Month: June 2008

Me & Mr. Jones (and a special guest)

The latest Indiana is exactly what you’d expect, for better and … well, maybe not “for worse” but certainly not for the best. The film hews exactly to its boilerplate, and it was never less than diverting, amusing. But only once–one glorious, extended, escalating car-chase in the jungle–is it enormous fun. If I really sat down to rewatch the first film, I might find that its flaws have been recreated each go-’round: a slew of great set-pieces, sewn together with Ford’s creaky charisma and hoping for a supporting cast that is equally lively. That latter element is true, I think, in Indy 1 and 3, and mostly true in 4. (Cate Blanchett, tongue circling around her “wowels” in a gloriously loony accent, clearly is having great fun; LaBoeuf, Winstone, and Hurt get saddled with less interesting characters, and do less interesting things.) So… sure, why not? It’s summer. And did I tell you about that chase?

But now that I have your attention, let me direct you to the far better, far more challenging, really damn interesting Aussie film Noise. Matthew Saville’s 2007 film attends to the aftermath of a massacre on a train, which left one survivor; we follow her, a low-level cop suffering from vaguely-sourced tinnitus (and maybe psychological problems?), and an assortment of well-drawn supporting characters, the importance of whom we are always trying to untangle. A note: any summary does injustice, fools you into certain expectations, when the film was dazzling in its confident refusal to collapse into a particular kind of story. Continue reading Me & Mr. Jones (and a special guest)

Grace is Gone

Very, very funny. I was surprised; the plot centers on a sad-sack Stanley (John Cusack, shoulders appropriately slumped throughout) with two daughters and a soldier-in-Iraq wife. Wife dies, husband frets over what to do, unsure how to break the news to his kids let alone how to grapple with his own grief and shame, and decides to take the kids to Enchanted Gardens. It’s like National Lampoon’s Mourning Vacation. Or maybe Little Miss Cloud Cover.

Okay, I kid. This movie made me cry, from sheer boredom. I should be polite, because intentions are so pure, so noble, so right-minded. But good lord what a drain. Call me insensitive (and if you do I’ll cry again), but Grace couldn’t be goned quickly enough for me. As Kris pointed out to me while watching, the whole film is one big long interrogation of Stanley’s inability to surface his emotions, and when we finally get the grief money-shot, the big moment of revelation and mourning with the daughters, the hammer-to-the-forehead-soulful soundtrack kicks up and we see the actors pantomime the scene — the moment of disclosure is literally repressed. I would love to see that as irony, but I doubt it.