Annie -- Leaping Lizards Annie is a prisoner in an orphanage presided over by a mean and silly drunk played to perfection by Carol Burnett. Somehow the legendary orphan winds up in the all-singing and dancing mansion of the legendary billionaire Oliver "Daddy" Warbucks who instantly falls for her limitless charms. Annie persuades Warbucks to stop being a reactionary Republican and charms him into joining FDR's New Deal. The movie catches a lot of the social optimism of the Roosevelt period, there are few nasty villains around but the indomitable Annie always triumphs. Another Stakeout -- A cop comedy, staring Richard Dreyfuss, where most everything goes wrong in a mildly funny slapstick way. Two cops and a female DA are trying to locate the whereabouts of a missing witness in a big Federal trial and so is the mob. And one of the cops is trying to resolve some "issues" with his girlfriend. The film teaches us that men should be more sensitive to their feelings and that no one can trust the government because it might be in league with muderers. "Another Stakout" offers nice shots of Vancouuver BC's Gulf Islands and some cute full face shots of likable dogs. Auto Focus -- Bio flick about poor Bob Crane once famously known as Hogan of Hogan's Heroes - the improbable TV comedy about a Nazi Prisoner of War camp in Germany. It's all about the permanent rebellion of the prisoners against their would be masters. Crane never had a second hit. The film suggests it's because of the typical Hollywood corruption's and Crane's relentless sexual addictions which were so publicized they made him embarrassing and unbankable. He had a falling out with a friend - the guy probably murdered him. A very sad story. If Crane had only opted for the porn film industry he would probably still be with us.
Bad Santa -- A film which definitely does not put the Christ back in Christmas. It opens on a department store Santa (played by Billy Bob Thornton) in his disheveled costume getting drunk at a bar, and then going out to the ally for a good puke. 'Billy Bob Santa' is really a safe cracker who works on Christmas for the sole purpose of robbing department stores in partnership with a hot tempered and dangerous dwarf - the brains of the gang. Along the way, Thornton somehow acquires a likable Jewish girl friend and then bonds with a lonely, overweight and parentless rich kid who is regularly beaten by bullies. Will Santa stick to his criminal ways or will his better angels prevail? This is a dark and funny movie about an everyman loser who might finally be getting a lucky break. BASEketball -- A completely silly, vulgar and occasionally funny satire of professional sports with two slacker losers inventing a game that combines features of basketball and baseball. This catches on in the major league and revives the notion that sports should be fun and not just played for money, sex and fame. But the usual evil capitalist is on hand to corrupt everything. Don't worry about it though, the liberal plot is totally predictable. The Big Chill -- First seen in the early 80's, it features a weekend reunion of 1960's SDS-like militants attending the funeral of their old pal and former radical leader who has mysteriously committed suicide. (My friend Phil Ochs had already taken this final step, but Abbie Hoffman was still among the living.) The ex-radicals are almost all doing quite well, including a famous TV actor, and the owner of an expanding sneaker company called "Running Dog." Of course, they spend a very stoned, super sexual/musical weekend comparing the present with the past. Paradise has been lost, but restored friendships, and acts of kindness may be a working substitute. What amazes me about this film is the way it gets the small things right - the body language, the expressions, the music and dope. (I know what those post-suicide weekends can be like.) The presentation of the fallen leader's leather jacket to the gang's last rebel, a present day drug dealer, should enter the 60's icons and images history books. Black Samurai -- 70s flick featuring Jim Kelley with his considerable martial arts skills and athleticism. Black Samurai frees a damsel in distress locked up in a Mexican tower, and takes on the evil white Warlock. Black Samurai looks a bit like Huey Newton in his prime, and the Warlock looks a lot like George W. Bush on a bad day. Blood and Orchids -- A three hour made for TV movie about a racist trial in Hawaii in 1937. Based on history, four natives are falsely accused of rape - a rape of the daughter of one of the most powerful people on the Island. Lots of interesting history and sociology are worked in- as well as some beautiful shots of what it all must have looked like before it became so commercial. The Blob -- Not the original but an OK remake. What seems to be a comet hits close to a small Midwestern town, and a life sucking blobish monster is brought to earth. [Why doesn't the comet ever hit a Jewish neighborhood in Brooklyn? We never had any fun.] We think it's an ET but big surprises are in order. The Blob's most tenacious enemies are the town resident juvenile delinquent and the home coming queen. Romeo and Juliet taking on the evil slime as they fall in love. Keep a good eye out for evil government scientists. Bread And Tulips -- The Italians still know how to make romantic comedies with anarchist undertones. And as a bonus they throw in Venice. Brother Bear -- An animated Disney retelling of a NW Canadian Indian myth about a young man whose Totem is the bear of love. He kills a bear so the magical Northern Lights transform him into a bear, and he has to go on a spiritual journey to discover his true identity. The animation is spectacular and carries the story very comfortably. Best comic relief? The Brothers Canadian Moose eh? They would spend their days drinking Molson and watching hockey, if such behavior were permitted in a land of legends. Brother From Another Planet -- John Sayle's compassionate film about a run away slave from an unknown planet who puts down in Bed-Sty Brooklyn finding support and protection against men in black (the originals) who come hunting for him. The Brother also takes on the local drug problem. Bubba Ho-Tep -- This might have been the most ridiculous movie since Attack of The Killer Tomatoes. It features Elvis Presley and JFK, who are dumped into an old folks home in Texas that is under murderous assault by an Egyptian mummy. To make matters even nuttier, JFK is played by Ossie Davis, the legendary Black actor. What is truely shocking is that the film turns into an insightful presentation of how old people and their souls are cruelly discarded. It's also about the spiritual healing powers of rebellion and heroism. And most surprising, is the very accurate description of how the real Elvis threw away his soul and body - and finally, his life. Bull Durham -- The classic tale of minor league baseball where the players are either heading upwards or sinking fast. Nobody remains in the same place for very long. For a baseball film, this movie actually reveals a lot about baseball, how to play it well, and how not to. It also conveys a bit of wisdom -- the big leaguers with their multi million dollar contracts are the superior athletes but truth is, many of them are only a little bit better than the guys in the minors who work for Wall-Mart in the off season. Burn -- Staring Marlon Brando and directed by Gillo Pontecorvo, who also created the legendary Battle Of Algiers. Brando plays an early 19th century aristocratic Brit version of a CIA agent who arrives on a Caribbean Island ruled by Portugal that still practices slavery. Brando stirs up the Black masses to revolution, selects and mentors their leader and then steals their triumph by giving power over to a wealthy cabal of pro-British plantation owners. But slavery is abolished and the Island is freed from Portuguese rule. It seems like a net gain. Ten years later Brando returns, this time working directly for the sugar companies and charged with capturing and killing his former Black pupil who is now leading a people's rebellion against sugar capitalism. Burn offers a great score and fantastic visual portraits of the oppressed, especially their smoldering faces of rage. Brando does a great job creating an opportunist with some humanistic streaks, who degenerates into a full blown mass murderer but is also honest enough to admit his crimes. I last saw this film in a 1970s Harlem movie theater. As the screen brutality against the black rebels grew increasingly brutal, I could hear considerable girding of loins and gnashing of teeth from the all Black audience. I am very blonde so at movie's end, I left the theater quickly and before the lights came on!
Calendar Girls -- The cinematic retelling of a true story about a bunch of bored Yorkshire club women who get an exciting idea. To raise some money in honor of the beloved and recently deceased husband of one of its members. The middle aged women will distribute a photo calendar tastefully and somewhat shyly displaying themselves in the nude. All profits will go to buying a comfortable waiting room sofa for the hospital in which the husband passed away. The town goes wild and so do the rulers of the women's club and some of their husbands but the calendar is a popular and financial triumph and the women are headed to Hollywood to appear on the Jay Leno Show. Will success spoil them? Calendar Girls is witty, insightful and touching, and the aging women turn out to be very beautiful indeed. The film also contains some magnificent views of the equally beautiful Yorkshire countryside. The famous calendar raises enough money to buy a sofa and a new cancer wing for the hospital.
Captain Zoom In Outer Space - It's the early 1950s and
Captain Zoom is a popular hero on the newly created Dumont TV Network (think Captain
Video, if you can remember that far back). Some kid on a distant planet
manages to pick up the Dumont signal and very mistakenly imagines Zoom is a real
hero and because the kid's world is on the brink of being conquered by arch evil,
he beams him up. An egotistical actor of little courage must now face the
problems of an entire planet. To lessen his burden, he also has to cope with two
beautiful women. My favorite character is the super villain, a kind of
hedonistic, overweight, and love sick "Ming The Merciless."
Cat's Meow -- About a strange love triangle between WR Hearst, Charlie Chaplin and Marion Davies. The action takes place on Hearst's yacht and it culminates in a murder and a ruling class cover up. They all do an excellent Charleston.
Chicago -- Fantastic, unbelievable dancing, constant motion, and unlimited energy - a remake of a remake - about lawless Chicago in the 20s, its murder trials and love of entertainment. And about current America and how murder trials, politics, religion have all become over the top show business. The movie's lawyer reminds me of Bill Kunstler giving a Chicago Jury the old razzmatazz - handsome, ironical, slightly cynical - quite warm hearted --ah, that was Bill.
I remember seeing an ancient black and white non musical version of Chicago right after the great Chicago Conspiracy Trial of 1969-70. The lawyer tells his client the law is against her and she should be found guilty - then he turns, looks her in the eye and say "but this is Chicago and the law doesn't mean a thing." After the Conspiracy Trial I took this as scientifically self evident.
City By The Sea - Staring Robert De Niro as a New York cop with a gruesome history, this is a movie with a very complicated storyline. When De Niro was a kid his father was executed for kidnaping and accidentally killing a baby. De Niro grew up to be a cop with an unsuccessful marriage. He abandoned his wife and baby. Now De Niro has been assigned to find the murderer of a drug dealer who is his grown up, and never seen, son. Seeking redemption, De Niro tries to help the kid. More death follows. The film is very well acted and shot in Long Beach New York, a city that was once filled with bright sun and hope and now seems to know only darkness.
Clash Of The Wolves -- A 1925 silent movie starring the immortal Rin Tin Tin. The plot is a kind of Call Of The Wild in reverse. Here an Alpha Wolf leader of the pack turns into an amiable dog who is grateful to the handsome Borax prospector who saved his life by pulling a piece of cactus out of his infected paw. When claim jumpers try to steal his new human friend's riches Rin Tin Tin goes into action and fortunately retains many incredible wolf abilities as well as the loyalty of the pack. Rin Tin Tin was capable of amazing leaps, comic acting, ferocious fights, subtle mechanical moves and an amazing athleticism. All in all, the dog who built Hollywood could certainly have kicked Lassie's ass.
The Collectors -- Two mob hitmen from New Orleans breeze into New York City as debt collectors, and if necessary as killers for a major mob boss. The plot unfolds via daily vignettes of accomplishment and frustration and these killers are surprisingly likable guys. There are many surprising plot twists, comic moments and great gun battles. You'll never guess how it all winds up.
Confessions Of A Dangerous Mind -- Based on the life of Chuck Barris, the former Gong Show host. What makes this tale unusual is that Barris confesses to having also been a trained CIA assassin, recruited because he wore dresses as a kid, and the fact that his real father was an executed serial killer. The film's appropriate use the Pete Seeger and Lee Hays time-honored song "If I Had A Hammer" was right on target. Is this is a true tale, is it a frightening revelation, or more Gong Show madness? Who knows? Maybe we should just say America is The Gong Show.
Confidence -- A film about nonstop grifters (con artists), who are always going for the big money. Their targets are rich guys who deserve to be seriously ripped off, and they're tactics are always nonviolent. They do it for the bucks, but also the kicks, sense of power ,and accomplishment. The camera catches the con's action with lots of quick close ups and shifting angles. Among the corrupt crew is actor Donal Logue playing a bought and paid for cop. Logue was last seen on the big screen playing me, in "Steal This Movie." From portraying a Yippie Prince, to a roguish cop--is this a comedown?
Conspiracy -- Made for HBO movie on the Nazi command meeting that adapted a secret plan to kill all the Jews. Seems to say the plan came out of the specifics of war rather than a long standing goal. The manipulated meeting approving of mad mass murdering proceeds under a strained cover of civility and civilization
Control Room -- A riveting documentary of Al-Jazeera's coverage of George Bush's Iraqi War. Al J (the Arab CNN) is the only widely available news source in the Muslim Middle East that is not controlled by a government. Control Room tells a bold tale of brave men and women who report the news Bush and Rumsfeld want to suppress. All the corpses that were blacked out of Fox appear in Al J's coverage. Eventually Al-Jazeera comes under US military attack and one of their reporters is killed. The film gets a little weaker after the US assault, becoming more about Iraq and war itself than independent news coverage. Do you wonder whatever happened to those humanistic secular Arabs who were so influential in the 1960's? It seems their children all work for Al J.
Cowboy Bebop -- Amazing Japanese animation about a group of bounty hunters who seek their prey in a fantastic Martian City. It looks a lot like NYC but the neighborhoods are settlements from many different Earth nations. The colonies look exactly like their original counter parts. Naturally this makes for exciting artistic opportunities and the animators really do the job in a style more pop art than surrealism. As usual the plot is a mess. It's all about a depressed villain who wants to destroy the city so it will make him feel better. Sounds like the NeoCons and the job they did on Baghdad.
The Crime of Padre Amaro -- A joint Argentine-Mexican production, featuring a young priest, played by Gael Garcia Bernal (currently starring as the young Che, in Motorcycle Diaries), arrives in a Mexican town on assignment from his Bishop. We quickly learn that the handsome prelate has kind as well as cruel aspects to his character as the hypocrisy and cynicism of the Church brings out the worst in him - politically and sexually. He isn't a monster by choice, no one in the movie really is, but it seems that to rise upward in the Christian bureaucracy one must forget about Christianity. This is the lesson taught to the one priest who tries to follow the original ideals to the letter, living in a Socialist Christian community, and believing in liberation theology. Naturally he is excommunicated.
The Crow -- Gothic film romance of a rock musician who comes back from the grave to avenge his wife's rape and murder - and his own murder. He confronts nihilistic anarchists. Too bad 6 million Jews can't come back from their graves to kick a little ass.
Crossing Delancey -- Can an assimilated and beautiful Jewish sophisticate who works in NY's most respected bookstore (IB Singer takes her phone calls), find love and happiness with a handsome, good natured, hand ball playing, ghetto dwelling, pickle dealer? Her grandmother who still lives on the Lower East Side and who arranged their meeting thinks so. An evil but fashionable poet has other designs. The acting is energetic and always great fun, especially the kindly but tough grandmother, who carries on in the best traditions of the Yiddish comedic theater. The film reminds us of the once great and forever lost Jewish world of the turn of the 20th Century Lower East Side, when young philosophers, movie makers, song writers, prize fighters, entertainers, gangsters and Communists rubbed crowded shoulders and dreamed.
Cuba -- An underrated Sean Connery film about the last days of the Batista dictatorship. It's an excellent portrait of a cruel and corrupt society too dumb to know it's day are numbered, and the dialog is occasionally crisp enough to provide quiet echoes of Casablanca. Connery is a Brit mercenary/anti-terror expert hired by the dictatorship to defeat Castro. It takes him about five minutes to figure out this is impossible.
Cut Throat Island -- Old fashioned Hollywood Saga of buccaneers and rogues on the high seas looking for great adventure. The only difference is this time around the Pirate King is a Queen played by beautiful Geena Davis -- a tough, big boned yet somehow sweet Pirate Person. She is quite naturally searching for the treasure of Cutthroat Island and seeking to revenge her murdered father. The tale is told according to a time tested Jolly Roger formula and is fun. I did keep hoping that Johnny Depp or Captain Hook would make a cameo appearance. 
Deadline -- A documentary, created in part by Katy Chevigny (full disclosure --I knew her when she was 5), tells the story of a Republican Governor of Illinois - a Republican, and life time supporter of capital punishment who must decide the fate of 117 death row inmates. The Governor orders clemency hearings. What will be his final decision? Governor Ryan's belief in official execution was originally challenged when a group of Illinois college students proved that 13 people on the state's death row were innocent. They were all released. Deadline is outstanding for its human portraits. Especially those of convicted killers and the families of their alleged victims. The film reminds us that a criminal can't be reduced to his or her crime. He remains a human being.
Death In Gaza -- A wrenching documentary from HBO about Palestinian kids preparing for suicide and martyrdom in the anti-Israeli cause. The film is surprising because the kids are so sweet -- death is such a constant, that joining its ranks comes easily without character distortions or corruption. In Gaza, the suicide cult is as common as humus. The original project called on filmmaker and cameraman James Miller to shoot the killing from both sides, Israeli kids were to be interviewed, but Miller was himself slain by Israeli soldiers while walking under a white flag of protection. No one has been charged in his death.
Dead Man -- Johnny Depp in a wonderful un-western - good crazy people vs. bad crazy people. No Jacksonian democratic community way out west--just killers and cannibals.
De-Lovely -- Another [and much better] Hollywood telling of the great Cole Porter's life -- the first time around in "Day And Night," he was played by Cary Grant -- this time Kevin Kline does the job in a masterful, energetic and honest way. After all, who can picture Cary Grant playing a gay guy? It tell us what in Porter's life produced his dark, mysterious, and joyous lyrics of love, pain and liberty. There may be some quibbling about whether or not he was bi- (like the film portrays), or homosexual, but after hearing his revealing song "Experiment" a few times, you won't care.
Die Mommie Die -- This is a send up of all those 60s soap operas about wealthy dysfunctional families on the verge of homicide, and starring, cross-dressing gender-bending, Charles Busch as the female lead. She is a once great singing star, who is now begging for gigs at Catskill Hotels and married to Sol, a wealthy Hollywood producer who hates her guts. So does her self righteous daughter and her maid. Only a gay and somewhat mentally defective son and a gigolo boyfriend feel her charms. Multiple murders ensue, as do unexpected plot twists in which nobody is what they seem and everybody likes to show it off. My favorite item is Sol's poisoned suppository.
Dinner Rush -- About a trendy Manhattan restaurant. A place where both the cooking and eating is about performance, the generational conflict --between the owner who prefers meatballs and spaghetti, and his son the cook who is newer than noveau -- gangsters because the father is also a bookmaker. Have an Italian meal (old style or new) and watch this movie.
Dirty Dancing-Havana Nights -- A remake of course, but this time it's set in Havana 1958 (really shot in Puerto Rico) and not the Catskills - and it features a dirty dancing love affair between the daughter of an American businessman and a young Habanero Fidelista. Since Castro comes to power on Jan 1, 1959, the relationship has a rather melancholy time limit. Film does a good job of catching the mood of terror, hope, illusion and hedonism during the gringo's last days of ruling Cuba. I went to Havana just a year and half later. It was strictly Yanquis Fuerra - hardly a gringo to be seen.
Don Juan De Marco -- A comic mock-Byronic tale about an aging shrink and his supremely sexy patient. Brando and Depp have fun with their roles and it's hard to say who is curing who. Under the influence of his patient, who believes he is Don Juan, the world's greatest lover, Brando grows much more amorous to his wife and playfully adventurous in his life.
Donnie Darko -- A cult classic film of insane high school dimensions. Time travel, teen sex, hallucination, apocalyptic paranoia, dark humor and boundless alienation. Not just the teen age anti-hero Darko, but his friends, teachers and family all seem on the far side of near madness. Although it's about kids, it never condescends or gets superficial. The plot is unreal but the characters are very human.
The Dreamers --It's Bernardo Bertolucci's latest and perhaps most annoying film. It should be called 'Peter Pan's Last Tango In Paris'. Set in 1969 as massive worker and student uprisings explode French society. It's the very best time to be young, idealistic, smoke dope and have a great creative time. But for his own unclear motives Bertolucci concentrates instead on a brother-sister pair of unhappy twins who spend most of their time either pretending they are playing parts in great old American movies, or reading out loud from the wisdom of magical Mao. The twins recruit an attractive and impressionable American into the group, mostly to add a little decadent sex to their games. They don't like the way their wealthy parents grew up -- their father was once a rebel, he's now a rich writer and a member of the establishment. The newly formed trio never seem to leave their very large apartment or even get out of bed or the bath tub until the revolution marches by their window and throws a rock through it. The twins return to the streets as dangerous terrorists. Is Bertolucci saying that super subjectivity, decadence infantilism and day dreaming fantasy destroyed our hopes for revolution? Most of the people I knew back then were willing to grow up and take on amazing responsibilities -- they just wanted to do it on their own terms.
Dream Catchers -- This is not a movie about Native American mystics. It's about invading extra terrestrials who look like snakes and eels with millions of big teeth that chew up humans beginning with their most vulnerable parts. Offering a pointless, largely incoherent plot, and shot in the North woods with lots of pretty snow, Dream Catchers has one major accomplishment - the aliens are so sick I found myself rooting for the humans. That's a first!
Dusk to Dawn -- Great vampire movie about redemption. The action takes place in an insane Mexican saloon . |