probably has better odds over a Flight at getting a green light.

My only qualm with Flight is that I think the movie would have been better without the last ten minutes.  Not that it’s a bad ending, I just think the story is more about the pilot’s death-defying act than about the pilot himself.  Great movie, nonetheless.

Reports directly to Office Manager and supports staff in all
departments, including theatrical, sales, and publicity.

Responsible for all front desk coverage, including answering and routing
phone calls and receiving visitors to the office.

Other tasks include:

* receiving and distributing mail and packages;
* maintaining office supplies;
* mailing weekly invoices and quarterly reports;
* consumer sales backup: taking phone and mail orders and answering
customer inquiries;
* logging and reporting employee vacation and sick time; and
* monitoring company’s contact email account and providing first-tier
responses.

Position assists other departments in varied tasks as needed.

Requirements:
* flexible, detail-oriented, and responsible
* capable of multi-tasking
* professional telephone manner
* basic proficiency in Word and Excel (produce mailing labels and edit
spreadsheets)

Work schedule is M-F 9 am to 6 pm.

 

Robots welcome.  

Silver Linings Playbook, but more-so, Notes on Clothing Fashioned by Filmmakers

This season, I’ve seen Silver Linings Playbook three times. The last being the most special because the screening was supported by the Screen Actor’s Guild.  Following the movie, director David O. Russell, two producers (blah blah), author Matthew Quick and actress Julia Stiles sat on stage for a conversation followed by Q & A.

To those who’ve held any conversation with me over the last month regarding movies, you know that I believe SLP to be the movie of the year. It’s not an unpopular choice; there are many out there who share in my enthusiasm for the film. It’s nearing $60 mil at the box office so word-of-mouth is getting the word out! And that’s always great to see: a great film with an amazing cast getting the kind of national attention it deserves.

So anyway, the discussion was great.  But what stood out most to me was Russell’s get-up aka his attire aka his threads. 

As you can see in the image above, he was sharply dressed in a black blazer, black sweater over white collar and what looked like Nike running sneakers, along with sporting a pair of black-rimmed glasses. He looked like THE filmmaker.

I think there’s more to the world-class director’s (which I believe Russell to be) dressing with certain distinction than we’re led to believe. Otherwise Wes Anderson would be just some weird hack obsessed with plaid and corduroy.

Perhaps directors like Tarantino, Gus Van Sant, Wes Anderson and finally O. Russell can best, and most generously be defined as “eccentric.”  And their uniform ward-drobe is a statement to their absoluteness in character, reflective of their dedication to their craft. I mean in a time (modern times) where fashion is flexible and changing (always changing), the artist is the sturdy constant. 

David Lynch says in his book “Catching the Fish” that he doesn’t like choosing what to wear in the morning.  Probably why he wears the same outfits over and over.  It’s a small decision, but think about how much time and energy is wasted in the morning on deciding what to wear?  I surmise that Lynch believes continuous fashion decisions distract from the creative decisions and discoveries he could potentially have as a filmmaker. 

There is more to be said about fashion belonging to the filmmaker: the choices, the gaudy versus the Spartan.  But I won’t go into it now.

My point was, and remains, that this was not the first time I’ve seen David O. Russell wear this outfit.  It may be his press outfit; maybe he has a different look on set.  I’ve heard Sam Raimi does this Hitchcock thing of wearing a suit and tie.  Seems strange, and fun!  Maybe I’ll start chopping off colors and varieties and start rockin’ a basic look all-around, all-the-time.  I have a notion of what mine would be.  What about yours?

That’s all for now.  Go see Silver Linings Playbook. 

Trainspotting (1996)

Trainspotting was covered in my British Film Studies course back in 2007.  I remember the discussion at the time, how the movie represented a big, new thing for Scotland on the big screen along with its grit-surreal depiction of drug-user subculture. A few of my fellow classmates were convinced director Danny Boyle was a former heroin junkie because how else could a filmmaker make something so convincingly stark?

That was their logic. I absolutely disagreed. In fact, it was no surprise to me that Boyle had never done heroin.

At the time, I thought the film to be rather innocent in intent. Of course the subject matter is dark, the story is at times disturbing, but the movie is something else, too precise in tone and style. I think Boyle went into this with very clear ideas in mind, not bothered by personal experience and not stigmatized by what his audience may perceive as too graphic or inappropriate. What makes the film so fun is its energetic, fast-paced storytelling that doesn’t adhere to Hollywood virtues of right and wrong. These people aren’t heroes.  The hero is heroin, and everyone else falls mercy.

Watching it now, for the first time since my time abroad, I’m actually more disturbed by the film. The acting is great: Ewan Mcgregor and Kelly Macdonald are great to watch. But perhaps its the nihilism in Trainspotting that bothers me. As a 20-something adult, trying to live within my means, I relate more to Mark (Ewan Mcgregor) now than I did years back. His problems, aside from a filthy drug habit, are pretty common to the modern man.  Sorry for sounding a bit pompous.  But really,  he doesn’t want a job because he’s afraid of, among other things, dull conformity. So give me heroin or give me death says his rebellious conscience (which provides great voice-over throughout the film.)

As dark as the film gets, Mark remains a trustworthy narrator.  He’s smart and insightful and his addiction slips in with the rest of his life, which surprisingly is not so wretched.  He has two parents that care about him, he works a job in London (however brief) and he meets a girl that actually wants his company (although she is under-age).  He is kind of a regular guy and he may not know it yet.  Part of what drives his character, and the skewed comedy in the film, is the how he continues to “not give a fok” with his bad decisions.

He is a drug-taking, club-going gambler who goes in on deals with his awful group of “friends,” and inevitably betrays them.  Most fans of the film celebrate the final monologue delivered by Mark.  It’s a nice, poetic attack on the docile working stiff, probably lifted verbatim from the novel by Irvine Welsh.  The image is just as effective:  Mcgregor walks toward the screen until he is in close-up and completely out-of-focus.  Mark has embraced what he believes to be conformity, and Boyle brilliantly conveys this with this final shot, a blurry, indistinguishable man, on the brink of success, dictated by societal norms.

A few final thoughts:  there’s a lot of death and muck in this film.  But it’s not tragic and I would never call it sad.  Everything is presented with this rather portentous stench, it pervades the film.  Even a character who doesn’t do heroin, like Begbie, has no good thing to offer.  Yet with all this bad, all this gloom, the movie is alive and honest and false and I guess, most importantly, entertaining.

Cloud Atlas

I’m here to see about a plot!

Maybe it was the cooling temperature, or the reflecting lights off the East River, but after exiting Cloud Atlas, now playing at 62nd Street Cinema*, I felt strangely compelled to take the long way home.  A casual walk along the pedestrian river way was precisely what I needed, and then some.

Cloud Atlas makes you believe in cinema. It took me back to my childhood, when great films used to pull you in and not let go once you exited.  Like you were all-at-once taken to some strange fantastical plane that you couldn’t bear to resist after the credits rolled, nor did you want to.

The mystery of the unknown, the mysteries of life, the strange and exotic appeal of love, spanning and universal in concept and feeling, and almost within your grasp. The film, the newest from Brother-Sister Wachowski, is about connection. And I think it probably succeeds where an effort like Aronofsky’s The Fountain had failed. It’s able to tie in values of human kinship across vast spreads of time and space. Interstellar, intergalactic, yet never seemingly tied to fate.

Fate is something the Wachowski’s dealt with heavily in the Matrix Trilogy. And although, there are many similar elements adorning this 2 hour 44 minute epic, it never seemed tiresome or cheesy like Reloaded or Revolutions.

The plot is intricate.  Eight very talented actors take on four and as many as eight roles throughout the picture with the help of prosthetic appliances.  Blemishes, wrinkles, wigs and a good deal of makeup comprise each character to make them distinct yet naturally woven into each other.  For the most part, I thought it worked!  And I found it fun to spot Halle Berry under all the guises. Some will be curiously surprised by who-played-who, so wait a little while after the closing credits to find out.

The re-appearance of each character in a different time, place and more-often-than not as a different gender and nationality, make Cloud Atlas probably the most cleverly sought-out endeavor in recent cinema.

Maybe sought-out is the wrong choice of word. But you feel that something has been reached for with Cloud Atlas: something strangely idealistic and original. Of course there are moments in the movie that will seem sort of outlandish and puzzlingly unnecessary when you pause to think about it TOO much. But it all comes together rather nicely. A visual poem, if only for it’s abstract nature and the way it just has to be elliptical, or else it probably would not have existed at all.

So yes, the Wachowski’s are going for greatness, grand, spacey masterpiece theater. Maybe there’s a trend. After all, there was Aronofsky’s aforementioned dud, as well as Terence Malick’s The Tree of Life: both I think went for enormous ethereal effect in portraying human struggle.  But this is my favorite space escape by far.

It’s really a crazy endeavor and frankly, I don’t think I would have financed it either if I was a Hollywood executive.  The big IF.  See, in case you didn’t know, the movie was only picked up by Warner Bros. for distribution.  It took a whole lot of foreign money to get this baby made.

It probably afforded the Wachowskis creative control and without that, this movie never would seen the light of day.  And if so, it would have morphed into a poorly plotted fiasco which would have cheated this audience of 1 out of what I can best describe as a pleasant rumination on escape and fantasy and love.

…I don’t want to spoil any of the details.  Can you tell?

Parks & Rec Season 4

I took some time out of my not-so busy schedule to watch four recent episodes of Parks N Rec. And let me just say that I was pleased. The characters are funny. The writing is whimsical.

In the past I thought the show as too absurd, often depicting its characters as individually and collectively incompetent, making for occasionally successful gags, but easily exhausted comedy.

This season is a little more grounded. The characters are less crazy-prone and the story lines are more in-line with real life “issues.” It’s still a show about people at the workplace, but there’s no insult comedy; it’s people trying to help each other to the best of their ability.

I actually feel kind of good for watching it. And you can too! Since PnR has been a perennial dud in the ratings, do Leslie Knope a public service and check it out.

Margot at the Wedding (2007)

Tonight I decided to watch Noah Baumbach’s post-Squid feature Margot at the Wedding. Squid & the Whale was kind of a breakthrough picture for the Baumbach. He had modest success with his 90s features, which were comical and occasionally incisive.  But the technical prowess and depth of his onscreen characters reached awesome new heights in the Aughts.

I remember being really amped for Margot leading up to its release and then responding to the critical backlash with heavy disappointment.  I think there was a pretty nasty review from Manohla or A.O. @ The Times AT THE TIME.  Or, actually, I don’t think it was nasty as much as fairly derisive in the way that only the Times can do it.

I liked Margot at the Wedding.  It was strange and messy and unsuccessful.  Sometimes movies hit you like torpedoes.  This story was a blast for the ages.  A real effed up impression.

At the center of the story are two sisters. (played by Nicole Kidman and Jennifer Jason Leighe) who are competitive children around each other and seemingly incompetent adults when they’re apart.  It’s not that they’re hard to figure out; they state themselves quite clearly when throwing insults at one another, wielding sex-tinged fury like knives.

Baumbach has this complex scene work and incredibly verbose dialogue.  It goes so far to ALMOST be an outright comedy, but refrains from the predictable conflict.  Comedy of Manners, I guess is the simple term.

Some of it doesn’t work.  And when the conflict does reach its climax, it seems sort of contrived.  **SPOILERS**I’m talking about the scene where Jack Black (who’s brilliant) gets the shit kicked out of him by Margot’s former beau.

The scene is kind of messy and poorly set up.  But it works for Black’s character who’s this pudgy, rather pathetic fellow.  All his life, the scariest thing he’s probably ever had to face was getting the crap kicked out of him.  He’s a shit artist who’s afraid of his own shame.  That’s what makes his final telephone conversation with Leigh’s character so hysterical.

And Kidman’s Margo is just hard to come around to.  You’ll hate her and you’ll hate yourself for putting up with her, but that’s kind of become a Baumbach staple.  Strange, intolerable characters who seemingly move through life with zero obstacles beyond the ones they mechanize themselves.

I laughed.  Jack Black is great.  Nicole Kidman has panache.  The children are kind of thrown into the fray and I sort of wanted them to be more emotionally vulnerable (or just more responsive as actors), but they sufficed.

 

Acting Reel

David Lynch with Isabella Rossellini (the picture undated; the couple dated. I don’t know the dates on either but it all happened in the 80s.)

Google image people you like. Not all the time, but occasionally.  You’ll get some really cool images that you’ve never seen before, like here.

What an interesting, dynamic shot that, I think sums up Lynch’s relationship with one phenomenal actress: a bit seductive, a play for control, power, fascination.  The move for the neck!  Blue Velvet had to have been an inspiration for the shoot.

Weekly Dose of Philosophy

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/08/work-good-or-bad/?src=me&ref=general

I like The Stone, “a forum for contemporary philosophers.”  I never took a course in philosophy*  This is the only educated writing I’ve perused on the subject.**  That’s right, you’re correct: I don’t know anything.

I read it when it’s interesting for me, when it’s something I can identify as true.  When that happens, it’s comforting…

Sorry if you expected me to expound on the article.  This is more of an introduction.   All I will say regarding the article is that I’m on the lookout for the so-called “leisure.”

*There was a “PHI 434: Hegel, Marx & Nietzche” that I dropped; it was mightily intimidating.  A bunch of kids quoting and referring and not really making any sense (also known as first class introductions).  Plus, the professor advised against beginning philosophy with a 400 level course.  Fair enough.

**And it reads kind of safe since it’s a popular newspaper and not say, an academic journal.  I have read a few articles in science journals.  Comparatively, the journals are neater.  :I