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SCREENING LOG
- 8/26-9/01, 2002
Back to 2002 Index
I watched BEN HUR: A TALE OF CHRIST (1927), LANDSCAPE IN
THE MIST, TASTE OF CHERRY, ZVENIGORA, RED RIVER, THE MAN WHO
SHOT LIBERTY VALANCE, GEORGE WASHINGTON, HAPPY TOGETHER and
DEAD RINGERS. In order of preference:
Taste of Cherry (1997, Abbas Kiarostami) second viewing
http://us.imdb.com/Title?0120265
I got to rescreen this, the most (in)famous of Kiarostami's
masterpieces, at a local revival theater, and the communal
experience added much to my esteem of this film. I haven't
seen so many people hanging out after a movie and talking
in a long time as I did that evening with both my friends
and a few strangers, but I guess that's what that stunner
of an ending is good for, if anything. For the record, the
story follows a man, practically in real-time, as he drives
through the outskirts of Tehran in search of an accomplice
for his own suicide. What appears at first to be a straightforward
depiction of events (and thus dismissable as cinema verite
at its most tedious) blossoms into a totally engrossing, even
suspenseful meditation on personal interactions and moral
choices, not only about the responsibilities of one's life,
but the responsibility one has towards the lives of others.
It is also about such things as the value of life and the
beauty of autumnal hillside landscapes even as they are being
destroyed by urban development, but why ruin a glorious film
with such banal descriptions? Kiarostami's sense of space,
his brilliant essentialist method of storytelling and above
all his rigorous humanism make everything clear enough.
Zvenigora (1928, Alexander Dovzhenko)
http://us.imdb.com/Title?0019611
Of the three Dovzhenko films that are considered his masterpieces
(ARSENAL and EARTH are the others), this, his debut feature,
is at once the most baffling and yet possibly the most accomplished.
I'm not even sure I fully understand the story -- it centers
on an ageless man who knows the location of the Ukraine's
hidden treasures, and contends with various contingents, including
his own sons, to preserve them. Stories are told within stories
and a centuries-long account of Ukrainian history, mythical
origins included, is scrambled to create a dense leapfrogging
exploration of a national heritage. The film's glorious use
of multiple special effects and heart-pumping editing rhythms
kept me enthralled despite my moments of confusion. I look
forward to explore this film further, but for now I appreciate
Dovzhenko's technique: both spirited and spiritual, elusive
yet lyrical, it takes Eisensteinian montage to poetic heights
that transcend propaganda, frees the viewer to explore its
meanings, and gives precedence to all the Russian film poets
to follow, Parajanov and Tarkovsky included.
Ben-Hur: A Tale of Christ (1925, Fred Niblo)
http://us.imdb.com/Title?0016641
The original silent adaptation of Lew Wallace's faux-Bible
story is much preferrable to the bloated 1959 William Wyler
version, if only because it runs half an hour shorter and
is missing Charlton Heston's overbearing jawbone. With the
famous Irving Thalberg overseeing the proceedings, this is
definitely a producer's movie, full of pomp, platitude, showmanship
and spectacle, in the best and straightest Hollywood sense.
I don't know what came over me, but I fell for it every step
of the way (esp. such cheap tricks as conveying Jesus' holiness
by never showing his face, just an outstretched hand here,
a tattered robe there...)
Dead Ringers (1988, David Cronenberg)
http://us.imdb.com/Title?0094964
Jeremy Irons has a field day playing twin gynecologists
who fall for the same woman (a wonderful Genevieve Bujold),
leading to the destruction of their uncommon fraternal bond.
CronenbergÕs quirky style is in full evidence, lending the
bizarreness of the subject matter a dignified gravity while
embracing the materialÕs sordid B-movie allure. The first
hour doesnÕt miss a single step; only in the last act when
the story fixates on the twinsÕ undoing does it seem to have
lost its way. But IronsÕ performance is an undeniable achievement:
he should have won two Oscars for this movie, one for creating
two distinct and compelling characters and another for creating
a rapport between them that is both uncanny and profound.
Red River (1948, Howard Hawks)
http://us.imdb.com/Title?0040724
John Wayne first showed signs of complexity as an overbearing
cattle baron trying to drive his stock from Texas to Missouri,
only to drive his men closer to death each step of the way.
The story works as an allegory for what it took to win the
West: Wayne blazes through the first half of the movie, ruling
with cold-blooded charisma, killing Mexicans, Indians and
anyone else in his path. His embodiment of rugged individualism
inspires both awe and terror until his tyranny becomes too
much for his men to bear. Taken as a whole, it's a terrific
examination of American ideals, questioning the greedy amorality
of Manifest Destiny while espousing teamwork and mutual respect
as the key to American democracy. Startlingly, Hawks jeopardizes
his achievements by throwing in a love interest, leading to
an awkward finale that can best be defended as a camp parody
of macho idealism. I might change my mind, but for now it
didn't quite seem to fit with the rest of the picture.
Landscape in the Mist (1995, Theo Angelopoulos)
http://us.imdb.com/Title?0096288
Having been enthralled by Angelopoulos' magisterial 4-hour
historical epic, THE TRAVELLING PLAYERS, I was expecting the
best of this more recent and no less highly praised work,
whose story follows two Greek children in a futile search
for a father who doesn't exist. Angelopoulos' meditative,
searching style, using long takes and minimal dialogue was
still evident, but the overt symbolism of both the story (a
generation bereft of personal or national history) and the
many loaded images that decorate the storyline didn't excite
me so much as they made me think of other European filmmakers
who have trod this path (Antonioni, Fellini, Tarkovsky, Kieslowski).
There's even an explicit reference to THE TRAVELLING PLAYERS
that only reconfirmed my suspicion of recycled elements. It's
a fine-looking film, and sure seems to be saying something
important about the current state of European society, but
it seems less singular than his earlier breakthrough, which
I found more extreme, more challenging and ultimately more
rewarding.
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1960, John Ford)
http://us.imdb.com/Title?0096288
A U.S. senator (James Stewart) reflects on the event that
made him a popular hero, divulging the truth of what really
happened when, as a geeky lawyer from the East, he stood up
to the local villain (Lee Marvin). Ford offers a deconstruction
of western myth-making that somehow doesn't seem all that
profound in the end given the thick brush Ford uses to paint
his moral picture of the rule of law vs. the rule of might;
Ford keeps rubbing Stewart's face in his own wimpiness, and
the incessant mugging of his stock company doesn't help matters
(Lord spare me from another simpering performance by Andy
Devine). Maybe the hyper-cartoonishness of the people and
the fakeness of their frontier town is supposed to figure
into the metafictional aspects of Ford's project, but I found
it to be a grating experience. The only person who rises above
the fray is John Wayne, who here seems to walk through the
movie like a ghost, completely relaxed and self-assured with
who he is, and yet his every gesture betrays an awareness
of his impending obsolescence. It is a profoundly moving performance.
George Washington (2000, David Gordon Green)
http://us.imdb.com/Title?0262432
There's much to like and much to suspect in this debut feature
about kids in a mixed race community who try to cover up the
death of one of their peers. It invites comparisons with DONNIE
DARKO, another impressive but overdressed debut feature also
centered on a kid with a superhero complex. While shallowness
of insight is as plain as day in DONNIE DARKO, here it is
buried in a digressive narrative cloaked in pensive jazz music.
I enjoyed the North Carolina community being explored and
there were some moments of genuine beauty; I even think the
meandering storyline was on to something new and promising.
But even these kinds of innovations require a certain cohesive
power of personal vision, something that I think this film
comes close to achieving but ultimately lacks.
Happy Together (1997, Wong Kar-Wai)
http://us.imdb.com/Title?0118845
Two gay Chinese lovers reach the death throes of their stormy
relationship while slumming in Argentina. Of the six Wong
Kar-Wai features I've seen, I consider this the weakest, a
prime case of his typically refreshing anything-goes style
gone off the tracks (he may have felt the same, since his
following film IN THE MOOD FOR LOVE demonstrated a newfound
sense of form). This manic affair was considered upon its
release as some kind of response to Hong Kong's handover to
Communist China, but I wouldn't be nearly so generous with
this interpretation. The couple's search for the southern
tip of the country, known as "the end of the world" may be
read metaphorically as the dead-end options for Hong Kong,
but aside from this overwrought symbolism the film has no
clear sense of its surroundings -- though that in itself may
be indicative of the claustrophobic state of mind inhabited
by its leads, not to mention the director. A petulant and
shallow Leslie Cheung seems to be parodying his role in the
much preferred DAYS OF BEING WILD, and not even the formidable
talents of Tony Leung Chiu Wai can lend much weight to the
proceedings. There's lots of flailing, lots of posturing,
and not a whole lot of insight into people or places.
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