Another Earth

Mike Cahill's "Another Earth" feels sort of tossed off. Maybe that was because the film got rushed for Sundance (if so, that decision paid off handsomely with a Special Jury Prize). Even if that wasn't the case, I wish Cahill had gotten more of a sense of what his movie was about. He has two winning actors in Brit Marling (his fellow screenwriter on the project) and William Mapother, and he and Marling have a potentially stimulating idea in having an exact copy of the Earth appear and be open to scientific and popular speculation. But they hardly explore what it really means to have another planet right there in the sky. I'm pretty sure tidal movements would be totally screwed up, not to mention orbits and all that jazz. We get the invasion angle, and the "what can that me tell me about me" angle (as humans are the same on that planet as well), but not really any satisfactory depth. It's woven into the plot in a way that makes sense, but at the same time it would have been cool to actually know more about it, instead of just having newsspeak thrown at us. And although I know the ending fits in with the processes of science and is somewhat sound on a thematic level, it feels rather like a cop-out, especially since a lot of great fiction has the protagonist eventually experience the mystery at the center of the plot, and as a result we do too. Not here.

As for what I experienced when I watched "Another Earth": I'm from the area where "Another Earth" is set and was shot, and perhaps I might have been more into the film if I hadn't been so distracted by the locations (Truffaut was right when he said that watching a film in a place you're familiar with is hard). Nonetheless, we plunge into the action in the suburbs of New Haven, as Rhoda Williams (Marling) drinks to celebrate her getting into MIT and then drives and, while taking her eyes off the road to take a look at the other Earth (as a radio broadcaster, DJ Flava, chimes in, one of the film's finest details), gets into a fatal crash where only she and the driver of the other car survive (a wife and a son are killed). This leads to her imprisonment (and thus her not going to college), which sends her into a state of intense depression (long walks and laying down in the snow naked are not out of the question), still hanging on her when she gets out four years later.

Working a menial job far below her possible trajectory, she goes to try to get the forgiveness of the other driver, a composer and ex-Yale-professor named John Burroughs (Mapother), but instead keeps quiet about the accident and atones in a different way, by cleaning his extremely messy house. The two are initially distanced, but they bond over Wii Boxing and discussions of the other planet. Soon, though, they do share profound things, like music played with a bow on a saw (not feasible, seemingly, but who knows?*) and an anecdote about a cosmonaut. You can see where this is going, but the tropes that the film employs sometimes do work, mostly do to the work of the leads. ALL of the actors in the film are superior to the script with which they are supplied. Better writing could have led to a great success.

There are scenes that really work, but as a whole, the film has trouble with justifying its existence. In retrospect, it just barely does, but there are sections of the film that don't go far in giving the film any point (other than the somewhat shallow notion of "can I learn from me"; I'm more interested in the film's idea of "how would I confront me"). Ultimately, "Another Earth" is not really in the right hands, and as a result lacks the muscle and cohesion it takes to tell a story like this. C+

*I learn from @SawLady on Twitter: "Playing music on a saw is totally possible." Here's the link she provided to the NYC Musical Saw Festival, an amazing-sounding event. Also, if you want to know what the fuss is about regarding the saw in this film, go here to the other link she gave.

The Myth of the American Sleepover

I don't think that the story threads in the jam-packed, affecting "The Myth of the American Sleepover" are all uniformly strong. However, writer/director David Robert Mitchell has united them with strong cinematography, exceptional editing (very valuable), and impressive execution. Here is someone who knows what he's doing. The precision here is undeniable, from the intimate aspect ratio to the way that he creates interest by staggering events (time is not linear; we cut back to the same moment as experienced in different places). There will be some people that won't be as disarmed as I was by this film, but I'd bet there's a contingent of folks who will elect to skip this film without knowing the craft involved. I hope those people don't miss out.

The film takes place in the waning days of a supposedly disappointing summer. School approaches with its constrictions, and it seems the only way to really escape now is to have a sleepover. Thus, many such gatherings are held, and everyone around is going to one or the other, with a few people roaming, searching desperately for fun and (possibly) love.

Most of the characters are well shaded, leaving those that aren't sticking out (such as the new girl who stumbles into trouble probably due to her being under the influence of alcohol) like sore, stereotypical thumbs. That being said, Mitchell manages to elicit at least a couple good moments in all of the different passages. A few times, he strikes gold, like when he makes the brilliant choice of cutting between girls and boys talking about the same memory. Or when he has a difficult confession play out in a way adeptly designed enough to distract you from the (possible) blatancy of the situation. (Judging from photos on IMDb, he bears a resemblance to this character, a troubled college grad; perhaps the scene is drawn from personal experience. Much of the film could be.)

The various parties range from the interior type where people play games and watch porn to the exterior style where people swim, dance, and lounge on the shore and on rowboats. The latter is supposedly better suited for those who are older, but, as one guy at that party muses, sometimes older teens wish they could go back to the more juvenile days. This is what the title refers to, that people grow old without wanting to be where they used to be (this isn't true). Not, as some have thought, that kids don't really drink or do drugs at parties (they do, according to this film).

Mitchell is a talented scenarist who, if he works out the minor kinks in his writing, has the potential to make some incredible films. He's got the technical facets down, with an eye for lighting and a feel for music (knowing for the most part how to employ potentially cloying music). Even if it falls slightly short of greatness, "The Myth of the American Sleepover" is memorable, with engaging incidents and characters. B+

The Man Who Fell to Earth (Uncut 35th Anniversary 35mm Print)

A film of startling narrative incoherence, Nicolas Roeg's "The Man Who Fell to Earth" made me even less of a fan of its director than before. I had previously seen "Walkabout," and I wasn't too impressed by it, though the fact that the disc I had seen it on was scratched may have had some effect on my patience for the film. It would be hard to deal with "The Man Who Fell to Earth" under any circumstances. It's 139 minutes long (20 minutes lengthier than the previous theatrical cut; the Criterion edition has always been this long), but it doesn't really use that time in a productive way, as it could have if it were a more focused epic. Instead, it's full of ridiculous clutter, so much so that Roeg would have to go back to the drawing board to really make any sort of success. What could have been piercing comes out bland, tedious, and amusing in perhaps a bad way when it's not utterly insane.

Many seem to love this film. To have any such affection for this film, you'd have to give yourself over to it, and, in my opinion, that's very hard to do. Sure, you could appreciate its mildly humorous flourishes, but that's very little to go on. The film has passages that are absurd beyond reason, especially the various sex scenes (the one with the gun full of blanks and the alien-on-alien action are simply risible, despite a friend's pretty solid theory for the latter), and it's nearly impossible to keep track of what's happening beyond a certain point.

At the same time, I'm having a hard time dismissing the film. It's probably because of the hype, or maybe because I love David Bowie's music. I guess it could be because there is some commendable essence here, elicited at times by Anthony B. Richmond's photography. Ultimately, though, no matter how I look at it, the film doesn't work. It's hard to care about the character because his backstory is portrayed in such unappealing ways and also because of the general disorder of the film.

Bowie plays Thomas Jerome Newton, the titular character who has apparently developed patents on his home planet in order to apparently get rich and be able to get back, supposedly with water. (This is all slightly unclear to me.) He's taken on a British persona, even though he doesn't even know the motto of the Royal Guard, and he's often extremely dizzy when traveling fast (he has trouble riding in elevators and traveling faster than 30 mph on the road).

He does indeed make a whole lot of money. He appoints the lawyer he met (Buck Henry) the president of the company he founds and travels out to New Mexico (which is where he crash-landed originally) to apparently scout out a location to build a facility. There, he meets Mary-Lou (Candy Clark), a hotel maid with whom he develops a relationship (despite a supposed spouse at home). She's the one who (as has much been remarked upon) gets him to drink alcohol instead of water, which is not a good thing at all. Screenwriter Paul Mayersberg (adapting Walter Tevis' novel) could have worked better with this, but instead develops it only slightly, making it feel banal and as weak as the rest of the film.

Also a fixture in the plot is Nathan Bryce (Rip Torn), who's both a sexually predacious professor and a thermal photography buff. He gets fired for horrible class reports and his antics, and comes on board at Newton's World Enterprises. Though he comes to be a little more important later on, a fixture is really all he seems to be, perhaps acting as kind of an audience entry point. I don't really know, having possibly forgotten (this film is hardly indelible outside of its ineptitude).

Roeg definitely tries to do some crazy things with the movie, made relatively early on his career. He punctuates the film with abrupt bursts of ironic music, gives random characters narration tracks, tries to document the New Mexico landscape like he did the Australian outback, and goes for broke with outlandish characterizations of extraterrestrials. These things didn't pay off for me, in the same way the atrocious makeup didn't. I was reminded of "Synecdoche, New York," a similarly big-scale and meticulously art-directed production that was assembled in a much better way than this one. Thus, Charlie Kaufman's soared while Roeg's sank.

Do I misunderstand this movie? Possibly, but it frustrated me and not in a pleasant way. It's one of those where nothing technically is really top-of-the-line but it seems like it could possibly make do anyways. It really doesn't, though. I have to say that if you admire the works of any of the participants, you're better off just skipping it, because your perception could be forever altered. I'm really not too sure what to think; it's difficult in the lack of solid redeeming qualities to be found. But, as you can see, even if it's a little imprecise, what I can put together is hardly positive. D

Tabloid

"Tabloid" illuminates a story that makes very little sense unless very carefully told. Joyce McKinney, the person at the center of the events, seems like she's happy to tell the story over and over again until someone finally believes what she considers to be "the truth." Her interview, which anchors Errol Morris' film, is invaluable, as it gets us as close as we can get to the case which has been termed "The Manacled Mormon," even if her view on the matter is extremely one-sided and filtered through a fairytale-esque vision.

Without her, "Tabloid" would be a mediocre documentary, likely to end up on some specialty channel on TV. (The film is also flawed technique-wise, using fadeouts to a distracting degree.) But the film would be of similar quality if it featured only her. So Morris supplies outside opinion such as reporters from two tabloids who covered her story, an "accomplice" in her scheme, and an ex-Mormon missionary. This mix paints as full a picture of the situation as possible.

Renowned for being (apparently) extremely smart and beautiful, McKinney went to Utah when what seemed like a matchmaking opportunity opened up. She fell in love with Kirk, who she didn't know was Mormon. After hitting it off really fast and getting engaged, Kirk apparently left without any notice and sent Joyce on a wild goose chase to find him, resulting in her "rescuing" him from the Mormon religion and trying to trigger his supposed love of her via some unconventional techniques.

"Tabloid" goes on to cover how what happened was snapped up by the news and how McKinney was forced into stranger and stranger situations as a result. Since it goes full-bore into the story (as is per usual for Morris), those who are alienated by the idea should stay away. For those drawn in, though, it could prove to be an engaging documentary experience, something that many folks find to be pretty rare. I think it's definitely diverting, but in the context of the strongest recent docs it doesn't stand out all that much. B

Project Nim

James Marsh's "Project Nim" has admirably incredible access to the saga of Nim Chimpsky, and raises some interesting questions, making it an easy early favorite for Best Documentary as well as a film that a lot of non-documentary-junkies will pick up and enjoy. However, in my opinion, it's far less sweeping and engrossing than Marsh's tremendous previous documentary "Man on Wire," and more a movie, despite some fumbling of style and technique, to appreciate than to love.

The subject of the film was first brought to my attention when I was milling about in a bookstore. It sounded pretty lame (what with the name they gave the chimpanzee in question) and I never looked into it more. However, when a strong filmmaker puts a focus on something, one is given incentive to take notice. "Project Nim" chronicles events that really seem to play out a lot better visually anyways.

Nim was a chimp who was wrenched from his mother when he was young. Used in an experiment by an extremely controlling professor, Nim was given to a family to be raised as a human being and to be taught sign language in the hopes that he could put sentences together. However, the professor didn't see what he was getting the chimp into, as the mother Stephanie was less interested in furthering the process of the experiment and more interested in raising the chimp as a part of her vibrant family. Her notion of parenthood seems a little perverted, though, since she both breast-fed and supplied alcohol and marijuana to her simian charge. The whole situation was bizarre, and apparently detrimental to both the family (only two of its many members allowed themselves to be interviewed) and the experiment itself. After a more specialized sign language teacher Laura came into the mix (whom the professor desires, along with Stephanie previously), the professor became inclined to move Nim and the observation to an exurban Columbia University mansion and a classroom. This is where he stayed until he became more and more strong and less and less compatible with human beings.

The film, in its later passages about which I will not go into detail, shines a light on how we think of "animal cruelty": once people anthropomorphize, they start to think differently about the "feelings" of that particular animal. If we're going to think about one case like that, it's only fair to think about all other animals the same way. It gets a little complicated, and justice can't really be ever served. Despite the fact that the experiment yielded results about how manipulative chimps can be, this examination was never really a good idea, and it ended up causing a lot more harm it seems than benefit.

"Project Nim" doesn't sustain itself well for 93 minutes, and it ends up at some point seeming like a bunch of talking heads over endless footage. Not necessarily a bad thing, but I can't say my attention was held from beginning to end. Plus, Marsh makes certain elements that fit well in "Man on Wire," such as the dramatic re-enactments, feel precious in a bad way. Nonetheless, it's a decent success, and will surely appeal to at least some audiences. B

Green

"Green" by Sophia Takal has the opposite problem of one of the three main characters, Robin. While she constantly (though maybe in the interest of trying to be polite) overstays her welcome, the film that she's in ends up being way too short at 75 minutes. It offers up a lot of interesting ideas about social structure, but doesn't go about explaining them to the extent that it should. This and the fact that many elements of the film feel strained are its biggest problems. If only these issues had been fixed somehow.

The film takes place almost entirely in a small town (possibly in Pennsylvania, judging from a license plate), opening with its only scene set in New York. We come in medius res, as people heatedly discuss Philip Roth and Proust. The camera darts between various angles before settling on Genevieve (Kate Lyn Sheil), who will continue to be examined throughout the movie. This seems like a strange way to start things off, but we come to see how it establishes the dearly held intellectual status of Genevieve and her boyfriend Sebastian (Lawrence Michael Levine), her moderate distance from him, and how their life is full of consistent social interaction.

After this, the action moves to the rural home where the two are subletting for around a year as Sebastian writes an article about sustainable farming. They seem to think they're alone, and thus prepare themselves for a particular sort of intimacy. But soon, their neighbor Robin (played by writer/director Takal) comes stumbling into the picture. The way that Takal integrates her character into the plot exhausts credibility as much as her put-on Southern sounding accent does (you definitely can see from this interview that her voice is nothing like the one in the film). The difference in attitude of Genevieve and Sebastian regarding Robin from the first to second scenes struck me as kind of odd. However, it's a testament to Takal's much-remarked-upon strength as an actress that she can somehow make Robin into more than just a stereotype, even as at the same time she explores the way that both of the Manhattanites see her as one.

Robin again and again seems to be prying into their lives, offering to go on walks with them and show them around the town (though it's usually just with Genevieve) and becoming a regular at their table. Although Robin seems to get at a fun side in Genevieve's personality (eventually getting her to reveal certain personal stories), Genevieve feels her time slightly more and more disrupted. This happens especially when she starts to pick up on undertones of romance between Robin and Sebastian (which I took to be entirely imagined until the very end of the film, which I think Takal misplays). This she takes as an insult to her pronounced braininess.

Her intense disdain for Robin and her supposed mental incapacity comes out in the film's strongest scene (both thematically and technically), when, during a lunch, she asks Sebastian about returning to New York to attend an art show. Done in an unbroken take where the camera moves back and forth across the table, at times resting on Robin but seeing her as more a catalyst than a participant, this scene is the movie's most successful distillation of the tension between the three characters. It showcases Genevieve's iciness and quickness to laugh, Sebastian's abundance of humor, and Robin's knack for (perhaps strategically) saying things at the wrong times. It's in moments like this that "Green" excels.

It helps that Takal has a real eye for good dialogue (especially for Levine, who ironically supposedly is her fiancee in real life), arresting images (the transposition-heavy campfire scene is a stunner), and engaging techniques (the voiceover conversations between Genevieve and Sebastian are strong). Her main cinematographer Nandan Rao (Benjamin Nicholas and Kim Takal did additional photography, making it slightly hard to tell who shot what) creates a lot of nice compositions in the forest that often have interesting facets of focus. I'm less hot but still somewhat appreciative of the work of her composer Ernesto Caramo, who makes transitional textures that sound often like noises of aliens. The best job is done by the sound designer Weston Fonger, who makes certain features of the sound come out very palpably and thus produces an additional layer of friction between the leads.

What the director doesn't have down is how to put together the introverted and extroverted components of her story. Within each of the modes, the scenes jell quite nicely, but when Takal wants to switch from personal to public, the film feels awkwardly put together in a way that sort of screams Mumblecore (and probably actually is, due to the film's extremely small looking budget and type of content). This is a hitch that, along with the other flaws noted above, hurts the film as a whole. If Takal can avoid these weaknesses in the future (and maybe hire an editor other than herself), she could be an extremely strong filmmaker. B-

13 Assassins

"13 Assassins" shouldn't be the first film of its kind that you see. Remaking a film from the early '60s, director Takashi Miike strives to mix the motifs of the samurai film with some J-horror flourishes. What results is technically sound, thematically competent, and pretty involving. However, it's not as strong as the hype may have lead you to believe, and, if you're a newcomer, there are some other movies you should watch before you elect to view this one. But there's something to be said for a filmmaker who wants to entertain audiences by both respecting and altering the genre, even though in this case Miike is being more reverent than subversive, and "13 Assassins" is, if not transcendent among the ranks of its samurai predecessors, at least better than a lot of movies in current release.

The film has a heavy-handed, melodramatic story typical to this sort of film: the half-brother of the Shogun, Lord Naritsugu (Goro Inagaki, channeling a privileged menace) is destroying the area's long-held peace with his horrific nature. To give an example, after one samurai commits hara-kiri (read: suicide) in protest, Naritsugu tortures and kills his family. At the core of his misdeeds is his perverted notion of what it means to be a samurai and also a misunderstanding of what it's like to be anyone else other than him. He actually admits that he wants to "bring back the age of war," which would be catastrophic.

Something must be done, posits Sir Doi (Mikijiro Hira), the advisor to the Shogun (who's never shown). He sends for Shinzaemon Shimada (Koji Yakusho), who's enjoying a retirement fishing. Sir Doi wants him to kill Naritsugu, because if Doi himself did it the system of honor would be disrupted. Thus, Shinzaemon (renowned for being determined) recruits a few extremely capable fighters, including his trainee (who brings a long his trainees), his gambler nephew, and towards the end, a guy who lives in the forest (who uses a rock in a sling rather than a sword). He needs all the help he can get, since Naritsugu's army (comprised of roughly 200 guys) brings strength in numbers, and they're led by Shinzaemon's rival Hanbei (Masachika Ichimura). But, as you will come to see, the assassins, though outnumbered, have some tricks up their sleeves.

"13 Assassins," (supposedly) like Miike's "Audition," is a film that practices restraint and then unleashes all of its pent-up energy. Although dreadful things happen towards the beginning, they are isolated and only slowly do they build up the film's momentum. This limitation of action makes the moments that come later on much more stimulating. However, once we get to final part, when things happen in quick succession, the combat becomes a bit duller. I've heard the climax of the film, which depicts the long battle between the assassins and the lord's clan for 45 minutes, both praised and criticized for its technique. It's pretty standard stuff, and it can be (as I noted above) a bit monotonous at times, as it shows many henchmen killed in exactly the same way. But, since we relate somewhat to the main characters, and since they have personality, it manages to be entertaining nonetheless. Speaking of the camera, there are some remarkable images captured by Nobuyasu Kita, who manages (successfully) to make the cinematography both salient and secondary to the action.

Making Naritsugu a bratty pushover may have emphasized his strength only derived from power, but it also makes the film look like it went through too much for such a simple objective (that's actually kind of overcomplicated at the start). All the same, "13 Assassins" is an absorbing diversion, one that offers a bit of variety for people looking for something interesting and exciting to see in theaters. Plus, it has the pedigree of being nominated for the Golden Lion at last year's Venice Film Festival, if that means anything to you. B

On Tour (Tournée) (BAMcinemaFest)

Despite some dodgy notes hit by a cast of first-time-acting burlesque dancers and a script that at its worst gives itself over to bouts of corny humor and worn out situations, "On Tour" ends up working in the end. It is anchored by the beautifully grainy and composition/focus attentive 35mm photography by Christophe Beacaume and a solid performance on both sides of the camera by Mathieu Amalric, not to mention a clutch acting job by the most prominently featured dancer Miranda Colclasure (better known as Mimi Le Meaux). The film's angle on its main subject is hardly philosophical, but that's no matter. It finds other things to look into, and all-in-all ends up an enjoyable film, at times more blissful and at others more plodding.

Joachim Zand (Mathieu Amalric), we come to learn, is alienated from his father, brother, and wife, and not entirely favored by his kids either. He's pissed off a lot of people, and it's not hard to see why: he desires to be in control at all times, constantly and perhaps arbitrarily telling bartenders and hotel managers to turn down the music or the television. He's put together an act in America consisting of stripteasers such as Kitten on the Keys (Suzanne Ramsey), Julie Atlas Muz (Julie Ann Muz), and Dirty Martini (Linda Marraccini), to add to the aforementioned Mimi Le Meaux, for whom he has a greater amount of affection. Now he's taking them on tour (hence the title) in France. This trip is ostensibly just to conduct performances, but when he has a hard time holding down event spaces, he gets around to seeing his family, as well as an estranged dancer whom he mistreated some time back. A lot of the film's strength comes from its examination of Joachim, who's trying to manage a lot and just barely keeping things together.

The film spends a lot of time also with the dancers, lingering on their stripteases (though with skilled camera placement, perhaps for a bit too long) and showing their off-time. Of the girls, it spends the most time following Mimi. She's lonely, both a part of the crew and somewhat isolated, having disappointing trysts and perhaps loving Joachim a little bit. We see her often in close-ups, sometimes of her numerous tattoos, sometimes of her (theoretically) masked face. Though she's notably histrionic at times, this is strong work by Cloclasure, a product of the direction that won Amalric the Prix de la mise en scéne at Cannes last year.

"On Tour" I don't think has the makings of a great film. However, judging from the audience I saw it with, for more than a few people it will have the makings for a great time. Though some parts of the movie are trite, some scenes are actually pretty funny. And you'd have to be allergic to fun to not be overjoyed by the film's final shot. Concluding the last passage of the film (which has an amiable, mellow vibe), it provides a fitting end to both the section and also the motif of which it is a part. This ending (apparently not the only great closer in Amalric's career), most likely among the strongest this year will have to offer, deserves to be seen by audiences, and I hope that a distributor takes heed and purchases it, along with the solid film that came before. B

Beginners

Appealing and profound simultaneously, "Beginners" finds a way to navigate through its story that makes it feel much realer and much more involving than most recent "whimsical" comedies (viz. "500 Days of Summer," "Away We Go"). It is about the pursuit of happiness, elusive at every moment in time due to far different repressing circumstances. Hal (Christopher Plummer), a museum director, went through married life a closeted gay man, and finally, after his wife died and the times changed to allow homosexuality, came out to salvage the final years of his life. He doesn't live much longer, but he gets to experience a timeless thing, which one can have even in the face of death: love. His son Oliver (Ewan McGregor), not very successful romantically, comes to find a source of joy after his father dies in Anna (Melanie Laurent), whom he meets at a party. This is after periods of isolation where no one finds his stoicism and seriousness all too enjoyable.

In both instances, death unlocks love and death bears hardship. Even though Oliver narrates history in a linear, practical way, his memories come to haunt him in random moments and in random order. The film often repeats itself and delves back into Oliver's childhood and time with his dying father to show what he's relating to his girlfriend. He often thinks of his zany mother (Mary Page Keller), with whom he had one of those more strange relationships; there are moments from his early life that he brings in perhaps to have some touchstone to operate with. He's so tied to his past that the ending, which I've seen before in other films of which this one is reminiscent, makes sense and nicely concludes the film's thesis.

"Beginners" for the most part has a subversive sensibility that strays towards Noah Baumbach's "Greenberg" and Richard Linklater's Jesse and Celine diptych (the latter at certain points perhaps a little too much). It knows how to be actually sweet and funny, utilizing the supporting cast (Kai Lennox and China Shavers as Oliver's friends; Goran Visnjic as Hal's newfound lover) well and supplying old Woody Allen/newly repurposed cliches (eccentric subtitles, old music) with not only new life but a tangibility to the plot. Mike Mills, who has written and directed this film based on his life, both allots time to both blissfully meandering and thoughtfully meditating on deep themes (some subtly introduced).

The film's key asset, though, is its lead performers. McGregor drives the film with his pensiveness and quiet humor and pleasure. It's his finest performance by a good measure. Laurent, with her glorious smile and incredible charisma, is exactly what the film needs: its embodiment of delight. But the film really shines under the control of Plummer, who knows how to play the newly emerged father: open to new things, accepting (sadly but wholeheartedly) of his fate, amazedly discovering things that are supposedly obvious. With this complex and radiant performance, Plummer alongside McGregor marks his career high.

"Beginners" may be about 10 minutes too long, wasting some time in repeating things and sometimes frustratingly moving away from the scene at hand. But it gets at and portrays emotions palpably enough to produce a state of euphoria for a viewer receptive to the film's carefully developed wavelength. B+

The Trip (Theatrical Version)

I was going to do some sort of food review gimmick for my take on Michael Winterbottom's "The Trip," but I feared that I wouldn't be able to fully address the copious problems with it. The reformatting from the roughly 3-hour BBC miniseries shows in that the film is abrupt and choppy throughout, never providing any backstory for the main characters or letting any of the comic situations build to their full potential. Seeing as I didn't get a chance to view the TV version, I'm unsure whether its this cut or the whole venture that deserves blame. I'm not necessarily the right audience for this film, since I always feel like I'm forcing laughs at this sort of British humor (which seems funnier to me when read).

Ultimately, "The Trip" is just another opportunity for comedic actors Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon, most famously paired in Winterbottom's "Tristam Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story," to screw around. The joke, both times, is that the two are playing themselves, and that Coogan is a womanizing asshole while Brydon is a charismatic family man. This schtick wore thin even before the end of "Tristam Shandy," and here it really started to get on my nerves. However, even Brydon comes off as annoying and generally intolerable, with his incessant impressions and jokey, overly agreeable nature.

Much of the film seems to have been developed via the aid of illegal substances. I can't say I understand why Coogan, who is apparently struggling but still very affluent and getting parts (in "In the Loop" and "The Other Guys," recently), is suddenly writing food criticism for a British magazine. This is the foundation for the film, and it already involves a suspension of belief. Anyways, Coogan has to go on a trip through the UK to eat various bits of fancy food and write about them (though we never actually see what he thinks or hear what he's going to write, rendering this facet of the film pretty useless). He gets to bring along a guest, and he elects for Brydon, after his girlfriend Mischa (Margo Stilley) heads off for America instead of coming along.

Even though it's patently ridiculous, this is a set-up that could work. But it doesn't. The biggest reason is that Winterbottom ignores the fact that comedy needs to build to work. I'm not a huge fan of comedy derived from awkward situations, but I can see that this film could have cashed in many times. There are only a couple of extended bits, and they are the wrong ones to be continued on. The only really uncomfortable thing in the film ends up being the way that Winterbottom startlingly cuts away from the action and expects us to find the last thing that was said (whether it be a genuine punch-line or not) to be funny. It rarely if ever pays off, and he does it many times.

Another massive failure of the film is that it often neglects to incorporate the surroundings into the humor. Sure, there's that bizarre moment with the guy on the mountain, but this is a movie that takes place in public spaces, and it feels like for the most part everyone around is oblivious to the antics of Coogan and Brydon. Never does either one of the two interact with the waiter except to politely thank them for the food. Think of how hilarious it could have been if one of them had insulted the staff and/or restaurant patrons and trouble had ensued. The camera often lingers on the food and the terrain around, and since the film never really puts them to use, I think it's fair to assume that they function mostly as food/location porn.

Finally, if the film had been more probing than it is, success may have resulted. We see inside Coogan's head, like the psychedelic passages in "Tristam Shandy," this time with a totally unexpected celebrity cameo which hasn't been mentioned anywhere. But does this really say that much about Coogan? Maybe it does, I don't know. There are moments where the film seems to be trying to get at what it's like to be an entertainer or a critic, and the whole negotiation between the kitchen and the dining hall, but Winterbottom is far too surface-deep for that. (Now that I look more carefully at it's page on IMDb, the film apparently doesn't have a script, which does clearly explain the film's lack of a focus.)

Brydon is a far stronger performer than Coogan, despite the fact that Coogan's Sean Connery impression is better. Maybe it would be sort of kind of interesting if we got to know him a little better? All we see him doing is talking on the phone with his wife. Maybe that's all there is to his life, but still, more exposition would be nice. I'm well aware of the fact that people will think I was expecting way too much out of this venture. Well, doesn't Winterbottom need to make reputable films to keep his position as a regarded director? Or else isn't it all just meaningless hype? No matter. "The Trip" would have been served much better by a) keeping the same scenario and aiming for more of a faux-documentary style, b) relegating Coogan and Brydon to having lunch at one of their pads and filming, or c) someone realizing having this pairing together on the screen isn't worth that much trouble. D+