You know how I've been excited by the idea that Kirsten Dunst might be in a considerably promising movie again? Well it looks like there's not just one, but two contenders for her comeback. All Good Things certainly looks like it has some awkward, overwrought moments, most of them involving Frank Langella, as is wont to happen when he gets involved in something a little too purple to be good for him. But as a couple initially brought together by the fact that he doesn't want her to really know him, and undone when she realizes how little she knows, Dunst and Ryan Gosling look pretty good:
And some of the dialogue is quite intelligent, a cut above the usual platitudes movie people use to express love, or anger, or fear. "What do you mean by perfect?" one of Gosling's friends asks him after he says that Dunst is perfect. "There's nothing I do that she doesn't like," Gosling's character explains, and it's immediately evident how creepy that conception is, even before we know that he probably killed her. It's just so patently the wrong answer.
Across the Universe
Given how bad G.I. Joe was, I really do hope Channing Tatum's next foray into sci-fi goes better if only so I can smirk at all of my friends who feel reluctantly compelled to see a movie with him in it. I wouldn't say Ion sounds promising, per se, but these days, it's nice to be able to hold out a little irrational hope for something.
Take, Take, Take
I realize that it's unfair to keep referring to Idris Elba as Stringer, since the man does have a career outside The Wire, and I am quite antsy to see Luther as soon as it makes it over to this side of the pond. But Takers really does look like an alternate universe in which Stringer Bell gets a private jet, gets a police nemesis much less interesting than Jimmy McNulty in the form of Matt Dillon, and gets taken down by trusting T.I. I'm not sure which is more embarrassing: betrayal by T.I. or corrupt local politicians. Not sure this incoherent mess (it's not always clear who is talking in the dialogue) is going to be worth watching to find out:
Also, something does feel slightly off in the movie's valorization of crassly materialistic, violent criminals. There's not a lot of charm written into here to take the edge off, no Danny Ocean panache and regret, no Andy Garcia set up as a guy worth robbing just because he's such an abiding jerk, and no particularly compelling-looking Guy Who Tries to Do the Right Thing. It's an interesting approach, cops and robbers facing off just because that's what cops and robbers do. I'm not sure it'll end up being compelling, or just weary-feeling.
Also, something does feel slightly off in the movie's valorization of crassly materialistic, violent criminals. There's not a lot of charm written into here to take the edge off, no Danny Ocean panache and regret, no Andy Garcia set up as a guy worth robbing just because he's such an abiding jerk, and no particularly compelling-looking Guy Who Tries to Do the Right Thing. It's an interesting approach, cops and robbers facing off just because that's what cops and robbers do. I'm not sure it'll end up being compelling, or just weary-feeling.
No Matter What I Do, All I Think About Is You
I'm not super-into coronating a song of the summer, but as I wrote at The Atlantic yesterday, if there's got to be one in 2010, I'm kind of rooting for it to be by Kelly Rowland's "Commander." As I explain:
The chorus is absolutely gigantic, way bigger than any of the verses, and more important than David Guetta's minor lyrical interventions. It's a high-concept understanding of the dance floor, even if it's not my preferred interpretation of that space. If love and shaking it are war, Kelly seems like she'd be a pretty decent person to have boss you around in both.
And the truth is, I'd really like to see Rowland succeed on her own, much in the same way I root for Solange Knowles. I genuinely don't have anything against Beyonce, I just think that she shines so bright and hot that sometimes I want to see what's obscured by that stardom. And other than "Dilemma," Rowland's extremely amiable 2002 duet with Nelly (speaking of folks I'd like to make a compelling return), she hasn't really had a significant hit on her own.Speaking of which, what happened to Nelly? Guy had decent skills, and a sort of suburban version of hip-hop that seems like it ought to have stuck around a bit.
Keeping It Simple
The plot of the Mean Girls sequel, or revival, or whatever, sounds way too complicated from the outset. The thing that the original movie did brilliantly was tease out the extent to which high school is inherently byzantine, from the arrangement of cliques, to the trouble girls in particular create for themselves over relatively simple situations:
The movie would have been a lot worse if, say, Regina George and Cady Heron were secretly switched at birth, or whatever. An incredibly complicated setup leaves less room for the slightly cracked but still true-to-feel high school scheming that made the original so great.
The movie would have been a lot worse if, say, Regina George and Cady Heron were secretly switched at birth, or whatever. An incredibly complicated setup leaves less room for the slightly cracked but still true-to-feel high school scheming that made the original so great.
Do I Actually Like Elijah Wood?
I always have this idea of Elijah Wood as someone I like, bolstered mainly on the sharp but positive memories I have of him in Lord of the Rings, the hazier memories of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and, I am ashamed to admit, Flipper. But looking at this trailer for The Oxford Murders, which is two years old but appears to be getting an American release or something, he reminds me of nothing so much as Frodo in high pout mode:
And I don't think I like it. Obviously one trailer isn't enough to make me dismiss an actor's entire career, but it is making me rethink that impression I have of Wood. He was definitely quite good as Frodo, but I don't think he was the best actor in that trilogy. Andy Serkis, Viggo Mortensen, and Ian McKellen were what made it extraordinary. And beyond that, I don't have intense memories of Wood recently. Maybe I should go back and dig into things like Sin City, etc., to see if my concern is warranted. It is funny, though, to realize that an opinion like that rests on very thin supports. I usually have more evidence for the vague impressions I carry around with me.
And I don't think I like it. Obviously one trailer isn't enough to make me dismiss an actor's entire career, but it is making me rethink that impression I have of Wood. He was definitely quite good as Frodo, but I don't think he was the best actor in that trilogy. Andy Serkis, Viggo Mortensen, and Ian McKellen were what made it extraordinary. And beyond that, I don't have intense memories of Wood recently. Maybe I should go back and dig into things like Sin City, etc., to see if my concern is warranted. It is funny, though, to realize that an opinion like that rests on very thin supports. I usually have more evidence for the vague impressions I carry around with me.
Granny, Get Your Gun
I was, I admit, somewhat concerned about Red. Another movie about spies getting back into the game, except this time it's about Olds, instead of about Marrieds? And yet, the trailer suggests otherwise:
However thinly sketched, these characters at least to appear to have distinct, and not typologically derived, personalities, and the sad state of the industry as a whole makes that simple fact feel like a miracle. Helen Mirren's Martha Stewart assassin reminds me delightfully of Emily Pollifax (about whom it's tragic there hasn't been a good, updated movie adaptation), particularly the bit where she chops a guy in the neck with a book she's carrying like a very chic librarian. Morgan Freeman may seem like a semi-dirty old man in a nursing home, but his relaxed, happy "We're getting the band back together!" makes it seem like he's just a dude with a lust for life. John Malkovich, not shockingly, is playing crazy, but the nod to Project MKULTRA is nice. Bruce Willis and Mary Louise Parker look the most like stock characters, but I trust them both as actors, and if they're part of a good ensemble cast, it shouldn't be a problem.
The point of all of this, though, is it's not insanely hard to create characters who are distinct and original, if not for the ages. There are so many interesting juxtapositions to come up with, contradictions to imagine. One doesn't have to go the whole Operation Mincemeat route, of course: most movies don't have to hold up to Nazi scrutiny with the invasion of Europe on the line. But how much more interesting must it be to wander through characters' heads without knowing precisely where you'll end up, than to pick a type from a file cabinet and get out your colored pencils? I don't know why anyone would want to do the latter (other than, of course, money and the promise of steady work). But it'd be great fun, if you had the leeway, to do the former.
However thinly sketched, these characters at least to appear to have distinct, and not typologically derived, personalities, and the sad state of the industry as a whole makes that simple fact feel like a miracle. Helen Mirren's Martha Stewart assassin reminds me delightfully of Emily Pollifax (about whom it's tragic there hasn't been a good, updated movie adaptation), particularly the bit where she chops a guy in the neck with a book she's carrying like a very chic librarian. Morgan Freeman may seem like a semi-dirty old man in a nursing home, but his relaxed, happy "We're getting the band back together!" makes it seem like he's just a dude with a lust for life. John Malkovich, not shockingly, is playing crazy, but the nod to Project MKULTRA is nice. Bruce Willis and Mary Louise Parker look the most like stock characters, but I trust them both as actors, and if they're part of a good ensemble cast, it shouldn't be a problem.
The point of all of this, though, is it's not insanely hard to create characters who are distinct and original, if not for the ages. There are so many interesting juxtapositions to come up with, contradictions to imagine. One doesn't have to go the whole Operation Mincemeat route, of course: most movies don't have to hold up to Nazi scrutiny with the invasion of Europe on the line. But how much more interesting must it be to wander through characters' heads without knowing precisely where you'll end up, than to pick a type from a file cabinet and get out your colored pencils? I don't know why anyone would want to do the latter (other than, of course, money and the promise of steady work). But it'd be great fun, if you had the leeway, to do the former.
Demosthenes and Locke
From The Atlantic yesterday, on why you should read Ender's Game to understand blogging today, particularly the confusion that surrounds Dave Weigel:
Peter and Valentine are able to be successful--and more importantly--plausible in their guise as adult policy experts and demagogues because their online personas provide something that reading audiences want. Valentine, the kindest of the children, wins acclaim first as a militaristic, anti-Russian writer who even guides the opinions of her unknowing father. She sets up the conditions for Peter, who tortured and threatened to kill his siblings, to step in and propose a plan for peace, and to become a world leader. Their age and identities end up mattering not in the slightest because their readers want to believe in them.
Obviously, what happened to Weigel last week was different. Unlike Peter and Valentine, his identity, and his personal opinions about what he was writing and reporting about have always been clear to anyone who bothered to look for them. But it does seem that part of the furor that surrounds his exit from the Post comes from the fact that people wanted to see him in different ways, and so they did. Whether they saw him as a conservative voice hired to counterbalance Ezra Klein, a tough, diligent reporter exposing the excesses of parts of the conservative movement, or a clever blogger-reporter who wrote with voice and energy, lots of folks were invested in their conceptions of Dave Weigel.As I've said to some of you in comments and offline, I'm still working on how much of my posts will be visible in the feed, getting the RSS feed actually working (though Google Reader will create a feed for you), etc. Keep it up with the emails about things though: it helps me prove there's a demand for more text, etc.
The Girl Can't Help It
I would be absolutely fine with the Black Eyed Peas breaking up, both because they've become obnoxious and sonically much worse, but also because it would allow Fergie to do a solo album. But I do think it's worth remembering that brief moment in 2003 when Fergie had just joined the Peas, and they were kind of charming. "Where Is The Love?" is hardly the most intelligent political song in any genre, but it definitely had Song of the Summer status that year, and the video is kind of charmingly low-rent, particularly the shots of the dudes riding around in a sound track:
And I like the high-school-play-from-hell vibe of "Shut Up, too. That was the first moment when they really knew how to use Fergie, I think:
It all got bad, both in quality and annoyance value, really, really fast. But there was some potential there, and something endearing. If Fergie quits, has a kid, and goes solo, I hope she figures out how to get it back. There was a lot to like on her solo album. I really would like another one. Particularly if she and Lil Mama get together and combine some of the aesthetics from "Clumsy" and "Truly in Love."
And I like the high-school-play-from-hell vibe of "Shut Up, too. That was the first moment when they really knew how to use Fergie, I think:
It all got bad, both in quality and annoyance value, really, really fast. But there was some potential there, and something endearing. If Fergie quits, has a kid, and goes solo, I hope she figures out how to get it back. There was a lot to like on her solo album. I really would like another one. Particularly if she and Lil Mama get together and combine some of the aesthetics from "Clumsy" and "Truly in Love."
Population Control
Is the existence of the Fockers franchise the most depressing indicator of American cultural decline today? The evidence is at least nominally persuasive:
Everything about these flicks is just poisonously unfunny—there isn't even guilty, dumb pleasure, a "I can't believe I laughed at that, but man was it funny" element to the proceedings. And yet, it's here. It's continuing. If the Fockers keep reproducing, we could be stuck with them forever, and I worry that Ben Stiller's grimness could become a genetic trait.
Everything about these flicks is just poisonously unfunny—there isn't even guilty, dumb pleasure, a "I can't believe I laughed at that, but man was it funny" element to the proceedings. And yet, it's here. It's continuing. If the Fockers keep reproducing, we could be stuck with them forever, and I worry that Ben Stiller's grimness could become a genetic trait.
Oh, And One Other Thing
I've opened up my Twitter feed, if y'all want to stop by. Handle is alyssarosenberg. Picture is extremely outdated.
Tickling the Ivories
I used to joke that Lady Gaga was cycling through concepts so quickly that she'd get to a point where the most radical thing she could do would be go back to singing piano ballads. Apparently, that point has arrived more quickly than I expected:
Don't you think Michelle Branch and Vanessa Carlton are kicking themselves for not thinking of the studded bras and throwaway references to drinking whisky first? This isn't that different than Gaga's latest:
Don't you think Michelle Branch and Vanessa Carlton are kicking themselves for not thinking of the studded bras and throwaway references to drinking whisky first? This isn't that different than Gaga's latest:
The Announcement
So, as of today, I'm joining TheAtlantic.com's Correspondents roster, and that feed of my pieces over at The Atlantic is turning into a blog. I'm thrilled for the opportunity, and have a whole bunch of posts in the works. It's cool to get to hang out on the same channel as Ta-Nehisi, Cathy Alter, Christopher Orr, and many, many talented other people, so this is effectively like getting to go to a bar you like with people you enjoy spending time with much more often than you used to.
What does that mean for this blog? It certainly doesn't mean that I'm going to stop writing here. It does mean that I'll be doing some cross-posting, but I'll usually lag posts that go up at The Atlantic so they pop up here 24 hours after they're initially published. It means that I'll be thinking carefully about what kind of content fits best there, and best here. And I really hope it means that those of you who have been amazing enough to help me grow as a writer and to explore all the things that we talk about here will follow me over to The Atlantic. You guys are my partners. I need you. Add: http://www.theatlantic.com/alyssa-rosenberg/ to your RSS feeds, and please stop by. There will be a Disqus commenting system, A Game of Thrones blogging, and more!
What does that mean for this blog? It certainly doesn't mean that I'm going to stop writing here. It does mean that I'll be doing some cross-posting, but I'll usually lag posts that go up at The Atlantic so they pop up here 24 hours after they're initially published. It means that I'll be thinking carefully about what kind of content fits best there, and best here. And I really hope it means that those of you who have been amazing enough to help me grow as a writer and to explore all the things that we talk about here will follow me over to The Atlantic. You guys are my partners. I need you. Add: http://www.theatlantic.com/alyssa-rosenberg/ to your RSS feeds, and please stop by. There will be a Disqus commenting system, A Game of Thrones blogging, and more!
A Bit of Business, and a Seal of Approval
Sorry for the slow pace today, all. I was traveling for work the past couple of days, and I'm playing catchup on everything. In addition to that, I'll have an announcement about the Future of the Blog on Monday, but I'm trying to get a couple of things straightened out, so stay tuned.
In the interim though, I bring tidings of great joy! Rumor is out that the damn fools involved in Sherlock Holmes and its forthcoming sequel appear to be moving away from the damnfool idea of having Brad Pitt play Professor Moriarty (it was under discussion for the original, then the sequel) and are considering Daniel Day-Lewis instead. Dude isn't quite stooped enough, but I think he'd do nicely. And if it comes to the Falls, that could be quite a compelling fight.
In the interim though, I bring tidings of great joy! Rumor is out that the damn fools involved in Sherlock Holmes and its forthcoming sequel appear to be moving away from the damnfool idea of having Brad Pitt play Professor Moriarty (it was under discussion for the original, then the sequel) and are considering Daniel Day-Lewis instead. Dude isn't quite stooped enough, but I think he'd do nicely. And if it comes to the Falls, that could be quite a compelling fight.
You Took My Hand, You Showed Me How
One thing I've enjoyed about the big music profiles that have come out this summer, whether it's been the stuff about Diplo in the New York Times Magazine and now GQ profiles of M.I.A. or the smaller but still interesting profile of Dr. Luke in New York this week is that they keep bumping up against a great and mysterious truth of pop music. Music can be engineered to be wickedly successful, as Luke does with pop hits:
On another note, the New York piece focuses on Dr. Luke's party anthems. I think he deserves a little bit more credit for emotional depth. He did three of my favorite songs on Pink's I'm Not Dead album, the hilarious bravado chant "Cuz I Can," the delightfully independent and a
The cases both for and against him can be built on the exact same evidence: that his ability to turn out consistent chart-toppers suggests something repetitive and formulaic. “If you look at his discography, there are so many gigantic songs,” says the music critic Maura Johnston. “He clearly has this formula that works. A friend said to me, ‘I can’t get ‘California Gurls’ out of my head. I hated it at first. But it totally overtook me.’ ” A Dr. Luke song reliably involves tension-building verses followed by a soaring, strap-yourself-in chorus (a poppified take on the old grunge approach); no end of bleep-blorp synthesizing (both instrumental and vocal) borrowed gleefully from eighties electro-pop; and an unapologetic, don’t-even-think-you-won’t-be-humming-this-all-summer hook. He’s successfully cracked the secret to what once seemed like a musical oxymoron: the aggressively sunny song that melds “the veneer of rock and the sheen of pop,” in the words of Sean Fennessey, a critic for Spin and the Village Voice, who adds, “It’s this amazing weaving of different genres. And you can’t really see the seams.” Of his work, Dr. Luke says simply, “I want to make songs that reach a lot of people and are fun and spread joy. You can make depressing music, that’s cool, and maybe I’ll want to do that sometime. But for now, I want fun stuff.”Or Diplo does with hip-hop. But in both cases, I think there's a useful acknowledgement that there is something inexplicable about the ability to just hear the sound of the moment, and to go out and create it. I like things like that, where you reach the limit of understanding and explanation.
On another note, the New York piece focuses on Dr. Luke's party anthems. I think he deserves a little bit more credit for emotional depth. He did three of my favorite songs on Pink's I'm Not Dead album, the hilarious bravado chant "Cuz I Can," the delightfully independent and a
Origin Story
So, no one told me that Green Hornet is actually about Seth Rogen's efforts to turn from a likable schlub into a major movie star:
I'm not too interested in that story. And I'm not too interested in this.
I'm not too interested in that story. And I'm not too interested in this.
Twang
New fantasy supergroup—the Scissor Sisters, Kylie Minogue, and Jack White team up for the best country album of all time. Seriously:
Loretta Lynn can do guest vocals.
Loretta Lynn can do guest vocals.
You Can't Always Get What You Want
I hope this isn't an augury, but no sooner do I lament the lack of decent parts in Amanda Bynes' recent career than she announces she's retiring from acting at 24. I actually think that a hiatus might be smart. She can go off, have a life, decide if acting is what she really wants, and come back when she knows exactly what kinds of parts she'll enjoy playing—and maybe even when she's aged past being a sexpot starlet. On the other hand, if she decides that she really doesn't enjoy acting, then I wish her well. Movies would probably be a lot better if they were made solely by people who were absolutely sure that the craft of them was what they loved doing best.
Toy Stories, Part II: No Spoilers Edition
So, I don't think I'd ever particularly considered this going into Toy Story 3, but Andy's mom is a single mother. I didn't notice it until a scene where Woody considers Andy's high school graduation, but it's just his mother, his sister, and him in the picture. Apparently canon says she's a widow, but the movie never establishes that. It just takes for granted that their family functions just fine without a guy in the picture, whether his absence is due to abandonment, death, or divorce, and it never, ever judges Andy's mother for being on her own and not remarrying. I realize, of course, that the family other than Andy is semi-peripheral to the series. But I really do appreciate that the movie is firm about the fact that this archetypal American family doesn't have to be composed of a store-issue set of parts.
I realized, watching the movie this week, that Andy's actually older than my younger brother. I was 10 when I met him, and now he's going to college, 15 years later. No matter who else is in that family Andy Davis is basically my generation's kid brother.
I realized, watching the movie this week, that Andy's actually older than my younger brother. I was 10 when I met him, and now he's going to college, 15 years later. No matter who else is in that family Andy Davis is basically my generation's kid brother.
Toy Stories, Part I: Extreme Spoilers Edition
Image used under a Creative Commons license courtesy of Loren Javier.
So, I completely lost it towards the end of Toy Story 3, and my only real consolation was that the person I was with cried at the same parts that I did. I honestly hadn't expected this development, in part because the movie managed to keep the ending ambiguous until the final scene, but I thought the smartest part of the movie, perhaps of the series, was the moment when Andy gives all of his most beloved toys, including Woody, to a little girl his family knows.
It's an extremely brave story moment. The entire movie is built up around an idea Woody promulgates to the other toys: that their role is not to be played with, but to be there if Andy ever needs them again. But in the end, Woody decides that his friends deserve to be with a child who has an imagination and love to match their first owner, and decides that the best service he can give Andy is to provide himself to be handed off, to be the bridge between the child Andy was and the man he'll become. The moment Andy chooses to let Woody go, but to introduce him and the other toys to Bonnie by playing with them one last time and helping her integrate them into her own fantasy universe, left me in floods. I'm tearing up again just thinking of it.
Without going into too much detail, part of the reason the end just destroyed me is because it's true. My favorite childhood toy, the one I'm going to give to my first kid someday, was the gift of a family friend who had outgrown it. It's rare that I go to the movies and have a "I thought I was the only one" moment in the theater. In fact, it may never have happened to me in my entire life. But Pixar got me—and the feeling of seeing one of my deepest, oldest memories extracted and played out by someone else on screen just devastated me. It's an amazing testament to how considerate, how talented, how emotionally astute the story-writing team at Pixar is, and the vast, wasted potential left lying around by other studios.
This May Be Unnecessarily Harsh
But perhaps Rob Reiner ought to retire? The evidence:
This is the first movie he's written since 1998's Spinal Tap: The Final Tour. It is not an encouraging trajectory, even from that starting point.
This is the first movie he's written since 1998's Spinal Tap: The Final Tour. It is not an encouraging trajectory, even from that starting point.
Billie Piper Is Delightful
Dr. Who has been on my to-do list for a long time, so I started with the 2005 revival this weekend. And while I'll have lots more to say about the show once I'm further into it, I have to say it makes me feel very justified in liking Billie Piper. I first got introduced to her during a New Years in the UK, where "Something Deep Inside," along with "Rock DJ" (warning, if you haven't seen the video, the end may not be for the extremely squeamish) and "Lady, Hear Me Tonight" were in near-constant rotation.
I actually like her more as she looks in the 2005 Dr. Who episodes than she does in the "Something Deep Inside" video, where she's intensely blonde, and tanned, and almost too skinny. She's a real girl in Dr. Who, she wears jeans and cotton, she's got some really nice curves--it actually feels gratifying when she spits at the last pure human, who lives in hyper-altered state as a sheet of skin and is played by the same actress who plays Madam Hooch in the Harry Potter movies, "I'd rather die than live like you, a bitchy trampoline....You're just skin, Cassandra, lipstick and skin."She's not some stick who looks hypocritical saying it, but she doesn't have to be making some statement in praise of ugliness, either.
And there's a winsomeness to her performance, the wishes of a girl who didn't hope for something more than to work in a store and who lives with her hilariously scrounging mother (who tries, and fails, to seduce the Doctor the moment he walks through the door), and who runs after adventure not the first, but the second, time it's offered to her. There's no shame in her former state, in her dismay at some of the places she ends up in. She doesn't have to be a chav, or a redneck, she can be unsophisticated without being an object of derision. I'd be curious to see how she plays as someone with complicated morals and manners in The Secret Diary of a Call Girl.
I actually like her more as she looks in the 2005 Dr. Who episodes than she does in the "Something Deep Inside" video, where she's intensely blonde, and tanned, and almost too skinny. She's a real girl in Dr. Who, she wears jeans and cotton, she's got some really nice curves--it actually feels gratifying when she spits at the last pure human, who lives in hyper-altered state as a sheet of skin and is played by the same actress who plays Madam Hooch in the Harry Potter movies, "I'd rather die than live like you, a bitchy trampoline....You're just skin, Cassandra, lipstick and skin."She's not some stick who looks hypocritical saying it, but she doesn't have to be making some statement in praise of ugliness, either.
And there's a winsomeness to her performance, the wishes of a girl who didn't hope for something more than to work in a store and who lives with her hilariously scrounging mother (who tries, and fails, to seduce the Doctor the moment he walks through the door), and who runs after adventure not the first, but the second, time it's offered to her. There's no shame in her former state, in her dismay at some of the places she ends up in. She doesn't have to be a chav, or a redneck, she can be unsophisticated without being an object of derision. I'd be curious to see how she plays as someone with complicated morals and manners in The Secret Diary of a Call Girl.
Dissolution
It seems inevitable that, given its importance in our popular culture as an avatar of disaster and decline, that someone would make a movie about the Chateau Marmont in West Hollywood. And it doesn't seem particularly surprising that the person who makes that movie would be Sofia Coppola:
I don't know what it says about Stephen Dorff that the first thing I think of when I consider him is his bad-boy act in Britney Spears' video for "Everytime," which is really quite sad, even with the dippy rebirth conclusion. I've seen Blade, and I liked Public Enemies so much I saw it twice, even though I don't know that it registered for me that Dorff was in it. But he looks just fine here, even though I'm not quite sure what the point of the movie is. Will his character become a better person by accepting his responsibilities as a father? That seems a bit trite for Coppola. Will Elle Fanning's character get to be an actual person, or just the angelic, gorgeous, and talented vehicle for her father's growth? Maybe none of that's supposed to matter, maybe the movie is just supposed to be dissolute and lovely and an expression of the boredom of having basically anything you want whenever you want it.
I don't know what it says about Stephen Dorff that the first thing I think of when I consider him is his bad-boy act in Britney Spears' video for "Everytime," which is really quite sad, even with the dippy rebirth conclusion. I've seen Blade, and I liked Public Enemies so much I saw it twice, even though I don't know that it registered for me that Dorff was in it. But he looks just fine here, even though I'm not quite sure what the point of the movie is. Will his character become a better person by accepting his responsibilities as a father? That seems a bit trite for Coppola. Will Elle Fanning's character get to be an actual person, or just the angelic, gorgeous, and talented vehicle for her father's growth? Maybe none of that's supposed to matter, maybe the movie is just supposed to be dissolute and lovely and an expression of the boredom of having basically anything you want whenever you want it.
Snacks and Stereotypes
I have to say, I'm feeling a bit mixed about the trailer for Nikki Blonsky's new television show, Huge:
It's not so much that I have fully-developed opinions on size acceptance, Body Mass Index as a useful measurements, etc. that the show sets off. I just think that Blonsky's line reading of "Everyone wants us to hate our bodies. Well, I refuse to," is pretty wooden. Given, it's a pretty bad line in the first place. And I do understand the rationale for addressing body image issues directly and clearly, without inference or subtext, especially in a show aimed at teenagers. But how much better was she in Hairspray, where her character just lives a happy life in stubborn (and perhaps mostly unaware) defiance of the ugliness all around her than she is in these clips? And it doesn't help a lot to deconstruct stereotypes of heavy people to show an adjacent scene of Blonsky swiping another girl's abandoned dessert.
It's not so much that I have fully-developed opinions on size acceptance, Body Mass Index as a useful measurements, etc. that the show sets off. I just think that Blonsky's line reading of "Everyone wants us to hate our bodies. Well, I refuse to," is pretty wooden. Given, it's a pretty bad line in the first place. And I do understand the rationale for addressing body image issues directly and clearly, without inference or subtext, especially in a show aimed at teenagers. But how much better was she in Hairspray, where her character just lives a happy life in stubborn (and perhaps mostly unaware) defiance of the ugliness all around her than she is in these clips? And it doesn't help a lot to deconstruct stereotypes of heavy people to show an adjacent scene of Blonsky swiping another girl's abandoned dessert.
Goodbye, Ruby Tuesday
Luke Wilson may not have the most depressing career trajectory of guys who seemed like they were going to be hot stuff at the turn of the millennium, but there is something profoundly...discouraging about it. It's not a tragedy, like the fall of Lindsay Lohan, or anything. It's not even that he has his brother Owen's insane multi-medium talent—we'll never know exactly how much of Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums he wrote, but I imagine Wes Anderson doesn't share credit lightly—and intense personal demons. But there's something so incredibly discouraging about watching him go from Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums to a somewhat puffy dude who shills for AT&T and takes roles ranging from the creepily misogynistic in My Super Ex-Girlfriend and Death at a Funeral to the just insanely bland, in stuff like Henry Poole is Here. It says a lot that I don't even remember him in You Kill Me, which I quite enjoyed, and that I'd kind of forgotten him in The Family Stone, which I think is underrated, in part because it insists that breast cancer survivors can still be sexy, and not just in a Samantha Jones kind of way.
All of which is a really long way of saying I am moderately hopeful and excited for Middle Men, in which Wilson stars as a family-man internet porn entrepreneur:
There's a wistfulness and opportunism to what we see of his performance here. It's not ever going to match this:
But maybe the whole point of Wilson's flailing is that nothing ever really could.
All of which is a really long way of saying I am moderately hopeful and excited for Middle Men, in which Wilson stars as a family-man internet porn entrepreneur:
There's a wistfulness and opportunism to what we see of his performance here. It's not ever going to match this:
But maybe the whole point of Wilson's flailing is that nothing ever really could.
Y'All Are Convincing
I downloaded A Game of Thrones onto my Kindle on Friday. As soon as I finish Operation Mincemeat, it's up next. But in exchange, can I seriously urge you guys to read Mincemeat? It made it onto my list after Malcolm Gladwell's New Yorker review, less because I'm super-interested in spycraft (though my colleague Shane Harris has done a lot to correct that), but because it's just a great story. For those of you not familiar, a bunch of British spies, inspired by cheesy spy novels, decided to create a fictional dead man (though the body they used was very much real), arm him with papers suggesting an alternate Allied invasion route into Occupied Europe, drop it off the coast of Spain, and hope the Nazis would find it and fall for the misinformation. All of which they did. It absolutely demands a contemporary film or miniseries adaptation, particularly because earlier versions were based on a deliberately misleading account of the case written by one of the spies responsible, and Operation Mincemeat updates the historical record, which was much more eccentric than anyone actually admitted even when they came clean about it.
Ideally, it's something I'd like to see the BBC make, since Americans would excise or misunderstand the cultural particulars. I think it's telling that in the premium cable resurgence, the two closest things we've gotten to British shows are Little Britain USA, which garnered a far larger British audience than American one, and The Tudors, which seems far too silly to count. The folks behind Spooks would do a cracking job with Operation Mincemeat, I think. And they could even bring in Rupert Penry-Jones and Matthew Macfayden to play the two main spys at the heart of the plot on the British side.
The King Stay The King
The pairing of the speech and mouth movements here isn't actually that great. But the choices of which characters to transmute into their equivalents is pretty brilliant, and a reminder that, from Toy Story to The Wire, a lot of American stories are essentially the same: the struggle against irrelevance, the push for conformity, the glory and desperation of our dreams:
It's Not Funny
So, the trailer for Never Let Me Go looks quite good:
I really do need to read the book. But I have to say that what the trailer most made me think of, and I had to go back and check on this, is that unless the Pirates of the Caribbean movies* count, which I don't think they do, Keira Knightley's never been in a comedy. It's a weird omission from her resume, and I can't quite figure it out. I don't think of her as an exceptionally humorless actress. She's tried a whole bunch of genres, from period, to action. So why not comedy? Is it just that her great, quivering, sharp jawline, perhaps her best physical asset as a performer, is more suited to drama?
*Or Domino, which is beyond laughably awful. It's from before Mickey Rourke's comeback. And before Mo'Nique won her Oscar. It is quite something.
I really do need to read the book. But I have to say that what the trailer most made me think of, and I had to go back and check on this, is that unless the Pirates of the Caribbean movies* count, which I don't think they do, Keira Knightley's never been in a comedy. It's a weird omission from her resume, and I can't quite figure it out. I don't think of her as an exceptionally humorless actress. She's tried a whole bunch of genres, from period, to action. So why not comedy? Is it just that her great, quivering, sharp jawline, perhaps her best physical asset as a performer, is more suited to drama?
*Or Domino, which is beyond laughably awful. It's from before Mickey Rourke's comeback. And before Mo'Nique won her Oscar. It is quite something.
Down at the Mouth
You know, I sort of hoped Michael Clayton would make better job choices after ending his legal career:
I'm not saying I'm totally against the Grim Clooney phase. I just think since Pierce Brosnan reminded us that the whole assassin-doing-one-last-job thing can be crazy, and uproarious, and genuinely moving in The Matador, super-grim doesn't have to be the default on these kinds of things.
I'm not saying I'm totally against the Grim Clooney phase. I just think since Pierce Brosnan reminded us that the whole assassin-doing-one-last-job thing can be crazy, and uproarious, and genuinely moving in The Matador, super-grim doesn't have to be the default on these kinds of things.
A Bad Taste In The Mouth
There are lots of things to be said about Katy Perry's dreadful Candyland-Gone-Wild video for the otherwise quite likable "California Gurls." Among them, that girls who really can't dance probably shouldn't make videos with significant dance sequences, and that someone might want to tell Ms. Perry that there's something kind of creepy about wrapping her non-white backup dancers in cellophane or trapping them in bubbles and having the dippy white girl set them free to join her whipped-cream entourage.
Bon Temps Girls, They're Unforgettable
It's sort of beside the point to argue that Snoop Dogg's ode to Sookie Stackhouse isn't very good, although it is pretty funny:
It's just another data point in the case that in our popular culture, the barrier between reality and fiction is getting much more porous in both directions. Snoop has about as much a chance of getting with Sookie as the Real Housewives have of being friends in real life. Why shouldn't a rapper dream?
It's just another data point in the case that in our popular culture, the barrier between reality and fiction is getting much more porous in both directions. Snoop has about as much a chance of getting with Sookie as the Real Housewives have of being friends in real life. Why shouldn't a rapper dream?
Gone, Baby, Gone
Gawker's wondering whether the trailer for Conviction, about a Boston woman who put herself through college and law school to challenge her brother's conviction on murder charges, proves Hillary Swank is actually a good actress. I'm more interested in Sam Rockwell:
Not that it's news that dude's a good actor. But this looks like a potentially powerful portrait of how people have to change to survive in prison. You see Rockwell's hair change, the tattoos that bloom on his arms as the years pass in the trailer. But much more importantly, you see him withdraw, act out in the confines of his cell and then in the larger prison community. He's not a saint, but he's not a psychopath either. He's just a relatively decent man adapting to a profoundly unnatural environment, even as his sister insists that he retain unuseful hope of returning to the world that most of us live in. Her love, weighed against his survival.
Not that it's news that dude's a good actor. But this looks like a potentially powerful portrait of how people have to change to survive in prison. You see Rockwell's hair change, the tattoos that bloom on his arms as the years pass in the trailer. But much more importantly, you see him withdraw, act out in the confines of his cell and then in the larger prison community. He's not a saint, but he's not a psychopath either. He's just a relatively decent man adapting to a profoundly unnatural environment, even as his sister insists that he retain unuseful hope of returning to the world that most of us live in. Her love, weighed against his survival.
Don't Call My Name
It's the weekend. Clearly what you need is the inevitable, really quite good "Alejandro"-Ace of Base-"Don't Turn Around" mashup. I am so totally fine with a nineties revival, something I never thought I'd say. Never:
Plus the heartbroken lyrics to "Don't Turn Around" and the anti-love lyrics of "Alejandro" make for a nice, spiky conversation
Plus the heartbroken lyrics to "Don't Turn Around" and the anti-love lyrics of "Alejandro" make for a nice, spiky conversation
Big Boi Needs a New Video Director
While it is undeniable that Big Boi rocks one serious bowling alley:
I sort of miss the full-on ridiculousness of "The Way You Move," you know? The dude can hold his own against such distractions as a garage staffed entirely by extreme hotties, giraffes, and a floating Fonzworth Bentley. He doesn't need to be at the absolute center of the goddamn frame all the time.
I sort of miss the full-on ridiculousness of "The Way You Move," you know? The dude can hold his own against such distractions as a garage staffed entirely by extreme hotties, giraffes, and a floating Fonzworth Bentley. He doesn't need to be at the absolute center of the goddamn frame all the time.
Party! In the Forest!
Like many other people, I am confused about why Adam Lambert is holding a rave in the woods to illustrate a song about sexual and romantic longing:
I sort of suspect this is my punishment for praising Ke$ha's "Your Love Is My Drug" video. It's going to be a new era of outdoor ridiculousness. I apologize, by the way, for posting this so early in the morning. But the song's actually not terrible, if you don't watch the video, isn't it?
I sort of suspect this is my punishment for praising Ke$ha's "Your Love Is My Drug" video. It's going to be a new era of outdoor ridiculousness. I apologize, by the way, for posting this so early in the morning. But the song's actually not terrible, if you don't watch the video, isn't it?
Francis Urquhart Is More Gully Than Rahm Emanuel
So, I started watching House of Cards, the deeply badass BBC serial about a manipulative chief whip in Parliament that aired starting in 1990. And it is sublime nastiness, I think it provides some of the reasons that British political serials are so much better than American political shows and movies.
The circumstances are these. The whip, Francis Urquhart, helps get a fairly weak Prime Minister elected, only to find himself left out in the cold when said PM decides not to appoint him to a Cabinet position on the grounds that reshuffles show weakness, telling him "Do you remember MacMillan? The night of the long knives?" That rejection turns Urquhart irrevocably against an ally he never particularly respected, and he sets out, with absolute glee in the brutality necessary, to take the PM down.
That nastiness is one part of the puzzle. Americans may continue to be surprised when governors hike the Appalachian Trail, or flirt with pages, or attempt to manipulate the hell out of reporters, or enjoy the fruits of high office a little bit too much, and our art has to assume that same state of shock. Urquhart assumes all of those things are true. He's a man who cheerfully uncovers an operative's cocaine addiction and turns it to his own purposes, encouraging the man to pimp out his girlfriend to one of Urquhart's rivals. He blackmails a faltering MP into voting for an energy bill when he discovers the man was stopped for soliciting prostitutes—then tells the fellow that he'll happily provide him a list with appropriately discreet hookers. Urquhart even, in one of the reminders that the series is 20 years old, sets up a false account to create the impression that the PM is involved in insider trading from his own home phone. He names fools for what they are so the audience can benefit from his expertise in recognizing them. His political strength is assuming the worst about absolutely everyone, and by having more dire definitions of worse than many people can imagine.
The brutality isn't limited to the events or the dialogue. "We have a general election to win," Urquhart declares before shooting a bird dead in his fields. The second episode begins with a shot of his kills hung up after the hunt. Urquhart isn't afraid to get blood all over his hands, or to have an affair he thinks will be advantageous (with a pretty young reporter played by Susannah Harker, also known as Jane Bennet in the BBC Pride and Prejudice. It's pretty awesome to see her getting indignant about stories that have been spiked, and drinking with the PM's dissolute brother.) to his career. He's effective because he has no shame, and all the appearance of rectitude. "You are a real person, aren't you?" the young reporter asks him at one point. "Oh yes, I am a real person," he replies, but he can't help but laughing at the absurdity of it.
It also helps that the producers assume that the audience is smart. No one needs to explain the MacMillan quotation. No one needs to explain Question Time, so shows can just include scenes set in untranslated and unsimplified repeats of the ritual.
Nobody's willing to appear this cold in American politics, whether in reality or in television or the movies, and no one gives mainstream audiences this level of detail—and as a result, no one plausibly builds this level of intrigue. Rahm Emanuel may curse people and send them dead fish, but he also wants the impression that he's a decent family man and good to his brothers. We want to believe that politicians can be decent, and rather than believe they're inevitably weak and corrupt and ineffective, we want to retreat to living in contradiction. That contradiction may be true. Power may corrupt good men. People who are effective in one sphere may be ineffective in another. But sometimes bastards are as bastards do. The British seem capable of acknowledging this in a way we're not always capable of. Rahm Emanuel better hope he never meets a Francis Urquhart in a dark alley, a legislative floor, or anywhere else, or we'll see how tough he really is.
I'm Happy for Gabrielle Union For Getting The Work, But...
A Request for Translation
Game of Thrones fans, is there something in this teaser I'm supposed to be excited about, or that is a dogwhistle to y'all? Because it just seems like some dudes on horses declaring "Winter is coming" when snow's already on the ground, suggesting less than impressive powers of observation:
I want to be impressed and excited, so lend a sister a hand. And tell me if the books are worth reading.
I want to be impressed and excited, so lend a sister a hand. And tell me if the books are worth reading.
Mean Girls
I think the finding that people commit more acts of cruelty on reality television than in fictional shows is simultaneously questionable and interesting. First, I think it's important to recognize that while more acts of cruelty may be broadcast on reality programs, that's the result of many more hours of filming than are actually shown. The minute-per-minute bad acts in reality television may represent concentrated bad behavior by people who still behave better than the fictional characters dreamed up by writers and producers. Second, television shows are probably relatively evenly balanced between shows that portray real life much more optimistically than it really is and shows that portray it more pessimistically, so the average is the result of shows with wildly different world views.
But I also think the tendency towards cruelty has a lot to do with how we view reality these days, as somehow...deficient in comparison to the rich worlds of entertainment we've created. I think this is where the plague of fake memoirists and heightened so-called reality programs comes from, a sense that our own lives couldn't possibly be as interesting and rich as blockbuster movies or novels, so we have to augment them. It's a bit sad, really. In an age dominated by reality programming, we have less respect for and interest in actual reality than ever.
A Thought
It says a great deal about how awful Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen was that Transformers looks totally reasonable and fun by comparison. It's definitely not the most egregious thing in the second movie, but I particularly regret that John Turturro got turned entirely into a stupid ethnic joke.
Breakable
All Kinds of Storytelling
I don't know if any of y'all are following BuffySummers, AgentFinn, willow_r, TaraMaclay, Xander, SpikePratt on Twitter, but if you're not, the person or persons behind the handles are doing a wonderful job of retelling the whole arc of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, in conversation, and essentially in real time. It's probably something that will only appeal to fans of the show who are already basically familiar with the events that are unfolding in prose. But it is a good illustration of Twitter's potential for storytelling. This example is episodic, the pace can be a little jerky sometimes. But as a way of re-exploring characters I feel familiar with already, it's working quite well.
It's becoming more common for shows and movies to create character Twitter accounts. Glee, for example, has a whole bunch of them set up, but they aren't particularly good: lots of repeated jokes, extreme sporadic entries, no real interaction with the events of the plot or deeper development of the characters beyond their tics. I think feeds like these will work best if they're treated like webisodes, a way of offering more, quality original content that expands a universe, and can be produced at no cost other than the time of the person who is tasked with updating them. But that means taking them seriously. Just because a product doesn't require major production costs doesn't mean it should look and read cheap.
It's becoming more common for shows and movies to create character Twitter accounts. Glee, for example, has a whole bunch of them set up, but they aren't particularly good: lots of repeated jokes, extreme sporadic entries, no real interaction with the events of the plot or deeper development of the characters beyond their tics. I think feeds like these will work best if they're treated like webisodes, a way of offering more, quality original content that expands a universe, and can be produced at no cost other than the time of the person who is tasked with updating them. But that means taking them seriously. Just because a product doesn't require major production costs doesn't mean it should look and read cheap.
Supernatural Problems
But the problem with the faeries who have showed up in the last couple of books is that they're so entirely of another universe. They're the standard gorgeous, supernatural, sometimes extremely vicious creatures from another dimension, but as a result, they don't latch into the rest of the story. Vampires have a specific physical reaction to them, so there's continuity, it's another part of the supernatural world that gets explained. But they don't add anything to our understanding of our own society. If they were going to, there's need to be a concept like Will Shetterly's Bordertown, where we see the engagement and cross-pollination between the world and faerie, where both are changed. I'd actually love to see what Shetterly and Harris got up to together. It's be fun to see Sookie buy her books at Elswhere and Ron get some mentoring, maybe even a substitute older brother, in Alcide.
I'm So Sick of America's Sweethearts
So, I was doing my ironing this weekend, and Miss Congeniality 2 was the least bad television option to have on while I was doing it. The movie is awful, and it's a reminder of why we should ditch the America's Sweetheart label, whether we're applying it to Sandra Bullock, Julia Roberts, or any other young actress who nips at their heels for a while. It's a title that appears to give actresses permission to appear in all sorts of mediocre junk with the expectation that we ought to like it simply on the strength of their track record and personal charm. And in particular, I think it lets those actresses offer really ugly portrayals of women without the kind of scrutiny that they might get if they weren't Tefloned by prior box office and reviews.
The thing that sucks about Miss Congeniality 2 is that the first movie in the franchise actually was a lot of fun. Sure, Bullock was uglied up in a way that was unrealistic and insulting to her natural charms. But it wasn't objectionable. Sure, her character got a makeover, but that makeover also gave her an in to challenge a group of beauty queens, who turned out to be, among other things, gay, and a former ecoterrorist, on their assumptions about looks, toughness, and behavior. In Miss Congeniality 2, Bullock's character becomes even more disgusting than the backstabbers the original movie deconstructed, and the explanation for it was that she went through a bad breakup. That, plus the ugly, racially-inflected her character has with the awful stereotype that Regina King is wasted on is, makes for a jaw-droppingly bad movie.
Same with something like All About Steve. An actress with less goodwill in the bank would be absolutely destroyed by appearing in something like that. Why would an actress with any measure of personal charism and judgement appear in a movie where she's such an extreme, implausible grotesque? What does it say about what she thinks is good? What performances she thinks she's turned in well?
It's been a while since Julia Roberts has made a movie as unfortunate as All About Steve or Miss Congeniality. But Runaway Bride is pretty vile. It's not actually charming that a woman would grow up with absolutely no self-knowledge, it's sad. And ditching people at the altar causes real damage, and not just to the person doing the ditching. The end result of that should be therapy, not salvation and snuggling with Richard Gere. I will admit to having liked My Best Friend's Wedding at the time, and I will stand by my admiration of Rupert Everett's performance, but as I've grown up, I've realized more and more just how crazy and unlikable pretty much ever character in it is. It's a movie about marriage hysteria, on the part of both Cameron Diaz and Julia Roberts' characters, and it's awful. And in America's Sweethearts, we get to watch the delightful spectacle of Roberts, who has been skinny as long as she's been famous, pretend she's a fat girl who has dedicated her whole life to her sister, played by Catherine Zeta-Jones. It's a funny, prescient movie about the era of reality entertainment, but there's a huge, sour note in the middle of it.
This isn't to say that Bullock and Roberts haven't made a lot of charming movies. While You Were Sleeping is the first romantic comedy I ever saw, and it's great, and Bullock's utterly believable in it. I hear great things about Infamous, which I'm looking forward to seeing quite a bit. I adored Roberts in Duplicity last year, and she's great in Closer, which made for one of the most uncomfortable movie-watching experiences I've had in a long time, but is excellent none the less. And that's only the recent movies.
But there ought to be genuine penalties for making rotten movies, particularly ones in which smart actresses debase themselves to turn in rotten portrayals of their fellow women. Julia Roberts and Sandra Bullock both have Academy Awards. They both have a lot of money. They don't need the worst movies they've made. And neither do we.
A Question
Is The Wrath of Khan one of the Star Trek movies you have to have watched the television show to enjoy? Or am I missing something? In between the goofy costumes, and the incredibly lingering shots of the ships, it seemed to me like any real sense of pathos got lost. Having someone complain about their long-dead and never-seen wife without a) convincingly representing that trauma or b) seeing her die, makes the whole mess that follows seem more overwrought than moving. Maybe it's just that Eric Bana was so good as Nero, a role that I think really ought to move his career towards fully-realized supporting parts, and the cast surrounding Montalban was so milquetoast, that I'm biased by having seen the reboot first. On the other hand, seeing Khan made it much clearer how much the reboot was a gift to fans. I could watch any number of Boneses holler "are you out of your Vulcan mind?" one of the cleverer transformations of a sci-fi term into an obscenity ("frak" has nothing on this, sorry) any number of times.
I Am About to Abandon Any Credibility I May Have As A Critic
But I kind of like the video for Ke$ha's "Your Love Is My Drug." Consider, before you judge:
The original spend-the-night-in-the-desert concept is pretty goofy. You'd get dehydrated out there. But I love the dust-and-turquoise color palette. And I love the Yellow Submarine-esque animation even more. The only-cute guy Ke$ha's losing it over transformed into the Birth of Venus is a little bit witty, and she an affectionate Little Mermaid. Speaking of said only-cute guy, I like that he's not aggressively hunky. It makes her feelings for him more plausible, actually--she must be really into the guy to be singing things like this about him, rather than blinded by his overwhelming good looks. The glowing-body-paint-with-a-snake is annoying, unfortunately, but the transformation to a kaleidoscope and back into the animation isn't bad.
As for the song itself, it's pretty much her standard. It's not going to change the world or anything. But I do think that her lyrics have an air of the self-dramatizing conversations I feel like people have in a real life, from the "maybe I need some rehab / Or maybe just need some sleep" declaration, to the declaration of herself as behaving "like a lovesick crackhead." It's not a particularly attractive way of speaking, but it's true to the way a lot of folks do talk.
The original spend-the-night-in-the-desert concept is pretty goofy. You'd get dehydrated out there. But I love the dust-and-turquoise color palette. And I love the Yellow Submarine-esque animation even more. The only-cute guy Ke$ha's losing it over transformed into the Birth of Venus is a little bit witty, and she an affectionate Little Mermaid. Speaking of said only-cute guy, I like that he's not aggressively hunky. It makes her feelings for him more plausible, actually--she must be really into the guy to be singing things like this about him, rather than blinded by his overwhelming good looks. The glowing-body-paint-with-a-snake is annoying, unfortunately, but the transformation to a kaleidoscope and back into the animation isn't bad.
As for the song itself, it's pretty much her standard. It's not going to change the world or anything. But I do think that her lyrics have an air of the self-dramatizing conversations I feel like people have in a real life, from the "maybe I need some rehab / Or maybe just need some sleep" declaration, to the declaration of herself as behaving "like a lovesick crackhead." It's not a particularly attractive way of speaking, but it's true to the way a lot of folks do talk.
Further Proof that I Am Ancient
I caught High Fidelity over the weekend, and was reminded that it's ten years old.
Iben Hjejle hasn't made a major American movie since. Todd Louiso's basically gotten by on bit television appearances since, though he was in Snakes on a Plane, so points, dude. Lisa Bonet was on Life on Mars, which is a further reminder that I really need to get around to catching the British original first. Joan Cusack's mostly continued to be stuck in roles that are incredibly far beneath her. With the exception of Mystic River, Tim Robbins has mostly spent his time in projects that didn't get as much traction as it seems like they should have. John Cusack has vacillated between extreme romantic drippiness and overdone action and suspense. And Jack Black's succeeded by relying on the parts of himself that let him play the jackass in Barry, rather than the smart guy (with rare exceptions, I thought he was quite good in The Holiday).
Looking back that way, all of those subsequent careers seem like a significant waste of talent. Maybe High Fidelity was just a rare moment of artistic convergence for all of these folks. Maybe it's just that my own personal history makes me feel intensely sentimental about the damn movie (although I still can't listen to "I Believe (When I Fall in Love With You it Will Be Forever" with the kind of equanimity and peacefulness I think you're supposed to feel at the end of it). But I do think it was that kind of great, deeply-felt, emotionally and physically specific but universally relatable movie that's all too rare these days. It really does make me feel kind of old that I've been carrying it around as a touchstone for more than a decade.
Iben Hjejle hasn't made a major American movie since. Todd Louiso's basically gotten by on bit television appearances since, though he was in Snakes on a Plane, so points, dude. Lisa Bonet was on Life on Mars, which is a further reminder that I really need to get around to catching the British original first. Joan Cusack's mostly continued to be stuck in roles that are incredibly far beneath her. With the exception of Mystic River, Tim Robbins has mostly spent his time in projects that didn't get as much traction as it seems like they should have. John Cusack has vacillated between extreme romantic drippiness and overdone action and suspense. And Jack Black's succeeded by relying on the parts of himself that let him play the jackass in Barry, rather than the smart guy (with rare exceptions, I thought he was quite good in The Holiday).
Looking back that way, all of those subsequent careers seem like a significant waste of talent. Maybe High Fidelity was just a rare moment of artistic convergence for all of these folks. Maybe it's just that my own personal history makes me feel intensely sentimental about the damn movie (although I still can't listen to "I Believe (When I Fall in Love With You it Will Be Forever" with the kind of equanimity and peacefulness I think you're supposed to feel at the end of it). But I do think it was that kind of great, deeply-felt, emotionally and physically specific but universally relatable movie that's all too rare these days. It really does make me feel kind of old that I've been carrying it around as a touchstone for more than a decade.
Three Crazy Nights
Get Him to the Greek is no masterpiece. There are too many shots of Jonah Hill vomiting, two too many jokes about Jonah Hill getting violated (by which I mean both of them are gratuitous and tasteless), one too many episodes of Hill being sent to buy heroin, a chemistryless relationship between Jonah Hill and Elizabeth Moss, and a reference to Forgetting Sarah Marshall that would be fine except for the fact that it makes us remember that Hill plays two different characters in that movie and this, making true continuity impossible.
But there's much more about the movie that's good than that's bad, and despite its occasional discomforts, it's well worth a watch. Given much more room to build a character, and as promising a character as Aldous Snow, Brand is just wonderful. He's a plausible object of Hill's worship and sacrifice, a man whose charisma, newly rediscovered for a Today Show audience, or fully on display for a stadium audience, outweighs his sometimes loathsome behavior. He's struggling to be a good father despite having a fairly miserable one himself (an everything-goes-wrong-at-once sequence featuring the two of them, Hill, and Diddy is a debauched high point of the movie). He may be having as much sex as possible, but he seems to be a reasonably considerate lover, and to have been genuinely attached to his long-time girlfriend. I really want to see Brand in a fully-realized role outside this one. Because while he's clearly drawing on his own wild past here, he puts a lot into individual scenes and individual moments, and I think he's capable of building roles without personal resonance.
But then, we already knew that Brand had potential. Far and away the surprise of the movie is Sean Combs. Who knew that the way for the dude to establish himself as a serious acting talent was to embrace patent ridiculousness? He's consistently hilarious riffing on his own outsized personality throughout the movie, but he's good enough to invest a scene about searching for string cheese while preparing to watch Biggest Loser with his kids with humor I certainly would never have found in it on my own. I really hope he takes the lesson from this, and does more comedy, as opposed to say, moving from A Raisin in the Sun into August Wilson adaptations, or something. That'd be upsetting.
In contrast, the movie did nothing to lessen my discomfort about Jonah Hill. It's yet another role for him where he's playing basically a weak personality, someone who lets himself be lead along because he has no actual ideas for how he ought to be living his own life. He and Moss have absolutely no sexual chemistry, and it's not remotely clear what ever bound their relationship together in the first place. By the end of the movie, he's moved to Seattle for her career, perhaps the only time an Apatowian hero has made that much of a sacrifice for a woman, although he gets to be a rock star's producer in exchange, so it's not really a sacrifice. I sometimes feel it's fruitless to keep focusing on the rank sexism that infects the Apatow universe and its offshoots, because there's no indication that a) it'll ever change, or b) there's any disincentive for the folks working in that universe to move beyond it. But there's no question that the women in these movies deserve more in ever conceivable way: better writing, better plotlines, better partners.
But there's much more about the movie that's good than that's bad, and despite its occasional discomforts, it's well worth a watch. Given much more room to build a character, and as promising a character as Aldous Snow, Brand is just wonderful. He's a plausible object of Hill's worship and sacrifice, a man whose charisma, newly rediscovered for a Today Show audience, or fully on display for a stadium audience, outweighs his sometimes loathsome behavior. He's struggling to be a good father despite having a fairly miserable one himself (an everything-goes-wrong-at-once sequence featuring the two of them, Hill, and Diddy is a debauched high point of the movie). He may be having as much sex as possible, but he seems to be a reasonably considerate lover, and to have been genuinely attached to his long-time girlfriend. I really want to see Brand in a fully-realized role outside this one. Because while he's clearly drawing on his own wild past here, he puts a lot into individual scenes and individual moments, and I think he's capable of building roles without personal resonance.
But then, we already knew that Brand had potential. Far and away the surprise of the movie is Sean Combs. Who knew that the way for the dude to establish himself as a serious acting talent was to embrace patent ridiculousness? He's consistently hilarious riffing on his own outsized personality throughout the movie, but he's good enough to invest a scene about searching for string cheese while preparing to watch Biggest Loser with his kids with humor I certainly would never have found in it on my own. I really hope he takes the lesson from this, and does more comedy, as opposed to say, moving from A Raisin in the Sun into August Wilson adaptations, or something. That'd be upsetting.
In contrast, the movie did nothing to lessen my discomfort about Jonah Hill. It's yet another role for him where he's playing basically a weak personality, someone who lets himself be lead along because he has no actual ideas for how he ought to be living his own life. He and Moss have absolutely no sexual chemistry, and it's not remotely clear what ever bound their relationship together in the first place. By the end of the movie, he's moved to Seattle for her career, perhaps the only time an Apatowian hero has made that much of a sacrifice for a woman, although he gets to be a rock star's producer in exchange, so it's not really a sacrifice. I sometimes feel it's fruitless to keep focusing on the rank sexism that infects the Apatow universe and its offshoots, because there's no indication that a) it'll ever change, or b) there's any disincentive for the folks working in that universe to move beyond it. But there's no question that the women in these movies deserve more in ever conceivable way: better writing, better plotlines, better partners.
It's In the Details
Speaking of terrible things made for children, the upcoming Ramona and Beezus movie looks pretty bad. I haven't read the books in a long time, but I do remember Ramona being treated a little less like she's disturbed, although looking back, I guess I was wrong:
I do kind of wish, though, that someone would make an adaptation of Beverly Cleary's teen novels. They're dated, and sweet, to be sure. No one's having sex. No one's really drinking. The worst thing that happens to anyone is one of the characters gets so distracted by a cute-but-dumb boy (whom she eventually dumps for a guy she does word puzzles with) that she gets a bad grade in biology. That said, they're extremely perceptive about something I think folks seem to forget is actually the main part of dating: falling in love.
The details are just right. In Sister of the Bride, the main character is torn between a boy she feels is the kind of dude she ought to fall for, who drives a moped, and a boy she actually likes much more, who plays a trombone, even thought everyone thinks he's got the perfect body for basketball. The former asks her to darn his shirt, the latter asks her to a folk music concert. It's exactly that kind of mundanity that we rely on to make decisions and guide our feelings. Fifteen's even better, from the boy who hides a bicycle in the bushes so he won't look like a nerd when he rides over to take a girl to the movies, to the cheesy pop song said girl gets caught in her head and associates with said boy, to the cup of coffee she orders so she'll look more sophisticated.
These are the things that make movies really good, the very specific movie theater that characters go to, or the restaurant they go to that looks like it was actually decorated with someone with very particular taste. I like to fall into art and get lost in it, and it's such a problem when it's just not possible to do that. People of all ages deserve that kind of attention and care.
I do kind of wish, though, that someone would make an adaptation of Beverly Cleary's teen novels. They're dated, and sweet, to be sure. No one's having sex. No one's really drinking. The worst thing that happens to anyone is one of the characters gets so distracted by a cute-but-dumb boy (whom she eventually dumps for a guy she does word puzzles with) that she gets a bad grade in biology. That said, they're extremely perceptive about something I think folks seem to forget is actually the main part of dating: falling in love.
The details are just right. In Sister of the Bride, the main character is torn between a boy she feels is the kind of dude she ought to fall for, who drives a moped, and a boy she actually likes much more, who plays a trombone, even thought everyone thinks he's got the perfect body for basketball. The former asks her to darn his shirt, the latter asks her to a folk music concert. It's exactly that kind of mundanity that we rely on to make decisions and guide our feelings. Fifteen's even better, from the boy who hides a bicycle in the bushes so he won't look like a nerd when he rides over to take a girl to the movies, to the cheesy pop song said girl gets caught in her head and associates with said boy, to the cup of coffee she orders so she'll look more sophisticated.
These are the things that make movies really good, the very specific movie theater that characters go to, or the restaurant they go to that looks like it was actually decorated with someone with very particular taste. I like to fall into art and get lost in it, and it's such a problem when it's just not possible to do that. People of all ages deserve that kind of attention and care.
Condescending to the Kids
Is it supposed to be, like, subversive or empowering or something that the girl wolf voiced by Alpha and Omega is supposed to be the best hunter?
I am not exaggerating when I say I despair over the fact that this is about the average for what's offered to kids these days. Can you imagine growing up with this as the standard? Maybe it makes it even more amazing when you realize art can be better than this, but I still feel like I had some genuine revelations, and I grew up in the second Golden Age of Disney. It's not fair to treat kids that lazily, to give them such junk, to suggest this is all there is. It's really sad.
I don't know that the solution is to raise hipster kids either. But if you love your children, you've got to give them stuff that will move them, that will make them laugh, and help them grow. There's good stuff out there that doesn't have to be arch, and emotionally removed. If only studios would continue making more of it, instead of churning out this kind of trash.
I am not exaggerating when I say I despair over the fact that this is about the average for what's offered to kids these days. Can you imagine growing up with this as the standard? Maybe it makes it even more amazing when you realize art can be better than this, but I still feel like I had some genuine revelations, and I grew up in the second Golden Age of Disney. It's not fair to treat kids that lazily, to give them such junk, to suggest this is all there is. It's really sad.
I don't know that the solution is to raise hipster kids either. But if you love your children, you've got to give them stuff that will move them, that will make them laugh, and help them grow. There's good stuff out there that doesn't have to be arch, and emotionally removed. If only studios would continue making more of it, instead of churning out this kind of trash.
Legendary Beauty
The news that Angelina Jolie's going to play Cleopatra in a movie is incredibly predictable and deeply boring. There are debates over whether or not she was a babe, but ultimately, they're irrelevant. A movie about a woman who decides to use seduction as a means of securing political power is much more interesting than a movie about a woman who is just beautiful.
This may not be the case for everyone, but Angelina Jolie has reached the point where it's hard for me to see beyond her beauty on the screen. It's overwhelming. It's hard to imagine anything bad happening to someone who looks that good. Someone like that will always have protectors, although I suppose sometimes those protectors could have bad intentions. Knowing how much money she has, it's hard to imagine she ever wants anything. And so I have an incredibly difficult time forgetting who she is in real life. I know too much about her, or too much about what's been made up about her, to get it all out of my brain. I'd like to see a new Cleopatra movie, given my semi-long-running obsession with ancient Egypt. But I feel like Jolie, rather than being a draw, will actually make me stay away from this one.
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