Noir-5 Reviews

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

2001 – The year after next

[10/10 · 15 February 1999]

Kubrick has his finger thrust into every pie in this project, even designing most of the special effects (as well as the more mundane: producing and directing). It also bears his trademark; a sinister soundtrack running throughout the film, which regularly reaches unbearable crescendos, before sudden silence

Part one sees a bunch of apes getting the low-down on rapid career development from a 10ft-tall headstone. Thus using a combination of tools, co-operation and a great deal of shouting, they are eventually able to step off-planet. Around this time, another slab is found on the Moon and 20th Century mankind suddenly gets a very real sense of being close to a great and long sought-after discovery (a very 60s notion – all that ‘Age of Aquarius' stuff). I like the shot where the astronauts are crowding round the slab looking very similar (obviously with the addition of spacesuits) to their earlier chimpanzee counterparts

Part two of the movie moves on to tackle AI and whether we're just machines. Great, great cinematography. Hal steals every scene with his Prozac-happy delivery style: `I honestly think you ought to calm down; take a stress pill and think things over, Dave.' Awesome amounts of irregular breathing.

Part three is the final FX sequence followed by the `let's put that thing in a zoo' type ending, with smatterings of reincarnation as Dave becomes Starchild.

Several devices run throughout the film. One is the extensive use of long pauses in the dialogue and the other is the abundant use of distressing sound effects (like the heavy breathing, the chimps screeching, alarms, etc). A possible third being the intense use of colour in deep space. (Though it could just have been showcasing the talents of the new ‘Colourama' processing technique – dunno).

The Apollo astronauts went to the premiere of this movie, before going to the Moon and apparently got a big kick out of it. Although I'm sure it was entertaining, you can't help wondering whether they were just a little freaked by it all. If Neil Armstrong felt a bit of resistance as he pushed the flag into the ground and half wondered whether there was a black slab of granite beneath his feet?

I love this movie. It's visionary, original and plain weird. And the good news is: there's only two years to go.

The Name of the Rose (1986)

Scarey Days...

[7/10 · 12 February 1999]

If you like movies to send you back to another historical period, there are few which can do it more effectively than this one. The period is pre-enlightenment when the only books in the land (Italy) are owned by the different denominations of the Catholic faith. Inquisitions are the order of the day and the atmosphere of mistrust and misrepresentation which accompany such a fragile state, is expertly realised.

Enter Sean Connery playing a Sherlock Holmes (`…Elementary my dear Wat-shun…') from the dark/middle ages, replete with a magnifying glass of sorts and a recognisable system of logical deduction. The story is a fine balance of complexity (easy enough to follow, but not too simplistic) with the inclusion of a number of sub-plots to keep it all ticking along nicely. The acting is very good but what makes it stand out is its evocation of another era, which is reproduced with authority. Highly enjoyable.

Grosse Pointe Blank (1997)

I'm drawing a complete...

[8/10 · 8 January 1999]

Good movie. Particularly the part where John Cusack is using the frying pan to put his point across to the bad guy on the kitchen floor. It's hard not to belly laugh. I thought it took cues from 'Blue Velvet', with its uncommon blend of humour and ultra-violence.

I read that parts of the dialogue were contributed by Cusack and a couple of [real-life] school friends, though cannot confirm this. It's believeable though - for example when he meets the legal guy propping up the bar at the re-union. His offering of the pen, the aside that Cusack should 'read the cap' and asking to use the funny quip - 'they all seem kinda related' - must have been based on a real person. Too sad to be fiction.

Minnie [cab] Driver, Joan Cusack and Dan Ackroyd personalise their performances very well. The support cast were excellent too. The music was an oddly enjoyable mix and the fight sequence with the pen was the most realistic (and exhausting) I'd seen. It was the attention to small detail which swung it in the end though. Cusack's buddy's coke-fuelled, paranoid banter was spot on ("Jenny Slater, Jenny Slater") as was the burning the fingers on the furnace, to name just two random details. The effect of this, is that they all add up to a movie which you can enjoy watching many times. And that makes it a rare gem.