Drive

Drive is a very still, quiet picture, punctuated with moments of extreme violence and surprising tenderness.  In retrospect, it’s easy to see the influence of two major directors in Nicholas Lynd’s stunning sophomore film.  With the beautiful cinematography and character-driven story, Drive harks of Michael Mann at his best.  Harking to the feel of Heat and Manhunter and Collateral, this LA, too, is threatening and fantastic to behold.  The second is David Cronenberg for the nauseating violence of the film.  It doesn’t happen a lot, but when it does it looks and *sounds* disgusting.  There’s a real visceral feel to the film.

The third is John Carpenter.

(SPOILERS FOLLOW.)

Ryan Gosling is mesmerizing as the lead (never named in the film – always referred to as “the Driver” or “kid”), playing a laconic loner who, according to his mechanic, can do anything behind the wheel.  Given the opening sequence where he expertly eludes the police on a hired heist, we have no trouble believing this.

Gosling slowly falls for his young mother neighbor (Carey Mulligan) and her young son, albeit reluctantly.  He avoids them in the supermarket until he’s forced into socialization via a broken-down car.  He may even interpret this as fate, as his life revolves entirely around cars.  Their comfortable, quiet conversations eventually give way to a beautifully filmed scene where they just stare at each other for perhaps a half-minute, conveying their feelings of interest clearly without saying a word.  It’s some breathtaking acting and rarer still in this era of very chatty films.

A kink in the plans arrives with the unexpected release from prison of Irene’s husband, Standard, who has fallen in with the wrong crowd.  The Driver tries to help him out of a bad situation to protect his family, but it goes horribly wrong.

This is where I get a strong influence from the third director.  Carpenter by way of Halloween, that is.  And I’m talking about the hero of the film.

Even before the stunning and mesmerizing scene with the mask and Nino on the beach – which is starkly framing the Driver as a horror monster – the scene in the elevator combines all three directors in one amazing sequence.  The Driver, confronted with impending violence (or is there?) of a gangster in the elevator with him and Irene, pulls her aside and they share  a couple of tender, soft, empassioned kisses.  Immediately following this, he proceeds to protect her by attacking the gangster and kicking his face in.  Literally.  The horror of the actions and lengths he will go to protect her stuns them both (her more than him), and likely the audience beyond what we are used to for an anti-hero.  He crosses the line of acceptable “protection” and continues to for the remainder of the picture.  Not necessarily because it is violence but because the violence is naked, stark, and threatening to us.  It’s not easily disgestible, put a bullet-in-him death but visceral, drawn out, and ugly.

As an aside, was Nicholas Lynd trying to tell a twilight-zone story – a kind of What If tale featuring Michael Myers if Michael was a more socially acceptable killer?  Specifically reminiscent of Halloween, the stillness of the main character (Ryan Gosling – unnamed throughout – and fantastic) and his laconic nature juxtaposed with his amazingly violent reactions to his love being threatened – just something I’ll have to re-examine the next time I watch it.

Dracula v. Dracula

This is one of those rare cases where I am going to absolutely champion the film version of the book over the actual book.  After many years of avoidance, I finally read Bram Stoker's classic novel, Dracula, mostly thanks to the fact that Kindle allows you to download and read thousands of books for free.  (Those that have gone out of copywright, for instance.)  And, after being impressed with the opening third, found the book ultimately wanting.  What for, apparently, is the added touch of romance (and a little tidying of plot) that Francis Ford Coppola's "Bram Stoker's Dracula" (don't quite roll off the tongue) provides.

Why call it "Bram Stoker's Dracula" if it's more like "We started with Bram Stoker's Dracula, but thought it could use a little work, so..."?  Well, the crux of the story is all very Bram Stoker, from the iconic and creepy image of Gary Oldman's (peerless) Count crawling upside-down the castle wall to the seduction and undoing of classic flirt Sadie Frost, is there.  But wasn't in the original is the glue that holds the story together, that of Mina and Vlad's former-life romance.  At first, this might sound a little outrageous, but in the context of the gothic, horror, supernatural tale, it makes complete sense.  And it works.  When I think about the movie, I think of Oldman and Ryder (Winona, sparkling) in their penultimate scene together -- Dracula pulling away from her saying, "I love you too much."  It's some dramatic stuff that is only heightened by the Scooby gang's interruption and the enflamement of their protection.  When Oldman in full man-bat gear scowls, "You think your *symbols* can frighten me?!", it's so on.

Alas, that Dracula that doesn't shrink from godly symbols is reduced to a monster.  A monster whose motivation to move to England seems to only be to find some western flesh to munch on, whereas in film they solve this by, again, linking Vlad to Mina in a past life.  He's in search of her, not just idle destruction.

This is by no means an indite of Bram's original.  The style (told by journals and newspaper clippings) is surprisingly effective and maintains suspense very well.  But, with a richer film to think about, ultimately I ended up getting a little bored with the straightforward nature of the book. Had I read it first, may have been a much different story for me.

So, chalk this one up as an improvement over the book, surprisingly.

Raising Arizona

On a recommendation in the guise of fan outrage, I borrowed a copy of Raising Arizona and tried to erase any misgivings I had about the picture.  It's not easy, because what sat with me as a horrible premise for a comedy (the kidnapping of a baby) just doesn't make me go "ha ha" out of the gates.  But this is the Coen Brothers and so I begrudgingly tried to make room for what is a cult classic.

And I tried so very hard.  There is a single moment in the film that is utterly brilliant and at the same time so obvious that I wonder why I had never seen it before.  It is when Nic Cage's character raises his hands together over his head to hit someone and inadvertently scrapes his knuckles against the deco plaster on the ceiling.  That was a bravura moment in the film.

The rest of the film was mediocre.  The main characters' inability to adopt or have children of their own is just an incredibly sad premise that it's hard to find a lot of comedy in what they are doing are how they go about it.  In fact, the dream ending of the film (where Hi dreams of being old surrounded by children) is almost painful to think about.  Raising Arizona just left me feeling sad for the characters; probably not what you want to have happen for a comedy.

The Time Traveler's Wife

I read The Time Traveler’s Wife years ago, and like all books I loved, I’ve had mixed emotions about seeing it translated to film.  TTTW is told from the first-person perspective from the two lead characters, the titular Clare and the reluctant time traveler Henry.  As with his mutant ability, the episodes are not necessarily told in order, creating foreshadowing and tension.  The book is a story of lifelong romance despite the odds where one partner cannot be counted upon to be there.

Like any translation, the film had to leave out some fleshier subplots in order to streamline the story.  Overall, I found the story to be successful, if a slight lament because the ending was changed.  The final pages of the book were rather sad, but not depressing.  The film changes the end (is it really the end , or they just left off that episode?) to something a little lighter, more wistful, but still very effective.  You really don’t know if Clare and Henry are going to get to embrace, and the payoff works.

It's not really worthwhile to talk about the differences, which could be ticked off in a spreadsheet, but I have a few observations.  One of my favorite scenes in the book is the first one, where Clare has waited her entire young life to meet Henry for the first time in true continuity (he has been coming back in time from the future to visit her for years).  Clare in novel is nearly busting with romantic love, barely able to control her emotions in formally starting her relationship with her future husband -- her future husband who in the timeline hasn't even met her yet.  It's just the right amount of angst, tension, confusion, comedy, and heart.  I was disappointed in the translation to film -- it's a crucial scene to nail and it comes off a little off -- more like a detective mystery as to why she's behaving this way rather than a gushing young woman's first real touch of her true love.  In writing this, I think perhaps the film in parts feels just a little off in the same way.  It's a good effort, but the book will remain the better story.  (Note, WTF on not being available on Kindle!)

The Invention of Lying

The Invention Of Lying is single-concept comedy, played out to ridiculous and often entertaining levels, but ultimately comes off a little flat as if from a script-reading rather than actual performances.  That concept, that an alternate Earth (assumption here – the metaphysics of this closely-resembling Earth are never explained) is inhabited by humans who have never learned to lie.  Ricky Gervais plays a man who one day in a pressure situation tells the world’s first lie.  And the more he lies, the more he benefits from it because regular people perceive everything that comes out of their mouths is the truth. 

If Ricky says his friend isn’t driving drunk, even though the police officer just administered a drunk driving test, then the driving test must be broken.  If Ricky says his bank account has an extra few hundred bucks instead of being depleted, then the computer must be broken.  This is a fine point, but this movie isn’t so much the invention of lying but the invention of being incorrect, because every normal (foil) person believes everything that anyone says.  Because it is spoken, it is so.  I speak, therefore what I say is a fact.  (There is apparently no word for ‘truth’ just as there is no word for ‘lie’.)

We could examine whether this is also more a fact versus opinion exercise, or a mixture of all of these to suit the picture, but about halfway through the film we get to the whole point of the enterprise – using the invention of lying to invent religion.  Because in a world without lying, there *is* no religion.  That is, until Ricky makes up a story of a paradise beyond death to assuage his mother on her deathbed.  The attendant overhear his merciful story and assume he knows all about this afterlife.

The world’s first prophet does his best to contain the tidal forces he’s unleashed, but everyone is dying to know about this new life, about this new god (a nice guy, but kind of a prick).  Hilarity ensues, or rather that is the expectation.  The rest of the film is a satire on religion itself, and is sometimes rewarding if you’re familiar with Biblical stories and dogma.  (My wife isn’t and didn’t get a lot of the ‘in’ jokes.)  But I won’t go so far as say it was anything more than mediocre.  Good effort, but a full shoulder shrug on entertainment value.

The Social Network

It’s not just watchable, it’s addictive, much like the topic it’s about.  Aaron Sorkin doesn’t need to be called a genius or one of the great American script-writers by me to feel good about himself, but, damn.  This is a film about a website, without a single action sequence of any relevance contained, and a shit-ton of geek-speak.  And the film is riveting.

Falling somewhere between “a tad” and “highly” fictionalized, Sorkin’s script (and David Fincher’s direction – spot on and claustrophobic) shows the nasty underbelly of the creation of Facebook with all its flaws.  Jesse Eisenberg’s rightly-lauded turn as “Mark Zuckerberg” (there’s quite a bit of creative license going on here; not at much as “Abe Lincoln, Vampire Hunter”, but enough) is the glue that holds the film together, with more one-liners and intelligent-rambling diatribes than can be isolated.  But the support cast is excellent, and Andrew Garfield’s “Don’t *fish* eat other *fish*” line is still the most quotable.  Heck, I’ll even give kudos to Justin Timberlake for playing a shady, entrepreneurial prick… maybe a little *too* well.

It’s a film about belonging, the need for acceptance and belonging and the scratch and claw way we humans go about to connect and yet remain disconnected.  It’s funny and sad and I’m sure I’ll Facebook about it at some point.  (I'd be remiss if I didn't get tingles when Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross took home an Oscar for Best Score.  Something surreal about that.)

Source Code

I rented Source Code primarily on the basis of Duncan Jones’ impressive sci-fi debut, Moon (not because of Jake Gyllenhaal), and my belief that Jeffrey Wright could do no wrong.  Source Code turned out to be a rewarding and challenging picture of second (and third, etc) chances and what happens to those chances.

See, it’s best to go into this picture with as little information as possible and let the series of clues be revealed as the picture goes on.   Ostensibly, Jake’s Captain Colter Stevens is sent into an 8-minute window of time that the scientists (led by Jeffrey Wright) can somehow tap after a horrific terrorist incident by getting into the mind of one of its victims.  Never mind the garbly-gook explanation, and just accept that somehow these little pockets of time can be used to mine the past to catch the terrorist and prevent him from striking again.  But what the film ultimately ends up doing with it opens it to a richer territory than advertised and leaves the viewer (or this one, anyway) with more theoretical questions than anticipated.  Source Code is an unexpected treat.

Sherlock Holmes

It’s not really a reboot – was there a Sherlock Holmes franchise that needed an update? – but more of a re-envisioning project that is very much a Guy Ritchie film.  It feels a little like a mash-up between Fight Club (for atmosphere), Snatch (fight sequences), and mandolin-driven soundtrack and, well, Sherlock Holmes.  Only, if it was just that easy, and it couldn’t have been, it would have been done long before. 

The pairing of Robert Downey and Jude Law works, and works surprisingly well.  The two have chemistry, and succeed in their respective roles playing off one another.  This revision of Sherlock has Downey something of a menace who *needs* to use his formidable, sometimes even crippling observation abilities, lest he become a problem to himself.  Whether it be as an occasional pugilist (the fight scenes where he mentally deconstructs his approach are a highlight) or a barely-reluctant analyzer of a woman’s former past, this Sherlock appears to be almost a victim of his mental sharpness.  In a brief moment before he meets Watson’s lady in a restaurant, Sherlock’s gaze about the room ends with him habitually focusing on his watch’s ticking – this implication being there may be something mentally off about this Holmes.  Downey plays the role as his own and my only complaint is that his English accent is so quick that it is sometimes hard to catch.

Law’s Watson is ruled by his own demons, although he ostensibly has put a leash on his gambling habits.  I’d not thought of Law as playing a tough, but he does it convincingly.  His care for Holmes – really he knows his friend better than most and knows he needs help – is palpable despite the character’s mask of disdain.

A little less effective is Rachel MacAdam’s turn as Holmes’ love/foil Irene Adler, if for nothing else than the chemistry between Downey and her falls a little short.  Mark Strong seems to be making a sweet living playing villains of all sorts (see Green Lantern, Kick Ass), and knocks it out of the park with Blackwood’s sneering, supernatural threat.  (Downey and Strong, *do* have great chemistry when onscreen.)

Sherlock Holmes is eminently watchable and rewarding, especially repeat viewings.