JScott Blog

Three Monkeys [Review]

JScott — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 16:12:37 GMT

Nuri Bilge Ceylan has been a name on the international film circuit since 2002 with Distant - a "well-paced" character study - and has continued his success with Climates (2006) and now Three Monkeys (2008). Ceylan is putting Turkish film on the map through unorthodox shots and unconventional story telling techniques. Three Monkeys succeeds on many levels while being quietly devastating.

Aesthetically we are presented with images of civilization on the brink. The dark nature of the film’s content and meaning is echoed beautifully in the cinematography. The clouds thicken as the plot does. As Eyüp (Yavuz Bingol) throws a tantrum so does Zeus. The breadth of darkness that cinematographer Gokhan Tiryaki is able to achieve adds a noirish richness to the film.

The lingering shots place emphasis on the inner-workings of the characters. The deliberate pace could be mismanaged by lesser actors.

Ismail - convincingly acted by Rifat Sungar - is the son. Eyüp, the father, goes to jail to cover the crimes of his boss, small-time politician Servet (Ercan Kesal: co-writer of Three Monkeys). Eyüp is virtually absent from the first half of the film while serving a jail sentence but leaves a heavy depression through an impactful performance. Hacer (Hatice Aslan) is the mother who is a lonely yet empowered persona.

The entire cast worked through a minimalistic style with deliberate themes rooted deep in their character.

These characters are shown often shown with animalistic undertones: Ismail's eating habits and hygiene, Hacer's lounging, being surrounded by birds, the soundtrack, and so forth. . These people are all capable of anything and in a moment’s notice will revert to a survival state.

The animals that the title refers to are the three wise monkeys - see no evil, speak no evil, hear no evil - from the Japanese parable. Today it is commonly used to describe someone who doesn't want to be involved in a situation, or someone turning a willful blind eye to the immorality of an act in which they are involved.

This goes back to the underlying political message of the film that the rich can often sidestep their legal responsibility. All three members of the family are guilty in covering a crime for the bourgeoisie politician. Ultimately the less fortunate and marginal will have it fall back on them.

Ceylan leaves potentially excessive and cliché scenes (i.e. sex, murder, etc.) to the viewer's imagination. What he chooses to show us is more impactful than blood, lust or other stimulate. It's the aftermath of an accident or the reaction to hearing something you shouldn't have. The silence between a father locked away by his duties and the son who is caged up in his own guilt can tell so much.

Nuri Bilge Ceylan has successfully created another emotive film. Three Monkeys has well choreographed pace, award worthy acting and a story that is deep in tone and text.

Uncounted [Review]

JScott — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 17:27:00 GMT

Since 2000 the United States has been up-in-arms about its voting. 2000 was the year of Bush/Gore and the infamous Florida chad - who is not some guy you hung out with on Spring Break. WOO SPRING BREAK!!

Director David Earnhardt challenges the electronic voting system and makes some incredible valid points. For one why a company (Diebold) would make a voting machine that gives out no receipts and isn't auditable when they are a company that produces most of the world's ATM machines thats only job is to print out reciepts and be auditable.

While the evidence provided to us tends to lean towards showing us the Republican party gained more from the alleged voter fraud the documetary does claim to be non-partisan. Even as a liberal I found this documentary to be too one sided and only focusing on what the Republicans are rumored to be doing rather than spending too much time talking about ACORN and other hot topics of the day.

It is difficult to judge this film on what is shown. I do find it making a convincing argument especially when a programmer testifies that he is the one who developed the software to switch votes (on purpose) and that he was paid by a man who works in the Florida State Government and has ties to the Bushes.

Following some of the information provided in the film led me to Blackboxvoting.org which is run by one of the talking heads in the documentary Bev Harris. Director David Earnhardt is a frequent contributor on that site. Bev Harris and Mr Earnhardt also frequent the Alex Jones show. Mr Jones is the leading proponent of the 9/11 Conspiracy Theories and blames Bush and a secret shadow government (New World Order - not led by Hogan).

Many of thoes claims seem far fetched to me so I wonder what their agenda is in this documentary.

Again on the surface it does a good job on convincing you of all this wrong doing which I think is great. Get awareness out there so we can see it coming but I wonder how much of it is actual fact and how much of it is like the jump-to-conclusions mat.

Basically what I took away from this is that the TruVote system is the best available (if we go electronic, it allows you to check on your vote online and prints out a hard ballot to be hand counted if needed) and if not we need to stick with paper ballots.

I know in 2 and 4 years I will be volunteering at the local polling presinct just to be sure there is nothing shady going on. This documentary is propaganda and much of it may be true but I would urge you to do your own research and get involved in the political process.

The Year My Parents Went on Vacation [Review]

JScott — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 23:48:22 GMT

Director Cao Hamburger tells an almost Truffaut-like story of childhood, impossible love, abandonment and ultimately being found. This film reminds me a lot of The 400 Blows as children occupy the main space of this film. The actors give an almost neo-realist performance as characters who could be anyone you know. They are played to perfection and very relatable.

The writing is humorous in the right places while choosing to remain classy instead of raunchy. I appreciate the extra effort taken to make this film approachable for all ages while being sophisticated at the same time. The somewhat whimsical story doesn't hold back on dealing with political issues and world events of the 1970s in Brazil.

I feel that this is a very powerful tale of finding out that home and family are what you make of it. You could miss what isn't there but then you are just missing what is. Perhaps thats an overly optimistic view of it.

If you enjoy films by Francois Truffaut, Roberto Rossellini or Pedro Almodovar I would think you should enjoy this film. Its a masterpiece.

Summer Palace

JScott — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 15:23:08 GMT

Summer Palace, which was first shown in competition at the Cannes Film Festival in 2006, is remarkable for its candor about sex and politics. Predictably its honesty has not been appreciated by Chinese authorities who banned Mr. Lou from making movies for five years after he brought it to Cannes without their permission. The film’s fervent, unsentimental embrace of youthful idealism is likely to strike a chord with anyone who can recall — or imagine — such feelings overtaking his or her own life.

Yu Hong (Lei Hao), a young woman, recently arrived at Beijing University from a provincial town. She displays a romantic, sometimes reckless appetite for experience, confiding in her diary a longing to live with maximum intensity. She satisfies this desire, in the movie’s heady, headlong first half, through a series of friendships and flirtations, most of all her fierce, jealous on-and-off relationship with Zhou Wei (Xiaodong Guo) - a skinny, brooding intellectual and the love of her life.

But Yu Hong and Zhou Wei and the various other friends, rivals and hookups are hardly ordinary university students. Or if they are, their matriculation comes at an extraordinary moment. Yu Hong arrives in Beijing in 1988, and her first year at the university, already full of emotional and sexual upheaval, ends with the pro-democracy demonstrations in Tiananmen Square and their violent suppression by the Chinese government.

Toward the end of Lou Ye’s Summer Palace, Yu Hong reflects that her college years were the “most confused” time in her life. A lot of us might feel similarly, but the beautiful and passionate heroine of this beautiful and passionate film, is something of a special case. Skip to next paragraph

Mr. Lou, however, is not interested only in reconstructing a vanished moment of high, intoxicating promise in his heroine’s (and his generation’s) youth. He is equally concerned with what comes after, with the drift, disappointment and compromise that seem, for his characters, to constitute both the legacy of Tiananmen and the mundane facts of postgraduate life. He follows Yu Hong and Zhou Wei as they make their way across the splintered landscape of adulthood, and takes note, via television clips, of the changing world around them.

Zhou Wei joins some of their university friends who have become expatriates in Berlin, while Yu Hong finds an office job in a provincial Chinese city. Fashions change. Rickety bicycles and battered envelopes give way to S.U.V.’s and e-mail. There are love affairs, a suicide, an abortion, and in the midst of it all Yu Hong clings to a belief in her own future that is all the more poignant for being somewhat vague.

Neither the later disaffection nor the earlier ardor feels in the least bit melodramatic or overstated. And in spite of its 2-hour-20-minute length, Summer Palace moves with the swiftness and syncopation of a pop song. Like Jean-Luc Godard in the 1960s, Mr. Lou favors breathless tracking shots and snappy jump cuts, and like Francois Truffaut, his camera is magnetized by female beauty.

Ms. Lei, a tough and uninhibited actress, is not simply the object of the film’s gaze; Yu Hong’s resilience and vulnerability are the film’s emotional core, and its feverish rhythms follow the chaotic pattern of her desires.

The delirious scenes of dorm-room sex and nightclub dancing in Summer Palace convey more sensation than narrative or psychological meaning. And this is clearly the point. In the end Mr. Lou is not trying to reflect on the recent Chinese past so much as he is trying to communicate its texture. Perhaps inevitably, this effort leaves some loose ends and blurred impressions.

Every day in China students were concerned about the future of their country, even while worried about their personal safety and their own possible punishment for taking part in the demonstrations. They were being awakened to political consciousness, and they knew the risk they were taking by expressing their views. The characters in this film were barely conscious of politics or anything else but their personal relationships. They were basically hormone driven and self-involved whilst living amid political change but too absorbed in their personal misery to notice.

The story of a hysterical young woman who liked sex with cute guys and the poor saps who fell for her, along with her mixed up girl friend and other various young students could have been set in any university anywhere in the world.

But in Summer Palace he nonetheless succeeds in finding a cinematic language that does more than summarize the important events of a confusing decade. He distills the inner confusion — the swirl of moods, whims and needs — that is the lived and living essence of history.

Mother of Mine

JScott — Sat, 05 Apr 2008 18:39:32 GMT

Mother of Mine is a film that focuses on the unseen impacts of war. Eero [Topi Majaniemi] is a Swedish child sent to live in Denmark after his father dies in the war and his mother gives up on life. He is taken in by a mother who isn't excited to have him and a father who wants nothing more than for Eero to be able to adapt and thrive. He takes Eero to school where they call him the "war child" which is all he knows about his identity anymore. It takes over his life. All he imagines are air raids.

Every actor in this film is much more than capable. Personally I think the acting is the biggest strength of the entire film. Klaus Haro mixes the strength of the acting with the natural beauty and depth of the Finnish landscape.

I am in the camp of people who believe the flash forwards take away from the film more than they add. I think the story would flow better and perhaps have more impact if it weren't for the disjointed feeling the flash forwards evoke.

I think this film would make an interesting double feature with Koreeda's Nobody Knows about a mother who gives up on her children and leaves them to raise themselves without taking their lives into consideration. There are many great films about troubling childhoods. Anything from Francois Truffaut or the country of Iran would be a nice start. I will also always recommend seeing Nicolas Roeg's Walkabout as it might be my absolute favorite coming of age tale. I also am drawn to its colonizing undertones.

I think Mother of Mine fits well into the childhood genre and lives up to the high expectations I have for such films and for this film because I had heard so much positive reaction going into it.

Movies 101: Leading Ladies

JScott — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 22:33:14 GMT

NYU Professor Richard Brown interviews Jennifer Anniston, Jennifer Connelly, Julianne Moore and Sigorney Weaver as part of an on-going series dedicated to sharing their experiences with his class. Each interview is about an hour long and focuses on their pre-cinema/television careers as well as previews their upcoming work (most of which was dated by the time I watched it.)

The first interview in the set is Jennifer Anniston. I went in without a lot of "respect" for her body of work. No offense to her - I enjoy Friends and I think she is great as Rachel Green. I just never put a lot of faith in her talent. I learned however that at age 11 she had a painting hanging in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC. I am obviously not the most well versed person when it comes to her life but I also learned that her dad (John Anniston) is an actor on a Soap Opera and has been for years. I am sure many out there are aware of that nugget of information but I wasn't. I originally felt like Jennifer would be the odd-duck in this line-up of fairly well established film stars who experiment with different roles. I think after watching the interview and because of Brown's in-depth questioning I found myself most pleased with the Anniston segment. The conversation between the two was very eye opening and I think even dug deeper than I think she was expecting.

The second interview was Jennifer Connelly who I felt was kind of boring. Even with top notch questioning she fell a little flat. She talks about her desire to work in film and how she was discovered but overall nothing all that interesting to note. I have long felt that she has been on a downward spiral since her days of singing with Bowie and dancing with muppets - I think this just about clinches it for me. If you ever get a chance to watch these interviews you can just pass this one up.

I am a huge fan of Julianne Moore. She may be one of my top five living actresses. She came out about how her parents supported her through her wishes to become an actor but also strongly cautioned that she prepare herself for failure by getting a degree that could lead to a graduate program down the future. While it doesn't look like she will ever need to take her parents up on that advice it was well taken and could be useful for hundred of people out there struggling to do what they dream. Her interview is completely uninhibited and she talks frankly about her set affair with her now husband and how she will feel when her children stumble upon the fact that she had done some nudity in her films. Overall I would say she was the interview I was most hyped up for and it delivers unquestionable.

Lastly we see Sigorney Weaver who obviously has a spectrum of work from Sci-Fi to Comedy to Drama. She is just about everywhere. She was a lot less intimidating and commanding as I thought. Perhaps I bought into the Ridley Scott persona a bit too much but she seemed to be just surprised and pleased with her career. She doesn't take it for granted or too seriously while at the same time seeming dedicated and well educated about it. Along with Anniston this interview changed my mind about the person involved because it opened up a human side of them and showed the struggles and hardships they went through to get where they are.

For those of you interested in acting or the art of acting this would be an inciteful viewing for you. Well researched by Professor Brown and well recieved by the audience this is a winner that easily compares to Lipton's Inside the Actor's Studio which gets far more noteriety. I can't wait to watch the rest of the series.

How much do you believe in yourself?

JScott — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 23:07:34 GMT

Craig Zobel writes and directs this film produced by independent film maker David Gordon Green about a small record production company also called "The Great World of Sound" or GSW if you want to make a check out to them.

Martin (Pat Healy) joins the new company in hopes to make a difference and get some pointers in the world of business to help promote his wife/girlfriend Pam's (Rebecca Mader) arts and crafts that she makes. Clarence (Kene Holliday of Matlock fame) is Martin's partner as they both learn the ropes of the industry together. For the record, Clarence is by far the most entertaining character in the film. The most true and talented artist of the entire film is Gloria a waitress at a bar in Indianapolis played very convincingly by Robert Longstreet.

The film is about the choices made when faced with adversity. It shows the proverbial "slippery slope" when dealing with morals and success. From the small lie of using a cell phone as a camera phone to straight up taking people's hard earned money for a bogus venture the pair of Martin and Clarence run the entire gamut.

Many of the potential artists are so willing to believe that they are something special that they blindly hand over checks of up to $3,000 in hopes of getting their music out there.Great World of Sound may turn people off with its ending which initially might leave some feeling unsatisfied. Zobel does a great job showing how a man even of the highest scruples can succumb to the lows of necessity, want and embarrassment of failure.

I think this is one of the more real films in recent memory. There are con artists out there who are trying to play on the desire for people to become overnight sensations by making a quick buck without much work. It effectively shows the ways people are willing to compromise to believe in their dream. Smooth talking business men can accomplish a lot with just a few metaphors and words that strike the right chord with the right person.

There are a lot of pitfalls to big business out there. Corporations set their own laws in a lot of cases but at least with them you know what you are getting even if getting them to hear your voice might be impossible. In this case it was the shady small businessman who had no remorse for his actions and left others to hold the bag both financially and morally.

It is certainly not a positive film to watch in a lot of ways but it is enjoying and worth checking out.

No Country for Old Men

JScott — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 19:50:54 GMT

Get rich quick schemes used to be reserved for late night television preaching riches if you mailed a nominal sum for the packet containing instructions on how to master said system. Currently at all hours of the day can you find someone promoting a "system" or insider knowledge that has as much to do with chance as anything else.

Surprisingly this is a main theme of the Coen Brothers' latest film No Country for Old Men. Llewelyn Moss (James Brolin), arguably the main character, stumbles on a drug deal gone the way most movie drug deals go - poorly. A number of poor moral decisions lead him to finding a large sum of money that belongs to another man Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem) who is probably the most terrifying villain since Robert Mitchum in both the 1962 Cape Fear and Night of the Hunter. Llewelyn's desire to hold on to the $2 million leads him running down a path for his own life and the life of others.

As always with a film by the Coens the dialogue is the strongest point of the film and technically this is probably their best work. The big gripe about the film is the ending. It doesn't really have one but at the same time it does. Sheriff Ed Tom Bell (Tommy Lee Jones) opens and closes the picture with a monologue. By paying attention to his scenes additional themes begin to develop and emerge from the story. The film isn't so much plot driven - although it is for 80% of it - but revolves around the characters and their traits.

If you go in expecting everything to be tied up in a nice package like National Treasure then you will be disappointed. No Country for Old Men is closer to John Steinbeck's East of Eden where the aforementioned Nicholas Cage project is closer to Where's Waldo. The man in the striped red and white costume is there on the page, you just need to keep your eyes open. Steinbeck requires you to dig a bit deeper and examine the story and not just on the superficial Cain and Abel that they make reference to multiple times.

No Country for Old Men has layers of depth and meaning to it but it will require some work on the viewer's part to dissect it. It is definitely worth seeing and might be one of the big winners come Oscar Night.

**** (4/4)

Witnesses

JScott — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 18:48:49 GMT

Vinko Bresan has made a few films that have landed him international acclaim as a talented filmmaker and as a director who chooses to break down Croatian stereotypes. Perhaps the most controversial part of Brešan's opus to date is the 2003 war drama Svjedoci ("Witnesses"), based on the novel Ovce od gipsa ("Alabaster Sheep") by Jurica Pavičić.

Reminiscent of Akira Kurosawa's Rashomon, it explores the human complexities and moral murkiness of war through multiple perspectives and flashbacks surrounding the unintended murder of an alleged Serbian smuggler by three Croatian soldiers returning from the front in Karlovac. The "Rashomon" style of multiple stories is already so imbedded in our society that even the popular 70s TV sitcom Mama's Family used it for an episode called (not surprisingly) "Rashomon."

Witnesses was nominated for the Golden Bear at the 2004 Berlinale and received the Peace Film Award as well as a Special Mention from the Ecumenical Jury. It also won the Philip Morris Award at Karlovy Vary in the same year. Notably, Serbian actress Mirjana Karanović was cast in the role of a Croatian war widow—a decision Brešan had to defend as the film drew protests from the Croatian Party of Rights and right-wing sections of the Croatian public.

Personally the war film is not my genre. I just came off of seeing Emir Kusturica's Underground which takes a similiar set of events and ideals but handles them in a completely different tone. That film is light hearted, funny, yet poignant. I get tired of the "real life" aspect of some film genres and seek out films that handle them uniquely. Also Kusturica is obviously a huge fan of Fellini which can't hurt anyone's case.

Back to Witnesses, I liked a number of things about it including, but not limited to, the lighting, the ambiance, the acting but none of it was able to grab my attention and make me want to continue to watch the film.

This film is gritty and real, but that also lends to it being depressing and I guess I am just not in the mood for that. Maybe watching it down the road would change my opinion but I don't think it will end up in my DVD player again anytime soon.

The Darjeeling Limited

JScott — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 20:38:28 GMT

Director Wes Anderson's (Bottle Rocket, The Royal Tenenbaums) new film The Darjeeling Limited features Owen Wilson, Adrian Brody and Jason Schwartzman as three bothers who haven't spoken in a year after their father's (Bill Murray) death. Each brother has a distinctive way of dealing with the depression left after the funeral.

The brothers engage on a spiritual journey across India in a train per the request of the eldest brother Francis (Wilson) in order to re-establish trust and a family connection. He goes so far as the plan their entire trip with the help of his assistant Brendan (Wally Wolodarsky) who maps it out with laminated itineraries. The bandaged wounds on Francis' face obviously mirror his open inner-wounds.

Absolutely certain his marriage is going to end in divorce the middle child, Peter (Brody), is possibly the most enigmatic and fatalistic of all of the bothers. He is the one who has a family back home but he disappears within himself as his way of dealing with the tension and stress of the last year of his life.

The youngest, Jack (Schwartzman), runs away from his girlfriend (Natalie Portman) and hides out at the Hotel Chevalier (more on that later) in France. His inability to have a sustainable and positive relationship with any woman is well developed throughout the film.

As always, the quirky aesthetics employed by Wes are there but the film isn't as comical as previous Anderson attempts. It is a deeper more mature look into his personal universe. The brothers' constant use of over the counter Indian pain killers and cough syrup is funny but they go back to that well a few times too often. The film feels like it has a certain sentimental value to it that you have a hard time putting your finger on. Anderson's previous films have left me feeling cold and unmoved but this film has certain genuine heartfelt warmth about it that is very different from anything he has done before.

It feels more like a companion to The Royal Tenenbaums more than a new direction for Wes Anderson. It is a film about the characters that are trapped within themselves and a film about, literally, shedding the baggage of their family's patriarch.

If you are a fan of Wes Anderson I don't need to convince you to see this. You will and you'll probably enjoy it due to familiar motifs and themes found in his films. If you haven't seen many of his films this one stands well on its own and is much deeper and satisfying than it is on the surface. This might be the type of film that grows on you after a few viewings and to make sense of it all you might want to watch it more than once.

Hotel Chevalier is the name of the short film that preceded The Darjeeling Limited at the Venice and the New York Film Festivals. The 13-minute short is rumored to be cut from the nationwide release of the film but can be downloaded for free on iTunes. If you plan on seeing the movie, you should watch the short or parts of the film might not make sense.