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Reviews
Oppenheimer (2023)
Impressive
I saw this in IMAX. Though most of the film consists of people talking and talking and talking...it is never dull and it held my attention for the entire 3 hours. The film is also LOUD. The soundtrack is overpowering and extremely emotionally manipulative. It's as if the composer was asked to illustrate in sound how the audience should feel at every single moment. It made me think of opera...specifically Richard Wagner's theory of the Gesammtkunstwerk where all of the arts work together to provide a super sensory experience beyond any reality. The sound (or music) is meant to communicate with your subconscious as opposed to your conscious mind. But I sometimes became all too conscious of the soundtrack and found it distracting. That's why I rate this film at an eight. Nevertheless this is a must-see film and I thank the filmmakers for giving us something very worth watching.
Tár (2022)
A fascinating puzzle of a film that rewards multiple viewings-SPOILERS
This is a movie in the Stanley Kubrick tradition in that it is challenging, works on different levels and reveals new insights on each viewing. I think this will be a classic some day. But it is not easy viewing.
Here are some random thoughts I've had after two viewings...
The opening text exchange between Krista and Francesca: On first viewing I assumed it was Krista who was still in love with Tar. But after studying it closely I think it is actually FRANCESCA who is still in love with Tar. That then explains Francesca's odd behavior around Tar and the doodles she makes such as Tar/Rat. That also gives her character much more motivation to destroy Tar (which she does.) Krista, who I originally thought committed suicide due to her rejected love for Tar actually killed herself because her career was sabotaged.
I was on the fringes of the classical music world in NYC socially. I found Blanchette's portrayal of such an accomplished conductor completely unconvincing. The way she talked did not sound to me like someone who really lives and breathes classical music. So I thought her acting from that perspective was pretty bad. But maybe it was deliberate? Tar is such a phony. Was she even really friends with Lenny or did she just know him on videotape? I suspect that some of her dialogue might even be lifted from some of Bernstein's television shows. Was she, dare I say it, a beneficiary of what we call "equity" today? Did she get to where she was partly because she was a woman? Also, during the early "Inside the Actor's Studio" style interview she is treated more like a celebrity than an artist.
The movie opens with closing credits and some beautiful music I believe that Tar had recorded during her stint in Peru. The fact that she spent those years in Peru was the one truly likeable/redeeming aspect of her character. So while the film is kind of like a classical tragedy where an exalted human being crashes to earth via their own behavior, the truth is that THIS IS A MOVIE WITH A VERY HAPPY ENDING. The person Tar becomes at the end of the movie is the person she was before all the BS of success turned her into a monster. Her downfall has saved her. She is a very likeable person at the end...one who is not too proud to take on such a "demeaning" job and who treats it with the same enthusiasm she gave to Mahler. I think that those who think the ending is sad or a punishment are missing the point. Which brings us back to the closing credits being at the start. If you think of the movie playing backward from the end to the beginning, it is the story of a good human being being turned into an absolute monster. So the movie is a tragedy when played backward which is why the ending credits are at the start. But played forward the movie is actually not a tragedy. It is a story of redemption.
I have the feeling I will be analyzing this movie for the remainder of my life!
Avatar: The Way of Water (2022)
Yawn
I went to see the original Avatar a dozen years ago in 3D. Unfortunately I could not get the 3D glasses to work over my prescription glasses so I had to watch the movie as a 3d blur. Nevertheless I did find the film interesting and engaging and I imagined that it would have been really awesome in 3D. So I was really looking forward to seeing the new Avatar in IMAX 3D because I heard that they had 3D glasses that now worked much better with prescription glasses.
After about 10 previews of upcoming superhero movies at the IMAX the new Avatar movie started. The 3D really worked. I had no trouble at all seeing the images. But after a few minutes the novelty wore off. I found the 3D did not add much of anything at all. In fact it started to look really cheesy and I was surprised at how phony it all looked. After 10 minutes I realized that I had not paid attention to any of the dialogue or characters and had no idea what was going on. It was a lot of talk, talk, talk but completely unengaging.
I nodded off a couple of times and 45 minutes into the film I left and went home. So I really did not see this movie. Maybe it got more interesting as it went along. So I'm giving it a generous 5 based on what I saw. I am never going back for another Avatar. And I will avoid all 3D for the near future.
The Banshees of Inisherin (2022)
Samuel Beckett is Back in a Bloody Way
This movie is almost beyond description. It is funny in the most deadpan way. Much that happens to the characters is not really believable. (That, I guess, is what makes it a comedy.) But the overall impact is existential. This movie questions the meaning of life in a profound way.
I think the author wrote this as a parable of the Irish Civil War in the 1920's. But it goes way beyond that into universal territory. I keep thinking of Samuel Beckett's "Waiting for Godot." Like "Godot" it is funny but bleak. Unlike "Godot" it has some shocking violence and raw emotion. But again, like "Godot," the overall impact is devastating.
I think that Beckett had Laurel and Hardy in mind when he wrote "Godot." And the two main characters in this film are also L&H-esque. One is dimwitted and the other thinks he's more important that he is. Whatever!
This film is heads and tails better than anything else released this year.
The Fabelmans (2022)
A bit shallow and self indulgent
Once on some TV awards program a decade or so ago Leonardo DiCaprio was presenting an award to Martin Scorcese. In his speech Leo equated Scorcese with the great geniuses of all time and said that Scorcese's name would be uttered in the same breath as Shakespeare and Beethoven.
From his seat in the audience Scorcese shook his head with embarrassment and disbelief. When he got to the stage to accept the award he disavowed DiCaprio's comparison and said that film is a collaborative medium calling for the contributions of dozens of creative talents from writers, composers, cinematographers, editors, etc. A director is not writing Hamlet or a Beethoven symphony.
I kept thinking about Scorcese's comments while watching this film. This movie is expertly made and I enjoyed it. But I also found it self-indulgent and ultimately shallow. Stephen Spielberg is talented, but he is not a complex or deep artist and thinker. And the story of his childhood/youth is actually kind of ordinary.
Though it all may be much ado about nothing it is still the work of a master filmmaker and worth seeing. The cast is fantastic. And Michelle Williams is a revelation.
West Side Story (2021)
Somewhat disappointed. But maybe it's me.
I know West Side Story very well. I first heard the score back in the early 1970's. I tuned in to the 1961 version a few days ago on TCM and was surprised at how well it stood the test of time. Based on the general critical reception I was expecting Spielberg's version to knock my socks off. It didn't.
Going in to a movie with big expectations and/or pre-conceptions is not fair to the film. I plan to go see this again in a few days at a theater with better sound...possibly IMAX. One of my disappointments was that the sound at my theater, though pristine, seemed slightly muted. The orchestrations didn't pop. I kept wanting to turn up the volume so that the music could have more visceral impact. After all, when all things are said and done, it is Bernstein's amazing score that makes WSS great.
I therefore found the movie a bit long, overproduced and overthought. The sets and camera work seemed to be competing for attention with the music. This WSS reminded of the 1971 film version of Fiddler on the Roof. On Broadway Fiddler was a funny, charming, earthy and ultimately moving experience. To me the film was bloated, pretentious and self-important.
That being said, one of the people I saw the movie with had never seen any version of WSS. He thoroughly enjoyed the film. I think his reaction to the film is probably more valid than mine because he came with no preconceptions.
Other comments: the acting was excellent. The actress playing Maria was perfect. I found the actor playing Tony to be a huge improvement over the 1961 version. In fact the development of the Tony character was probably the best thing about the film. The Anita actress was excellent but not better than Rita Morena in 1961. Rita Moreno in 2021 was kind of a disappointment...though it's hard to believe she's 90 years old.
My final thought is that this film may grow in stature as time goes by and become a classic. Or not.
Gutfeld! (2021)
Edgiest show on TV and probably the best.
I'm a former Democrat who for 25 years couldn't watch Fox News for more than a minute without my blood pressure going through the roof. Now I feel that way about CNN and MSNBC. This is not your father's Fox News. GUTFELD is risky, edgy, outrageous and smart as hell. Greg's jokes come at you like a machine gun. It sometimes takes a second to "get it" but when you do you laugh like hell. He often goes right up to the line and then crosses it. It is SO refreshing in this time of wokeness, cancel culture and political correctness. GUTFELD is the antidote to all that.
I think that Greg is our time's John Stewart's and I will bet that Stewart watches the show. It makes any other late night show on today seem fake, phony and lame. Who would have thought that Fox News would be breaking the barriers of television comedy? If Greg represents the new generation of "conservative" then that's where I belong. He's a true free thinker with truly diverse views and opinions. Would highly recommend any "liberals" who would never watch Fox to give this show a try. It will strike you as weird at first but give it a chance. This is what comedy is supposed to be.
Mank (2020)
This movie needed a writer like Herman Mankiewicz
Dull, pretentious, self-important biopic that lacks the energy and wit that were Mankiewicz's trademarks. The real Mank wouldn't allow his name on the credits of this one.
A Clockwork Orange (1971)
A Report from the Original 1970's Release
I was 16 or 17 and going to boarding school in Pennsylvania. I had to take the train into Philadelphia by myself in order to testify about some theft that happened at my school (someone stole my stereo!). I had some free time and I sneaked into a theater for the first afternoon showing of this film. There had been some publicity in Time Magazine with racy pictures, so I had heard about the film. I was amazed that I was able to get in because it was rated X and I had never seen an x-rated film before. I was shaking with guilt and anticipation. There was practically no one else in the theater.
As soon as the first note of the soundtrack started and the orange titles began to appear rhythmically with the music I was riveted. I couldn't believe how musical this film was and how the music and images worked as one. Images I had never, ever imagined popped onto the screen. The make-up on Alex, the costumes with the cod pieces, the naked milk figures. Suddenly a naked woman appeared. I had never seen a naked woman in a moving picture before, only in Playboy and Penthouse magazine! Then all of the violence. And all of it choreographed so perfectly to the music. It was a completely foreign world...but so incredibly stimulating! My heart was pumping with absolute joy. I had never seen anything so exciting in my life. The dancing Jesus, the snake and the vagina, the bouncing penis sculpture, the Beethoven statue smashing a face, the scissor stripping of the woman, Singin in the Rain...I was absolutely intoxicated.
By the end of the film my life had been changed. This was the first entertainment that I had ever seen that stimulated all of my sense and moved me to the core. For years after I replayed the movie over and over in my head (this is before VCR's) using a book with the script and black and white pictures from the film and the soundtrack LP.
Now, over forty years later, I still like the film very much but it is not in my top ten. It really tapped into my adolescent mindset back in the 70's, but as I grew older and focused more on the story and message it was not as interesting. However, to me this film was pioneering, particularly when it comes to music videos which it anticipated and which developed many years later.
My first love in life now is classical music. Only music can move me the way Clockwork Orange did when I was a teen. The music in Clockwork Orange helped give it it's power over me and sent me on a lifelong journey into the world of classical music. Kubrick was brilliant when it came to using classical music...but in a way it is cheating. Without classical music, 2001, Clockwork Orange and Barry Lyndon would not be as great as they are. So I thank Kubrick, Beethoven, Purcell, Rossini, Elgar and Wendy Carlos for A Clockwork Orange.
The Shining (1980)
The Director's New Clothes
Stanley Kubrick is probably my favorite film maker. Dr. Strangelove and 2001 are on my top 10 list. Clockwork Orange blew my mind when it first came out. I think Barry Lyndon is a visual masterpiece. But The Shining has always struck me as "the director's new clothes"
a film that forces me to question whether Kubrick was really a charlatan.
I remember being at a bookstore back in the late 70's and seeing a paperback book called The Shining with the tag line "soon to be a Stanley Kubrick motion picture." I immediately grabbed it and devoured it in a day or two. I had never heard of the author and I had never experienced such intense horror while reading it. I absolutely could not wait for the film to come out.
I imagine that Kubrick must have had a similar reaction to the book which is why he bought the rights. The advertising for the film promised a horror roller-coaster: the blood pouring from the elevator, the creepy girls, Jack Nicolson with the ax, the boy and mother running through the maze in the snow. But when I sat there at the first showing the movie just never took off.
Was it me? Had I been expecting the book? Shouldn't I have known better than to expect a faithful adaptation from an iconoclast like Kubrick? But the screenplay seemed amateurish and way over thought. The whole production struck me as an attempt to create big effects with music and sound to cover up a complete lack of substance.
What went wrong? I think that Kubrick picked the wrong book in his attempt to recreate movie horror in the same way that he redefined science fiction with 2001. I'm guessing that he was bowled over by the book and committed to it before really thinking through whether it was the right material for his style. Once he started working on it and trying to break it down to its essentials (throwing out half of the book in the process), he found that the "bones" of the piece just didn't work.
So, in essence, Kubrick became the character Jack at the typewriter, struggling to create something but going mad in the process. To me, Kubrick's Shining is the cinematic equivalent of "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy."