Wild Grass (Les herbes folles)

Alain Resnais' "Wild Grass" references its title in (as my friend said) its "pacing." It goes in spurts, some longer than other, often cutting itself off with a blank screen. It has offshoots of (as my friends said) "randomness" to represent this as well. It also has a very, very annoying main character in Georges Palet (André Dussollier), who recalls the main man in "The Seven Year Itch" in his (as my friends said) "obsessive" preoccupation with a woman. His thoughts are not only heard, but there is also a narration that has been suspected by critics to be his that overlays as well. The rhythm and the lead are the film's main problems, and they lead to other ones (including perhaps the seemingly problematic way that that the other characters are seen).

We are first greeted (after some buildings and grass) with a detailed narration of Marguerite's (Sabine Azéma) actions leading up to an "incident" (which is the namesake for the novel that this film is an adaptation of, "The Incident" by Christian Gailly). This happens to be her buying of shoes before she gets her bag and, more importantly, wallet stolen from her. The rollerblading thief apparently leaves it in a faraway parking garage after making off with the money, and this is where Palet finds it. He is driven to call the woman to tell her he's found it, and when she doesn't pick up, to take it to the police station. This is no simple drop, though. He deliberates about it with cop Bernard (Mathieu Almaric) at his side, for one. He also feels imbued with an extreme interest in this woman (partially because, as other critics, IMDb, and sort of the film itself said, she has an interest in planes like he does), one that made me want to groan furiously, as these sort of things are incredibly (as my friend said) cheesy.

As my friends said, Palet has some sort of problem, as he often goes as far as wanting to kill women for not tucking their panties in. He's also promiscuous, as he has the hots for many women, despite having a beautiful wife (Anne Consigny). He's (as they say in the film) "awkward," abrasive and (as my friend said) an "asshole." He doesn't know exactly how to interact with Marguerite. She also doesn't know how to act with him, and needs a sort of male interpreter, who is Bernard the cop.

The film is populated with many (as others said) "fantasies," just like in "The Seven-Year Itch." They're not always quite that (as my friend said) "lame," but sometimes they are. I understand their purpose, but I wish that ways would be found around them. I know, as critics such as Scout Foundas (who called the film "a lucid, luxuriant dream") have said, this is part of the film and its intent, but it's very tiresome.

Like "Seven-Year Itch" found a redeeming quality in Marilyn Monroe, "Wild Grass" has Eric Gautier's amazing cinematography (that I believe Resnais or the interviewer said in a Film Comment interview was "glossed"), especially in (as Nick Davis and my friend said) its "colors" (in this way it echoes the style of a Jean-Pierre Jeunet film, as does the film itself in other ways). If the film hadn't had this to save it (as well the non-jazz sections of Mark Snow's score), there wouldn't be a thing to watch it for.

As my friend describes it, the film sort of "breaks down" towards the end, as (as IMDb poster yris2002 said) it gets "absurd and incomprehensible." The very ending (described Glenn Kenny as "worthy of the final minutes of "2001") is so insane in its abruptness and (as yris2002 said) sheer "absurdity" that I sort of understand it, possibly as an offshoot or something resembling "2001". Then again, one of my friend says it could just be Resnais tacking on "B.S." It will leave many howling with laughter, before it leads into the amateurish done credits that are pretty much appalling for a Cannes Official Competition film. It is one of the worst films of the 2009 edition of the festival. Resnais won a Special Lifetime Achievement award at that time, placed to offset this film's inability to win anything and as a way to, as critics and other festival programmers have done, cover his ass. Because, while it does have a couple of (as they say) "nice moments" and good technical features, "Wild Grass" is a film that (recalling what my friends noted) "crashes like a plane." C-

Salt

I'll admit, I was closed-minded while watching "Salt." I didn't pay as much attention as I should have, and of course, when you do that, some stuff doesn't make sense. But this was not a very interesting or satisfying film. The film is allegedly an adaptation (subject of debate on the internet), but Internet Movie Database doesn't list anything. That makes this film one unoriginal original screenplay, one that deserves the obvious label of "Bourne ripoff," and one that gets too close for comfort in certain instances.

Of course, it would have been much more of a problem if the film had had a male lead, as Entertainment Weekly said it was originally set to have. The fact that the lead in the finished product is a woman is a boost, convincing the audience that the idea is different. This is furthered in the "tables-are-turned" aspect from the trailer (that Owen Gleiberman and others mentioned), where Evelyn Salt (Angelina Jolie, somewhat of a good choice, though not entirely original) is told by the man she is (as said before) interrogating that she is (as Owen Gleiberman et al. said) "a Russian spy" and (as they say in the film and I believe as critics said) "an immediate threat" to kill the Russian president, which sets off the alarms of her cohorts and in the building in which she is holding the questioning. This was the aspect that made me and probably countless others watch the film. At least I expected that this was going to start the film off, as it could have and should have, but instead, we get a very dull beginning to establish the characters, especially Salt and her husband Mike (August Diehl).

To go back to the "real" start of the movie (that really should have been the start), surprises only truly are satisfying upon their arrival and shortly afterwards. After Evelyn Salt manages her way out of her confines, as she is fated to do, the film shows definite signs of its predecessors in the "track-down" genre, as Salt, as Ebert said, continues to "escape from, or break into, one impenetrable stronghold after another." It should be more entertaining than it is, especially in the esteemed "truck sequence," which has been given a profile in Entertainment Weekly, but that failed to really to stimulate me as it should have (i.e. beyond interestingly done shots and more into actual (as said before by critics) "involvement"). I did close my mind up a little bit, but still.

The film's plot within the plot really is (as said before) "complicated," and supposedly involves killing (in some capacity) both the American and Russian presidents (I know I'm somewhat wrong about this, but I don't really want to go back and watch the film again to get the facts straight). It involves a lot of double-crossing (others mentioned "satisfying twists," but only one or two are worth note) and friendships back through the years. It also features Salt shifting her personality sometimes into the psychotic and driven range, which I think is interesting. I'll do as Ebert did (not only as a way to not reveal spoilers, but to also try to cover my ignorance of the plot that I should have paid more attention to) and (as he said) "not say much more than that." As Ebert said, the film has some interesting shots in the derivative camerawork by Robert Elswit, but that sort of thing doesn't do much more than occasionally stimulate when there's a score like there is in this film (that makes you even more recall "track-down" movies). "Salt" is not all bad (if you, as said before, "follow it along," probably it would be more rewarding), but it's not indelible and, at least for me, not very enjoyable. C

My Best 10 of 2010 so Far

In no way a top 10 of 2010 altogether, just a top 10 of the year so far.

1. Exit Through the Gift Shop

2. Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work

3. Toy Story 3

4. Fish Tank

5. Winter's Bone

6. Greenberg

7. The Ghost Writer

8. Please Give

9. The Art of the Steal

10. How to Train Your Dragon

Check out Mike D'Angelo's twitter account (@gemko) and his website for his Top 5 of the year as of yet.

Look for Nick Davis' "midway special" sometime soon.

Also, see In Review Online's great list.

The Playlist's good list was the first one I saw.

Movie review of yet undecided film to come later!

The Kids Are All Right

"The Kids Are All Right" has what I would call a weak start (not counting the exhilarating opening sequence set to Vampire Weekend's "Cousins"). Perhaps that's because, as my friend said, we don't know the main characters at this point. A dinner conversation between the 4 major characters, lesbian parents Jules (Julianne Moore) and Nic (Annette Bening), and their children Joni (Mia Wasikowska) and Laser (Josh Hutcherson), is implemented to set tones and introduce the players, but it comes off (as Amy Taubin and others said) "sitcom" and impersonal. In light of the events to transpire throughout the film, I think the beginning (the dinner conversation and everything leading up to the film's main plot point) would be enjoyable on a second approach.

The film's major event is the arrival of a fifth character, by a phone call that Laser begs and begs Joni to make, as she's 18 and is eligible to make such a call. Laser wants to get in touch with their sperm donor, by the name of Paul (Mark Ruffalo), for the reasons you would expect. Their talk is realistically uncomfortable, preparing you for a lot of what the rest of the film's dialogue will be like. But Paul makes an impression on Joni that really sets the film into motion. No, I'll tell you from the onset, is not another "Fish Tank." But it does lead to chaos.

As Anthony Lane said, the film mirrors life in its awkwardness, or at least for me. It takes me some time to get going with someone, but there's a point where I become freed and able to talk freely and to really get to know someone. What I'm trying to say is that there's a moment in "The Kids Are All Right" where the characters suddenly become more accessible, as, as my friend says, I "got to know them." I'm not exactly sure when that comes, but it does, and it makes the film better, especially because (I think) it comes before the problems the characters face towards the end.

The work done by Bening, Moore, Ruffalo, Wasikowska, and Hutcherson has high and low points, but the highs are memorable for everyone. I should issue an apology for Wasikowska, who is beloved on IMDb fan boards and disliked by me for her job in "That Evening Sun." Commenter Adelaide Dupont noted about "Sun" that Wasikowska's "better than some of the roles she's getting at the moment," and I have to commend her for that insight, because it's completely true. "The Kids Are All Right," a (as most other critics have said; I didn't say it at first but felt the need to add after reading an LA Times quote) "humorous" and substantial film, can be weak and at times forced, but it ultimately works itself out, quite well actually. B

Cyrus

"Cyrus" is basically a slightly more thoughtful version of another film that John C. Reilly was in, "Step Brothers." Even though it's funny when it does, "Cyrus" boils down to the same idea as its predecessor: two guys trying to prove "who's boss." I think possibly the film's funniest moments came when Reilly and fellow comic Jonah Hill were duking it out, uncivilized expletive style. But I feel like the detractors of this week's buzz-movie "Inception" et al.: there are ideas that get thrown aside that really could have yielded something more.

Reilly plays John (Mumblecore-type naming strategy at work), who's an "editor" who doesn't do much. All he can muster is that he "has a big DVD collection." At the start he's got no one, "left" by the beautiful Catherine Keener (who has something off in her performance), left "scratching his jocular." Jamie (Keener) forces him to go to a party, and even not by seeing the film's trailer you should know that this is going to work some sort of results for John. John makes a complete ass of himself (acting a little like when he drank "sweet berry wine") by getting drunker and drunker on Red Bull and Vodkas. His idiotic antics catch the eye of Molly (the equally attractive Marisa Tomei). John thinks things are looking up and that he's finally gotten himself into a good relationship.

Of course not. He has instead gotten himself into a shattering, problematic situation. He follows Molly home, falls asleep in his car, "semi-stalks" her by going up to her house, and he finds someone at the door: Cyrus (Jonah Hill), her son, who's a techno musician with a thing for mashing up music and "landscapes." Seems like an innocuous guy at first, although to John it's a little bit of a blow to end up with a lady with a "Momma's boy" for a son. It steadily gets worse, however, with Cyrus desperately and manipulatively wanting to keep his mother all to himself and John not wanting to let go of something finally nice in his life. It starts with small incidents, but then it escalates a little more into "war."

There are some interesting ideas that a viewer like me could think of that are ignored by Jay and Mark Duplass to keep the film from veering from "uncomfortable" (as critics have said) to something worse, such as the true depths of Cyrus and Molly's relationship. Also some that are perhaps simply too deep, such as how Jamie feels about John (respect or not?), which is really another motherly relationship that recalls the adults-as-"kids" reversals that critics have brought up in dealing with "The Kids Are All Right."

None of this is given thought. It would diverge even further from what it already has diverged from, which is a "comedy" (as people said) with a touch of "uneasiness." It is (as people said) "mildly funny," in how Reilly is (like Nick Davis said) and how he looks when he's perplexed. Still, (as said before) it doesn't get much beyond that, although being well-cast, not being well acted (except for Hill, who does well with his two-faced mix of Cyrus the Great and amiable and tender).

The film is strung together with jaunty sequences with forgettable music that show very little effort put in by the Duplass Brothers, and finds itself plodding through an ending (About Face! But NOT QUITE!) that made me enjoy the film even less than I had before. It sometimes works itself up to being a little enjoyable, but not too much. Not much of it is entirely satisfying (just being unpleasant, or, when it's a little more upbeat, screwing things up with dumb technique such as audio that doesn't match video, or ending with a cheesy, totally Mumblecore ending), and that's no good sign. Aside from some "merits," this wasn't a very "appreciate"-able film (I'm struggling with how to say that, just like the lady introducing "Restrepo" at the screening I went to, and I have settled on her word choice). C

Inception

"Inception" is astonishing intellectually, just like your average "twisty" Christopher Nolan. However, that cannot make up for the fact that the film has stumbles, in the areas of dialogue (which is a very common issue for Nolan; as many such as Nathaniel Rogers have said, this film is very Nolanesque in its strengths and weaknesses), and also a subplot that echoes "Shutter Island" in a major way (not least because Leonardo DiCaprio is the lead in both), although, as my friend pointed out, it's probably not ripping it off. But it must be said: I was very, very entertained by this film, which had me checking my watch in a good way.

The film is pretty much incomprehensible at the beginning, which is entirely intentional, as it reflects the maxim that you are plunged into a dream and that you can't remember when it started. After a weird encounter that comes back later in the film, we see Leonardo DiCaprio's Cobb and his partner Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) do an extremely intricate "job" with Saito (Ken Watanabe), some sort of energy magnate, and you see why we need some information on the whole process.

After a dizzying set of (as Ebert and the film said) "dreams-within-dreams-within-dreams" and weird uprisings that I thought were (as my friend said) "cliché" but then realized otherwise, Saito deems the process of him being protected a failure, but tips the two off about what really could help him out: an inception. Don't believe what the trailer tells you, or else you'll be as screwed as I was going into this film, as an inception is pretty much an idea that is put into someone's head and designed to make the person in question think that they were who thought it up. Arthur tries to back Cobb away from the job, but Cobb is tempted by Saito's terms of the deal, which apparently will "bring him home."

But, at this point, you're asking: who exactly are Cobb and Arthur? Apparently, they are contractors (techincally "extractors") from some unseen employer who go into dreams made by an "architect" for a certain person and retrieve information from the person's ever-flowing subconscious, which the person cannot control and that flows the info into certain locales. Cobb also lends his services in protecting a person's subconscious from extractors because he knows all about how one would "break into" (as said before) the dreams. Cobb is the best in the business in this field.

They lose their architect on their previous excursion, so they have to find a new one for the present work at hand, which happens to be planting a subliminal message into another energy magnate's (Pete Postlethwaite) son's (Cillian Murphy) head that he will disband the company and allow Saito to have an energy monopoly. They find the best in the business in that field, Ariadne (Ellen Page, looking like she stepped out of that Cisco commercial), who has another agenda besides just doing her work, which is Cobb's past and his dreams (involving his wife Mal, played by Marion Cotillard in a role that is as disturbing and similar to Michelle Williams' wife-to-DiCaprio role in "Shutter Island"), which she feels are necessary to know about. And we find that Cobb gives out lots of instructions, but doesn't follow any of them himself.

I will leave it to you to see this film, which I recommend, though it does have some problems. As said above, dialogue is not a strong suit of Nolan's work, whether it be just poor or overly "expositional" (which is what people said about "The Last Airbender"). Also, as my friend said, there are not just a few "clichés" in the plot. And also, as a friend noted, the film uses "montage techniques" a little too much. But the biggest problem is the "emotion" (which many have mentioned). Whenever Cobb and Mal's relationship comes up, the film stumbles a bit, going between (as said before) "creepy" and sentimental. I mean, I guess what happens is warranted, but it felt a little tedious at the end. How many films are you going to have where DiCaprio plays a character who is good at their job but is pestered by some sort of problem within? I also found something else: the (as others have said) "set piece" pretty much determined how interesting a sequence would be, and Nolan hit it correctly most times.

Some of the cast members (including DiCaprio, Page, and Tom Berenger) are not always (as has been said) "satisfactory" for different reasons, but, as has been said, Gordon-Levitt, along with Murphy and Tom Hardy, do very good jobs in their roles. But no matter about the faltering: this is a film definitely worth seeing, despite the stumbles, for what it has to offer, for the (as has been said) "ensuing discussion," and as a very enjoyable summer film that seems caught "in limbo" (as they say in the film) between being a repeat viewer and a first timer (although I, like Lisa Schwarzbaum, will probably watch it again). B

Green Zone

"Green Zone" above all else is (as others said) "extremely well-made," which is pretty much stating the obvious for a Paul Greengrass film. It's also pretty (as my friends said) "involving," although it can be said that my mind wandered. But really, this film "captures the feeling of Iraq" (as what was said of the oft-compared and superior "The Hurt Locker"), which is as my friends said "chaotic" and a "total disaster." The opening images we see are that of some sort of robbery, and it's pretty much insanity and nonstop motion. The same can be said for the sequence following the title card, in which Roy Miller (Matt Damon) and his WMD squad excavate a building for WMD, and there is nothing to be found except for toilets. Miller is not only pissed off about the lack of a find, but also about the fact that lives were risked in a dead-end mission. Before his next mission, he even finds from Martin Brown (Brendan Gleeson) that there is again nothing to be found.

As Ebert said, this is a film that says "WMD don't exist" and (as he and my friends said) "people are dupes corruptly hiding the truth." Watching this film in 2010, one does not expect a positive outcome of this situation. Yet Greengrass gets us behind Miller, who, as someone I know said as well as the DVD case as well as friends, "is on a search for the truth" and who is trying to get to the bottom of whether or not the WMD are there. But the soldiers of his own side keep getting in his way, as well as Clark Poundstone (Greg Kinnear), who wants Miller shut down. Poundstone is also the guy who mediated between journalist Lawrie Dayne (Amy Ryan) and "Magellan," who's a "source" and who supplied information about WMD and where they were hidden. Problem: Miller has already been to some of these places, and no WMD abound.

Perhaps the film's key character is Freddy (Khalid Abdalla), who, while Miller is basically wasting his time going to locations that are already bound to have nothing within them, tips him off about an important gathering at some house. He also acts as an interpreter for Miller. He really gives Miller a lead, and changes the game later on in an ironic way.

The film has an ending that fulfills our fantasy yet at the moment of its arrival seems (although there is another, somewhat embarrassing reason for how I felt this way) abrupt and too good to be true. It's both a good thing but also a flaw. That and also the very long follow climactic scene, which can be admired for its "chaos" (as my friend said) but not for its clarity (which may in fact be the whole point, but still). I did think Damon, Kinnear, Ryan, and Gleeson all did pretty well, fitting appropriately in their parts, although Damon is a little typically "heroic" (as has been said) and Gleeson is in spots a little weak. "Green Zone" isn't all great, and the only areas where it really excels is in its (as other critics et al. said) "technicalities" and (as others said) "feeling," but it's a solid film, on par with Ridley Scott's "Body of Lies." B

I Am Love (Io sono l'amore)

Luca Guadagnino's "I Am Love" has a final third, after a significant event transpires (in the most surprising moment of the film), that is plodding and then suddenly stupidly frantic to keep with the whole "opera" theme many critics have mentioned. The previous two thirds were good and well-done in their craftsmanship, with the excellent and unique score by John Adams as well as the show-offy but still quite good cinematography by Yorick Le Saux (that seems heavily governed by Guadagnino, as his work in Erick Zonca's "Julia" is much, much different) and the sound design. With the final section fixed, I'm not sure if the film could have been exactly great, but it would have saved face for me, as my interest was almost completely lost and by the probably referential ending with birds in a cathedral, I couldn't have cared less.

The film finds its focus in the enigmatic Emma Recchi (Tilda Swinton), which is not her real name. She came from Russia, and married into the Recchi family, one with, as Sight and Sound said, "quite a bit of money to their name." This is apparent from the film's opening, which takes place during Grandpa Recchi's birthday. Nick Davis called the film similar to the work of Arnaud Desplechin ("A Christmas Tale") and that it is, referential even of that film. So many subplots abound at the start, from Edoardo (Flavio Parenti) who has brought home his lover Eva (the beautiful Diane Fleri), who is from a class level lower than that of the Recchis. Edoardo, as Sight and Sound noted, has somewhat "blemished the family name in his loss in a boat race." This stilts the evening (and also really sets off the film), as well as lesbian daughter and photographer Elisabetta (Alba Rohrwacher), who is somewhat disrespected by the grandfather, who is quick in showing his disappointment (you could call it a family trait). In this scene, as well, the old Recchi hands down the business to Edoardo (which, as my friend says, is not the best idea). We also are introduced to, as Sight and Sound said, the victor of that race, who is a chef ("A chef!" the family exclaims when Edoardo tells them who he lost to or maybe tied with ) and an excellent one at that.

As Nick's Flick Picks' Nick Davis, The New Yorker critic Anthony Lane, et al. noted, the film is very food-minded, and a lot of plot points hinge on various dishes. For example, Antonio the chef (Edoardo Gabbriellini) makes an extremely good eggplant dish for Edoardo, which convinces him to get Antonio's reluctant father into allowing Antonio to have a restaurant. Also, in a scene that Lane mentioned in his review, Swinton eats a prawn and falls deeply in love with Antonio as a result. The critical moment of the film, the moment before the film goes into a total downfall, is also culinary.

As Lane also mentioned, the film is about "repression." Emma has come from Russia and keeps her memories to herself (this backstory I wasn't all too fond of). Emma's relationship with Antonio also has quite a bit of fantasy involved, as the chef has a hard time turning back his desires. Lane commented that the film should have left the actual sexuality "offscreen", and although I don't entirely agree, it's a little overdone here. Emma's daughter Elisabetta discloses her sexual orientation only to her mother, as her conventional father would be in a fit of rage at it.

This is not nearly as personal a film as "A Christmas Tale," where you knew about everyone and quite well. Here, certain characters of the family are left mostly uncovered (although it's not a requirement to bring everyone into light). Swinton, as my friend said, is "good," and, as I think another friend said, very right for the part. I also liked Waris Ahluwalia in his bit part as a businessman in dealings with the Recchis. The film manages to be decent for a long while, but falls to pieces at the end, which also calls attention to fellow flaws. The ending needs to deliver here, and it really doesn't (making, as Nick Davis said, "the sum off"). To use the typical critical language in a "food film," the film has a good and impressive main course but slinks off into a dessert with low-grade ice cream at the ending (with a tart but useless chocolate center). C+

Live Tape (New York Asian Film Festival)

Kenta Maeno, the singer/songwriter in Tetsuaki Matsue's "concert film" (as it was referred to by the NYAFF program) "Live Tape," has lyrics that drift between the completely ridiculous (from "a big phallic apartment" to "I met a cat on the way home from work") and the sincere, most of them breaking down into romance before the close of the song. His music is good, but it suffers without his lyrics (I know this firsthand from the non-subtitled songs that he played after the end of the screening).The film is a chronicle of his New Year's Day in Tokyo (Matsue himself and the program I believe noted it as "a day of some significance in Japan"), as he stumbles along, at one point seeming to lose his self-confidence, playing his music in "an unbroken take of 74 minutes" (as the program said) that mirrors many music videos and that helpfully brings on the feeling that comes with one of these "long shots" (as they've been referred to). The film, while being interesting, isn't exceptional, as the direction by Matsue isn't all great, in how he interjects commands ("Kenta, sing 'Sad Song' here!") to Maeno in certain parts (although, as my friend and others at the screening said, this was a hard enough task that Matsue should be given slack). Despite that, I did admire some of the interesting setpieces here, like how Maeno sings a song called "Mansion" (which mentions Coke) near a vending machine as the lights undulate in the background.

The beginning and the ending are also very well done. It starts with an audience entry point technique that I've seen before: we see at the very beginning a woman (played by the "adult film actress" Tsugami Nagasawa), apparently placed there to have at least one female figure, who prays for the director (who apparently can't on New Year's Day as he's lost someone) that the film's making will succeed, and then threading through the crowd to where Maeno is. This prevents the film from starting as in-your-face and also really is a nice touch to start the film, if you understand it. The ending I enjoyed as it ends with a better song than that you would have thought it would have (the much sentimentalized and well-performed "Weather Forecast" is bettered by the beautiful "Tokyo Sky"), with good final camerawork to match.

The film's exposition of Maeno's past comes with the description of "Weather Forecast," and perhaps that's not done exactly perfectly by Matsue, but you get to sort of see into Maeno's personal situation there (though, as Michael Sullivan said of Joan Rivers in "Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work," his regular songs aren't necessarily seen into through this, although Maeno might just be weird and "goofy," as my friend et al. said of him, as a songwriter). But, as the program says, the film is somewhat of a "tiny lo-fi miracle" in that the songs start to become familiar and are so absurd (and sometimes just good enough) to be memorable. This is probably what they were for Matsue, who made this documentary (among other reasons, such as the fact that Maeno would do it) to show how profound an impact that Maeno's music had on him through the (as others said) "hard times" he went through. B