Tag: catch-up reviews

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Pivotal Film Selling Out Your Monkey

Dan Seeger

Taxi to the Dark Side (Alex Gibney, 2007). This Oscar winner for Best Documentary Feature catalogs and condemns the harsh treatment of prisoners in the Bush administration’s zealous “war on terror.” Gibney lays out the evidence of vicious abuse and clear-cut torture perpetrated by the American military at prisons in Afghanistan, Iraq and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Just as importantly–arguably even more importantly–he examines the ways in which the highest leaders created, encourages and perpetuated the environment for these horrendous practices and then casually, heartlessly blamed the enlisted men when the worst of it came to light. Like Charles Ferguson’s No … Continue reading Pivotal Film Selling Out Your Monkey

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And our silver screen affair, it weighs less to me than air

Dan Seeger

McCabe and Mrs. Miller (Robert Altman, 1971). There are many who consider this film to be the quintessential Altman effort, and it’s not hard to see why. The hallmarks of Altman’s legend are all there: the overlapping dialogue, the moral ambivalence, the richly-conceived characters. Most importantly and impressively, the film is a thrilling example of the ways in which Altman pulls all these elements of his craft together to give the sense of a fully developed culture and society. The film is focused on the main characters, but the entire frame ripples with life. You feel as if you know … Continue reading And our silver screen affair, it weighs less to me than air

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Oh the movie never ends, it goes on and on and on and on

Dan Seeger

Trouble the Water (Carl Deal and Tia Lessin, 2008). It would be easy to make a documentary about the devastation Hurricane Katrina brought to New Orleans and the equally disastrous governmental response that is grounded in apoplectic anger, especially since indignation seems to be the default starting point for many current non-fiction filmmakers. Deal and Lessin create something more delicate, more nuanced, more complicated, and, because of these qualities, far more fascinating. The hook of the film’s first half is on-the-scene camcorder footage taken by Ninth Ward resident Kimberly Rivers Roberts as her neighborhood and then her home floods during … Continue reading Oh the movie never ends, it goes on and on and on and on

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B movie, that’s all you are to me

Dan Seeger

Get Smart (Peter Segal, 2008). So mechanical that it quickly becomes depressing. This launch of a new film franchise based on the sixties TV spy spoof–it’s nearly impossible think of it in terms of a single film rather than the beginning of an ongoing endeavor–is assembled from repurposed parts and spectrum-spanning cast members designed to make sure there’s at least one person in the credits that appeals to any randomly selected potential moviegoer. Anne Hathaway, playing Agent 99, has one moment that she plays with admirable commitment to honest emotions. I’m assuming that her castmates consulted with her after that … Continue reading B movie, that’s all you are to me

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Wasting time, dropping lines like “I could get you into movies”

Dan Seeger

Atlantic City (Louis Malle, 1980). Malle’s film is about the ways in the which the glimmers of remaining light at the end of the day can lure the most desperate into believing it’s actually the unexpected emergence of a new dawn. Burt Lancaster plays the old-time small-timer at the heart of the film, conveying his forlorn desperation and self-deluding rejuvenation with great delicacy. You can feel the character shift as his opportunities the become the big operator he’s always fancied himself begin to come to pass. But the film is about reality rather than aspirations. Malle keeps it all grounded, … Continue reading Wasting time, dropping lines like “I could get you into movies”

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I dreamed i was in a hollywood movie and that I was the star of the movie, this really blew my mind

Dan Seeger

Somebody Up There Likes Me (Robert Wise, 1956). By all accounts, this is the film that made Paul Newman a star. The most intriguing thing about that is that his performance here has little of the charismatic verve that drove later work in films like Hud or Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. It’s a thick, meaty character piece as Newman plays boxer Rocky Graziano as his pummels his way from backstreet destitution to the heavyweight championship of the world. Newman brings integrity to his character’s brutishness, subsuming his natural sparkle in favor of a honest portrayal of simpler man. … Continue reading I dreamed i was in a hollywood movie and that I was the star of the movie, this really blew my mind

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Here comes the movies with dialogue so cool — why did they never tell me to speak like that in primary school?

Dan Seeger

Breaking and Entering (Anthony Minghella, 2006). Unexpectedly standing as the last feature film from Minghella, Breaking is evidence that we’ve lost someone from the dwindling population of directors interested in crafting films for grown-ups. With its tricky plot, its examination of delicate matters such as the growing chasm between economic classes and its unapologetic willingness to let the messiness of life seep into its framework, it’s hard to imagine that anyone ever expected this to become a substantial earner at the box office. Yet there it is, playing out with delicate insight and unfussy emotion. There’s a quiet ache to … Continue reading Here comes the movies with dialogue so cool — why did they never tell me to speak like that in primary school?

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Outside it’s a bright night, there’s an opera at Lincoln Center, movie stars arrive by limousine

Dan Seeger

Blow Out (Brian De Palma, 1981). De Palma is a fascinating figure to me. He emerged with the film school generation of the seventies, standing shoulder to shoulder with the likes of Scorsese, Coppola and Spielberg, indeed earning the most rapturous reviews bestowed upon any of them by the grand doyenne film critic of the era. To this day, there are a fleet of people who will proudly stand up and talk about every scrap of his output as if it were the needs to be studied with the unwavering attention usually reserved for the peak offerings of Welles or … Continue reading Outside it’s a bright night, there’s an opera at Lincoln Center, movie stars arrive by limousine

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Hollywood, you got a lot of pretty things, I saw a lot of movie stars with diamond rings

Dan Seeger

Divorce American Style (Bud Yorkin, 1967). I had my reasons for watching this, but expectations of quality wasn’t one of them. That’s fortuitous since hints of quality were hard to come by in this comedy steeped in creaky examination of social issues. Four years before he transformed television with All in the Family, Norman Lear copped an Oscar nomination (with Robert Kaufman) for penning this screenplay that centers on one man careening towards divorce from his combative wife. The film’s point of view is scattered and confused, seemingly in an attempt to cover every bit of ground in consideration of … Continue reading Hollywood, you got a lot of pretty things, I saw a lot of movie stars with diamond rings

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Like an old late movie show, you’ve seen it all before

Dan Seeger

The Other Boleyn Girl (Justin Chadwick, 2008). Chadwick’s feature directorial debut suffers from many of the problems that make costume dramas one of the most dreaded of film sub-genres. It shoves needlessly complicated castle intrigue to the forefront in place of thoughtful plotting and intricate characterization. It is marked by static visuals that accomplish little more than sustained examination of the efforts of the costume designers and art directors. And actors emote wildly, flinging words aimlessly at one another with little apparent interest in finding depth in the language. Simply, it entirely forgoes imagination and probing details in favor of … Continue reading Like an old late movie show, you’ve seen it all before