Tag Archives: movies

The Merchant of Venice

Posted by melydia on February 14, 2005 None comments

The Merchant of Venice: I’ve seen and read and participated in a fair amount of Shakespeare’s plays but was unfamiliar with this story. Al Pacino plays Shylock, a Jewish man who lends the Christian Antonio three thousand ducats at zero interest with the provision that if Antonio should forfeit, Shylock may cut off a pound of his flesh. In the meantime there are all kinds of amusements going on among the main lovers: Bossanio and Portia, Gratiano and Nerissa (Shakespeare was fond of double weddings). This was meant to be a comedy, after all, with Shylock being largely played as a bumbling fool. In a more anti-semitic time, I can imagine all this being quite humorous, even Shylock’s poor end: losing all his money, being forced to give up his religion, and watching his own daughter marry a Christian. Think of it this way: if Shylock was a Nazi instead of a Jew (since Nazis are one of the few remaining acceptable Bad Guy stereotypes), would we feel very sorry for his ruin?

Even so, this is a play at odds with itself. If Jews are meant to be portrayed as such loathesome creatures, why the famous monologue wherein Shylock talks about the similarities between Christians and Jews as men (“If you prick us, do we not bleed”)? If he’s supposed to be looked upon with such scorn, why include Shylock’s comparison between being merciful to Antonio at the forfeiture of his bond and the notion of showing mercy towards slaves? Perhaps the latter would be so preposterous that the crowds would have laughed, but today it serves as a powerfully dramatic moment. Such is the beauty of Shakespeare.

Regarding this specific version, I thought it was gorgeous. The costumes and sets were amazing and the acting was actually quite good. I liked the dichotomy between the merry antics of the lovers and the tortured and blindly vengeful acts of Shylock. I liked the quiet scenes tacked onto the end of Shylock standing in the rain and his daughter Jessica looking remorseful from Portia’s palace. In the end, there were no real heroes or villains. Shakespeare, though perhaps unintentionally this time, has once again provided us with characters of such depth, such complexity, that they become truly human.

Drugstore Cowboy

Posted by melydia on January 21, 2005 None comments

Drugstore Cowboy: Bob is a junkie in the early 1970s who robs pharmacies to get the drugs. He and his friends inject everything they take, then rob another drugstore before the effects wear off, thus ensuring they are more or less perpetually high. There is some humor and some tragedy, but I was less moved by the story than by the situation. This film has a similar feel to it as Trainspotting, minus the thick accents and statutory rape, which leaves the viewer marveling at the fact that there are actually people who spend their lives this way. Such a waste, but it makes for a decent movie. And for God’s sake, man, don’t leave that fucking hat on the bed!

House of Flying Daggers

Posted by melydia on January 16, 2005 None comments

House of Flying Daggers: To quote a truly apropos user comment, “It’s An Action Flick! It’s A Love Story! It’s A Date Movie!” I can’t really explain the story very well without giving away most of the plot twists, so suffice it to say that this movie contains amazingly choreographed martial arts against a backdrop of absolutely gorgeous scenery, with a Romeo & Juliet style romance interlaced throughout. As long as you can accept that this film is more a feast for the eyes than anything else – and that Chinese people are impervious to stab wounds – this movie is worth seeing. Just don’t come looking for an original, actor-driven plot; you’ve seen all these characters before.

Singin’ in the Rain

Posted by melydia on January 16, 2005 None comments

Singin’ in the Rain: The word “classic” is overused. When I watch a movie that’s supposed to be a classic, I expect an engrossing story and likeable characters – sheer entertainment, basically. A classic should be able to make such guarantees. Happily, that is exactly what I got with this famous musical. The film is set in 1927, right at the introduction of the talkies. The story revolves around a famous silent film actress whose voice is absolutely terrible (and hysterical), so in order to ensure her smooth transitions into talkies, a chorus girl is hired to dub over her voice. With the exception of a lengthy dance number in “Broadway Melody” that kind of drags on (much like the movie it parodies, An American in Paris), the entire film is smart, witty, and a delight to watch. I confess to a pre-existing love of tap dancing, but I did not expect to laugh out loud as much as I did. The first take of “The Dueling Cavalier” as a talkie is a true highlight of the film. What happened to comedies that aren’t vulgar? What happened to subtly funny lines tossed off casually, so quick you almost miss them? Luckily, they’re still available on DVD.

Quick quick

Posted by melydia on November 30, 2004 None comments

Too lazy to read the book? Too busy to see the movie? They’ve got you covered.

National Treasure

Posted by melydia on November 24, 2004 None comments

National Treasure: This, my friends, is a very silly movie. It tries to be Indiana Jones meets The Da Vinci Code: Nicolas Cage plays a man attempting to find an ancient treasure which was hidden from the British back in the Revolutionary War, the map to which is supposedly on the back of the Declaration of Independence. Believe it or not, the premise is far from the most ridiculous part of this film.

I laughed every time someone pulled a fact or a theory out of thin air and it ended up being exactly the correct interpretation of the clue (apparently practice makes perfect: they took 30 years to puzzle out the meaning of “the secret lies with charlotte” and maybe a week to get the rest). I laughed even harder at the logical errors: more than once I wondered, “How would he have known about that?” Ah, but the biggest was the scientific errors. My personal favorite was the clocktower, the shadow of which was supposed to fall on the location of some vital clue when the clock struck a certain time. However, what the writers failed to realize is that the Earth travels around the sun: the clocktower’s shadow would only fall in that precise location at that particular time of day once a year. How lucky for Nicolas Cage that he happened to show up just at the right time.

Ah, but it was a fun movie. Surprisingly few explosions (for a Bruckheimer film) but plenty of amusing banter and entertaining plot holes. It’s cheesy and formulaic, in that I called the Love Interest, the Witty Sidekick, and whenever something was about to explode or otherwise fall apart at the Worst Possible Moment, but National Treasure remains a solidly entertaining film.

Team America: World Police

Posted by melydia on October 24, 2004 None comments

Team America: World Police: In a word, funny. If you like watching marionettes get blown up, mauled, shot, and torn apart, this is the film for you. The political humor was also amusing as hell, and was much less partisan than I’d been expecting. In fact, there was a refreshing absence of Kerry and Bush. Its main point was that actors are no more relevant in the political scene than any of us unfamous schmoes, and there’s no reason to value their opinions more than anybody else. The parts that I found funniest, however, poked fun at action movies as a whole. The dialogue was fittingly silly and delivered with standard melodrama. The music really capped the whole experience, from the montage song (played over a montage) to the generic sappy patriotic country song reminding us that “freedom costs a buck-o-five.” If you are overly fond of Michael Moore, Alec Baldwin, or any of the politically mouthy Hollywood set, you might be offended by this movie. But come on: they’re puppets! Being blown up! That’s cinematic quality right there.

Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow

Posted by melydia on September 20, 2004 None comments

Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow: We’ll start with my complaints. First off, the film, though fantasy, was set in 1939. Two historical inaccuracies jumped out at me: a reference to World War I (it would have been called The Great War at that point), and a knowledge of the dangers of radiation (if that was known, why were we testing atom bombs on our own soil for years hence?). Second, the homages to other films (James Bond, Laputa, and Star Wars, to name a few) were frequent and a little distracting. Third, there were huge plot holes (though I’ve been assured that that’s just part of the old school adventure genre), plus further evidence that replacing Jude Law with Ewan McGregor would be a vast improvement to any film. That said, there was much I liked about this movie as well. The visual effects were stunning, the action was exciting, and the humor was charming. The characters, though flat (also part of the genre), were entertaining and pretty (despite a flagrant underuse of Angelina Jolie). All in all, I felt like I was watching something on Turner Classic Movies: engaging and nostalgic, but still just a movie.

American Psycho

Posted by melydia on August 23, 2004 None comments

American Psycho (unrated version): This movie was described to me as a film that you laugh at, then feel bad for laughing. The story is carried entirely by Christian Bale, a 1980s executive with homicidal tendencies. His over-the-top pretension and metrosexuality are funny, as are his absurdly detailed lectures about popular music, which are only spouted just before he brutally murders someone.

Did I laugh? In parts, though not as much as my fellow audience members. Bale pulled off the psycho yuppie role well. Unfortunately, every one else in the cast was pretty uninteresting, just so much scenery. Which may have been how it was meant, but I still felt a nagging disappointment in the underuse of people like Willem Dafoe as the detective. To top it all off, the ending leaves you with a “what in God’s name just happened here?” feeling, which I personally find unsatisfying. I don’t mind being confused throughout the story, but if things don’t get tied up at the end I leave with a lingering doubt, wondering if I just wasted two hours of my life.

Equilibrium

Posted by melydia on July 21, 2004 None comments

Equilibrium: With the huge success of The Matrix, it is not surprising that this film did not do well commercially. It contains some similar elements, including widespread mind control (though in this film it is acknowledged and voluntary), really awesome fighting (though with camera tricks and choreography instead of cop-out CG), and lots of black clothing. Critics also weren’t too fond of it. The entire idea of the film was a bit much: because emotions cause war and suffering and hate, let’s do away with them using a drug called Prozium. Okay, that’s fine, but the fact that they had a government-run group of uber-fighters to destroy paintings and pets and music and anything else that might cause feelings threatened my suspension of disbelief a bit. If they’re taking a drug to prevent emotions, why get rid of all the colorful stuff? People won’t care either way.

But if you can swallow that, you’ll enjoy this film. The dialogue can be melodramatic at times but attains its goal of multiple memorable lines and exchanges. Though it’s incredibly violent (with a body count of 236, more people die in this film than any other non-War movie to date), the fighting is flat out awesome. The soundtrack is excellent. And while many critics accused it of making grandiose, hackneyed Orwellian warnings about too much government control, I saw it from a different angle. The name of the drug, Prozium, was a clever blend of Prozac and Valium, both popular medicines for reducing negative emotions. We forget that it is human nature to be unhappy from time to time. Society expects us to be constantly happy and confident but that’s just not how we’re built. Emotions are part of what separate us from animals. Without emotion we have no drive to better ourselves. The society in Equilibrium had reached exactly that; it had become a collection of stagnant, circular lives that exist only to eat, breed, and die. Nothing changing, nothing tipping the balance either way. Perfect equilibrium.

« Previous page | Next page »

utter randomonium