The Times They Are A-Changin

Despite yet another horrible audience at the Navy Pier IMAX, I have to say I fully enjoyed Zack Snyder's Watchmen. After reading almost every take on the film I can find, and probably not having much to add to the discussion, I have to say that the film is a success as an adaptation, and not entirely a success as a freestanding film.

My big question after viewing it is, will anyone that hasn't read the book be at all interested in this slavish adaptation? The entire structure of the film follows the book almost to a T (despite some cuts) with long flashback sequences and changing focuses and narrators in a way that made me feel like "wow, they're really pulling this off" but in a way that I have to imagine will make the unfamiliar wonder, "where is this all going anyway?"

The long asides built into the book, like how Jon became Dr. Manhattan, Nite Owl II and The Comedian in Vietnam, and Rorschach's childhood all worked in adding depth to the characters, fleshing out the alternate history, and just as cool set pieces, but by the end of the film, the climax and resolution ends up feeling a little rushed. Unfortunately, the revelation that The Comedian is Laurie Jupiter's father seems to come out of nowhere rather than the emotional moment it should be.

At almost 3 hours, and I feel this actually speaks to the strengths of the film, it made me think that the director's cut with everything included will actually be stronger by making the film more sprawling and spacing things out, making the whole experience wash over someone, rather than making the end feel like some sort of rush to the finish line.

Doomsday

11 hours: 50 minutes

My thoughts to come.

I'll show you around the city, and we'll eat well. We'll drink good wine. We'll make love.

Once again I was promised a return to form from Woody Allen, this time with Vicky Cristina Barcelona, and I was disappointed.

It would be easy to attack Woody Allen and his films for the kinds of characters they present. Characters with the financial means that allow them to take summer trips to Barcelona to study the Catalan. Characters who are high-minded, narcissistic, self-loathing and mildly pretentious. Characters who can worry about the meaning of love and their own self satisfaction rather than how they're going to be paying their rent. But to fault the film for presenting the social class of characters that Woody has been exploring for most of his career, when he isn't dabbling in the Depression, isn't really fair.

While my own financial and employment dissatisfaction served as a small barrier for my engagement with the film, what didn't work for me was that much like Match Point, the film is simply a play on small and familiar themes. Match Point was all about chance and whether someone can be at the right place at the right time to either change their social class or to get away with murder.

This time around, Woody presents his treatise on European romance. When I say European romance, I mean this concept that to travel to Europe is to indulge in a different life, a more care free life. The idea that Americans can throw caution to the wind when in romantic cities and indulge in sexual experimentation with little consequence (exemplified with both Vicky and Cristina's romance with Juan Antonio) or that to be European is to be more passionate and artistic (exemplified by Cristina's photography, as well as most of her relationship with Juan Antonio and Maria Elena). That to live in Europe is to be on vacation all the time.

I can respect the films exploration of these ideas. The problem is that it all just ends up feeling a little too small. By the end, everything is just a little to pat and dry as unsurprisingly, Vicky and Cristina realize that no matter how idealistic Barcelona may have seemed, it isn't what they want in the long run. Vicky ultimately needs the safety and stability she seemed to running away from, and Cristina always needs something new or she'll get bored.

In the end, the film doesn't commend its characters for what they've learned. Rather, it shows contempt for nearly everyone. As a viewer, we look down at Vicky first for being so straight laced, on Cristina for being so aloof and indecisive, on Juan Antonio and Maria Elena for being so emotional and overly passionate while lacking any real intelligence, on Doug for being a shallow financial douche bag. By the end, this contempt is just unsatisfying, as the film really provides no real answers to the questions it presents by being an exploration of a theme. If filling one's life with passion, love, and art isn't the way to overcome dissatisfaction and find meaning, then what is?

Mr. Smith

Dear Macy

I'm playing some catch up, much like the narrative of Gus Van Sant's Paranoid Park. Having endured Van Sant's Death Trilogy (Gerry, Elephant, Last Days) I've been waiting to see Paranoid Park, and its well earned appearance on quite a few top 10 lists this year has finally given me that final push to watch.

The film is very much a continuation of the seemingly art house Gus with its slow ponderous tracking shots courtesy of a first class DP (Christopher Doyle) and its barebones narrative which can be described in just a sentence. IMDB adequately summarizes the movie, "A teenage skateboarder's life begins to fray after he is involved in the accidental death of a security guard." And yet, this is a refinement of the previous three films where things feel much more resonant and meangful. Rather than set a single mood and tone like the aimless school hallways in Elephant or the endless desert trails in Gerry, each long tracking shot plums more emotional depth as we begin to unravel the narrative that Alex is presenting. Each time we repeat the same sequence which we have seen before, something Van Sant did really confusingly and annoyingling in Last Days, rather than feel like it's some trick to make the run time feature length, it just gets us further in the head space of Alex.

While the film starts out slowly, and a little confusingly with the narrative trick of the narrator realizing he should start a bit earlier, circling around the most major event, and it takes some time to adjust to the nonactors, the film is sublimely rewarding, and by the end, you as a viewer will feel the same release Alex has by telling his story. Really, like Slumdog Millionaire, this is another 2008 film that cleverly engages the audience through the act of storytelling itself.

Now bring on Milk.

Baby Steps

It really has been forever since I've blogged, which is what I seem to be saying every time I start back up, but I really feel it's going to take the help of Dr. Leo Marvin to start again. It's not that I don't find that I have plenty to talk about between movies, television, Blago's corruption scandal, my horrendous job search, and just plain living, but let's just take this one step at a time.

There Ain't Going to Be a Jumbotron

"This year is going to be different."

It was almost surprising how efficient the season premiere of Friday Night Lights was providing all the exposition for its third season.

While the Taylor family still bickers with the same rhythms and realism as ever, a lot has changed. Smash injured his knee and lost his scholarship (which I can't recall happening at the end of last season so I assume happened in the interim), Riggins is the new tailback, leaving the team struggling. A new quarterback has come to Dillon to shake things up and maybe take Matt's QB1 position. Coach Taylor's job is seemingly in danger after not taking the team far enough last season.Tami is now principal of Dillon. Lyla has given up on Jesus and rebounded with Riggins, and lastly, Tyra and Landry are just friends again. Unfortunately Street and his pregant waitress are nowhere to be seen, but in contrast to that, it at least seems we are forever rid of the Latino stereotypes of Carlotta and Santiago as well as that damn Jesus freak Logan Huntzberger. And, oh yeah, the show is about football again.

And now that we're all caught up, I can say that this was quite a welcome return. I personally never had a horrible problem with Season 2, although watching this episode and thinking back, I really feel like the show has found itself again. I'm no sports fan, and so the very idea of the show focusing more on football doesn't exactly excite me, but that hardly matters. What really works about this show is that by focusing on football and the team, it's able to capture the smaller moments in the characters lives around it, instead of becoming a show about grand moments and inanane melodrama as it did last season.

This might sound like some attempt to be overly profound, but by actually being about football, the show actually gets to be about so much more that feels real. In a way, Tami's current conflict with the school budget seems to be a commentary on season 2 as she is concerned with everything else but football at Dillon, including the students, the teachers, the textbooks, and meanwhile while she struggles with the budget, the coaches have new computersand working AC. It's especially telling when Buddy starts telling Tami "Clear Eyes, Full Hearts..." and Tami saying "Let's not go there." It's as if the writers are saying that as great as football is, there are other things that matter.

And what really matters about the show is the people and their lives. Really, this show is about the Taylors and how they inspire and support everyone around them. While the vice principal tells Tyra that there is no way she is getting out, and will be lucky to get into a tech college, Tami lets her know that she can do anything she wants as long as she works hard enough. And in the best scene of the episode, which got me pumped the way the best moments in the run of the series have, Coach Taylor plays a game of raquetball with Brian "Smash" Williams, and tells him that he will play football again and make it onto a college team, and he won't give up on him until it happens because he needs something good to happen. The scene is especially powerful because not only does Coach tell him, but he shows him that he can be fast again as we watch him move around that raquetball court and implicitly understand that while he's a half second slower now, Smash will play again.