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December 31, 2005
4 more Movie Reviews
Have been seeing the year-end onslaught of Academy Award wannabe's. Here are a couple of should-be's and a couple of not-so-much's.
The Promise
This is China's entry for Best Foreign Film and, though noone will have seen it (I had to go across town for the 1 show at 11:30AM at the one theater that's getting it qualified for the Oscar), it wouldn't be out of place nominated for Best Picture.
A girl, given a choice by a beautiful floating goddess, decides her destiny and sets up an epic tale of love, loyalty, sacrifice, and heroism. Yes, it's another Chinese fantasy film with swordplay, kung fu, people who can outrun a stampeding herd and climb trees with a few hops, and, of course, gorgeous costumes and scenery. Though the cinematography and scenery may not be quite as spectacular as those in recent films like Hero and House of Flying Daggers, the story here is a little richer and easier to follow. And carries more emotional depth. Special effects don't exactly look real, but in a movie like this, nothing has to be too realistic. You just say 'wow' and go along with it.
 | Brokeback Mountain About halfway through the movie, I was wondering why it was getting so much hype, but I guess that is the reason. Without forcing anything, the story and the emotions build over the course of the entire film -- it's not an extraordinary story. It's just a normal (if tragic) love story about two people who happen to find each other but can't make it work. |
| But by the end, we believe in the love so deeply, that the end, as natural as the rest of the film, is extremely affecting. (It helps to have two incredible, elegiac songs over the closing credits: a Willie Nelson version of a Bob Dylan song that's better than the original, and sad-voiced Rufus Wainwright with a beautiful folk/gospel song.) The script (by Diana Ossanna and Larry McMurtry, of "Look at those pigs swim" fame) is a miracle of economy. Nowhere have characters said so much with so little. The acting is consistently terrific, starting with Heath Ledger, who had the most difficult and conflicted role, but including Jake Gyllenhall, and all the supporting actors. Ang Lee does his usual great job of letting the direction serve the story. He seems to come upon the story as it happens, somehow just manageing to be there at the most important times. He focuses on the smaller moments, so that the bigger shocks have even more power.
King Kong | |
Match Point The trailer for Match Point was very tricky. It didn't reveal that this was a Woody Allen movie until the very end, after people had already gotten interested in a film that seems nothing like a typical Allen picture. Except for one thing. When I saw the trailer the first time, I thought to myself 'this looks like a rip-off of Crimes and Misdemeanors'. I guess if anyone can rip off Woody Allen, it's Woody Allen, but, having seen the full movie now, I still feel like I would have been better off just renting the true classic Crimes and Misdemeanors. |  |
Sure, for Match Point, Allen threw in some points about class (unfortunately under-done) and his main theme about luck (extremely over-done). But once the movie becomes a story of a man, cheating on his wife, who finds that his extra-marital lover will not quietly wait her turn (a truly cliched storyline), the film becomes awfully tedious. Though I liked the actors' portrayal of an upper-class British family, just smug enough to seem to deserve any bad luck they get, the biggest problem was a horrible performance by Scarlett Johansson as the American object of affection. (You would think she was struggling with an accent, her line readings were so stiff.) Allen's direction (always underrated) is great, but it's his writing that let him down this time.
Posted by JoshHornik at December 31, 2005 06:08 PM