“Napoleon Dynamite”
Rated PG
2004

“Napoleon Dynamite’s” heartiest laugh doesn’t come from Napoleon’s moon-booted dance, meek brother Kip’s gangsta-grill makeover or uncle Rico’s failed attempt to travel through time.

There’s ample reason to praise the wackiness of Jared Hess’s 2004 comedy about miserable Idahoans. But “Napoleon’s” best bit is simple, painfully realistic and one of the Zeroes’ best reaction shots.

While student-body president shoo-in Summer Wheatly (Haylie Duff) blathers on about benefits for her friends, Hess shows us a nameless boy for whom Summer will, at best, offer nothing and, at worst, make school more miserable. He’s bespectacled, overweight and silent. What can he do? He’s got no voice here.

That’s why Napoleon’s climactic spaz-out dance is more than a goofy gag. It’s a payoff to a great buddy-system comedy and reason to give this other kid hope — a risky self-expression meant to resolve one major misunderstanding and prop up pal Pedro’s (Efren Ramirez) flagging student-body president campaign.

Like John Hughes’ characters, Pedro, Napoleon (Jon Heder) and Deb (Tina Majorino) are misfits, not losers, and their quest for jobs, girlfriends or independence differs little from their ’80s peers apart from Hess’s strange, skewed sensibilities.

As for adult partners in pathos, Rico (Jonathan Gries) is a sympathetic villain forcing company with his misery and Kip (Aaron Ruell) learns that technology might not make one happy, but it can lead to happiness, always and forever.

Hidden beneath “Napoleon’s” humor is a heartfelt message that it’s not high school’s dreams and regrets that last, it’s the sometimes-bizarre friendships.

“Mystic River”
Rated R
2003

Clint Eastwood’s moody, evocative 2003 masterpiece merged a compelling whodunit with stunning drama about the erosion of a neighborhood and its people.

In an Oscar-winning performance as a man with whom we can sympathize but also feel sketchy about, Sean Penn is Jimmy, an ex-convict running a corner grocery store. Sean (Kevin Bacon) is a Boston homicide detective separated from his wife. And Dave (Tim Robbins) hulks his shrug-shouldered frame around the neighborhood every day — haunted by his abduction and abuse as a child.

These estranged friends are thrown back together when Jimmy’s eldest daughter, Katie, is murdered. On that same night, Dave stumbles in at 3 a.m., covered with someone else’s blood, and Sean and his partner (Laurence Fishburne) investigate in what becomes a long nightmare of rigorous police procedure. (One of the Zeroes’ finest scenes is an interrogation with Fishburne, Robbins and Bacon that’s an acting master class.)

Yet no one is better than Robbins, who also won an Oscar. Doddering in a daze, Dave implodes with rage over the psychological roots of his problems. Forever robbed of his childhood and, thus, his life, Robbins amazes as a man who’s lived the façade he thinks he must while knowing his emotional emptiness in full.

While the particulars of the mystery fascinated, the shame, awkwardness, fears and cosmic fate compelled. Eastwood’s directorial omniscience rewarded, and never restricted this tough, lean, relentless film, which left its specifics open-ended, but not the frightening finality that the vicious cycle would continue.

Austin Lugar and Sam Watermeier have argued about film for years now. Instead of just keeping it to themselves, they’re bringing it to the Yap. You’re welcome! Today’s topic is The Criterion Collection.

Austin: As I conclude my viewing of the latest edition of Black Narcissus, I can’t help but marvel in how awesome The Criterion Collection is. They really are everything a film buff respects. They bring forth unseen and beloved movies onto DVD and Blu-Ray with pitch-perfect transfer. They load the discs with scholarly bonus features and wonderful box art. Their stamp really does hold weight and I know you’re a big fan of them as well. So let’s start off our discussion by talking about some of the movies you never would have heard of if it wasn’t for The Criterion Collection.”

Sam: I blind bought Seduced and Abandoned before I even knew it was a hilarious and biting comedy of manners from Italy. That’s how much I trust The Criterion Collection and its enticing DVD cover art. Check out the cover for Seduced and Abandoned!

Another film I discovered, thanks to Criterion, is Clean, Shaven. It’s a trippy journey in the mind of a schrizophrenic as he searches for his long-lost daughter — or a figment of his imagination? It’s not a film I fell in love with, but I certainly don’t regret watching it. I had never heard of it or seen it in video stores before. It was probably rotting away at the bottom of some $2 DVD bin. So there’s a power of Criterion — it takes lost, obscure films and gives them the Hollywood treatment so to speak, with impressive packaging, essays and other special features.

Criterion also gives Hollywood films a certain mystique and weight they never had before. For example, I was inspired to give Michael Bay’s The Rock a second shot when it was released on Criterion!

Austin: I still haven’t seen Seduced and Abandoned, but I need to. It looks like fun. Now you bring up The Rock. I never viewed the Criterion version of it, but many people cite that and Armageddon for being rather odd titles. They now have over 400 titles of acclaimed and challenging films from all over the globe….and two Michael Bay movies. What do you think of these picks? It seems like they need these in order to pay the rent. It’s not as tasteless as Bay, but we’re also seeing this with The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and every Wes Anderson film. (Sans Fantastic Mr. Fox so far). Does this lessen the label?

Sam: I don’t think they lessen the label too much because they are still good movies. The Rock and Armageddon don’t tarnish the Criterion label as much as say, Bad Boys would.

However, I wonder how much these more mainstream releases are really helping Criterion “pay the rent”. These DVDs still cost $30-$50. If Criterion wants to attract more customers, I think it would benefit more from simply lowering costs than keeping the same costs with the addition of mainstream films. I mean, who wants to buy a $40 edition of The Rock, right? I’d rather buy something like Seduced and Abandoned for $15.

Austin: Well I’m not an expert on economics, but I believe there is a strong reason why the movies cost so much. Like a nice restaurant, the price means a certain level of quality. With a $40 DVD you can expect the best from them in terms of picture quality and impressive bonus features. They don’t just have director commentaries, but more often they have esteemed scholars providing commentary tracks, essays, and documentaries. It isn’t about providing sound bites from the cast saying “I had a great time working on this feature!” but allowing the audience to have a richer cerebral experience.

In terms of paying the rent, I would say that films by Richard Linklater and Wes Anderson are easily more compelling than Michael Bay.

Sam: You’re right about the price reflecting the quality, but I don’t think people who are new to Criterion are going to spend $40 on something like The Rock or The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, you know? So that’s why I’m suspicious as to how much mainstream releases are really helping financially.

I agree that more mainstream directors, like Linklater and Anderson, are at least opening people’s eyes to The Criterion Collection.

I’ll admit that my introduction to Criterion was from more mainstream or well-known films like Rushmore, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Dazed and Confused, etc. In fact, I’m still drawn to those recognizable films now. For example, I’m looking forward to the release of The Thin Red Line. I think Criterion fans like us will always have a certain excitement, maybe even a bias, for the Criterion release of films we’ve already seen or heard of.

Austin: I can’t remember my introduction to them exactly besides noticing a difference in some of the DVDs I was checking out at the library. See I guess I’m a different kind of Criterion fan. Sure, sometimes I’m excited about Criterions I’ve already seen (Chungking Express was a fun one), but I actually like it more when they announce films I haven’t seen from directors I love. They just announced The Magician by Ingmar Bergman a few weeks ago and I’m pumped to check that out. Even though the director is dead, it’s like he has a new movie out.

Criterion just made a deal with IFC so it’s weird seeing more recent movies coming out though the label. Like A Christmas Tale, Summer Hours, Everlasting Moments, and Che. Worthy movies, but it’s still odd seeing a 2008 movie next to Josef von Sternberg’s The Docks of New York. Cool range.

Now I don’t want to argue with you on how “good” The Rock and Armageddon are. We’ll go ahead and say they are both watchable. Now I’ve mentioned The Criterion Collection has hundreds of titles. (540 to be exact.) Not every one of them can be a masterpiece. What are some bad ones that you have come across? Personally I can’t stand Taste of Cherry by Abbas Kiarostami or Naked Lunch by David Cronenberg. I get why people like them, but man both of those left me extremely cold. I’m also not the biggest fan of a lot of work by Jean-Luc Godard or John Cassavetes. (Will my snobbery card be revoked from that statement?)

Sam: Well, speaking of Godard, I couldn’t stand Pierrot Le Fou. I found it unbearably pretentious. There is actually a scene where the main character talks about death while sitting on the edge of a dock with a parrot on his shoulder, looking out at the beautiful ocean. Give me a break. I gathered that the film was partly satirizing this character’s pretentiousness, but it was also pretentious itself.

Another film I didn’t like was Secret Honor, the one-man act starring Philip Baker Hall as Richard Nixon. The film consists of him madly pacing back and forth in the Oval Office for 90 minutes, pontificating about Watergate and his troubled past. To me, it grew tiresome pretty quickly. It’s a dreadfully one-note film. I might have tolerated it more as a one-act play, but from a film, I want something visually dynamic, something rich.

Those are really the only Criterion films I’ve been disappointed by thus far, though.

Austin: I think we’ve talked about this outside of this article, but how much Godard have you seen? If you think that is pretentious you may not be able to mentally handle Week End, Alphaville, or Made in U.S.A. I wish you good luck if you are to continue with his canon. I do strongly recommend Breathless, Contempt, and A Woman is a Woman.

Also I love Secret Honor. I think that’s a very captivating movie that I would consider one of Robert Altman’s underseen films. In that case I think the writing is so strong and the situation is fascinating. You forgot to mention it’s the night before he’s going to resign. That’s great internal conflict.

Now are there any films you wish would get the “Criterion Treatment”? I know they’ve teased at a definitive Magnificent Ambersons for years now and I would love to see that happen. I would also like them to take on the Three Colors trilogy by Krzysztof Kieslowski. They’ve already released Kieslowski’s The Double Life of Veronica which is brilliant. I know the trilogy has a DVD release already in the States, but I can’t testify to their quality. (I originally saw the trilogy on VHS.) But those movies are so beautiful with its use of color and light, that I think it could just look even better with the right digital transfer.

Sam: The only other Godard film I’ve seen is Breathless. Don’t worry, I survived that one. I liked it a lot actually.

Last thing about Secret Honor: I think the history it is based on is richer and more interesting than the film itself. To me, the film was just saying, over and over again, that Nixon was a bitter paranoiac with a troubled past. I just grew tired of it. I can see how one would be engaged by Hall’s feverish performance as Nixon, though.

Because I am a huge nerd, I often think of movies that I want to receive the Criterion treatment. I even think of possible cover art for them! One film I saw recently that I would like to receive the treatment is Red Rock West. It’s a stark southwestern thriller starring Nicolas Cage as a drifter mistaken for a hitman in a small town. It’s a taut neo-western-noir. It also has an interestingly rocky backstory worthy of Criterion. You see, it was well-received at the Toronto Film Festival, but strangely went straight to cable and video after that. Then, after positive word-of-mouth, it was picked up for theatrical release and it toured the U.S. as an art-house hit. Now it seems to be rotting away on a bare-bones DVD. I’d like to see it revived by Criterion the way it was revived at the time of its release.

Another one I’d like to see a Criterion version of is Manhunter, the first film in the Hannibal Lecter series. It seems to be slowly fading from people’s memory.

I’d also like to see Criterions for The Counterfeiters, Das Boot — the masterful German submarine thriller, Paul Thomas Anderson’s directorial debut, Hard Eight, the list goes on and on.

The Criterion DVD artwork alone seems to be enough of a reason to revive these films. That is part of the thrill of Criterion — seeing how films are reinterpreted through beautiful illustrations and photography. The artwork adds a weight to these films, the same weight as the Criterion stamp of approval itself.

Austin: Red Rock West sounds pretty interesting. I’ll throw it on my queue. Hard Eight would be a good choice. Manhunter I think is just okay. I remember it being too visually dark to understand what’s going on, but I’m not a big Michael Mann fan either. (The book is better!)

I do agree with the artwork. It’s uplifting because it’s always an original take on the graphic. It’s either an underused moment from the movie or original artwork. I think they’ve only caved once (Benjamin Button!)

As we wrap up, let’s give some final recommendations that people can check out. For me, I’m going to say the amazing crime movie Le Samourai, Ingmar Bergman’s masterpiece Winter Light and the great 90s independent film The Last Days of Disco.

Sam: I’d recommend Knife in the Water, Roman Polanski’s directorial debut — and one of my all-time favorite films. I couldn’t leave this discussion without also recommending Wages of Fear and Withnail and I. For those who don’t know, Wages of Fear is a French film following four men as they transport truck-fulls of nitroglycerine across extremely dangerous South American terrain. During the trip, a rivalry develops between the two sets of drivers. How cool does that sound?

Withnail and I is a hilarious British black comedy about two unemployed actors living together who leave their squalid flat to go on a road trip to the countryside. It’s one of the funniest movies you will ever see.

I still need to see the films you recommended, I’m sure they’re great. After all, Criterion films rarely aren’t.

As the credits rolled on “Dinner for Schmucks,” I looked over at a friend and said “That was either a complete disaster or brilliant. I’m not sure which.”

After ruminating for a day or two, I’m pretty sure it’s the latter, a conclusion I came to when I found myself inexplicably quoting the movie with the same friend on Facebook. Back and forth we went, my amusement betraying the film snob within me with each post.

“Schmucks” is based on the sorts of contrivances on which director Jay Roach (“Austin Powers,” “Meet the Parents”) has feasted over the years. Paul Rudd stars as Tim, who, found that getting a promotion isn’t as easy as bringing a novel idea to a staff meeting.

No, he has to pass the final test: come to his boss’s (Bruce Greenwood, as assbaggy here as he was fatherly and inspiring in “Star Trek”) house for a special dinner for “extraordinary” people. Of course by “extraordinary” he means “complete idiots,” and the goal for the evening is for the execs to have laughs at these poor bastards’ expenses.

Tim seems slightly put off by this development, but sees dollar signs when he literally runs into (and almost over) Barry (Steve Carell), who might just be the king of these “extraordinary” people. He certainly fits all of the requirements: his hobby is taxidermy with a twist in that he dresses up stuffed mice in costumes and creates dioramas based on works of fine art (“Mousterpieces,” he calls them). He also appears to be none too bright.

The setup is implausible, yes, and there’s a romance subplot between Tim and his girlfriend Julie (Stephane Szostak) that doesn’t quite work, despite the presence of Jemaine Clement (HBO’s “Flight of the Conchords”), who plays a less-grating variation on Russell Brand’s character from “Forgetting Sarah Marshall.”

When the film is off it’s off. Barry is comically stupid, and if you forgive my comparison to two of Steve Carell’s most famous characters, he’s playing sort of a combination between Michael Scott and Brick Tamland. He’s incredibly stupid, but selectively so, and at times it grows tiresome to suspend disbelief that someone is in fact this incredibly vapid.

He’s someone who is completely good-intentioned, even sweet, but his efforts invariably lead to a tornado of destruction. Not just in the sense of being maddening, but literally destroying everything around him.

A sequence where Barry unwittingly tips off a psychotic stalker (Lucy Punch, looking like she stepped out of Terry Gilliam’s “Brazil”) to Tim’s location drags on too long, and is revisited later in a funnier scene that still feels a bit repetitive.

But when ”Schmucks” is on, it’s Right On. The dinner itself is a raucous affair full of ventriloquists, vulture tamers, pet psychics, and a guy with a rather unique beard, among others.

There’s also one sequence with Galafianakis that is an extraordinary piece of comedy where his face turns red, then back to normal. I’m still trying to figure out how he did it.

As I mentioned before, “Schmucks” is imminently quotable, its often funny as hell, and is, regardless of its flaws, a fun, lighthearted good time that tells a simple, enjoyable story. It’s a solid summer comedy recommendation.

Yappers Nick Rogers, Christopher Lloyd and Austin Lugar dissect and discuss “Inception’s” true outcome. Obviously, MAJOR SPOILER ALERTS, and please join the debate with comments.

Nick Rogers
One ticket to “Inception” should cost about $750. Theater ushers could then give three hours of college credit to departing patrons in lieu of mints.

Intelligent, witty and exhilarating, “Inception” knocks you flat with punches of sheer spectacle and pop psychology no other summer 2010 film (hell, no other 2010 film, period) has even bothered to throw.

So few movies demand such attention, and Christopher Nolan’s too busy throwing haymakers to hold the audience’s hand through this mammoth mindgame — a film that, at first blush, feels like the bravest, boldest, most bracing blockbuster since “The Matrix.” Its inter-dream audacity makes “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” look like a Little Einstein title.

Nolan’s latest dangerous tumble down a rabbit hole of perception, identity and memory might be his masterpiece. It might also be the one most open to narrative interpretation.

In many ways, being taken by “Inception” is like being swept up in street magic: For all its complexities and exposition, there are simple illusions and emotions at play that dazzle the most. The same thing went for certain episodes, and later the ultimate endgame, of “Lost”: For all of the scientific-notation talk of “constants,” it boiled down to love and togetherness.

Those are present in “Inception,” too — very much a story of fathers & sons and husbands & wives, albeit viewed through a grimy prism. We all have dreams of success and comfort for our children and spouses that we hope become reality. Well, in “Inception,” you may see those dreams play out (at least in part), but they might simply remain dreams.

IF YOU’VE NOT SEEN “INCEPTION” AND WANT PURITY, BAIL NOW.

While this doesn’t begin to detail everything that happens in “Inception,” here’s the main crux (which could serve as a recap for those who got temporarily lost). Dom (Leonardo DiCaprio) is a single-minded man: He wants to get home to his kids, Phillipa and James, after being forced to flee the United States. The latest job presented to him by Saito (Ken Watanabe) makes that possible for him: Plant an idea inside a rival competitor’s mind to break up his company.

Think of this heist film as “Ocean’s Pi” and Dom — in DiCaprio’s best performance in years — as a man who values the solace of theft over the pain of creation for good reason.

Dom’s an international fugitive after authorities believe he murdered his wife, Mal (Marion Cotillard). In actuality, Mal took her own life.

After spending a lifetime in a shared subconscious with Dom — a lazy afternoon in real time — Mal didn’t want to leave to return to Phillipa and James, fascinated by the god-playing world she and Dom had created.

To persuade her to return, Dom performed “inception,” planting an idea in her mind — that idea being that the world they were in wasn’t actually real and that it didn’t matter if they died there because they’d always have each other in the real world.

The problem is that this belief carried over into the real world, which Mal also believed to be false and a place where they couldn’t actually die — tragically not the case when she took a nosedive off a hotel windowsill. (Here, “Inception” approaches the cautionary-tale aspects of “Altered States.”)

In the end, Dom, having carried out Saito’s heist mission despite breakneck complications, returns to Phillipa and James on American soil. But before embracing them, he spins his dreidel on a dining-room table. The dreidel is Dom’s totem, a unique way for him and him alone to discern reality from dreams. If it topples, he’s in reality. If it continues spinning, he’s in a dream. Although it audibly slows, Nolan cuts to credits before we know for certain.

Yes, “Inception” can be enjoyed on its surface purely as a cerebral ride with a wicked stinger tease. However, in a film that takes place within dreams, dreams within dreams, dreams within dreams within dreams and, in the climax, the raw landscape of the subconscious, it should surprise no one that the narrative’s face value could easily be discarded.

(On a side note, I don’t know whether “Inception” will contend for a Best Picture Oscar. But if there’s a better-edited film this year, I want to see it right now. At one point, Lee Smith simultaneously edits together five — count ‘em, five — layers of consciousness with suggested hints to an invisible sixth.)

While I think it’s impossible to grasp beyond basic to moderate narrative understanding after the strap-in, hang-on feel of the first-time viewing (especially with Watanabe’s strained English-language dialogue), suggestions are sprinkled throughout that the final moments are all in Dom’s head (from the moment he willfully stays in Fischer’s subconscious to the final shot). In some regards, that makes it a mega, meta “Memento.”

Perhaps the entire film is, too, save for sequences in Dom and Mal’s initial shared subconscious and the torturous reality following their departure from it.

Here are my rationales, and Christopher Lloyd’s counterpoints, discussing the theory that Dom’s regained freedom and family in the finale are not to be taken as literal reality, but as a wish-fulfillment fragment of his slumbering subconscious.

As it’s said in the movie, “The deeper the issues, the stronger the catharsis,” and “Truth? What truth?”

1. Where’s Grandma?
Nick: Unless I missed her somehow, where was “Grandma” in that final scene? Dom’s mother was presumably watching the kids while Dom’s father, Miles (Michael Caine), was off at a foreign university, right? Subconsciously, Dom has no idea who’s watching his kids now or where they’ve ended up. He’d like to think they’re playing in the idyllic backyard of Grandma’s house, so that’s where he envisions them.

Chris: Maybe grandma and Michael Caine are divorced and hate each other.

Nick: That’s a big leap of faith to make. Given the family fallout resulting from Mal’s suicide, I’d think Nolan would bring that up were it to be true.

2. How old are those kids again?
Nick: As to those kids, notice how they never seemed to age. And, again, unless I missed it, there was never a specific amount of time mentioned that Dom had been away from them (although it was long enough for it to have become a burden). Perhaps they’re at the idealized age at which he chooses to remember them in his subconscious.

Chris: The kids did age. I know this only because I spotted in the end credits two different sets of actors. It said James, 20 months and James, 3 years, etc.

Nick: Good counterpoint. I saw that credit notation, too, but didn’t know whether they’d been played in a flashback sequence. I still think the lack of explanation for how long Dom’s been away — and presumably able to build some sort of business around his technology — seems suspicious.

3. One call solves it all.
Nick: After at least touching upon the intricacies of extradition in “The Dark Knight,” Christopher Nolan pretty much just leaves it at the idea that Saito can make a call and get Dom back in the United States — and under his own name, no less. That seems like an atypical gap for Nolan and perhaps a tad too easy for it to be reality.

Chris: I thought of this same point. You could also argue that if he really wanted his life back, he could have targeted the governor of his home state and planted the inception: “I must grant Dom Cobb a full pardon.” Probably a lot easier to get to a governor than businessman Fischer (Cillian Murphy), or Saito, for that matter.

Nick: Ha. When you phrase it that way, it makes me think of Reggie Jackson believing he must kill the Queen in “The Naked Gun.” To me, a lack of explanation for Saito’s pull was the biggest smoking gun for the argument that the reunion is not to be believed.

4. Geek out on Greek mythology.
Nick: Apart from being the noble bearer of reams of exposition, Ellen Page’s dream-architect character is Ariadne, whose namesake is famous for giving Theseus (Dom) a sword and thread to lead him out of the labyrinth of the Minotaur (Mal). However, Theseus abandons Ariadne (much as Dom does in choosing to stay in the subconscious and not following Ariadne out). Perhaps Dom, like an addict, is creating loopholes in his mind that he thinks will lead him out and, in conjuring new characters in his mind, is drawing on his knowledge of Greek mythology.

Chris: Yes, the mythology allegory was fairly obvious, and I think just thrown in to show off how literate Nolan is.

Nick: Greek mythology: Always worth paying attention in class.

5. Arthur seems too good for that.
Nick: For me, this was the biggest huh-what: Dom’s heist pointman, Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), doesn’t anticipate that Fischer’s brain would have had a militarized subconscious from training to prevent extraction/inception?! That seems unexpectedly sloppy for a notably fastidious guy like Arthur. Maybe that was another manifestation of Dom’s brain showing the impossibility of ever really getting home.

Chris: Meh. If he’s so fastidious, how come he didn’t notice Dom’s obsession with Mal that kept ruining their missions? Besides, it would be hard to know if an exec received dream training unless you tapped his dreams first. It’s not like there’s a Web listserv where dream companies post a list of their clients. Now maybe if you tapped the CEO of a dream company …

Nick: This is the sticking point that ties a couple of my theories together. OK, so the supposition is that Dom’s been away from his kids long enough to turn his dream-invasion technology into some sort of business, recruit a team and have people (like Tom Hardy’s Eames) who he’s worked with “in the past.” If Dom’s team didn’t teach Fischer in the art of avoiding extraction/inception, then who did? Is dream invasion a growth market? I don’t recall mention of any sort of competitor to Dom’s services.

Maybe, as there was no spoon in “The Matrix,” there is no business. Maybe Dom was just a scientist tragically caught up in his own research, now subconsciously envisioning this as a likely application for his work. (He could be forever asleep in an environment like the one Yusuf [Dileep Rao] shows him.)  Also, Arthur did know Mal was tampering with their missions; she shot him in the prologue dream with Saito. He just didn’t know Dom had stashed her away in a metaphysical memory hotel, as Ariadne learned when she took the elevator down to Dom’s brain basement.

Yes, I just typed that previous sentence about a major summer blockbuster.

Austin: I need to see it again for a lot of these points. During the movie, I had a theory that Mal was never real, but an inception planted by Arthur. That was mostly from odd lines like Cobb saying they met in a dream and seeing how her presence defines his entire situation. Their warnings about inceptions ran parallel to her involvement in his life. I’m not sure if that plays out, but I think it just works best as a thematic parallel.

I could just be the romantic or hopeful, but I’m not sure if I want to think that the totem keeps spinning at the end. Thematically, that just felt like less of a cliffhanger, but Nolan giving a “THE END????” type of shot. I think it’s too cruel to think that Dom doesn’t get to be with his kids at the end; even though it may just be a year or so in the real world, he had to endure potentially more than 100 years to get to that point.

Nick: That’s certainly an optimistic view and one that’s wholly possible. If Mal wasn’t real, though (an idea I’d love you to elaborate on), who fathered Dom’s kids?

Debra Granik’s first film, “Down to the Bone,” introduced much of the world to Vera Farmiga, who would go on to stardom in films like “The Departed,” “Orphan,” and and Oscar nomination in ”Up in the Air.”

Granik’s new film “Winter’s Bone” seeks to spark a similar career for its star Jennifer Lawrence, whose relentless portrayal of Ree, a teen who has a week to find her meth-addicted father who may or may not have jumped bail, before the government takes their house.

Granik spoke to The Yap about “Winter’s Bone,” about the stark authenticity of the film, and whether her film, along with 2008’s “Frozen River”  forms two parts of a Rural Women trilogy.

How did you get started with “Winter’s Bone”?

We got started with it by reading the book, this novel by Daniel Woodrell called “Winter’s Bone.” The book was a compelling read, and my partner I make movies with, Ann Rosselini, and I both really loved the book and we really latched onto this female protagonist. She was a very full-bodied, tragic character, and we haven’t seen the likes of her for a long time. She’s like a Western hero in a lot of ways. Very captivating, and so was her life. We sought out Daniel Woodrell and actually went down there and met him. We got the permission and it went from there.

The first thing that hit me about this film, and I hope you don’t take this the wrong way, but I watched the Korean Vengeance trilogy, and I was joking that this was kind the second in an American trilogy with Rural Women Looking For the Men Who Wronged Them. I was thinking of “Frozen River” and thought “Winter’s Bone” compares favorably to that one. Did you see “Frozen River” in the process of making this film? They’re similar in tone and they both have that grittiness and a sense of rural realism.

“Frozen River” was definitely a role model for us. Not the content per se, though there are similarities, but the scope of it and how it was made and the fact that audiences were really able to see a side that was interesting being an independent film. In the sense of making a film outside of the major industry, “Frozen River” was an extremely positive role model for us. And the fact is that there are content similarities that you pointed out, but since the stories were set in such different regions that didn’t strike us as hard as just what kind of film it was and how it struck us.

Well, and you get people like Charlize Theron, who gets acclaim for “going ugly” or “going gritty” in a film, using makeup and things, but your film is a step beyond that. It’s even more realistic, and at the end of the day Charlize Theron is still incredibly glamorous and beautiful and it takes all of this makeup to make her seem she even belongs in a world like that. The people here seemed natural and authentic.

I so appreciate your comment. I’ve never really had the chance to discuss this. The woman I made this film with, Ann Rosselini, made this comment about how if you airlift someone into a situation, no audience will forget that. They’ll always have a sense…that doesn’t mean they won’t play along, but there’s this actor that the audience adores, but the fact is a character will always seem airlifted into an environment. The dream we have as filmmakers is that if we cast all of these local people, there’s a way that there can be some kind of hybrid or, if you will, cross-pollination, where the cast can have a rich array of local people and local actors, then some more experienced actors will come in and have life experiences that pertains. Many of the cast that came from out of state had rich experiences acting, they had life experiences growing up outside of Missouri. Whenever a film can cast in this way, and doesn’t have to rely on casting very well-known, if you want to call them stars, for its financing, there’s a chance you can have a cast where people may feel like they have roots of understanding for where the film is being made. We were thrilled that the cast for this film was comprised from the ingredients it was, and Jennifer [Lawrence, the film’s star] has very rich experience. She was in two films prior to “Winter’s Bone” but the fact is she wasn’t so well-known or over-exploded that there were people saying “Oh, that’s Jennifer Lawrence doing that role.” Instead there was a little opportunity for the audience to accept her as Ree versus trying to isolate her and understand her as a star who is in a role.

Speaking of Jennifer Lawrence, how comfortable was she in carrying a film like this? It’s certainly her film, the central character without a doubt. How did she handle that, and how did you encourage her and guide her along the way with a character that has to have that certain amount of self confidence and brashness even though there are these horrible consequences to what she wants to do?

Jennifer, I always love to give her props for this specifically, but she did such a great job of reconciling her expectations and my expectations. Her expectations were that the shoot would be arduous, and she understood that she would have to do her own work. This would be someone that she would have to put her own guts into. We were actually filming in Ashley, who plays her sister, in Ashley’s real-life home. She had to learn how to do many tasks on that property. She had to learn to use firearms, and she would have to be down there and actually put herself into. And she signed onto that very willingly, and proved herself to be a woman of her word and proved herself big time. My work was easy with Jen because she was an absorbing device working with John (Hawkes) and Dale Dickey, who played Merab. She was observing…I don’t want to call them her elders, but she was observing actors with more experience than her. What I was able to do is put her into a real environment. She had real tasks to perform. She real children to wrangle, and real animals to wrangle. That is one thing that I think all actors respond to, and they build a foundation from that. They’re actually immersed in something.

If we can go back for just a second to the look of the film, how did you visually capture the distinct look of the film? It’s like the layer of gloss most movies have is gone.

You know, our job was to be very astute note takers. The DPs, with photographing, the production departments were photographing with great detail. We didn’t need to mess with what we found, because what we found was a life that a family had set up in itself, and it looked much like the life that was described in the book. It was believable that this was their house, and these were their toys. The wardrobe was inspired by teen women in the environment, and we did an exhchange. We had new Carhartts, we had new flannel shirts that production was able to acquire, and we exchanged them for things that had had a life from that environment. These are specific coordinates in the United States. This isn’t just anywhere. These are hardscrabble people that live in this area in Missouri. Many of the homes are hand-built, and people have different textures in their house, and use 5 different building materials in their house. That’s what we wanted to capture. We didn’t have to create that. It’s what exists in 2009 when we filmed, and that’s what contributes to the look of the film. I’m not trying to be coy and say we were hands off and didn’t do a thing. Of course making a film is an arduous process, and the DP and the camera operator and the prop master all had a huge amount of work to do to make this film realized, but the fact remains that their muse was a life that was lived in and a habitat and a house and a dwelling and a home that had character and history, and we were permitted to film that.

That is really interesting. I have never thought of exchanging new clothes for stuff that has been worn.

Yeah, clothing departments often have to distress clothing. You know, they have new clothing and have to make them look worn, but it did not just make sense. First of all it felt wasteful because the people could use those garments to great effect, and they had distressed their clothes over the past years, and just lived life. Their Carhartts have frayed cuffs and necklines and it made no sense other than to make that exchange. It was just like the logic of the conditions in which we were filming.

If we can, I’d like to move to adapting the novel. How did you balance the needs of the film’s narrative, condensed to 90 or 100 minutes, to the book’s layout. How did you approach making those changes in the script?

Are you also asking what gets lost from book to screen?

Yes.

One thing a book can do is describe a huge amount about a character’s inner conscious. What this does is allows a person to know what we have felt in the past about her father, what she knows about her family before the story starts, about a time before meth, why the family’s land means so much to them. How this is achieved in a film is exposition, and that’s an enemy to film, frankly. Some films use it to beautiful effect with voiceover or other forms of exposition. But when a character is told at the beginning of a film that she has a week to solve something, that deadline becomes a tyranny. It becomes a sort of mistress the film must serve. Her journey is a little bit relentless. She doesn’t have time to ruminate or have lyrical voiceover about her family’s history. So what gets lost is some of the inner workings of Ree’s family, and things that are admirable and rich, and in some ways the heritage of hill country that people do want to talk about, a sense of self-reliance is unparalleled. Sometimes we were able to show that in Ree’s character. But some of that heritage gets lost. Also there were scenes between Ree and her best friend Gail, scenes that showed Ree as a much more normal teenager where she was at ease. But we had to operate under the notion that Ree has a fire under her. Once the character is able to relax, it dilutes the notion that she has pressure. These were the quandaries we had. And I love to show details of her life, and we couldn’t show nearly as much of that as we wanted to.

So where are you now? Are you working on your next projects now, or are you still in some sense doing post-production on this one?

We’re trying to read scripts as fast as we can, and we’re working on our next script. Right now we’re trying to work on the DVD, because there’s some really lyrical material from the community that worked on the film: anecdotes, interviews with members of the community, definitions of the word “hillbilly,” things that couldn’t be in the film. So we’re trying to work on that, and it’s a balancing act, trying to give this the best sendoff we can, and also make sure we’re immersing ourselves in new projects.

It’s interesting you mentioned the DVD portion. A lot of filmmakers really dislike doing that. Steven Spielberg has a ban for instance on doing commentaries. He thinks it ruins the magic of the film. How do you feel about that?

Gosh. In this film I really feel the other way. Because we collaborated so profoundly with a different location. We were a mostly coastal urban crew, that then met the crew in southern Missouri, and we had all of these local advisors, people who basically were experts in their own life, meaning they understood wild game, how to make their lives work, they understood the housework. This was really a film with a diverse people. I’m not trying to make it like a Mr. Rogers scenario or something, but this film was not some rarified enclave of a California studio, making a special effects film. Americans in southern Missouri who have never been involved in filmmaking had a huge input in this film, and a making-of would be the only way to capture that.

Take a look at the resumes of all of the A-list directors in Hollywood, and you’d be hard-pressed to find a guy with a better stretch of films than Rob Reiner did from 1983-1992: “This is Spinal Tap,” “Stand By Me,” “The Princess Bride,” “When Harry Met Sally,” “Misery,” “A Few Good Men.”

Heck, even after the colossal flop that was “North,” he bounced back with the cable-TV mainstay “The American President.”

The son of comedy legend Carl Reiner, Rob Reiner grew up with guys like Mel Brooks, Sid Caesar and Norman Lear hanging around his house and made his first big splash on television playing Mike “Meathead” Stivic, Archie Bunker’s liberal son-in-law on the classic sitcom “All in the Family.”

Reiner’s latest film is “Flipped,” told from the dueling perspectives of a 13 year-old boy and 13-year-old girl who are discovering romantic love for the first time. “Flipped” will premiere in Indianapolis Aug. 2 as part of a special Heartland Film Festival event, and Reiner and “Flipped” stars Anthony Edwards, John Mahoney and Penelope Ann Miller will be in attendance for the red carpet.

I’m curious to know first of all how you got involved with this adaptation of a young adult novel.

Yes. My son Nick, who was 11 years old at the time—he’s 16 now—but was in 5^th grade and was assigned the book, and he brought it home and we read it to each other. I was just blown away about how sophisticated the writing was. Usually when you’re reading a novel for young adults, it’s only on this one level. This had so much depth and insight, and it struck a chord in me and it kind of reminded me how I felt when I first fell in love as a young guy, and I was fascinated by the book’s style, and the convention of going back and forth between the boy’s point of view and the girl’s point of view. I had never seen that was, and I was surprised at how engaged I remained even though the story was told twice. But there was new information and the take was different. My son Nick said “You know, I think this could make a great movie,” and I said “you know, I think you’re right,” And that was the beginning of it all.

The one film that pops to my mind that uses that device of telling the same story through different points of view was “Vantage Point” a few years back, and it didn’t work out that well. How did you handle those challenges of telling the story over?

I think in “Vantage Point” it was basically just perception. In this case, we’re dealing with a very universal feeling, this powerful, universal feeling of falling in love from a boy’s point of view and a girl’s point of view. Hopefully it’s something everybody can relate to. What’s interesting is that you think back on it and though it’s a story about young kids, I believe it’s something adults will get more out of. It’s kind of like “Stand By Me,” which you know was a story about kids, but we found that adults appreciate it even more. There’s a great line at the end, and it’s from Stephen King’s novella, and it says “you never have friends like you did when you were 12.” And when you look back on it, it has a tremendous resonance. They remember how powerful those things are. When you’re 12 and going through it you don’t think anything of it. The same thing can be said for the first love. You’ll never forget the first girl you had that major crush on. I think people looking back will have very powerful strong feelings about it, and kids going through it now will relate just because they’re going through it. It works on both levels, so that’s one of the reasons why I think the back-and-forth point of view makes sense, because we each look at this really confusing, powerful time differently.

You did mention the story took you back to your own childhood. I noticed the “Bonnie Meadow Road” reference.

(laughs) Well, it’s actually “Bonnie Meadow Lane.” When I was a kid growing up in New Rochelle, I lived on Bonnie Meadow Road. I lived at 48 Bonnie Meadow Road. When my dad did “The Dick Van Dyke Show,” he had the Petries living at 148 Bonnie Meadow Road. So in this movie I made it Bonnie Meadow Lane, so it’s an homage to my youth and my dad’s TV show.

You’ve worked with some of the biggest stars of the times, and you also have a history of working with children in leading roles. Can you talk about some of the challenges this time around working with children, and without any major stars?

Right. Well, you’re right, I have worked with a lot of big actors over the years: Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman, Michael Douglas, Tom Cruise and so on. I found that in the case of Madeline Carroll, I’ve never seen someone, she was 13 when we filmed, who was that kind of developed instrument, whose craft was so developed at that age. I put her right in there with those great actors. It was extraordinary how little I had to do with her in terms of directing her. She came full blown for the part, and had this incredibly fine-tuned instrument. Same goes for Callan. I didn’t know anything about Callan. We had a hard time finding a boy, because it’s hard finding a great-looking boy who has this kind of sexy quality, who has intelligence and at age 13, 14 can play that kind of stuff. Turns out Callan is from Australia, and has a thick Aussie accent. He was able to do this perfect American accent. The moment we’d stop the take he’d right away lapse into Ausie, and when we rolled he was this American kid. He had a great facility as well. These kids I think were more developed as actors than the ones I’d worked with on “Stand By Me.” Except for Corey Feldman, there was very little acting experience among the other kids, so we had to work hard and almost doing like an acting class for a few weeks before we started shooting. Kids have great instincts, but they don’t always have great craft, so you have to work with them. Professional actors who have been around awhile have a great craft and know how to turn it on and off and do what they need to do to make it work. But in the case of Callan and Maddy, their craft was as good as any seasoned actor I’ve worked with.

You have obviously been around awhile, you’ve gotten the awards and the respect, commercial and critical acclaim. Is there still something you’re shooting for-a goal-or do you take projects that just make you happy or interest you?

Well, first of all I still love doing what I do. I really enjoy it. I gotta say making this film I had the best experience of any film I’ve ever made. It was an absolute pleasure. Maybe it was because I was relaxed a little bit with my abilities, and we were in Michigan for the summer, and we had these wonderful kids and the parents. It was like almost going to movie camp, it was so much fun. But what I look for is a way to express myself. If I can find something in a book or a script or an idea that can resonate with something I have experienced or have gone through, then for me it’s just a matter of expressing yourself on the screen and expressing some of the thoughts and feelings and emotions that I’ve been through. In this case it was an easy one, because I related easily to what these kids were going through.

What is the most common crazy thing people shout at you? I’m sure “Hey, Meathead” is one of them.

I do get Meatheaded on a regular basis still. I’ve made the joke many times through my career that no matter what I do…I could win the Nobel prize and it would say “Meathead wins the Nobel.” It’s still traveled around, and because of Nick at Nite and TV Land, these shows play over and over. People usually…they recognize my voice, but they don’t usually recognize my face because I don’t look anything like I did when I was 20.

My dad even said “Tell Meathead I said hi,” so I had to throw that one out there.

There you go. (laughs) Tell him I said hi back.

I will! Can you talk a little about acting as well as directing. Was acting your first love?

I love to act. For me it’s like being let out on a playground for recess. It’s fun because I don’t have the responsibility for having to make all the decisions. I remember years ago Ron Howard called me up and asked me if I wanted to be in a movie he was doing called “Ed TV,” and I said “yeah, I’ll do it.” He said “well, let me send you the script…” and I said, “you know Ron, I don’t have to read the script, because if the movie’s no good, it’s not my fault.” I just love going to work and acting. I just did something on “Hannah Montana” recently. So whatever they ask me to do if I’m free I’ll do it

You mentioned your son earlier. A lot of stars will make movies and cite doing movies that they want their kids to see. You almost made this one together…

I don’t really think of that consciously, but certainly this is one parents can watch with their kids, and we’ve had screenings with parents and kids, and like I said the parents sometimes get more out of it than kids. But the parents feel great because it’s something they can take their kids to. I like doing that, because when I’m taking kids to movies, more often than not they’re just movies I’m taking my kids to, and I have to sit there and watch. That’s a reason I enjoyed making “The Princess Bride,” because that’s a movie the kids will love, but the parents will get more out of it. And I think parents love to see their kids enjoying something. So adults will love this for themselves, and will love that their kids are enjoying it.

Are there any of your films that you feel like didn’t get the respect they deserved, or by contrast films that you didn’t think would do well that people just love?

Um, you know I didn’t realize when I made “Stand By Me” it wouldn’t do as well as it did. At the time there were only the four boys, and no stars in the movie, and I didn’t know that was going to do all that well. “When Harry Met Sally” was a surprise to me, and when I make a picture like “North,” which got such terrible reviews, wasn’t THAT bad of a movie. To me it was kind of a stunner it was received as poorly as it was. But you never know, you make films, and you try to do what you think is good, and sometimes people love it and sometimes people don’t, and it’s just part of what you do.

If you’ll excuse my fanboy moment, for me “The American President” is that film. I constantly try to quote that film and people look at me cross-eyed. My favorite line in that movie is when Michael Douglas walks in behind Annette Bening while she’s badmouthing him, and he says “let’s drag him out back and beat the shit out of him!” It never fails to crack me up.

Thank you very much. Someone told me Keith Olbermann quoted “The American President” in some commentary he was doing. I love it. People tell me all the time, when it comes on television they get into it. It’s one of my favorite movies of the ones I’ve done, because it combines comedy and romance and also politics, which are a lot of the things I really like.

Well, speaking of politics, is there anything you’re actively involved with right now?

Well, I’ve been involved in children’s issues for a long time and I still am, and we’re involved in a lot of civil rights things right now. There’s a court case to try to overturn Proposition 8 here in California, which was said to be unconstitutional by the California Supreme Court, then was an initiative passed that changed the California constitution, so now we’re trying to overturn that. To me it’s the last piece in the civil rights puzzle, which is to allow every segment of the population to have equality. That’s what I’m working on right now, but I always look for my spots. It’s tough right now. The political atmosphere is really poisoned right now. People are really more interested in partisanship and trying to score political points than they are trying to get things done, and it’s really sad. I really understand why the Tea Party came to be, not that I agree with it or support it, but people are just really angry with the system, which is not really serving anybody right now.

Now we have a sequel, of sorts, which has improved the sleekness of the computer-generated antics, but not the bone-headed approach to making kiddie flicks.

As near as I can determine, nobody involved with the first movie had anything to do with this one, other than Sean Hayes, Michael Clarke Duncan and a couple others reprising small roles voicing critters — essentially, they’re vocal walk-ons. Even the humans have been swapped out.

By the title, “Cats & Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore,” we might be led to believe that a dastardly arch-villain has returned to wreak more havoc. But no, Kitty Galore is a new creation, a hairless cat voiced by Bette Midler, and with an origin story that’s an homage/rip-off of the Joker’s.

Kitty wants to broadcast “The Call of the Wild,” a nefarious high-pitched recording that will drive all the world’s dogs mad, thus estranging them from their human companions, and leaving cats free to take over as, er, top dogs.

Nick Nolte provides the voice of Butch, the veteran dog agent (voiced by Alec Baldwin last time around) forced to partner up with Diggs (James Marsden), an accident-prone police K-9 recently recruited into the doggie agency. They’ve got fancy comm links in their dog houses, collars hiding lasers and lockpicks, and subterranean rocket transit tubes for high-speed travel to Dog World Headquarters.

Turns out the cats have their own spy outfit, Mousers Ensuring Our World’s Safety (I’ll let you figure it out), and Catherine (Christina Applegate) is their top agent. After briefly tangling with Diggs and Butch, she decides to join paws to foil Kitty’s evil plot.

Tagging along is Seamus (Katt Williams), a dodo-headed dove who turns out to be an unwitting stool pigeon, but mostly is one jive-talking turkey.

There’s a few occasional inspired moments. I liked the trapped room slowly filling with kitty litter. And a houseful of catnip-tripping kittens. And there’s a cookie after the end credits worth sticking around for.

But this is low-wattage entertainment aimed at very small children — kindergartners would likely grow impatient with it. It’s an unimaginative collection of shiny things, cute critters and goofy action meant to distract tykes for 82 minutes.

Call me catty, but I think we can do better by our kids, and our pets.

The 3-D effects are decent, but not worth the ticket upgrade. Though “Coyote Falls,” a new Road Runner cartoon preceding the movie, is a nostalgic treat.

2 Yaps

In the contest of films from 2010 that have a contrived and manipulative young romance with an inappropriate twist in it, Charlie St. Cloud wins a silver medal. Please note there are only two entries so far this year.

It will be very difficult for a movie to be lower than St. Cloud because this movie prides itself in being baby food. It used to be regular food, but it was meshed up and now its end result is just gross. Yet the film still insists on shoveling spoonful after spoonful at you, equipped with the condescending airplane noises.

Charlie St. Cloud (Zac Efron) is the greatest human being on the planet. He is the perfect yacht racer and the perfect brother to Sam (Charlie Tahan). Everyone around him keeps telling Charlie that he is going to go on to great and wonderful things. Sam keeps talking about how great they are together and how happy they are. Nothing can possibly go wrong!

Charlie makes a bizarre promise to Sam saying that every day at sunset he will play catch with him for one hour until he goes to Stanford. (Oh he’s also perfect at baseball.) They repeat this promise verbatim several times throughout the movie to further stress the point that nothing can possibly go wrong in their lives. So they get into a car accident and Sam dies. Charlie technically dies too, but the paramedic (Ray Liotta) doesn’t belief in lost causes and tries the defibrillator and that wakes up Charlie.

Not more than two movie minutes after Sam dies, Charlie runs into the woods out of angst and sees his ghost brother ready to play catch. The audience has no time to ever miss Sam, which would be difficult considering he was quite a brat throughout the movie. So Charlie plays catch with Sam FOR FIVE YEARS. That’s over 1800 games of catch.

During that time Charlie has become more emotionally unstable. His mom (Kim Basinger) moves for no particular reason. He doesn’t go to college and decides to work at the graveyard where his brother was buried. This is a very subtle movie. The town has noticed that Charlie has paused his life because of grief so every single character tells him this. Even the paramedic comes back and tells Charlie exactly what he needs to do with his life.

What he needs to do is fall in love and learn how to live again. He starts up a romance with Tess (Amanda Crew), a girl who is also excellent at sailing. (Not as good as Charlie though). She’s planning to sail around the world in a race. Before she goes she learns more about Charlie and a romance beings. By the way we learn that Charlie is a perfect cook, artist, and doctor. He’s also in perfect shape and is constantly shirtless. (Did you notice part of his name is “saint”?)

This movie is baby food because it doesn’t trust the audience at any point during the movie. Every line of dialog is used only for foreshadowing or bluntly repeating its message over and over and over again. In this world there is no such thing as subtext and this overt simplification ruins this movie.

A lot of people like to riff on Zac Efron, but I do believe that he is a good actor. He has a natural charisma and knows how to handle a strong range of emotions. He’s fine in this movie, but he’s forced to say lines that are hammier than anything he had to say in High School Musical. This is not the sort of movie to show off his skills, because it’s the worst type of character study. The characters in this film are Charlie St. Cloud and ensemble. There is not one other character that is even 2-demenisional. He can bounce or clash with anyone, because each character is designed only to give him blunt and repetitive advice.

Since I referenced it in the opening, there is a twist halfway thought this movie. It makes absolutely no sense and makes one scene incredibly inappropriate. It’s just gross, Splice gross.

1 Yap

America hates subtitles. You know why? Subtitles means reading and reading is for losers. This may not be true—hopefully this is not true, but it is what Hollywood thinks. That’s why whenever a foreign film becomes popular, there are quickly plans to remake it. This time all of the actors will be speaking English. Thankfully!

Most of the time Hollywood messes it up, but every once and awhile the right filmmaker knows how to respect the original. This allows them to make their own product that stands on its own while drawing from its new location to benefit the story. This makes me think of both versions of Insomnia and the trio of The Seven Samurai/The Magnificent Seven/A Bug’s Life.

So here’s a look at some recent and upcoming remakes and their foreign counterparts:

Nine Queens (2000)/Criminal (2004)

One of my all time favorite subgenre is the con artist film. Nine Queens (or Nueve reinas) does a very good job of constructing a situation where two thieves team up to pull off a con involving a set of stamps. It stars Ricard Darín who was great in the recent film The Secret in Their Eyes. He works so well with Gastón Pauls in that they can pull off cons together, but the audience still doesn’t know who to trust at one moment. A lot of the smaller cons have seen before in Paper Moon and the ending can be deduced if you’ve seen too many of them, but the ride is plenty of fun.

Criminal’s casting wasn’t as strong. I think John C. Reilly in the Darín part was very inspired, but Diego Luna never pulled off what Pauls was able to do in being very suspicious and keeping the cards to the table while still operating the cons. The original Argentian movie knew how to keep the movie flowing in a natural direction, while I think Criminal suffers from being a bit too rigid in setting up its ploys. It’s still entertaining and I appreciate it not just being a frame-for-frame copy.

Winner: Nine Queens

Infernal Affairs (2002)/The Departed (2006)

This is such a great concept, it’s a wonder that it hasn’t been done a million times before. Tony Leung (In the Mood For Love) plays a cop who goes undercover in the Traid society while Andy Lau is a Triad who is working his way through the police department. It’s a fantastic game of cat and mouse with brilliant set pieces. There’s one in particular that uses Morse code that is very suspenseful.

The Departed takes that concept and uses a lot of similar things, but adds a lot more. There are new themes of fathers and the role of the Catholic Church. (In a Scorsese film? No way!) It’s noted for having a very different ending from Infernal Affairs, but I think each ending works for their respected movies. There’s not a scene that can top the Morse code scene in the original, but the entire movie is amazing, ranking among Scorsese’s best in my mind.

Winner: Tie

REC (2007)/ Quarantine (2008)

One of the coolest horror films of the last decade was the Mexican movie REC. This follows in the vein of The Blair Witch Project where the entire movie is told through a handheld camera. The camera was used to shoot a fluff news piece about the late-shift firefighters. The reporter (played by Manuela Velasco) decides to hop along and they end up in an apartment complex where something is going bump in the night.  The entire place is put on lock down and then the thrills begin.

REC is not a very long movie, but knows how to perfectly pace it. It is a slow burn while they spend a long time at the firehouse, but even that builds up suspense. The American movie, Quarantine, copies the movie almost beat for beat but it doesn’t work. Maybe it’s because Jennifer Carpenter isn’t as charming as Velasco or maybe the budget was too big for it. The American apartment complex didn’t seem to have the same level of danger as the original. Very disappointing.

Winner: REC

The Dinner Game (1998)/Dinner For Schmucks (2010)

Now we’re into the upcoming category. I haven’t seen Dinner For Schmucks yet but you can see the Yap’s review for it up on the site on Friday. However I can already tell a ton of differences just from the trailer. The original movie introduces the concept of a cruel dinner party early on. A bunch of elitists find some idiots and bring them to dinner and makes fun of them. The one who brings the biggest idiot wins. Thierry Lhermitte thinks he’s struck gold with Jacques Villeret. However they can’t make it to the dinner because Lhermitte throws out his back and is stuck with his person idiot for the duration of the night. It’s not a great comedy, but it’s very enjoyable.

The trailers for this new version is rather odd. It looks like it’s taking all of the subtly of the original and going really broad. Seeing Steve Carell hit the windshield with the forced face is a bit embarrassing. I know I’m just basing it on early material, but a lot of the ads are showing the actual dinner and it’s crazy slapstick. It’s just weird to take a movie that was praised for being based in reality and going a complete opposite direction with it. Maybe the tone works, but right now I’m very hesitant.

Let the Right One In (2008)/Let Me In (2010)

One of my favorite films of the last decade was Let the Right One In. It’s this very creepy and brilliant vampire tale. It’s not a story of teenagers, but smaller children. A young girl moves in and she looks to be a nice companion for the weird boy next door. Yet she is a terrifying creature when she’s hungry. The film succeeds by being very intelligent with using small ways to unnerve the audience. Like having a lot of the scarier bits off screen or in the background.

Bringing the story to America seems to be an impossible task. One of the things that added to the creepiness was the vast Swedish atmosphere. However when they hired Matt Reeves as the director I had a bit of hope. I may be alone, but I loved his Cloverfield. Then they hired Chloe Moretz (Kick Ass’s Hit-Girl), Kodi Smit-McPhee (The Boy from The Road) and Richard Jenkins as the three leads. Then the first trailer came out and it looks like this movie will definitely not be an embarrassment, to say the least. There’s still a chance it may be too faithful to the original that it can’t stand on its own, but for now I’m looking forward to it.

So what are some of your favorite or hated movies that were based on a foreign film?