Lincoln (5/5 Stars)

Hmmmm….yummy political sausage….nomnom

Movies about the political process are about as rare as movies about marriage. We tend to romanticize politics by only making movies about campaigns, that romantic engagement between candidate and constituency, whose love for each other is consummated on election night right before the credits roll. Then like every romantic comedy that ends with a wedding we are left with the impression that everyone lived happily ever after. Love never faltered and the impassioned promises made in the campaign speeches were borne into reality by magical political storks. Abracadabra. Getting hitched/elected was the hard part and everything after was easy.

“Lincoln” the newest directorial effort from Steven Spielberg, is that incredibly rare movie that is about the actual work of being a politician. In it, our 16^th President, Abraham Lincoln, spearheads an effort to get the 13^th Amendment, which abolished slavery, passed by the required two-thirds vote in the United States House of Representatives. How rare is it for a movie to be about passing a bill in Congress? Well, according to what I’ve rated on Netflix, I have seen 1700 movies. I went through them all to find something similar on this topic. I found almost nothing. There are a few television series that have successfully written about the political process (Aaron Sorkin’s ‘West Wing,’ Armando Ianucci’s “Veep,” David Simon’s “The Wire) but to find a political movie that was not directly concerned with an election, I had to go all the way back to 1939’s “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.” Is it not amazing that whenever filibuster reform is discussed on the 24-hour news networks that they keep bringing up a movie from 1939? We literally do not have a more current movie to draw upon for examples of the political process. All we have is “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” and that short cartoon from schoolhouse rock “I’m Just a Bill.” So when I say that “Lincoln” is the best movie I have ever seen about Democracy, you can take that with a grain of salt. The bar is extremely low.

“Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” is a decent movie and great democratic propaganda for a nation on the edge of an apocalyptic war with fascism and communism, but it still makes the same goddamn mistake that every political movie has made since and in my opinion what has completely gridlocked the legislative branch we currently have. That mistake is the idea that an impassioned speech about principles will somehow convince the other side to change their position. It was bullshit when it worked in the 1939 movie and it is bullshit now. What I love most about “Lincoln” is that it shows politics how it should be done: down and dirty in the mud of power, greed, and nasty compromises.

For this reason and how it is so clearly and efficiently represented, the writer Tony Kushner should win an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay. The job performed is to represent all constituencies that Abraham Lincoln has to appease to in order to pass the Amendment. There is the Conservative Republican led by Preston Blair (Hal Holbrook) who are anti-slavery but prize the preservation of the Union above all else. Lincoln has to promise them that he will take into consideration any peace offer by the Confederates, even if slavery is to remain intact, if it will end the war. Lincoln has to keep this secret though from the Radical Republicans led by the abolitionist firebrand Thaddeus Stevens (Tommy Lee Jones). The radicals are not merely for equality before the law but total racial equality (i.e. going into the south, breaking up plantations and redistributing property amongst the ex-slaves). Lincoln has to temper the positions of this voting block in order to make the idea of a 13^th Amendment palatable to everyone else. But even if Lincoln gets the unanimous support of all the Republicans in Congress he still needs twenty Democrat votes to get past 2/3rds. Practically all these votes are pro-slavery. So Lincoln decides to call upon three “fixers” from Albany (James Spader, John Hawkes, Tim Blake Nelson) to do some bribing. They focus on lame duck congressman who have lost the past election and will be out of a job come the next term. They are offered political posts like postmasters and treasury secretaries in exchange for a “Yes” on the 13^th Amendment. Each voter has his own opinions and motivations. It takes extremely good writing to get everything explained in such a way that is clear, creates suspense, and does not bog down the momentum of the story. It is accomplished and then some with enough room for Kushner to throw in updates from the Civil War and some domestic strife for Lincoln to deal with, i.e. the hysteria of his historically crazy wife Mary Todd (Sally Field) and the wishes of his son Robert (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) to join a war effort that has already cost hundreds of thousands of lives.

This is all rather serious stuff; so much so that one of this movie’s greatest attributes is that it is also consistently funny. The three “fixers” provide a good part of the comedic relief but the main component of humor is Abraham Lincoln himself, played brilliantly by Daniel Day-Lewis. It has often been chronicled that the historical Lincoln was a great joke and storyteller and in this movie we are treated to a retelling of his best material. Have you ever heard of the one about Ethan Allan and the portrait of George Washington in an English outhouse?

The portrayal of Lincoln in this movie does great justice to the man as a politician. Many times I have read about politicians who were great at actually getting things done as opposed to politicians who were just great at making speeches (think LBJ and FDR as opposed to JFK and BHO). One consistent attribute is the ability to making others believe that they are in agreement without any real commitment being made. There are many great examples of that being done in this movie by Lincoln. The trick is to listen thoughtfully and then tell a rather vague yet humorous story. For instance in the beginning of the movie, Lincoln is speaking to a couple of black soldiers. The black soldiers speak of equal pay with white soldiers and having black officers someday. Then they press Lincoln on what will happen to them after the war. “I’m not very good at shining shoes and cutting hair,” one says. Lincoln then makes a self-deprecating joke about how hard it is for anyone to cut his hair. “My last barber committed suicide,” he jokes. Then the conversation is interrupted by a couple of other soldiers and the conversation topic is eluded. Classic Politician. This great technique goes back thousands of years all the way to Jesus. Instead of focusing on the details of current policy that can lead to many minor points of contention, tell a parable vague enough that everyone can agree with it in theory. The fact that Lincoln was able to do this in private and at the same time actually craft a definite specific policy that successfully passed is the essence of his genius. I am of the opinion that it takes genius to aptly portray genius and that is what makes this one of the best movies of the year.  

Skyfall (4/5 Stars)

Arthouse Bond

M recites Tennyson; Q critiques an oil painting, Adele sings the theme song, and the villain displays homoeroticism and serious mommy issues. This is not your father’s James Bond and considering how this movie ends will probably not be your father’s Bond for several more movies.

What is a James Bond movie? I do not count myself as a huge expert in the franchise. I have seen all of the Pierce Brosnan and Daniel Craig movies but only two or three of the Sean Connery ones and none from the 70s and 80s. What I can tell though is that they all have a similar format: Action Sequence: either escape or chase. If in cars be sure to run into fruit carts - Song and Credits – Mission Briefing – Gadgets – Exotic Locale – Exotic Woman - Disfigured villain with crazy plans – Action Sequence: guns if men, melee weapons if women – Sex – Action Sequence: explosions this time? – Pithy one-liners over martinis and poker – Action Finale: use any gadgets not previously used – Sex: if not all gadgets have been used, here is your final chance – Credits and hook for next movie.

Of course, the problem with any formula movie is that they tend to be formulaic. At the same time, if one tried to do something that strayed from the formula, they might capture the wrath of die-hards that flock to these movies to get just what they have come to expect. It’s the franchise paradox: Do something original and make the core audience uncomfortable or do something standard and succumb to a barrage of comments that the first movies were better. It’s a lose-lose situation (not counting the box office.)

It is kind of amazing then that “Skyfall” can be persuasively debated as the best James Bond movie in the fifty years of the franchise. It is actually debatable. Whether this is true or not should be left to someone who has seen all the movies. (Not me!) I do however feel comfortable in saying this: This is the best-looking James Bond movie ever.

In this sense, the franchise has embarked on something truly original. It has gone through the trouble of hiring an Oscar caliber heavyweight duo to be the director and cinematographer of this movie. I am speaking of Oscar Winning director (American Beauty) Sam Mendes and his frequent collaborator and perhaps the world’s best living cinematographer Roger Deakins. I do not know the name of many cinematographers but many a time I have seen a truly good looking movie, looked up the credits and found the name Roger Deakins. Amazingly he has never actually won an Oscar, but there is hardly a year that goes by where he has not been nominated for one. His list of nominated movies include: True Grit, The Reader, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, No Country for Old Men, The Man Who Wasn’t There, O Brother Where Art Thou? Kundun, Fargo, The Shawshank Redemption.  I believe after Scorsese finally won for “The Departed,” Roger Deakins has rightfully taken over the title of most snubbed. He should be nominated for this movie it is about time that he finally won.

Outside of a Tarantino movie or something from China, this particular skill is rarely used in action thrillers. But here it is. When James Bond engages in a fistfight with a sniper on the 50^th floor of a building, they are silhouetted against a serene vision of skyscraper blue. When he tussles with some heavies and a couple of komodo dragons in a casino, the scene is ensconced in delicious Chinese red. Back in Scotland the moors are distinctively gray, bearish, and heavy with the past. When there are explosions, the characters are framed just right for the audience to feel the full effect of the raging fires. Take your girlfriend to see this movie and if she doesn’t approve of the sex and violence tell her she does not appreciate great art. How many times after a James Bond movie do you expect to truthfully be able to say that again?

But hey we did not see this movie for the beauty of it, did we? Let’s talk about sex and violence.

The action has thankfully been returned to “understandable” after that sojourn into chaos, which was “Quantum of Solace.” I especially liked how each set piece differed in the type of action from the chase scene in the beginning to the standoff in the end. It’s good stuff and people die well, especially the victim of that giant lizard.

The women are not especially memorable and Daniel Craig continues his trademark Bond style of not being particularly focused on swinging his way through his movies. This is the third movie in a row where a female is introduced, seduced and murdered (by the bad guys) in a span of let’s say five to ten minutes. In fact, I think it is fair to say the Bond Girl in this movie is none other than Judi Dench, as the MI6 boss, M. Her part in this movie is substantial as the bad guy’s plot revolves around specifically exacting revenge on her. Much has been said about the misogynistic nature of James Bond, but like “Casino Royale,” this movie provides an actual excuse for his behavior. Bond is already taken. He is married to England and M, well, that abbreviation may as well be for ‘mother.’ At least that is what the bad guy, a disgruntled ex-MI6 agent out for revenge, played by Javier Bardem, seems to think.

It has been noted before that the novelty of franchise movies is contained in its villains. They are after all are the newness of the installment. I think it is a less of an insult to Javier Bardem’s Julian Asssange tinged cyberterrorist and more of a big compliment to the sure-handed competence of the last three movies to say that Daniel Craig’s orphaned thug of a James Bond still remains the most interesting character in these stories. That’s a big thing. This is not just a great Bond movie; it is a very good movie in general. Not just for diehards, for everyone.

Argo (3/5 Stars)

“You’re an associate producer at best,” says Alan Arkin to Ben Affleck during a telling moment. Ben Affleck is playing a CIA exfiltration expert in what is also his latest directorial effort, the historical action thriller "Argo." Affleck is speaking to a Hollywood producer played by Alan Arkin who has agreed to put up a front for a phony movie to help the CIA smuggle several Americans out of Iran during the 1979 revolution. The fake movie is a sci-fi epic titled Argo. Affleck will fly into the Iranian capital, Tehran, under the pretense of scouting locations for the fake movie shoot, find the six Americans who are hiding out in the Canadian embassy, disguise them as part of his film crew, and then fly them out of the country via the Tehran International Airport. This is a true story. At this point in the movie Arkin and Affleck are doing a bit of casting. Which American will be the screenwriter? Which will be the cameraman? Which will be the director? Affleck puts out the idea for himself as the director. Arkin shoots it down. “You’re an associate producer at best,” he says.

Two things are happening here: First and more obvious is the clever self-referential self-deprecating joke Affleck is playing on himself. His character is being told nobody would believe him as a director in the very movie he is directing ha ha. Second and less obvious is a demonstration of an actual critical element of movie casting. Specifically, the utility of casting a movie star. It has been said that casting a well-known star saves fifteen minutes of exposition. For example: when Bruce Willis shows up in a movie the audience subconsciously should expect a no-nonsense action-oriented character because they have seen that actor play that character effectively many times before.  So the movie can skip that one scene where the character establishes his badassness (if it would for some weird reason want to). We already know Bruce Willis is badass.  

Now what do you think of Ben Affleck? If you are like me, you do not automatically think “Director” either and I say this with the knowledge that he has competently directed two movies already. When I think of Ben Affleck, I think of a lightweight actor that tried a bunch of times to be tough in the vein of Alec Baldwin and never really pulled it off. I think of all those years he was fodder for dumb romantic leads in bad movies. I think “Bennifer.” And I think of that time he stood next to Matt Damon clutching an Oscar for “Good Will Hunting” and was pretty sure that was a Roger Avary type of Oscar. This history is what my subconscious delivers when I see Ben Affleck in a movie.

Now this does not mean that I think he is a bad actor. A movie that is well cast will simply recognize and capitalize on audience expectations. You can see this marvelously done in what is perhaps Affleck’s best movie, “Changing Lanes,” in which he plays a naïve pretty boy junior associate at a corrupt law firm. Nor does this mean that Ben Affleck is miscast in this movie! He just needs to be less of a major character and more of a supporting one. Much less of a major character.

There is a gross flaw in “Argo,” and it is a result of an imperfect understanding of what the central and most interesting conflict is in this story. The movie starts with a riveting scene in which the American embassy in Tehran is overtaken by a riot of Iranian protestors. We see how the six Americans from the visa office escaped while everyone else was taken hostage. We see them go into hiding at the Canadian embassy. And then these six people are bizarrely ignored for most of the movie as the story focuses on the CIA coming up with a plan to exfiltrate them by going to Hollywood and teaming up with a Hollywood makeup designer and producer to create a fake movie as a front for the operation. There are scenes in which the CIA and Hollywood argue over the screenplay, negotiate its purchase, and throw a party in which it is read and advertised by the press. I ask you, is this more interesting than what six Americans hiding for fear of losing their lives are going through for three months? I submit that it is not.

The worst effect of all this attention being paid to the plan being developed in the USA is that it is already vetted and explained by the time the Americans in Iran hear about it. All the good objections are stated, all the other plans are explained away, and all the work is done. When it finally gets to the people that matter we are already two thirds of the way through the movie. The six have not been given any depth as characters and when the movie finally focuses on them, only one is given a substantial role, and that is merely as a contrarian voicing all the objections we have heard before. At the end of the movie we have learned almost nothing about the people being rescued.

Imagine what this movie could have been if it were less enamored with CIA spies and Hollywood producers and more with the ordinary people being thrust into an extraordinary situation. It could have stayed with the Americans after they arrive at the embassy, we could have learned a little about their personalities and histories, we could have learned about their daily routine of hiding, we could have seen the scary developments happening in Iran through their eyes. For example there is a scene where Ben Affleck arrives in Tehran and sees from his cab window a dead man being hung from a construction crane. Why couldn’t the six be the ones to witness that? Would not that have a greater effect on them. And then two-thirds of the way through the movie, Ben Affleck, can show up on the doorstep with some cockamamie scheme to smuggle them out of the country in full view of everyone by disguising them as a film crew for a sci-fi epic named “Argo.” What a great way to use Ben Affleck's lack of credibility to enhance the suspense of the storyline. Would you trust Ben Affleck with a plan like that after watching the world disintegrate into chaos before your eyes? No of course not. That would be ludicrous. Therein lies the natural center of suspense and conflict for this movie. 

How does this movie build up tension? Well, by lying about what really happened. This movie will have you believe that the six Americans got away with merely seconds to spare. Seconds. I didn’t say minutes or even hours. I said seconds. When the final plane is taking off (I really don’t think I’m spoiling anything. We all know they successfully escape) a jeep full of angry Iranian soldiers is racing practically parallel to the plane trying to get the pilot's attention. I don’t need to check Wikipedia to know that did not happen. If the story were told correctly, it would not be necessary to enliven it with trumped up bullshit.

I make a big deal out of this because no doubt much of the thrill of watching a "True Story" is in knowing you are watching something that is actually “True.” Well, if it isn't, and I assert that some really important parts aren't, then what? Let's pretend for a moment that we are not watching a "true story" and simply judge this movie on the merits as if it were any other movie. If it we’re fictional, would this be a superior movie? The answer must be no. It is repetitive, misplaces its suspense, does not use its characters wisely, and offers plenty of red herrings where a superior movie would contain actual twists and turns in the plot. Bad events always seem about to happen in “Argo” but never actually come to fruition in any sort of way that would cast doubt on the most predictable of outcomes.

I’m hearing Oscar buzz for this movie. I don’t need to see any more movies this year to be able to say I’ve already seen at least five better ones in every category. “Argo” should not be nominated for anything. If it does get nominated and especially if it wins anything I will take that simply as more proof that Hollywood likes kissing its own ass. Sure they would nominate the movie about how Hollywood saved six Americans in Iran through the Power Of Movies! Just take a look at last year’s best picture, “The Artist,” if you haven’t already forgotten it. To the Academy there are movies about them and there are movies about us. All movies are treated equally I’m sure, but some movies are more equal than others. 

Cloud Atlas (5/5 Stars)

Earning the Melodrama

Ultimate Truth, Matters of Life and Death, Good and Evil, Chance and Fate, Love and Hate, The Inherent Nature of Man, The Shape of Things to Come, the Natural Order of Things, The Meaning of Life. All are weighty and serious subject. But just because something is serious does not a good movie make. In fact, it is far more difficult to make a good movie out of something serious than it is to make a good movie out of something trivial.  Bad movies about weighty subjects are worse than just bad. They are disrespectful. The best example I can think of is any movie about the Holocaust. If you are going to bring that up, it better be in a great movie. It is a subject that simply should not be half-assed. In this way, I tend to judge movies like “Cloud Atlas” which contain all of the above themes in a hypercritical way. They have to earn their melodrama. 

This movie is based on the book “Cloud Atlas” by David Mitchell and has been screen-written and directed by Tom Tykwer (“Run Lola Run”) and Lana and Andy Wachowski. The Wachowski’s have made great and terrible movies before. Very rarely are they ever in between. Their best has to be “The Matrix,” a movie with such top-notch action sequences that plenty of people probably did not notice its strong currents of philosophy and theology. Their worst was “V for Vendetta,” a disturbingly obvious piece of left-wing propaganda. Both movies display exceptional talent on behalf of its directors but as Roger Ebert is wont to say, it is the best directors that often make the worst movies.

It is my pleasure than to let you know that “Cloud Atlas” is one of the best movies of the year. It is a beautiful movie of great scope and ambition that sets out to achieve many many things and succeeds in practically all of them. The little inconsistencies or confusing tidbits that do exist can be readily filed under “who gives a shit.” 

“Cloud Atlas” is composed a six different stories employing the same actors that take place in different times and places, seamlessly edited together. The first story takes place in 1849. The main character, a procurer of Maori slaves played by Jim Sturgess, takes ill on a long ocean voyage between New Zealand and England and forms an unlikely bond with a Maori stowaway.  The second story takes place in 1936 London. The main character, a young “degenerate” played by Ben Whishaw, infiltrates himself within the household of an aging composer with plans to become an invaluable apprentice before revealing his true identity as a disinherited relative. The third story takes place in 1972 Long Island. The main character, a reporter played by Halle Berry, is investigating a corporate conspiracy to cover-up an impending meltdown at a nuclear power plant. The fourth story takes place in 2012 London. The main character, a down-and-out publisher played by Jim Broadbent, comes into a stroke of good when his client murders a book critic which makes his book, "Knuckle Sandwich," become a best seller. Unfortunately the author’s thug friends want their piece of the profits and the publisher has already spent it all on old debts. The fifth story takes place in 2144 New Seoul. The main character, an artificial human made specifically for slave labor played by Doona Bae, is rescued from her fast food restaurant/prison and becomes the symbol of a violent revolution. The sixth story takes place 106 winters after an apocalyptic doom maybe on Hawaii. The main character, a pacifist goat herder played by Tom Hanks, deals with a vicious tribe (not unlike the Maori) with the help of an interstellar human trader looking for a secret among the ruins of an ancient civilization that will save her dying planet.

The greatest achievement of "Cloud Atlas" is that all of the stories are equally good and what makes them equally good is that they reside in different genres with drastically different characters and yet find a way to complement each other. Take for instance the 1936 London. It is bereft of the action found in the car chases in 1972 conspiracy thriller and the futuristic cityscapes in 2144 science fiction epic, but it forms the important musical component of the movie which finds itself in every other storyline. Or for example the idea that a single theme, let's just call it "freedom," can be explored in wildly different ways, whether it is terms of the broad comedy in the 2012 storyline which culminates in the escape attempt from a nursing home by a quartet of elderly residents to the love story in the 1936 storyline between homosexuals that earns them the rejection of society to the actual revolution against a futuristic totalitarian state in 2144. These different stories comment on each other in unexpected ways from the 1972 discovery by Halle Berry of the Cloud Atlas Sextet written in 1936 which inspires her to continue her investigation in the face of mounting danger to the 2012 spontaneous shouting of the Jim Broadbent character during his first and failed escape attempt that "Soylent Green is People!" at once an absurd and funny exclamation given the seriousness of the reference in contrast to his own situation, but also a recurring and foretelling expression of something horrifying that was true before 1849 and will become true again in 2144. 

I think it is worth just going out and saying it. "Soylent Green is People!" is a reference to cannabilism from a 1972 science fiction movie about a futuristic dystopia in an overpopulated NYC in which a mega-corporations attempts to sell people as food to unwitting consumers. Cannabalism is a major theme in "Cloud Atlas." I'm not saying you are going to see people eat people in this movie, but it is brought up several times in this movie's debate about social darwinism and the natural order of things. The historical basis of this starts in the 1849 storyline. It should be noted that the slaves on the plantation are not any regular slaves. They are the conquered Maori tribe of New Zealand, which just happened to be a tribe of vicious warriors that practiced cannabalism and had successfully conquered and eaten all the other peaceful tribes around it before the Europeans conquered and enslaved them. So when the plantation owner (Hugh Grant) gets into a philosphical discussion with the young procurer (Jim Sturgess) about the natural order of race and brings in his Maori slave butler (Keith David) to defend his case, it is actually a pretty good question. Are the weak meat that the strong do eat?

"Cloud Atlas" is a three hour movie that feels like 90 minutes. There is so much in here and the pace is so quick that it recalled my experience in watching Robert Altman's "Short Cuts." It is sort of imperative that this movie be seen on a big screen in a movie theater. The scope requires a large screen and the plot's complexity requires your full attention. To wait to see it at home on DVD or streaming would be a mistake. 

For the most part I understood everything but some of the details in the sixth story about the Hawaiian goat herder. This had largely to do with futuristic linguistics of the characters. They had tons of slang that resembled English but not enough. I must confess I did not quite understand why Hugo Weaving was dressed up as some humongous evil leprecaun that apparently only Tom Hanks could see and hear. But that is not to say I did not enjoy the sixth story as well. I garnered enough of what it was about to sort of understand what was going on. It was sort of like listening to a song by Beck. The words sounded good even when the phrases didn't make any sense. 

And as far as using the same actors to play a multitude of roles in all the different storylines, was it necessary? No, but it sure makes watching the movie a lot of fun.

Looper (5/5 Stars)

“Time Machine” by Simon Rich:

As soon as my time machine was finished, I traveled back to 1890, so I could kill Hitler before he was old enough to commit any of his horrible crimes. It wasn’t as gratifying as I thought it would be.

           

-       Oh my God. You killed a baby.

-       Yes…but the baby was Hitler

-       Who?

-       Hitler. It’s…complicated.

-       Officer? This man just killed a baby

“Looper” written and directed by Rian Johnson and starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Bruce Willis, is the rare movie that is far more interesting than its title or even its marketing campaign lets on. It is being sold as a movie about time travel in which Joseph Gordon-Levitt plays a mob hit man named Joe. Joe lives in the year 2044. Time travel has not been invented yet, but thirty years later, it will have been. The mob in the future of 2074 uses time travel as a convenient way to get rid of people. They send them back in time to 2044 where Joe is waiting to kill them instantly in the middle of a Kansas cornfield. Joe is called a Looper. The odd name comes from the understanding that in order to get rid of all the evidence, the mob will one day send the future version of him back in time for Joe to kill. This is called “closing the loop” and is akin to being fired. Old Joe gets sent back with a bag over his head and his hands tied behind his back; Young Joe shoots himself and collects his severance package, many gold bars strapped to Old Joe’s back.

There is a complication however when Old Joe comes back to be killed. He doesn’t have the bag over his head and he isn’t tied up. Young Joe recognizes himself (btw Joseph Gordon-Levitt with a prosthetic nose does a rather good Bruce Willis impression), hesitates, and Old Joe gets away. In the trailer they allude to a chase and this is about it. What this leaves out however are two very good questions and answers that make this seemingly normal run-of-the-mill action movie one of the best movies of the year. The first question is why does Young Joe want to kill Old Joe instead of just helping him escape? The second question is why has Old Joe come back to the past without a bag on his head or tied up? If he had gotten the best of his captors in the future, why would he send himself to the past at all if he knows that his younger self is waiting there to kill him?

The first question is answered within the first twenty minutes and so I will give away the entire thing. For demonstration purposes, a fellow Looper, played by Paul Dano, lets his old self get away. The mafia reacts by kidnapping Young Dano and holding his body parts for ransom. There is a truly terrifying scene where Old Dano is escaping on the outskirts of the city when all of sudden he experiences a scar being written on his arm. It states to be at a certain address in fifteen minutes. Then Old Dano’s fingers start disappearing just in case Old Dano didn’t get the point. Old Dano races back as he loses his fingers, toes, nose, feet, and arms. He gets to the address with basically just his torso. A door to a warehouse opens revealing the mob, a saw, quite a lot of blood, and what is left of Young Dano. Yes, young Joe is reasonably motivated to track down and kill Old Joe before the mob tracks him down and does the same thing to him.

The second question is what really sets this movie on a level of greatness. I won’t be giving away too much by simply stating the premise. Old Joe has come back on a Terminator-in-reverse style of mission. Armed with only a birth-date and a hospital, he is tracking down the five-year-old version of a future Hitler nicknamed “The Rainmaker.” His mission is to kill every child with that birth-date from that hospital in order to save his wife who was killed in the wake of many other untold deaths. Young Joe figures it out the plan and stakes out the last house on Old Joe's list. What a moral conundrum! Young Joe is a killer and drug addict and Old Joe is sober and reformed, but that does not allow one to forget the fact that Old Joe is going around killing children! How that turns out, well, you will just have to find out, but ask yourself this one question before you walk into the theater: How do you want it to turn out?

There is a tendency for movie critics to withhold praise from a movie when it reminds them of movies that they have already seen. For instance you can see the futuristic dystopia projected in “Looper” and be reminded of “Blade Runner.” Or you can see the parallels of the time travel mission in “The Terminator.” Or you can recognize the weird sensation of seeing an older version of yourself being killed from “Twelve Monkeys” (with Bruce Willis!) or if you wanted to go back even further, “Le Jetee.” In this way, critics tend to take away credit from movies that are made in our time in order to bolster the reputation of films of the old ones. I don’t want to detract from “Blade Runner,” “The Terminator,” or “Twelve Monkeys,” (I haven’t seen Le Jetee although lord knows it keeps getting mentioned when movies like these are made) but just because a movie that is made today that has some similarities it should not amplify the worth of a previous movie because now it is all “Influential.” In the same way the similarities should not detract from the current movie because it was all “Influenced." I guess what I’m saying is that “Looper” is better than “Blade Runner.” I’ve seen both and do not particularly care that the better one draws from the previous one. And there is plenty in “Looper” that is original enough that I would suggest that Rian Johnson get an Oscar Nomination for Best Original Screenplay.

Speaking of nominations, I think it is about time that Bruce Willis got one. This could be the year given he has had two great performances already, (I recommend the nomination for “Moonrise Kingdom.”) And Joseph Gordon-Levitt although perhaps not yet earning such a distinction, is fast becoming noticeable for his DiCaprio-esque ability to show up in a multitude of good to great movies. Look at IMDB and see where he will show up this year. “The Dark Knight Rises,” “Premium Rush,” “Looper,” “Lincoln,” “Django Unchained.” That is pretty impressive.  What can definitely be said about both of these actors is that they truly know how to share a screen. “Looper” is definitely an ensemble picture that engages the audience with multiple well-rounded characters. Paul Dano has an unforgettable part that lasts only about ten minutes. Then there is Jeff Daniels as “Abe” the mob boss from the future who instills a comedic been-there done-that fatalism to his persona. Finally there is boy Hitler, a five year old played by Pierce Gagnon, who can, dare I say, really act.

If there was an award for “Most Understated Title for  a Great Movie,” I think “Looper” would be a lock for that one as well.

The Master (4/5 Stars)

Good luck trying to brainwash a crazy person.

Suppose you were a charlatan, somebody who falsely claims to have special skills or expertise. Now suppose you were a very ambitious charlatan, not just an ordinary con man peddling nonexistent charity or selling used cars as new, but someone who with the gall to claim access to the divine. Let’s go even further now and head into L. Ron Hubbard territory. Suppose you had the chutzpah to start your own religion and suppose you had the personality and intelligence to actually pull it off on a grand scale. We have gotten this far so we must assume that one of two things is true. One: you are correct about the secrets of the universe. Or two: You’ve got to be some sort of megalomaniacal psychotic sociopath.

This is an important thing to keep in mind as one watches “The Master,” mainly because the sociopath in question, Lancaster Dodd played by Phillip Seymour Hoffman in another brilliant characterization, is such a nice, friendly, and warm fellow. He likes singing. He likes dancing and he loves giving speeches. It is easy to forget that he spends the vast majority of his day lying, cheating, and stealing from those who follow him. Lancaster Dodd, modeled after the founder of Scientology L. Ron Hubbard, is an evil person. His entire demeanor is a well-rehearsed act played to disarm the senses, gain trust, and to ultimately control his followers. I believe the common term is brainwashing, although how Dodd works is more like hypnosis (don’t tell him that!). The to remember about someone under hypnosis is not that they do not know the truth. They just don’t care. They have intentionally submitted themselves to a fantasy.

In that view it does not actually matter what is the fantasy. A cursory study of the beliefs of Scientology reveal an absolutely ridiculous plethora of science fiction looniness. It boggles the rational mind. Given that Hubbard was not insane, why would he base a religion on something so unbelievable? Think about it this way: What if the ridiculousness of it all was simply a byproduct of an enormous ego. Perhaps the next step in self-glorification from creating a religion that men will follow blindly, is creating an absolutely absurd religion that men will follow blindly. The absurdity grotesquely emphasizes the personal magnetism of the leader. If the Pope can get priests and nuns to give up family and sex for a life of service to God, if Napoleon could get men to die for ribbons and medals and country, what does it say about Hubbard if he can get bank accounts for thetans and other like rubbish? Perhaps that is what makes him truly a Master of men.

The religion in this movie does not actually encompass any of the tenets of “Scientology.” It doesn’t need to; the actual belief system is arbitrary in front of the central conflict between the master's cult of personality and his would-be followers. In particular, one relationship between Dodd and ex-Navy man Freddie Quell, played in erratic fashion by real life crazy man Joaquin Phoenix, is the central driving force of the story.

Freddie Quell is an animal. Possibly suffering PTSD from his service in WWII or simply just crazy, he is an aimless drifter with no friends, family, or money. He starts fights with innocent bystanders, mixes death-defying cocktails with intoxicants such as rocket fuel and paint thinner, and thinks sex in an uninhibited fashion. The man is a walking id. Lancaster Dodd has many bullshit reasons of why he would seek the company of Freddie Quell as a protégé, plenty going under the guise of “helping him.” What this relationship really amounts to however is a vanity project. Lancaster Dodd has successfully brainwashed old rich ladies, several ex-wives, and a small legion of believers, and now he is aiming for bigger game. He wants to be able to control a man who is uncontrollable. Freddie Quell could be the Great White Whale for charlatans. Here is a man who will not join the following for all the usual reasons. He has no family or friends in the group. He does not seek influence over other people. He has no interest in making money (unlike for instance the oilman submitting to a baptism in order to build his pipeline in Paul Thomas Anderson’s last movie, “There Will Be Blood.”) And lastly, he is certainly not affected by peer pressure in any conventional sense. If Freddie Quell joins the following and stays put it will be because he truly believes and that in turn glorifies the controlling power of the Master. Quell may be deranged but he has no lying in him, (which is perhaps what makes him so deranged.)

Boy does Lancaster Dodd throw the book at Quell and gives the man everything he has got. Every scene they have together is a mind-battle between two heavyweights. Perhaps one of the best scenes involves a Dianetics inspired interrogation where Dodd peppers Quell with a multitude of intensely private questions. Notice how Dodd gains the upper hand. Mind control works like ju-jitsu. You can’t win by getting the other person to fight against himself.

Paul Thomas Anderson’s writing is on a level far above the average movie. A character like Lancaster Dodd is so hard to pull off. Take a scene that takes place in a high society party. Dodd is explaining how people have had past lives and are repeatedly incarnated. When they go through “processing” they can recall their past lives and gain insight into their present and future lives. “Processing” can even solve certain types of Leukemia. A man at the party intends to confront Dodd on this point. I think we can all agree that “processing” cannot cure Leukemia and that professing such a belief is absurd if not downright odious. Would it surprise you that Lancaster Dodd wins this argument and wins it handily, leaving the man speechless and embarrassed? It is not movie magic with unrealistic dialogue happening here. The time-travel man wins the debate against the skeptic because he is such an intelligent speaker that he is able to run logical circles around ordinary men on even the most absurd of topics.

Combine that with another strange musical score from Jonny Greenwood (who also did “There Will Be Blood”) and you have one of the most fiercely original movies of the year. Here is to hoping it does not take Paul Thomas Anderson another five years to make his next movie. 

Side by Side (4/5 Stars)

A Quiet Revolution in Movies

Pretentious cineastes like to use the word “Film.” You take a class in “film” studies. You are a “film” critic. You understand and appreciate serious “film.” Contrast that with going to the “movies,” blogging about “movies,” or even watching a dirty “movie.” Nobody ever sees a dirty “film.” The word is high class and reserved for those who treat the medium in a certain artistic je ne sais quoi.

“Side by Side,” is a marvelously educational documentary (shot digitally) about how all of that is changing. With the onset of more and more sophisticated digital cameras, the word “film” is becoming more and more of a misnomer. You can’t call the latest movies by such cinema stalwarts as Martin Scorsese (“Hugo”), David Fincher (“The Social Network”) and James Cameron (“Avatar”) films. They aren’t films. Film refers to a type of medium that records the sights and sounds of the moving picture and these movies did not use that type of medium. These movies were recorded digitally. So “The Social Network” is a serious “movie” not a serious “film.”

So what does that mean for us moviegoers beyond a conversational defense mechanism against predatory semantic Nazis. Well, the demise of the word “film” actually is correlated with the demise of the pretentiousness that goes along with it. Digital movie making is a democratic revolution. It is cheaper. It is faster. It is easier to shoot and edit. It takes the process of putting images onto a screen less of a mystery and hands more control and power over the artistic vision to writers and directors. The losers in the revolution are cinematographers and studios. With the expertise and financial backing no longer needed to produce a film print, you don't need technical experts and corporations. As Lena Dunham, the writer/director of HBO’s GIRLS, wisely notes “I don't think without digital video, I don’t think I would be making movies because I always felt that you had to have a certain kind of knowledge. Basically you had to be a dude who knows how to operate machines.”

So what is different about the process? This documentary pulls no punches is getting technical and does a wonderful job of plenty of interviews with some truly big names in cinema. (Here are a few: Christopher Nolan, Martin Scorsese, James Cameron, Danny Boyle, George Lucas, Robert Rodriguez, David Lynch, Steven Soderbergh, David Fincher, and the Wachowskis. Plus there is a bunch of great cinematographers and editors whose names I did not know, but whose work I recognized.)

First of all, digital will allow you to immediately see a take on the set of a movie. With film you had to develop the picture overnight and watch it for the first time the next morning. David Fincher expressed the difference the most candidly. When working with film, he would ask the cinematographer, did we get the shot? What about the details in the corner? Did we get those? Will we be able to see those details in the finished product? And the cinematographer would go, yes we got it, take my word for it, you will see tomorrow. Sometimes the cinematographer would be correct and you would be amazed at what he captured (Seven) and other times you would be looking at the dailies the next day and go, “What the F***!” With digital, you can rest assured that you actually accomplished something during the day of shooting it and that you won’t have to come back to it.

Second, digital will allow you to run the camera for far longer takes than you could with film. After about ten minutes of shooting film you would have to change the reels, but digital filmmaking can go on basically forever. Some actors like John Malkovich, a theatrically trained actor, talk of why not stopping is better for momentum purposes. On the other side is an anecdote about Robert Downey Jr. on the set of Iron Man 2. Apparently he got so fed up with the digital process and started taking pisses in mason jars and leaving the urine around the movie set in protest of never having a stop in production where he could go to his trailer, rest up, and get his shit together for the next couple of takes.

Then there is the greatest argument of all and that is which medium had the better picture quality. The documentary takes us on a grand tour of all the advances of digital moviemaking in the last thirty years starting from the first digital character, a stained glass character in a Spielberg/Lucas production of Young Sherlock Holmes, the first movies shot entirely on digital, the Star Wars prequels, the earliest indie movies made on extremely low budgets made possible only on digital, Chuck and Buck, to the new camera used for Michael Mann’s  Collateral, to the first movie shot on digital to win an Oscar for Best Cinematography, Danny Boyle’s Slumdog Millionaire, and ending of course the ultimate digital movie, the 3D colossus Avatar. As Cameron frankly admits, “You can’t shoot film in 3D, so film has been dead in my heart for the last ten years.”

Today it seems that the pictures produced by both digital and film are almost indistinguishable. (To the very trained eye this is not completely so. Take a look at Fincher's Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. The snow would look colder if shot on film.) With digital, however, you can do far more with the picture in post-production, the best examples being the Roger Deakins use of color-correction in “O Brother, Where Art Thou?” and Robert Rodriguez’s comic book classic, Sin City, two movies that achieved looks that are impossible with film.

Of course film has its defenders, the biggest and most admirable being Christopher Nolan, who has shot all of his movies, most notably the Dark Knight series, on film. He enjoys the process, trusts his cinematographer (interviewed as well and memorably dismissing 3D as an upsetting distracting scam), and defends the picture quality as being superior to digital. Anyone who has seen his movies knows he has a point. Film is still a very good way to make movies.

But for those who are not blockbuster directors with access to studios willing to indulge their aesthetic choices, digital opens a door that had been kept closed for not just movie history but for all of human history. There is a reason why Shakespeare mostly wrote about kings and it is not because kings are inherently more interesting than the rest of us. The reason is because kings were the ones paying for the plays. When movies are so expensive that decisions for who gets to make what movies are kept to bigwig studio heads of corporate conglomerates what you get is a off kilter proportion of movies made about the upper classes. Anyone who lives in NYC knows this. How many times have you seen a movie where the characters are living in gigantic apartments and they don't seem to be aware of how outrageously way too expensive the apartment must be. I say, the rest of us who live in normal sized apartments are interesting too, but these stories won’t be told until we can afford to make movies too. Digital cameras gives us that ability.

There are plenty of film lovers in this movie that speak some truth about how just adding more people into the ranks of moviemakers is not going to automatically equate better movies in the marketplace. They look at the Sundance Film Festival and its growing amount of inferior submissions each year. Yeah, but they still produce great indie movies on a consistent basis as well. In any case, the British Parliament said a similar thing about democracy in America. Digital moviemaking is unambiguously a good thing. 

Side by Side Official Trailer (2012) from Company Films on Vimeo.

The Campaign (4/5 Stars)

Five-term incumbent congressional candidate for North Carolina, Cam Brady, played by Will Ferrell, has invited his challenger, the local tour guide/novice political contender, Marty Huggins, played by Zach Galifinakis, to a civility brunch. Marty unwittingly attends it. Both candidates step up to the podium and profess their wish to have a civil campaign for Congress devoid of all the negative smear tactics that mar the American political landscape. Then as Marty sits down, Cam comes up and announces that he has a slideshow of his opponent, a helpful introduction he has put together for the press corps. Cam shows several embarrassing photos of Marty, digs in a few passive aggressive slights, and shows a picture of Marty's two pet pug dogs. Pug dogs, Cam explains, are Chinese, just an interesting fact for everyone in the press ought to meditate about. Then Cam sits down and as Marty is confusedly trying to figure out what just happened, Cam whispers with venom, “Welcome to the fucking show.”

Above all, “The Campaign,” is funny. Its best attribute is that it allows two veteran and extremely skilled comedians with vastly different styles to play off each other. Will Ferrell uses his best alpha male aggressive egomaniacal man-boy techniques to play Cam Brady, a politician who will remind you of several of the more alpha male aggressive egomaniacal man-boys of American politics in the recent past. He has the hair of Jon Edwards, the libido of Bill Clinton, the grammar of George W. Bush, and the camera techniques of Anthony Weiner. Marty Huggins, will remind you less of American politicians than of Zach Galifinakis himself, in that he has an out-of-shape physique, an out-of-style facial hairstyle, and an effeminate weirdo aura. This generally plays out with Marty trying to attack in a terribly feeble and ineffective way, while Cam counterattacks with far too much power ending up causing himself as much if not more damage than he inflicts on Marty. See the scene where they trash talk each other in the first debate or the attempt to kiss the same baby afterwards.

The movie also does a great job of setting up a comic technique that let’s just call “Line-o-Rama.” A “Line-o-Rama” is a set-up that allows several punch lines to fit into the same joke. The best instance of this is when Marty tells his family at the dinner table that he is running for Congress and thus they will all be under much media scrutiny. Marty promises his sons that he will not be mad as long as they come clean to him about anything embarrassing before the press does. What follows is a series of confessions about increasingly weird and perverted things, all of which are funny because Marty has promised he would not get mad no matter what they may be. Comedically speaking, “Line-o-Ramas” are great because of the efficiency they entail. For every one setup you can get five-to-ten laughs and “The Campaign” does this several times in the span of the movie.

The movie also does a fine job of playing comedic jujitsu with its marketing trailers. A huge problem with trailers for comedies is that they invariably give away the best jokes. Jokes generally need to be a surprise, so it is always a bad idea to put the best ones in a trailer. But here, either the jokes in the trailer are actually not in the movie, or they are tweaked in such a way that they still work as surprises. The hunting scene in the trailer where Marty shoots Cam in the leg with a crossbow actually works better in the movie because of what they changed. In fact, the trailer may have even made what happened in the movie funnier. How “The Campaign” was marketed is something that should be imitated by other comedies.

The movie’s main weakness is its length. At 97 minutes it sometimes feels like it is skipping scenes. It usually is a good idea to make a comedy as lean as possible in order to keep up a fast pace, but were losing something in terms of character development and targets for satire. There is too much to make fun of with this subject and too little of it gets onto the screen. What is there though works is relevant scathing social satire. 

The satire comes from how either of these candidates could ever reasonably get elected. The movie employs the Motch brothers, a pair of billionaire brothers played by Jon Lithgow and Dan Akroyd to pull this off. They have supported Cam Brady with untold amounts of money in the last five elections and have succeeded getting him elected each time. This time however Cam has drunk-dialed and left a very salacious and adulterous voicemail on the wrong answering machine (Seth Macbreyer’s to be exact). His numbers plummet and the Motch brothers look for someone to replace Cam. They settle on Marty Huggins, as he is the son of a well-known ex-politician (Brian Cox). The Motch brothers hire a campaign manager, played by a snaky Dylan McDermot, to form Marty into less of a weirdo and more of an American. First step is redecorating Marty’s house with lots of rustic wood paneling and replacing Marty’s beloved pugs with a Chocolate Labrador and a Golden Retriever. As the campaign manager explains, focus groups want their politicians to be Authentic. So Marty is completely re-tailored in order to achieve Authenticity. And it works too because I don't know, Americans (or at least the majority of them) tend to view eccentricities of character (i.e. what makes a person an individual) as phony fakery. 

And also notice how little attention is paid to actual issues during the debates. Supposedly Cam Brady is a Democrat and Marty Huggins is a Republican but you wouldn’t hear anything about either party’s platform in this movie. All the attacks and defenses are about personal foibles, suspicious alliances with Communism and Al Qaeda, and which one supports the troops or loves Jesus more. This seems less of the movie actually being ignorant of the issues and more as deliberate satire of actual politics. In one scene an intern brings up the idea of running an advertisement about how multi-national corporations get tax credits for outsourcing American jobs to other countries. Cam Brady yells the intern out of the room and decides to put out a sex-tape instead. Cam Brady is a Democrat keep in mind, but that is beside or may just be the point. The point might be that both parties should logically be against tax breaks for corporations who fire American workers, but neither candidate has any plans to change it or even talk about it because well, they have a better chance of winning the election by focusing on trivial bullshit. As for the Motch brothers, they don’t care at all whether they help elect a Democrat or a Republican just as long as the people they put in power remember who put them there.

Is this satire relevant? Take our current presidential campaign. Why should I know that Mitt Romney once put his dogs on the roof of his car for a road trip, or that he has a car elevator, or his opinion of the London Olympics, or that he beat up a gay kid in high school? There is no reason to know these things. None of it matters when it comes to actually running a country. Hell, you know how little personal morals matters to being an effective politician. Lyndon Johnson boned every woman he could get his hands on. He also happened to be one of the best senator majority leaders this country ever had. Shit, lots of it, was actually accomplished in Congress when he was in charge. As Cam Brady states during his Capra-esque moment of preposterous humanity at the end of “The Campaign,” being a great politician and being a great congressman are two entirely different things.

"The Campaign," is director Jay Roach's second great political movie of the year. (The first was HBO’s “Game Change,” about the vice presidential pick of Sarah Palin.) One is a fictional comedy and the other is a historical drama but the theme is the same, the idiotic way that we as a people tend to choose our leaders. The brilliant thing about “Game Change” was not that it bashed Sarah Palin. It was brilliant because it explained quite clearly why Sarah Palin was a choice that made sense and for a couple weeks looked like a home run. I figure we got lucky that Obama seems to have a brain, because quite frankly, we elected him because he looked nice and gave great speeches. That seems to be the most important ingredient nowadays and everything else is frosting. 

If I had a suggestion to the American people it would be to ignore national politics and the national media that covers it in general. Local politics are far more important. Those people actually affect the day-to-day lives of citizens. They are the ones that make the zoning decisions, administer the schools, pick up the garbage, and provide police and fire services among many many other things. What’s more, these are people you can actually influence. One, because your vote has much more power on the local level than on the federal level and two, nobody else gives a shit.