Cinema Romantico

Why Mark Harris Is Wrong About The Descendants

2012-01-27T08:30:00.004-06:00

To be clear, film writer Mark Harris is fairly brilliant. He wrote the best, most engaging book I read all of last year. Mr. Harris, as the saying goes, has forgotten more about the history of cinema then I will ever know.

That said, he's an idiot.

I love "The Descendants." Go ahead and quote me. Fifty-seven times, if you want. I wrote this review of it within 48 hours of seeing it and I still stand by every single word. I named it my #5 movie of 2011 and I still stand firmly behind that, too. Of course, in the face of its awards success, many have turned against it. And Mr. Harris is among the most prominent haters. Now, to be even more clear, Mr. Harris didn't simply slide into "The Descendants"-haters camp once it started racking up Best Picture trophies from varying critics associations (The Winneshiek County Critics Association names "The Descendants" its picture of 2011!). He was against it from the beginning. And I respect that.

That also said, he's still an idiot.

(Note: There will be some minor spoilers ahead.)

Of the Oscar Best Picture nominee directed by Alexander Payne, Mr. Harris wrote: "It just opened to what Metacritic numerically defines as 'universal acclaim' (despite some serious non-acclaim from the likes of Time, Slate, and Movieline). Perhaps some of you saw it over the weekend and loved it, too. But perhaps some of you objected, as I did, to (mild spoilers follow) voice-over narration that is at first overbearing and then, mysteriously, gone. Or the TV-pilot-ish subplot about whether George Clooney’s character is going to sell a beautiful piece of Hawaiian land to rapacious developers, which takes two hours to go exactly where you know it’s headed the second it’s introduced. Or the movie’s irritating habit of introducing characters by showcasing their worst qualities — the teenage girl is an angry brat, the teenage boy is such an insensitive dolt that you’re happy when he’s punched in the face — only to turn around and say, no, you’ve judged them too hastily, they’re actually good, rock-solid, sensitive people, after which the movie never returns to or acknowledges their problematic sides again. In other words, 'The Descendants' makes them look like clichés only so that it can then claim they’re more complicated than they look. Anyway, I, frankly, don’t see what all the fuss — wait, where’d everyone go?"

In regards to the "voice-over narration that is at first overbearing and then, mysteriously, gone", well, that's just like "Jerry Maguire." And "The Royal Tenenbaums." And......I could do that all day.

Regarding the "TV-pilot-ish subplot" which "takes two hours to go exactly where you know it’s headed the second it’s introduced" allow me to first just say very, very loudly...SIGH. It never fails to amaze me how much misplaced pride (which doubles as pseudo-disgust) people take in being able to "predict" plot outcomes simply so at the end they can say "I told you so!" Yes, you know from the first moment that Clooney ISN'T going to sell the land. But do you know WHY he isn't going to sell the land?

In his review of the film the esteemed Roger Ebert writes: "The film follows Matt's legal, family and emotional troubles in careful detail, until Payne shows us, without forcing it, that they are all coiled together. A solution for one must be a solution for all. This is so much more complex than most movie plots, where good and evil are neatly compartmented and can be sorted out at the end." "The Descendants" carefully, wonderfully cultivates this multi-layered story so that by the time we reach the point where Clooney must decide if he will or will not sell the land it is made very clear that if he agrees not to sell it he can, in a sense and to be vulgar, screw the guy who was, ahem, screwing his wife. HOW CAN ANYONE MISS THAT?! As I said in my own review (to be self-indulgent): "The critical decision he makes in the end may very well seem predictable but stop and think about it for just a moment. Did he actually make it for the right reason?" To simply write off this subplot because you can "see it coming" is that lazy sort of criticism I despise.

And that brings us to "the movie’s irritating habit of introducing characters by showcasing their worst qualities...only to turn around and say, no, you’ve judged them too hastily, they’re actually good, rock-solid, sensitive people, after which the movie never returns to or acknowledges their problematic sides again." We will address the two characters he cites as examples in order.

"The teenage girl is an angry brat." This would be Alex (Shailene Woodley), the 17 year old daughter of our main character Matt King (George Clooney). And yes, that first time we meet her she comes across as a brat, defying authority, drinking, talking back to her dad. And yes, as the film progresses this introduction will prove to be less than entirely accurate. But, is she actually a good, rock-solid, sensitive person? Does the movie never return to or acknowledges her problematic side again? Consider, for example, just who it is that pushes her father to track down and, in turn, spy - yes, spy - on the man with whom his wife was cheating. Consider just who it is that pushes her father to go up to this house of the man on whom he's been spying and knock on the door to confront him and who then assists in getting that man's wife out of the way so her father can continue with the confrontation. Alex! That's who! Is that "rock-solid"? Is that not acknowledging her "problematic side again"? That is beyond question one of my favorite bits in any movie in 2011. Father & Daughter teaming up and sleuthing around and, for a moment, the father regressing to the level of an immature teenager, failing to note the consequences of his actions for anyone else involved in this - to quote Juno Macguff's stepmom - "garbage dump of a situation." It's GLORIOUS! It's the DEFINITION of "complicated"!!! Dammit, we should be so lucky to have this sort of easy-going complexity in filmmaking ALL THE TIME!!! I'M GETTING A MIGRAINE!!!!!!

......getting it together......

This brings us to the "insensitive dolt", Syd (Nick Krause) who is Alex's kinda, sorta boyfriend and who shows up often and tags along for various excursions because Alex makes it clear she will be easier to deal with if he's around. And for the majority - I repeat, majority - of his screen time he is portrayed as insensitive and a dolt. Or, to say it another way, he is introduced by showcasing his worst quality primarily because his worst quality is his FOREMOST quality. He is an insensitive dolt, until the wonderful sequence when Matt and Sid find themselves having a late night chat. I self-indulgently quote myself again (underline added): "Then Matt asks him about his family and Sid offers a fairly harsh revelation – without ever ceasing to be the character he’s been the whole way – and hits Matt and us hard."

Matt poses a question and without even thinking about Sid supplies an answer, he simply says exactly what comes out of his mouth first, which is exactly how he's acted the whole movie, except in this moment he miraculously steps up to the plate......kind of a dolt savant, if you will. And the admission he makes to Matt is what explains his problematic side that Harris claims was merely an invention of the writers.

If there is one thing that annoys me above everything else about awards season it is unquestionably backlash. And the backlash against "The Descendants" as it dukes it out for a possible Best Picture win is pissing.me.off. So hey, Mark Harris, go lash your back somewhere else. Thank you.

Submarine

2012-01-26T08:30:00.001-06:00

15 year old Oliver Tate (Craig Roberts) is explaining via voiceover how a school classmate earned his street cred when two girls literally stabbed him in the back with compasses and he refused to react even as blood spots appeared all over his fine white shirt. Of this act Oliver says: "His stoicism reminded me of the brave men who died in the First World War." It's not just that this line is so funny I had to momentarily pause the DVD to necessarily extricate all my chuckles, it's that it summarizes in full the remarkable tone director Richard Ayoade manages to set up and then hold throughout.

In recent years high school films have all sort of adopted that ironic "Juno" posing (though, to be clear, I did and still do like "Juno"), and while one might look at "Submarine" and be quick to heave ready-made labels at it such as quirky and/or Welsh West Anderson, these miss the mark. Students of Oliver's sort at that particular age are, above all else, what? What's a term that springs to mind? How about say, self-serious? Listen to the score of the film as composed by Alex Turner and Andrew Hewitt, a kind of orchestral lament, the kind of thing you might hear in, oh, I don't know, a WWI film. It takes itself seriously, much like Oliver takes himself seriously, much like the film takes itself very seriously, and which is what routinely makes it funny. The title is not lost on me. What is high school but becoming submersed in cliques and not re-surfacing for another four years?

His forehead hidden behind a tousle of black hair that suggests the eleventh or twelfth Beatle, Oliver is the sort who carries a briefcase to school and spies on his parents (Noah Taylor & Sally Hawkins), tabulating notes on their non-existent sex life. He wants to be a cool kid at his school and he wants to be a cool kid at school primarily so he can woo Jordana (Yasmin Page), resembling Zooey Deschanel if she played bass for The Pixies instead of fronting She & Him, who is, as they say, out of his league. He earns his stripes by aiding her and another mischievous classmate in bullying the equally uncool Zoe. And although he apologizes (sort of) to Zoe while the others run away, it is rather unmistakable that the film has chosen to align us with a character who bullies and then, apart from a passing mention or two of his victim, moves on. Risky. Not that he won't be met with his own string of come-uppances.

He and Jordana, miraculously, become an item. He forges ahead with no real idea of what he's doing, inviting her over to have sex and then cooking a sit-down dinner complete with boxed wine, alternately intriguing and repulsing her. The film, in fact, takes great care in painting Oliver as a true chip of the old man's shoulder, his nervously indifferent chatter and social obliviousness causing the slow-burn demolition of the relationship just like they led to the precipice of the downfall of his parents' union.

And because Oliver worries his parents are headed for divorce when an asinine ex-flame (Paddy Considine) re-enters his mom's life with potential intentions of wooing her, and because his dad essentially stands by and does nothing, Oliver decides to man up and take matters into his own hands.

The voiceover and the tone are meant to resemble a 15 year old telling his (so far) life's story as if it were a humongous piece of dramatic literature, occasionally even working in his own cinematic fantasies of how he sees things playing out. Of course, in the end he's forced to face up to the fact things in the real world don't always have those tidy dramatic resolutions, a fact which can be scary.

But also liberating.

The Help

2012-01-25T08:30:00.001-06:00

I have one of those "Courage" posters that features an image from Birmingham, Alabama in 1963 with three black people pressed up against a brick wall because a fire hose has been turned on them. I have this poster rolled up and tucked away. I don't really ever want to look at it because the level of human idiocy that forced these three people (and countless others) into this kind of situation is not only unsettling but entirely incomprehensible. How could anyone possessing even a shred of sanity possibly treat the three people in that photo that way? That image, to quote Chris Rock, is "real racism." I mention this because this particular topic is not just so hot-blooded but so deep and terrible that trying to do justice to the plights of those who experienced it is not just delicate but extraordinarily difficult. It demands a screenplay as rooted in conviction as the heroes of "The Help." Unfortunately "The Help's" screenplay can't live up to the precedent set by its own heroes.

This film is based on Kathryn Stockett's novel and directed by Tate Taylor and set in 1960's Mississippi and tells the story of the black maids hired to do the cooking and cleaning and shopping and, in some cases, the actual raising of the children of the uppity white folk. Specifically it tells this story from the point of view of Abileen (Viola Davis), employed by Elizabeth Leefolt (Ahna O'Reilly), and Minny (Octavia Spencer), employed by Hilly Holbrook (Bryce Dallas Howard), only to find herself fired on account of some serious sass which leads to a job with Celia (Jessica Chastain), the one woman purposely ignored by the snooty white lady circle of Jackson Mississippi, probably because her good heart is shrouded by the fact she's a minor headcase.

Ah, but of course the film can't simply tell its story from the point of two black maids. Heavens, no! With whom could white America "identify"?! Enter: Eugenia "Skeeter" Phelan (Emma Stone), an idealistic recent graduate of Ole Miss who yearns to be a ground-breaking journalist but takes a job at the local paper ghost-writing "Miss Myrtle" columns as a starting point. As it happens, Skeeter herself was basically raised by a black maid, Constantine, who upon returning from school she learns her sickly mother (Allison Janney) has fired. This gives Skeeter the idea of writing a book told from the perspective of the maids who make so many southern homes run but are forced to sit at the back of the bus and use separate restrooms nonetheless. She gets Abileen onboard. Eventually Minny will come aboard too. They know the risks they run and those are considerable. They forge ahead anyway.

I have not read the book and thus, obviously, have no idea how it reads or what the intentions were of its author, but if this story as brought to the screen is meant to be a look into an emotionally charged and painful part of America's past it's entirely too soft. It's like taking a slap to the face from a tuxedo glove. It doesn't want to make anyone too sad because if it's too sad then the person watching (or reading) might not recommend it to their friends. It's also possible that Stockett's goal was simply to craft her own Dixie-set "Da Vinci Code" - you know, use a fairly thorny issue to mask nothing more than a heaping, steaming slice of melodrama. That would account for the film's lack of any real complexity. I have no qualms whatsoever with an author or screenwriter or director wanting to make a melodrama for entertainment's sake. I love melodramas. God bless them, every one. The problem: Stockett's story hinges on telling the perspective of two black maids knee deep in Jim Crow. "The Help", however, wants to have its shit pie (somewhere Mookie and his garbage can are emitting long, loud, sad sighs) and eat it too and, in turn, displays the sort of cowardice akin to the monstrous Bryce Dallas Howard character.

At least Viola Davis nuts up. Fear and resignation dot her face at every turn but she also sells us on her defiance in her willingness to go on the record with Skeeter without requesting sainthood. There is a fantastic sequence late where the intention is to display her as a real American hero and she chooses brilliantly to play against the moment - embarrassed by the adulation she tries to wave it off. The problem is she seems to have wandered in from a different, tougher-minded movie, a movie where there no easy answers, a movie where a great deal of her incredible strife must have remained.

At the end in voiceover she says "No one ever asked what it felt like to be me." The answer is apparently on the pages of this book that Skeeter writes. The pity is we hardly get to hear any of it.

Oscar Nomination Q & A

2012-01-24T10:01:00.000-06:00

Rooney got nominated. Shailene didn't. Oldman did. So confusing. You can read my traditional Oscar Nomination Q & A session over on Anomalous Material this year.

You're still Best Supporting Actress on this blog!

Underworld Awakening (3D)

2012-01-23T08:30:00.010-06:00

Kate Beckinsale (Selene) has just jumped from a high up window ledge, crash landed on a semi truck and then had the semi truck driver stop short so she is thrown to the cement. This begs the question: why does she need the semi truck to cushion the leap when later in the film we see her leaping from higher places and landing cleanly on her impeccable high-heel lookalicious boots? I don't know, reader, and I don't care, and neither should you because, for the love of God, she's playing a vampiric "death dealer". Anyway, where was I? Right. Thrown to the cement. So the semi truck driver gets out because he's employed by the film's endless supply of bad guys and blasts a bullet straight into Kate's forehead. But Kate, non-plussed, stands, grabs the semi truck driver and bites into his neck, drinking his blood, while the aforementioned bullet simultaneously drops right outta her forehead and the wound closes up.

For the next five or so minutes I tuned out the film's various swirling plot points and incessant machine gun fire to wonder if I was placed in a situation as the last human on earth and Kate Beckinsale was the vampire tasked with switching me over to their side, if I would cave into her requests simply so my last few seconds as a human would double as seconds spent having Kate Beckinsale bite my neck and drink my blood. Sigh.

I digress.

The government, you see, has learned about the existence of vampires and Lycans - who, to clarify, are like much more CGI-enhanced werewolves and have long held a grudge against the vampires - and after rounding up Kate Beckinsale during "the purge" she has broken out, as she must, from her cryogenic chamber allowing for the obligatory shot of a clothes-less Kate Beckinsale in which specific body parts which shall go nameless are cleverly shrouded "Austin Powers"-like by steam that emanates from the film's special effects department lingering just off camera. She quickly slides herself back into her standard form-enhancing spandex, re-acquires her precious guns and for reasons I'm fairly certain I missed when I briefly nodded off (no, really), she strikes out to rescue and keep safe Eve (India Eisley), a "hybrid" vampire/Lycan, recalling a sci-fi "Exorcist" Linda Blair, and......wait for it......Kate Beckinsale's daughter. Gasp!

But the Lycans want Eve for themselves so they can......uh.......kill her? No. Not kill her. Perform scientific experiments on her, I think. She was strapped down to a "Franksenstein"-esque table at one point so I'm assuming it was a scientific experiment to harness her plethora of powers. I'd consult my notes taken during the film but there aren't many aside from "LOVE the shot where Kate Beckinsale's Bahamian blue right eye peeks out between two of her dangling, hella regal bangs." There was more after that but it wound up smudged out on account of my drool.

Where was I? I don't remember. Damn it, why did I pay $12.50 to see this movie? That's right! $12.50! Do you know why?! Because it's in 3D! And this use of 3D in this movie is so absurdly pointless if James Cameron had attended my sparsely populated screening he would have hurled profanities at the screen while using his own bare hands to tear that same screen down before going and de-friending co-directors Måns Mårlind and Björn Stein on Facebook. This movie did not need 3D. It's not visually inventive in any capacity. It's just dark. Like, really, really dark. I suppose darkness is necessary when taking into consideration its main character is a vampire but, heck, even the police precinct of the detective (played by some guy who appears to have been hired after the real Chiwetel Ejiofor read the script and said, "Hell no, I won't play that part!") is shrouded in an ultra-plush darkness that makes it look more like a club on Rush Street in Chicago. This ceaseless darkness is helpful because it covers up the lameness of just about everything going on.

Except, of course, for the strutting and ass-kicking of Kate Beckinsale, when we're allowed to see it. There is one magnificent moment when Kate is hollering at someone about this Lycan that's bigger than any Lycan ever, or something, and she steps forward into the synthetic light and although Handel's "Hallelujah" doesn't play it should and then Kate goes over to this fellow vampire who's dead and cuts open his chest and reaches inside him and literally re-starts his heart and brings him back to life and then we cut to an exterior shot of Kate throwing on her chic trench coat as she strides in slow motion in front of a rollicking waterfall. The meaning is implicit. Even if Brad Pitt plays Dracula, no other vampire will have ever have this much style.

For Your (Razzie) Consideration: Jordana Spiro, "Trespass"

2012-01-22T10:00:00.002-06:00

Tomorrow the Razzies, recognizing the worst in cinema, announce their 2011 nominations. Buzz for Worst Supporting Actress includes, amongst others, Katie Holmes for "Jack and Jill" (oh Katie - what has L. Ron Hubbard done to my poor Katie?) and Rosie Huntington Whiteley for "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen."

I haven't seen those performances, and while there isn't a doubt in my mind that they're wretched, Razzie Nominating Committee, I ask you, are they merely "boringly wretched"? Or, are they SPECTACULARLY wretched?

Jordana Spiro in "Trespass" is SPECTACULARLY wretched.

This was quite literally the only photo of Ms. Spiro from "Trespass" I could find online, so you'll have to make do. But notice the unhinged facial expression. Screenshot don't lie.

Imagine Samuel L. Jackson in "Jungle Fever" recast as Bonnie Parker as re-imagined by Phoebe Buffay if Phoebe Buffay doubled as a stripper. That's Jordana Spiro in "Trespass." She's a splendifirous wackadoo that's part of a motley crew determined to rob Nicolas Cage & Nicole Kidman. And while the writing is crazy-pants bad and the direction is, well, the direction of Joel Schumacher, it is Spiro who shapes the character of Petal (yes, Petal) into a scene-stealer in the all the ways acting coaches encourage you NOT to steal scenes.

The Razzies are the anti-Oscars, are they not? So don't be like the Oscars. Don't be all predictable. Think outside the box. Jordana. Spiro. "Tresspass." Worst. Supporting. Actress. See it and, trust me, you will believe it.

Someone Else Stands Up For Elizabethtown

2012-01-21T09:00:00.000-06:00

As is well known, Cinema Romantico is an ardent, unwavering supporter of Cameron Crowe's much maligned 2005 flick "Elizabethtown." Which is why any time any of my esteemed colleagues stand up and defend it I become most decidedly giddy.

Kristin of All Eyes On Screen is the latest to stand up and defend my current favorite movie 'ever'. She writes, amongst many other things, "(F)or me, 'Elizabethtown' is one of those movies I will watch again and again, because the movie captures little moments in life that I’ve experienced, and it’s a great reminder about what’s important in life–not success, but time spent with the people who matter." Do read the whole piece at once. She even tweeted Cameron Crowe about her love of the film and got a tweet back from the Man himself. That's fairly awesome.

Long live Drew Baylor! Long live Claire Colburn! Long live "Elizabethtown"! In fact, I haven't watched it in a few months.....

The Underworld Awakening Experiment

2012-01-20T08:30:00.001-06:00

I won't lie. I've written what amount to mash notes to Kate Beckinsale on this site before, so much so that I'm still a little surprised her agent hasn't filed a restraining order. That said, I've never gone quite as far as I plan to go this weekend, which is to say I will go against my usual moviegoing taste and venture to the theater for a showing of "Underworld Awakening" specifically to write a review from the viewpoint of a critic who openly admits to having an enormous crush on Kate Beckinsale and wants to see her in 3D.

Wish me luck. And check back on Monday for the most ridiculous review of this movie anywhere on the interwebs, guaranteed!!!

Further Definitive Proof of the Movie Gods

2012-01-19T08:30:00.002-06:00

I have written before of my immense love for the opening expansive tracking shot committed to film by Paul Thomas Anderson at the open of his 1997 classic "Boogie Nights." In fact, I like it so much I discussed it in my 1,000th post. A shot that is not merely a technical marvel, two minutes plus moving down a street and around and into a club and across the dance floor, etc., but a thematic marvel in the way it introduces this dysfunctional but loving porn-movie making family and eventually, at the very end, finding the brand new member of the gang.

I was 20 years old at the time. I'd always loved movies but I was really only in the infant stages of understanding how movies worked and understanding what I wanted from movies and how I related to movies. And this shot, to quote Berlin, took my breath away. It still does. It always will. It's why the day after the movie I bought the "Boogie Nights" soundtrack so I could listen to the song that underscores the whole shot, "Best Of My Love" by The Emotions, and imagine the camera swooping to and fro over and over and over in my mind. To this day whenever I hear that song it conjures up the shot and that movie going experience in my mind.

There has been this what-have-ya going around on the social networking device known as the Facebook where you can learn what song was #1 in the country on the date of your birth. And after a bit of time I decided to check it out and when I did I had to take a step back and compose myself. Do you know what song was #1 in the country on the date of my birth?

"Best Of My Love" by The Emotions.

Feel free to draw your own conclusions.

New Girl: Story of the 50

2012-01-18T08:30:00.003-06:00

So our girl Jess, played by the mercurical Zooey Deschanel, has decided to put together a birthday party for her cool-guy (i.e. douchebag) roommate Schmidt and she's going through the whole what-have-you and winds up in another teacher's room at her school (she's a teacher, remember, even though we rarely see her teaching) and the teacher (Rachael Harris) enters and rather than question why Jess is snooping around in "the confiscation drawer" in her room immediately wonders if she can assist Jess in finding anything necessary, going so far as to suggest a "locker search" to acquire potential drugs.

The look on Jess's face made me wonder - is it always like this at her school? Had she just never noticed? Or does she notice all the time and ignore it? Or try to fight back against it in her own mercurial way? There seemed to be a bit of potential there - a high school where locker room searches so teachers can get the good stuff are the norm and, in turn, are cleaned up through the effervescent hijinks of its mercurial teacher. It could be a little off the wall, a little unpredictable, "Lean on Me" with a hipster. (And M. Ward could guest star as a janitor!)

Instead we quickly left the school and moved on to a party bus and a stripper who turned out to be (twist!) a male stripper and "bro juice" and Schmidt almost kissing Jess and........I'm melting.

I'm melting.

I'm melting.

Crazy, Stupid, Love

2012-01-17T09:00:00.001-06:00

Cal (Steve Carell) and Emily (Julianne Moore), husband and wife, though currently separated, sit in the hallway, a little ways apart, of their son's school, waiting their turn for a parent/teacher conference. They fall into a conversation that is at first slightly uneasy but slowly transitions into something more real, more heartfelt. But then the teacher appears. It is Miss Tafferty (Marisa Tomei) and we and Cal quickly realize she doubles as the woman with whom he engaged in a one night stand several scenes back and purposely neglected to call. Miss Tafferty drags them in for the parent/teacher conference anyway and casts aside discussing their son to explicitly discuss Cal and the infinite idiocy of men in general. This inevitably leads to the truth emerging and Emily barging out and Cal chasing her down and the two of them having a sincere argument, an argument that just so happens to take place in front of all the teachers and all the parents just as it's about to - you guessed it - pour rain.

"Crazy, Stupid, Love" has a mind to be taken seriously, as the first portion of that sequence shows, except it often becomes dependent on typical romantic comedy crutches, as the second portion of that sequence shows, and winds up staring itself down, wanting to be taken seriously in the context of an uproarious comedy, as the third portion of that sequence shows. Naturally this makes for an uneven, though often entertaining movie, that comments on and embraces and (all too) occasionally discards the mechanics of the kind of movie it fully knows it is. More than anything, though, it's saved by two standout performances.

After Emily asks for a divorce from her high school sweetheart in the face of cheating with a leech (Kevin Bacon) from her office, Cal retreats to a posh bar/club where David Beckham-lite Jacob Palmer (Ryan Gosling) who apparently, improbably averages taking home about 3 women per night (not sure how that works) overhears this soon-to-be-divorcée whining to anyone within earshot of his plight. Thus, Jacob decides to take Cal under his wing, upgrade his wardrobe and teach him the finer points of "the game". In a way, Cal is kind of like what might have happened to Carell's "40 Year Old Virgin" if he'd wound up separated from Catherine Keener and having to start all over again.

Meanwhile Jacob has his own romantic entanglement to pursue in the form of Hannah (Emma Stone), a tough-as-nails about-to-be lawyer who has no interest in Jacob or "the game", until her requisite Boyfriend She Would Never Date If This Was Real Life (Josh Groban) fails to propose at which point she seeks out Jacob which leads to a more genuine courtship than she ever expected.

The third bit of business in this nearly 2 hour film is Cal and Emily's 13 year old son Robbie (Jonah Bobo) being lovesick for his 17 year old babysitter (Analeigh Tipton) who, as it turns out, is lovesick for the much, much older Cal. Complications and hijinks ensue.

All parties involved do good enough work, though the screenplay by Dan Fogelman definitely focuses more on the male aspects than the female aspects, a fault of scads of screenplays, but Gosling stands out in the predictable role of The Douche With The Heart Of Gold. Look, from the second he sits down in his brilliantly cut Italian (I'm assuming) suit and councils Cal about nutting up and shutting up - "Are you in or are you out?" - everyone knows the script will get flipped and his stylin' Jacob will be revealed as decent and desperate to change up his There's Always More Fish In The Sea outlook on life. Gosling, though, cleverly keeps the core of the character the same throughout and just adjusts his demeanor a few degrees here and there in accordance with his maturation. Arcs of these sorts in these sorts of movies are too often all at once and unbelievable but with such nuance it's virtually undetectable, Gosling creates the least broad character despite playing the most broad role. Skillz, baby.

And that brings us to the ever-magnificent Marisa Tomei in a small part as a delightfully unhinged teacher who in but a few brief scenes suggests a life always in danger of careening off the rails that nevertheless still somehow manages to stay on that track. Miss Tafferty is in serious need of her own spinoff with a tougher script and, believe me, Marisa would leave Cameron and her wannabe "Bad Teacher" sinking pathetically in quicksand. Alas, 'tis but a dream.

The conclusion works in not only one Big Speech but two Big Speeches, overlapping one another (and suggesting that psychologically Cal may be more than a little selfish in the way he usurps his son's moment), and so "Crazy, Stupid, Love" settles, as it must, for a belief in eternal love and soulmates. Unless, of course, you're poor Miss Tafferty. But then never mind her. She's merely rom com collateral damage.

Warrior

2012-01-16T09:00:00.002-06:00

Set in the uncompromising world of MMA (Mixed Martial Arts), writer/director Gavin O'Connor's "Warrior" is pitched somewhere between "Rocky" and "The Wrestler", though for me it conjured up memories of 1975's "The Great Waldo Pepper", a film starring the young Robert Redford as a barnstorming pilot who at the end finds himself filming a flying stunt sequence with a German WWI ace that, improbably, gloriously, turns real, two men giving themselves up entirely one final time. "Warrior" skillfully builds to a conclusion that's very much in the same vein and that on paper would sound utterly ridiculous, which is to say imagine if Redford and the German ace had been.........brothers.

Older Brother is Brendan (Joel Edgerton), an ex MMA fighter who has since settled down into the straight life with a wife (Jennifer Morrison) and two daughters and a job as a high school physics teacher. But his bliss is tested when foreclosure on his home is threatened, re-sending him into the most outer limits of MMA to make a few quick bucks which leads to attaining a black eye which leads to him getting suspended (understandably) from his job which leads to him seeking out his old trainer to get back in the ring.

Younger Brother is Tommy (Tom Hardy), a former MMA prodigy who joined the marines and turned heroic before, in turn, going AWOL for reasons this review will not reveal. He turns back up on the doorstep of his father (Nick Nolte), formerly a broken down, vicious alchohlic but now more put together and 1,000 days sober, not saying much of anything beyond expressing his desire for his dad to aid him in getting ready to enter "the Super Bowl" of MMA tournaments, "subtly" named Sparta, set on the shores of Atlantic City where, of course, famously "everything dies, baby, that's a fact, but maybe everything that dies someday comes back." Which is to say that, yes, "Warrior" also unmistakably evokes the essence of a Springsteen song. ("Atlantic City" crossed with "The Hitter.")

Springsteen tells familiar stories but makes them matter. "Warrior" tells a familiar story but makes it matter, more than I would have suspected possible. If you think for even a moment that despite the presence of "the mighty, mythical Russian" (the movie's words, not mine) and a single, fast-moving montage that summarizes all the training our main characters need to face the best MMA fighters in the world that the two brothers won't meet for the championship of Sparta then you obviously haven't seen "Best of the Best." So what is then that makes "Warrior" matter? Above all, it's the unmistakable urgency of the performances. Despite being Australian and English, respectively, Edgerton and Hardy genuinely convey two men whose rough upbringing colored them as the mistrustful men they are today. Forgiveness of their father for his insinuated flurry of sins might be stated once or twice but is not really implied, never more so than in a MAGNIFICENT sequence set around a slot machine where Hardy's lips literally seem to be dripping with bitter menace. Nolte, meanwhile, who late in his career has often seemed disinteresed in so much as making his line-readings even halfway intelligible against all odds somehow becomes even more hoarse, heartbroken that his sons won't show him mercy but understanding that nothing he does now can offset what he didn't do in their youth. And that might be the film's final assets, the portrait of this significantly strained relationship between sons and father and the unconventional refusal to have it all neatly resolved.

Of course, by making them brothers you're not just enhancing drama, you're also sacrificing suspense, and much of the Sparta Tournament is going-through-the-motions because it's all so terribly foregone. Yet, to its credit, once it gets to that inevitable tete-a-tete it isn't cheap because a rather skillful job was done in getting us to care for both parties. (Although in my opinion the war hero bit with Tommy pours it on too thick when considering how gritty and realistic the rest of the movie is and yearns to be.) The ending works. Damn it all to hell, it really works. Two people related by blood who are nonetheless distant and unknown to one another enter a ring to engage in some mixed marital arts and exit the ring as......well, you know.

Apparently Not Everyone Thinks Kate Is Great

2012-01-14T09:03:00.000-06:00

The following is an approximate transcript of a conversation I had with a co-worker yesterday in our office's kitchen.

Him: "What are you doing this weekend? Seeing any new movies?"
Me: "'Carnage!' I'm seeing 'Carnage!'"
Him: "What's that?"
Me: "It's the new Kate Winslet movie!"
(Co-Worker rolls his eyes.)
Me: "Oh, come on! She's the-"
Him: "The greatest actress in the world. You've told me before. I know."

Some things are non-negotiable. Like the earth being round, or Kate Winslet being The Greatest Actress In The World.

Me: "Well, she is."
Him: "Yeah, I still don't get it. Her career really isn't all that special."
Me: "Isn't all that...have you SEEN any of her movies?"
Him: "What all has she done?"
Me: "I know you don't like 'Titanic' so we'll skip over that one. 'Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind?'"
Him: "She was okay."
Me: "Okay?!" (Regaining composure.) "'The Reader?'"
Him: "Nope. Didn't see it."
Me: "Heavenly Creatures?'"
Him: "Never heard of it."
Me: "'Little Children?'"
Him: "What's that?"
Me: "No one's seen 'Hideous Kinky' so never mind but......'Sense and Sensibility?'"
Him: "Nope."
Me: "She was Ophelia in 'Hamlet.'"
Him: "Mel Gibson's version?"
Me: "No, the Branagh version of the whole text."
Him: "Then I haven't seen it."
Me: "'Finding Neverland?' You must have at least seen 'Finding Neverland?'"
Him: "Nope."
Me: "Have you maybe seen parts of 'The Holiday' on TBS?"
Him: "Is that the one with Jack Black?"
Me: "Yeah, but-"
Him: "Ugh. No way."
Me: "But SHE'S fantastic in it. I'm telling you."
Him: "Sure she is."

How can you dismiss the entire career of an actress - especially The Greatest Actress In The World - when YOU'VE ONLY SEEN TWO OF HER MOVIES?????????

Friday's Old Fashioned (Will Return)

2012-01-13T09:00:00.002-06:00

You may have noticed the lack of the Cinema Romantico staple in which every Friday we review a classic film. Or you very well may not have noticed it. A couple of my friends have admitted to my face they don't read those posts since they are often films with which they are completely unfamiliar and likely have no intention of ever seeing. And that's perfectly fine. Honest, it is. Either way, I kind of write those Friday-only posts for myself as much as my readers as a way to get myself to watch more classic film, something I wasn't doing near enough of in the last couple years.

But I got quite tangled up with the ceaseless spate of new movies at the theater and 2011 releases I still needed to see on DVD (and still need to see) and with holiday obligations and currently I'm in the midst of a very expansive project that is very, very close to my heart (and which will be up over on Anomalous Material soon).

All of this is just to say that yes, Friday's Old Fashioned will return. Eventually. So stop acting like your Fridays are meaningless without it!

A Whole New Mann-Land

2012-01-12T08:30:00.002-06:00

Wait, wait, wait. Why didn't anyone TELL me Michael Mann's daughter was directing movies?! Seriously! You don't think that's information I'd like to know?!

Make sure to check back on January 31 (or thereabouts, upon its arrival from my Netflix queue) for my review of Ami Canaan Mann's "Texas Killing Fields."

Viva Riva!

2012-01-10T08:34:00.002-06:00

"It takes money to make money." - Mark Wahlberg, Contraband

"Money is like poison. In the end, it always kills you." - Mani Malone, Viva Riva!

I don't think it's mere coincidence I saw the African crime thriller "Viva Riva!", written and directed by Djo Munga, the night before the American crime thriller "Contraband" was released into theaters. The latter's trailer comes across like so many films before it, an ex-con who's gone straight unwillingly pulled back into the game to save a loved one. It is done this way, of course, to ensure audiences have a rooting interest and so that when the rooting interest inevitably emerges victorious audiences can go home happy and not feel as if they were spending their two hours in the company of bad people. The former is the exact opposite. Don't let that title fool you. It is a movie about a large number of bad people doing bad things to one another in the name of some very bad reasons. Even the eventual "man of God" who shows ain't all on the up and up.

The Riva of the title, played fairly charismatically by Patasha Bay, is your typical wheeler, dealer, schemer, though not so much a dreamer, returning from Angola home to Kinshasa of the Democratic Republic of Congo with a whole big bunch of gasoline. See, gas is scarce in Kinashasa, sort of turning it into an African "Mad Max", and Riva and his pals plan to sell it off to desperate bidders for a high cost. Ah, except Riva's old boss from Angola, Cesar (Hoji Fortuna), is hot on his tail and enlists the unwilling aid of an army commander (Marlene Longange) by taking her sister hostage. Riva, though, seems less concerned about the possibility of - to quote 2Pac - "death around the corner" than with finding a way to make Nora, the girl of a local crime boss (Diplome Amekindra), fall in love with him. This is probably the film's sweetest aspect and yet even it is coated in the stench of deceit. Every time Riva makes a move Nora threatens to have her "man" who she clearly doesn't even like rough the persistent Riva up. And when Riva finally appears to have won her over via a bit of dashing cunning she cons him for damn near all his cash. Even if she seems to regret doing so, well, she still CONS HIM FOR DAMN NEAR ALL HIS CASH.

Everyone here seems well aware that it takes money to make more money but they also seem well aware that the more money they make the more likely they are to end up bloody and beaten on the floor or burned alive. The lives of leisure they lead when not trying to make money seem not born of enjoyment but as a respite. They didn't die today so tonight they live it up because tomorrow......who knows? The stakes consistently feel real and the film maintains a gritty, forceful feel without ever really resorting to your standard shaky cam sorta cinematography, eliciting its mood through rough and tumble locations and some seriously wicked comedy.

While there is significant violence throughout there isn't much gunplay until the concluding setpiece that brings most everyone together. In a way this sequence seems predictable - like something out of the worn pages of the Q.T. playbook - but it's actually a lot tougher than it appears, not letting any single character off the hook. And the closing shot is a bag of bricks dropped from a roof that clean knocks you out. For 90 minutes you assume you're watching a bit of genre madness - albeit a minorly brilliant bit of genre madness - and then suddenly everything flips which is so spot-on because all these people swirling around and grabbing for cash fail to realize the trickle-down effect of their actions.

In the end, it's the children that get screwed and the circle of unpleasant life continues.

30 Minutes Or Less (In 30 Words Or Less)

2012-01-09T09:07:00.000-06:00

Pizza delivery driver. Strapped to bomb. Forced to rob bank. Hijinks ensue.

Eisenberg = Eisenberg.

Aziz = Tom Haverford with less pseudo-style.

Worse than Tombstone, better than Totino’s.

The 7th Annual Prigges: Top 10 Movies Of 2011

2012-01-08T12:00:00.003-06:00

I, of course, posted my official Top 10 lists on Anomalous Material this year but would be remiss if I didn't keep the spirit of the so-called Prigges alive and well on Cinema Romantico. Thus, my Top 10 Films Of 2011 are presented here via entirely via image.

10.

Cinema Romantico's Five Most Anticipated Movies For 2012

2012-01-06T08:30:00.017-06:00

A new movie season is upon us! Well, sort of. It's January, after all, the time when studios throw their table scraps to audiences and Oscar bait that only New York & L.A. got in December finally makes its way inland. But after that it's a new movie season!

Most looking-ahead lists will contain your usual suspects, your "Dark Knight Rises", your "Avengers", your "Prometheus", your "Django Unchained", your "Battleship" (I just threw up in my mouth a little), but we here at Cinema Romantico want to turn your potential attention to a few other upcoming 2012 films that have our mouths watering.

1. Butter (March 16). Unless you have ever left the Iowa State Fair after an REO Speedwagon/Styx show (yes, REO Speedwagon AND Styx) drunkenly shouting about how you and your friends need to go ogle the Butter Cow (yes, the Butter Cow) you might not get the appeal of Jennifer Garner as a small town Iowa gal who becomes a champion butter carver. Well actually, even if you have done all those things you still might not get the appeal of Jennifer Garner as a small town Iowa gal who becomes a champion butter carver. But it also stars Alicia Silverstone! And it's set in Iowa! Granted, it was filmed in Louisiana but then as any Iowan will tell you if there's one state in the union that looks exactly like Iowa it's The Bayou State.

Wait, what?

2. Titanic 3D (April 6). It seems like only yesterday I returned home from the University of Iowa for winter break and plunked down a whole $4.25 to see this at the theater......sweet Jesus, I'm old. I'm getting amped-up for a 15 year re-release of a movie I saw in the freaking theater! (Breaks down sobbing at whimsical memories of youth.) But seriously, as I've ranted before, it's not the 3D, it's the mere fact I can see this melodramatic event I hold so near to my heart again on the big screen where it belongs. In fact, I'm making this my first IMAX movie.

So are they, like, about to start singing, or what?

3. Damsels in Distress (April 6, NY & LA). Whit Stillman, the talkiest of the talky directors, makes a musical.

Juliet Hulme's much anticipated return to the big screen?

4. Movie 43 (April 13). A collection of short-comedy segments I want to see not simply because Kate Winslet FINALLY gets to do comedy (yes, I realize she was in "The Holiday" but nothing from the pen of Nancy "Dinner Theater For The Multiplex" Meyers can be counted as comedy) but because according to IMBD her character name is identical to the name of her character in her debut masterpiece "Heavenly Creatures." Seriously, people, I will eat a discarded Whopper out of a garbage dump just to see Kate's short.

5. The Wettest County (April 20). Perhaps it's merely because FX's "Justified" is the one dramatic TV show I follow and last season dealt a bit with moonshining down Kentucky way and "The Wettest County" also is set to deal with moonshining in Depression-era Virginia. Or perhaps it's because Nick Cave wrote the screenplay and it stars Gary Oldman and Tom Hardy and Jessica Chastain and Guy Pearce and Mia Wasikowska and......Shia LaBeouf? Those five outweigh the one. Right? Or maybe he'll be like like Steven Seagal in "Executive Decision" and just get offed in the first five minutes?

What are YOU looking forward to?

The Artist

2012-01-05T08:30:00.003-06:00

"The Artist", the (not totally) silent French film set in the late 20's, early 30's that Harvey Weinstein got a hold of in order to make his annual Oscar run, suggests something the film-worshiping Quentin Tarantino would have made if his influences were Chaplin & Keaton rather than Leone & Sonny Chiba. To not say it's completely aware it's a (not totally) silent black & white film made in a talking, colorized world would be wrong, but to say that its ultimate intentions are not warm and loving would be wronger than wrong.

It opens by presenting a film within a film where the character on the movie screen inside the movie screen is specifically declaring that he will never speak, he will never say a word, and thus the viewer would be forgiven for momentarily fearing that writer/director Michel Hazanavicius has crafted an artistic lecture on how modern moviegoing audiences don't truly appreciate the early days of the cinematic movement. (Hey! I just DVR'd "The Gold Rush"! Okay?! Back off!) But it quickly settles down. The Artist of the title is George Valentin (Jean Dujardin, procuring the most mileage from a movie smile since the days of Errol Flynn), a silent film star who is the toast of Tinseltown. He has a mansion and a wife (Penelope Ann Miller, who always kind of looked like a silent-era star) and a devoted dog who doubles as his co-star and not a care in the whole dang nabbed world! He falls, kind of, for the auspiciously named wannabe starlet Peppy Miller (Bérénice Bejo) whom he decides to favor her over his current leading lady (who, by the way, angrily gives the "finger" to Valentin a mere 15 years after Rose DeWitt Bukater gave the "finger" on the R.M.S. Titanic which is to say if "Titanic"-haters are gonna keep griping about Rose's "finger" then they've gotta gripe about this "finger" too).

Before long, however, Valentin morphs into a Roaring Twenties Jack Horner, clinging to the outdated silent movie tradition even as the talkie movement overtakes it. Eventually he (and his loyal dog) will be re-located from the top to the bottom while Peppy Miller becomes the new toast of Tinseltown, willing and able to show off her speaking voice.

This story is as old as, well, the silent era. Man Has Everything. Man Loses Everything. Will Man Regain Anything? And this seems to be the intent of Hazanavicius, to homage the silent era with the story that's straight out of it. Even so, there are moments when he steps outside of that homage, such as one particularly meta moment where the movie teeters on the brink of going all Charlie Kaufman before making a predictable about-face and opting for Bob Newhart waking up in bed next to Suzanne Pleshette instead.

Yet Hazanavicius never overstays his welcome in the land of self referential and never dwells in the darker turns of his tried and true story. Overall it's a small, sweet, simple movie made with a lot of love that returns us for a brief time to a cinematic era that I would argue was never really any better than the one here and now but is missed nonetheless and deserves to be remembered. And on that score, "The Artist" succeeds.

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo

2012-01-04T08:30:00.002-06:00

Mikael Blomkvist (Daniel Craig) has just had a bullet graze his forehead. He retreats back to his temporary home. He is bleeding fairly profusely. Our title character, Lisbeth Salander (Rooney Mara), knows how to handle this situation. She will stitch up the wound with a bit of dental floss. Mikael, as would likely be natural, vociferously objects. But Lisbeth doesn't have time for his whining objections. She knows what's best, she knows the best way to do it and whether he likes it or not that's how this is happening. And it does. She stitches him up matter-of-factly with dental floss. As this scene unfolded I thought of David Fincher, director of the film, the second (first American) adaptation of Stieg Larsson's mightily successful novels. Fincher never comes across as someone with time for people's whining objections. I recently read an interview where the subject of his massive number of takes for the infamous opening sequence of "The Social Network" was addressed and even if he had not openly stated he was "exhausted" with that question, and he did, you could have gleaned that exhaustion from the answer, and from the whole interview, really. I totally could see that version of Fincher irritatedly stitching up a bullet graze with dental floss. "I know what I'm doing. So shut up and let me do it." Which is to say, has he found his muse in Rooney Mara? Or, more to the point, has he found his muse in Lisbeth Salander? If so, could he just ditch the storylines of the books and go off and explore on his own with her?

This Lisbeth, this Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, from the moment she turns up in the film's first moments with a dramatic mohawk and loudly, graphically wipes her nose (Social graces? Eh, no) on the elevator, is a cinematic character quite unlike any other I can recall having encountered. She speaks in a frightful monotone and replies to every query so quickly it's as if she had already gleaned her answer before the person started asking. She is employed by a security company as a "researcher" which constitutes gathering information on persons who typically go to extravagant lengths to prevent revealing any information. And she's damn good, too. One scene that's essentially a throwaway involves her re-absconding her backpack after a thief absconds with it. It is quick, vicious, expert, and a little funny in the way she hustles back up at the end to catch the train. (A barbaric Sheena Easton?)

She is also a ward of the state and this is because, well, in her own word, she's "insane." Her legal guardian has suffered a stroke and so she goes to visit the lawyer that assumes his estate to explain her situation, what she does and why she needs money. In this first encounter something absolutely awful and graphic takes place but something far more suggesting takes place right before the more "sensational" subject matter. The lawyer gets up from his chair and comes around to the front of the desk, to within a few inches of Lisbeth, and she recoils and turns away (to the right - she's always turning to her right), uncomfortable. You can sense her reacting this way in any social situation with just about anyone. She prefers the company of her laptop, the occasional McDonald's Happy Meal and side trips to the techno club for a little, shall we say, R & R. Her backstory is virtually non-existent, a crucial bit revealed only extremely late in the proceedings, and this is right on because this Lisbeth would be closed off, she would not want me, you, anyone in the movie, anyone outside the movie, etc, to know anything private. She'll tell you when she's good and ready. She's a character defined through her actions, which are often so ruthless one could label them "exploitive." Or is she merely operating by a code that is as honorable as it is sadistic? Or has she simply gone beyond the realm of any so-called "code"? Rooney Mara never asks for empathy, doesn't want empathy, and would spit in your face if you offered it anyway since she knows (probably better than you do) that she doesn't deserve it. She wears a ripped up tee shirt, after all, that says "Fuck You You Fucking Fuck." That's her life code. This character has gone well past any kind of trite nonsense like empathy, people. Empathy is for J.Lo rom coms. You're in Lisbeth Land now, a land that's much more complex even though Lisbeth seems to treat much of it as being only black or white.

Astute readers - particularly fans of the "Girl With The Dragon Tattoo" books - may have noticed I have not to this point discussed the plot itself much at all. Yeah, there's a reason. The plot details Craig's Mikael, a just disgraced magazine journalist, being hired by retired CEO Henrik Vanger (Christopher Plummer) to look into a decades-old mystery involving the murder of his niece Harriet. It seems entirely possible that one of Henrik's many odd relatives, all of whom restrain from speaking to at least one other family member, may have been responsible. So Mikael takes the case which automatically leads to him pinning dozens and dozens of photos and old newspaper articles to the wall and looking at them thoughtfully and eventually turning to the woman who did research on him - Lisbeth Salander - for further assistance, and she cheerfully (in her own way) agrees when pitched the idea of going after a woman killer.

"The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo" then goes about pairing the lonesome tale of god-awful woe of Lisbeth with the long-gone tragic tale of Harriet. Whoops! My bad! That's what the movie seemed like it was going to do, and that had the potential to be fascinating. Instead it reverts to a by-the-numbers investigation with montages and people snooping around houses they aren't supposed to be in and a Talking Killer Scene (coinage: Roger Ebert) where the Talking Killer actually, honestly, literally says the line "We're not so different, you and I" (Come on, Steve Zaillan! You can't write a better line than that?!) and car chases and explosions and a third act "twist" (kind of) that probably was built to in the book (which I haven't read) but just sort of swoops in out of nowhere in this film.

As director, Fincher tries to gussy all this up with fierce editing that recalls his own "Zodiac" on amphetamines and perhaps re-imagined as a more pulpy piece. Craig does decent work, too, but throughout it all, even when she's off screen and you're hoping and praying she quickly returns to the screen, Rooney Mara stands above the rest.

I loved The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, not so much "The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo." Lisbeth Salander deserves so much better than re-heated murder mystery leftovers. If I had my druthers, Ms. Mara would win an Oscar. And if you don't agree with that sentiment then pardon me very much but fuck you fucking fuck.

Selecting A Republican Caucus Candidate Cinematically

2012-01-03T08:00:00.004-06:00

Today thousands of my Iowa homeys (Iowa, if you didn't know, is where I'm from) will sally forth to the so-called Caucuses (i.e. An Introvert's Nightmare) in an effort to springboard one of the conservative candidates toward the title of President Barack Obama's opponent in the forthcoming November elections. And as Cinema Romantico does for each and every Caucus we are here to tell you, dear Iowans, for whom to pledge your support based SOLELY on movies. I cannot stress that enough: this article is based SOLELY on the candidates' favorite movies. I am in no way whatsoever endorsing anyone politically. I am endorsing him/her cinematically. That's it. That's all. Nothing more. Is that understood? Are we clear? No one's going to leave a comment at the end if I pick a candidate whose politics they loathe when I just told you this article is based SOLELY on movies, right? You're not? Good. Let's pick the Republican front-runner cinematic style!

In late October the Washington Times asked each candidate (including Herman Cain, who has, of course, since dropped out in the face of incessant question-asking) to identity their favorite movie. These were the answers provided.

Newt Gingrich: "Casablanca."
Michele Bachmann: "Braveheart" or "Saving Private Ryan."
Rick Santorum: "Field of Dreams."
Ron Paul: No answer given. "I don't watch a lot of movies," he was quoted as saying.
Rick Perry: "Immortal Beloved."
Mitt Romney: "O Brother, Where Art Thou?"

Jon Huntsman was not involved in this article and our attempts to learn his favorite film via the interwebs proved fruitless. His Facebook page does not list a favorite film, merely listing his favorite music as "progressive rock." Thereby Cinema Romantico has deduced that Jon Huntsman's favorite film must be "Pink Floyd The Wall" which automatically eliminates him from contention in .0000003 seconds.

Obviously Ronnie P. gets the heave-ho for not only failing to answer the question but for failing to apparently have any interest in the cinema whatsoever. The next time one of those people with a Ron Paul sign approaches me at my "L" stop I'm telling him/her to tell Mr. Paul to take a film class at the local community college and then maybe I'll listen.

Never trust a candidate that says "Casablanca." It's not that "Casablanca" isn't a masterpiece, because, of course, it is. It's that any political candidate (yes, including our current Commander & Chief) who gives it as an answer is obviously attempting to kowtow to every single possible base. Cross Newt off the list. (Though doesn't Newt resemble an even more un-trustworthy Sydney Greenstreet?)

Am I the only one more than a little freaked out that Michele Bachmann is apparently a William Wallace fan? One strike and she's out.

"Field of Dreams" is awesome. My favorite baseball movie. Heck, I just got the DVD for Christmas! But if Santorum ain't just sayin' it's his "favorite" to court the vote, then Shoeless Joe Jackson didn't really bat left-handed. (Memo to Santorum: Kubrick's "Lolita" was set in New Hampshire. You know, just in case you want to switch things up for the primary.)

"O Brother, Where Art Thou?" Mitt, you rapscallion, I love it, love it, love it, except......wait a second......returning to my Cinematic Caucus Post of 4 years ago I see that......hold it......you said then your favorite movie was......"Raiders of the Lost Ark." Flip-flopper! Flip-flopper! Flip-flopper! Flip-flopper! Flip-flopper!

This brings us to Rick Perry, that Texas-styled maniac, and his apparent love of the Gary Oldman-starring Beethoven biopic "Immortal Beloved". That's what I'm talkin' about! What do you think, does Rick fancy himself a latter day Ludwig? The film takes its title from a love letter that Ludwig penned but did not send. To whom was it addressed, that's the question that has plagued scholars for years and that "Immortal Beloved" purports to answer. Of course, in truth the answer is likely unanswerable much like Mr. Perry himself was unable to answer just what federal agency he'd eliminate if elected (zing!!!!!) but what isn't unanswerable is this.....

Rick Perry receives Cinema Romantico's Caucus Endorsement!

(Unless, of course, it turns out Governor Perry was merely selecting something off the beaten path to woo the most critical Caucus endorsement this side of the Iowa Falls Times-Citizen.)

To New Beginnings

2012-01-01T11:29:00.000-06:00

Here's to hoping, all my fellow awesome bloggers, that 2012 finds you prosperous personally, professionally and, of course, cinematically.

2011 Ultimate Mix Tape

2011-12-30T09:00:00.004-06:00

Back in August I had a long (drunken) conversation on the phone with my best friend Jacob one Saturday evening (Sunday morning). This was less than 48 hours after I had gone ahead and already declared 2011 to be the greatest year for music ever. Jacob explained he had relayed this information to a friend earlier that night and his friend, suspiciously, wondered, "Really? 2011?" A fair question and one that I will address simply by explaining that in no way am I proclaiming this as the greatest year for music EVER. No, no, no, no, it's the greatest year for music I have ever PERSONALLY experienced. That's it.

My poor friends on Facebook know this because seemingly every 15 seconds I was pitifully blathering about yet ANOTHER hellacious concert I'd attended and, well, it was sort of true. The awesome shows just wouldn't stop. And I'm going to self-indulgently list them all again because this list sends my heart aflutter. Handsome Furs twice and Zola Jesus twice and Ra Ra Riot simply doing what they do (i.e. being the best live band on earth) and Jessica Lea Mayfield singing a song acoustic out of necessity on top of her blown-out speaker...

...and this and Justin Townes Earle covering Springsteen and Youth Lagoon blowing up the spot two nights before Thanksgiving (thanks to my friend Cindy for inviting me along to that one because I wouldn't have gone otherwise) and miraculously scoring free Sounds tickets and getting to meet Lindi Ortega and listening to her play an original song I've never heard and that in some sort of small, selfish way I don't ever want to hear again so it can just always be part of that special evening and Lissie at the House of Blues on Lollapalooza Weekend which, honestly, surprisingly, might have been my favorite show of the whole year if not for the mother Mary of all shows.....Kylie Minogue in NYC, a show that did to me emotionally and physically what only my first Springsteen show has done to me which is all that needs to be said and which is why I will never watch or listen to footage of it or discuss it in depth for the rest of my life so it can just exist forevermore the way I remember it in my mind.

Lissie at HOB: terrible sound and a bad angle can't disguise life-affirmation in action.

But it wasn't just the live music. It was the music itself. We discussed Handsome Furs yesterday and yet in any other year I would/could have written an insanely passionate diatribe about Zola Jesus and "Conatus" or Wye Oak and "Civilian" or Lindi Ortega and "Little Red Boots." To find four albums in one year that meant that much to me? The odds are so unlikely I don't even want to consider them. And yet beyond even those priceless works of art there was so much more - songs, songs, songs, songs, an endless towering tide of wonderful songs, so many that when I sat down to compose my annual mix tape I had something like 46 songs (several artists had two or even three) on here. Well, that was ridiculous. This was a mix tape. You can't just throw everything on there! That's cheating, and besides you need to create a mood that reflects your state of mind. So I went about whittling it down to a mere 13 bits of tuneage, a process that was simultaneously difficult (I didn't want to leave anything off) and easy (these were it). It's an eclectic list to be sure but then that's always been representative of my state of mind.

A tip of the cap, 2011. I could spend the rest of my days describing how much your music rocked and still come up short.

1. It's So Easy, The Sounds. My official 2011 Anthem. If only this song was longer. But, of course, to be longer would negate its entire point.

2. Angels, Lindi Ortega. This song is my sunshine. My only sunshine. It makes me happy when skies are gray. You'll never know how much this song means to me. Please don't take "Angels" by Lindi Ortega away.

3. Blue Skies Again, Jessica Lea Mayfield. The greatest dregs of winter and/or arrival of spring song ever recorded. To repeat, that's ever. End of discussion.

4. The Big Charade, Julia Klee. This song makes me want to buy a car right now so I can listen to it in it at top volume with all the windows rolled down.

Big Charade by Julia Klee

5. Take It In, Wye Oak. A massive, rumbling, beautiful musical thunderhead that will leave your emotional flood plain overwhelmed. (Note: This song was released in 2009 but I heard it for the first time this year.)

Listen to the song here.

6. Shake It Out, Florence and The Machine. This isn't gospel music for people who don't like gospel music, this IS gospel music.

7. Will Do, TV on the Radio. I definitely have days where I suspect the line "I'd like to collapse with you and ease you against this song / I think we're compatible, I see that you think I'm wrong" will be on my tombstone. Self-pity aside, this luminous tune is proof-positive TV on the Radio could be an untouchable pop super-group.....if that's what they wanted to be (which I'm pretty sure they don't).

8. Hair, Lady Gaga. To paraphrase Our Lady Of Perpetual Gaga herself, this song makes my heart bleed rainbow syrup. (I was reading somewhere recently a discussion as to whether or not Ms. Gaga had become "overrated" on account of the.....zzzzzzzzzz......whoops! Sorry! The predictability put me to sleep!)

9. Comme Un Enfant, Yelle. A fire-breathing dragon displaced to the discotheque, this song is further definitive proof that when it comes to dance music America has no idea what the hell is going on.

10. Forget That You're Young, The Raveonettes. You know the scene in movies often repeated when characters are looking out a window - in their home, in their car, in a taxi, in a bus, on a plane, etc. - with that sort of beautiful sadness? This song feels like all those thousands of shots combined into one.

11. Collapse, Zola Jesus. ....gasp....

12. When I Get Back, Handsome Furs. My favorite song of 2011. It makes my heart soar on the wings of leonopteryxes.

Hidden Track: Marry Me, Emilie Autumn. It's hidden because, well, I'm fairly certain my insanely exotic musical tastes freak some people out but my immense love of this particular song freaks myself out. (If this track isn't your speed, perhaps this one might be. Might be, I said.)

Cinema Romantico's Person(s) Of The Year

2011-12-29T08:45:00.002-06:00

There is a moment in the song "When I Get Back", which opens the Handsome Furs' third album "Sound Kapital" that far exceeds spectacular and nestles right up against the tiny but beautiful territory of life-changing. At the end Dan Boeckner comes in and sings "It might sound simple / It might sound strange......It comes straight from the heart" and it is so indescribably perfect because in our current cynical, ironic, un-earnest world such a notion would sound overly simple and ridiculously strange and so then he repeats again and again and again just to re-inforce it, just to shoot all the haters down, just to speak for all us painfully and proud earnest mo-fos out there! "It comes straight from the heart!" Damn right, it does. Bless this song. Bless this band.

Dan Boeckner and Alexei Perry, the husband/wife Canadian duo that comprise in totality Handsome Furs, are Cinema Romantico's Person(s) Of The Year.

As 2011 opened the infamous Mount Rushmore Of Non Bruce Springsteen Albums (central to my ridiculously melodramatic existence) looked as follows:

George Washington: Lucinda Williams' "Car Wheels On A Gravel Road".
Abraham Lincoln: Arcade Fire's "Tunnels".
Theodore Roosevelt: ?
Thomas Jefferson: ?

What constitutes a place on this hallowed vinyl mountainside? Many things. Not simply a killer album, of course, but an album where every single song is killer, so much to the point that even while you have a clear FAVORITE song on the album your "favorite" song switches roughly every 2.5 weeks. It must be an album that survives that initial 1 month, 2 month burst of "I need to hear this all the time endlessly" and lasts and lasts and lasts, etc. It must be an album that while speaking to you deeply at a specific time in a specific way also can stand apart from all that and function on its own as an objectively kick ass piece of work. These sorts of albums, as we all know, are difficult (nigh impossible) to find.

The best example I can think to constitute something that almost but doesn't quite make my Mount Rushmore is Kathleen Edwards' "Failer". 10 songs but I always skip over "The Lone Wolf", only want to hear "Sweet Little Duck" in very rare instances and merely think "Maria" is just okay. It survived a few extra months past that initial burst, unlike many albums, but it still has never equaled to me what it meant right there at the start when I desperately needed and cherished it. Close, Kathleen, oh so close, but no cigar. Ra Ra Riot's "The Rhumb Line" also made almost made it on there, fitting every possible piece of criteria except that, well, speaking honestly, their lyrics have never thrilled me all that much. I cherish that band so much because of their sound, because their sound is how I feel, and lead singer Wes Miles' voice is very, very much part of that sound but the lyrics can't quite bring it all the way home and so it never made it up onto the mountain. (Also, they put the wrong version of "Dying Is Fine" on there.)

I've always liked Handsome Furs quite a little bit. Their first two albums were anthemic, romantic, and mostly enjoyable. But nothing in any way, shape or form could have possibly prepared me for the copious riches of "Sound Kapital", the Theodore Roosevelt of my Mount Rushmore Of Non-Bruce Springsteen Albums. In the last several years I have become enthralled - one might argue, obsessed - with electronic music. Kylie was where that all started, of course, and it branched off into varying directions, and electronic music gets a rap for being - well, let Sub Pop, the record label on which "Sound Kapital" was released, tell it (because I can't possibly tell it any better):

"It’s...the first Handsome Furs album written exclusively on keyboards. This was a conscious decision. Here in 2011, the suggestion that electronic music is cold, alien or unfeeling, somehow detached from the human experience, is as lingering as it is outdated. Handsome Furs don’t just shrug off this myth on Sound Kapital, they reject it with every fiber of their shared being. On this new album they use keyboards and drum machines to forge life-affirming anthems taut with muscle and blood. These nine songs of innocence and experience occasionally look ahead to a better world in the not-so-distant future, but Handsome Furs know what time it is: Now. They are fully engaged in the moment and their surroundings, wherever that may be."

It's a road album, songs Dan & Alexei composed on their travels through Eastern Europe. Road Albums typically come with the ready-made stigma of being lonely, depressed, desperate to be with someone who isn't there or wasn't ever there, a narcotic need to be anywhere else. Maybe the "road" makes us feel that way, but what about "travel"? Travel redeems and rejuvenates and romances. It leaves you breathless while simultaneously replenishing your oxygen supply. You stand on a mountain you've never seen in a faraway place where you've never been and take in different air and just think "Yes." Or maybe you don't think at all. Maybe you just live in the moment.

Living in the moment is so confusing. "Remember those posters that said, 'Today is the first day of the rest of your life'? Well, that's true of every day but one - the day you die." That's what Lester Burnham said in "American Beauty", and the dude made a good point. How can you live every day like it might be your last (a common refrain) when it's also the first day of the rest of your life? I wrestle with these warring notions all the time and, frankly, it makes my head hurt. And "Sound Kapital" is an embodiment of this all-important war. Inexplicably, unexpectedly my entire 2011 sort of turned into a defiant The Year Of Living Every Day Like It's My Last. I could not have hoped for a better soundtrack to accompany it than this album...

1. When I Get Back. See above (and below).
2. Damage. The primary reason I'm naming "Sound Kapital" as the Teddy Roosevelt on my personal album Mount Rushmore rather than Jefferson is because I think this song would be the perfect soundtrack to accompany his Midnight Ride.
3. Bury Me Standing. My least favorite track on the album which means on 89.7% of other albums it would likely be my favorite track.
4. Memories of the Future. When God's had a tough day at the office, He likes to come home, pour a finger of bourbon and put this track on repeat.
5. Serve The People. I've already declared this my official 2012 Election Anthem.
6. What About Us? The first half of the song is all about the pain that a broken heart elicits. The second half is about how freeing it can feel once that pain is gone.
7. Repatriated. This song has more soul than Otis Redding. That's right! I said it! I meant it! I stand by it! What are you gonna do about it?!
8. Cheap Music. I read a review of "Pearl Jam Twenty" where the reviewer was lamenting the absence anymore of traditional four and five piece rock bands, essentially indicting the very "Cheap Music" which Handsome Furs are championing here. And that's fine. That reviewer and everyone else can have all the traditional rock bands they want, I'll take this guy on guitar and this girl on synth and no one and nothing else and be happy because they're more rock 'n' roll than your traditional bands will ever be.
9. No Feelings. The perfect capping song. Why? When you get back from a momentous trip or a life-altering experience you are often gripped with the sensation of having been so overwhelmed with feeling for an extended period of time that you are now, in fact, with no feeling which, of course, is one of the very best feelings out there.

Listen to it. Believe it. Long live "Sound Kapital." Long live Handsome Furs. Long live 2011. Long live The Moment. Long live rock 'n' roll.