I decided to pump out one last batch of movie reviews before the Oscar nominations. (NOTE: That didn't happen) I'm not making predictions or anything, but I'm still around. I wish I posted more often, but I also wish I had more to say at the moment. Most commentaries and thoughts on the goings-on of the entertainment world aren't nearly as interesting to me as they used to be, so I doubt they'd be as much interest to you guys, at least for now.
And I'm getting to some of the movies that are in the Oscar conversation a little earlier for me. At this rate, I feel confident I might get done with my Top Ten Lists of 2021 by the end of 2026. Anyway, I'm trying to get back into things. It's tough to find all the time I want, but I'm enjoying it so far. The only awards commentary I have at the moment is that, I suspect the "Family Film Awards", are not a real thing. I mentioned this on Facebook, but they're advertising that this year is the 27th Annual Family Film Awards, and I don't believe that. I think that's wrong. I believe they've, maybe existed as far back, in their modern form since 2017, but I think it's more likely that they're even younger than that. They claim the first show happened in 1996, which I do think happened, but if you look up literally anything since that show, up until like, 2-3 years ago, there's like, nothing. IMDB doesn't have any info, their website's history only goes back a couple years, and doesn't have an "About" page, which, even the most cheap hack local film festival awards usually have that,- and everything else I can find on them so far, basically nothing. They are suspicious as hell to me. So, before I devote myself into doing an expose on them, I would like to be proven wrong about this. So, if anybody has or can find, any evidence that the "Family Film Awards" are actually real and have been around for 27 years, up to and including the history, voting body, past winners and nominees for the last 27 years,- literally anything that convincingly proves that they've been around and handing out awards on 27 separate and distinct occasions, since 1997. Press releases, newspaper clippings people who've won or hosted, or- literally anything. Please let me know. Post links in a comment, find me on Facebook or Twitter, or even Bluesky-
Oh yeah, I'm on Bluesky too now. I keep forgetting I did that. I did it awhile ago, and I didn't like it back then, but I kept the address and it's starting to get better now. (I'm still on Twitter too; I'm not calling it you-know-what-letter though.) I'm trying to remember to post on it, but eh.... Anyway, Family Film Awards, until otherwise noted later, I consider, not a real award. Consider this a public warning.
Anyway, onto the reviews.
ANORA (2024) Director: Sean Baker
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
So, I often tell a self-deprecating joke about how I win every game of "Never Have I Ever", 'cause of the long list of, what would probably be described as typical and normal things that most people have done that, for one reason or another, I have not. It's not really a joke though, don't play that game with me, you will probably be hammered, far quicker than you think. Like, one of them is "I've never been legally drunk," and I've played this drinking game multiple times, so, this is from experience, don't do it! That aside, one of the more surprising ones, despite being born and raised in Las Vegas is that, never have I ever, been to a strip club. I have several reasons for this, mostly, just calculating the odds and tendencies of my peers, I was fairly certain that there was a more than 2-1 chance that if I'd go to a local strip club I will inevitably run into at least one friend/former classmate of mine. (It's probably more like, 5-1 now, but,-, well, let me put it this way, despite not ever actually being in a strip club, I have known more than a few strippers. [It's kinda just, what happens when you live in Vegas long enough, you end with at least one stripper friend])
I bring this up 'cause, "Anora" doesn't make me want to go to any of them. "Anora" is the latest feature from Sean Baker, who's become one of the great American independent filmmakers of our time. He's been on my radar since "Prince of Broadway", with his best films being "Tangerine", a film shot entirely on an iPhone about transsexual prostitutes out looking for cheating pimp at Christmastime, and "The Florida Project" about a little girl who lives with in a weekly on the outskirts of Orlando, unaware as her petulant mother loses control of her life as well as custody of her daughter. Both those films, also dealt with people in the sex industry; in fact, that's a really common theme with him. I forgot until I looked it up, that he had directed "Starlet" about a friendship between a camgirl and an older lady she met at bingo. And he made a splash a couple years ago with "Red Rocket" a film about a "suitcase pimp", trying to leave the adult industry, but basically ends up going back to his recruiting ways.
All that said, something else is going on with "Anora". You see, there is a seedy undercurrent to strip clubs, and the sex industry in general to an extent, strip clubs in particular,- what really makes the world of the strip club so, queezy to me, isn't the nudity, or the questionable clientele, but, the capitalism of it all. The more you work in Vegas, the more you realize that, the poor are essentially working, for the upper class, and strip clubs, really are just capitalism in its most grotesque and bare form; the lower class getting money for just, showing off how bare they are to those who have more money than they'll ever understand. Nobody broke (and somewhat smart) actually goes to strip clubs, only obnoxious young pricks with tons of money to burn do. Particularly among the more delusional in that world, and- with all due respect to some of my friends, the stripper world is really weird and delusional in of itself. It's selling a fantasy to those who's lives are already ridiculously fanciful, and losing track of that, can lead to some real problems.
Anora, (Mikey Madison) is about to get lost in illusion and begin believing her own scam. At first, she seems almost like a Picaroesque character, which, is, shockingly something that I'm surprised more strippers and sex workers in fiction aren't, but then she falls in "love" with a client, Ivan (Mark Eydelshteyn), a young trust fund kid of Russian oligarchy. He's supposed to be studying, but he's spoiled and rich and, he's a twenty-one year old kid. Anora, who isn't much older, likes him though, and she can speak a little Russian as her grandmother is from Russia. Eventually, an offer to stay a week with him, turns from a girlfriend experience to a week in Vegas, and then, making the stupidest mistake you could possibly do with a hooker in Vegas, they get married.
What happens next, takes this movie from observant societal commentary to absurdist comedy. There's a long sequence where, Ivan's family finds out about their marriage and sends Toros (Karren Karagulian) the family's fixer, who in turn sends, his henchman Garnick and Igor (Vache Tovmasyan and Yura Borisov) to, basically take the couple, through any means necessary, and get an annulment, a job that turns into a comedy of errors, just with the kidnapping, and then becomes even more absurd when Ivan runs off and they're not sure where to find him. It's all,-, just hilarious. I don't even want to describe the absurdity to it. It's one of those, everything that can go wrong, goes wrong, scenarios, that keeps playing out but, eventually, they find Ivan. He's drugged up and eventually, the parents, Nikolai and Galina (Aleksei Serebryakov and Darya Ekamasova) come in and demand an annulment, which requires flying the private jet, with Anora, back to Nevada, and then, flying her all the way back to New York.... It's- like-, I don't even know the words...- I've heard of stories like these all the time, in fact, one of the things I like about "Anora" a lot, is that, this is a fairly, familiar story beat-wise. I can think of lots of stories of a couple of young idiots getting wasted and married in Vegas, in real life and in fiction, and they almost all end the same, and this one does too, but it contextualizes just how absurd and disturbing, societally these kinds of situations are.
Then, the movie humanizes it, by humanizing Anora. I called her "picaroesque" earlier, I don't know if everybody knows that term, but I remember one of my old professors bringing that term up back in the day. I've seen various definitions of it since, but, the way he described it, to paraphrase, is as a main lead character, who through their own selfish and cynical actions and lack of emotional caring or interest in anybody but themselves, directly affects the lives of everyone else around them, but they themselves are not effected. He used the example of Dedee Truitt in Don Roos's "The Opposite of Sex", but basically this is any main character, who basically acts only in their own self-interest, regardless of everybody else's needs or wants. I've heard other definitions of that term though; Google seems to think the term only refers to any "rogue-type" character, particularly male characters. If I have to give a modern example that everybody might know off-hand, Capt. Jack Swagger actually fits both definitions more than you'd think, but I think Anora mostly fits too. Mostly, the issue, at least, in terms of coming up with characters like these according to my old's professor's definition, is that, unlike other lead characters, they can't have actually "learned anything" or "evolved" in any way; they affect and change others, they themselves, are not affected. Hell, even in "The Opposite of Sex", his own example, the only real reason Dedee Truitt counts is because, the movie specifically turns black to have her avoid showing us that she's evolved despite all the situations, so even then, there's a bit of an asterisk. It's more difficult to do that than you'd think, which is why we've probably either loosened that definition immensely, or my professor was just wrong and is making this up, but for most of the movie, whether or not we think of her as a picaroesque protagonist, she definitely thinks and acts like she is, or that that's what she should be, at least. Even her falling in love with this guy and marrying him, she's in "love," but that "love",- she was still for sale. I doubt if this guy gave her all this money for the week and then she came to his place and it was half of a windowless trailer and that he was basically giving her all his life's earnings, that she'd still be interested in him.
The ending of the movie, and I won't spoil it, involves her, under the eye of Igor, who's keeping an eye on her before dropping her off at her home, ends with her, completely going through every emotion she's been holding in and holding back. It's a scene that only works if you get the right actress with the right performance and Mikey Madison gives an amazing performance. She was so convincing, and knowing Baker's tensions to use lesser-known or unknown actresses, I didn't even realize that I'd been watching her career for years, all the way back when she played the oldest daughter on the seriously underrated series, "Better Things". I easily would've bought her as just a talented stripper that Sean Baker just found through the strangest open casting call in years.
"Anora" I think works more than Baker's other great films, because it best places all of this in it's greater context. His other films tell these great emotional, human stories as well, often about working all around the fringes of the sex industry, but never has he placed it so precisely before in a context of just how dreadful the glamour of that industry can feel when it envelopes you, and really shows just how, so many greater outside forces dictate and effect these worlds. Strip clubs like these exists because people like obnoxious billionaire sons want to experience beautiful young women who are poor enough that they can throw their money at them and they'll do whatever they want, and no matter how much pink lip gloss sexual revolution feminism you put on that fact, it doesn't really make it better or more meaningful. You throw that realization on top of everything else that just happened to poor Anora, I'd breakdown crying in someone's arms too.
DUNE: PART TWO (2024) Director: Denis Villeneuve
⭐⭐⭐⭐
"Dune, yo"! "Dune"! Or, "Dune: Part Two", or as it is in french, "Dune: Part Deux".
(Shrugs)
I don't know. Anyway, I wasn't looking forward to this one. I didn't care much for Denis Villeneuve's first "Dune" and frankly I was always skeptical of this franchise in terms of feature films. It's been beloved for years, but it's a really a strange and complex franchise, that's also fairly dated. At least, the first part of it is.
In my negative review of the first film, which, for the most part, I still stand by, I mentioned that I thought Villeneuve was not a great choice for director for "Dune". I still think that, but I think he was a much better choice for "Dune: Part Two". See, that's always been the real problem, whether it was Lynch or Villeneuve, the first "Dune" book, which is where everybody starts with this franchise, is one of the weakest parts of the franchise. It doesn't really get to be a good story until "Dune: Part Two", which is what makes Villeneuve a good director for this, he's a good storyteller. Even his weakest sci-fi-iest films, "Enemy", "Blade Runner 2049", they weren't great stories but they were told well. Even "Dune" was about as good a version of that book that I think could be told on film.
"Dune", on top of everything else about it, the political commentary, the very obvious-it-was-written-in-the-LSD sixties, vibe and tone, it's kind of a bait-and-switch narrative. The whole time, for at least the first couple books, it follows a fairly traditional Hero's Journey narrative, even a chosen one narrative as Paul Atreides (Timothee Chalamet) is believed to be the one according to the Fremen. He is the son of the House of Atreides, which was destroyed in the first movie, but the legitimacy of the prophecy itself is under question. However, as the prophecy more and more seems real with Paul Atreides, power and revenge seems to keep getting the better of him, and by the time, the "Prophecy" is fulfilled, he's complete turned into a dictatorial oligarch.
Yeah, that's the thing with "Dune", it's very much a sociopolitical allegorical warning as oppose to a traditional raygun gothic space opera. It's basically a story of what happens when you don't beware of false prophets. Hell, it's actually about why having such prophets or believing/hoping for such prophecies is delusional brainwashing. I was skeptical, but I ended liking this movie more and more as it went on, 'cause this is the true story of "Dune".
The filmmaking is out of this world, even from the beginning sequences of the Fremen flying up the sand dunes,- like, that's the other problem with the David Lynch one, he wasn't a visual effects specialists but even if he was, they just weren't up-to-date enough for the visual effects that we have now. There's some great sequences with the giant sand worms. Like, a lot of this stuff on paper, is true effects, but the elaborate world-building made it a lot more enriching and entrancing. "Dune" gets you into that hallucinogenic mindset, and then when Chalamet's characters finally begins to really turn, and that's to me, when this experiment in filming the supposed "unfilmable" feels like it's actually baring fruit. The performances are strong, especially Chalamet as well as Zendaya, who plays, essentially a love interest, but isn't blinded by the religious prophecy of Paul, and when he does ascent, she's the one who- well, I won't give it away- this movie gets, the complexity of Frank Herbert's work, better than it probably deserves on film. I think the only thing really holding me back is that, I don't particularly care about the world itself; and I think the symbolism of the story works better in a more insular medium like the books, but that just might be me. I don't think my thoughts on the first film would change, but I bet the more I would explore the world of "Dune" the more I'd appreciate it.
I'll say this, above anything the movie "Dune: Part Two", more than anything, actually makes me want to read the books, and frankly even "Jodorowsky's Dune" didn't make me want to do that.
OPPENHEIMER (2023) Director: Christopher Nolan
⭐⭐⭐⭐1/2
I remember in grade school, that their were certain kids, not me in particular but, there was a lot of discussion and fascination with the atomic bomb. In fact, I remember a lot of discussion amongst them about how powerful dropping an atomic bomb, or an A-bomb, now would be, and/or how a hydrogen bomb, or an H-bomb, would cause about ten times the amount of destruction as the atomic bombs had done in Japan. Come to think of it, I'm not exactly sure why there was such obsession and fascination about it; this wasn't exactly the dawning of the atomic age, I'm not that old, but the Cold War had, we assumed anyway, concluded after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, so there was a lot of discussion and debate going on about, what exactly we should be doing with all these bombs and other horrific and destructive weapons that both sides had been building and stockpiling for decades. It's not like there was a good answer, and me living in Nevada where, a lot of atomic testing went on, well into the '50s.... In fact, I'm about an hour bus ride from the Atomic Testing Museum at the moment, and there's also a few people who worked at a few nuclear plants that, hmm, let's say, if something goes wrong out there one day.... In fact, I lived through one of those such incidents once.... (Look up Pepcon Explosion, 1989 if you're interested.)
So, I guess, me having grown up in that backdrop, I shouldn't be too surprised that J. Robert Oppenheimer (Oscar-winner Cillian Murphy) should be a subject of a biopic, but, an Oscar-winning biopic, by, of all people, Christopher Nolan?
Yeah, it's weird, that this is the film that suddenly earned Nolan that precious Oscar, right? That is weird; I'm not like, completely off on that, right? I remember all summer of last year, how the film world was divided by the conflicting powerful forces of the atomic bomb that was "Oppenheimer", and the capitalistic marketing and corporate advertisement bomb that was, "Barbie", of all films. "Barbieheimer" they called the phenomenon. And it did have this, disturbingly dated "Boys vs. Girls" kinda undercurrent, as though women couldn't also be fascinated with Cold War politics and physics, and men, couldn't possibly be interested in empty braindead dolls that you could strip down and play dress up with. Having seen both of them now, hmm,- I'm honestly kinda just wondering what other options I had to choose from.
Don't get me wrong, I like both these movies a lot; I guess I'm more in the "Barbie" camp than the "Oppenheimer" camp, but not by much and the thing is, they don't really feel really comparable to me. I don't know what I was expecting with Christopher Nolan's film in particular, but I guess, what I got out of it, was,- for-lack-of-a-better-word, a meditation.
A meditation on what exactly though? Well, like most meditations, it's hard to fully describe. The movie itself is non-linear, which is not surprising from Nolan, no popular filmmaker has ever been so fascinated with playing with time chronology. Or, even just the feeling of time passing in general and how it can effect you. His breakout film was "Memento" a movie that took place in reverse chronological order but from the perspective of it's main character, who had no short-term memory, so he was constantly rediscovering information as thought it was already new. People forget the next movie he did though-, it wasn't "Batman Begins", it was "Insomnia" a remake of a Scandinavian police thriller that took place in Alaska when the sun never set during the summer. Al Pacino's cop character, 'cause of the lack of night and darkness, was unable to sleep and that lead to him, not fully able to keep his mind as sharp as he normally could while trying to catch a murderous Robin Williams, who was practically teasing him with how well he played him. To some degree, a lot of his films, really are about the trying to solve a problem while having one's mind constantly devolving or in the process of getting disoriented as time goes on, and in Nolan's world, time always seems to not only be the literal ticking clock, it's often the antagonist and enemy itself. It used to work brilliantly, but I'd argue he hasn't really been pulling it off lately. I thought "Interstellar", while having an idea about time, existed in a world that was too outlandish to take seriously, and when it jumped into 5th dimension, "A Wrinkle in Time" kind of magic, I thought it lost the plot. "Tenet" was a million times worst though; which basically, was the first time I think he presented a puzzle that I didn't want to see solved.
The point I'm making with this, is that, "Oppenheimer" is about, the same thing, it's just, in this case, it's about the developing and dropping of the atomic bomb, and everything that entails. The science of creating and testing it, what it entails to even do the science, the politics that bring about how it's being created, and then later used, and then, the after-effects of it's usage, but not so much, the literal, as it is, the mental realization. When the crew at Los Alamos created the bomb, and then dropped it, it meant that, we were in a new age; an age where the Earth can indeed, create something, that could destroy itself, and we've been living with that fact ever since, and trying to reconcile that, must've been difficult at the time, for the normal person, much less the people who actually did it. And I think that's where ultimately, Nolan's going here.
The movie essentially cuts between three periods of Oppenheimer's life. The first, is his youth and the leading up to and the building of the bombs. The second, comes years later when, due to his involvement in Communist politics during the McCarthy era, he's denied his Q Clearance from the U.S. government, and later, in Lewis Strauss's (Oscar-winner Robert Downey, Jr.) Senate confirmation hearings for Secretary of Commerce, where the hold up is his involvement in Oppenheimer losing his clearance, revealing his lifelong personal vendetta against Oppenheimer at how it's coming back against him now. All three of these incidents are quite thrilling on their own; Nolan is a master manipulator, and even if we ourselves are barely able to keep up, we're able to emotionally understand all that's at stake at each moment, and none of these events essentially couldn't happen without the other.
It's also, just contemplating the horrors of having created such a killing machine, how much genius and greatness there is in that, and yet, understand how, something like the atomic bomb, or worst, can never be used again. And yet, it did win us the war; it wasn't used on the Nazis like we intended, but Japan was refusing to give up. We can and will forever debate whether or not we should've dropped the bomb, the point is that we had developed a bomb that could, and then was, dropped, that was the changing moment, in a way, you can argue no other moment has more shaped the 20th Century than that.
It's in that sense where I most appreciate "Oppenheimer" and can most understand it's appeal; it's a thriller disguised as an epic philosophical meditation on the atomic age. You see, you can learn all this, I mostly knew all of these details outlined, at least, the ones about Los Alamos, and what Oppenheimer went through afterwards, I didn't know a lot about his life before that, although I think I did hear about the Neils Bohr (Kenneth Branagh) story involving the apple. What Nolan achieves with "Oppenheimer" and I'm not even sure it's entirely perfectly done, but he gets you contemplate what all of that actually means in the greater, more philosophical aspects of science. The way Neil DeGrasse Tyson can take some of the more inane and abstract ideas about quantum physics, and make it seem, philosophical, in the best way, that's what Nolan does here.
Of course the filmmaking is spot on, although I question some of the artistic use of jump cuts,- it's one of those weird things where when you get one wrong it makes the movie worst, but if you do it hundreds of times, you win an Editing Oscar, and I kinda think he maybe didn't do it enough, but that's minor. The all-star cast is great, I didn't even mention Matt Damon or Emily Blunt or Florence Pugh,- I mean, half of Hollywood is in this movie. Like, it was a distracting when say, Rami Malek, showed up for basically one scene at the end of the movie, but at that point, I had given over to the film. I thought I was done with Nolan honestly, but man, he got me again.
"'A planet doesn't explode of itself,'" said dryly,
The Martian astronomer gazing off into the air-
'That they were able to do it is proof that highly
Intelligent beings must have been living there.'"
---John Hall Wheelock, his poem, "Earth".
CYRANO (2021) Director: Joe Wright
⭐⭐⭐⭐
I don't know if I've ever brought this up before, but I love "Cyrano De Bergerac". It's one of my favorite stories to tell and see told. Hell, I've tried a few times to tell it myself in my own scripts. Not ever successfully, but I gave it a go, and honestly I'm surprised more people don't take shots at it. When I do see it done, I tend to enjoy most versions of it though. Of course, the best modern one, and I'd argue the best recent one is "Roxanne" with Steve Martin and Daryl Hannah; I'd argue that's Steve Martin's best film and screenplay, and really, even though it fumbles around some of the modern issues with its premise, it also knows that the story is better as a romantic-comedy. (And frankly, it changes the ending to the ending the story deserves. Who likes that, spoilers for a 125-year-old+ story, but Cyrano dies at the end, no, you wanna see him and Roxanne.) I know some people are affectionate for the 1990 French version with Gerard Depardieu, which, is oh-kay, I guess. I don't know, this version never did for me, but it's fine. I do love the stage version though; I saw a wonderful taped version of the Broadway play years ago with Kevin Kline and Jennifer Garner among others that I loved. Kevin Kline was such a perfect choice for that role, and if you see him do it, and then watch the Depardieu, you'll realize that, yeah, as talented as Gerard is, he was kinda miscast for that role, at least for me.
Still, I love "Cyrano de Bergerac", but you should take that with a grain of salt, because I think most writers, and I'd argue most, critics, in particular love Cyrano because of our own little wish fulfillment fantasies. Cyrano (Peter Dinklage) is a writer, poet, fighter, romantic, and I must stress this part in particular, he's a "critic"; I don't know why that doesn't get brought up enough, but he's one of few main characters in the literary canon that is himself a critic. His introduction is always him, just demolishing and destroying a beloved performer, in front of his audience, and getting cheered on for it. If that's not critic wish-fulfillment, than I don't know what is! He even beats the crap out a guy who tries to attack him, and his deformity, and he's almost more insulted that he was lousy at insulting him as he was at the insult itself! I mean, the closest we ever normally get to something like this is yelling insults at a screen in a dark room next to a couple robots. Of course, writers and critics in particular love "Cyrano de Bergerac". We are never the star, we are the ones who only pray that we can sing their praises or knock them down.
So, what about this "Cyrano". Well, it's the first time I've seen the story told as a musical?!
Yeah, there's a lot of adaptations of "Cyrano de Bergerac", but I was a little caught offguard when the actors broke into songs originally. It's not the strangest idea, I guess, but if you're not aware going in, it can be a little daunting, and sometimes they made some interesting choices on what to devote a song or dance motif to. For instance, there's an early scene where Cyrano, tells a baker friend Ragueneau (Peter Wight) to change the metaphor in his love poem from planets to baking, which is the right decision, but there's a strange dancing segments where a lot of dancers are essentially dancing around a lot of dough, and it's-, weird. It's an odd choice. Just, an odd thing to have a song or dance segment devoted to, at least to me. That scene is in the original play, but still.... Obviously, there are other differences, Cyrano's infamous deformity was his long nose, which,- I don't know if Edmond Rostand was going for, any deeper symbolism with that,- most scholars think he wasn't, I tend to agree, although I'd say naming the person that Cyrano's helping get the girl, Christian (Kelvin Harrison, Jr.) and having him be helped by a guy with a big nose, was probably a questionable idea, but essentially, any sort of modern, physical deformity would work, so naturally, dwarfism fits in, just as well here. It would seem even more naturally that Dinklage would be the star, but this project was specifically garnered for him, since it's based off the musical by Erica Schmidt, who is Dinklage's wife.
I'm cool with it, 'cause Peter Dinklage is one of our greatest actors, and if she didn't create "Cyrano" for him, than somebody else either would've, or should've. He is the reason to watch "Cyrano". Honestly, Peter Dinklage is often the best reason to watch nearly everything he's in. (He's actually the only reason I watched "Game of Thrones", he was the only character I really liked or cared what happened to.) Of course, Roxanne (Haley Bennett) is also a tricky role; it's hard to understand how much letter-writing was a big deal back in the old days, especially when it does come to romance,- like, we can laugh at how the "Fifty Shades..." books being mostly text messages exchanges between characters, but, y'know, it honestly wasn't that different from most of Jane Austen's works being letter exchanges, even her good work being that.
That said, yeah, Roxanne, is already a little tricky, it's always kinda hard to make her not seem shallow, (Although that's the best thing about "Roxanne", Daryl Hannah's version of the character isn't. I should really do a Canon of Film on "Roxanne" one day.) That said, the movie does make an, interesting choice in taking the De Guiche (Ben Mendehlson) character, and making him, much more possessive of Roxanne, in his insatiable desire for her. I-, I don't know about that choice; I like it here, but making him more of a villain overall-, De Guiche has his own arc in the play that's much more nuanced as he is usually more inspired by Cyrano's actions, and not by Roxanne. He does start off as a suitor of Roxanne, but that has less importance once she's infatuated with Christian, here, it's almost like he's ordained to be with her-,... I-, I get why, but I don't love that change,- especially since it makes him seem less trustworthy in the third act during the war, when that really should be his moment to shine. It probably wouldn't bother most people if you're not obsessed with the original like I am, but it irked me enough.
Anyway, again, I'm bias, I could watch re-workings and re-imaginings of "Cyrano de Bergerac" on a loop and be satisfied. And "Cyrano" would definitely be among them and be a highlight, and for everyone else, Peter Dinklage's performance should absolutely be seen by everyone. He's amazing in everything, but this is clearly a role he loves and relishes, and it's about as perfect a casting or actor and role you can come up with today, and he is truly great in this. Roger Ebert, once wrote about "The Station Agent" how he realized that Dinklage could play "Braveheart" during that performance, and he could, but I'm gonna pretend he wrote "Cyrano de Bergerac" there instead, and just be happy we got this.
THE LAST SHOWGIRL (2024) Director: Gia Coppola
⭐⭐⭐1/2
Oh boy, where-the-hell do I start with this one....
Um, so, I didn't end making Oscar predictions or anything, but I have been keeping up most of the awards, or trying to anyway, and even watching a couple of the films. I'm seeing who's getting nominated where and for what..., in general, I'm not usually surprised by somebody getting nominated or even being in consideration for their performances. I tend to believe most everybody, if they're getting work in Hollywood, especially if you're an actor, you're talented to some degree, even if the material doesn't exactly show them in their best light. I've met and worked with plenty of talented actors who can't get a dogfood commercial, so I know subconsciously that, if you're working for a long period of time at all, you're probably talented, so- unless it's your first performance that I've become aware and I had never heard of you before, than I'm now particularly stunned to see any name, show up anywhere, in terms of getting critical acclaim. Especially with the all the critics awards that I will look up, and I'm looking for the some of the obscure ones, just to-, you never know what small film that only one group of critics like will secretly be the best film from that year or something. Still, if there was one name from the past, that I completely didn't expect to see show up surprisingly consistently, during this or any award season, it would've been Pamela Anderson.
I'm not even entirely sure how to explain this, honestly. She didn't end up getting an Oscar nomination, but like, I don't think modern youths fully realize, just how, even the idea of her, even being in this conversation feels so, surreal. In fact, while I'm writing this, I've put on "Pamela: A Love Story"; it was in my Netflix queue anyway, but the documentary, which was produced by her son Brenden, who's also a producer on this film, "The Last Showgirl", and part of me is a little nervous about watching it. Like, I basically grew up with Pamela Anderson being an ever-present figure in pop culture and media, even trying to explain that,- is.... like- if you challenged me right now, I betcha, I can recall the literal rise and fall of her breasts. I'm not even trying to be like, pervy or anything by saying that, I just know, 'cause every time she got implants or had them taken out, it was news! Like regular, on the six o'clock Evening News, news! And having a two hour refresher on all of that, her record-setting amount of Playboy appearance, the fact that she was on the biggest TV show in the world, on two different shows,- and oh, Christ the doc is starting with home videos, (NOT THAT ONE!) but...- like whoever the biggest celebrity is right now, who you really wanted to ignore and couldn't, Pamela Anderson was 50x bigger in her day than whoever the modern day version is.
And yet..., here she is, in a film and a role that not only is perfect for her, and she nails, but is practically right up my alley and sweet spot of knowledge. "The Last Showgirl", might seem like an anachronism title to anybody who walks down the Las Vegas strip these days and sees half naked girls dressed like showgirls regularly, and you can pay them for a picture, but A. those aren't real showgirls. They're cos-players, and B. it's a scam, be nice to them, but don't take a photo with them, but they're really not showgirls like their used to be on the Strip, not anymore. There's a few people like Dita Von Teese trying to bring back the old showgirls-type shows, but the last one that really existed was Jubilees and that closed in 2016. I'm not sure the Rockettes still exist in New York honestly. Like, even in the opening of the film, Shelly (Anderson) saying she's 5'7'', in my mind, I went, "Oh, you were barely a showgirl." I've met actual showgirls from some of those shows, they're gorgeous even now, but among all their other proportional requirements they're mostly tall. You had to generally be about 5'8''- 6', to even be a Vegas showgirl, most of them, were usually at least 5'10'', and that was the minimum beginning of the requirements. It might not be Cirque du Soleil, but it was not then an easy job for anybody to get. (That's about the one thing the movie "Showgirls" got right, btw.)
The movie begins and ends with her trying to audition after her show, after 30 years, is announced that it's closing. In her day, she was the star of the show, but now, she struggles to change outfits backstage, and those are tough outfits, and all the other dancers around her so much younger, they think of her as a mother-type figure. (And they are also all running up and down stairs backstage, why are their always stares these girls in twenty-pound headdresses and beaded bustiers always had to run up and down stairs in these things, and that is a thing too btw) The show's producer, Eddie (Dave Bautista, who apparently is just in everything lately, and is actually, quite good here.) Tells the girls that the show's ending in a few weeks. They're crushed, but nobody more than Shelly. The other girls start working the tryout circuit around town, and when one of the girls, Jodie (Keirnan Shipka) shows the routine they had her tryout, Shelly's offended by how overly-sexual it is. And yeah, that, is definitely a thing too. If you've lived here long enough, there is this odd notion from the old-timers that the shows, even the topless revues were so much classier back then. I don't want to stray too far into this, 'cause I've lived in Vegas more-than-long enough, that I definitely reminisce a lot on a lot of the ways things used to be better, and you definitely hear it from people who've been around longer than me, but eh, their is something a little odd about that particular notion to me.... I do get it to a degree, but eh I'm not as sure that "Crazy Girls" or "Jubilees" were more or less classy than "X Burlesque" or "Zumanity" is/was now.
The only other character that's been there as long as Shelly is Annette (Jamie Lee Curtis) who isn't in the show anymore, having left the show earlier to work as a cocktail waitress, another job that also, is getting replaced by younger, prettier, girls underneath. Thankfully, she's union, so she can work forever; if she doesn't blow her money on gambling and booze. (I've met that type of former showgirl as well.) Other than that, Shelly's world, is basically just the show, and now that that's closing. She mentioned at one point trying out in New York years earlier, even complaining that when she tried out for the Rockettes, she thought the leg kicks were too repetitive. (They are, but that actually makes them more impressive, 'cause that is fucking impossible! You try kicking like that, that high, for that long!) She does get a visit from her daughter Hannah (Billie Lourd) who's studying photography in Arizona. I struggle to explain all the detail of their relationship, for one it's kinda underwritten, but it does hint at Shelly's more, adventurous youth. Let's just say that she wasn't a good mother.
In fact, Shelly's constantly being told about, how she could've or should've left the show years ago, and gotten a more steady and secure gig. It's when she's pissed off the most, no matter who's telling it to her, her friends, her daughter, her producer,- honestly, I get both sides of this; yes, you have a kid, and it's just a show and she needs a mother more, but then again, why should she give up something she loves to raise her if she doesn't want to, and it does make it more tragic. I can kinda even see the argument for this story being a little under-developed. The movie was based on an unproduced play from Kate Gersten; it's her first feature film as a screenwriter, but she's worked as a writer on a lot of good TV shows in recent years, and I could tell you some parts were some things could've been more fleshed out, but,- maybe it's more interesting, compelling and even realistic if her world is incomplete to us, and to her. The film was directed by the first third generation Coppola filmmaker, Gia Coppola. She's Gio's kid, and Francis's granddaughter and this is her third feature; she made "Palo Alto", that strange multinarrative based on James Franco's short stories about teen youth awhile ago. I haven't seen her other feature "Mainstream", which, I'm fairly certain it wasn't, so I feel safe in saying that this is probably her most interesting and mature work so far.
Pamela Anderson,- like, this part is too perfect for her. She still nails it though. That audition scene, once we get back to it at the end, is just brutal, and oddly it makes me wonder, how much this film would actually work, if it wasn't Pamela Anderson in the main role. It's one of those films and performances that feels like it's too difficult to not place the actor's personal life and history onto the part itself. Thankfully, it doesn't quite feel like she's completely undercutting everything she is and was up 'til now, but yeah, I wonder what those who come into this movie blind and legitimately don't know who Pamela Anderson is, what they would think of the film. I think they'd love the performance, but I do wonder.... I mean, that's kinda her unfortunate curse, that we know everything about her. I want to say that it took all these years, long past her sex symbol icon days to get this performance from her, 'cause it is that experience that makes it that much more special, but frankly, I really wonder if maybe she's been this good this whole time and just never really got the chance to show it off. I would argue that no film or acting role ever gave her the chance or the ability to express herself like this before.
Hell, maybe my biases mean that I never gave her that chance, and maybe if I rewatch "Barb Wire" I could see it there as well.... Okay, maybe not, but you know what, "The Last Showgirl" makes me want to see what else she can do as an actress. What we've missed all these years with her just being showcased, more as an image and a brand because of her looks. See her in roles that show off how special and beautiful she is as a person and talented she can be as an actress, and not her as an iconic sex symbol. As I said before, nobody stays around in Hollywood this long continuously getting work, if you're not talented.
NO HARD FEELINGS (2023) Director: Gene Stupnitsky
⭐⭐⭐
Before I start the review, this is the movie that made me pay full price on Netflix. Let me explain, apparently, there are now certain titles that you have to pay extra for, and extra, without ads; I had the basic package, with ads, because, I don't really have the biggest issue with advertisements, even on streaming, but apparently, I couldn't watch this film without getting that deal. I because of "No Hard Feelings," I paid extra on Netflix for a service that I didn't even want, when I would've preferred the crappier service. Look, I complained about the pitfalls about streaming for years on this blog, and nobody listened, so I'm not complaining now, I'm just making note of these things.... "No Hard Feelings" by the way, to those who said I was making too much of some of these things, btw. (Also apparently Netflix has games now you can play. I-eh, I don't know what to do with that info.)
Anyway, I was looking forward to this film; I think there's still room for the raunchy sex comedy and this is honestly a nice modern twist on it in theory. In practice, eh, it's-, it's got some moments, but maybe I would've given it another once over on the script. Or perhaps, eh, I don't know, was Jennifer Lawrence the best choice for this script?
Now, I love her work, but I'm going a little back-and-forth on this one. She can definitely do comedy; I think she should've won her Oscar for "American Hustle" and not for "Silver Linings Playbook", and "American Hustle" a comedic performance, but there's different kinds of comedic performances too. Here, she plays, Maddie, a down-on-her-luck local beach girl in Montauk; ah, the rare, northeast coast surfer girl. She's the local trainwreck, who barely keeps a job as a bartender at one of the beach bars that caters to the tourists, in between driving violations. The kind of girl who sleeps around but keeps a few sadsacks on the hook who are enchanted with her, at least until they're done with her bullshit, and right now they're mostly done with her bullshit. She's losing her house and her car, which she needs to keep up for Uber gigs between all her other conquests and hustles. The house belonged to her mother, and she really has nowhere else to go; she's alienated most of the town and what few friends she has are trying to move on, and she's determined to stay in her comfortable hometown, no matter how many rich out-of-towners come in and build and buy summer homes there.
This leads her to answering and advertisement on Craigslist, for...-, hmm, how do I put this.... She has to, um, secretly, seduce, a young teenage boy, nineteen-year-old Percy (Andrew Barth Feldman), on the request of, the kid's parents, Laird and Allison (Matthew Broderick and Laura Benanti). Basically, Percy, a very talented musician, is an extreme introverted loner, which, is something I get, and yeah, to an extent, sometimes people like these, they aren't as able to connect with others, as much as they'd like, and occasionally, they might need, more extroverted friends around them, and that includes sexually extroverted, to get them out of their introverted shells. Sometimes, they're particularly dense and shy about stuff like this....
Okay, full disclosure here, I'm not saying this character is similar to me, but I get it, and I also very much get, not exactly being able or willing, to accept the advancements of others easily either. (And from my experience, sometimes we are so dense about some of these things that even that at age, we don't even get when we're being advanced upon. Sometimes, I-, we, didn't find out until years later we were being hit on, even when clues were ridiculously obvious... [bites lip in shame]) At least I was never so dense that I thought Hall & Oates's song "Maneater" was about a literal monster, but yeah, this is an interesting character and an intriguing dilemma.
The movie has it's laugh, but oddly, I think it kinda works best when it's not being funny; the moments when Maddie and Percy connect, are when they both start opening about themselves, and really, this movie, gets what I think most people don't, is that, being extremely introverted and being extremely extroverted, are kinda the same thing. Or at least, they both come out from the same feelings of needing to bottle up your own emotions and feelings. Maddie's so venomous and cold-hearted towards others, including the lovers she takes in regularly, because she doesn't want to open up about her own personal issues, in this case, a father who left home when she was young, who wants nothing to do with her, and having to take care of her dying mother after when she really should've been going out into the world. In Percy's case, he's got his own embarrassing issues, although it's implied that his parents were extremely protective of him, rich helicopter parent-types, but it's not really elaborated on or shown much honestly. This is why I think the script could've used another rewrite or two, not necessarily to make his parents more extreme, because I actually don't think that automatically correlates to extrovertedness, but show more of how they struggled with him beforehand. Not only how they did baby him too much, but also how they couldn't get him out when they had the chance before.
Yeah, the movie, is good, but it is a bit underwritten, I feel like I might've watched a version with like 25 minutes cut from the film. That's not the worst thing per se, I think casting can save some comedies like these, but you gotta cast the right person, and Jennifer Lawrence, she's- she's good, I don't know if she's great here though. She's brave, I'll give her that, and she goes for it here, especially during a couple action sequences, especially one on a beach that kinda inches towards the kind of outrageousness this film aims for, but it just doesn't quite get there in those scenes. She's so much better at the character stuff for me. Apparently this part was written with her in mind, and her production company was one of the films behind this so she really put some effort into it, but I watched this film and couldn't help thinking, make this film, ten years earlier and put Cameron Diaz in it....-
I mean, the obvious comparison character that Maddie reminded me of the most was Diaz's work in "Bad Teacher", and that movie is actually,- like on the page, that movie's much more underwritten than this film. In fact, script-wise, that movie is a disaster; part of what's amazing about that performance is how Diaz has this ridiculous character and is somehow trying to show character growth and evolution when really, there isn't any, but because she's so perfectly cast in the film, it sells it anyway.
"No Hard Feelings" problem, is that, it's somewhere in between. It's not quite outrageous enough to feel like it's on that extreme, but it's also not exactly loaded with as much depth to make us fully care about Maddie and Percy, but it almost does. The balancing act here, is just off. There's something here, there's enough to here to recommend, for trying if nothing else, but it just feels like it could've been more. It's trying to be a little more of each, but in different ways, it doesn't become enough of either.
CRIMES OF THE FUTURE (2022) Director; David Cronenberg
⭐⭐⭐1/2
Huh... Well, it's-, it's not the first I've sat through a David Cronenberg movie and constantly found myself mumbling aloud, "What the hell am I watching?" Actually though, this one's kinda,- well, most Cronenberg movies are weird, but this one's kinda...- let's just say, this is something I've thought about for a bit.
So, one of the big trends going on right now, is body dysmorphia horror. It's been around for awhile, in fact, and frankly it's long been part of Cronenberg's aesthetic, but I've honestly found it intriguing or taken it seriously, at least not until recently, most notably, it's taken over recently French horror like the films of Coralie Fargeot like "Revenge" and "The Substance" and my favorite so far, Julie Ducournau, and her films, "Raw" and "Titane". These are films that really put body dysmorphia to some pretty extreme places, but it's for a point. They're exploring a lot of the pressures and expectations and, objectifications that have been thrusted upon the female form from the historically male gaze society that's shaped them. "Titane" is about a girl who's literally both turning into and begins a relationship with, a literal car and it's way more fucked up than even that description, btw, that movie is amazing!
Yet, those are very female perspectives, and newer ones at that, Cronenberg's been making films for decades, although, he does have a movie about where his characters are, um, aroused by cars, well, car crashes at least.... (At that's the movie called "Crash" that most people think is good..., uhhh..., ye-ah, I don't know how exactly that happened, but-eh, they got that wrong. I don't care, I stand by that one.) Yeah, that said, when he uses body dysmorphia, it's different. His characters are often under the influence of the outside world, they're turning into things, and other beings or people or objects, are invading their personal bodies. I think the best way to describe things like, "Jacob's Ladder" or "Videodrome", or some of his other films is that they're not so much, is that body dysmorphia is more about the invasion of and eventual loss of personhood. It's the fear of becoming less human. And that's where this film, "Crimes of the Future" comes in.
Here's the thing though, most of the time with his films, I'm kinda just amazed and baffled that he's even thinking about some of this stuff, this time though, uh,- well he takes it in an interesting direction that I definitely wouldn't have gone, but.... so, the main narrative of this films involves humans, evolving, into a different mutated form, in the future, because with the lack of more normal nutrients and natural food sources that were once available, they're not only becoming able to consume things that are made of plastic, their bodies are beginning to, and indeed are, growing new organs, in order to evolve into this new paradigm of humans + plastic. Like the opening, horrific images, involves a mother, and fair warning here, this is horrific and graphic, a mother, Djuna (Lihi Kornaski), um, suffocating her child, Brecken (Sozos Sotiris) because he's developed an ability to eat plastic.
The father of that child, Lang (Scott Speedman) is apart of a revolutionary group of, I guess evolutionist um, rebels, who believe that humans are evolving and that this is a natural part of human evolution and have begun helping adapt their bodies along, including using literal poisonous toxic waste to create, essentially a plastic power bar that's poisonous to non-plastic eaters, but to them, is basically fuel.
This is in response to the actions of the government, represented by the National Organ Registry, here by Dr. Whippet (Don MacKellar) and his main assistant Timlin (Kristen Stewart). They're fascinated by our main characters, a performance artist duo, Saul and Caprice (Viggo Mortensen and Lea Seydoux). Saul, is somebody who's mutated to the point where he's constantly able to grow these new organs, but Caprice, a former surgeon, which, is-, okay, this kinda confusing, but pain and lot of other illnesses are kinda things of the past now, so, it's actually harder to tell when somebody's actually ill or sick, so, she is a former professional surgeon, who now, does this surgery, as part of a performance, by removing Saul's new organs. This, in this world, is literally attuned to, the new form of sex, in this world. It's...- I...-
Yeah, I-, I don't know what to think of this. I do get it. It's weird, like, to go back to those power bars as well, since these mutations are often effecting everyone's digestive areas, people like Saul and Lang aren't able to eat normally, and they need this, skeletal like chair in order to actually eat and digest properly regular food. I don't fully get this whole world, but, I can't say this is all that, obtuse and weird as I suspect a lot of people might think.
I've known about this for years, I won't go down, deeper into this, but if you really want to go down a disturbing rabbit hole, go look up "plastics found in autopsy reports", one day. It's honestly pretty horrific and depressing and, here's the thing, um, this is something that, I've thought about more than most. Human evolution, I think people are under an impression that we've completed evolving, but-eh, have we? I mean, even now...-, people thought up until very recently that our appendix was a useless organ leftover from when humans ate things like grass and dirt, and it might still be, but now there's a growing theory that perhaps it's more necessary than we thought and that it helps store good bacteria in our body, and therefore helps our digestive system so maybe fighting appendicitis with antibodies can be more useful, than cutting it off and that we live longer with it than without it! Like, yeah, human evolution could still be happening, and yeah, with an evergrowing amount of plastic in our bloodstream and vital organs, this is like, the one time these odd Cronenberg images and ideas don't just feel like remnants of an old William S. Burroughs drug trip.
As to the film itself,- I- I guess I think it works enough. I'm probably more horrified by the reminder of what's actually happening to us than the surreal hypothesizes the movies thinks we might become, but it works in the same way most other Cronenberg films work. That said, I do prefer Cronenberg more lately when he is infatuated with the mind instead of the body,- I think his best recent efforts deal more with invasion of the conscious mind than the literal body like "A History of Violence" and "A Dangerous Method" but you know there is something to be said for this side of Cronenberg. I guess I just prefer others' interpretations and metaphorical uses of body dysmorphia at the moment, than this one,- this kinda feels dated in that respect, like this should've been a film he made in the '80s or '90s perhaps, not now, but, hey, I liked those films enough then too.
(Sighs)
Plastics. There's a very big future in them, isn't there?
BROS (2022) Director: Nicholas Stoller
⭐⭐⭐⭐
There's two genres out there that I feel, are probably, currently in our culture, the best at really presenting a unique and personal artistic vision to the world. The first one is horror, people like Jordan Peele I think exemplify this the most recently, however, I think a seriously underrated second genre that does this is romantic-comedy. I'm honestly not exactly sure why the rom-com has kinda fizzled for the most part in recent years; I think part of the problem is that, it's just too difficult a genre for most people to pull off these days. No seriously, people think rom-coms are easy, but they're-, they're not at all. They're hard to write, and they're often even harder to act in. There's a reason why like, the same actors used to keep showing up in them when they were around, they're hard and only a few great actors can really do them well. That's why Meg Ryan and Sandra Bullock worked for years at them, nobody else could do them! I think that's part of the reason they've really been so few-and-far between, at least really great ones. But the ones that have been great have been, the most unique and personal; "(500) Days of Summer", "Trainwreck", "Crazy Rich Asians", they're the best recent ones and all of them have really distinct and important visions to show the world.
"Bros", yeah, "Bros" is in that same category. Personally, I've never really been a big Billy Eichner guy though. Not that I ever hated him, but, I was never the biggest fan of his series or his comedy, but that's different than recognizing his comedic voice and the importance and gravitas his perspective brings to the world. He does seem to come off as a little abrasive for me, but I think he's aware of that. While on his "Billy on the Street" show, he seems more likable, whenever I do see him playing a role, he definitely seems to be leaning into his more obnoxious aspects to him, and he does that here.
He's a combative sys gay white man, a noted podcaster who's trying to help run/open the first LGBTQ+ museum in the country to teach the history of, well, being gay in the world. (Or bi, or trans, as he's often reminded) He leans into the stereotypes of being a gay man, perhaps a little too much;- (Sidebar: Do single gay men, actually have a lot of, threesomes? I mean, I'm sure there's some that do, but, boy, it seems like they have a lot, at least in the gay clubs that Billy frequents. Lotta sex, I get, occasional menage-a-trois, but like regularly? I feel like that's- I mean guess there's no harm to it, assuming everyone's using protection but,-, well I guess throuples are becoming more of a thing, as is pointed out in the film.... Did this sidebar go off-the-rails; I probably went off the-, I'll stop.) Anyway, between moments of freaking out in front of numerous gay icons of today and yesteryear, some playing themselves, others playing parts, he begins a tender, eh,- he probably wouldn't want me to say, "relationship", but, relationship, with Aaron (Luke MacFarlane) a young estate lawyer who frequents the gay nightclub scene, and they hit it off, despite Aaron, seeming a bit, boring, according to Billy.
Aaron, is somewhat boring for a gay person. (I mean, who-the-hell's favorite gay TV lesbian is Susan from "Friends", like, c'mon Aaron, she's not even the best lesbian in that relationship! [BTW, the best TV lesbian, is Shane from "The L Word". The best one from a sitcom though is Elena from the "One Day at a Time" reboot.])
Anyway, it's a rom-com, and it's slowly goes through the steps of the rom-com, admittedly there's a foursome scene that's, a little, um, atypical, but the beats are still there, Billy's trying to get comfortable being in a relationship, even though he feels like it goes against everything he stands for.... This is the kind of person who will through a fit when you try to mention that the rumors of Abraham Lincoln's bisexuality are still not completely confirmed or agreed upon. Hell, he'll argue he was gay, and not bisexual, but...-, look it up if you don't know.... Anyway, Aaron, except for the fact that he's openly gay, and has a secret dream of being a chocolatier, he's basically a pretty-heteronormative cis white male, and that does freak out Billy. He likes basic television shows and movies, and music, he like Garth Brooks, who is a known ally I might add, but still, not at the top of most gay men I know's playlists. He grew up pretty normal, and Billy is very extrovertive, aggressively, combatively gay. Aaron's more willing to jump into a temporary relationship, but he's also just as willing to float from one-night stand to one-night stand. Billy's used to that life as well, and even though he spends his lonely nights moping in front of Hallmark movie marathons, it's like a struggle between that comfort of cynical loneliness and opening up to the possibility that a normal relationship might be something he's possibly, perhaps open to..., at least long enough to give it a shot and then talk again about their status?
"Bros" didn't do particularly well in the theaters; it's one of those rare gay Hollywood mainstream releases, but, on top of, most movies not being huge in theaters anymore, it ran into competition, plus, yeah, romantic-comedy gay romances, some people in America aren't ready for mainstream versions of that, especially ones that might talk about the actual history of gay people, and how they've shaped our current world. Perhaps that's why I do have a soft spot for "Bros". Yes, Eichner can be a lot, but I'm glad he's a lot and somebody out there is willing to just, not hide everything about them. Rom-coms, when done hell, can give us this unique look into great artists, and Eichner's is right up there with those rom-coms I mentioned earlier. It's directed and co-written by Nicholas Stoller, who was the director behind "Forgetting Sarah Marshall," another recent rom-com I could've mentioned earlier, another one that's also more graphic about sex than most would be these days as well I might add. And, yeah, I do like that this film, on top of being a good rom-com about a gay couple, it does use this backdrop of history, a history, that honestly hasn't been as well told as it should be, to emphasize this inherent contradiction in Eichner, and in some ways, modern gay men and other members of the rainbow spectrum in general. What is love to those who's entire lifespan of history, is basically about being ostracized, erased, or worst, I might add, because of who they love? What is love for those for whom love itself is a political and radical act? What is being in love when just being able to express one's love to another is itself a fight? It would sure make me cynical about the whole aspect.
I guess that's why I like this more than Eichner's other work. Eichner is already a representative of all this, and I think confronting all of that, and that adding love to the mix,...- Like I said, rom-coms really are a great genre for personal expression like this, and a seriously underrated one too.
JOSEP (2022) Director: Aurel
⭐⭐⭐
As we plunder ever deeper into fascism in America, apparently, I feel it does become more prescient that we learn more and more about the Spanish Civil War. It's kinda stunning, and surprisingly under-discussed in this part of the Western world, so to me, Spain's fascist turn, post-WWII seems, almost surreal to me. If you ever do look into you really just, how horrific it actually was, and a lot of it's aftereffects are still being felt....- it's...- I don't even...- I think a lot of what throws us is that we're not familiar with a lot of Spain's history, which, in of itself is really complicated. Like, parts of Spain are trying to separate into their own separate country, today, and I think they're history and world and culture, those nuances that would lead to fascism, just,- we really just don't fully understand them. It's like that old Eddie Izzard joke about how we think that if you're killing your own people like dictators like Pol Pot or Stalin, we're just fine with that, but Hitler killed people next door, and that eventually annoyed everyone else. I think that's kinda just how we look at Spain, and the fascist regime that overtook the country for, basically the middle of the last century. We just, don't think about the atrocities and horrors of that time, because we, don't really know it, but we also just don't get it; like why certain groups of Spaniards hated other groups of Spaniards, not realizing just how different those groups are to those living in that amalgam of a country called we call Spain.
I don't know if "Josep" got me to understand it more thoroughly or not, but if it's a quiet first step for some, I think that's a positive. "Josep" is about Josep Bartoli (Sergi Lopez), at the time a revolutionary, a political cartoonist, and a refugee. Once he managed to escape through the Pyrenees, after fighting in the war, he was in a concentration refugee camp in France. Nowadays, I don't think his work as beloved as it was, because partly, among other things Bartoli did, he eventually married Frida Kahlo, arguably the most important Mexican artist, ever, and frankly, at least in America, her work is more prescient than Bartoli's work, at least nowadays it is. At the time, when he had escaped the refugee camp and made his way to the Americas, he was one of the biggest artists of his time, but this story is about that escape.
Actually, I think that's kinda where the film struggles. It's about his escape, but a good deal of it is told in flashback, and not from his perspective, but from the perspective of Serge (Gerard Hernandez) a French guard at the refugee camps, who purportedly helped Bartoli escape. His character does show that, these refugees, weren't exactly beloved by the French either at the time, 'cause,- oh Christ, France and Spain,- that's a whole other aspect that I don't have time to get into, but he was one of the few empathetic guards who didn't just see Bartoli, or the refugees as, what I will charitably call, less-than-human.
The film is the feature directorial debut by Le Monde cartoonist Aurel, and eh, it's not my favorite brand of animation; it kinda has a graphic novel feel, but it's interesting enough. I think Josep is one of those people's who singular life couldn't possibly be fully told in one movie, but even still, I worry this wasn't entirely the best approach, but it's still an honorable attempt. You'd need a full miniseries to really get into everything he did, but perhaps this is the most important part of his life and story. Who knows what would happen if he didn't escape that camp, and yeah; hell, he was lucky he even was able to keep drawing while he was there at all, much less escape.
SOFTIE (2020) Director: Sam Soko
⭐⭐⭐1/2
I knew that most of the issues revolving around African politics, especially in some of the more war-torn violent countries, or if not, specifically war-torn, definitely the ones most often succumbed to political violence and corruption was essentially based in tribalism. I didn't realize that, the reason it's based on tribalism, was because of the British imperialists. And I don't mean, some of the, more arbitrary delineations and border lines between some of these countries, I mean-, they- (colonizers), as they were, taking over the country, and began hiring and using the local natives to help build the continent in their, more western ideals and images, they determined what tribes were best, for whatever positions or jobs that they needed. And, now that, Africa, isn't trying to be colonized anymore by the Europeans or the west, the positions that the tribes were given, from the past, have essentially, determined, their statuses in their modern political scenes, which is now, basically, the basis for most of the violence and corruption.
I guess, if you think about it, that makes the most sense, but-, I guess,- being an American, we would've compared such tribalism to, something akin to, well, the Israelis and the Palestinians, where, they're history is so long and ancient that, they're disgusts and conflicts with each other is basically inevitable, and that, these nations, struggling to form, shape and run their own governments and nations, is just another chapter in their own personal, trivial histories, grudges and rivalries, and perhaps it is to a degree, but I get the impression from "Softie" that, it's much more arbitrary than that.
"Softie" is the nickname of photojournalist Boniface Mwangi, one of the most influential people in Kenya and all of Africa. He's been covering the violent government corruption and politics since the late 2000s, around the time when Kenya, essentially, restarted their country and formed a new constitution, replacing the one that had been ongoing since 1963, when they first declared their Independence from Britain, and the way he described it, the government had basically been run more like a monarchy than a republic before and since, with the people from the preferred tribes, being and staying in power, and oppressing those who dispute them through violence and other means. Softie, has had enough and the movie follows him and his family as he decides to run for Parliament, and the movie details that journey.
Personally, my most strongest opinion from this movie is that I liked his wife, Njeri, probably a little more than him. She seems like the more no bullshit one of the house.
There's this one aspect, of just seeing Kenyan politics like this, and how campaigning here is so much different. There are political parties, but it's really kinda difficult for a laymen to delineate them, and like I said, it's more tribalistic than anything. There's,- well, there's dispute on the count, but there's about 42 tribes in modern-day Kenya, some even use the term "42+", 'cause there's some disputed ones, Mwangi was born Kikuyu, which is one of the bigger tribes, but it's mainly focused in the southern part of the country, near the Tanzania, and he's long-since moved from there.
Eventually, things kinda fall apart for him. Part of it, is that, while he is a great photojournalist, one of the best, CNN used his work constantly and he's won awards for it, I'm not sure he's a great politician. Not that it would've mattered much, because, right before the election, the guy in charge of the elections office was killed a week before, and the footage of election day, is a nightmarish mess, with people standing in line from the early morning to early night, and the line not moving at all.
Maybe elections should only be run from people outside the nation that's having them? Anyway, there was violence and outrage, and then there was some kind of strange political compromise and a handshake. You know, I never realize how phony a lot of our, political, machinations are, until they're imitated and being done by others. We dress up in suits and shake hands with our rival and smile like they've accomplished something; it feels so forced, doesn't it? It did here seeing it.
"Softie" as a film, is an interesting look into this strange grey area where journalism meets politics and just how tricky that area is to crossover. I was definitely worried going into this, I've seen documentaries on war photographers in the past, and, as you can imagine, they're mostly depressing portrayals, not just of war, but of the photographers themselves. Mwangi, does, kinda feed into that stereotype of mine, but I think it's just a matter of he's not a politician and when he tries to speak like one, it comes off as unnatural and his wife rolls her eyes acknowledging it. She should be the politician. Mwangi can definitely be a voice of reason, but I think his photos have spoken better than he can. I still think he should do both and the Kenyan parliament would be a little better off with people like him in there, but yeah, his country may need him, but he's not ready yet. Perhaps the ones he influences will help change the country for the better in the future. Perhaps in the future, politics will also matter more than the tribes one belongs to.
