Catch me if You Can 1/03/2002
What’s Good: A convincing DiCaprio saves a flawed film.
What's Not: First: The Music. John Williams may be the most distracting composer ever. His fanciful music makes me want to vomit. Second: Spielberg did this film instead of Gore Verbinski, who would have been better suited for this material.
Directed by Steven Spielberg
Plot Outline: Based on the true story of Frank Abagnale Jr., a successful con artist who managed to pass himself off as several identities and the FBI agent hot on his trail.

     “I’m calling a truce” the fresh faced con artist, DiCaprio, says to his diligent FBI pursuer played a nerdy/cool Tom Hanks. Hearing that line got me thinking: I should be calling a truce too. While I am still critical of the Spielberg way, a director I feel to be overrated, pandering to the point of fault and worst of all, disingenuous in even his most acclaimed films ("Schindler’s List," "Saving Private Ryan" and "AI"), but with this jaunty outing I am calling a one time truce with the man. The reason is that I found this film impossible to dislike…and believe me I tried to give this film a C+ but my fingers wouldn't let me. True, the film has it's glairing flaws; Spielberg predictably throws down sappy contrivances (Leo and his love interest played by Amy Adams) but thanks to DiCaprio’s conviction as the conflicted fraud, “Catch Me If You Can” is brimming with an aura of joy that cant be denied. Just one actor is able to save a whole and that can't be easy. Plus, this may be the first film where Spielberg resists showing young boys without their shirts on so give him credit for... no, wait, the was a poolside scene where... damn it! That perv! He still got one in.

     "Catch me..." is perhaps the most lighthearted grifter story since "Paper Moon." The setup is simple: A kid that comes from a broken home forges checks to impress Dad. Kid finds he's really good at forging checks from Airlines, becomes rich, forgets Dad, and is chased by the Feds. Kid likes being chased because that means someone cares about him. While all this sounds simple, 140 minutes later I thought I was missing something. Why should a trifle of a film take so long to be told? Easy, because the material works. And while I had problems with the film’s turgid pacing (it grows redundant and could have been a good twenty minutes shorter) I can't say I was bored.

Another near problem I had was Hanks' character. Though this ex-family man/FBI agent is underdeveloped, as a father figure to DiCaprio’s Frank, he serves his simple purpose by complimenting the actor. Hanks manages to find a nice mixture of austere persuasion and paternal love. While Hanks elevates this throwaway role, the real saving grace of the picture is the fact that every step of the way I bought what DiCaprio was doing with Frank Abagnale Jr. As DiCaprio cons and bangs his way to the top and eventually topples over, I never questioned the actors sincerity. And I questioned even less his range as an actor in this, his best performance since he played that retard way back. Even in a scene that a friend of mine called totally superfluous (Leo's encounter with the high class hooker Jennifer Garner playing, how about that, a high class hooker) the notion that this high school brat is so smooth that he not only doesn't have to pay using his own money, that he not only gets laid by someone who looks like Garner, but that he convinces this thousand-dollar-a-night model to pay him. DiCaprio's winning work in scenes like that won't go unnoticed and I hope he does more that two movies every five years. Though this film will be forgotten in no time what will be remembered hopefully is that being a charming, sharp, and a guile check bouncer beats the hell out of being in a New York gang. 

Grade: B

About Schmidt 1/03/2002
What’s Good: One of the best characters Jack has ever played. Payne's morbid worldview.
What's Not: Other characters seem underdeveloped. This is not an ensemble.
Directed by  Alexander Payne
Plot Outline: Warren Schmidt (Nicholson) is forced to deal with an ambiguous future as he enters retirement. Soon after, his wife passes away and he must come to terms with his daughter's marriage to a man he does not care for and the failure that his life has become.

     Director Alexander Payne takes on the story a man retiring with all the grace and tact of a Michael Bay history. As with his brilliant and savage high school satire, “Election,” Payne gives us a hero that is rendered intellectually impotent by a society that's bogged down in a vast wasteland of materialism and warped priorities. One small moment really defined this picture for me. After his wife suddenly died Warren Schmidt (Jack Nicholson) takes his newly bought Winnebago and goes on a solo road trip. Seeing all the depressing sights the depleted Midwest has to offer (his childhood home is now a Tire Club) it’s fair to say that we are watching a man who has just hit an all-time low. When it seems that life can get any worse for poor Warren he gazes across the grey road and the scene occurs when he looks to the car on his left and sees one of those mobile cow transporters. A massive metal thing that looks like a prison for cows who are most likely being sent to a death and afterlife that consists of being digested by overweight Americans (I recalled the humans turned into pigs in "Spirited Away"). I think Payne is saying that while those cows are imprisoned, there better off then us because they don’t know how futile their existences are. Or could he be saying that it is humans who are the oblivious ones and it is the simple cows who know what’s up? Either way, with small and memorably dismal moments like that and just about every other darkly comic stroke of this film, Payne’s paints a cinematic portrait of a modern condition that’s drenched with wry humor and the director hits upon a layer of absurdly funny urban misery that I haven’t seen since "Fight Club," “Brazil” and, okay fine, I guess "American Beauty" disserves to me mentioned here too. Point is this director sees things that no one else can. Things that are right in front of us.

     By the film's end, Payne spits you out feeling as despondent as the main character who's “just waiting to die,”  but film also offers a glimmer of hope in it's final moments. The last shot involves a hungry African boy, a drawing and a huge close-up of Nicholson’s face swelling with bittersweet emotion. Everything beautifully comes together at this point and this is one of the best movie moments of the year.  

     “I see something more than grief and loss in you… my guess is anger. And fear” a fellow road traveler says to Warren.  In this scene a virtual stranger, a jolly white trash nomad, has just hit upon a more accurate character assessment of Schmidt's aura than his now dead wife of forty years ever could. He knows this and the fact that he may have squandered his life away is slowing killing him. Though she could be talking more about the actor that’s playing this character than the character himself, this throwaway character has just perfect described the mist behind Nicholson’s saggy eyes in this movie. Every fiber of this character’s being is tired but too afraid to break down or let others know of his misery. Warren goes from dealing with being insignificant after retiring to grieving with his wife's death (whom he later finds out cheated on him with his best friend) to dealing with his daughter, Jeannie (Hope Davis) marrying a vacuous “nincompoop” (Dermot Mulroney). Nicholson delivers a truly mannered performance with an air of almost unbearable malaise. More than the director, Nicholson is the auteur of this film. With a character this sad most films would call for a guy like this to run the emotional gambit as a pitifully bad biopic like “Riding With Cars With Boys” did, but Payne is too smart for generic main characters. This is mostly an internal piece so whatever growth or digression occurs in this story is all in the guy's soggy head. Nicholson, an actor so great at projecting what can almost be considered a trademark brand of sardonic mania, is playing one of the best nobodies of his career. On par with the nobodies he played in "Heartburn" and the brilliant but obscure "The Passenger."

     The film wisely doesn’t try to wrap loose ends in a contrived manner. Characters stay mad, things left unsaid and Nicholson’s character is robbed of his usual BIG SCENE where he flies off the handle and rips into every poor soul in his proximity. Three characters play a big part in Schmidt's life but the film keeps them at a distance; Hope Davis is brilliant in a small role as Warren's daughter, Mulroney as the son in law and Kathy Bates as his lascivious mother (think, Ben Stiller’s parents in “Flirting with Disaster”). While Davis’ subtle turn as Schmidt's dejected daughter will be upstaged by Bates’ usual (but good) jolly/aggressive banter, both characters lack the dimension they disserve and feel underdeveloped but this can be forgiven if only because that means more Nicholson for us. As an ensemble, this film is incomplete but as a character study it is a fine piece of work—though, not as polished a dark screwball comedy as the similar but vastly superior old-age crisis movie, “Wonder Boys.” To reiterate: though this character brings a sea of anger with every line uttered, Jack is not playing the usual caricature of himself. He's more mouse than jackal. And just like his last important role in the inconsistent cop drama, “The Pledge,” the actor seems to be gravitating towards characters who are mentally blocked. Regular guys who could never give the "Five Easy Pieces" egg sandwich speech. Anything but confident. It seems that Nicholson's ultimate coup with this film is him convincing us that what's just as rewarding as seeing his classic grin/arched eyebrow it is to see this aged giant blubber in silence. 

Grade: A-

Gangs of New York 12/26/2002
What’s Good: A first rate production...
What's Not: with shallow characters, a tedious plot and virtually feeling.
What's Sad: The fact that I gave "Scooby-Doo" a higher mark.
Directed by  Martin Scorsese
Plot Outline: The film starts in 1846 and ends in 1863 with the draft riots. The setting is New York's five points, the most violent part of the world at the time. The story is risen out of the conflicts between the white Anglo-Saxon "natives" and the Irish immigrants coming into the five points.

     Contrary what the “America was born in the streets” tagline says, “Gangs of New York” is not a film about history, it’s a film about blood. “Gangs” is also not a film about multilayered characters living in history but, rather, Shakespearian shadows that play out their little dramas on an artificially garish podium.

     Shallow but beautiful this film will tease you with glimpses of many worthy themes; immigrants struggling in America, racism, the great class divide, fathers and sons, civil war ethics... but none of this materializes into a salient message. “Gangs” is “Once Upon a time in America” and “Godfather II” crossed with “Braveheart” and while Scorsese's picture manages to come away with more visual finesse than those films, it lacks the heart and soul that I expect… no, demand, from Martin Scorsese.

     Take any one of the 10,000 invading orc’s seen in the impressive battle coda from "LOR: The Two Towers" and put them up against this film’s rowdy bunch of dreary miscreants (Daniel Day Lewis excepted) and, sadly, you’ll find more personality in a soulless CGI automaton. There are basically two complete characters in this film and the rest of the performers seem to exist as window dressing. And forgettable window dressing at that.  

     Though this film is half an hour too long it’s not that Scorsese didn’t have enough to say it’s that it felt like he didn’t know how to say it. The opening shot is a beauty: A close-up of Liam Neeson’s ghostly eyes. The first shot turns out to be a priest preparing for a battle that will kill him. He shares a few quiet moments with his son, gives him a pendant, and gets his men ready for battle. The nervous “army” gathers and slowly enters the arena; withered slums that are now an urban battlefield. It’s quiet out. After a couple of tense beats we see men from across the snowy street spill out of a decaying warehouse an pretty soon there are hundreds of cold men standing parallel to each other. Staring each other down but all nervous and tired. Words are exchanged between Priest Vallon (Neeson's character with a sword in one hand and a giant metal cross in the other) and a big hat wearin', curly moustache sporting, lanky motherfucker that looks like a monocle-less Monopoly man and walks like he's got hemorrhoids. The gauntlet is thrown down, war is declared and in an A+ overhead shot we see the two screaming forces charging each other, equipped only with paltry weapons such as dull bats and rusty knifes. Scorsese then ups the tempo by orchestrating a kinetic battle scene where a football field’s worth of white snow turns blood read. For about five minutes "Gangs of New York" was the best film of the year.

     The opening of this film is thrilling and the bloody result of these two gangs clashing gives Scorsese an excuse to rip off that classic Gone With the Wind-esq overhead shot of dead bodies that, from far away, look like wasted ants. We come to find out that the reason for this carnage is territorial as an Irish gang called the Dead Rabbits defend their newly Americanized rights against the native American New Yorkers led by a man named, for obvious reasons, Bill the Butcher. In the battle, Bill ruthlessness dispatches Priest Vallon and his young son, witnessing his father's undoing in horror (of course we get more close-up shots of eyes), later vows revenge on Bill the Butcher. The town now belongs to the ruthless Bill and due to respect for the now dead holy man, the Butcher has mercy on the orphaned boy and sends him away to be educated or something (the details are hazy). Cut to 16 years later and the kid has grown up to be Jack from “Titanic,” except this guy calls himself Amsterdam and instead of being a good artist all this guy can do well is emote anger... and he's sporting a wicked mullet so you know the dude means business. Amsterdam's extraneous plan: to infiltrate Bill’s enormously powerful criminal empire and betray him in front of the world by becoming his treacherous right hand man. And that makes up the rest of the film. Sprinkle a torpid love affair/love triangle between Bill the Butcher, Amsterdam and an up and coming ho, Cameron Diaz (whose acting is about as convincing here as it was in “The Sweetest Thing”… not surprising since Scorsese has never really been able to get inside the female mind), a few stabbings, the always-welcome John C Reilly as a Irish cop, a double cross or two, a plethora of bad 1890’s accents, and a climactic battle sequence where the Northern Army combats the rioting Five Corners plebs while Bill and Amsterdam play out their own micro-war on the sullied streets of NY. So add all of that and you’ve got yourself one bloated epic that sounds cool, sure, but is as empty as the Butcher's gallon sized hat.

     As Roger Ebert once said, “It's not what the movie is about that makes it good or bad, but how it is about it." So regarding the how's, this is a vapid clunky film with excruciating pacing. "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets" flows like a 70 minute version of DMX's "Up in Here" music video compared to this measured action-drama. I say if you're going to make a violent three hour melodrama then make damn we care about the participants (as Kubrick did so well in "Barry Lyndon"). No such luck here, for "Gangs" is perhaps Scorsese’s worst film. It seems that Marty decided he wanted to make a NY epic first and only later decided to fill in the blanks. Sure the film’s scope is expertly executed; the authentic production design is spiraling and humbling; the costumes are first rate; there's Oscar worthy cinematography by Michael Ballhaus; a playfully cool score by Peter Gabriel; and set pieces that are aesthetically pleasing when placed alongside the rustic, decrepit and gorgeously photographed slums but give anyone $110 million dollars and a film this prominent on the surface could be yielded. Too bad the inflated budget didn’t go towards a more focused editor and a tighter script.

      As I see it, the film's biggest problem is that it lacks convincing (i.e. real) characters. Daniel Day Lewis’ William Cutter disserves an Oscar nomination to be sure but in an epic full of hundreds, one, maybe two round characters just won’t cut it. While Lewis gives us a loathsome yet decidedly human character who is a product of his demoralizing culture, consumed by “fear,” greed, and xenophobic hatred, DiCaprio’s young and shallowly motivated hero is rendered all but forgettable. I don’t intend to say that DiCaprio’s acting is sub par because he's actually quite good in this movie (the kid’s got a scowl that was made for the movies and he should bring it out more often), but his character’s one-note depth leaves much to be desired. Just because Amsterdam is hell-bent on revenge doesn’t mean he shouldn’t have a personality-- I mean, hello, Iago.
      I sat down and tried to think about what this film means. What was Scorsese trying to say with the corrupted characters of Bill and Amsterdam? Do they represent the virtuous and damning attributes of this nation? If not then how does all this relate to the America and New York of modern times (a question that the brilliant closing shot demands we ask)? And how much are we supposed to like this ruthless Amsterdam and his superficial lover, Jennie Everdeane (Diaz), when they seek to flee the city? All futile question's and I’m afraid that after DiCaprio’s Amsterdam, the many characters that follow only seem to contain less purpose and are tediously drawn the point where, after three hours of beautiful but ultimately empty male swaggering, I wanted to pull a Snake Plisken and Escape from New York. Martin Scorsese is usually a master but with this film he’s just a master-bater.

Grade: C

Far from Heaven 11/18/2002
What’s Good: Beautiful production design, even better performances by Moore, Hasbert, and Quaid. Director Todd Haynes has made his first masterpiece.
What's Not: Sure the film is full of social meaning but what exactly was Haynes trying to say here. Is he being ironic like he was in "Velvet Goldmine?"
Directed by  Todd Haynes
Plot Outline: In 1950s Connecticut, a housewife faces a marital crisis and mounting racial tensions in the outside world.

     Being that this is an age where nobody can show us anything that we haven't seen before ("Being John Malkovich" excepted) I have accepted this sad truth yet gather a secret thrill out of watching how various filmmakers attempt to reinvent or jumpstart old art (i.e. the 1950's soap opera movie) as they recapitulate it through the ironic eyes of our contemporary zeitgeist. Most the time this reinvention comes out looking forced and seems to have no reason to exist other than to cash in on nostalgia ("Charlie's Angels," "Shaft," "Plesentville") but if done right, audiences are rewarded to throwback masterworks that use old style to actually something new. Film's like “Pulp Fiction” or “Muholland Drive” may not reinvent stylistic moviemaking but they sure do put a fine polish on it. "Far form Heaven" falls into the second category.  

     "FFH" may look like a sappy melodrama but, truth be told, I laughed at this film more than I sniveled. Indeed, the whole audience (mostly middle aged women and, sigh, me) was laughing along. What was so amusing was how ignorant and repressed the society portrayed in this film was. A society that, by today's standard seems hopelessly purblind but a nonetheless a truthful chapter in a paranoid, post-war America. As we laugh at the puritanical, racist, women hating, pro white male/anti gay male society that is basically put under a microscope, the film's higher purpose may be to tell us that things haven’t changed that much since the 50's. The only difference is that were more politically correct today and our laughter may be an attempt to cover up the truth.

     Julian Moore plays a peppy housewife who works intensely to maintain the household's status quo. She is married to Frank (a stellar Dennis Quaid who better fucking get an Oscar nomination) a man who provides for his family but for reasons we come to see, a miserable phoney who has a socially unacceptable "addiction" that society says can be "fixed." Ha. The film starts off picturesque but turns dark and sinister; once layers of truth get peeled back we gain more insight in this society’s seedy subculture and by peering into the eye of societal taboos we learn just how intolerant this free country can be if you don't fit into a very specific niche-- white, straight, male (Three for three: I'm so lucky). It seems that everybody has a secret or true self in this film and a line from “American Beauty” came to mind. The scene was when Spacey and Bening were pretending to be normal at a social function and after being called "weird" in front of “The King,” a sardonic Lester French-kisses his spurious wife and declared “We have a very healthy relationship.” You see, time after time in film's about culture we see characters wearing masks and doing anything they can to appear normal on the surface while a brushfire rages within themselves. As such, nothing in this film’s Plesentvill-esq town is what it seems. Sensing her husbands misery and in need of some human contact of her own, Moore falls in love with "the help." A gentle gardener nicely played by Dennis Haysbert who has been just awesome as the president in Fox's “24.” The two start an affair but in retrospect I feel I should note that the implications of each and every character is about so much more than individual struggles.

     The question I was asking myself early on was “is Todd Haynes being ironic here?” I was certain he was and, at first, a bit irritated at his glib showmanship. Moore’s child would say “gosh darn” and her character would scold him with a “watch your language mister.” We all laugh and as I got into this increasingly intricate film my disposition went from irritation to absolute fascination at how a throwback could feel so genuine. There are indeed many laughs at the expense of how out-of-touch (from my modern perspective) the American culture depicted in this film was but with every smirk comes a world wind of meaning. There’s a moment in the film where Moore is seen walking down the street with her “colored” gardener. Just walking. And this causes a chain reaction of hate and ridicule and pretty soon, Moore becomes an outcast and soon understands, to some degree, what it’s like being different (i.e. Black). These moments are truly touching (as are Quaids struggle with his natural tendencies and use of alcohol to quell the pain inside) but question remains, is Haynes being ironic and are the sentiments raised in this film genuine? The answer is that Haynes is being both ironic and genuine. You see, the more I watched this film the more I forget it was a study of culture and I ended up treating these people, not as characters from postmodern satires like the underrated second “Brady Bunch” film, but as organic agents of a well made melodrama. People that I cared for. The film’s text may have an agenda but the emotional core of just about every character is startlingly real and that’s thanks to a handful of brilliant performances, most notably Moore a performer in this piece who, besides Quaid, should get an Oscar nomination... and I say, a win. A third of the way through the film I found myself forgiving the irony in favor of being swept up by the rich narrative and once the film was over the real reward of this film began. I got to the fun stuff which was thinking about what Haynes is staying with this movie. Over a month later and I'm still thinking about "Far From Heaven." This film has given Cultural Studies writers years worth of material (yes, even more than "Scooby Doo"). 

     I can’t help but be intrigued by this filmmaker. What’s his deal? I simply can’t figure him out. Haynes was an art and semiotics major at Brown University and this fact throws a wrench in the works. Could an unnaturally born filmmaker make such a vivid and caustic throwback to 50's Hollywood in such as concise way? More than that, could any director reasonably jump from a crapy film about dust phobia (“Safe”) to the cluster-fuck, glam rock musical epic (the lopsided but fascinating “Velvet Goldmine”) and on to this a subtle and thoughtful study of a fractured society? Haynes is a fascinating figure but as an auteur, his films are not visually related. And they should not have to be. Each film is wildly different and, in their own way, unforgettable (remember that UFO from “Goldmine?”) yet I wouldn’t call the man a good director just yet-- after all, I’ve only really liked 1.5 of his films so far. Like my conflicting feelings towards Mr. David Lynch, I may question this artist's "vision" at times but I am instantly drawn to his work and I understand that dismissing a director like Haynes is to remain as ignorant as the housewife in the sticky milieu of this brave and wonderful film. Easily one of, if not the, best film of the year.

Grade: A

Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers 12/21/2002
What’s Good: Dazzling. Stunning. Much, much better than the first film. Much better.
What's Not: Still a tad too long. Even at three hours, Wood's Frodo didn't get nearly enough screen time. Plus, Liv Tyler's character is off in just about every respect.
Directed by  Peter Jackson
Plot Outline: Frodo and Sam continue on to Mordor in their mission to destroy the One Ring. Whilst their former companions make new allies and launch an assault on Isengard.

     Towards the end of this film the stately and pristine Gandalf speaks the words “The battle for middle earth has just begun….” JUST BEGUN???!!! Two films into this almost fulsome series and you’re tell me that we’re just getting warmed up? I should be irate but I'm sooo not. If the first six hours has all been the foreplay, a part of me can’t wait to see the money shot. In a word, this film is relentless. It pounds away at Tolkien's Middle Earth mythology in a rasping manner leaves us spent and dizzy. Most surprising to me, though, is not the exhilarating narrative but the fact that a sequel to the film that intensely annoyed me turned out to be the one of the most memorable film's I've seen all year.

     The anti-industrialism themes of man vs. nature and humanistic themes man vs. himself that were barley touched upon in the first film take form here and contribute to a story that explodes with vacillating amounts of action and meaning. "The Two Towers" may still be too long, its characters may lopsided and pacing incongruous but unlike the first film, it doesn’t seem mechanical and soulless. In short, all the walking, talking, talking about walking, fighting, resting, gay sex... er, I mean talking about fighting etc. was all still there but entirely bearable. In this film, characters don’t feel aimless anymore by virtue of the simple fact that they have a destination—Strider, Frodo and their respective posies know where there going and know, despite the impossible odds, what they have to do to get there. So because the cocksure plot thrusts  seemed to have an aim (okay, I cease with the innuendo), the triumph of this middle child is that it is not a beautiful film with a hollow core; again, it's not like the first. Far from mechanical, this is a heartfelt adventure saga, the kind of film that draws you in with an elevated narrative that is replete with fantastical visions.

Three stories for the price of one:
--The film is divided into three mini-epic stories. First is Frodo and Sam, two sexless “best friends.” While Hobbits seem to be asexual in the literal context of the film the homosexual subtext has never being stronger for Sam could represent the jealous boyfriend, living in fear of Frodo’s ring. Throughout the film Sam is very protective, afraid of loosing his “best friend” to the dark side and weary of the selfish motives of Frodo’s new “friend” named Gollum. Now, Gollum represents a landmark moment in modern cinema, he is a fully rendered CGI character that I didn’t want to shotgun blast to the head after five minutes. He’s no Jar-Jar and certainly not that fuck-head from the last Harry potter film. Gollum seems fully realized and complex and... tragic. Demented and manic, Gollum has a priceless scene where he argues with himself on whether he should be loyal to Frodo and allow him to keep the ring or betray him. During this dazzling and funny and somewhat ominous scene, we see how within this character’s psyche, there lies a good Gollum and a bad Gollum. Two sides that are in constant struggle (a far better execution than the split personality villain of "Spider Man"). His divided personality gives the Frodo subplots their mystery.  Likewise with Frodo. Though I wish Frodo’s arc got more screen time (all totaled I wouldn’t be surprised if you told me that Frodo’s scenes only add up to about twenty-five minutes), its fascinating to see how this once callow character struggles with the division within him. In this film we see how the power of the ring is so powerful that it can even corrupt a good natured Hobbit. But like all great fantasy characters (Luke and/or Buffy Summers), Frodo's success lies in his ability to choose good and this is what makes this story so rich. Sam helps Frodo to see his “true self” and Elijah Wood and Sean Aston give two great supporting performance. Too bad those performances are, you know, supporting. 

--Second is Pippin and Merry, not as annoying here as in the first film. After being captured, the two escape from their Org captors into a nearby forest. A foreboding but ultimately enriching place where they befriend lanky, Princess Mononokie looking tree men (not visually convincing creatures but meaningful in the context of the nature-first message). Pippin's scenes do not stand on their own but they do act as a nice break from the serious content. And as a reward for putting up with this somewhat mediocre subplot, Pippin, Merry and and their sky-high tree buddies are given a stellar payoff towards the end when they partake in a fantastic battle against Saurmon’s tower and earth raping minions. In the battle, the cleansing force of mass amounts of water that was once bound up by a manmade dam is released and it is here here that nature (through the images of angry trees and ragging water) has it sweet revenge. Very cool.

--And finally, Strider, Gimli and Galadriel. The Trio spend the whole movie preparing for battle and boy do they provide us with one. Though what curbed this pre-battle boasting was that just a night earlier I saw Buffy and her comrade in arms brace themselves for battle in a much more taut and meaningful manner. Still, I don’t expect any movie to be better than "Buffy" and therefore this film's action-saturated coda is satisfying on it's own terms. The set piece that consists of the forces of good (a few hundred poorly armed men guarding a decrepit castle) braving an invading evil army or 10,000 is unrivaled in it's scope. I've never seen anything this big. The moments before the battle are thrilling and once it starts, Jackson’s God-like camera movements put us right there in the Godly cockpit as we are given a window into the poetic carnage that just about sparkles under the moonlight. This is the kind of outnumbered dread that I haven’t felt since the storming bugs of "Starship Troopers" or even the 1969 film “Zulu.” I should say that the way Jackson (and I suppose Tolkien) fetishizes violence and machismo is a tad arc. The good vs. evil themes are a little too simplistic and are no match for Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s proclivities towards depicting morally complex movie monsters. An ambivalence I much prefer. Still, the director of this film is earnest in his black-and-white binary oppositions. He is, after all, only re-telling this male centric fairytale.
     Speaking of boys and girls, before the battle that ends this film we see Viggo Mortensen's Strider dealing with his love of that elf chick while another fair lady named Éowyn (a human heir to the King of the castle that is being protected… at least I think, maybe I'm mistaken in the small details of this dance world) develops feelings towards the unshaven hero. Played by Miranda Otto this character gives the film it’s badly needed feminine touch. I just wished I could say the same thing about Liv Tyler’s Arwen. This character seems so forced that I just about wince at the execution of each of her artificially maudlin scenes; injected, no doubt, just to please the sappy "Titanic" crowd. Still, the love triangle is compelling because of Éowyn's introduction and all of this will hopefully evolve into something by next year's film.   

     Yeah, I can go on and be antagonizing by saying how much I hated the first "Lord of the Rings" but a part of me knows that this is not entirely true. You see, while I still am disillusioned with the indulgences of that film –its too long, too mechanical, too unsatisfying with it's tacked on ending—it stuck with me and just recently became a true joy to watch on the special edition DVD that just came out (that, despite the fact that it is half-an-hour longer than already too long version). Regardless, the cinematic rendition of the Tolkien iconography, those sweeping vistas, stayed in my head even a year after it was out. So like Gollum’s push-and-pull feelings towards that persuasive ring, I do hate it and I do love it too. Therefore "The Two Towers" was a film I was secretly looking forward to while dreading at the same time. Thankfully my dread has been quelled for I now fully trust Jackson with this saga and, again, unlike the first film, I feel he has told a story that goes through the motions of a real, complete movie that has a beginning, middle and an all important end. Though "The Two Towers" represents the slighted middle chapter in a series (even Jackson has called it the worst in his series) where as the first and third are considered far superior, this film  in no resembles the film I thought I would see, which is three hours of filler material that exists only to hold us over until the third episode. Never before has a sequel surpassed its predecessor with such furious bravura. The title says it all, this film towers above the fellowship. It is one of the finest action epics ever created by a mortal.

The Two Towers: A
The Fellowship of the Ring: B-
Extended DVD version of Fellow: A-

The Powerpuff Girls Movie 12/17/2002
What’s Good: Surprisingly smart and fun and, oh man, this is the most violent film since "Way of the Gun."
What's Not: Do I even have to answer that?
Directed by Craig McCracken 
Plot Outline: The movie shows the origin of the Powerpuff Girls before the cartoon series. It explains why they were born and why they dedicated their lives to fighting crime and the forces of evil.

   Being a fan of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” I can see where "Powerpuff Girls" is coming from. A mixing of classic sci-fi genre with modern “girl power,” "PP Girls" may not be as intellectually stimulating as the little Slayer that could but, like its main characters, this film is a little bundle of energy.

     In this origin story when a professor accidentally “made” three “cute and bubbly” young girls from something called Chemical X, they become superheroes naturally must do battle with an evil monkey created by science. Obviously we could go into the ideological implications, and to be honest the feminist iconography this show exhibits is a tad on the creepy side. But it’s a fascinating kind of creepy like when the girls express themselves in a set piece where they play the most violent game of tag cinema has ever seen. An innocent act is taken and, because of the girl's super powers, they end up leveling an entire city and causing 40 million dollars worth of damage. Then there's the pint sized Jewish mayor who seductively eats a Kosher pickle as the town's going to hell… or the fact that these powerful girls listen to whatever the professor says (he is the Giles of the movie). His dialogue, “lets get your nighties on and into bed,” is gentle within an absurdly violent production. Also fascinating to me is the Professors bedtime story where he cautions his thee girls “Your powers are very special and unique and although we have a lot of fun doing unique things around the house, out in Townsville, people don’t understand how special you girls are. And unfortunately people often get scared and angry when they don’t understand something special or unique.” A very telling bit of dialogue. This is perhaps a comment on the fragile femininity of young girls and the hegemony’s need to exploit and control the female form. Throughout the film, seemingly innocuous lines like that become loaded with undeniable subtext and I was entertained all the way through. Going into all of this may seem foolish but I'm bored and it beats talking about what the plot is literally about. Which is, after the tag rampage the girls becomes victims of a city wide witch-hunt and their creator is arrested. The girls are “alone, scared and maybe even… lost” in the big bad city and they are then manipulated by a super evil monkey and fellow “freak” hell bent on destroying the world. The monkey, named MojoJojo may representation man’s primal side, the monkey makes for a fine Frankenstein villain for the girls to do battle with. Along those lines, the mayor seems to represent the oblivious nature of politics and the Professor-- the one responsible for the good (girls) and evil (the Mojo Joho) that comes into Townsville-- could be the gentle yet enabling face of single parents or the blameless nature of men. The girls get all this shit for being powerful but it is the professor who is ultimately responsible for their erroneous  creation.

     I never watch cartoon network and know nothing of this series but it’s thrillingly kitschy. While the big lumbering stupid as shit "Ice Age" will probably get the Oscar nomination for best animated film, "PP Girls" and "Spirited Away" are the only two animated films this year that know what's up. "PP Girls" packs a wallop of extreme “cartoon” violence, female empowerment, and a minimalist animation style that consists of groovy two dimensional architecture and round heads with huge eyes. It seems that the very fiber of this shows being may be one big joke (the animators must be a sorted bunch of pervs... I loved director McCracken's commentary) but so was “Ren and Stimpy.” Plus, I’m thrilled to see a film take that “Charlie’s Angles” model of embellished girly action and do something constructive with it.  

Grade: B

Solaris 11/30/2002
What’s Good: Clooney is one of the best actors in the country. This is his film. "Solaris" is a drama that happens to be set in space. Clooney plays a character that happens to be living in the future. It could be called sci-fi but, like “2001” it’s more than that.
What's Not: The film didn't really grow in me once I saw it.
Directed by  Steven Soderbergh
Plot Outline: Upon arrival at the space station orbiting an ocean world called Solaris a psychologist discovers that the commander of an expedition to the planet has died mysteriously. Other strange events soon start happening

     “It’s almost as if it knows its being observed” a scientist declares in the American adaptation of an epic Russian sci-fi classic. What has obviously turned off audiences around the nation (fucking "They" has made more... why God, why?) is that this scientist is not talking about is not a vile creature but a self aware planet that has recently been visited by a satellite space station. The planet, named after the film (or is it the other way around?) is one of only six characters in this beautiful and isolated little film; the rest happen to be human but that doesn't stop the planet from giving as good a performance as the orga. As such, even when this massive signifier can't be directly seen we feel it's presence. This object with all it’s vibrant colors and menacing stillness represents the unknown. The unconscious. Ever-glowing with these radiant pink and blue hews, this conscious planetary mass is as ubiquitous as my silence during an Adam Sandler comedy. Now that's scary.

    More than any of that, though, the film is a study of one man, George Clooney, who goes to that station to “solve a problem.” Aliens defending their planet? No. Robo-Britney gone mad? I wish. The reality of the situation is far more convoluted. I can say that once Clooney finds out what the problem is we spend the rest of the movie trying to figure out if it’s legit. Themes on the nature of truth and reality remain in the foreground and it seems that from the moment Clooney's character leaves planet earth, a place framed in that same beautiful orange and grey tint that “Out of Sight” had,  the film takes on a persona that can only be described as “2001: A Space Odyssey” meets “Event Horizon.” This is wicked mix tailor-made for film geeks and practically nobody else because “Solaris” is a horror film where the only horror to speak of comes from the psyche of a man coping with loss. "Solaris" has got to be one of America's best ever sci-fi/horror dramas.   

    The setup is almost too simple: Clooney is playing a bereaved therapist who is visited by his dead wife once he's in space. The irony is that the Clooney is more dead than is wife, the actor goes from being a dashing zombie to a dashing zombie with a microscopic gleam of hope that the incarnate of his wife has spurred. I'm not sure why exactly he was called to fix this problem and even less sure how he could have even fixed it but once there, all Clooney does is hang with his wife. The two spend a majority of the time chatting it up and remembering the past but "Six Sense" or "The Others" this film ain't. Instead, his wife is “A mirror that reflected part of your life. And you’re the formula.”  

    “I came from your memory of her” his wife says when she finally realized who (or what) she is. But even then there are no answers. If she is a copy then she is a self aware and decidedly organic copy and this would make her just as real as the next schmoe. This is a fascinating character trait that would be rendered trivial or silly by a actor who didn't quite know how to approach this material. As is, Clooney and his fax of a wife played by Natasha Machorn are a match made in space.

    The nature of memory is explored in a cool, languid manner by the exacting Steven Soderbergh. The film weaves in and out of Clooney's past memories with his wife; the first time they held hands, a heated dinner conversation about God, reading a poem, having sex, eating noodles, Clooney’s ass etc. So when put up to Soderbergh's other works similarities come up. This film could easily be seen as the counterpart to the director's other brilliant ode of memory called “The Limey” and here's hoping Stevie has a memory trilogy up his sleeves because no director has made the simple act of thinking or recalling the past seem so alive. Prust would be approve. As both films try to reconcile the notion of false memory verses reality and how the two may not be as divided as we think since everything we experience is through our memory anyways, I just sat there and tried to absorb the quintessence of the film. I was too hypnotized to dissect the possible metaphors.
Questions of how higher forms of conscious can be reached through our probing minds are raised and linger throughout the production. Whoa there, did anybody tell Soderbergh that this is an American film? Raising things like that might actually make people want to think. Rob Schneider socking chicks or gay Hobbits, yeah, that we can rally behind but this film will be seen as something hopelessly pretentious. But why can't films be thought provoking without being didactic. Well, at least the French will probably understand what Soderbergh was trying to do here.

     The film takes a minimalist approach to both storytelling and grandeur but Soderbergh's visual poetry still manages to overtake the the content. His camera floats around the room as if it too is a constructed being. The only showiness in this film exists in our perception of the ideas that it raises. “Solaris”  is a masterpiece of tiny proportions—a film that must be seen if you love mainstream filmmaking that's also artsy. Compared to most everything else I've seen all year this film is alive. It’s real.  

Grade: A-