The Filmcake

May 16th – May 22nd

The Searchers — This is quite possibly the first John Wayne film that I’ve seen in its entirety. My film knowledge is sadly lacking when it comes to Westerns. So, this was a perfect film to kick off our Westerns Marathon. It is problematic, for sure. But I also think it’s pretty great.

I loved those outdoor shots. Of course those grand shots just made the ones shot on a sound stage look all the more fake and small. And I didn’t really care for Mose and Charlie all that much…pretty much solely based on they way they sounded. I can see those characters as a product of the time though. But John Wayne really surprised me. Sure he’s got his drawl…but I think it totally works here. I figured I’d hate him but I quite liked him.

Of course Ethan Edwards is despicable. But the key for me is viewing the film as a post-war film. The circumstances are left vague. We know that he apparently fought on the side of the Confederacy….but didn’t surrender (or didn’t fight?). We know there was a gap between the end of the civil war and his return home. According to Wikipedia, the medal he gave to Debbie was a Mexican Revolutionary War medal. Does that mean after the war he fought in that war as well? Given that he is in possession of a bunch of money that doesn’t have a mark on it, could he have been a paid mercenary or perhaps he just stole it (he admitted that being sworn in as a Texas Ranger wouldn’t be legal).

At any rate, it all creates a morally ambiguous sort of fog of war. At this point, he’s seen blacks and whites, Union soldiers and Confederates, French, Spanish, Mexican, and Native Americans. I don’t think he really knows who he is supposed to hate anymore…who the everchanging enemy is. The only thing he has is family…and that was ripped away from him. I think by the end he has learned that his niece is worth saving.

I Spit on Your Grave — Quite disappointing. The original controversial 1978 version is much, much better. It kicked the audience between the legs, made them feel complicit, and then cautiously urged them to root along with the revenge. This one just seems like someone wanted to make more of a Saw ripoff than a film that questions the role of the viewer and of gender. Maybe the acting was terrible in the earlier version, but it is horrendous here. The girl is okay, but the rest of the cast was disappointing. Maybe the gloss of a newer film just makes it more pronounced.

The Fighter — A not disappointing but not entirely impressive movie from David O. Russell. Sure it’s a boxing movie that isn’t really about boxing (hint: it’s about family). It’s good. Christian Bale is wonderful as is his norm. And Marky Mark is kinda believable as a boxer. Otherwise, it was just one of those good movies that you could recommend to anyone but probably won’t remember or care about too much later on.

January 25th – January 31st

I Spit On Your Grave, Peeping Tom – A couple of films I sought out after reading Carol Clover’s Men, Women & Chainsaws book. The first is a rape-revenge movie from 1978 that Roger Ebert described as a “vile bag of garbage.” In his 1980 review, he also described it as “so sick, reprehensible and contemptible” that he couldn’t believe respectable theatres were even screening it. He also equates the rapes in the film with the revenge that is taken. That was thirty years ago and there is no indication that he has had the inclination to revisit the movie. While I wouldn’t call this movie feministic, it’s also not as vile as Ebert (of 1980, at least) would have you believe. Identification of the audience with the rapists and the revenge-taker are more complicated. At any rate, Camille Keaton’s Jennifer is certainly an antecedent for Tarantino’s women of late–the girls of Death Proof, Kill Bill’s Beatrix Kiddo, and even Shosanna in Inglourious Basterds.

Peeping Tom was another film rich in controversial history. After its release, the movie was panned so harshly that it essentially destroyed director Michael Powell’s career as a director in the UK. Thankfully, Martin Scorsese championed both the director and the film to give them both a second chance. Watching it now, the movie seems so obviously “important.” It says so much about voyeurism, scoptophilia (“the morbid urge to gaze”) and the cinematic gaze. This is what viewing (and making) movies is all about.

Gomorrah – A mafia movie that quotes Scarface but doesn’t bother to be just another rip-off of The Godfather and Goodfellas. It is a slice of the horror that The Comorra has wrought. But ultimately it is a critique of capitalism and of Western notions of power (and more tangentially of the American wars in the Middle East). Success (or wealth) isn’t a matter of intelligence, or of good conquering evil. It is a matter of who has the more powerful gun. And all of us who participate, who share in its riches, are complicit. There is no escape.

Fight Club – There’s a lot that could be said about this movie. I find it kind of maddening myself. It’s about one thing. And then it’s about another entirely different thing. While it says something, I’m not sure thatsomething is consistent. Or maybe that inconsistency is what the movie is trying to convey–our identification and authenticity are as confused and fragmented as The Narrator’s (Edward Norton) mind.

Objectified, Scenes From a Parish - A couple from PBS’s Independent Lens. I was a little disappointed with Objectified, Gary Hustwit’s follow-up to his excellent Helvetica doc. This one wasn’t nearly as enlightening or entertaining as that one. Scenes From a Parish was a bit of a surprise. It was roughly about a priest’s attempt to bridge the gap between two different groups of parishioners whilst trying to get a soup kitchen built. If it weren’t for the religion and parishioners, maybe church wouldn’t be so bad…

The Room - Ahhh, it never gets old. I just hope I manage to attend a midnight screening of it at some point. In the meantime, kindly put your comments in your pocket.

Blindness - Eck. This seemed like a movie that was trying way too hard to convey a message. But what that message was is unclear. It just seemed like the work of a naive, untalented hack with a dangerous streak of earnestness. As soon as the surgical scissors were introduced I wanted nothing more than to stab out my own eyes. I’m guessing it was trying to say something about humanity (or government) or something. But since the messages it was sending out were conflicting and confused, it didn’t actually end up saying much of anything.

A Boy and His Dog – Now this was a genuine surprise…and almost made up for the awfulness that was Blindness. Up until a couple weeks ago, I hadn’t really been aware of this movie. Manohla Dargis’s made reference to it in her review of The Book of Eli, calling it another “post-apocalyptic fairy tale.” Give me a dog and a post-apocalypse and I’m SO there. I immediately added it to my queue. And, then last week I saw where it was going to be shown in Los Angeles as part of a double feature with the documentary Waiting for Armageddon (which I am also very eager to see). Well, that just shot it straight to the top of my queue. And what a delight! And with a young Don Johnson. Wow. I could certainly see a remake of this–if only so the female character (Quilla) could be better constructed. Not that every old movie needs to be remade…

Big Fan - A decent little movie starring Patton Oswalt as a devoted New York Football Giants fan. It’s not a great movie, but it has some nice moments. One thing I realized is how similar geeks are to sports fans. It’s all just a matter of what you geek out over. You could easily replace comic book guy with sports talk radio guy and still be talking about essentially the same person.