Review: Pam Grier is Radiant in "JACKIE BROWN," Tarantino's Best (Maybe) Film

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 77 of 2022 (No. 1889) by Leroy Douresseaux

Jackie Brown (1997)

Running time:  154 minutes (2 hours, 34 minutes)

MPAA – R for strong language, some violence, drug use and sexuality

DIRECTOR:  Quentin Tarantino

WRITER:  Quentin Tarantino (based upon the novel by Elmore Leonard)

PRODUCER:  Lawrence Bender

CINEMATOGRAPHER:  Guillermo Navarro

EDITOR:  Sally Menke

Academy Award nominee

DRAMA/CRIME

Starring:  Pam Grier, Samuel L. Jackson, Robert Forster, Bridget Fonda, Michael Keaton, Robert De Niro, Michael Bowen, Chris Tucker, LisaGay Hamilton, Tom Lister, Jr., Hattie Winston, Sid Haig, Aimee Graham, Tangie Ambrose, and T'Keyah Crystal Keymah

Jackie Brown is a 1997 drama and crime film from writer-director Quentin Tarantino.  It is based on Elmore Leonard's 1992 novel, Rum Punch.  Jackie Brown the movie focuses on a flight attendant who schemes with an aging bail bondsman in a bid to defeat both the ATF and her boss who smuggles guns into Mexico.

Jackie Brown introduces 44-year-old, Jackie Brown (Pam Grier), a flight attendant for the low-budget Mexican airline, Cabo Air.  She smuggles money from Mexico into the United States for her (kind of) boss, Ordell Robbie (Samuel L. Jackson), a gun runner in Los Angeles.  One day, Ordell's courier, Beaumont Livingston (Chris Tucker), is arrested, and he snitches about Ordell's business.

Acting on that information, LAPD Detective Mark Dargus (Michael Bowen) and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) agent, Ray Nicolette (Michael Keaton), intercept Jackie while she is returning with some of Ordell's cash, with a small bag of cocaine thrown in.  Dargus and Nicolette use the cocaine to threaten Jackie with serious criminal charges and hard prison time.

Ordell hires bail bondsman, Max Cherry (Robert Forster), of Cherry Bail Bonds, to bail Jackie out of jail.  Feeling trapped between Ordell and the law, Jackie conspires with Max to pretend to give both sides what they want – Ordell the money and the ATF Ordell.  If this heist works, Jackie and Max will secure her future with half a million dollars of Ordell's money.

Jackie Brown is obviously writer-director Quentin Tarantino's ode to 1970s blaxploitation films.  The film is also a star vehicle that Tarantino created for the actress playing the title role in Jackie Brown, the great Pam Grier.  She starred in some of the most fondly remembered and popular blaxploitation films, most notably Coffy (1973) and Foxy Brown (1974).  The roles in those two films obviously inspired the role of “Jackie Brown,” although “Flower Child Coffin” a.k.a “Coffy” (of Coffy) and Foxy Brown are action heroes.  Instead, Tarantino makes Jackie Brown a world-weary woman, not an action hero, but a working woman willing to take the action that will help her make her way in the world.

Grier plays Jackie Brown with subtlety and grace, making Jackie comfortable in her skin.  Her sexiness is not forced, but radiates from her, buoyed by her confidence.  Grier makes it seem quite genuine that Brown would one day finally have enough with getting the crappy end of the stick in life.  Jackie takes a chance, and with nothing to lose, she works her magic.  Grier also works her magic, and the audience can believe that she is going to pull off this implausible heist of Ordell's money and also trick the ATF and LAPD by giving them only some of what they want.  Here, Grier gives the best performance of her career, and it is a shame that Hollywood has under-utilized her amazing talent and screen presence.

I have not seen enough of his performances to say that Max Cherry is actor Robert Forster's best performance of his career.  Playing Max revitalized Forster's career, which was mostly stalled at the time.  With charming stoicism, Forster perfectly plays the calm, wise, and a little weary, Max Cherry, one of the most perfect characters that Tarantino ever wrote.  Forster also convinces us that he has so totally fallen for Jackie Brown that he is willing to do everything she wants even if it is everything that he should not do.

I also think that Ordell Robbie is Samuel Jackson's best performance.  Ordell is an example of what would become the stereotypical Samuel L. Jackson character – the menacing, bad-ass Black man who loves to shoot people and curse up a storm.  However, Jackson makes Ordell a man full of angles and twists.  He is coarse with a trashy sophistication; he is menacing, but sentimental in odd ways.  He is not nearly as smart as he thinks he is, so he is ultimately a cheap hood with enough low-rent ambitions to make himself a doomed idiot.

Tarantino uses Grier, Forster, and Jackson's performances and those of several others (Robert De Niro, Bridget Fonda, and Michael Keaton) to give his usual style, wit, humor, and rapid-fire bravado traction and depth.  Jackie Brown does not have the snappy banter nor the nonlinear antics of Tarantino's previous film, Pulp Fiction.  Jackie Brown's narrative is a straight story, Tarantino's most substantive film to date.  It may be an ode to blaxploitation and also a smooth heist film, but most of all, Jackie Brown is a character drama.  With a superb soundtrack behind it (focusing on “The Delfonics” 1969 classic song, “Didn't I (Blow Your Mind This Time)”), Tarantino uses a slow pace to weave a delightful Los Angeles crime story about the criminal things people do when they are desperate … or in love.

I think that Quentin Tarantino and Pam Grier are a match made in cinematic heaven.  2022 is the twenty-fifth anniversary of Jackie Brown's original theatrical release (December 8, 1997).  Jackie Brown has aged well, and for me, it gets better every time I watch it.

10 of 10

A+

Friday, December 30, 2022

NOTES:

1998 Academy Awards, USA:  1 nomination: “Best Actor in a Supporting Role” (Robert Forster)

1998 Golden Globes, USA:  2 nominations: “Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture-Comedy or Musical” (Pam Grier) and “Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture-Comedy or Musical” (Samuel L. Jackson)

1998 Image Awards (NAACP):  1 nominations:  “Outstanding Lead Actress in a Motion Picture” (Pam Grier)

The text is copyright © 2022 Leroy Douresseaux. All Rights Reserved. Contact this blog or site for reprint or syndication rights and fees.

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Review "Murder at 1600" Surprises (Happy B'day, Diane Lane)

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 10 (of 2002) by Leroy Douresseaux

Murder at 1600 (1997)
Running time:  107 minutes (1 hour, 47 minutes)
MPAA – R for sexuality, violence and some language
DIRECTOR:  Dwight H. Little
WRITERS:  Wayne Beach and David Hodgin
PRODUCERS:  Arnold Kopelson and Arnon Milchan
CINEMATOGRAPHER:  Steven Bernstein (D.o.P.)
EDITORS:  Leslie Jones and Billy Weber
COMPOSER:  Christopher Young

DRAMA/CRIME/THRILLER with elements of action

Starring:  Wesley Snipes, Diane Lane, Daniel Benzali, Dennis Miller, Alan Alda, Ronny Cox, Diane Baker, Tate Donovan, and Harris Yulin

The subject of this movie review is Murder at 1600, a 1997 crime and detective thriller from director Dwight H. Little and starring Wesley Snipes and Diane Lane.  The film follows a homicide detective and a secret service agent as they try to unravel the conspiracy surrounding a young female staffer found dead in a White House wash room.

Washington D. C. Police Homicide Detective Harlan Regis (Wesley Snipes) gets a call that there has been a murder at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, the address of the White House.  When he arrives, he discovers the body of a slain young woman, and it is obvious that the Secret Service has already tampered with and removed evidence from the crime scene.  He immediately suspects a cover up.

Through a lot of effort, he eventually convinces Secret Service Agent Nina Chance (Diane Lane) to join him in the murder investigation.  From that point, they operate through a myriad of roadblocks and obstacles.  They are constantly on the run from murderous pursuers and others intent on stopping the investigation.  Raising the intensity level, the murder occurs during a touchy international incident between the United States and North Korea.

Directed by veteran helmsman Dwight H. Little (episodes of “The Practice” and Free Willy 2: The Adventure Home), Murder at 1600 is a surprisingly intriguing and exciting movie.  With elements of suspense, mystery, and drama, it is something of a thriller and an action movie.  Little expertly paces them film so that there is never a dull moment.  Something’s always just around the corner, and some seemingly nefarious person is always in the next room.  Add the element of government paid snipers and assassins, and the result is a nice edge of your seat picture - a chase movie for grown ups.

The writers Wayne Beach and the late David Hodgin do a wonderful job creating a single plot line that neatly divides into other interesting plot lines.  Very little is thrown away in this movie.  Like a classic whodunit, the suspects and motives pile on, but not like crap on the wall.  Rather, it’s like a complex puzzle, with not too many pieces, for the viewer it’s an engaging challenge to put together.

Wesley Snipes has always wanted to be an action movie badass, but his gift is in his untapped acting talent.  His rock solid good looks and thespian skills make him a natural leading man in the old Hollywood tradition (Kirk Douglas or Humphrey Bogart).  Like them, he is best in dramas that are suspenseful and intriguing.  He carries this movie on his strong shoulders even when the movie action becomes implausible.

Diane Lane (“Lonesome Dove”) is also another surprise.  She is a natural beauty, more earthy than doll-like without a model’s overdone and artificial looks.  She’s a woman’s woman – gritty and determined to do her job.  Her Nina Chance is the ideal partner to Snipes' Regis.  She isn’t the typical action movie female baggage; she holds her own, and she gets to pull Regis out of the fire a few times.

Ronny Cox as President Jack Neil and Alan Alda as Alvin Jordan, National Security Advisor are very good and quite intense in their parts.  Both are seemingly determined and over anxious to “be real” in their parts.  Dennis Miller makes a light add-on to the story and manages to serve a function, but nothing, not even his light part, hurts this movie.

Murder at 1600 isn’t by any means great, but it is very good and somewhat smart entertainment.  The last fifteen minutes or so is an exercise in the implausible, and is often inadvertently funny.  However, there is something to be said for making a movie that could have been bad quite enjoyable.

6 of 10
B

Updated: Wednesday, January 22, 2014


The text is copyright © 2014 Leroy Douresseaux. All Rights Reserved. Contact this site for syndication rights and fees.

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Review: "Chasing Amy" is Worth Chasing (Happy B'day, Kevin Smith)

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 107 (of 2005) by Leroy Douresseaux

Chasing Amy (1997)
Running time:  113 minutes (1 hour, 53 minutes)
MPAA – R for strong graphic sex related dialogue, language, sexuality, and drug content
WRITER/DIRECTOR:  Kevin Smith
PRODUCER:  Scott Mosier
CINEMATOGRAPHER:  David Klein (D.o.P.)
EDITORS:  Kevin Smith and Scott Mosier
COMPOSER:  David Pirner
Golden Globe nominee

COMEDY/ROMANCE/DRAMA

Starring:  Ben Affleck, Joey Lauren Adams, Jason Lee, Dwight Ewell, and Jason Mewes

The subject of this movie review is Chasing Amy, a 1997 romantic comedy and drama from writer-director Kevin Smith.  It is the third movie in Smith’s world of films known as the “View Askewniverse.”  The film follows two young men who are comic book artists and a third comic book artist, a young woman, who catches the attention of one of the young men.

Writer/director Kevin Smith wowed audiences with his debut film, Clerks, and promptly stumbled with the problematic follow up, Mallrats.  The promise of the first film was more than met with Smith’s third film, the frankly sexually political Chasing Amy.

Comic book artist Holden McNeil (Ben Affleck) has been looking for the perfect woman and falls for Alyssa Jones (Joey Lauren Adams, who received a 1998 Golden Globe nomination for “Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Comedy/Musical”), who, much to his disappointment, turns out to be a lesbian.  Still, Holden and Alyssa build a special relationship, but it threatens to come tumbling down when Holden’s long-time friend and comic book collaborator, Banky Edwards (Jason Lee, 1998 Independent Spirit Award “Best Supporting Male”), digs up some awful dirt on Alyssa.

It would be easy to call Chasing Amy (Independent Spirit Award for “Best Feature”) outrageous because of its subject matter, and though some of the humor is outrageously funny, the film takes a painfully intimate and detailed look at sexual politics.  Same sex relationships, sexual experimentation, promiscuity, gender roles, stereotypes, role playing, bigotry, double-standards, and pretty much everything related to the world of intimate relationships Kevin Smith throws on the table in his delightfully written, delectable, engaging, and witty script.  The acting is good, and Smith’s direction is unobtrusive, allowing the cast to gradually warm up to their roles and make the film their own.  The cast is at ease with the material and understands it shocking well; they make this story work on the screen.  However, in the end, the strength is in Smith’s thoughtful script (Independent Spirit Award for “Best Screenplay”), which unashamedly looks at the minefield that is love between a man and a woman in a time when so many go into new relationships with a lot of sexual experience and/or a lot of hang-ups about what is right and true.  This is brilliant work.

8 of 10
A

NOTES:
1998 Golden Globes, USA:  1 nomination: “Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Comedy/Musical” (Joey Lauren Adams)

Thursday, July 7, 2005

Updated:  Friday, August 02, 2013

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Review: "The Lost World: Jurassic Park" is Both Different and Good

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 26 (of 2013) by Leroy Douresseaux

The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997)
Running time: 129 minutes (2 hours, 9 minutes)
MPAA – PG-13 for intense sci-fi terror and violence
DIRECTOR: Steven Spielberg
WRITERS: David Koepp (from a novel The Lost World by Michael Crichton)
PRODUCERS: Gerald R. Molen and Colin Wilson
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Janusz Kaminski
EDITOR: Michael Kahn
COMPOSER: John Williams
Academy Award nominee

SCI-FI/ACTION/ADVENTURE/THRILLER

Starring: Jeff Goldblum, Julianne Moore, Pete Postlethwaite, Arliss Howard, Richard Attenborough, Vince Vaughn, Vanessa Lee Chester, Richard Schiff, Peter Stormare, Harvey Jason, Ariana Richards, and Joseph Mazzello

The subject of this movie review is The Lost World: Jurassic Park, a 1997 science fiction adventure film and thriller from director Steven Spielberg. It is the sequel to the 1993 film, Jurassic Park. The Lost World: Jurassic Park is loosely based on the 1995 novel, The Lost World, from author Michael Crichton. The first film is based on Crichton’s 1990 novel, Jurassic Park.

The Lost World: Jurassic Park opens four years after the events depicted in the first film. The story focuses on Dr. Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum), a mathematician, chaos theorist, and one of the survivors of the disaster at Jurassic Park (located on the island of Isla Nublar). Ian is invited to the home of John Hammond (Richard Attenborough), the billionaire industrialist who created Jurassic Park. Hammond has lost control of his company, InGen, to his unscrupulous nephew, Peter Ludlow (Arliss Howard). Hammond asks Ian to lead a team to Isla Sorna; also known as “Site B,” this is where he initially engineered the dinosaurs before moving them to Jurassic Park.

Isla Sorna has become a “lost world,” where dinosaurs have been living free in the wild. Hammond wants the island to become a nature preserve. He needs a team to document the dinosaurs in their natural habitat, documentation Hammond hopes to use to rally support for the creation of a nature preserve. Ian initially refuses, as he has his daughter, Kelly Curtis Malcolm (Vanessa Lee Chester), in his custody. Ian changes his mind and rushes to the island when he learns that his girlfriend, Dr. Sarah Harding (Julianne Moore), is part of the team and is already on the island. Once on Isla Sorna, Ian discovers many unexpected visitors to an island full of unpredictable dinosaurs.

The Lost World: Jurassic Park is the only one of the three Jurassic Park films that I did not see during its theatrical release. When it was first released in 1997, I thought about seeing it, but a friend of mine (Pete) told me he hated it. I did see The Lost World when it first arrived on VHS, and though I liked the movie, I could see that it paled in comparison to Jurassic Park: the movie, memories of it, and the feelings it evoked. Since I first saw The Lost World, I have seen it countless other times (as with Jurassic Park). I have either liked it or had mixed feelings, leaning towards the positive, about it. Recently, I have started to like The Lost World more and more with each viewing.

The Lost World and the original Jurassic Park are different films. Jurassic Park is a fantasy adventure, wearing a genre suit that is half science fiction-techno thriller and half action thriller. In spite of its violence and intense elements, Jurassic Park is a family film and juvenile fantasy filled with a sense of wonder and discovery. The Lost World is an adult drama that is part monster movie, part science fiction adventure, and part action-thriller.

The Lost World does not have a sense of wonder and discovery about it. It is darker, where its forebear is light and magical (thanks to the magic of Hollywood visual and special effects). The Lost World is the dark side of the mess adults make of the world with their corporations, schemes, mistakes, and even good intentions. Where is the fun in that? As scary and amazing as the Velociraptors are in the Jurassic Park, they’re just filthy, nasty, ugly things that need to be killed in The Lost World. Even the cameo appearance of Jurassic Park’s child stars, Ariana Richards and Joseph Mazzello, as, respectively, Lex and Tim Murphy, only serves to remind that this movie is something different from the first movie.

I think when you accept what The Lost World is and also is not (Jurassic Park), you can really enjoy the sequel. I think it is a fine movie, although not the all-time great I think Jurassic Park is. I am also glad that Jeff Goldblum appears in The Lost World. The third film, Jurassic Park III, clearly misses Goldblum’s acerbic, but resourceful Dr. Ian Malcolm. He is the main reason I have come to really like The Lost World: Jurassic Park and why I’ll probably watch it again… soon.

8 of 10
A

NOTES:
1998 Academy Awards, USA: 1 nomination: “Best Effects, Visual Effects” (Dennis Muren, Stan Winston, Randy Dutra, and Michael Lantieri)

1998 Image Awards: 1 nomination: “Outstanding Youth Actor/Actress” (Vanessa Lee Chester)

1998 Razzie Awards: 3 nominations: “Worst Reckless Disregard for Human Life and Public Property,” “Worst Remake or Sequel,” and “Worst Screenplay” (David Koepp)

Sunday, April 07, 2013

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Review: "Batman and Robin" or Badman and Rotten

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 81 (of 2003) by Leroy Douresseaux

Batman and Robin (1997)
Running time: 125 minutes (2 hours, 5 minutes)
MPAA – PG-13 for strong stylized action and some innuendos
DIRECTOR: Joel Schumacher
WRITER: Akiva Goldsman (based upon the Batman character created by Bob Kane and Bill Finger)
PRODUCER: Peter Macgregor-Scott
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Stephen Goldblatt (D.o.P.)
EDITORS: Mark Stevens and Dennis Virkler
COMPOSER: Elliot Goldenthal

SUPERHERO/ACTION/ADVENTURE/FAMILY

Starring: Arnold Schwarzenegger, George Clooney, Chris O’Donnell, Uma Thurman, Alicia Silverstone, Michael Gough, Pat Hingle, John Glover, Elle Macpherson, Vivica A. Fox, Coolio, Nicky Katt, and Jeep Swenson

Until there is a fourth sequel, the third sequel to the 1989 box office smash Batman, Batman and Robin will be considered the film that killed the modern Batman film franchise. It’s not as if there is nothing redeemable about this film in particular because it has some good story elements. Batman and Robin is awful simply because it is over-produced. It is as ostentatious as a lavishly decorated and spectacularly colorful Mardi Gras or drag ball.

Batman (George Clooney) and Robin (Chris O’Donnell) face the combined forces of Mr. Freeze (Arnold Schwarzenegger) and Poison Ivy (Uma Thurman). Complicating matters is a rivalry that has grown between the Dynamic Duo. Robin/Dick Grayson wants to do his own thing, and although he understands his young friend’s quest for independence, Batman/Bruce Wayne thinks the young man has a lot to learn, and that he, Bruce, is the teacher, and that the boy should listen. Poison Ivy picks up on this and plays the partners against one another. More trouble arrives in the form of Wayne Manor butler Alfred Pennyworth’s (Michael Gough) niece Barbara Wilson (Alicia Silverstone) who eventually becomes Batgirl.

Everything is overdone in this movie except for the script and the acting, both of which seem neglected. The art direction is as over-the-top sweet as high fructose corn syrup, and the costumes are high camp. Clowns wouldn’t want them, and trick-or-treaters wouldn’t be caught dead in them. The script is poor when it comes to internal logic and consistency. For example, how does Poison Ivy create that ridiculously fancy lair of hers? Where does it come from, and what’s the point of it? It’s just another over-dressed set. I could suspend disbelief if that, along with so much else, just didn’t seem…well, stupid, dumb, and tactless.

The acting is also over the top and bad. At times, Arnold Schwarzenegger seems to revert to the skill (or lack thereof) he showed in his early films. George Clooney, though earnest, is very weak as both Bruce Wayne and Batman. Batman needs to carry the movie, but Clooney struggles with poor material, and that’s made worse by the fact that he doesn’t have a grasp of what he’s supposed to do. It’s like the whole time he was running around the movie wondering just what the hell a “Batman” was. Also, it is high time to drop the use of sexual innuendo is Batman films. It’s not funny, and the dialogue is so hackneyed that these “naughty bits” fall flat when delivered by actors who are already being way too campy. I’m not saying that Batman needs to be so dark and serious, but nor should it be played as a bad joke.

However, there are good elements in the story: Mr. Freeze’s quest to save his wife, Poison Ivy’s machinations against Freeze and the Dynamic Duo, Alfred’s illness, Batman dealing with Robin’s growing pains, and the emphasis on family in the story. But it’s all tossed aside in favor of throwing tons of garish crap against the wall in hopes that something will stick; in the end, almost nothing does. The movie is almost a total failure from top to bottom, and it’s frustrating because it could have been something good. Director Joel Schumacher is not without some directorial skill and screenwriter Akiva Goldsman is one of Hollywood’s top scribes.

What we get in this movie is an overblown and wild spectacle made by people who cynically believed that enough people would pay to see this movie no matter how abysmal it was because they just have to see the next installment in the Batman franchise. And that worked to an extent, but many of their ticket buyers left as unsatisfied customers. If Warner Bros. wants to make shit, it’s no skin of my nose. There are always other action movies, always another action blast out, even if it’s from Warner’s own stable.

2 of 10
D

NOTES:
1998 Razzie Awards: 1 win: “Worst Supporting Actress” (Alicia Silverstone); 10 nominations: “Worst Picture” (Peter Macgregor-Scott), “Worst Director” (Joel Schumacher), “Worst Original Song” (Billy Corgan for the song "The End is The Beginning is The End"), “Worst Reckless Disregard for Human Life and Public Property,” “Worst Remake or Sequel,” “Worst Screen Couple” (George Clooney and Chris O'Donnell), “Worst Screenplay” (Akiva Goldsman), “Worst Supporting Actor” (Chris O'Donnell), “Worst Supporting Actor” (Arnold Schwarzenegger), and “Worst Supporting Actress” (Uma Thurman)

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First "Men in Black" Still Fresh and Original

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 19 (of 2003) by Leroy Douresseaux


Men in Black (1997)
Running time: 98 minutes (1 hour, 38 minutes)
MPAA – PG-13 for language and sci-fi violence
DIRECTOR: Barry Sonnenfeld
WRITER: Ed Solomon, from a screenstory by Ed Solomon (based upon a comic book by Lowell Cunningham)
PRODUCERS: Laurie MacDonald and Walter F. Parkes
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Don Peterman (D.o.P.)
EDITOR: Jim Miller
COMPOSER: Danny Elfman
Academy Award winner

SCI-FI/FANTASY/COMEDY/ACTION

Starring: Tommy Lee Jones, Will Smith, Linda Fiorentino, Vincent D’Onofrio, Rip Torn, and Tony Shalhoub

The subject of this movie review is Men in Black, the 1997 science fiction comedy film directed by Barry Sonnenfeld. Starring Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones, it focuses on a secret organization that monitors and polices the alien population that secretly lives on Earth. Steven Spielberg is the executive producer of Men in Black, which is based on the comic book created by Lowell Cunningham) as his production company, Amblin Entertainment, is one of the studios that produced the film.

I don’t watch many movies twice; I watch even fewer thrice. Movies that earn multiple viewings really have to entertain me, and much to my surprise, Men in Black is one of those movies. It is certainly one of the few examples of science fiction and comedy blended to make a great film. From the opening strains of Danny Elfman’s score over the credits, I realized that I was in for something special, something that combined some of my favorite forms of entertainment: B movies, EC Comics, weird and pseudo science fiction, alien conspiracies, monsters, wry comedy and black humor.

In the world of this movie, a secret organization, the Men in Black (who identify themselves to civilians as INS agents) monitor and regulate the presence of alien visitors and other world immigrants on earth. When his partner “retires,” Agent K (Tommy Lee Jones) recruits a new partner, James Edwards (Will Smith), a brash young cop who showed excellent skill and much courage in the pursuit of an alien. After Edwards agrees to join, he must give up his identity; MiB literally erases everything that proved Edwards existed, and Edwards becomes Agent J.

Their first mission together is to find a dangerous alien “bug,” Edgar (Vincent D’ Onofrio) who seeks to possess a mysterious universe that is hidden somewhere in Manhattan, and, to keep him from getting it, a powerful race of aliens is ready to destroy the earth.

Director Barry Sonnenfeld was the perfect, though not the first, choice for this film. A former cinematographer (Raising Arizona, Misery), Sonnenfeld’s films always look gorgeous, and here he is abetted by MiB’s director of photography Don Peterman, who worked with Sonnenfeld on Addams Family Values and Get Shorty. Peterman captures the look and feel of low budget sci-fi film from the 1940’s and 50’s and the sparse look of such cult classics and The Brother from Another Planet and Buckaroo Banzai, while giving film a glossy, pretty look. Between director and photographer, they manage to make the film look like it belongs in the genres to which it aspires; this makes for a convincing and atmospheric film that feels right. At times, it is a sci-fi adventure, a detective story, a monster movie, and a horror film, but it never looks like an expensive, over produced Hollywood film, which it is.

The performances are excellent. Jones as Agent K is the consummate old veteran, and Linda Fiorentino as the morgue minder Dr. Laurel Weaver brings a wry and cynical sense of humor to the film. However, the actor who carries this film and sells it both as a wacky sci-fi film and as a funny movie is Will Smith.

Prejudiced science fiction and comic book fans often given short shrift to African American actors in genre films. The adventurous pasts and mysterious futures of sci-fi are often bereft of people of color, especially people of brown and darker hues. For years, racist fans blamed Richard Pryor for the poor quality of Superman III, when he was actually the film’s saving grace. In fact, when rumors placed Eddie Murphy in Star Trek IV, fans went into paroxysms of fear because black comedians can only ruin sci-fi films. “Look at Pryor in Superman III,” they cried through their white hoods. Of course, Star Trek films managed to suck eggs all on their own without a Negro jokester in sight.

Smith makes Men in Black. He’s our point of view. His reactions to his strange new environment sell the fantastical aspects of MiB as being actually both fantastic and weird. He’s the every man, albeit sexier and more personable than most, through which we follow the story. Despite the position of the actors’ names on the marquee, he’s the star and the lead. If you haven’t seen this wonderful and funny film, do so immediately.

8 of 10
A

NOTES:
1998 Academy Awards: 1 win: “Best Makeup” (Rick Baker and David LeRoy Anderson); 2 nominations: “Best Art Direction-Set Decoration” (Bo Welch-art director and Cheryl Carasik-set decorator), and “Best Music, Original Musical or Comedy Score” (Danny Elfman)

1998 BAFTA Awards: 1 nomination: “Best Special Effects” (Eric Brevig, Rick Baker, Rob Coleman, and Peter Chesney)

1998 Golden Globes, USA: 1 nomination: “Best Motion Picture - Comedy/Musical”

Review: "Good Will Hunting" Maintains Itself (Happy B'day, Ben Affleck)

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 8 (of 2001) by Leroy Douresseaux

Good Will Hunting (1997)
Running time: 126 minutes (2 hours, 6 minutes)
MPAA – R for strong language, including some sex-related dialogue
DIRECTOR: Gus Van Zant
WRITERS: Matt Damon and Ben Affleck
PRODUCER: Lawrence Bender
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Jean Yves Escoffier (D.o.P.)
EDITOR: Pietro Scalia
COMPOSER: Danny Elfman
Academy Award winner

DRAMA

Starring: Matt Damon, Robin Williams, Ben Affleck, Stellan Skarsgård, Minnie Driver, Casey Affleck, and Cole Hauser.

Will Hunting (Matt Damon), a charismatic, brilliant young man has spent, or rather wasted, the first 20 years of his life when an MIT math professor discovers Will’s mathematical gifts. When Will is arrested after a street fight, Professor Lambeau (Stellan Skarsgard, Breaking the Waves) takes custody of Will determined to nurture Will’s rare genius so that it is not wasted.

Will runs through a gamut of psychiatrists as part of his court ordered treatment until he meets a grieving, career impaired shrink named Sean Maguire (Robin Williams). Maguire is from Will’s old neighborhood, and he recognizes some of the young man’s difficulties with a society so different from their ‘hood. He tries to reach the young man as Will continually enforces a wall around himself, a wall he has had since childhood to protect himself from a world seemingly always out to hurt him.

Will also meets and falls in love with Skylar (Minnie Driver, Grosse Point Blank), a pretty, young pre-med student, who eventually demands a commitment of love that Will is reluctant to give. If he embraces a new life, Will may have to abandon the impoverished, but familiar life he knows, including his childhood friend, Chuckie (Ben Affleck).

Good Will Hunting is a beautiful, moving story that pulls not too gently on the heartstrings. Affleck and Damon won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay of 1997 for the film’s script. They crafted simple, yet evocative characters for both themselves and the rest of the cast. Hunting is the most complex of the lot, but he isn’t difficult to understand. He’s been hurt, so he lashes out at the world. He’s made a safe little hovel in which he can live, and he doesn’t intend to venture far from it. He knows it and he feels safe in it, only occasionally peeking his head out of his hole to delight people with his brilliance and wit.

Williams’s portrayal of Sean Maguire earned him a long overdue Oscar for Best Actor in a Supporting Role. Like his Dr. Malcolm Sayer in Awakenings and Parry in the Fisher King, Maguire is a man in pain. You can feel a great building up in the shell, that these men have created for themselves, ready to break out and violently splash the world. In the end, they learn to gradually release their pent up pain and emotion and to reach a sense of balance. The parts that Williams usually take are usually so flamboyant and loud, begging for attention, like Williams himself. When he takes a part like Maguire, he has to control himself, and we can feel, along with him, the struggle to remain in his containment unit. To see him so controlled may have attracted Academy voters to his cause.

Good Will Hunting isn’t a smart movie. Damon and Affleck are occasionally stiff and forced in their parts, and there is still a rough edge to their acting abilities, especially Affleck’s. Driver is good, but the script only allows hints at her personality. Skylar’s one outburst about her troubled past piques the interest, but is gone as suddenly as it came.

Gus Van Zant does a credible job here, but one mostly gets the sense that he was just following a sort of paint by numbers plan. This is more about Damon, Affleck, and Williams than the director. But Van Zant assists them in bringing some tears forward; it’s a empathic, feel sad movie with a tacked on feel good ending. But done well, it’s worth repeated viewings.

7 of 10
A-

NOTES:
1998 Academy Awards: 2 wins: “Best Actor in a Supporting Role” (Robin Williams) and “Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen” (Matt Damon and Ben Affleck); 7 nominations: “Best Picture” (Lawrence Bender), “Best Actor in a Leading Role” (Matt Damon), “Best Actress in a Supporting Role” (Minnie Driver), “Best Director” (Gus Van Sant), “Best Film Editing” (Pietro Scalia), “Best Music, Original Dramatic Score” (Danny Elfman), and “Best Music, Original Song” (Elliott Smith for the song "Miss Misery")

1998 Golden Globes: 1 win: “Best Screenplay - Motion Picture” (Matt Damon and Ben Affleck); 3 nominations: “Best Motion Picture – Drama,” (Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama” (Matt Damon), and “Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture” (Robin Williams)

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Review: "Scream 2" Doesn't Sustain Strong Start

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 51 (of 2004) by Leroy Douresseaux

Scream 2 (1997)
Running time: 120 minutes (2 hours)
MPAA – R for language and strong bloody violence
DIRECTOR: Wes Craven
WRITER: Kevin Williamson (based upon characters Kevin Williamson created)
PRODUCERS: Cathy Konrad and Marianne Maddalena
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Peter Deming (D.o.P.)
EDITOR: Patrick Lussier
COMPOSER: Marco Beltrami

HORROR/MYSTERY/THRILLER

Starring: Neve Campbell, David Arquette, Courteney Cox, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Jamie Kennedy, Laurie Metcalf, Elise Neal, Jerry O’Connell, Timothy Olyphant, Jada Pinkett, Liev Schreiber, Lewis Arquette, Duane Martin, Rebecca Gayheart, Portia de Rossi, Omar Epps, Heather Graham, (voice) Roger L. Jackson, Tori Spelling, and Luke Wilson

Two years after the shocking events in Scream, Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) and Randy Meeks (Jaime Kennedy), the only surviving teens of the Woodsboro massacre, are attending college. Sidney is trying to get on with her life until a copycat killer begins acting out a real-life sequel, and some of Sidney’s college classmates meet a grisly fate at the hands of a knife-wielding killer. Ambitious reporter Gale Weathers (Courteney Cox) and Woodsboro deputy Dewey (David Arquette) are also back as the new killing spree leaves no one safe and no one above suspicion of being the Woodsboro copycat murderer.

Scream 2 is, for the most part, quiet entertaining. It does not, however, have half the wild and crazy energy of the first, and part of that may be because the original film was full of nutty high school kids running amok and having a good time, although there was a murderer in their midst. There are plenty of party crazy college students in the sequel, but we don’t see much of them because the film really zeroes in on Sidney’s character. Wacky kid characters made the first film fun, not female problems. Beyond Sidney’s small circle of associates, no other characters, not even bit players, come in to add something surprising to the mix.

Scream 2 is worth watching, at least for the first hour. After that there are some good moments, but the film begins to fall apart.

5 of 10
B-

NOTES:
1998 Razzie Awards: 1 nomination: “Worst New Star” (Tori Spelling)

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Review: "Nil by Mouth" (Happy B'day, Gary Oldman)

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 29 (of 2004) by Leroy Douresseaux

Nil by Mouth (1997)
COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: U.K. and France
Running time: 128 minutes (2 hours, 8 minutes)
MPAA – R for graphic drug use, non-stop strong language, brutal domestic violence and some nudity
WRITER/DIRECTOR: Gary Oldman
PRODUCERS: Luc Besson, Gary Oldman, and Douglas Urbanski
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Ron Fortunato
EDITOR: Brad Fuller
COMPOSER: Eric Clapton
BAFTA Award winner

DRAMA

Starring: Ray Winstone, Kathy Burke, Charlie Creed-Miles, Laila Morse, Edna Doré, Chrisse Cotterill, Jon Morrison, Jamie Foreman, Steve Sweeney, and Leah Fitzgerald

Nil by Mouth is acclaimed actor Gary Oldman’s directorial debut. It’s what I call “cinema de unflinching,” in particular that “cinema’s” sub-genre “film de raw.” Oldman, an extremely talented actor who can simultaneously bury himself in a role and also exude movie star wattage, composed a film that stands as one of the most powerful family dramas of the 1990’s because of its dogged pursuit of portraying the effects of drugs and alcohol on a poor family in notorious South London.

Ray (Ray Winstone) is a coke snorting, alcoholic bully who brow beats his wife Valerie (Kathy Burke) and his brother-in-law, Billy (Charlie Creed-Miles), who lives with the couple. After Raymond savagely attacks Billy and kicks him out of the apartment, both men spiral downward, as Ray drinks more and becomes more paranoid and Billy does little other than feed his dope habit. Meanwhile, Val and the rest of the women in the family valiantly hold the family together and look for a few good times in a drug-addled world of poverty and crushing of claustrophobia.

The film starts off quite slowly, and I am certain that it will be difficult for many non-Brits to understand the London dialects (as it was for me). Still, the acting is good, quite good, actually. Oldman gives this film a good pace and a high level of intensity, considering that this film is heavy with the kind of dialogue that reveals character. However, when Nil by Mouth bogs down on a plot point, it is almost anal, and I occasionally found myself drifting away from it. Nil by Mouth is raw and unflinching, but it did not always hold my attention. Still, the script is well-written and well thought out; when you consider the movie as a whole, the screenplay seems rather brilliant.

All in all, Nil by Mouth is a satisfying and rewarding film viewing experience. Oldman makes the right choice in terms of satisfying the audience by letting his film family work through their difficulties. Rather than call it a Hollywood ending, I’ll describe it as artfully handled.

7 of 10
B+

NOTES:
1998 BAFTA Awards: 2 wins: “Alexander Korda Award for Best British Film” (Luc Besson, Douglas Urbanski, and Gary Oldman) and “Best Screenplay – Original” (Gary Oldman); 2 nominations: “Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role” (Ray Winstone) and “Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role” (Kathy Burke)

1997 Cannes Film Festival: 1 win: “Best Actress” (Kathy Burke) and 1 nomination: “Golden Palm” (Gary Oldman)

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Review: Remembering "4 Little Girls"

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 76 (of 2010) by Leroy Douresseaux

4 Little Girls (1997)
Running time: 102 minutes (1 hour, 42 minutes)
DIRECTOR: Spike Lee
PRODUCERS: Spike Lee and Sam Pollard
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Ellen Kuras
EDITOR: Sam Pollard
COMPOSER: Terence Blanchard
Academy Award nominee

DOCUMENTARY/HISTORY

Starring: Maxine McNair, Chris McNair, Alpha Robertson, Janie Gaines, Dianne Braddock, Shirley Wesley King, Bill Baxley, James Bevel, Bill Cosby, Walter Cronkite, Ossie Davis, Jesse Jackson, Coretta Scott King, Fred Shuttlesworth, Reggie White, and Andrew Young

4 Little Girls is Spike Lee’s 1997 documentary film about the 1963 16th Street Baptist Church bombing. Located in Birmingham, Alabama, this African-American church was a hub of the city’s Civil Rights movement in the 1950s and 60s.

On the Sunday morning of September 15, 1963, four members of a Ku Klux Klan group planted a box of dynamite with a time delay under the steps of the church near the basement. Killed in the ensuing explosion were 14-year-old Addie Mae Collins, 11-year-old Denise McNair, 14-year-old Carole Robertson, and 14-year-old Cynthia Wesley – the titular 4 little girls of the film.

4 Little Girls recounts the days leading to the bombing, the state of the Civil Rights movement in Birmingham at the time, and the aftermath, specifically the girls’ funerals. Lee interviewed the people who knew the girls, including surviving parents, siblings, neighbors, relatives, and friends, among others. For the film, Lee also interviewed a number of Civil Rights luminaries, social activists, and other famous figures, including Andrew Young, Bill Cosby, Ossie Davis, and Coretta Scott King. The film is filled with archival footage, most of it coming from televised news, which presents other key participants, including Dr. Martin Luther King and the bombing plot’s ringleader, Robert “Dynamite Bob” Chambliss.

The film begins with Joan Baez singing “Birmingham Sunday” a song that chronicled the events and aftermath of the bombing. The song, written by Richard and Mimi Farina (Joan Baez’s sister), is a haunting theme throughout 4 Little Girls.

In the first hour of the film, Spike Lee does a superb job in presenting the state of affairs in Birmingham and connecting it to the overall Civil Rights movement. Lee deftly builds to the bombing like a slow train gradually building speed to the terrible event. He does this by getting the girls’ families and friends to remember details (including one woman’s prophetic dream) that are startling in their intimacy.

The scenes that recount the actual bombing are as riveting as anything found in the best movie thrillers. Using interviews and archival footage, Lee presents the shock, grief, and anger in a way that still resonates and even seems to jump off the screen and into your gut. It may be too much for some. The recollections of the girls’ family and friends and also the funeral are tear generators, although the post-mortem photos of the girls may be a bit much for some (cause they were for me).

After the scenes depicting the funerals, Lee’s film falters. The movie’s focus on the grief is morbid and obsessive. Of course, there is nothing wrong with depictions of grieving family. However, the bombing, which was clearly a racially motivated terrorist attack, was meant to halt the integration that was already occurring in Birmingham (due to negotiations between African-American leaders and moderate whites). Lee’s film only mentions that in passing. Lee also fails to present the ways in which the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing affected the move for equality in America. The deaths of those four girls gave energy to a Civil Rights movement that, at the time, apparently needed reinvigoration.

I don’t fault the film for taking such a deeply personal look at how the girls’ deaths affected those around them. Their deaths had a larger meaning; they were essentially a sacrifice, one that directly led to improving the lives of all oppressed people, not just African-Americans, in the United States. 4 Little Girls is an excellent film and a wonderful document of the lives of four innocents. It is one of Lee’s best and most powerful works, but he missed something back when he made this film – the larger context of how the bombing changed us and our country.

Seeing the sacrifice as at least equal to the focus on the victims may be a cold equation, but it was and is a reality in the fight for equality.

8 of 10
A

NOTES:
1998 Academy Awards: 1 nomination: “Best Documentary, Features” (Spike Lee and Samuel D. Pollard)

1999 Image Awards: 1 win: “Outstanding News, Talk or Information Special”

Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Original "Insomnia" Both Cold and Engaging

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 1 (of 2003) by Leroy Douresseaux


Insomnia (1997)
COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: Norway
Running time: 97 minutes (1 hour, 37 minutes)
DIRECTOR: Erik Skjoldbjaerg
WRITERS: Nikolaj Frobenius and Erik Skjoldbjaerg
PRODUCERS: Tomas Backström, Petter J. Borgli, and Tom Remlov
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Erling Thurmann-Andersen
EDITOR: Håkon Øverås

DRAMA/MYSTERY with elements of crime

Starring: Stellan Skarsgård, Sverre Anker Ousdal, Maria Mathiesen, and Bjorn Moan,

The thriller film, especially the kind mixed with the element of a murder mystery, is a venerable Hollywood genre. Seeing a foreign version of such a genre can be a jarring experience. Lacking the star power wattage, lavish production values, and the insistence that the screenplay explain every bit of action and leave no sense of mystery (not to mention the never-ending public relations campaigns to promote movies), many foreign films must rest the case for their quality on the art and technique of filmmaking and on storytelling free of high concepts. That is exactly the case with the Norwegian film Insomnia.

Two detectives cross the Arctic Circle into northern Norway to solve the murder of a young girl, Tonya Lorentzen (Maria Mathiesen), where during the summer daylight lasts for 23 hours. Jonas Engstrom (the sublime Stellan Skarsgard, Good Will Hunting) is the best at what he does, catch murderers, and with his partner of one year, Erik Vik (Sverre Anker Ousdal), Jonas guesses that he himself will quickly solve the crime.

The investigators find Tonya’s friends and classmates reluctant to cooperate, and Jonas, who is a Swede, has a tough time communicating with them. Initially Jonas and Erik suspect Tonya’s boyfriend Eilert (Bjorn Moan), but he is merely a distraction. The murderer, who took time to clean his crime scene, is someone smart. During a stakeout at the crime scene to catch the killer, Jonas accidentally shoots and kills Erik, mistaking him for Tonya’s killer, who did, in fact, walk right into the police’s trap.

Rather than admit his mistake, Jonas covers the shooting of his partner, blaming it on the killer. He soon learns that Tonya’s killer witnessed Jonas’s mistake. Now, as the police move in on the Tonya’s murderer, Jonas must protect him, cover up his own crime, and frame someone else. Meanwhile, Jonas grows steadily exhausted; in the near perpetual daylight, he cannot sleep, and his reality blurs just as his web of deceit becomes more desperate. And a bright, local detective assigned to Erik’s killing begins to find the flaws in Jonas’s story.

Directed by Erik Skjoldbjaerg and co-written with Nikolaj Frobenius, Insomnia is a quite, but intense thriller that harks back to old Hollywood. The location, the setting, and every character are important to the tapestry of the story. However, it is Skarsgard who owns the film; greasy and sullen, he stalks his sleepless world trying to save himself, his sense of self worth, and his sense of justice.

There are subtle shifts, sans special effects, in reality, or at least, in Jonas’s perception of it. His lack of sleep allows his dilemmas to incessantly haunt him. Because the thriller is told from his point of view, the audience must share Jonas’s vague and murky world. It is a testament to Skarsgard’s skill that he can draw us inescapably to his character.

The other great character is Tonya’s killer. Although the police peg him as suspect early on, we see him mainly through Jonas’s eyes. His relationship with Jonas should be troubling, and he is a murderer. But like Jonas, the audience is drawn to him. Why? There seems to be so many reasons that this killer makes us curious and dare I say…sympathetic.

Insomnia has a sense of vagueness that can be off putting at time, and the creators are somewhat clumsy with the filmmaking as the moves to its resolution. It is still a very good film - one that demands its audience’s participation and attention, all the while burying us in a world of ambiguity. It was fun to be entertained and to feel like a part of this story; I wish it happened more often.

7 of 10
B+