A thread set aside for an occasional film critique/discussion/commentary

[Perversion]

As most of the films in my top 20, I've not seen in 6-10 years, I'm going to try to get through as many as I can this year, and write my impressions on them when the mood strikes me. If I happen to see any other films for the first time, and I'm inspired to write, I will do so as well. This will be a Top 22, actually, as the last four on the list, I could not choose between. These are in no particular order, except for the first five, which are pretty much set in stone.

Heavenly Creatures-dir. Peter Jackson
[Safe]-dir. Todd Haynes
Repulsion-dir. Roman Polanski
Before Sunrise-dir. Richard Linklater
Clean, Shaven-dir. Lodge Kerrigan

Boogie Nights-dir. Paul Thomas Anderson
Alien-dir. Ridley Scott
Picnic at Hanging Rock-dir. Peter Weir
The Road Warrior-dir. George Miller
Jackie Brown-dir. Quentin Tarantino
Lola Rennt-dir. Tom Tykwer
Fight Club-dir. David Fincher
American Beauty-dir. Sam Mendes
Being John Malkovich-dir. Spike Jonze
Slacker-dir. Richard Linklater
Memento-dir. Christopher Nolan
Dr. Strangelove-dir. Stanley Kubrick
Bad Lieutenant-dir. Abel Ferrera
Star Wars-dir. George Lucas
The Breakfast Club-dir. John Hughes
Series 7:The Contenders-dir. Daniel Minahan
Apocalyse Now-dir. Francis Ford Coppolla

[Perversion]

Lola Rennt


I just received this in the mail from Amazon yesterday, and it was the first Blu-Ray film I've played on my PS3 and on my HDTV. I saw this in the theatre 3 times when it was released (twice, I had to drive to the city-Chicago-to see it, as it was not playing in the local cineplex when it first opened). I've probably seen the film at least 10-12 times in my life, but have not seen it since 2003, when I watched it with this cute chubby girl who later committed suicide, and of whom I recently found a nude polaroid that she had given me. After watching it with her back in 2003, I let her borrow the only copy I had (a recorded-from-cable-onto-VHS-tape that was standing in for the DVD that I had bought years prior, and had subsequently been stolen before I met her), and got it back with 3 minutes of The Simpsons recorded in the middle of the movie. She said she was on the phone and tried to hit pause on the remote, but accidentally hit record. Meh. I've got the Blu-Ray now.


So it's a German film whose English title is Run Lola Run. As I watched it last night, I continually had a smile creep across my face as I began to remember exactly how brilliant the film actually is. You'll notice, if I continue writing these critiques, that a number of the films on my list play around with the accepted continuity of the film medium. Lola Rennt, Memento, Jackie Brown, and Slacker all take the concept of linear storytelling, and turn it on its head. Lola Rennt, in particular, is almost the antithesis of linear storytelling. The story unfolds in an almost circular pattern, reminiscent of a Mobeius strip. There is a difference, though. In a Mobeius strip, time becomes a loop (to paraphrase an Orbital song). In Lola Rennt, time loops to an extent, but in my opinion, it is more directly related to alternate realities.

Basic plot: Lola's boyfriend, Manni, calls her and tells her he is in trouble. He's a low-level criminal, and he was supposed to deliver 100,000 deutche marks to his boss as a test to see if he could be trusted to complete a job without taking a little something for himself. Problem is, he's "misplaced" the bag of money, and now must somehow get a hold of the entire amount in 20 minutes, or his boss will show up and kill him if he doesn't have it. So Lola decides to help him, and the movie is off and running (pun intended).

From this point on, the film unfolds in quasi-real time. Lola is on the other side of town, and must run to meet Manni within 20 minutes in the hopes of saving him. During the next 20 minutes, she crosses paths with (and sometimes literally runs into) various people along the way. These people's "futures" unfold in a series of quickly-shown Polaroids. One woman has her child taken away from her, and kidnaps a baby out of a buggy, and later slits her wrists and dies. Lola has a few stops to make along the way before she can meet Manni, but she eventually joins up with him. And things really do not go well.

After a brief interlude, the film reverts to the ostensible "beginning" again, and Lola must again run to meet Manni within 20 minutes. However, due to a small change at the very beginning of the sequence, the events that follow unfold in a completely different manner than they did the first time, with a completely different outcome, both for Lola and Manni, and the people she crosses paths with along the way (the woman mentioned above, in this current "reality," now wins the lottery).

This is repeated once more for the "true" ending. But plot descriptions cannot possibly do justice to this film. Due to the throbbing, trance-y techno score (composed by Tom Tykwer, the director, and sung by Franka Potente, the star), the very angular way in which the film is shot, and the constant running of Lola herself, the film has been described as hyper-kinetic. It's also been described as "playfully profound." Both are accurate descriptions. The movie is almost always constantly in motion, and uses to great effect the quick-cutting and handheld camera work that is so overused in the hands of lesser talents. The look of the film is also constantly changing, due to Tykwer devoting different film stock, graininess, and lighting and exposure to different aspects and characters. For example, Lola and Manni (with the exception of a short flashback for each at the beginning of the fim that are in black and white) are almost always shown in very bright, vivid color...very crisp and clean. Lola's father and his workplace are grainy and washed out-looking; almost sepia-toned. Other scenes without the main characters appear to have been shot on video, giving a really jagged look to everything, with very little definition. The cinematography for this film is superb, in the way that by merely changing film stock or type of exposure, an entirely different mood or emotion can be conveyed.

Playfully profound is also an accurate decription, as during the initial viewing, the viewer will probably be caught up in the action/thriller aspects of the film, but upon further reflection after the film is over, and especially upon subsequent viewings, he will be confronted with themes of fate, destiny, free will, and a human being's ability to create his own future. How malleable IS the future? How malleable is the past, even? To me, the main crux of the film, due to its atypical chronology, is to ponder the existence of alternate futures or alternate realities. There are a few times in the film where one reality crosses over into another (especially evident in the short sequence involving the safety on a gun in both the first and second "run through.") Do we, as human beings, have the ability to peek into another future that may exist for ourselves, but does not lie on the same "plane" as the one we are currently on? And if so, is it possible for us to affect that reality, or can things in that reality affect the one we are currently on?

Personally, I'm a bit obsessive and tend to dwell on deja vu's, coincidences, and the like when they happen in my life. In my way of thinking, these are brief glimpses into alternate futures, and as such, any movie that makes reference to these concepts tends to be among my favorites. Hence Lola Rennt and Slacker being on the list in the first post, and Richard Linklater being my favorite director (alternate realities also seem to me to be a major theme in Waking Life, along with astral projection, another favorite subject of mine).

Run Lola Run is actually directly referenced in an episode of The Simpsons, with the music from the film included in the episode, to boot. I've touched on the visual look of the film to some extent, but the creativity inherent in the zooms, quick cutting, the pacing, and especially the use of split screen to convey tension and drama (Lola, Manni, Lola's father, and a ticking clock are all employed using split screens to give specific scenes a sense of urgency) is almost without equal. At this point, I can do no more to describe the film without retreating into redundancy. It is a film that needs to be seen multiple times in order to pick up all of its subtleties.


This film is a direct influence on the RPGM game idea I have laid out for Episode 3 of Series 4, and, to a lesser extent, for Episodes 1 and 2. In fact, if I decide to incorporate some ideas I have for my contest entry, Run Lola Run will also be an influence on how one section is laid out. Meaning, one section of the game might possibly have a Run Lola Run-like framework. It seems as if a lot of my game ideas are influenced by films. And if Series 4 is eventually released, and turns out the way I envision it, Lola Rennt would be the major impetus behind its creation.



Oh, and it's a foreign film. It's all in German. If you choose to watch it dubbed, you fail.

[Perversion]

A few quickies...

I just watched The Road Warrior twice in the past week. I told my buddy to download it on Saturday night, and we watched it at his house that night, and my ex-gf just gave it to me on Blu-Ray yesterday for my birthday.

Neither of them had seen it before, and I asked my buddy Eric what he thought. It was funny, too, because right as the movie began, I began to think about how prescient it actually was for right now in the US. His major complaint was..."Well, if gas is so valuable, why is everyone driving around in these gas guzzlers?" I immediately pointed him toward the US right now, with the popularity of SUVs MAYBE just now decreasing. Not to go into a whole metaphoric diatribe, but I just found it funny how RELATABLE the movie is right now.

I also FINALLY saw my copy of A Scanner Darkly that I bought about a half a year ago on DVD from Best Buy for $5. It looked GREAT upconverted on my PS3. All I can say is, I NEED to see it again, and it was a real downer of a film. The addiction...the paranoia....I've been there. It'll probably be the LAST Linklater film that I own that I'll choose to watch if I am in the mood to watch a Linklater film. Honestly, I found this more unsettling than Requiem for a Dream. Granted, my first experience with that film was in the theatre two weeks before official release, and not quite sober, whereas I saw A Scanner Darkly almost six years into my sobriety. The lens of distance seemed to magnify everything about that film, to the point where, when the movie was over at 3 AM, I had a bit of trouble sleeping.

Maybe next time, I'll write a full review/critique/interpretation.

[John Mora]

Run Lola Run is a personal favorite. I love the Blu-Ray, too.

A Scanner Darkly came close to being ruined because of Robert Downey Jr. and Woody Harrelson.

[Perversion]

[Safe]


On my list above as the best film I've ever seen; I'd not seen this in probably eight or nine years. On a whim, I poked around online a few days ago to see what it was going for these days (I bought it release day on DVD when I used to work at Best Buy, and like most of my stuff, it was subsequently ripped off), and was amazed to see sealed copies on Amazon for $40-$80. I poked around a bit and found a used copy from someone who obviously did not know its value for $3. It came in the mail today, and went into my PS3 a bit later.


So, as I said above, I'd not seen this for almost a decade, so I was viewing it fairly fresh (this was a film I used to watch on VHS 2-3 times a year). I will say, on its initial viewing after a long gap, I was just a tad underwhelmed. This I think was mainly due to watching a digital master that obviously was not pristine, and when blowing it up to 65" via PS3, all the film's visual blemishes were amplified. On top of that, the upconvert looked pretty poor (everything was VERY soft, hazy, and sometimes indistinct), and the audio was only Dolby 2.0 stereo. As I said, a bit underwhelming from having seen it most on an SDTV on DVD and VHS, where it looked great and good, respectively.

As for the film itself, I will say that as prescient and ahead of its time as this was in 1995 on release, and in 1999, on its DVD release, it's probably even moreso now. The story in a nutshell: a woman (Julianne Moore, in the performance of her career, and probably the one she'll be remembered for 40 years down the road) becomes allergic to the 20th century.

That nutshell, of course, does absolutely no justice to the film. Thing is, I'm not even sure how to categorize it. Black comedy? Horror film? Drama? Extremely pointed social commentary? AIDS allegory (the most popular interpretation)? It's really all of these.

I will say, right upfront, that this film is EXTREMELY polarizing. Meaning, a lot of people love it, and see it as one of the best films ever made, and equally as many think it's one of the worst films they've ever seen. Obviously, I'm in the former camp, but I WILL say, the film is not for everyone. It's definitely an acquired taste of sorts. I would venture to guess that for 98% of its viewers, it would qualify as the absolute slowest-paced movie they've ever seen. To use a tired adjective, its pace is glacial. Myself, on first viewing, I was intrigued, but nothing more. Second viewing brought me closer to glimpsing its brilliance. The third viewing had me hooked, and the next 15-20 or so viewings were just reinforcements of the third.

So what is the film ABOUT? Actually, other than that nutshell above, it's really hard to say. And therein lies its brilliance. This is, without a doubt, the vaguest film you'll ever see (not including David Lynch's willful vagueness without purpose). It's also (again) probably the slowest-paced, and would probably qualify as one of the bleakest, coldest, and most sterile as well. Nowhere in the film is there a point where you are manipulated into feeling or thinking what the director wants you to feel or think. Almost every facet of the film is COMPLETELY open to interpretation, and can usually be viewed on multiple levels and with different interpretations.

The camerawork and cinematography have two major modes: Extreme long shots where the characters are dwarfed by their environments, and uncomfortably close closeups. Two characters in one scene talk about the death of one's brother, in terms like, "How old was he?" "5 years older. He was the oldest of my mother's sons," in a completely detached manner, and using words meant to dehumanize not only her brother, but also any sort of shared pain or human contact between the women. And the camera is likewise set up in a detached manner, lending no warmth or emotion to the scene.

Most impressive, though, are the incredibly slow zooms/dollys. If you watch this movie, one of the most impressive of these is the transition from, "What is going on in you?" to an innocuous baby shower. If you see it, you'll understand. It's the beginning to probably the most unsettling scene in the film.

And yes, there are a few scenes in this (lending credence to the "horror" tag) that are EXTREMELY unsettling, bordering on creepy. Even though I'd had the film for the most part memorized, at least four sequences made me tense up for their duration...not because of typical dramatic tension in a drama or horror film, but because of how unsettling they were, even knowing full well what was going to happen.

A major portion of this comes from the score. There are no sweeping moments of grandeur in the music, nothing to convey to its audience how to react emotionally. Really, all that's there, for the most part, is mechanical noise of both the ambient variety and the literal (vacuums segued into bad 80s radio). Any major scene between characters is almost always played without musical accompaniment.

Last thing to mention is the dialogue. A married couple who constantly trail off their words, as if they almost cannot even communicate with each other, or are afraid to say what they mean. The inflection in the voices and wording, a lot of it accusory, even in the supposed "healing center" toward the latter half of the film. The double meaning and manipulative speech of the characters. God, how much more cold, distant, and unhuman (as in, with no warmth or emotion) could they have made this film?


So, yeah. I've pretty much told you next to nothing as to what the film is actually about. But to tell you what I think it's about would almost defeat its purpose, as the film is SO open to interpretation that my opinion(s) on what it means is only one of a myriad. You need to see this film yourself (and at least three times) to begin to grasp an understanding of just why this film was voted as the best film of the 90s in Village Voice's end of the decade review.

Or, you may be one of the naysayers who think that absolutely nothing happens for the entire course of the film, which, in reality, is the complete opposite of the truth. There is literally SO much going on in the film that to make a final judgment after having seen it only once is to close off one of the deepest social commentaries and character studies ever committed to celluloid.


And Magus....this is the one with Xander Berkley I told you about.

[John Mora]

You should check out Funny Games. :3

[Perversion]

Oh, believe you me, John Mora...that's one of those films hovering very near the forefront of picking up. I'll do it eventually. Have you seen Safe yet, though? I thought I told you about it a while ago, and thought you had put it in your Netflix queue...unless that was one of the ones that somehow, all copies of disappeared from Netflix....which, being worth as much as it is, I can see happening.

[John Mora]

Safe is most definitely not available through Netflix.

[Perversion]

Requiem for a Dream


First off, I wish to retract what I said a few posts ago about A Scanner Darkly being more unsettling than this film. I just watched Requiem again, for the first time in 5 or so years (as is usual with the films in this thread), and it is immediately going on my "top tier" movie shelf. I bought it on DVD, bundled with Pi, a while ago, and even though I saw Pi before I'd ever seen Requiem, it was a major letdown after all the hype that had been built up. Visually and thematically, Pi was interesting, but I think in execution, it was a bit lackluster, especially when it devolves into a chase movie.

That being said, the last forty minutes or so of Requiem did exactly what they do every time, which is to keep the viewer in a state of very uncomfortable tension. Most films notch up the tension, only to give some release soon thereafter. I think I've never seen another film that keeps the tension level SO high for SO long without ANY break or resolution. In this lies its effectiveness. By the end of the film, I felt drained due to the almost 3/4 of an hour of discomfort I'd just been put through.


The editing in this film is probably the best use of "MTV-style" editing I've seen. Fight Club comes close, but this takes the cake. The recurring images, eventually set to a rhythm, and the thematic use of the split screen are something that I think Aronofsky will never top. He will never make a better film than this. But then again, I said the same thing about P.T. Anderson and Boogie Nights. Difference is, I think Aronofsky is now trying to make movies geared for Academy votes, whereas Anderson, with There Will Be Blood, I think made a movie so good that he didn't need to kowtow for Academy votes.


I really have nothing else to say right now abouut this film, because I started writing this about 45 minutes after the film ended, and after all that nervous energy had dissipated. I will say that when I saw the preview screening of this, there were two middle-aged black women in line in front of me with two kids. One was probably about 16 or 17, and even though the film was released unrated, meaning, no one under 17 admitted, PERIOD, I give that a pass. However, they also had another kid who appeared to be about 7 or 8 years old. I was waiting (hoping) the guy taking tickets would explain to them that the younger kid would not be allowed admittance, but they let them right in. These tickets were free giveaways you picked up at Borders or Barnes and Noble or something downtown (Chicago), and I have a feeling, without trying to be racist, that both women saw that Marlon Wayans was in it, and the tickets were free, so they went, without having ANY clue whatsoever what the film was actually ABOUT. Because I personally think that there's no way an 8 year old kid should have been subjected to that. I'd rather a kid that age see Saw or something. After walking out of the theatre afterwards, I was more than a bit sickened that the kid saw it.

If I wanted to be serious, and not just throw adjectives around, I think this would be one of a select few films that I would reserve the word, "brilliant" for.