This documentary by Tom DiCillo uses nothing but archival footage (much of it never-before-seen) of The Doors to document their rise from nowhere in 1965, to super stardom in the late '60s, to their ultimate demise with the death of Jim Morrison in 1971. There are no interviews with any band members, historians, producers or fans. It's simply the footage with a very smoldery voice-over narration by Johnny Depp.
The film is really just about Morrison and shows clearly how he was basically constantly high from when they started to when he died. He was high for every single interview he did and for most of those he was totally incomprehensible. Most of the band was also high most of the time too, for that matter. Morrison liked acid, pills and ultimately alcohol. He fancied himself a poet (though I admit I find his poetry overdone and much too psychedelic for my tastes).
The film has wonderful likes, like "some people say Jim was a poet caught between heaven and hell." Really? Who are those assholes who think that? Jim was a talented guy who overused drugs and drink and had a gravely, untrained voice that fit the carnivalesque music he wrote with his band. That's about it. He was not a divine power.
Ultimately this film is a very good history, but is much too glowing about Morrison and really just a fancy Wikipedia entry, beginning at the start and ending at the finish. It seems that some of the footage is important because it's new to our eyes, though that doesn't mean much to me because I don't know much about Doors footage that's out there - other than the Ed Sullivan clip of him saying "girl, we couldn't get much higher." (Apparently it is also important that this footage shows that he didn't expose himself in a show in Miami for which he was charged with exposing himself, which made touring difficult for the band.) Oh, well - I don't really care. This is a good enough movie, but nothing too amazing.
Stars: 2 of 4
Thursday, August 5, 2010
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
Brooklyn's Finest (Wednesday, August 4, 2010) (92)
Brooklyn's Finest is the most recent heap from turd-factory Antoine Fuqua. In this, there are three consecutive cop stories that never totally connect as well as they should and just add up to another dull movie about mostly bad cops and how "the system" and New York City are bad.
The first story is about Sal (Ethan Hawke) who is a generally good guy with a loving wife and a bunch of kids. He is way underwater financially and lives in a house that has mold that is killing his wife (as she's pregnant with two more kids). He decides that his only way out is to steal drug money that he would otherwise report when he and his team go into a drug den. For him it's a very moral thing - he's using the money to get a new, clean house, and if he didn't, the money would go into the system and be lost. At some point he raids houses and "loses" runners just to steal a few more bucks.
The second story is about Eddie (Richard Gere) a 22-year veteran cop who is about to retire. He has never done anything particularly good nor anything particularly bad. He's been only a decent cop and the experience has lowered his opinion of humanity. He has to train a bunch of rookies about what he has learned, but he hates their young passion for justice. He's in the process of divorcing his wife, he's in a somewhat domestic relationship with a whore and considers shooting himself in the head about once a day.
The third story is about Tango (Don Cheadle) an undercover cop working in a bad housing project under the drug lord there, Caz (Wesley Snipes). Tango tells his police contacts that he's getting too deep into the organization and that he's having doubts about nailing Caz, who is a long-time friend of his. He says he wants out, but the cops running the show on the outside (and the DOJ) have other ideas for him.
None of these stories are particularly interesting and most fall back on very trite material - some of it directly taken from other movies. Eddie's story is basically Fuqua's Training Day, where and old cop teaches a young cop how things work. Tango's story is basically a bad Donnie Brasco story - or Donnie Brasco meets the first season of The Wire (Michael K Williams, Omar, is even in this part).
I guess the story Fuqua is telling is that all cops have their sins and the police department is messed up because of this. It's not particularly hopeful, nor very original, really. "So what?", is my question. Why do I care that a bunch of cops in Brooklyn are bad guys (or good guys). The film ends so elliptically that it's not really clear what Fuqua is getting at.
Are we supposed to feel bad for Sal because he takes matters in his own hands? Are we supposed to feel bad for Eddie because he's reached the end of his rope? Are we supposed to feel bad for Tango because nobody will listen to him and he's stuck in a no-win situation? I don't really care about any of these things. They all fall particularly flat and don't really do much of anything interesting.
Stars: 1 of 4
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
Hugh Hefner: Playboy, Activist, Rebel (Tuesday, August 3, 2010) (91)
The most insightful moment in the bio-doc Hugh Hefner: Playboy, Activist, Rebel is near the end when Dr. Ruth Westheimer says that Hef has hurt his reputation as an activist and rebel by dating multiple women at the same time. He has become a caricature of what he once advocated and is now much more known for being a target of parparazzi flashes than any sort of force for social change. This disconnect between what he apparently once was and what he is today is the unexamined subtext of this film - a subtext that is really more interesting than the surface of the film.
Director Brigitte Berman shows us how Hefner got where he is now, with the history of the Playboy magazine and all the social causes it (Hef) championed over the years. From civil rights to anti-Vietnam, to obscenity and freedom of speech, to gay rights and women's rights, Hefner was on the forefront of the most of the major social issues of the second half of the 20th century. At least that's what his supporters and he says about him.
Most of the film is interviews with people who are friends or past collaborators with Hef. Some are former models or girlfriends, some are business people and some are old friends from his long-ago Chicago days. They all agree that Hef is a pretty fantastic guy all around.
Berman does have a few detractors on screen, but they are all people with "agendas", so they're easy to ignore. She has arch-Christian singer Pat Boone on talking about how the magazine traffics in sleaze and also how it has become not as interesting or cutting-edge as it once was (this second point is true - so why does the dismissible freak get this line and not someone more trustworthy?). Berman also has on Susan Brownmiller, a feminist writer, talking about the objectification of women as a counter point to Hef's claim that he is a feminist who has done more to help women gain control of their sexuality than anyone else on earth (an interesting, if unconvincing opinion). The big problem is that Brownmiller is a long-time foe of Hef and they once had a big on-air fight on the Dick Cavett show in the 1970s.
Basically other than these two, the whole film is totally laudatory. Nobody asks what to me is the most important question, which is what the hell happened to the magazine in the 1980s to turn it from an interesting magazine with top-notch writers and a sharp social compass (that also featured naked women) to the current trashy porno mag that has very little in the reading department. Yes, Alex Haley, Norman Mailer, Ray Bradbury and Kurt Vonnegut once wrote for Playboy, but nobody close to them has anything to do with the magazine anymore. At one point Hef suggests that obscenity cases and Jerry Falwell in the 1980s hurt the perception of the magazine, but this is ultimately unconvincing as it's been a long time since then and the magazine is still dull.
My biggest objection is that the film is way too long, running more than two hours. At most this should be a 90-minute movie, spending just a few minutes on each era and coming off as more than just a laundry list of achievements and anecdotes. There is no question that Hef is an important guy who was on the right side and out in front of all of these important issues, but most of the stories in the film I knew from other sources.
I know well that Hef drove to the West Side of Chicago to buy the Marilyn Monroe picture that was on the cover of the first issue; I know that he helped Lenny Bruce out of jail when he was arrested during a stand-up act in Chicago; I know that the Los Angeles Playboy Mansion is a fuckfest and a destination for celebrities. None of this is interesting. I would rather have had more cutting analysis of Hef, like what Dr. Ruth gave 110 minutes into the film.
Stars: 1 of 4
Director Brigitte Berman shows us how Hefner got where he is now, with the history of the Playboy magazine and all the social causes it (Hef) championed over the years. From civil rights to anti-Vietnam, to obscenity and freedom of speech, to gay rights and women's rights, Hefner was on the forefront of the most of the major social issues of the second half of the 20th century. At least that's what his supporters and he says about him.
Most of the film is interviews with people who are friends or past collaborators with Hef. Some are former models or girlfriends, some are business people and some are old friends from his long-ago Chicago days. They all agree that Hef is a pretty fantastic guy all around.
Berman does have a few detractors on screen, but they are all people with "agendas", so they're easy to ignore. She has arch-Christian singer Pat Boone on talking about how the magazine traffics in sleaze and also how it has become not as interesting or cutting-edge as it once was (this second point is true - so why does the dismissible freak get this line and not someone more trustworthy?). Berman also has on Susan Brownmiller, a feminist writer, talking about the objectification of women as a counter point to Hef's claim that he is a feminist who has done more to help women gain control of their sexuality than anyone else on earth (an interesting, if unconvincing opinion). The big problem is that Brownmiller is a long-time foe of Hef and they once had a big on-air fight on the Dick Cavett show in the 1970s.
Basically other than these two, the whole film is totally laudatory. Nobody asks what to me is the most important question, which is what the hell happened to the magazine in the 1980s to turn it from an interesting magazine with top-notch writers and a sharp social compass (that also featured naked women) to the current trashy porno mag that has very little in the reading department. Yes, Alex Haley, Norman Mailer, Ray Bradbury and Kurt Vonnegut once wrote for Playboy, but nobody close to them has anything to do with the magazine anymore. At one point Hef suggests that obscenity cases and Jerry Falwell in the 1980s hurt the perception of the magazine, but this is ultimately unconvincing as it's been a long time since then and the magazine is still dull.
My biggest objection is that the film is way too long, running more than two hours. At most this should be a 90-minute movie, spending just a few minutes on each era and coming off as more than just a laundry list of achievements and anecdotes. There is no question that Hef is an important guy who was on the right side and out in front of all of these important issues, but most of the stories in the film I knew from other sources.
I know well that Hef drove to the West Side of Chicago to buy the Marilyn Monroe picture that was on the cover of the first issue; I know that he helped Lenny Bruce out of jail when he was arrested during a stand-up act in Chicago; I know that the Los Angeles Playboy Mansion is a fuckfest and a destination for celebrities. None of this is interesting. I would rather have had more cutting analysis of Hef, like what Dr. Ruth gave 110 minutes into the film.
Stars: 1 of 4
The Extra Man (Tuesday, August 3, 2010) (90)
The Extra Man is a screwball comedy based on a Jonathan Ames book, directed by Shari Springer Berman and Rober Pulcini, who directed American Splendor (and The Nanny Diaries), and adapted by all three. It generally has the neurotic and silly frankness of Ames fare and feels a lot like the Ames HBO show Bored to Death. I don't think it's about as good as the TV show, which is to say not as good as American Splendor (or The Nanny Diaries). It certainly has moments of funniness, but overall takes itself much too seriously and has some very slow streaks, particularly toward the end.
Louis Ives (Paul Dano) is a young man who fancies himself a writer. He moves into an apartment in New York City as the roommate to Henry Harrison (Kevin Kline), an older gentleman who has been a playwright in the past, but now passes his days pretending to be rich and perfecting the art of being the "extra man". An "extra man" is basically a walker, though maybe not necessarily gay. In the context here, Harrison spends his time looking after one woman in particular who is super rich and has a big apartment he would like one day to move into. Louis and Henry co-exist for awhile until Henry begins to teach his young renter how to be an extra man.
Meanwhile, Louis is obsessed with cross dressing and kinky sex and has a low opinion of himself with regard to sex (well, really with regard to everything in life). He has a crush on a cute woman at work, Mary (Katie Holmes), but she has a boyfriend, so he steers clear of her mostly.
One big problem with the film is that there is basically no plot - basically nothing really happens. There are a bunch of scenes where stuff happens, but they don't really push any story along. The film is basically the journey of Louis, but it's really a trip with no particular direction. The film starts out pretty strong and funny and devolves into cheap jokes and dull set-ups.
Aside from all of this, major chunks of the film are not really necessary - like the whole character of Mary, who Louis is not really all that interested in sexually. Other plot points and characters are present, but we don't totally know why.
I have been a fan of Paul Dano in the past, but for reasons I can't figure out, he frequently doesn't pick good roles (ever since Little Miss Sunshine and There Will Be Blood at least). This film has the general feel of a piece he did in 2009 called Gigantic, which was also about a lost twenty-something. That movie was a dud too.
Here Dano is pretty awkward and flat. I guess he's supposed to be awkward, but it's not clear why he stays in the weird situations Henry puts him in. He's sorta passive through the whole film and it's not totally clear why. Kevin Kline, on the other hand, is over-the-top and pretty funny, though the role gets a bit tired by the mid-point of the film.
Really the whole film gets tired by the middle. It feels like the writers ran out of ideas and just kept writing stuff to keep the camera running. That the movie comes out at 105 minutes is ridiculous; at least 15 minutes should have been cut out. Mostly it feels like four consecutive episodes of Bored to Death - but ultimately less funny and more annoying than that. At least those episodes end after about 25 minutes.
Stars: 1.5 of 4
Louis Ives (Paul Dano) is a young man who fancies himself a writer. He moves into an apartment in New York City as the roommate to Henry Harrison (Kevin Kline), an older gentleman who has been a playwright in the past, but now passes his days pretending to be rich and perfecting the art of being the "extra man". An "extra man" is basically a walker, though maybe not necessarily gay. In the context here, Harrison spends his time looking after one woman in particular who is super rich and has a big apartment he would like one day to move into. Louis and Henry co-exist for awhile until Henry begins to teach his young renter how to be an extra man.
Meanwhile, Louis is obsessed with cross dressing and kinky sex and has a low opinion of himself with regard to sex (well, really with regard to everything in life). He has a crush on a cute woman at work, Mary (Katie Holmes), but she has a boyfriend, so he steers clear of her mostly.
One big problem with the film is that there is basically no plot - basically nothing really happens. There are a bunch of scenes where stuff happens, but they don't really push any story along. The film is basically the journey of Louis, but it's really a trip with no particular direction. The film starts out pretty strong and funny and devolves into cheap jokes and dull set-ups.
Aside from all of this, major chunks of the film are not really necessary - like the whole character of Mary, who Louis is not really all that interested in sexually. Other plot points and characters are present, but we don't totally know why.
I have been a fan of Paul Dano in the past, but for reasons I can't figure out, he frequently doesn't pick good roles (ever since Little Miss Sunshine and There Will Be Blood at least). This film has the general feel of a piece he did in 2009 called Gigantic, which was also about a lost twenty-something. That movie was a dud too.
Here Dano is pretty awkward and flat. I guess he's supposed to be awkward, but it's not clear why he stays in the weird situations Henry puts him in. He's sorta passive through the whole film and it's not totally clear why. Kevin Kline, on the other hand, is over-the-top and pretty funny, though the role gets a bit tired by the mid-point of the film.
Really the whole film gets tired by the middle. It feels like the writers ran out of ideas and just kept writing stuff to keep the camera running. That the movie comes out at 105 minutes is ridiculous; at least 15 minutes should have been cut out. Mostly it feels like four consecutive episodes of Bored to Death - but ultimately less funny and more annoying than that. At least those episodes end after about 25 minutes.
Stars: 1.5 of 4
Monday, August 2, 2010
Dinner for Schmucks (Monday, August 2, 2010) (89)
Dinner for Schmucks is a pretty bad movie based on a pretty bad French movie from a few years ago. In it, Tim (Paul Rudd), is trying to get a promotion in his company. One day his boss tells him he can get the promotion if he can attend a special dinner the guys in the office have. The point of the dinner is to bring the biggest freak and loser so that person can show everyone their bizarre skills. Tim agrees to this, despite his girlfriend disapproving of it.
The next day he runs into Barry (Steve Carell) who is an amateur taxidermist who likes to stuff small mice and put them in costumes depicting historical or literary events. Once Barry gets into Tim's life, all hell breaks loose and just about everything that Tim loves or hopes to do is ruined.
The whole film should be about 85-90 minutes long, but this ultimately clocks in just under two hours. The only way this is possible is for tons of endless, unfunny scenes that go on and on for what feels like forever. Most of the film is the lead-up to the eponymous dinner, rather than the dinner itself - making the movie really "The Day Before the Dinner for Schmucks".
I normally really like Steve Carell, but he doesn't work here. He is much too annoying and overdone for me. I guess that's the point - but he was so obnoxious that it was mostly frustrating that nobody punched him in the face or left him on the side of the road in the desert. I get that it's a screwball comedy, but someone who is that annoying can't just pass as being "funny". It's just too hard to believe.
I really only laughed a few times in the whole movie. Some of the office set-up with Rudd and his co-workers is funny and some specific lines are funny (at one point, Barry says that he sleeps in the "fecal" position - that's funny). Most of the film is just stomach-turning and uncomfortable.
Somehow about 30 minutes should have been cut out of this - but you could really cut from anywhere as the story was utterly shapeless. I left the film with nothing but hatred for Barry, which seems to me to be the wrong emotion. I think I'm supposed to feel pity for it. But he seemed totally unapologetic for what he did. This was also annoying.
Stars: 1 of 4
The next day he runs into Barry (Steve Carell) who is an amateur taxidermist who likes to stuff small mice and put them in costumes depicting historical or literary events. Once Barry gets into Tim's life, all hell breaks loose and just about everything that Tim loves or hopes to do is ruined.
The whole film should be about 85-90 minutes long, but this ultimately clocks in just under two hours. The only way this is possible is for tons of endless, unfunny scenes that go on and on for what feels like forever. Most of the film is the lead-up to the eponymous dinner, rather than the dinner itself - making the movie really "The Day Before the Dinner for Schmucks".
I normally really like Steve Carell, but he doesn't work here. He is much too annoying and overdone for me. I guess that's the point - but he was so obnoxious that it was mostly frustrating that nobody punched him in the face or left him on the side of the road in the desert. I get that it's a screwball comedy, but someone who is that annoying can't just pass as being "funny". It's just too hard to believe.
I really only laughed a few times in the whole movie. Some of the office set-up with Rudd and his co-workers is funny and some specific lines are funny (at one point, Barry says that he sleeps in the "fecal" position - that's funny). Most of the film is just stomach-turning and uncomfortable.
Somehow about 30 minutes should have been cut out of this - but you could really cut from anywhere as the story was utterly shapeless. I left the film with nothing but hatred for Barry, which seems to me to be the wrong emotion. I think I'm supposed to feel pity for it. But he seemed totally unapologetic for what he did. This was also annoying.
Stars: 1 of 4
Sunday, August 1, 2010
The Dry Land (Sunday, August 1, 2010) (88)
The Dry Land is a pretty typical returning-to-home-after-war movie that I feel like I've seen a hundred times already (even a few times in the current Iraq war). It really adds nothing to the long line of these films, and falls back on predictable, recycled material.
James (Ryan O'Nan) gets off the plane in El Paso and is met at the airport by his wife Sarah (America Ferrera) and his best friend Michael (Jason Ritter). They drive into the wilds of East Texas and get to their trailer home where their family is waiting to greet him. James has been in Iraq for at least one tour and is now done with his military contract. He gets a job at the slaughter house owned by Sarah's father and slips back into his normal life.
At some point he begins suffering from PTSD and has night terrors and long drinking binges. It seems he was in a convoy that was hit by an IED. He doesn't remember exactly what happened and is dead-set on finding out. To do this he and his best friend Raymond (Wilmer Valderrama) drive to Washington, D.C. so they can talk to a platoon-mate who is there in re-hab and find out more details about the incident.
The story is very tired. Most of it feels like earlier films such as Stop Loss or The Messenger (neither one of those was particularly good, by the way), especially the bizarre decision to drive from El Paso to D.C. (only about 1900 miles... but no sweat - we'll do it in a weekend). Nothing here is new or interesting.
The best part of the film is the acting - which is pretty solid throughout. American Ferrera is fantastic - a big improvement on the shrill comedy she's been doing on television for the past few years. She is very good as a strong young woman who is in a nightmare situation with the man she loves. She's very sweet and lovable too - which is important for establishing their relationship. Ryan O'Nan (who I admit I sorta recognize, but not from anything particular he's done before) is very good in the lead role - at least as good as he can be with the bad material he's give to work with.
Much of the story and many of the characters in the film are not very necessary to the central story. James' mother is played by Melissa Leo, but she is totally not needed for the narrative. The same thing goes for the Michael character who just seems to be extra stuff - and an extra twist ultimately - that is not really important.
I would love for there to be another interesting, intense Iraq movie - like The Hurt Locker. I would welcome such a film. Instead we keep getting banal films about PTSD and how it's hard to re-adjust after fighting. I get it already. It's dull.
Stars: 1.5 of 4
Get Low (Sunday, August 1, 2010) (87)
Get Low is a little movie with a big cast. Felix Bush (Robert Duvall) is an old hermit living in a cabin in the woods in the 1930s. He is crotchety only occasionally leaves his house to go into town, where he generally gets into fights with people there. One day he shows up at the funeral home run by Frank Quinn (Bill Murray) and says he wants to throw a funeral party for himself so he can have people tell stories about him. He offers a ton of money to do it and Quinn and his assistant, Buddy (Lucas Black), agree to help him.
It seems that Felix has a story of his own he wants to tell. He did something bad a long time ago and he's looking to confess to his party and get absolution. Somehow this thing he did has something to do with Mattie (Sissy Spacek), a long-ago lover of his. It also has something to do with a black preacher (Bill Cobbs) who Felix helped at some point.
The whole film is built up for this one big reveal - but when it comes it's utterly unmoving. The pacing of the film, the script (by Chris Provenzano and C. Gaby Mitchell) and the direction of the film (by Aaron Schneider, who seems to have worked a lot previously as a cinematographer, but not much as a director) are all really bad.
There is a string of scenes to open the film that sorta give us some texture of the environment, but don't really move the story along well. Major scenes are framed so badly that you can't see primary characters behind trees or other obstacles. In general the film is not very funny. It's silly at times, but sorta cheap and uninteresting.
In it's best moments it has the feeling of a bad Ealing comedy from the 1950s - but mostly it feels like one of those bad Coen Brothers Ealing-redux movies from a few years ago (Intolerable Cruelty and the Ladykillers). Overall I am impressed that such a big cast would do such a movie - but the final product is not worthy of their big names. It's a very OK movie and nothing totally offensive, but really nothing brilliant.
Stars: 2 of 4
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