Hounddog (2007)

Also known as: The Dakota Fanning Rape Movie. The rape scene is the only thing that I knew about this movie before going into it. It’s always interesting to state your preconceived notions about a film and then how it actually came together. As I was watching it, I kept wondering to myself, “which one of these characters is going to rape her?” it’s like a who done it, but with rape. Is it going to be the abusive father? Is it going to be the boy she kisses all the time? Is it going to be the milk man? Is it going to be her black neighbor? It kept me guessing the whole time. It’s interesting to enter a movie knowing what the most memorable scene is, but no other details.

If anyone didn’t know this was the Dakota Fanning rape movie, I apologize. I think by this point, that fact has leaked into the pop culture swimming pool and everyone knows about it. The same way everyone knew TITANIC showed Kate Winslet’s boobs before they saw it. Those scenes tend to create much more controversy than others. Why is nudity such a big deal? Or rather, why are naked famous people so interesting? It’s the equivalent of wanting to watch a sex tape that your friend is in. You see them all the time (with clothes on) and you wonder what they look like naked. People have a strange familiarity with celebrities and want to see them in a more vulnerable or attractive state.

There is a lot of hoopla about this movie because of the rape scene. Traditionally, rape scenes are never very pleasant to watch on film. I have yet to see a rape scene that was particularly easy to digest, until now. The scene in HOUNDDOG is not graphic at all. It shows a close up of her face as it’s happened (which is really intense), but the scene doesn’t linger. You get the idea, then it cuts. It’s a PG-13 version of a rape scene. Now, I’m not saying it was a lighthearted scene and I felt nothing, there just wasn’t that much focus on it while it was happening. From the hype of this movie, you would think it would be a terrible scene to watch. Something that would make you want to throw up or chop off your penis, but it was not. If you want to see terrible rape scenes, then you should check out I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE or IRREVERSIBLE. I have seen ISOYG and it made me sick to watch. I have not seen IRREVERSIBLE, but I hear it’s very difficult to watch as well. I guess the best word to describe the scene in HOUNDDOG is mild. I am not trying to downplay rape, I am just saying, the movie didn’t deserve as much controversy based on what is actually shown on screen.

Now that we got that out of the way, we can look at the rest of film and analyze it. I was very into this movie as it started, but then my enthusiasm slowly waned. I really liked the first scene and thought it was very well written. It made me think the movie was going to go in a different direction, but it didn’t. Dakota Fanning’s character (Lewellen) says something about how she is going to kill her abusive Daddy and that was a very interesting set up to me. She doesn’t do anything to push that agenda forward though. Sad Face.

Lewellen is obsessed with Elvis Presley and sings his songs all the time. The one she likes to sing the most is Hounddog. This movie is really interesting because it’s an Elvis movie, but it is also an anti-Elvis movie. Lewellen’s black neighbor is always talking about how Elvis is singing other people’s songs that were originally written by black people. That he has hijacked the blues and turned it into something white. He always tells Lewellen to listen to the original and that Elvis doesn’t do an accurate job at representing the blues. To me, this translates as Deborah Kampmeier (writer and director of this project) talking shit on the King. I personally, don’t mind a little shit talk on Elvis. I never saw what the big deal was. He does have good moves though (for a white guy).

There is a deleted scene in PULP FICTION were Mia Wallace asks Vincent Vega whither he is an Elvis man or a Beatles man. Vincent says Elvis. I say Beatles.

HOUNDDOG is not a particularly good film and I think most people want to watch it because of the infamous rape scene (this is what I did). I wanted to be an authority on the movie rather than just hearing about it off hand.

The ending is pretty weak. There is a plot twist that involves a lightning bolt and it is completely farfetched. I would say, see it if you want to be an authority on the rape scene instead of saying, “I can’t say, I’ve never seen it” at parties when the topic of rape films comes up. This conversation has come up with my group of friends. I look forward to having it again, so I can drop some HOUNDDOG knowledge.

Dakota Fanning is impressively good in it though. She has come a long way since UPTOWN GIRLS.

Spice World (1997)

When I was ten years I had the biggest crush on the Spice Girls. I had their album and listened to it all the time with my mom and stepsister. I no longer have this stepsister, my Mom and Bruce got divorced and we moved away. I haven’t seen her since. Want to hear a weird story? One time when her and I were driving around with my Mom, we asked her, “Is it OK for step sibling to get married?” I don’t remember her exact response, but it was something encouraging. I am pretty sure that my stepsister was my first crush. Nothing ever happened… you know…. that involved us playing doctor or something like that, but we were quite fond of each other. I think this taboo romance all began with our mutual affection for Spice Girls. I had never seen the SPICE WORLD movie, but I am so glad that I did. It’s easily one of my favorite movies.

One of my favorite genres is: movies that have bands playing pivotal roles in the story. That is kind of a long name for a genre, but these films include, A HARD DAY’S NIGHT, ROCK AND ROLL HIGH SCHOOL, and now SPICE WORLD!

One of the things that I like so much about SPICE WORLD is how bad the jokes are. A lot of them fall flat, but there is a lot of build up to them. One of the most memorable is when there is a dream sequence showing what the Spice Girls would be like if there were mothers. It went on forever and nothing was particularly funny about it. I just like the idea of all the spice girls showing up to some set, putting on outrageous costumes and trying their very hardest to be funny. It seems like the girls are having a really good time throughout their cinematic adventure, which makes me have a good time too.

There are a lot of really cool cameos in the movie as well. Uhhh….Elton John….. Meat Loaf… Elvis Costello… Roger Moore… what else could you ask for? Roger Moore plays the mysterious “chief” who the Spice Girls manager answers to. He has one of the best lines I have ever heard in any movie.

CHIEF: When the rabbit of chaos is pursued by the ferret of disorder through the fields of anarchy, it is time to hang your pants on the hook of darkness. Whether they’re clean or not.

Does dialogue get any better than this? Sorry David Mamet, but you aint shit. One of my favorite performances is by Mark McKinney (KIDS IN THE HALL) who plays a screenwriter who wants to make a Spice Girls movie. He has all these amazing monologues about possible plot lines for a Spice Girls movie. They have to be improvised. They are just too funny. Those monologues and lines from Roger Moore are so much funnier than anything else going on in the film. It can’t be written by the same writer.

SPICE WORLD is instantly better than a lot of movies because it was made in Britain. It’s technically a foreign film. Yes, that’s right. I am a cultured film viewer who just watched a foreign film about the pressures of success and the importance of girl power.

One of the best sequences in the movie involves the Spice Girls doing a photo shoot. At one point, they all dress up like each other and do impersonations of one another. Those Spice Girls are great because they have the ability to laugh at themselves. This makes me laugh as well.

The Spice Girls were so popular; what happened to them? I just checked their official website and apparently they did one final show in 2008 and no longer tour or record. Now, all we have is a goodbye letter posted up on their website. I wish I could have seen Geri, Mel C, Mel B, Emma and Victoria in their prime, but now I never will. All I can do is watch SPICE WORLD, but dammit, that’s good enough for me.

I don’t know why SPICE WORLD has a 27% on Rotten Tomatoes. I could watch this over and over and over. Mark McKinney’s ending monologue about how he wants to end the Spice Girls movie is absolutely brilliant.

It also has men dancing around in purple thongs. Purple is like, totally, my favorite color.

Let the Right One In (2008)

You know what I haven’t seen in a while? A vampire movie! That’s right. LET THE RIGHT ONE IN is another addition to vampire genre. There is a catch though, it was made in Sweden! I could be wrong, but I don’t think I have seen a Swedish film until now. I was looking at the geography to get a good sense of what Sweden is like. From what I can gather, there is a lot of snow and little sun. The combination of the two make the whitest people you have ever seen.

Netflix classified this movie as horror, but I would disagree. It’s definitely a romance film. Here is the plot. There is a little boy named Oskar (whitest kid I have ever seen in my life) who has a crush on his neighbor. They fall in love (in that little kid sort of way), but then a complication arises: she is a vampire!

I want to take another minute to thank Netflix for all their hard work to bring films like this to my computer screen. I wish I had a job at Netflix where I get to watch movies all day and pick which ones get to be put on instant. Then I get to supervise the transfer to whatever file type it is that runs in the instant player. Boy, that would be a wonderful job.

I also want to take a moment to discuss the use of vampires in film. There are universal truths about vampires that we all except. They live on blood, they burn in the sun, they don’t age, etc. We have never given a proper scientific explanation why these things affect vampires the way they do. It’s just accepted as common knowledge and vampire films rely on this common knowledge. This makes it so the writer doesn’t have to worry about creating rules for this supernatural phenomenon. They have already been defined in countless other vampire films. Now that I think about it, this is kind of a cop out. It’s easy to write a vampire story as opposed to creating your own supernatural human-beast-thing. In my opinion, the best way to use the vampire genre is with allegory.

In LET THE RIGHT ONE IN, there wasn’t much reason to have the girl be a vampire except to make the story a lot crazier (and bloody). Perhaps, it shows that love transcends vampire and human. It promotes interracial love.

There is one vampire rule that I didn’t know before watching this movie, but it is hinted at in the title. Whenever Eli is visiting, she has to be invited in by someone. I didn’t know vampires had to be invited in. That is so polite of them. Then they suck your blood and all politeness goes out the window.

Some little fun facts about the making of the film: Eli’s voice is not done by the actress playing her. It was all dubbed in by a woman who had a more androgynous voice. This makes for a much creepier experience. There aren’t too many cheap scares in the film. It’s never about trying to shock the audience with a loud abrupt sound. It’s a much more subtle experience. Going in, I was expecting to get scarred a lot more than I did. Instead, I found myself saying, “awwww.”

There is so much focus pulling going on in this movie. The way they set up the scenes are so creative and suspenseful. Sometimes, you are never completely sure where you are and it’s very disorienting. Sometimes, there will be really wide shots that hold for a long time then cut to an extreme close up of something. Every shot is composed with so much creativity and attention to lighting. Watching this movie will make you want to shoot something with an 85 mm lens of higher. There aren’t too many wide-angle shots.

LET THE RIGHT ONE is an amazing technical achievement as well as narrative achievement. Watching foreign films give you so many more ideas on how to shoot things than American films. This movie did nothing textbook and it succeeded wildly. I hear the director of CLOVERFIELD is going to do a remake of it. Do we want this? Can there be one foreign horror movie that doesn’t get turned into some American not-as-good-as-the-original bullshit?

Vampires are so hot right now. Even in Sweden.

Gattaca (1997)

Welcome to the world of the “not so distant future.” This is a world where genetic perfection is a must and anyone who doesn’t have the goods is considered subservient. Ethan Hawke plays one such “De-Gene-erate” (as they are called in the movie). His only aspiration is to travel to space, but the powers that be won’t let him because he has shit genes. For whatever reason, Ethan Hawke’s idiotic parents decided to have a regular birth with no genetic modification. They thought they would do the “right thing” and leave things up to chance. What were they thinking? Didn’t they know that would mess up his life forever? No one wants anything to do with these impure beasts. They end up being janitors at the space station, never the astronaut.

GATTACA is the struggle of Ethan Hawke as he tries to trick the powers that be and get into space. He does this with the help of a very drunk Jude Law in a wheelchair. This is one of my favorite Jude Law performances. He is such a drunk, cheeky bastard. Another great Jude Law performance is I HEART HUCKABESS. Check it out, if you have not already. Jude Law’s character (Jerome Morrow) is a “valid” that loans Ethan Hawke his genetically superior blood, hair and urine. It’s a very complex and well-paced film.

One of my favorite details of the film is that the color white can’t be found in the color scheme. It’s as if they set the white balance to gold. The entire film is golden and gorgeous to look at. It gives the impression of the future without having all sorts of crazy sci-fi bullshit (blinking lights, flying cars, etc.). Making a good film about the future is all about the subtle details. All of the technology seems appropriate for the times that they live in. They never give a specific date that the story takes place. It merely says, “the not so distant future.” I like that a lot. To me, that says, “Don’t worry so much about the year, just enjoy the story.” That is exactly what GATTACA does. The focus is not on the world of GATTACA, it’s about the Ethan Hawke getting to space.

Ethan Hawke and Jude Law look a lot a like in this movie. Part of the scam is that Ethan Hawke is masquerading as Jude Law, but no one can tell the difference. All white people look the same. The film has some minor racist subtext, but that’s OK. It would be funny if Andrew Niccol (writer / director of this project) were a black guy and making a comment on how all white people look the same, but that is not the case. He is in fact from New Zealand and wrote THE TRUMAN SHOW. That movie is sooooo white.

In the world of GATTACA, parents can design the traits of their baby (even making them less susceptible to acquiring gambling addictions) and I don’t think we are far from this. In community college, I remember being asked, “If you could, would you genetically modify your baby to make them immune to terminal illnesses and debilitating conditions (like mental retardation, leukemia, etc.)?” I thought long and hard about this and always came to the same conclusion, that I would most likely not. I like leaving things up to chance. I also don’t like the idea of there being a super race of people who live forever. I am most worried about over population. But as we learned from THE FIFTH ELEMENT, we can just keep building up and use flying cars. Hmmm. Now I am rethinking this whole thing. Maybe I do want a super hot heterosexual baby who will become really rich. Then my kid could pay for me to live in a really nice retirement home. I like this idea. Let’s do it!

Well, if GATTACA taught us anything, we should not do this. Then we are creating a world of prejudice and discrimination (that is even worse than now). I changed my mind back to my original position, no genetic modification on my children. I just got caught up in the idea of living in fancy retirement home (you know, one with an indoor pool and dining room).

Did you know the title GATTACA comes from the four nitrogenous bases of DNA? Adenine, Cytosine, Guanine and Thymine. A, C, G, T = GATTACA. Science Fiction Film Noir. I love it!

The Fifth Element (1997)

I want to begin this review with one word: Wow. I had seen bits and pieces of FIFTH ELEMENT (scenes with Christ Tucker and that singing Blue lady), but never the whole thing. Perhaps my favorite part of this movie is that the aliens in it are done with costumes and prosthetics rather than using CGI. There are a few CGI sequences, but they are never too CGI. In some movies, this can be a distraction for me. If it just looks too animated, then I start focusing on that instead of the movie. I think we should do away with CGI and have all effects done on camera. Yeah! Just like in the Méliès days!

Let’s begin with the first thing you notice about a film… the title! This title is very intriguing. One thinks, “what is the fifth element? I know about the 4 elements. Water, Wind, Fire, Earth. Captain Planet taught me that. But, I thought Heart was the fifth element….Wait. Holy shit, I am going to watch Captain Planet clips on Youtube right now. Once sec.”

(Ten Minutes Later)

“Oh man! Captain Planet and the Planeteers! I forgot that all of them are from different countries. Mother Earth is so pissed that humans are messing up her planet. So she sent out five rings to five special “young people.” When they combine the rings, Captain Planet comes to clean up the environment! Al Gore must love this show.”

Anyway, let’s get back to THE FIFTH ELEMENT, one of my new favorite science fiction movies. It’s such a treat on the eyeballs and ears. It also has one of my favorite actors in what I think is his best performance: Gary Oldman. He has the most amazing haircut and gun in this thing. The battle sequences are so great and I don’t really consider myself a “battle sequences kind of guy.” Should I have put that in quotes or should I have italicized it? Maybe I should have done one of those things were-you-combine-all-the-words-with-dashes.

It’s such a fun movie to watch and it also involves Ancient Egypt. I don’t know if you know this about me, but I love Ancient Egypt. It’s my absolute favorite ancient culture. So this gives the movie automatic brownie points with me.

Bruce Willis also does a fantastic job in the film. There is something about Bruce Willis that is so comforting. He is so damn manly and does all sorts of manly shit, but he has such a soft, boy-like face. You just want to pinch his ass and then pinch his cheeks. He evokes both sexual desire and patronizing adages like, “Awwwww! How Cute!” I wish Bruce Willis were my other Uncle. Then Uncle Willem and Uncle Bruce could take me to the zoo. I would make some joke about there being 12 monkeys in the cage and we would all laugh.

Milla Jovovich is also in the movie. It seems to me that this role is something of a Princess Leia for a new generation. I say this because Jovovich wears an instantly iconic and revealing costume through a lot of the film. This is like Leia’s slave suit in RETURN OF THE JEDI. Her charatcer is supposed to be the epitome of what a “the perfect human” looks like. But what’s up with that nappy ass orange hair? Regardless, she did a fine job in the film. You know what? Everyone did an awesome job in this movie. Iam Holm (Bilbo Baggins) plays a priest. Chris Tucker takes his annoying persona to new heights. Luke Perry also shows up for a little bit. Now I am tempted to watch BEVERLY HILLS 90210 clips on Youtube. My Mom watched that show a lot.

THE FIFTH ELEMENT also helped me grasp the concept of flying cars so much more. I have seen flying cars all over science fiction movies, but always thought they had them because it would cool if everything could fly in the future. I see now that flying cars were made because of necessity. This movie takes place in 2214 or some shit like that. There is a casual comment in the beginning of the film about how the population is somewhere near 200 Billion. Uhhh….. what? 200 Billion.

I just found a cool thing on the internet (http://www.ibiblio.org/lunarbin/worldpop) that tells you what the population is currently and what it was like before now. You can choose whatever month, day and year you like. I decided to see how many people have entered the Earth since I was born. The number is somewhere around 1.8 Billion. The current population is almost at 7 Billion. Can you image 28.5714256 x’s the amount we have now? Is there enough land on Earth for such a population? There is! But you have to keep building higher and higher. So now, people NEED flying cars to get where they need to go. It all makes perfect sense now! Thanks FIFTH ELEMENT. I owe ya one.

Also, the opera sequence is one of my new favorite scenes in any movie. So damn good! I love cross cutting and girls kicking butt!

Away We Go (2009)

Does anyone else think this poster looks a lot like JUNO? It has the same art style as the opening credit sequence and it’s about pregnancy. Maybe, the people marketing this movie thought they would cash in on the JUNO frenzy. Anyway, don’t let that fool you because AWAY WE GO is a wonderful, subtle film that deals with pregnancy in a much different (and more interesting) manner. There are never any scenes that revolve around the ins and outs of physically being pregnant. It’s more about where the couple (John Krasinski and Maya Rudolph) is going to start their family. They are miraculously untethered by work, responsibilities, or family (which is the most unbelievable part of the movie) and want to find the perfect place to raise their child.

So away they go! Off to Arizona and then Montreal and then some other places. I must admit, there were about 5 minuets of the film where I fell asleep. I know, I know, weak shit, but it happens. I just drank a Tecate and John Krasinki’s beard was so soothing to look at. The combination was deadly. I feel like John Krasinki’s beard deserves some kind of accolade. He was good in the film, but his beard was dynamite. It made the whole movie. If he didn’t have that beard and it was just regular Jim from THE OFFICE, I would have been so pissed.

I like this movie because:

1) The opening scene involves Oral Sex

2) John Krasinski’s Beard (have I already mentioned this?)

3) Jeff Daniels is in it. He is a scene stealer.

4) John Krasinski’s character reminds me of myself.

5) I like myself quite a bit.

6) It was shot pretty wide (I like seeing that in films. I am finding it more rare these days)

7) It’s very subtle

This movie really caught me off guard at how subtle it was. There weren’t very many loud or complicated scenes. Most of them involved people talking and relied on the strength of the actors and the writing. Dave Eggers co-write the script, so that explains a lot. From what I have read of him (bits and pieces of “Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius”), he is a wonderfully witty man.

Going into the movie, I was pretty certain that Sam Mendes (AMERICAN BEAUTY, JARHEAD, REVOLUTIONARY ROAD) directed it. I was not sure though. As it progressed, it was hard to tell if he had directed it or not. It seemed obvious that he used a different cinematographer, but it’s hard to distinguish his style as a director. The DP for this was Ellen Kuras. I didn’t know who she was before this, so I decided to look her up on IMDB. She is Michel Gondry and Spike Lee’s cinematographer!!! That is wonderful. I feel like I unlocked another piece of information in the universe of filmmaking. I don’t know about you, but I always try to stay conscious of what people have worked on. I am always trying to learn more crewmembers on films. I am going to make this a mission of mine. Learn more crewmembers and what they have worked on! It will all start making more sense!

Sorry, got on a little tangent there. Anyway, watch this movie. I don’t have a bad thing to say about it.

Daybreakers (2010)

You know what I haven’t seen in a long time? A vampire movie! I mean, what happened to these things? They used to be overflowing out of the pop culture swimming pool, now I rarely see them. Seriously, nothing with vampires has come out in the last 3 years. Nothing, until DAYBREAKERS.

On that same note, where are all the zombie movies? I haven’t seen one of those in a while either.

I knew nothing going into this movie. The only thing I knew was that it was about vampires (which I haven’t seen in film for a while now). I did not know it had Ethan Hawke, Willem Dafoe and that guy from JURASSIC PARK (you know, the main guy who hasn’t done shit since JURASSIC PARK). I did not know it was written and directed by a team of brothers. They apparently also did some of the special effects on the movie (which were OK). I had never heard of them before watching the movie so I checked them out on IMDB. There is a reason we have not heard of them.

I feel like every scene in DAYBREAKERS I have seen somewhere else. The opening credit showed media and landscapes as exposition to show what had happened to the world of 2019. I feel like this has been done multiple times in science fiction films. It’s effective, but still, borrowed.

Then there is Ethan Hawke’s character (vampire) that is on the side of the humans. This “outcast” character has been done so many times in futuristic films. The one guy who still has the values of “the way things used to be” living in a world of new, de-humanized policies. The humans have become an endangered species and are now being hunted for blood. The blood supply is running thin and there is a Vampire Army that goes out and finds humans. Hawke’s brother is a soldier in the vampire army. This creates conflict. Oh shit!

Ethan Hawke works for a company that is trying to find a blood substitute so the race of vampires won’t die off. Once the vampires go without blood for a while, they turn into these crazy blood junkies who attack everyone. They are obviously supposed to represent the homeless in America. Blood represents Oil. It’s going to run out at some point, so we need to find alternative energy. This movie is full of allusions to present day problems, but told through the vampire genre. I wish there was a show on HBO that tackled such issues. I feel like it would be very popular. Why don’t they make more vampire movies/shows/books targeted at emotionally immature teenagers? Sitting on a gold mine!

At one point, Ethan Hawke is wearing clothes that oddly resemble Han Solo’s. I found this strange, but also comforting.

We should take a moment to recognize the wonderful Willem Dafoe. I was so pleasantly surprised to see his name in the credits. I was not expecting that. Perhaps, that was the best part of the movie, seeing his name on the screen. When you read the name Willem Dafoe many things come to mind. Perhaps you think about him as the money counterfeiter in TO LIVE AND DIE IN LA. Or maybe you think of him in BOONDOCK SAINTS (the only good part of that movie). Or his immersive portrayal of committed character actor Max Schreck in SHADOW OF THE VAMPIRE. Or as the bi-sexual videographer in AUTO FOCUS. Or maybe his hyper aggressive/sexual performance in David Lynch’s WILD AT HEART. All of these films instantly popped into my head when I read his name. This put me in a good mood. So I recommend putting Willem Dafoe in a film for that reason alone. The guy is unstoppable. I wish he were my uncle. We could hang out and talk about Billy Friedkin, Paul Schrader, Martin Scorsese, Oliver Stone, Wes Anderson, Sam Raimi, the list goes on…

I have no idea if I can recommend this movie. I feel like it was entertaining the whole time through, but also not necessary to watch. My mind didn’t wander too much. It’s a perfect film if my mind doesn’t wander too much. Right before I saw the movie I was watching a lot of DARIA. While watching DAYBREAKERS, I would often have the thought, “I wish I were watching DARIA right now.”

Perhaps you could rent this at some point if you are really jonzing for ANOTHER vampire movie. It was pretty smart in its execution and those Spierig Brother sure put a lot of time into the film.

But seriously, watch DARIA.

500 Days of Summer (2008)

MEMENTO meets ANNIE HALL…. for the new generation! Two of our most beloved indie actors have joined forces to make one of the most indie movies ever! It’s about relationships (we’ve all been in those) told predominantly through the male perspective. Tom (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) works at a greeting card company and the theme of the cards he writes changes with his mood. What a cute storytelling device. I would say the best word to describe this movie is cute. It’s full of cute colors, cute editing, cute situations, cute shower sex scenes (no nudity…. Sorry Dad).

The film is told chronologically out of order and is narrated by the INSIDE THE NFL guy (or at least that’s what it sounds like). This narration style reminded me a lot of LITTLE CHILDREN. That was narrated more like it was a discovery channel program about a herd of antelope rather than people in the suburbs. 500 DAYS had a similar feel, but didn’t have the debauchery, child molestation or castration of LITTLE CHILDREN.

At points, I feel like Gordon-Levitt was putting on his best Hunter S. Thompson impersonation and Zooey Deschanel was just being Zooey Deschanel. There were many parts of the film that were ridiculously identifiable. A big theme of the movie was how the “modern” relationship works. How young adults don’t want to commit to anything too serious and want to leave their options open. Dating still goes on, but it never reaches a serious level of commitment (in a traditional sense). It’s the elimination of ownership and the embrace of being with someone and not having to put a pesky label on it. I know I have said, “No need to put any labels on it.” And I after I watched 500 DAYS I wondered: “Shit, am I being cliché or does this further validate my point?” I could go both ways on the topic. I felt like I had a somewhat original thought when I first said that, but then Joe Gordon-L said it in a movie. If someone says something in a movie (that you have uttered before) does it give you more cred or does it discredit you?

I don’t know. Perhaps 500 DAYS represents the new relationship and the direction things are heading, but I also feel like these ideas have been around as long as people have been doing it with each other. I feel like a lot of people can relate to this movie and the struggles of Joe Gordon-L. One of my favorite details is how un-chauvinistic the Tom character is. Sure, he does call Summer a whore in one of his greeting cards, but that’s beside the point. This movie was written by men though, so it might just be propaganda for them. Not sure. I wonder if the writers got laid because of this movie.

One of my favorite parts of the movie is the title. It’s just such a cute pun. SPOILER ALERT! The girl’s name is Summer and Joe Gordon-L has a 500 day relationship with her (from meeting her, all the way to the end). It’s NOT like the season. Isn’t that cute?

I would say 500 DAYS is an insightful relationship movie, something you should watch with that special someone. Wither you are madly in love or interested in things becoming more “serious,” you should watch it. You should also watch REVOLUTIONARY ROAD, another wonderful movie you should watch with someone if you are giving marriage any kind of thought (and who isn’t?).

Not sure what else to say about 500 DAYS. I would like to watch it again. I watched it with Amy and she has seen it multiple times and loves it. I am sure she won’t mind watching it with me again.

I need breakfast.

Even Dwarfs Started Small (1971)

This is the first narrative from Werner Herzog that I have seen. I did see GRIZZLY MAN (which was amazing), but never one of his narratives. Luckily for me, Netflix has just put of a bunch of his films on instant watch. I know Herzog mostly by reputation and the staggering amount of work he has produced. I know that he ate a boot in Berkeley once because he lost a bet. I thought I would start at the beginning, see his progression as a filmmaker (or some shit like that).

EVEN DWARFS STARTED SMALL (which is an amazing title) is a very unique experience for many reasons, but the one detail that stands out the most is that the entire cast is dwarfs. I am assuming dwarf is the appropriate classification (seeing is how that is in the title). I am never sure about these things. The Netflix description used the term little people. I guess they both work, but then again, I don’t know if Netflix has received any hate male for their insensitive synopsis of EVEN DWARFS STARTED SMALL.

There is a compound where all the dwarfs are held; it’s referred to as an institution. It’s not clear exactly why they are being held there, but the patients are not happy about it. The (potentially insensitive) Netflix description said something about them being in a mental institution, but that was hard to infer from watching it (or I am a complete dumb ass). The inmates stage a coup against the administrators and begin raising havoc. They burn plants, drive a car into a hole, break plates, have food fights, and pick on blind people. They are violent, destructive, jolly, juvenile and free spirited.

The films cuts between the mayhem of the inmates and the worried conversation of two administrators locked inside the complex. Much of the film is shot hand held and looks like a documentary. A lot of the hand held shots are done from a fully-grown adult view point, so it really emphasizes the heights of the characters. There are times when it calls attention to their height and times when it seems like height is irrelevant and we should just focus on the plight of the inmates.

One of the most memorable scenes that calls attention to their stature is when one of the characters tries to climb onto a bed, but can’t make it up. This scene is like 3 minutes long of a little person trying to get onto the bed through a lot of different tactics. He never does get it. Poor Guy.

A lot of times, the film seems to drag. The pacing could be faster, but then again, the focus isn’t on crafting a tightly woven plot, it’s about a specific event. Herzog has a documentary approach to narrative and wants to explore circumstance. I wonder if this style was used specifically for this project or if Herzog does this all the time. It will be interesting to see his other films. I imagine either answer will make him an interesting filmmaker.

I have seen a few foreign films lately that have a lot of cruelty to animals in them and I’m curious if there are different animal treatment laws for film in other countries. All of Jodorowsy’s films (EL TOPO, HOLY MOUNTAIN) had a lot of dead animals in them and so did EDSS. Characters were throwing chickens at people, sitting on dead pigs, and there is even a camel at one point. From what I could see the camel didn’t get hurt, but where the hell did that thing come from?

Apparently when they were filming this, a few of the cast members got hurt in some of the stunts. Most notoriously was when one of the actors got run over by a car. He was fine, but Herzog felt bad about this so he made a deal, “if no one gets hurt for the remainder of the production, I will jump into a cactus.” They finished filming, no one got hurt and Herzog made good on his promise. He jumped into a cactus. That is dedication!

It’s an incredibly interesting film, parts do drag and seem pointless, but the over all picture is worth viewing (at least clips of it). There are a lot of bizarre images that were iconic at first sight. From watching older films, I am learning that a good film can breath and doesn’t have to be edited for the attention deficit audience. It’s easy to get spoiled on modern filmmaking techniques so it’s refreshing to watch a film like this.

Wall-E (2008)

Perhaps my favorite Pixar film! WALL-E is a perfect example how wonderful production and sound design can be superior when using animation as opposed to live action. For about a month now (ever since I saw WALTZ WITH BASHIR) I have been thinking that animation might be the more effective format to making film in. You can manipulate any element in an animated film in a way that is just impossible to do in live action. You can have everything worked out to the last detail; there are no restrictions. I do agree that there is a magic about filming live action that can’t be created on a computer, and I think that’s the point.

Anyway, let’s get down to WALL-E. This is the Pixar movie that isn’t particularly targeted at kids. I feel like there are so many goofy and obnoxious elements to children’s movies that make them “less serious works of art.” Examples of this are: 1) the surfer turtles from FINDING NEMO; 2) Fart jokes; and 3) The entire film CARS. I love children’s movies, don’t get me wrong, but I feel like WALL-E is targeted at a more sophisticated audience that doesn’t laugh at fart jokes.

WALL-E is a science fiction film that deals with an eminent threat: the Earth filling completely up with trash. Wall-E is a robot whose job it is to pick up all this trash and put it into neat little piles. Not only does he have to pick up garbage all the time, but he has the worst luck of any robot I have seen. He is constantly getting beat up by bad luck. If he is in a situation where he could get hurt, he does. It’s like watching a Chaplin with a robot as the tramp. The film doesn’t have very much dialogue for the first half . It relies all on the personality of Wall-E and the visuals. These two elements are strong enough to keep the interest of the viewer (well, my interest anyway. I can’t speak for everyone).

The opening of the film establishes the tone quickly. It starts with “Put on your Sunday Clothes” (something you would expect from a much lighter Disney picture) as we see images of deep space. As we move closer to Earth and see the garbage everywhere, the music begins to fade. From the start of it, it seems like this is going to be a pretty happy flick, but psyche! It’s sad as shit! That just said to me, “this isn’t your average Disney-Pixar movie.”

It’s a very simple, insightful and visually stunning film. It makes me want to jump ship from live action to animated, but I then I remember I have no talent as an illustrator. It would be ideal to work on the production design of an animated film, but actually animating it would be so painstaking. That is the drawback of doing animated film, the amount of work that needs to go into it seems like much more. Perhaps the hours it takes to animate a film are the same as making one in live action (pre-production, production and post combined). This is an interesting question… perhaps Yahoo Answers can help me out once again.

Wall-E meets a new sleek and sexy robot named Eve and falls in love. Eve is obviously something that is supposed to represent how awesome and sexy Apple computers are. It has a smooth white design and even has some of the same operations as a Mac. Once Eve finds the plant sample and goes into “plant” mode, it has a glowing green circle like when Mac computers are sleeping. Well, the Mac thing isn’t green, but it looks the same. You get the idea. And when Wall-E is fully charged from the sun, he makes the Mac start up noise. If you have a Mac, this is making sense to you. If you don’t have a Mac, what’s wrong with you?

I am going to try and squeeze in more movie tonight so I am going to cut this one short. Not sure what I am going to watch.

You should see WALL-E though if you haven’t already. It’s so damn cute and thoughtful. The best thing Pixar has ever done.