Synecdoche, New York

A truly remarkable film.

It’s been a while since a movie has stuck with me like this one. I was concerned about it and went in with some trepidation.  Charlie Kaufman is, by now, legendary for his offbeat screenplays. And I was prepared for a good old-fashioned shark-jumping. How long can he keep up this quirkfest anyway without making us all sick? And he’s directing now? He’s never done that. This could be awful.

No. No no no no no. If you haven’t seen this, you need to. Really.  Not kidding here.  It is unmistakably a Charlie Kaufman script. Strange things happen. People are odd. There is a dream logic to the whole thing. And it’s an intensely convoluted and intellectual film. It’s also an intensely emotional film that explores the aging process, the artistic process and the processes of human interaction and non-interaction.

It would be difficult to “spoil” this film. It’s so loaded with words, images, concepts and surprises that no review could possibly give anything significant away without leaving plenty left to discover. But I find myself not even wanting to try.  If you had to sum it up, you could say it’s about a troubled playwright trying to create something “real” out of his life.   Whatever that means.  But that’s just the tip of the iceberg.  Go see for yourself.

The cast — including Philip Seymour Hoffman in the lead role, along with Catherine Keener, Dianne Wiest, Michelle Williams, Hope Davis, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Emily Watson and the incomparable Samantha Morton — is uniformly excellent.  (Talk about hitting the jackpot with female actors.)  I found myself completely absorbed in Hoffman’s tale and unwilling to let it go once it ended.  I need to see it again.  And probably again.  Although it’s entirely satisfying on first viewing, it will undoubtedly reveal more layers and details on repeat viewing. I can’t wait.

Seriously, this blew everything that was nominated for an Oscar last year out of the water.  No one will be watching “Frost/Nixon” or “Benjamin Button” ten years from now.  I’ll still be watching this.  And thinking about it.

Sicko

You know, I recently watched this film for the first time.  It is, of course, nothing if not timely.  If you saw it on its release a couple years ago, or if you’ve never seen it, now would be a good time to pop it in the queue.

I didn’t see it when it came out because at this point I’m a bit weary of Moore’s bludgeoning satire, even if I’m on his side politically.  And I didn’t think there was anything for me to learn about the situation.  Although I didn’t learn very much I didn’t already know about health care, I was moved by some of the personal stories that Moore tells and, more importantly, shows us.

Of course this is propaganda.  Of course this is one-sided.  Canada is not a utopia of satisfied patients.  Neither is Great Britain.  But the points made are, at their base, truthful and important.  The citizens there do not worry about being bankrupted by a medical crisis and their doctors are rewarded for keeping patients healthy and not just for doing stuff and using expensive equipment.  And Moore, for the most part, stays out of the way and only indulges in his penchant for stunts towards the end of the film.  After what had been a fairly straight-forward documentary up to that point, I was a bit disappointed to be brought into Moore-world again. But I forgive him.

The most heartbreaking story involves a woman whose very young daughter required immediate attention and was denied care at the hospital closest to her home because it was out-of-network.  While she argued with the hospital, bad things happened.  A caring society would never allow life and death to become a commodity.  And in a single-payer system, such an issue would never even arise.

You don’t have to take Moore’s skewed word for it.  You can go to the congressional records.  In one scene which could not possibly be viewed as slanted, a former HMO employee regretfully describes to congress how her company’s denial of benefits led to the death of a patient.  But it saved them lots of money!  Watch it here.

And hey, how much do you love Nixon?  Profits for denying care?  Awesome!

Afraid of death panels?  They exist already, but the government isn’t involved. Moore’s  focus, which I think is proper, is not on the uninsured, but on the insured, who aren’t really.  Insured, that is.  As long as profit is in the equation anywhere, we will have a problem.

Both Wonderful & Horrible

If you feel you need some inspiration to further your drive in life let me present you with Frau Leni Riefenstahl. Actress, filmmaker, convicted Nazi sympathizer. No, wait! Come back!

Quite seriously, though, she’s got the drive, determination and charm you wish you had. She was a successful dancer who saw an advertisement for a film that intrigued her. She wrote a letter to the lead actor telling him she wanted to work in his next movie. Soon after she was a film star on par with Marlene Dietrich. Someone pointed out that she had an affinity for directing and, voila, she was directing films and commissioning special lenses from the US for her effects. Hitler came into power and wham! she created the most exquisite propaganda film of all time. The war ended, she got convicted as a Nazi sympathizer and she skedaddled to Africa to escape the persecution. Suddenly she’s a world class anthropological photographer. And she wound up her life making undersea films with a “companion” forty years her junior!

I’m sure you’re an extremely motivated and successful human being but, like I said, you wish you could do what Leni Riefanstahl did. You know, minus the whole Nazi part.

I know all this not because I’ve gone back to school with a concentration in German History WWII to Present but because I just watched a documentary, The Wonderful Horrible Life of Leni Riefenstahl. More than a year ago Flea recommended it on her blog. I remember her saying that it was kind of boring so she sat down just to watch a little chunk and got so sucked in her husband had to come looking for her. Then he got sucked in too. (Upon re-reading Flea’s entry, linked above, that’s not at all what she wrote but it is, honestly, how I remember it. Yikes.)

It’s fascinating because Riefenstahl is fascinating and the filmmakers mostly sit back and let her do the talking. Not that you could do much else with the woman. On more than one occasion she stops the interview to tell them how they should set up a shot, what lighting she requires or that they’re fucking the whole movie up. Quite early on she rails at the director for asking her to respond to questions while walking. “Move the camera!” she insists. “I’ve never talked while walking in my life!” she says, while advancing on him like an extremely disgusted puma. Near the end of the film we see one lengthy uncut answer to the question of her involvement with the Third Reich. Her clearly heartfelt answer begins with how awful the reign of the Nazis was and how truly wracked by guilt she remains then, suddenly, she turns a corner and starts throwing angry questions back at the interviewer. “Why do you think I should feel guilty? What are you implying I’m guilty of? I have nothing to be guilty about!”

Frau Riefenstahl is rife with this sort of contradiction. Perhaps my favorite car wreck of a moment is just after she’s reorganized that walking and talking segment for the documentary team. They cut to a different interview and ask her if she had a hand in choreographing and orchestrating the National Socialist Party rally she filmed to make her propaganda piece, Triumph of the Will. She giggles softly and replies, “Oh no, I wouldn’t know anything about how to do that.” Maybe she’s a damned liar (she was given gypsies out of concentration camps to use as extras in a film she was making as the war ended), maybe she’s a confused old woman (she is over 90-years old during the making of the film), maybe she’s simply a bundle of contradictions, as some of us are (too many examples to mention). I guarantee that in three hours and eight minutes of studying her life you’ll change your opinion a dozen times, if only slightly.

Yeah, three hours and eight minutes. Flea wasn’t wrong, it is boring but it’s also pin-you-to-your-sofa engaging. The documentarians somehow manage to mix together biographical details, technical film information, personal interview and 60 years of rarely-before-seen footage so that no one person is ever bored enough to leave. At least not for long. I admit I watched the film over two nights in four or five sessions. It’s daunting, I agree, but if you’ve ever thought you’d like to know about the first woman rock climber (barefoot, no less), or propaganda films or those cameras that catapult alongside the track in a sprint or the film that inspired the final scene of the original Star Wars movie (among others) or how someone who lived through it can blithely dismiss one of the greatest massacres of humanity of the last century you can learn it all in this one documentary. Three hours and eight minutes doesn’t seem like such a sacrifice then, does it?

Huge Sigh of Relief

I wound up seeing Time Traveler’s Wife on Friday. We were supposed to see Paper Heart but I’d read the time wrong and we were at the theatre with almost 2 hours to spare and the other movie we could agree on was TTW. It seemed meant to be so in I went with all my trepidation.

Unwarranted, it seems. I haven’t re-read the book in preparation so I wasn’t bothered by the manipulation that must have occurred to wrangle such a twisted timeline into 2 hours on the screen. I was completely satisfied and found myself (silently) screaming the same words I did as I read the book. “Don’t go! Don’t go!” Eric Bana and Rachel McAdams did justice to the characters and beautifully honored the relationship.

It’s a brilliant story whether you’re reading or watching. If you don’t know it you should. Don’t even finish reading this post just hit the bookstore and the cinema and immerse yourself ASAP.

My movie going companion hadn’t read the book and as we headed for the elevator I asked him if he liked the movie. He replied, “It was wonderful.” So thank you creative team for allaying my fears. I feel certain you love the story as much as I do.

Eh

I finally saw the Laurence Fishburne/Kenneth Branagh version of Othello. It was extremely sexy, I’ll give it that. The woman who played Emilia really knew her verse and was a joy to listen to. Predictably Desdemona was all emotion and a lot less craft. I found her final speeches rough. Branagh was Branagh, Fishburne was chewing a little scenery but in a really fun way. I like the way he gets the bluff and bluster of the Big Man On Campus that Othello is.

I waffle over the screenplay. I haven’t studied it extensively so I don’t know where exactly it’s hacked up. I tend to be skeptical of any screenplay that inserts a lot of non-verbal scenes and allows actors (Dear Ken, Quit grandstanding. xoxo) to dismantle the meter in the name of emotion. Shakespeare gives you all the backstory, all the stage direction, you need. Don’t bother reinventing the wheel because you think he left something out. He didn’t. Again, very pretty movie, though.

It didn’t grab me but I’m glad I spent the two hours. I did mention it was super sexy, right?

(500) Days of Zoey

When Rent was just a little Off-Broadway musical it got a lot of criticism. Eventually that criticism gave way to praise and obsessive repeat viewing but it started out strong. The main difficulty that so-called connoisseurs had with the show was that Jonathan Larson wouldn’t pick a style. He had rock songs, a tango, recitatives, a little R&B, some rap, even some full on gospel. Perhaps the only gospel song ever written to include sodomy, the Wizard of Oz and Pee Wee Herman. (500) Days of Summer isn’t a powerhouse piece for the ages as Rent has proven to be but I fear it will run across the same version of doubt.

My personal response to the style critique for both is that the range of styles works because it’s a clear choice and each change in style is done for a reason and very carefully thought out. Larson used a tango to highlight class and sexuality differences in a relationship. Director Mark Webb and writers Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber use split screen viewing to point up the space between our realities and our expectations. There’s animation, voice over, even a musical number nearly straight out of 9-5. It’s the sort of variety one never expects out of a romance. At most we get an A and a B story line shuffled together to satisfy our shortening attention spans (See: Nick & Nora’s Infinite Playlist [which by the way I loved and can't believe I didn't write about here]).

(500) Days of Summer is a romance. It’s being billed as a “backward” one or “different,” implying a brand new sort of a thing you’ve never seen before, even though we all know that as much as every romance is unique we have seen it all before. (500) Days does shoot from a different angle, though. (HERE’S WHERE THE SPOILERS BEGIN. PROCEED AT YOUR OWN RISK.) Tom Hansen (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) is the romantic, planning a whole life with a woman the first time he sees her across a room and Summer (Zoey Deschanel) could care less. She’s not looking for a wedding or kids or even a regular bowling partner. She is willing to concede, for a time, that she is having fun and that she’s having fun. We, the audience, are warned from the outset that they will not end up together. It didn’t keep me from hoping, though.

The movie falls down for me on a seemingly minor casting issue. The cast is fabulous, that is, of course, not the problem. I could have done with much more of Hansen’s sister (Chloe Moretz) and his two best friends (Geoffrey Arend and Matthew Gray Gubler). Gordon-Levitt is as good or better than any actor should be who trained on the job with John Lithgow and Jane Curtin. He’s an actor I keep watching to see if he’s going to falter. Will he get into a rut, make poor choices, get too full of himself? So far he has not, he’s simply getting better with every step and I delight in the anticipation of what he’ll do next.

In the title role Zoey Deschanel…do you know her? She is luminous. The role was, I assume, written for her and every moment of the movie is engineered to draw you into her sphere, even the moments where Summer is being an ass. How anyone can watch ZD up there and not want to get closer and closer to her until you are swallowed up is a mystery to me. And that’s where the casting gets it completely wrong in my opinion. True to the warning Tom and Summer do not end up together. Not even close. But it’s a romance, you protest, we must have a happy ending in a romance! Yes, we must and Neustadter and Weber give it to us in the form of a new woman. Gordon-Levitt meets Minka Kelly of Friday Night Lights fame and the screen gets brighter and a bluebird lands on his shoulder and credits roll. We have, however, just spent over an hour falling in love with Deschanel, relentlessly, inevitably, torturously in love. Ms. Kelly, a delightful, light and engaging young woman, could not possibly begin to compare, not even if she had more than four minutes of screen time. For the audience to follow Tom’s journey these actresses needed to have switched roles. Summer needs to be someone whose brilliance overpowers us but equally she needs to be able to fade in our eyes so we believe that moving on is possible, nay wonderful. Moving on from Mistress Zoey after the filmmakers have created what can only be described as a celluloid shrine to her is preposterous.

I still think you should go see the movie. I’d see it again. Why would I pass up a chance to spend 90 minutes falling for La Z? Just be prepared, as Tom Hansen should have been, for disappointment in the end.

Away I Went (Spoilers Abound!)

Apparently Away We Go got a lot of bad reviews. People thought the characters were contrived or over the top or unfair or two dimensional or something. I only skimmed one review. It was from some online newspaper in NJ and that critic felt that the main characters were unrealistic. It’s clear that she’s never met me or any of my friends.

The picture to the left (It’s above, it was supposed to be to the left and is on the left in the writing pane but emphatically not in the published version. DAMN YOU WORDPRESS!) is the moment they realize she’s pregnant. Yes, it’s an unconventional way to realize it but as soon as the scene started I knew where it was going. I guess I’m just in tune with the unconventional and improperly matured. The couple, Burt & Verona, know they have these shortcomings, they know they’ve been rolling through life like human dust bunnies and they know that, since they want to have this kid, they have some decisions to make. So in true dust bunny fashion they hit the road. In true procrastinator fashion they do “research” as a way of putting off the terrifying act of decision-making. With all that going for them it was virtually assured that I would like them.

That being said, my major quibble with the film is that it tries to cover too much ground in too short a time. They go to Arizona and Michigan and Toronto and Wisconsin I think and Miami after spending some time with family in the Pacific Northwest and I haven’t even gone into where they end up. As a result things get shortchanged. For the most part that didn’t bother me so much. In the places where back story needed to be filled we spent some time and in other places I recognized what the writers were going for, I’d met the families they were sketching in my own life, so I could deal with brevity of the visit. Did I wish I could have seen more of Allison Janney? Of course! I always wish I could have seen more of Allison Janney. When they hit Toronto, though, it wasn’t enough and that wasn’t OK and it was all because of the lovely lady below, Melanie Lynskey.

If you know Ms. Lynskey at all it’s probably as Rose The Stalker on Two And A Half Men. She’s of course been in many other projects and we’ve all been just missing her as she flits in, blows us away, and departs. Away We Go is no exception to that rule. Lynskey’s character is the happily married wife half of Burt & Verona’s college friends, Tom & Munch Garnett. The Garnetts live in a fabulous brownstone, they have glorious children they have adopted from around the globe, they like their kids as much as they love them but aren’t chained to them, they love each other in every moment and they’re fun. If I were going to sketch the ideal family it’d be them, they’re just what I love, so of course there’s a sucker punch. They’re also the infertile couple. Here the writers, husband and wife team Dave Eggers and Vendela Vida, have combined two of the searingest of hot button issues into one stop on the oh-my-god-we’re-having-a-baby merry-go-round and it’s the shortest section of the movie. We get twice as much time with Maggie Gyllenhaal’s self-righteous attachment parenting schtick and we get barely a glimpse of Lynskey’s subtle depth as she lavishes love on her children and mourns a very recent miscarriage while showing her pregnant friend a good time. It’s a criminal waste of resources. I’ll have to rent the DVD to see if I can eke some justice out of the deleted scenes. In the meantime Melanie Lynskey, of whom I was already quite fond, has won herself a rabidly devoted fan.

The climactic moment of the movie went on too long. Frankly, everything after we left Lynskey’s presence was hard for me to concentrate on until the very end. They do end up somewhere. Everyone ends up somewhere, right? When, where and how they did broke my heart with the heaviness of its load of hope and doubt and inevitability.

Is it a perfect movie? No, certainly not. Is it a superbly crafted movie? I’m sorry to say, probably not, at least from a dramatic writing perspective. It is, however, well-executed and touching when you might least expect it. For someone who grew up on the love of road movies like The Sure Thing this felt like a movie made for me and mine. It’s a ride I was glad I took.

Thank You Mr. Hughes

Tomorrow, when I get paid I’ll be indugling myself in a copy of Some Kind of Wonderful on DVD. It wasn’t the most popular of John Hughes‘ movies but it was the one that touched me most deeply. Peruse his filmography and see how much of his work has influenced the way you date or kiss or play the drums.  Mr. Hughes passed away today in New York. He is survived by many family members and an entire generation of people unrelated to him who feel as though he lived inside their heads, or at least their hearts.

Thank you, Mr. Hughes, for all you gave me. If it doesn’t seem too greedy, when I go, wherever I go, would you please let me know the rest of the joke with the blond, the poodle and the salami?

Blubbering

Even just the trailer and poster for The Time Traveler’s Wife make me cry. Maybe because I know how it ends.

Man, I hope they don’t screw this up. Even if they don’t, though, I’m not sure I’ll be able to sit through it anticipating the breaking of my heart.

Again.

All American Kids

Something like 7 or 8 years ago I sat in my dad’s living room with an old friend of my parents’ and American Graffiti came on the TV. I casually mentioned that I hadn’t seen it and was strongly urged to get on the stick immediately! This was the story of Uncle D’s teen years and I was missing a crucial piece of history by not having watched this film. Eight years is sort of immediately, isn’t it? It’s immediacy-adjacent at least. No? Well, OK, you’re probably right.

I finally watched American Graffiti last night. It’s directed by George Lucas (his second such endeavor) and when the powers that be told him he needed a big name attached he asked if perhaps Francis Ford Coppola as producer would fill the blank. Given that The Godfather was coming out they conceded that it would do in a pinch. Casting went on forever and eventually a movie was born. A movie that stars, among others, Ron Howard, Cindy Williams, Mackenzie Phillips, Richard Dreyfuss, Suzanne Somers, and Harrison Ford.

It’s a small town movie, a little coming of age story, an ensemble flick, if you will. You’ve seen it a hundred times, maybe more, so why would you watch this old film? First you’d watch it because of that cast I mentioned. Ever seen Ron Howard play an asshole? Want to? American Graffiti can help! Then you’d watch it because if Coppola and Lucas thought it was worth doing then it’s likely worth your time. Furthermore you’d watch it because there’s a high probability that all those small town, coming of age ensemble flicks you’ve already seen owe a debt of gratitude to American Graffiti.

The story doesn’t delve deeply into any one issue and it isn’t riddled with high velocity crises the way a movie like, say, Adventureland, is today. (Did I tell you to see Adventureland? I should have if I didn’t. Go on, see it!) The shape and form of the film are that of its subject. If you’ve ever spent time wandering the streets of a small town in the middle of the night not knowing where you need to go or how to get there despite knowing every square half inch of the place then you’ll recognize this place and these people and, I think, you’ll immediately (in far less than 8 years anyway) drop into this world and enjoy your stay. If you love music from 1964 (or have a soft spot for Wolfman Jack) you’ll be in seventh heaven. Lucas wrote a draft of the script with a stack of his sister’s old 45s by his side, building each scene to the music that inspired it. If you remember what it was like to be a teenager and you worry about teenagers today you’ll be both comforted and terrified by this wholesome group of numb nuts. Finally, if you’re an actor, or ever hoped to be one, watch the film, then watch the special features and I will be flat out amazed if you don’t wet yourself in an embarrassing fashion over what a glorious opportunity this movie was for these young actors and how well they took advantage of it. I love movies but, as an actor, am drawn to theatre. This movie, these stories, that process made me want to run right out and act in movies now and forever.

I wasn’t riveted by American Graffiti. It’s not a perfect film by any stretch. I did some dishes and a crossword and ate some pudding while I watched and I don’t feel bad about it. It touched me, though. Even writing about it makes me feel a pang of regret that I won’t be going home to watch bits over again. Not to mention the pang of regret over bygone walks through a small town making bad choices and being lucky enough to live to tell the tale.