DVD Review: How to Survive a Plague

Wednesday, February 27, 2013

DVD Review: How to Survive a Plague

How to Survive a Plague
Directed by: David France.
Written by: David France & Todd Woody Richman & Tyler H. Walk.

How to Survive a Plague mixes old news footage and home movies to tell the story of ACTUP – an organization that was enraged with government and drug company complacency during the AIDS epidemic of the 1980s through the mid-1990s – when finally a combination of drugs was discovered that helped to prolong the lives of those infected with HIV. There is still no cure, but considering people were dying in a matter of months when the disease first came into being, and can now live seemingly indefinitely with it, this was a major breakthrough. That is happened has more to do with ACTUP than it does with the government.

 The movie shows just how the group progressed – what they did through the years (starting in 1987) as the death count rises. ACTUP  was smart enough right from the beginning to know they had to use the media to their advantage – so they had the type of protests that were too big for the media to ignore. They have media insiders teach them how to deliver catchy slogans that the media can grasp onto – the sound bite is more important than a speech – and know how to use grand gestures – huge banners reading “Silence = Death” or covering Senator Jesse Helms house (a hateful, hateful man) with a giant cloth condom. The system wasn’t working, they couldn’t change the system from within, so they did what they could to change it from the outside – and let everyone know they weren’t going anywhere.

Throughout the course of the movie, we will see them protest everyone from New York Mayor Ed Koch to then President George H.W. Bush (Reagan gets a pass, presumably since the movie begins late in his administration), to Helms, to the FDA and NIH, to various drug companies – and in 1992, Bill Clinton on the campaign trail. Their message really was simple – unless you step up and DO something, you are murdering us, and our blood will be on your hands.

It’s a provocative message, and I must say at times, I did think they were accusing the wrong people – but that hardly matters. They needed to guilt people into helping them, because nothing else was working. When AIDS first hit, hospitals did not want to diagnose people with the disease, or treat those who had it. Their bodies were often put in black garbage bags, and many funeral homes wouldn’t accept the bodies. Drugs, that were widely available in other countries, had not been approved by the FDA yet – it took them years to get through the “testing” phase, and people with AIDS did not have years to wait.

As with any group like ACTUP – from Vietnam Protesters to Occupy Wall Street and everything in between – eventually cracks start to emerge. Drugs still weren’t becoming available, and those that were didn’t help as much as hoped. Some wanted to get more involved in the inner workings of power – both in politics and the drug companies themselves – and others saw it as a waste of time. The movie pretty much skips over a few years in the early to mid-1990s when the new cocktail of drugs was discovered – saying only that it was “a dark time” – mostly because the group was fracturing, and people were still dying. But the movie ends with some inspiring moments. The only modern talking heads we had seen throughout most of the movie were those of scientists who worked tirelessly to research the disease and develop drugs to help those infected. Many of the faces we see during the course of movie who are infected say often that they expect to die. Many do. But some are still around today, and that is inspiring. And yet, for them, it seems more sad than that. They certainly feel a degree of survivor’s guilt over being the ones who didn’t die.

But overall, How to Survive a Plague is a tragic, yet inspiring story. Without ACTUP, who knows how long it would have taken for drugs that actually helps AIDS patient to become available. ACTUP is an example of how to protest effectively – and the value of doing so.

Movie Review: Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God

Movie Review: Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God

Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God
Directed by: Alex Gibney.

I am an atheist, but I have always believed that most Catholic priests are good men. Men who devote their lives to their faith, and try their best to help those in their congregations. And even after all the clergy molestation scandals that have rocked the Catholic Church in recent years, I still firmly believe that. I also firmly believe however that those in positions of power in the Church are more interested in keeping that power, in protecting the Church and their assets, then they are in actually helping the victims of the monstrous actions of the minority of Priests, who take advantage of their positions of power to prey on children. Watch a movie like Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God (or Twist of Faith or Deliver Us from Evil, two other excellent documentaries about the same subject) and I think you will find it impossible to disagree.

Mea Maxima Culpa focuses mainly on one case – the case of Lawrence Murphy, who was a Priest at a school for deaf children between 1950-1974, and molested countless boys during that time. That he preyed on children at all is deplorable, but preying on deaf children is somehow even worse – especially when we hear that he picked out the students whose parents didn’t speak American Sign Language, so it would be even harder for his victims to tell their parents about the abuse.

The film was directed by Alex Gibney, one of the best and most prolific documentarians working today (although he is dead wrong on Zero Dark Thirty, but I digress). He interviews many of Murphy’s victims, who sign their answers, and we hear the voices of famous actors (like John Slattery, Chris Cooper and Ethan Hawke) translate their painful words for us. The readings by these actors are very good, but the pain these victims feels really doesn’t need translation – it is written all over their faces, as it tells their stories.

The molestation scandal that has rocked the Church is obviously bigger than Murphy and his victims – and the movie gives us a wider ranging portrait of what was done in this case – how the complaints made their way up the food chain where they were ignored at each and every step – and how those responsible for covering up the crimes of Priests goes all the way to the top. Pope Benedict, before he was Pope, was in the head of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, and wanted to see every report on priests molesting children, although he didn’t really do anything about them. And the beloved Pope John Paul II, who seems to be on the fast track for Sainthood, is not above criticism either – considering his support of Marcial Maciel Degollado, who even the future Pope Benedict wanted to investigate, but Pope John Paul II protected (according the documentary, an investigation was finally launched – on the very day Pope John Paul II died).

Mea Maxima Culpa is the type of movie that inspires outrage and anger, but more than that sadness. Sadness because these Priests had a duty – took a sacred oath – to protect those in their care and help them, and instead used their positions to permanently damage them. Anger and outrage because it has become increasingly clear that those in positions of power didn’t want to see what was directly in front of them – didn’t want to know what had happened, and took the easy way out, shunting the problem off the side and ignoring the victims. One expert, who has testified at trials on behalf of the victims, says he is often asked how often he testifies on behalf of the Church – and he says “Always”. Because it is the people, not the priests or those in power, who are the real Church. If only those who had it in their power to change things believed that, this scandal would never have become so far reaching, such a permanent black mark on the Catholic Church, and so damaging to the victims. And also, it must be said, so damaging to all the good Priests out there – the majority of them – who really DO care, but are now looked upon with suspicion. There are no winners and losers in this case, just more sadness and anger than any child should have to feel.

DVD Review: A Simple Life

DVD Review: A Simple Life

A Simple Life
Directed by: Ann Hui.
Written by: Susan Chan & Yan-lam Lee.
Starring: Andy Lau (Roger), Deannie Yip (Ah Tao), Paul Chun (Uncle Kin), Pik Kee Hui (Aunt Kam), So-ying Hui (Mui), Fuli Wang (Roger's mother).

After her parents died during the Japanese occupation, Ah Tao (Deannie Yip) was forced into a life of service. She spends the next 60 years serving several generations of the same family. Most of the family has moved to America, but one has stayed behind in China. This is Roger (Andy Lau), a quiet, unassuming movie producer. Ah Tao is still his all-purpose servant – cooking, cleaning, shopping and keeping his small apartment running. They share an unspoken bond and are quietly content in their lives. Then Ah Tao has a stroke. Roger assumes that she will continue to live with him, and that he’ll bring in some help for her, but she insists on being put into an old folks home.

As I was watching A Simple Life, I kept assuming that at some point director Ann Hui and her writers Susan Chan and Yan-Lam Lee would add some false drama to the proceedings. That the old folks home would be crooked or cruel. But while its run down and not exactly high class, they do their best, and everyone is nice. Or that the sad old man who keeps asking for money will eventually scam Ah Tao out of all of her savings. But that doesn’t happen either. Instead A Simple Life is a precisely what the title implies – the story of Ah Tao’s life, and her bond with Roger – and his entire family. This is a true story about the type of woman that they never make movies about.

Deannie Yip plays Ah Tao in one of the best performances of the year. It is a simple, subtle, delicate performance where she plays this normal woman who loves the family she has served for decades, but does not want to be a burden on them. I assumed that the movie would eventually become something like Tokyo Story or Make Way for Tomorrow – two of the greatest films of all time, both about older parents who are pretty much forgotten and rejected by their grown children. Roger starts out the dutiful son surrogate who comes to visit Ah Tao in the old folks home. She tells him not to bother, but he will not be deterred. He loves Ah Tao – has been with her his entire life, and feels it is his duty to serve her to pay her back for everything she has done for him. At the old folks home he says he is her godson – and out at a movie premiere, says she is his Aunt. He does this not for his own benefit, but to make her feel more comfortable – less embarrassed by not having a family of her own – because she really does. And the rest of his family feels the same way. When they come to visit Roger, they all visit her as well – and love it. We meet Roger’s mother, and while she is a nice woman who loves her children, and they love her, they feel an even deeper connection with Ah Tao.

 The movie is, like the title suggests, simple. But it is quietly touching as well. We so rarely see real people on screen – people who live unremarkable, yet contented lives. The performances by Yip and Lau are remarkable in how they show these two normal people and their deep connection. A Simple Life is a simple film – but a wonderful one.

Ranking the Best Picture Winners: 70-61

Tuesday, February 26, 2013

Ranking the Best Picture Winners: 70-61

70. The Sound of Music (1965)
What Should Have Won: Another weak year for nominees, but I’ll take Doctor Zhivago over The Sound of Music any day. I may even go against the whole colorful epic thing, and pick A Thousand Clowns.
What Was Snubbed: Roman Polanski’s first English language film, Repulsion, was a masterful horror film. Orson Welles’ final masterpiece, Chimes at Midnight.
Review: Call me overly cynical if you must, but this film is just too sickly sweet and manipulative for me to truly like it. And it goes on forever. I enjoy Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer in the film, but the kids can’t really act. By this point haven’t we heard all the songs so often that they’ve lost nearly all their impact. One of those films you don’t mind watching once, but if I had to watch again, I may shoot myself.

 69. Hamlet (1948)

What Should Have Won: The Treasure of the Sierra Madre won a whole lot of Oscars, but not picture. Come on! The Red Shoes would rank among the Best Winners as well, had they chosen it.
What Was Snubbed: Red River is one of the great Westerns ever made – and quite a gay romp too under the surface.
Review: Out of all of Oliver’s Shakespeare movies, Hamlet is my least favorite, which is odd because it is probably by favorite Shakespeare play. But the film manages the strange trick of being too stilted and too theatrical at the same time. Olivier cuts the guts out of Hamlet’s famous soliloquy by doing it in voice over as he looks longingly into the distance. I have never been of the opinion that he is the greatest actor ever, and this version of Hamlet certainly proves my case for me.

68. Out of Africa (1985)

What Should Have Won: Out of Africa was by far the weakest of the nominees, so while I would have voted for Prizzi’s Honor, Witness, The Color Purple or Kiss of the Spider Woman all would have been acceptable.
What Was Snubbed: Akira Kurosawa’s final masterpiece Ran came out this year, and no matter how good the other films of the year were, none compare to this one. Martin Scorsese’s After Hours, the Coens Blood Simple, and Paul Schrader Mishima all would have been on my list.
Review: Out of Africa is a long, slow romantic movie about a woman (Meryl Streep) married to someone she doesn’t love (Klaus Maria Brandeur) and finding love with someone else (Robert Redford). Streep and Brandeur are excellent, but Redford is miscast. I like director Sydney Pollock quite a lot, but he should have won for something else. This is one of the slower movies to win, and while it certainly isn’t terrible, it isn’t exactly good either.

67. A Beautiful Mind (2001)

What Should Have Won: In the Bedroom would have been my choice, although any of the other nominees would have made a far superior winner this year.
What Was Snubbed: David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive was the most critically acclaimed film of the year, but the Academy played it safe, and didn’t nominate the weird. And why do they never nominate Spielberg sci-fi – A.I. is one of his very best.
Review: A Beautiful Mind is a fine film, just nowhere near the best of the year. It is a by the numbers biopic, by a by the numbers director in Ron Howard. Yes, Russell Crowe and Jennifer Connelly are excellent in the film, but the movie never really rises beyond its limitations. It’s good, solid, grade B filmmaking, and as such, while it’s an ok movie to watch, it certainly doesn’t qualify as Best Picture material. This one is likely to look lost in the coming years, if it doesn’t already.

66. Braveheart (1995)

What Should Have Won: I don’t know, Apollo 13? Babe? Sense and Sensibility? All were better than Braveheart – none were among the best of the year.
What Was Snubbed: Leaving Las Vegas, Nixon, Heat, Casino, Dead Man Walking and the list goes on, and on and on – seriously possibly the worst best picture lineup ever.
Review: Braveheart does have some thrilling battle scenes, but the problem is that director/star Gibson never connects to all that crap that goes on around it. Gibson as a filmmaker is a sadist – he loves inflicting pain on his characters, and the audience, and is incapable of any subtly whatsoever. All that being said, I do enjoy this film more than it sounds like I do – it is never boring – but it doesn’t mean anything.

65. Gentleman’s Agreement (1947)

What Should Have Won: Crossfire touched on many of the same themes as Gentleman’s Agreement, and hasn’t aged nearly as poorly.
What Was Snubbed: Out of the Past is perhaps the best film noir ever made, so of course they ignored it. Black Narcissus also should have been in play.
Review: It’s easy to make fun of Gentleman’s Agreement now, but it’s also easy to forget how daring the film must have been seen at the time. Star Gregory Peck was told by everyone he shouldn’t make the film, because it would ruin his career, but he believed in it so much he did it anyway. Sure, this is a very simplistic view of anti-Semitism, but just two years after the end of WWII, it was a film that needed to be made. Not great cinema by any means, but fascinating as time capsule.

64. Ben-Hur (1959)

What Should Have Won: Anatomy of a Murder and Room at the Top were the best of the nominees.
What Was Snubbed: Some Like it Hot got nominated for a bunch, but not picture. Hitchcock’s North By Northwest and Hawks’ Rio Bravo were more completely ignored.
Review: Ben-Hur is the type of long epic that the Academy loves to honor, and while the film is at least mildly entertaining, it also goes on WAY too long, and suffers from Charlton Heston’s overwrought (though Oscar winning) performance. And while we’re at it, why did Hugh Griffth win for his mildly racist performance, instead of Stephen Boyd, who seems to be the only one who realizes that the film has all that gay subtext.

63. Crash  (2005)

What Should Have Won: Munich, although I know I was in the minority of that opinion, and so in the Crash vs. Brokeback Mountain dogfight, put me down for Brokeback.
What Was Snubbed: David Cronenberg’s A History of Violence was his best film, and hugely acclaimed, so it should have got a spot. Michael Haneke’s Cache is his best.
Review: Crash is a rather simplistic look at modern race relations. Yes, it is well acted, but it beats you over the head with its message too often. I am not one of those people who hate Crash, and ludicrously call it the worst choice the Academy ever made (seriously people, go back and watch some of the shit that won this prize in the past), but no, I don’t think Crash should have come close to winning the Oscar this year.

62. My Fair Lady (1964)

What Should Have Won: Dr. Strangelove is the one of the best comedies ever.
What Was Snubbed: Not surprisingly, they overlooked Hitchcock’s great Marnie.
Review: Rex Harrison is wonderful, and Audrey Hepburn is luminous, so I forgive some of the movies more blatantly obvious flaws, and the inherent sexism of the whole enterprise. While, some of it anyway. I don’t think My Fair Lady represents the pinnacle of great musical movie making as many do, but it certainly is an entertaining movie. I just wish it weren’t at least an hour too long.

61. Gandhi (1982)

What Should Have Won: They should have went with their hearts and gave it to ET. Or hell, Tootsie. Or maybe even The Verdict.
What Was Snubbed: Blade Runner is perhaps the quintessential sci-fi movie of the era. Too bad they didn’t see that.
Review: Gandhi is actually a fine biopic, and Ben Kingsley is quite outstanding in his “debut” performance as the Indian leader. But it’s one of those “important” movies you see once and then never really feel the need to watch again. It would fine for the classroom, but as cinema, it is merely good, not great.

Ranking the Best Picture Winners: 80-71

Ranking the Best Picture Winners: 80-71

80. Cavalcade (1933)
What Should Have Won: I Am a Fugitive from the Chain Gang is one of the few 1930s “message” movies that still packs a wallop all these years later. 42^nd Street is one of the most influential musicals of all time.
What Was Snubbed: King Kong was an early horror masterwork, and Duck Soup was the best of the Marx Brothers, and once again they overlooked Ernst Lubitsch at his best with Design for Living.
Review: Like Cimarron, this represents the Academy at its worst, picking a long, slow, boring film that spans decades in the life of one family – who seems to be involved in every major event for the late 1800s until the 1930s. The film is one slow, long winded scene after another, and gets boring really fast.

79. The Broadway Melody (1928/29)

What Should Have Won: I’ve only see three of the nominees – this, In Old Arizona (which isn’t any better) and Alibi, which is ok, so I guess that gets my vote.
What Was Snubbed: Lots of great foreign films, including two from GW Pabst – Pandora’s Box and Diary of a Lost Girl, as well as Fritz Lang’s Spies.
Review: This was the first year of the “talkies”, so it should come as no surprise that the Academy embraced this emerging art form, with all its bumps, instead of embracing silent film, which at this point had been perfected. But, still, there had to be something better than this clunky, melodramatic backstage musical about two sisters. I can guarantee that if it didn’t win the Oscar, no one nowadays would even care about it.

78. Oliver! (1968)

What Should Have Won: The Lion in Winter is the best of weak field.
What Was Snubbed: 2001: A Space Odyssey. That it wasn’t even nominated is a source of great embarrassment to the Academy. How about Night of the Living Dead? Rosemary’s Baby? Petulia? Once Upon a Time in the West?
Review: I really don’t think that Charles Dickens’ dark tale of orphans who rob the people of London needed a happy-go-lucky rendition to make itself better. The kid playing Oliver has got to be among the blandest actors ever to headline a best picture winner. You can almost forgive earlier screen versions for their blatant anti-Semitism in the portrayal of Fagin, but in 1968 they really should have known better. Yes, the movie is colorful and lively, and Carol Reed is a great director, but really, this was the best they could come up with?

77. The English Patient (1996)

What Should Have Won: Fargo, quite simply one of the best films ever made.
What Was Snubbed: Why no love for John Sayles’ best film Lone Star, an intelligent whodunit, and combining genres to perfection.
Review: Maybe it was that Seinfeld episode, but it seems like everyone now agrees with what I said all along – this film is downright boring. It is handsomely mounted, sure, but it gets so bogged down in subplots and spends far too much time gazing lovingly at its impossibly beautiful cast through Vaseline coated lenses, that I simply get bored watching the damn thing. In my mind, this is one of the worst films ever to win this prize.

76. Tom Jones (1963)

What Should Have Won: One of the weakest fields ever but America, America was easily the best of the bunch.
What Was Snubbed: Hud, The Great Escape, The Birds, The Trial and a host of foreign films.
Review: Perhaps there was a time when this ribald British comedy seemed daring and risky. Now, you get more sexual innuendo on any sitcom on TV. The film is acted well, but that’s about all you can really say. Director Tony Richardson jumped onto the trendy ‘60s style of direction, but the style hasn’t aged well. This simply looks embarrassing now.

75. Gladiator (2000)

What Should Have Won: Traffic was the best of the nominees easily, although I would have been just as happy with Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.
What Was Snubbed: Requiem for a Dream was my favorite film of the year, but it was so dark that the Academy basically ignored it.
Review: Gladiator was a huge sensation when it was released in 2000, but I immediately disliked it. For a gladiator movie it is way too serious and dour, and I thought the visual look of the film was weak – especially the phony special effects and the action scenes went on too long and became boring and repetitive. Yes, Russell Crowe commands the screen, and Joaquin Phoenix is slimy as the emperor, but the whole movie never really takes off. This is one of those films I keep meaning to re-watch, but never actually do, because the memory of watching it is so bad.

74. Mrs. Miniver (1942)

What Should Have Won: For the second year in a row, Orson Welles made the best film of the year – this time The Magnificent Ambersons – and once again, it didn’t win.
What Was Snubbed: More Lubitsch brilliance in the Nazi comedy To Be or Not To Be was ignored by the Academy. Either Preston Struges movie – Sullivan’s Travels or The Palm Beach Story.
Review: America hadn’t entered the war yet, but it didn’t prevent them from embracing this British film about a family struggling during WWII. It is awfully hammy, and functions as little more than propaganda, and the performances range from good to downright bad. It isn’t a horrible film by any stretch, but it isn’t very interesting to the modern viewer either.

73. The Great Ziegfeld (1936)

What Should Have Won: Mr. Deeds Goes to Town is one of my favorite Capra movies, and Dodsworth is an uncommonly intelligent adult drama for the 1930s but many of the nominees were better than the film this one.
What Was Snubbed: Where to begin? Charlie Chaplin’s Modern Times was his last great silent film, Swing Time was more Fred and Ginger fun, My Man Godfrey (which got nominated everywhere except best picture) is one of the best comedies of the decade, Fritz Lang’s Fury is a great revenge drama and the list goes on.
Review: The Great Ziegfield is giant, lumbering musical that goes on for at least an hour longer than it should, grinding to a halt a number of times because of its endless musical numbers that really have nothing to do with the movie. The great William Powell is saddled with a role that doesn’t make use of his considerable skills. But Luise Rainer is wonderful in her Oscar winning role as Ziegfeld’s first wife (she doesn’t have all that much screen time though), and the film is certainly watchable – just nowhere near great. It’s the first, but not the last, biopic to win the big prize.

72. Going My Way (1944)

What Should Have Won: Double Indemnity is one of the best film noirs in history.
What Was Snubbed: Otto Preminger’s murder mystery/necrophilia drama Laura, as well as Howard Hawks’ To Have and Have Not, which he made on a drunken dare with Hemingway. Another pair of Preston Struges comedies – Hail the Conquering Hero and The Miracle at Morgan’s Creek
Review: I’m sure there are some who like this film, about two priests, the old school Irishmen and the friendly youngster who sings, I just don’t happen to be one of them. It is an easygoing story, and certainly it’s not a pain to sit through, but Bing Crosby never was the world’s best actor, and although I enjoy Barry Fitzgerald, this isn’t his best work. I saw it once, and really have no desire to sit through it again at any point in my life. The sequel The Bell of St. Mary's is infinitely more famous and beloved than this one (my mother, who watches Bells of St. Mary's every Christmas did not even know it WAS a sequel).

71. The Life of Emile Zola (1937)
What Should Have Won: The Awful Truth is one of the best screwball comedies of all time and is still adored today.?
What Was Snubbed: Inexplicably, the first feature length animated film, the great Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, was not nominated. That’s just embarrassing. And Leo McCarey’s best film, Make Way for Tomorrow, found no love.
Review: Another biopic of a famous person, which would become a drug the Academy couldn’t kick over the years. The Life of Emile Zola is certainly competent filmmaking, and Paul Muni in the lead role is good as always, but for me this film is just too by the numbers, too pat, too predictable too dull to be worthy of a best picture prize. And why, when making a biopic of a great writer, do we concentrate on a court case late in the man’s life instead of what he was remembered for? Not nearly as boring as Cimarron or Cavalcade, but not exactly great either.

Ranking the Best Picture Winners: 85-81

Ranking the Best Picture Winners: 85-81

The last thing I'm going to do to wrap up the 2012 Oscar season is repost my rankings of the 85 films to win the Best Picture Oscar (note, some lists include Sunrise - F.W. Murnau's masterpiece because in the first year, they had two best picture prizes, but it's not official, so I don't include it). Today, I'll do three posts - 85-81, 80-71 and 70-61. These 25 films range from god awful to how-the-hell-did that-win-Best-Picture (if you like musicals more than I, you may well disagree with some of these rankings). I did this once before, in the early days on the blog, but back then there were only 80 Best Picture winners, so I figured it was time to repost. I rethought the entire ranking this time, and rewrote much of it. By the end of the week, we'll be down to the top 10.

 

85. Around the World in 80 Days (1956)

What Should Have Won: ANYTHING ELSE!!! My vote would have gone to Giant, but anything would have been better than this crap. Having said that, this was a fairly weak year, as I didn’t much care for Friendly Persuasion of The King and I either.
What Was Snubbed: John Ford’s single greatest achievement, The Searchers, was completely ignored. Alfred Hitchcock’s great The Wrong Man was also. Nicolas Ray’s drug addicted suburban nightmare Bigger Than Life should have found some love. Douglas Sirk’s wonderful melodrama won Dorothy Malone an Oscar, but should have been in the big category as well.
Review: This is the worst best picture winner of all time. It isn’t so much a movie, but a string of celebrity cameos following David Niven, and his sidekick Catinfalas, across the world. Even the terrible remake with Steve Coogan and Jackie Chan was better than this crap. I understand that the Academy wanted to go BIG, after three years of small, black and white dramas, but any of the nominees fit that bill, and while I have never been a huge fan of any of them, they are all better than this one. Most confusing of all, this isn’t even the type of thing the Academy normally goes for. Normally, they like “important” movies over blockbusters, so it stings a little that one of the only times they went the other way, was one of the times they definitely should not have.

84. Gigi (1958)

What Should Have Won: For me Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and The Defiant Ones are neck and neck out of the nominees.
What Was Snubbed: Alfred Hitchcock’s absolute best film was Vertigo, and Orson Welles’ made another masterpiece in Touch of Evil, but the Academy ignored them. Vincente Minnelli DID make a great film that year – called Some Came Running.
Review: Around the World in 80 Days is certainly a worse film, but out of all the Best Picture Winners, this is my least favorite. Essentially, the movie’s “happy” ending is when the hero of the movie decides not to treat the woman he loves like a whore, which was his plan for most of his running time. And old foggy Maurice Chevlier singing about “little girls” was creepy in the extreme. To me, Gigi is one of those musicals that gives musicals a bad name. You couldn’t pay me to watch this crap again.

83. Chariots of Fire (1981)

What Should Have Won: My favorite is Reds, although Raiders of the Lost Ark, Atlantic City, and hell, even On Golden Pond were better then this one.
What Was Snubbed: Body Heat is one of the best modern noirs, and should have got in. And since they nominated one Louis Malle masterpiece in Atlantic City, why not two, with My Dinner with Andre.
Review: I find Chariots of Fire ridiculously dull and boring. Even the much praised score by Vangelis has been overused so often now (in case you don’t know, it’s the music that plays in every sitcom when someone runs in slow motion) that I find it annoying. Yes, this was the rare case of the little movie that could triumph over the Hollywood behemoths. I just wish it didn’t. And on a side note, how they hell did this win costume design? They were all wearing white T-shirts and shorts! I could design these costumes after 10 minutes in Wal-Mart!

82. The Greatest Show on Earth (1952)

What Should Have Won: High Noon was probably the best of the nominees, but that’s not really saying much. The Quiet Man would have been a much better choice as well.
What Was Snubbed: How did they miss the genius of Singin’ in the Rain? Most of the year’s best (Forbidden Games, Umberto D., The Life of Oharu and Ikiru) were Foreign though, so they didn’t have a chance.
Review: This is the kind of “spectacle” movie that the Oscars periodically go for, and look stupid for all time because of it. Cecil B. DeMille’s circus epic has no real plot, no real characters, and simply moves from one cliché to the next. Charlton Heston made a lot of bad movies, but I’m not sure he was ever worse than he was in this film. Not even the presence of Jimmy Stewart as a sad clown or that sexual firecracker Gloria Grahame can save this utter mess of a movie. And the damn thing never ends! It just keeps going and going and going.

81. Cimmaron (1931)

What Should Have Won: The Front Page had a few problems on its own, but it was WAY better than Cimmaron.
What Was Snubbed: What wasn’t? Frankenstein, Dracula, The Public Enemy, M and best of all City Lights. 1931 was a great year, but you wouldn’t know it by looking at the nominees.
Review: Cimmaron represents all that is wrong with the Academy and their choices. Yes, Cimmaron was a sweeping epic, with big stars and lots of box office. But did know one notice just how bad Richard Dix’s lead performance is (honestly, this is one of the worst performance ever to be nominated), or how inherently racist some of the movie was, or the fact that director Wesley Ruggles somehow manages to drain all the energy out of the movie? Yes, Irene Dunne is good – she always is – but this movie is a bloated mess. I found it damn hard to make it through the film in one sitting.

Movie Review: Snitch

Movie Review: Snitch

Snitch
Directed by: Ric Roman Waugh.
Written by: Justin Haythe and Ric Roman Waugh.
Starring: Dwayne Johnson (John Matthews), Barry Pepper (Agent Cooper), Jon Bernthal (Daniel James), Susan Sarandon (Joanne Keeghan), Michael Kenneth Williams (Malik), Rafi Gavron (Jason Collins), Melina Kanakaredes (Sylvie Collins), Nadine Velazquez (Analisa), Benjamin Bratt (Juan Carlos 'El Topo' Pintera), Lela Loren (Vanessa), JD Pardo (Benicio), David Harbour (Jay Price), Harold Perrineau (Jeffrey Steele).

Despite the fact that he is built like a WWE superstar, there has always been an everyman quality to the screen presence of Dwayne Johnson, which is quietly appealing. He is best at playing good guys, because his big goofy smile is just too damn likable to be evil. He’s one of those actors you don’t need to be told is a good guy in every movie – you simply know he is. Perhaps Snitch is Johnson’s attempt to break free, at least somewhat, of the action movie ghetto he finds himself in. In the film, he plays a normal guy – he runs his own construction business, and although he looks big and tough, he is still vulnerable and human. Until the movie flies off the rails in the final act – becoming the type of implausible action movie, full of chase sequences and gun fights that the film had previously seemed like it was rejecting – Johnson quietly carries the movie with his normal guy presence. I like this Johnson better than action hero Johnson.

Johnson stars as John Matthews, a normal guy with a successful construction company. He’s on his second family – now married to Analisa (Nadine Velazquez), after divorcing first wife Sylvie (Melina Kanakaredes). This means he moved out of the house where his son, Jason (Rafi Gavron), lives – and he has become a rebellious teenager, bitter and angry at his father for breaking up the family. Jason makes a silly mistake – the kind of mistake any teenager could make – by agreeing to accept a package that his friend is going to Fedex him. He knows the package contains ecstasy, but he doesn’t think it will matter. He’s not dealing it, he’s just holding onto it for a day. Of course, it’s a setup, and Jason is busted as soon as he accepts the package. This is a Federal Charge, and under the new mandatory minimums set forth, Jason will go to jail for 10 years, unless he can turn over another drug dealer. The problem is, he doesn’t know any other drug dealers. And this is when John decides to step up. His plan is to give the Feds – representing by US Attorney and Congressional Candidate Susan Sarandon and agent Barry Pepper – a bigger drug dealer. He makes nice with a new worker in his company, who has twice been convicted of dealing drugs (Jon Bernthal) and gets him to set up a meeting with Malik (Michael K. Williams). And, of course, soon John is in WAY over his head.

The movie is said to be based on a true story, but I have a feeling that this isn’t one of those films that sticks closely to the facts because the movie is too outlandish to believe. I’ll let you discover the twists and turns of the movie yourself if you’re going to see the movie, but I have a very hard time believing that John would come into contact with so many big players as quickly as does – and that they all just immediately trust him. And the climax of the movie, which involves a complicated plot John to ensure he gets everything he wants, and ends with shootouts, and the kind of freeway car chases that only the movies, just doesn’t fit in with the rest of the movie.

No one is really going to mistake Snitch for a very good movie, but at least for the first two-thirds, it is an interesting little character study disguised as a thriller. Johnson has perhaps never been better than he is here – and although the supporting cast is playing rather perfunctory roles, they do so effectively. Michael K. Williams in particular oozes menace as Malik, Jon Bernthal is effective as a man trying to turn his life around, and Barry Pepper has a ridiculous goatee, and seems to be doing a strange accent for his own amusement – but it amused me too, so I liked it. Susan Sarandon is given nothing to do as the “Dragon Lady” Attorney, who cares about nothing except her own ambitions, and Benjamin Bratt simply smirks behind his overly large sunglasses, but both are about as good as their limited roles allow them to be. The movie lays things a little too thick – it is clearly a story about fathers and sons, with the fathers trying very hard not to screw up their kids.

The movie could have survived many of these clichés had it come up with a more effective way to end the movie. As it stands, it’s yet another movie with an implausible action movie climax, which while adequately handled by director Ric Roman Waugh, is a letdown to those of us in the audience who would have appreciated a more intelligent ending. Snitch is not a good movie, but mainly because of Johnson, it’s a lot better than it probably has any right to be.