Movies I'm Watching: The Best Movies I've Never Seen (April 27, 2010)

I've just seen three more of the films recommended in Leonard Maltin's 151 Best Films You've Never Seen. These three were all stinkers. I'm really surprised Maltin likes these films. Having said that, I've never thought much of Maltin's recommendations, and so far my prejudice has been reinforced by seeing the movies he singles out in this book--and I'm still in the "B"s. I saw American Dreamz, The Ballad of Little Jo, and The Big Hit. None of these three have much to recommend them in my view. Save your time and money.

American Dreamz (2006, written and directed by Paul Weitz, starring Hugh Grant, Dennis Quaid, Mandy Moore, Willem Defoe, Sam Golzari, and others) is an example of everything that's wrong with American filmmaking today--slick, bland visuals; mediocre acting; and flat writing that insults the viewer's intelligence. The film's one redeeming feature is the interplay between the Hugh Grant and Mandy Moore characters, two people who don't think much of themselves that are attracted to each other precisely because they understand each other so well. American Dreamz is billed as a comedy, but I don't think I laughed once. Typical Hollywood laziness. Almost entirely lacking in wit or intelligence. I can't imagine what Maltin sees in this. Two thumbs down, to borrow a phrase.

The Ballad of Little Jo (Written and directed by Maggie Greenwald, starring Suzy Amis, Bo Hopkins, Ian McKellen, David Chung, Heather Graham, Rene Auberjonois, and others) at least has in it the kernel of an interesting story--although there isn't a great deal of drama in the plot. A plot synopsis would seem to exhaust as much of the story's potential interest as the film itself has.

A woman with a child born out of wedlock on the East Coast flees to the West (leaving her child behind). She finds life tough as a single woman. The film suggests the only roles available to her are wife or whore. The central character, however, chooses an alternate path through life: she becomes a man, by cropping her hair, dressing as a man, and working as a man. She eventually finds a place among the people she settles near. In a subplot, the Chinese laborer she takes on as a manservant becomes her lover. Almost no one else knows she is a woman until she dies and the undertaker begins to prepare the body for burial. Everything else that happens is pretty much standard western fare.

The Big Hit (1998, directed by Kirk Wong, written by Ben Ramsey, starring Mark Wahlberg, Lou Diamond Phillips, Christina Applegate, Avery Brooks, and others) was about as good as American Dreamz, which isn't saying very much. It is a mostly dull, sophomoric action piece that seems to be trying to laugh at itself, but without much success. It occasionally veers off into Hong Kong-style martial arts effects, especially toward the end of the film. An implausible romance between sensitive hitman Melvin Smiley (the Mark Wahlberg character) and his kidnap victim, Keiko Nishi (played by China Chow), is embedded within strife among gangsters. At the same time, the sensitive hitman is trying to please two other women he's involved with, his Jewish fiancé, Pam Shulman (played by Christina Applegate), and Chantel (played by Lela Rochon). The kidnapped girl (daughter of a Japanese tycoon that has gone bankrupt) goes to a girls' school that has a uniform with the inevitable short plaid skirt, allowing the filmmakers to titillate in the style of soft-core Japanese schoolgirl porn. Although Christina Applegate was sporadically amusing as the Jewish bride-to-be struggling with her parents that aren't about to accept her non-Jewish fiancé, I suspect this film was more fun for the people that made it than it is likely to be for people who watch it.

Movies I'm Watching: The Best Movies I've Never Seen (April 22, 2010)

In the past few days, I've seen more of the films recommended in Leonard Maltin's 151 Best Movies You've Never Seen. As noted in my previous post on the subject. I didn't think that much of any of them. So far, I remain generally unimpressed by the recommendations in the book. This post looks at Aurora Borealis and Better Than Sex.

Aurora Borealis (2005, written by Brent Boyd, directed by James C. E. Burke, starring Joshua Jackson, Steven Pasquale, Donald Sutherland, Louise Fletcher, Juliette Lewis, and others) has been much praised, I see, but it struck me as being on the level of a decent made-for-TV movie, no better. Despite some good performances, particularly by Juliette Lewis, the whole was unpersuasive. Much as I like Donald Sutherland, and despite a very convincing Parkinson's disease tremor, I found his performance uneven. 

But the script is the real problem here: Would Duncan (Joshua Jackson), a man unable to shoot a deer, really give his aging grandfather a loaded shotgun to commit suicide with? I found myself unable to accept the incongruity. Duncan's brother is a cliché. The ending of the film is more than a little too pat--how nice that the Donald Sutherland character dies on cue so that his grandson can fly off to San Diego to get back together with Kate (Juliette Lewis). If only life were so neat.  

Better Than Sex (2000, written and directed by Jonathan Teplitzky, starring David Wenham, Susie Porter, and others) is at least a little bit different. It approaches falling in love from the perspective of two people trying not to fall in love--two people surprised they have fallen in love. 

Josh (David Wenham) and Cin (Susie Porter) meet at a party, they aren't especially attracted to one another at first, but they talk some and end up sharing a taxi home. He's staying in town for only three days. During the taxi ride, both Josh and Cin begin to think about a quick fling--knowing there'd be no strings attached. Inevitably, she asks him in when they arrive at her door, and one thing leads to another. The rest of the film is a chronicle of a one-night stand that ends up lasting three days (and then some). What was supposed to have been no-hassle sex turns into emotional attachment on both sides.

We can't help our feelings. Sometimes we fall in love in spite of ourselves, in spite of everything.  

The story is told through straight narrative intercut with documentary-like interview segments, portions of phone calls between secondary characters, musings we understand to be the thoughts of the main characters (sometimes during the action, like theatrical asides; sometimes with the character sitting against a studio backdrop as if being interviewed), and through wry comments from the taxi driver. The taxi driver keeps showing up in the right place at the right time, always encouraging love, like Cupid on wheels. The creative editing keeps things moving, keeps the sex (essential to the story) from playing too dominant a role or becoming gratuitous, and it keeps the audience at a distance. We are voyeurs, but voyeurs invited to see the show and the players know they are being watched and we know they know. Despite the somewhat obtrusive devices (especially the taxi driver) and a falling back on cliché in some scenes (notably the girl-takes-forever-to-get-ready-to-go-out-and-doesn't-have-anything-to-wear scene, which is quite long, and the guy-never-bothers-to-flush-the-toilet scene), Better Than Sex was mostly intelligent and entertaining. 

Movies I'm Watching: The Best Movies I've Never Seen (April 21, 2010)

In the past few days, I've seen three more of the films recommended in Leonard Maltin's 151 Best Movies You've Never Seen. I didn't think that much of any of them, to tell the truth. I wouldn't say they were a waste of time, but--so far, anyway--I have been disappointed by the recommendations in the book more often than not. I saw: Baadasssss! (2004, written and directed by Mario Van Peebles--based on a book by his father, Melvin Van Peebles--starring Mario Van Peebles, Joy Bryant, T. K. Carter, Terry Crews, Ossie Davis, David Alan Grier, and others); Better Than Sex (2000); and Aurora Borealis (2005). This post looks at Baadasssss! More about Better Than Sex and Aurora Borealis in a post tomorrow.

While Baadassss! was interesting on a number of levels, it left me wishing the film had been a straight documentary rather than a hybrid documentary/biopic. Baadasssss!, tells the story of the making of Melvin Van Peebles' groundbreaking 1971 film Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song, generally considered the first film made for a black audience by a black director that wasn't forced to toady to a white-controlled studio. Baadasssss! was interesting because it tells an interesting story: The elder Van Peebles, set out to make a feature film with almost no resources and entirely outside the Hollywood system--engaging in what some have referred to as "guerilla film-making." Van Peebles worked with whatever he could scrounge. The actors were friends and family. The sets were makeshift. Money was perpetually running out (he finally finished the film with a $50,000 loan from Bill Cosby). Surprisingly, Van Peebles succeeded.

The elder Van Peebles was angry and it was an angry period in US history. The Black Panthers were agitating for change (and later championed the 1971 film), the Vietnam War was raging. Hoping to direct full-length films after making several shorts, mostly on his own, Columbia offered Van Peebles Watermelon Man, a comedy about a white man that wakes up black. Watermelon Man was a commercial success, but it was mostly his contempt for the studios born of that experience that drove Van Peebles to set out on his own. It's a testament to his determination and persistence that Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song was completed and released (although rated X and initially in only two theaters nationwide). It went on to become the highest-grossing independent film made up until that time. Van Peebles paved the way for other independent black filmmakers, indirectly spawning the blackxploitation genre as well.

Baadasssss! switches back and forth between a straight retelling of the story of the original film production and documentary-like interviews with the people involved (both the actual people and the actors portraying them). Baadasssss! also attempts to say something about the relationship between the younger filmmaker and his obsessed father, but somehow that relationship never comes across as genuine, and Baadasssss! ultimately seems a fairly bland retelling of the facts. Still, Mario Van Peebles delivers an interesting performance as his father, the story is a good one, and the film gives us a glimpse of what it meant to make a film independently in the early 1970s--more interestingly, what it meant for a black man with a message the establishment didn't want to hear to make a film independently in the early 1970s. Having said that, I get the impression from reading about Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song that Baadasssss! downplays that film's violence and sexuality, and, in that sense, Baadasssss! is not entirely honest. Not a great film, by any means, but probably worth seeing once. I imagine Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song is available on DVD as well. Now I'm curious.

Movies I'm Watching: Delicatessen

Last night I watched Delicatessen, the next film on the three lists of little-known cinematic gems I'm going through. (For more on this topic, see my initial post on the subject, or use the "Movies I'm Watching" tab to the right.)

This one certainly fits the bill. I'd never heard of it, but it's wonderful. I'm virtually at a loss to describe it (I'll think of something, no doubt), so let me start with the conclusion: This is strange and wonderful and highly recommended. It's one of those films that seems both perfect and to make no sense at the same time--the sort of film that you keep going through over and over in your head for a long time after seeing it. It's a high-speed drive down the Autoroute strapped into a car that seems on the verge of losing control. There's nothing to do but sit back, watch the scenery whizzing past and hope to survive.

Delicatessen (French; 1991; Directed by Marc Caro and Jean-Pierre Jeunet, Starring Pascal Benezech, Dominique Pinon, Marie-Laure Dougnac, Jean-Claude Dreyfus, and Karin Viard) is like an underground comic come alive. The entire film plays out in, on, or immediately around a single crumbling building in a city of the future (Paris?) after some cataclysm has reduced the world mostly to rubble--or in the underground sewer tunnels controlled by what might be described as a group of vegetarian commandos. Food is scarce. People above ground do whatever they can to feed themselves. People are quietly hunted for meat like rats.

But there is some semblance of society still functioning. There are taxis. There is a mailman who delivers mail. There are newspapers. The butcher, owner of the delicatessen at street level in the building, keeps an ad running that seeks a handyman to help with chores. The people that answer these ads keep disappearing....

The film starts with the arrival of the latest handyman, one Louison (Dominique Pinon), a former circus performer who proves more resourceful than the butcher bargains for. Delicatessen is a small war in progress and the viewer has a seat at the front lines--obscured as the view is by heavy mists and the frightening, unfamiliar rules of this post-apocalyptic world. A general sense of disorientation is heightened by effective use of montages and distorted dream sequences.

The sound of Delicatessen is wonderful. Some of the funniest scenes in the movie (and this is a comedy) involve orchestrated sound samples. Patching together the sounds of everyday actions to produce music is now a staple of TV advertising, but once it was a novel idea. I don't pretend to know who thought of it. I first heard something like this listening to Pink Floyd's 1973 Dark Side of the Moon--remember the opening of Money, where the cash register sounds "play" the introduction? Delicatessen uses this device to wonderful effect. Everyone in the building is subordinate to the Butcher and dependent on him for food. The point is hilariously driven home when the squeaking springs of the amorous Butcher's bed momentarily take over control of everything going on in the building; every sound begins to fall in with the gradually quickening rhythm of the Butcher's love-making. Later, handyman, Louison, looking for the noisy coil to oil is just as funny when he tests the springs of the squeaky bed with the Butcher's lover (she has asked him to silence the squeak--and he does).

To say too much would be to spoil the fun. (For the squeamish among you, there is very little blood, despite the gruesome premises behind the story.) Strange and wonderful and highly recommended.

[Update: I was just reading about the film and I see that the writer of the screenplay is normally a writer of comic books--which explains a lot.]

Movies I'm Watching: Bubba Ho-tep

I recently embarked on a project to watch films I've never seen on lists of little-known films that, according to the list makers, are neglected gems well worth seeing. I compared three of these lists (one by critic Leonard Maltin and two others) and decided to start by watching the films that overlap (the films on more than one list--although there were only a few). Bubba Ho-tep (2003; directed by Don Coscarelli; starring Bruce Campbell and Ossie Davis) kicks off the project. For details, see my initial post on the subject.

I sincerely hope this is not indicative of the overall caliber of the films recommended. Surely we can do better than this, can't we? Bubba Ho-tep seems over-praised. It has one or two witty lines, but the humor is mostly vulgar and sophomoric.

The bare bones of the absurd story piqued my interest before watching the film: Elvis (or his soul trapped in the body of an Elvis impersonator, or just an Elvis impersonator that thinks he's Elvis, or maybe doesn't think he's Elvis--it's not quite clear) and a black man that insists he's actually John F. Kennedy discover that recent deaths at their depressing home for the elderly in East Texas have been caused by a re-animated Egyptian mummy that was lost years ago in a creek near the home. It seems the mummy now survives by sucking the souls out of debilitated patients (through the anus). For some reason, the mummy wears cowboy boots and other cowboy garb; he is Bubba Ho-tep--but none of this really makes sense. Ultimately, a superficially interesting story idea, a vague attempt to say something meaningful about how we treat our old folks, and one or two good jokes aren't enough to make up for the confusing plot, shoddy production standards, and mediocre acting. In the end, the most interesting thing about this movie has been trying to explain to people what it's about--and that's not much of a recommendation. I think I'm beginning to remember why I've never used Leonard Maltin's movie reviews. I will say one thing for Bubba Ho-tep. It's unique. I suspect, however, that it would have been best left in its original form, a short story by Joe R. Lansdale. Maybe I'll read the story. On second thought, maybe I won't.

Movies I'm Watching: The Best Movies I've Never Seen

I've been thinking further about the idea of little-known and forgotten cinematic gems (see my recent post on the subject). A few come to mind immediately: Here are 20 of my favorite movies that people I talk with don't seem to know very well (in no particular order). These, of course, are movies I have seen:

Badlands (1973)
Tom Jones (1963)
Tiger Bay (1959)
Walkabout (1970)
Doro no Kawa (1981)--also known as Muddy River
The Conversation (1974)
Hobson's Choice (1953)
The Dresser (1983)
Odd Man Out (1947)
Five Fingers (1952)--also known as Operation Cicero
The Duellists (1977)
The Marriage of Maria Braun (1978)
Fail Safe (1964)
The 49th Parallel (1941)
The League of Gentleman (1960)
Orphée (1949)
The Train (1965)
Topsy Turvy (1999)
I'm All Right Jack (1959)
Room at the Top (1958)

Some of these will be well known to cinephiles, but none seems to be part of mainstream consciousness--at least not in the US. Some of these have a higher profile in Britain. Among them, Tiger Bay, Walkabout, Hobson's Choice, and Five Fingers, are special favorites of mine. All highly recommended. For trivia buffs, Hobson's Choice includes one of the first film performances of Prunella Scales, later better known as Sybil Fawlty, wife of Basil Fawlty, John Cleese's character in Fawlty Towers.

Not to mention the incomplete 1937 I, Claudius, with Charles Laughton and Merle Oberon.... The surviving footage, unfinished as it is, will send shivers down your spine. Few people I know have ever heard of it.

I wonder what your favorite little-known films are? Send me your list. Don't exclude films because they are on this or other similar lists. I'm interested to see where the overlap is.

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Movies I'm Watching: The Best Movies I've Never Seen

I recently came across a reference to Leonard Maltin's 151 Best Movies You've Never Seen (Harper Studio, 2010). The title is designed to be provocative, to make you say to yourself "I bet I've seen a lot of them." And that's what I said to myself. I see a lot of movies, including fairly obscure ones, and I watch a lot of older films.

I looked the book up on Amazon and found myself humbled by the table of contents: I had seen only one of the 151 films on the list. Oh dear. I did a little searching, and found two similar books. One was Richard Crouse's The 100 Best Movies You've Never Seen (ECW Press, 2003). I have seen six of the films recommended in that book--somewhat better. The other was The 100 Best Films to Rent You've Never Heard Of (St. Martin's Griffin, 1997). I have seen 13 of the 100 recommended there--even better. Still, I have to admit that I'm surprised there are so many purportedly worthwhile films in these three books that I have yet to see--and there is very little overlap on the lists.

I feel a project coming on.

What sort of project? First, I clearly need to see some of these selections. Second, recommending obscure favorites is a game that anyone can play. I could recommend a few of my own. This is beginning to feel like a dual-layer project....

No film is on all three lists. Eight films are on two of the lists: Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, Bubba Ho-Tep, The Devil's Backbone, Delicatessen, Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Kind Hearts and Coronets, Peeping Tom, and Two-Family House. As I have seen two of these (Beyond the Valley of the Dolls and Kind Hearts and Coronets, I think I know where to begin.

For a list of some of my personal favorites that few people seem to know, see my following post on the subject of movies.