unclefestering Blog

Under discussion:

Death Race 2000  (1976)

Death Race  (2008)

No one is going to confuse Death Race for an Oscar contender. It is a loud, fun, explosive action movie. While it has been changed considerably from the original Death Race 2000, it has kept much of the same feel, while losing the moralizing of the original (not that there was much of that). This is a great movie to end the summer action season. It doesn’t take itself too seriously and delivers what it promises.

The year is 2025. The American economy is in the toilet. The crime rate has exploded. The overcrowded prisons have been privatized and one warden has found a solution to both the prisoner population and how to turn a profit: Death Race. Three days of heavily armed and armored cars driving around a secure track doing anything to win. Any racer who wins five times gets their freedom. Any racer who survives is skillful and lucky. The entire race can be watched from hundreds of cameras broadcasting on a pay per view basis.

Jensen Ames (Jason Statham) has recently been convicted of murdering his wife, a crime he did not commit. Ames was a race car driver before running into trouble with the NASCAR circuit. The warden (Joan Allen) informs him that she want Ames to take the place of the race’s biggest star, Frankenstein (so scarred from past races that he always wears a metal mask) who died in the last Death Race. Frankenstein’s death has been hidden from the public to prevent a decrease in subscriptions. Since this would be Frankenstein’s fifth win, Ames can go free, if he wins.

Statham is convinced to race after a further round of blackmail and gets to meet his crew and opponents. Frankenstein’s biggest competitor in the race is Machine Gun Joe (Tyrese Gibson), who doesn’t know he killed the real Frankenstein and still harbors a vicious grudge. After this quick setup we move into day one of the race. From the green light, it is a mix of fast cars, crashes, explosions, weapons fire.

Statham and Allen both make this movie. Both are ruthless and willing to double cross each other to get what they need: ratings for one and freedom for the other.

Under discussion:

Wristcutters: A Love Story  (2007)

Wristcutters is equal parts roadtrip, and bitter comedy. It is a tough pair to pull off, especially when all the characters in the movie have committed suicide. This movie isn’t for everybody, but if you have the patience for it, it does pay off.

Zia (Patrick Fugit) puts his world in order and then takes a razor to his wrist. He wakes up in a world depressingly like the one he just abandoned, only more washed out and one where everything is somehow broken. This world is inhabited by all the suicides. They all bear the physicals scars of their death into their new life, where even emotions are drained.

After a while, Zia discovers that his girlfriend has also killed herself. He decides to find her, so he and his friend, Eugene, a Russian rocker who electrocuted himself on stage set out across the desolate landscape to find her. Along the way they pick up a hitchhiker (Shannon Sossamon) who claims that she is there by mistake, because she never killed herself.

The humor in this movie is not the knee slapping laugh out loud kind of jokes. Rather it is just the wry observations of people stuck in situation which may never get better for them. Raspy voice Tom Waits also stars in this movie as the leader of a camp where some of the suicides hang out.

Under discussion:

The Ladykillers  (1955)

Keeping Mum  (2006)

Keeping Mum reminded me of the great Alec Guinness/Ealing Studio comedies of the 1950s, especially The Lady Killers. They were always funny, but had a dark ironic edge around every joke. Maggie Smith lives up to that tradition as the quiet, kindly, generous housekeeper with a penchant for murder.

It isn’t a rolling on the floor laugh out loud comedy. It is a quieter, more restrained kind of humor and I think it may turn off people who aren’t used to this kind of comedy. But I have to say that I really enjoyed it. Patrick Swayze is perfect as the sleazy golf pro hitting on every woman he sees. Kristin Scott Thomas plays the part of the frustrated housewife whose sensitive son is constantly beat up by the school bullies, and daughter sleeps with any boy with a pulse and a husband who shows no interest in her.

The real find in this movie is Rowan Atkinson, who actually acts here. Gone is the disturbing and not funny rubber-faced Mr. Bean. He actually plays a real character and -  guess what - he carries it off. I was amazed because he usually finds himself hanging on such a huge, strange, physical quirk that he thinks will make everyone laugh that it turns out not to be funny at all. When he finally tells a joke in the movie it turns out to be funny, because he just tells it well, without pratfalls and strange grimaces.

But the movie revolves around Maggie Smith as the murderous version of Mary Poppins, who believes that sometimes the best way to deal with a tiresome obstacle is to remove it entirely.

Sadly, the movie unravels in the final 15 minutes. It is unable to sustain the delicate chaotic balance it has held through most of the story. But it is worth seeing for everything that comes before.