p a u l b e l o d e a u

DEJA VU
2 out of 5 stars
    Sucked.

FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION
3.5 out of 5 stars
    Christopher guest and his usual ensemble cast poke fun at the absurdity of the Hollywood system and it's vanity. Guest is best known as the character Nigel Tufnel from Rob Reiner's classic THIS IS SPINAL TAP. Guest made his directorial debut with the awesome WAITING FOR GUFFMAN which set up his trademark style of oddball, quite pathetic characters searching for fame and glory. While a comedy, there is a dark undercurrent of realism within the film that ends on a very jarring statement about values-gone-lost. A bit short, the film leaves you wanting a bit more. All-in-all, well done and more of a social meditation than Guests' previous A MIGHTY WIND and BEST IN SHOW. Catharine O' Hara is terrific as a has-been actress trying to become "comfortable in her own skin."

CASINO ROYALE (RECOMMENDED!)
4.5 out of 5 stars
    Awesome fun! Daniel Craig makes a great new Bond in this "prequel" that details Bond's entry into the secret service and the birth of agent 007. Camp gives way to a bit more realism this time around. Eva Green is to die for, the action fun, the plot intrigue interesting. DAme Judy Dench returns as "M" and the original John Barry score we know and love is back! The opening song by Chris Cornell is amazing. The third act goes a little over the top and the love element a bit too much, but tried in earnest to explain the origins of Bond's ways and how he became so detached and sauve. A great ride.

HOLLYWOODLAND (RECOMMENDED!)
4.5 out of 5 stars
    I really thought this was an effective drama underscoring the vacuous nature of Hollywood. Not only is the entertainment super-structure of the biz one that promotes illusions in it's product, but the culture surrounding it deceives itself in the same illusory way. Adrien Brody (THE PIANIST) plays a dead-beat dad private-eye on the trail of another evil studio conspiracy, only finding that it is he himself who is spinning the make-believe. Strong performances by both Diane Lane and Ben Affleck (watch for them at Oscar time.) Directed by Allen Coulter (TV's: THE SOPRANOS, SEX IN THE CITY)

THANK YOU FOR SMOKING
3 out of 5 stars
    Well meaning and funny but kinda forgettable. An edgy marketeer is hired by big tobacco to help feed BS to the public. However, a crisis of conscious throws things off. Some high points include Rob Lowe as a transvestite Hollywood agent and Robert Duvall as the tobacco CEO. Directed by Jason Reitman.

AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH
3 out of 5 stars
    A fun time if you enjoy democrats telling you the world is about to end. If what Al Gore "The most famous Ex-Next-President" is saying is all true, then this movie is an important docu-conference. Otherwise, it's a colossal waste of time. Although tightly made, the problem here is that there is no way to corroborate the subject material for we the general public audience- at least not within the span of the film itself. So who knows- maybe it's all true, maybe it's not. This movie did not make me absolutely-sure-beyond-all-politics kinda "sure." Directed by Davis Guggenheim (TV's: DEADWOOD, THE SHIELD, 24, ALIAS)  UPDATE: this film has won Al Gore an OSCAR, an EMMY and a NOBEL PEACE PRIZE.

HIDALGO
3 out of 5 stars
    A well made and entertaining enough Disney-esque feature about an American (Viggo Mortensen) who enters an Arab-only horse race. Somewhat based on real life events. Everything is happy in the end and everything is nice as the hero wins and the Arabs learn the good values of Western democracy, blah, blah- you know the drill. Omar Sharif co-stars. Directed by Joe Johnston (JURASSIC PARK III, OCTOBER SKY, JUMANJI, THE ROCKETEER)

PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: DEAD MAN'S CHEST
3 out of 5 stars
    Big-budget fun! Johnny Depp is curious and weird as before and Keira Knightley is gorgeous. A bit more off-center than it's predecessor but with outstanding special effects (you can see the soon-to-come video game as you are watching.) Not as good as the first but wildly entertaining. Directed by Gore Verbinski (PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: THE CURSE OF THE BLACK PEARL, THE WEATHER MAN, THE RING)

SUPERMAN RETURNS
3 out of 5 stars
    Much more like the comic book than the other films. The narrative really goes into the tragic/hero nature of Superman and his burden of saving the world from itself. This is at the heart of most super-hero comics but is often watered down at the movies. Although the moral thread is tight, there is a lot of plot logic that doesn't add up and the story isn't so fetching. Brandon Routh is a dead ringer for a young Christopher Reeve as Clark Kent/Superman Kevin Spacey is well cast as Lex Luthor, but the writing of his part lacks dimension as well as missed opportunities for humor. Kate Bosworth co-stars as Lois Lane. Directed by Bryan Singer (X2, THE USUAL SUSPECTS) The film is nicely dedicated to Christopher Reeve and his wife.

CRASH
dir: Paul Haggis
    CRASH is one of those rarely satisfying films that you "wish someone would make" or you fantasize yourself making because it elaborates small, day-to-day moments of social conflict that might only be passing moments in another narrative. A host of varying characters in Los Angeles experience racial issues over a period of a few days. We are given sort of a fly-on-the-wall view of each character in their own separate worlds. Although, we don't see the same events repeated from different points-of-view, we are given enough colliding parallel stories such that the effect is almost the same. Part Robert Altman (THE PLAYER, SHORT CUTS) part Paul Thomas Anderson (BOOGIE NIGHTS, MAGNOLIA) CRASH edits together isolated moments of social-conflict to weave a portrait of modern urban racial intolerance.
    What's perplexing about the success of this film (or at least it's mass acceptance by critics) is the fact that it works on only a thread of dramatic structure and almost no character development. Audiences and reviewers seemed so taken by CRASH's themes and overall affect, that the same voices who would typically trash a project like this, instead exalted it to righteous levels. CRASH is not only significant in it's human themes but also as an example of how fickle the Hollywood establishment can be. I would have expected to have to defend a film like this on it's conceptual merits despite it's dramatic flaws, yet it walked away with the all the awards as the toast of industry. This once again proves that "rules" are meant to be broken and the only element that really matters in the end is if the work moves you or not. I'm really not sure how i feel about this.
I submit that if CRASH had been about another issue besides racism, perhaps a more subtle human issue and not one so politically charged, no one would have cared much for it. I think it has been impossible to separate the political climate of this film with the reality that it's 90 minutes of celluloid.
    I viewed CRASH on DVD back-to-back with MISSISSIPPI BURNING (my 3rd viewing) and DO THE RIGHT THING (also for the 3rd time) i found both to be much more lasting statements on racism and culture, mostly due to narrative character development. CRASH works more as an experimental statement on racism than as a story. CRASH sort of says "Here's is racism, this is what it is- in all it's irony- no one is safe and everyone is to blame." The solutions are left for us to find.
    As i watched CRASH, i couldn't help but be reminded of all the Theater Arts labs and one-act showcases i saw in college. The kind of very dramatic, socio-political plays where acting students reach down in to the depths of their very souls to say- pour coffee or answer the phone. As you watch you think to yourself, "in a few years, after they've grown into their craft, they'll look back and laugh at this." Well, i kinda felt that way about CRASH. It's a great experiment- like a big neon sign alerting us to this huge idea with all the earnest of a student film, but will it's drama have any lasting affect?
    Personally, i feel to fully review CRASH would be to also embark on several essays about the role of drama and film as mass-communication. A decade ago, Spike Lee's DO THE RIGHT THING was shut out- now CRASH gets the Oscar. Go figure.

THE DAVINCI CODE (RECOMMENDED!)
dir: Ron Howard
    I liked this movie, it was a fun "Indiana Jones" adventure that referenced real history and mythology in a densely woven mystery that is complete fiction. Ian McKellan was especially notable. The controversy surrounding this film is a whole other essay regarding the general publics' lack of cinema education. Suffice to say, the religious faithful have nothing to fear from this movie. While the story details are provocative, the overall themes they service are actually near and dear to any religious mind. "If you had the truth, would you use it to build up faith or tear it down?" Interestingly, all the characters in the story are doing what they believe to be right in the name of saving mankind's faith, yet they are all opposed to one another. The drama becomes about how far one will go for the sake of right and wrong. Would you step outside of what you believe in order to protect what you believe? The story begs us to consider the fundamentals underlying any system of faith, but more than anything, it's just an entertaining movie with clever plot mechanics and a few car chases. Directed by Ron Howard (CINDERELLA MAN, A BEAUTIFUL MIND, APOLLO 13, RANSOM)

POSEIDON
    No real reason to remake this other than updated FX tech. I liked the original film, this one adds nothing and is actually not as good. Amazing production values can't help an empty script. Kurt Russell is solid. There are the beginnings of some character development, but it doesn't follow through. Richard Dreyfus starts to kill himself, but then sees the giant wave coming to overtake the ship and he changes his mind quick! The film was trying to obliquely comment on the nature of heroes i think, but the original did it better. Directed by Wolfgang Petersen (TROY, A PERFECT STORM, DAS BOOT)

THE TERMINAL
dir: Steven Spielberg
    A light-hearted and effective story about the absurdity of modern beaurocracy. Loosely based on a true story, Tom Hanks portrays a man from a fictional former soviet state, who cannot enter America, yet cannot return home and must stay inside JFK airport in New York for nine months. Pleasantly, there are no black & white good guys and bad guys in this story, just people trying to do what they believe is right. The most poignant scene is one of his friends sacrifices his own amnesty in order to help him stay long enough to complete his goal. (in a shot reminiscent the famous image of a lone protestor facing a column of tanks in Tiannenmen Square) He charges like Don Quixote at an arriving airplane armed only with his mop. Summing up the absurdity of the situation, the scene ends with the tiny. harmless man surrounded by a SWAT team with riot gear and machine guns.

MUNICH (RECOMMENDED!)
dir: Steven Spielberg
    It's no wonder that pro-Israeli and pro-Palenstinian factions had so many public criticisms of this film- because it refuses to pick sides. Steven Spielberg instead renders a humanist story that only has flashbacks of "docu-drama" to ground it in real, factual events. The story follows a fictional group of unlikely assassins stuggling with their moral, spiritual and nationalistic identities. In my view, the POV of the film is a uniquely American one. I was afraid Spielberg was wading into the sticky political fray of Jewish-American concerns over the Palistinian issue. Instead, he plays Hitchock with many scenes of suspense and film noir, far away from any political or religious dogma, complete with his mishievous sense of humor. In one key scene, the Israeli hit squad, hiding undercover in a mobsters hideaway in France, encounter a group of PLO terrorists hiding out in the same apartment! All involved must contemplate the nature of their criminal activity and how much the opposing factions have in common. Tensions mount as the two groups fight over radio stations at bedtime until one of them offers a solution everyone can live with- an American radio station playing rock n' roll! The heart of the film is summed up in the dialogue of one of the hit squad members as he backs out from the operation, "...i understand the cause," he explains, "but what about my soul?" Like any soldier story, the fine line between holding values dear and stepping out of them in order to protect them- is a moral dilemma every man faces alone. In a powerful flashback scene, the events of the Munich hostage taking are portrayed. One of the Israeli athletes almost escapes out a window to certain freedom- but hesitates- choosing instead to return inside to help his comrades and is violently murdered. Scenes like this offer reminders of untold personal action and heroism in times of tragedy and moral ambiguity. The film has shades of a dozen differrent Hitchcock movies and reminded me at times of Rossellini's THE BICYCLE THIEF and other post-war Italian humanist dramas. I recommend MUNICH very highly.

LIVE FROM IRAQ
    Nothing wrong with it, but i've already forgotten it. Michael Keaton has some nice internal moments in his portrayal of the CNN producer who delivered the now famous broadcast of the U.S. bombing of Baghdad in the first Gulf War. There are some nice actor portrayals of real-life personalities Peter Arnett, Bernard Shaw and John Holloman as they broadcast live from the El Rashid hotel via dedicated phone line, before it was shut down by Iraqi Ministry of Intelligence. An HBO films production, the film plays very much as a "movie of the week" docudrama. The only reason i watched it because Helena Bonham-Carter co-stars, playing the same sort of bi-polar, chain-smoking, on-the-edge chick she played in FIGHT CLUB. She's so darn adorable, i sat and watched the whole movie.

BEWITCHED
    This movie should be screened in film schools as an educational tool to elaborate why the Hollywood system fails and what happens when you throw talent and A-list names at a bad idea. It's almost impossible to comprehend how incredibly awful this film is. It's pure, un-adulterated crap. The only positive element of this movie is the fact that it was mercifully short at around 80 minutes- the shortest length a "feature" can be. Nothing about the film was funny and it has the stupidest premise ever. An out-of-work lousy actor (Will Ferrell) gets the lead in TV series re-make of the original Bewitched series from the 70's. He finds Isabelle (Nicole Kidman) in a book-store and hires her for the part of Samantha because she can do the nose-wiggle thing. Turns out, she's a real witch. Ohh-ah, clever. Who the hell came up with this stupidity!? Hollywood industry main-stay Nora Ephron directs this pile of rubbish with as much pizzazz as a dead fish you find washed on the shore. Of the all the films or TV shows to resurrect for the sake of "retro" why Bewitched? Are we that out of ideas?? You can almost detect the complete lack of interest in all parties- from the actors to the music score. Total Hollywood assembly line misfire. Do not ever see this flick.

ANCHORMAN: THE LEGEND OF RON BURGANDY
    My friend and i started watching this on HBO. It was so dull, slow and not funny that we changed channels after about 15 minutes.

TRANSPORTER 2 (2006)
dir: Louis Leterrier
    The first TRANSPORTER was a refreshing surprise. The kind of action film that you don't realize is a martial-arts epic until the end because it develops it's character, story and premise slowly and thoughtfully. It isn't until after the film that you realize you just watched a chop-socky flick. Unfortunately, this sequel lacks all of the charm and poise of it's predecessor. Although the set-up in the first act is good, from the very first fight the film establishes itself as absurdly, un-realistic. In the first film, we were willing to go where it was taking us because there was a thread (be it a thin one) of realism perhaps- or at least a sense of wit that didn't treat it's audience as suckers. TRANSPORTER 2 is so wildly ridiculous that we stop paying attention half-way and the final action sequence in act 3 is so over-the-top that it's just insulting. Model-turned-actress Amber Valetta is gorgeous and offers up the best performance in the film. If you must rent the film, turn the sound down, forward through the fights and just watch her.

BATMAN BEGINS (2005) (RECOMMENDED!)
dir: Christopher Nolan
    Pretty darn good. As one critic said "they finally got it right." This installment of the BATMAN franchise goes deep into the roots of the "Dark Knight" tradition of the DC comic. Bruce Wayne is a tormented soul who learns to master his fears and turn fear against "the enemies of justice." The villians are not cartoon characters and there are genuinely complex conflicts and moral concerns at work in the story. There are no winks at the camera as with the other films. Although the finale was a little weak, the film was engaging from start to finsh and refreshingly dis-associated with any of the stylistic treatments the other sequels presented. Most of all, this movie is a good example of what a film can be if it has a decent script that has a solid premise, isn't afraid to beleive in itself and doesn't try to pander to anyone. Well done. Screenplay co-written by David S. Goyer (the BLADE trilogy) and produced by Larry (ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK) Franco. Great score penned by Zimmer AND Howard. Christian Bale contiues to impress with another solid acting performance of yet another in a series of strange and tormented charactes he is so well cast at portraying.

STREET FIGHTER (1974) (aka: Gekitotsu! Satsujin ken)
dir: Shigehiro Ozawa
    I had only seen one Sonny Chiba film prior to this one and it was God-awful, so i didn't understand all the hype. Now i do- this movie was awesome fun! There are many elements about Sonny Chiba and STREETFIGHTER that are unique in the martial-arts film genre. First of all, this is straight up Karate, not Kung-Fu. This isn't the Kung-Fu theater stuff out of Hong Kong Cinema we're all used to making fun of. STREETFIGHTER is a full on sync-sound, well produced Japanese film. The fight choreography is surprisingly realistic and the filmmaking pays a certain reverence to this. Although there are bizarre, absurd moments that are thrown in (like an x-ray close up of a hand breaking a paper-mache skull!) that raise an occasional eyebrow- overall the film works in its story and character as well as intriguing action sequences. The film transfer quality on the DVD was really sharp and well processed in full cinemascope aspect ratio. Pretty good score as well. Most interesting of all was the moral kunundrums surrounding Chiba's character "Terry" a gun-for-hire whose only allegiance is to his old-school fighting style which is becoming increasingly forgotten in the modern world. Tricky questions of loyalty and honor permeate this narrative where seemingly everyone is dis-honest and the only redeeming values are in dis-believing false values.

KING KONG (2006) (RECOMMENDED!)
dir: Peter Jackson
    The only problem with this film is that unlike the original or the 1976 remake- the special effects are too easy and believable. The original begged your suspension of disbelief with it's stop-motion miniatures and the '76 version used more of an inferential treatment and romantic production design. Peter Jackson's opus is not as much a quantum leap in it's contemporary field as the others were and this creates a different affect within the perception process of it's audience. The epic-blockbuster hugeness associated with the previous Kong films is certainly diminished here. Aside from this unavoidable reality of modern cinema, the film is otherwise near perfection. As with his LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy, KONG has pacing problems (particularly in it's excruciatingly long first act) and may be a bit too long for it's own good at 3 full hours. If the computer generated FX are a bit too common place in this era to impact the audience they are also incredibly sophisticated and perhaps the best ever produced, eclipsing even the newer STAR WARS films in realism and detail. Thought the film plays like a CGI cartoon this in no way diminishes the dramatic strength of the script. Jackson and Boyens manage to pack all the essential elements of the original story into an effective update while also taking them to much deeper levels. One of the most notable moments in the film are the two single times Ann speaks out loud to KONG, when they stare into the other-woldliness of the sunset together and she says "Beautiful." There is something truly magical in the connection of the two characters and the film places this on a pedestal. Gone is the awkward sexual overtones of the previous movies and the premise becomes much more readable as truth vs chaos. Overall, the film a scathing allegory on nature as order vs. the chaos of modernity. There are certainly some overkill moments of action and gratuitous camera angles, to say nothing of the ultra-creepy "spider pit" sequence which depicts men being eaten by giant roaches and worms. The metaphor of the prehistoric Skull Island contrasted against the mechanized jungle of New York City is portrayed masterfully, most notably in the overhead shot of Kong's lifeless body falling downward into the grid work of the city - animal instinct swallowed out of sight by the enormity of the man-made geometry below. KING KONG is an allegory for the ages and worthy of re-telling for future generations. Peter Jackson treats KONG with a sanctimonious devotion and despite it's few flaws, is worthy of much praise.