Film Club: The Musketeer

Jake and I decided to tackle Film Club once again, where we jointly review a movie.  While before we’ve done lauded works from auteurs, today we’re discussing The Musketeer (2001)

A: Okay, so I really just want to begin with a couple of thoughts:

1) Why can no American actor pronounce D’Artagnan correctly?

2) Where can I buy Tim Roth’s hat?

J: 1. Maybe because D’Artagnan comes from rural France, he gets the equivalent of a Southern pronunciation in the ever-awkward translation of French into vague stabs at French-accented English.

2. One cannot buy Tim Roth’s hat. It grows into his face like evil ivy.

A:  Joking aside, let’s talk about this terrible movie.It’s your basic Three Musketeers plot, only with a lot less of the eponymous Musketeers and a lot more wire-fu.

J: I knew I was in for something…different…when I saw the name Xin-xin Xiong listed as stunt choreographer in the opening credits. It promised a bit of insanity that sadly the film didn’t deliver on.

Having said that, the sword fights are clearly the highlight of this mess, if for no other reason than it forces the actors to stop talking. A weird thing I noticed, though: almost no one actually dies in this movie. Now, you can kill seemingly everyone on Earth so long as there’s no blood, but maybe back in 2001 you had to show some restraint?

A: D’Artagnan’s parents die at the beginning, then Tim Roth dies at the end in that insane ladder sequence.  And I suppose numerous Cardinal Guards or peasants supposedly die throughout, although none of those scenes are particularly graphic.I do like me some swashbuckling.  Maybe that’s why I find the movie so easy to rewatch.  Even though I can acknowledge it’s faults fairly easily, it’s somehow become my go-to rainy day film.

J: I guess what I meant is that there is a slightly more slapstick approach to the violence. It is bookended with deaths, but in the swordfights it looks as if Cardinal Guards are disarmed and incapacitated rather than outright killed. This is relation to last year’s Three Musketeers, in which people are unambiguously killed in great numbers, albeit with a lack of blood.

I think that version of Three Musketeers is part of the reason we decided to talk about this one, the other part being my new affection for director Peter Hyams’ son, John, who is quietly emerging one of the best old-school action directors.

I see a lot of the father’s talent in the son (and even a bit of Paul W.S. Anderson): The Musketeer is shot in ‘Scope aspect ratio and takes a clear pleasure in the castles and palaces and sets. Shots tends to be in deep focus with the actors in the middle distance, freeing up the audience to look around from the actors and take in everything else. And when he wants to focus attention in the wide frame, he puts in frames-within-frames. Think the young D’Artagnan’s face “resting” on the corner of his dead father’s grave cross, or both the prison bars and makeshift proscenium that bound a dungeon shot. If nothing else, this film is beautiful.

A: Maybe it was my cheap-as-free DVD copy, but I didn’t get the impression that this film was particularly well made.  With a few exceptions, even the costuming feels like left-overs from bigger movies.  Just with the opening credits, it seems like this film is saying “This is cheap, fun action.”  It is part of its charm, but I’m also not going to excuse it.

What I tend to appreciate is how tropes from modern genres tend to emerge in the films.  The scene that comes to mind is when D’Artagnan appears in the Cardinal’s chambers after the door suddenly blows open, then leaves in a similar manner.  And when it seems like Richelieu is speaking to an empty room, Fevre comes out of the shadows.  It’s the type of genre nod that acknowledges James Bond and kung fu movies in a single scene.

I still wished they had tried harder to match the Musketeers’ legacy with the script.  The updated action is fun and interesting, but it doesn’t have the same amount of swashbuckling spectacle as the Disney version from ’93.  You don’t really get to know Athos, Porthos and Aramis, so they wind up on the outs for the sake of a weak plot.

J: Oh, I think it’s pretty low-rent, too, but the cinematography (by Hyams himself, like most of his films and even his son’s Universal Soldier: Regeneration) makes great use of space. I also like the swordfights, silly and OTT as they are. Like you, I enjoy the intrusion of modern action clichés into a novel that itself had fun with tropes. That’s true of the wire-fu theatrics of this and the sailpunk ridiculousness of Anderson’s film.

I must say, though, there were a few times I was absolutely bored to tears by this. It is weird that Planchet has more to do in this movie than the Three Musketeers combined. Justin Chambers and Mena Suvari give a whole new meaning to “miscast,” and Stephen Rea gives a serious performance of quiet, Machiavellian calculation in a film where less stoic, unreadable work is more appropriate.

Again, though, when Hyams puts together a great shot or the fight choreography takes over, all is well for a few minutes.

A: One good thing about Chambers being cast is the plethora of opportunities to make Grey’s Anatomy jokes.  I spend every viewing referring to him as Karev.No one infuriates me more as Mena Suvari as a cast member.  She just can’t deliver a line to save her life here.  Although now that I think about it, the entire cast seems pretty questionable.  Catherine Deneuve isn’t given much to do here.

But yeah: fight scenes.

J:  Yeah, Deneuve is perfect to play a composed queen, and yet we get so little of her that it just seems like weird stunt casting. I love her and Rea, but if you put their parts together here I don’t think there would be enough for one person.If you were to rate this on a scale of one to five, what what you give it? I’d probably rate it a two: some of the deep-focus shots grabbed my attention when I threatened to give up altogether. I also liked the way the wire-fu was sublimated into more classical swashbuckling to temper the excesses of both styles. But man, as someone who will overlook a lot of stiff acting and wonky dialogue in the name of “vulgar auteurism,” even I was gobsmacked by how dull so much of the film could be. Nevertheless, I do want to check out some of Hyams’ other work now, especially his films with Jean-Claude Van Damme.

A: I would probably rate it a two as well.  It’s best if you can see the humor in how ridiculous and over the top the whole thing is, but there’s not enough good stuff about it to make it anything more.  The action scenes are worthy enough to earn the second star. 

Previously: Day for Night, Limelight

X-Men: First Class

Directed by Matthew Vaughn (2011) Starring: James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence, Kevin Bacon

Going to see a movie in Montreal for the first time was an interesting experience.  The mixture of awe at an unusual movie-theater set up and eating some delicious Kit Kat bites cast a certain glow over everything.  By the time we were leaving, I was sure that X-Men: First Class was the perfect summer blockbuster.  Only a few short hours later, I realized some of the weaker points, and noticed that everything I liked was coming from my id.

The film is the origin story for the X-Men and sufficiently introduces the two ideologies in the comics and prior films.  Professor X (James McAvoy) believes that mutants should work with normal folks for acceptance, while Magneto (Michael Fassbender) believes mutants will never have acceptance and should live outside of society.  There’s also some saving the world/threatening the world action going on there, but I’m kind of ignorant fool to the X-Men universe.  If you have questions, you should probably ask this lady.

Erik Lehnsherr was in the Concentration Camps, pulled out and tortured when his ability to move metal objects was discovered.  In sharp contrast, Charles Xavier grows up in the lap of luxury.  While Erik grows up, searching for the men responsible for his family’s death, Xavier goes to Oxford with his best gal pal Raven, aka Mystique (Lawrence).  McAvoy and Fassbender make this movie fun and interesting, although most of the emotional draw comes from Fassbender.  Where he brooded and James Bond-ed his way from Switzerland to Argentina, McAvoy was surprising in his snark, hitting on co-eds in one scene before switching around to teach mutants how to focus their powers in the next.

Unfortunately, the film has a serious problem with handling all of the characters, especially in key scenes.  Everyone else is left to stand or speak awkwardly whenever the camera is on them.  Kevin Bacon is possibly the only exception, but in the sense that he looks like he’s enjoying himself as the “Bwa Ha Ha” type of villain.  It’s genre-friendly for a throwback to old Bond villains, but it doesn’t pack much of a punch.

The Long Goodbye

Directed by Robert Altman (1973) Starring: Elliott Gould, Nina Van Pallandt, Sterling Hayden, Mark Rydell, Henry Gibson

 

Philip Marlowe (Gould) agrees to take his friend to Tijuana, but discovers that his friend’s wife was murdered.  When his friend commits suicide, it seems like the case is closed, but Marlowe continues pondering it as he does a job for a novelist’s trophy wife.

My first thought: Altman sure loved his zooms back in the day.  The Long Goodbye is composed of moving camera shots, always with a zoom combined with panning or dollying.  It’s an interesting technique, to say the least, but I left Film Class blinking, imagining zooms wherever I looked.  However, it does age the film, perhaps just as much as the leisure suits.

The plot was cool in a neo-noir kind of way, set in the Hollywood of the seventies in all its glory.  It also relies on only two songs throughout the soundtrack: “Hooray for Hollywood” and different versions of “The Long Goodbye”, composed by John Williams and Johnnie Mercer.

I think our collective culture will always associate Chandler’s Marlowe with Humphrey Bogart, but Gould gives a great impression as the tough detective in The Long Goodbye.  This is a Marlowe shaped by a different environment, who has a very particular cat, and a whole host of one-liners.  He interacts so smoothly with everyone else in the movie that it seems like he knows he’s just a character within a larger plot.  It’s impressive and makes for a very sympathetic main character.

Other characters are plays against type, such as the suspicious doctor, whose role in the plot is relatively small; the smart, almost femme fatale wife Eileen (van Pallandt), married to Roger Wade (Sterling).  There’s Marty-the-Mobster (Rydell), who is equal parts dorky and horrifying.

Soundtrack: Six-String Samurai

Seeing as Six- String Samurai is hinged around the musical prowess of the King hopefuls, I figured the soundtrack would provide an interesting listen.

The score is by Brian Tyler with music by the Red Elvises, who make an appearance in the movie as a Russian band out to stop Buddy from reaching Lost Vegas.  Tyler is best in the dramatic moments– his “Finale” theme is absolutely gorgeous and emotional in just the right way.  The songs provided by the Red Elvises are infectious, just what I would want from this soundtrack.

I was wondering about one track while listening to it.  It’s called “Surfing in Siberia” and I couldn’t figure out why they would call it that… then I realized they were playing balalaikas to that “Wipe Out” theme.  They mix Russian aspects into a typical rockabilly retro style, and their songs are catchy.  My favorites were “My Darlining Lorraine,” “Siberia,” and “My Love is Killing Me.”

Throughout the soundtrack, there are bites of dialogue from the movie– usually the witty one-liners espoused by Buddy and his enemies.  “If you were me, you’d be good looking” and “Nice Tuxedo.  Nice Tuxedo to die in!” made it in, which leaves me with a big smile on my face.

If you’re a fan of the film, the soundtrack is a great companion.  If you’ve never seen it, I think you’d still get a kick out of listening to the soundtrack.  It’s a really fun album, and outside of the awesome fight scenes, the music of Six-String Samurai are the film’s best moments.

The Book of Eli

Directed by Albert and Allen Hughes (2010) Starring: Denzel Washington, Gary Oldman, Mila Kunis, Jennifer Beals, Frances de la Tour, Michael Gambon, Tom Waits

I don’t have too many thoughts on The Book of Eli, but I do have some:

a) As much as it makes sense to have done it this way, the washed out color scheme got on my nerves.  I am lack-luster about it, stylistically.

b) The Bible as the titular book is not surprising, nor a spoiler.  I’m glad that the script explained that “the war” was the reason why there aren’t any more copies.  However, I was impressed by the spoiler, since it does relate to Eli’s personal copy of the book, and that was a decent twist.  Movie, you have my applause.

c) Solara (Kunis) … eh, I guess she was necessary.  Just, slightly less annoying than the Kid in Six String Samurai.

d) Gary Oldman is playing a villain again, and his performance was pretty cool, but not his best.  Carnegie comes off as a mix between O.W. Grant (Interstate 60) and Mason Verger (Hannibal), so not terribly original either.  I also can’t imagine anyone else in this role, but that is pretty typical with my opinion of Oldman.

e) Tom Waits is in this!  I actually knew that before I popped this into the DVD player, but I had forgotten.  Pleasantly surprised, got to say. And also Michael Gambon and Frances de la Tour, although I didn’t recognize them immediately.

f) I feel like I should have seen the shaking hands plot point coming, but it was a nice detail in the script.

g) Oh! While I’m on the script: damn, not that interesting.  Some lines just fell flat, and it was uneven enough that it’s obviously a script problem, not a performance problem.

h) I like knowing Denzel Washington did the action sequences himself.

i) These character posters are really classy.

My thoughts: There they are.

Six-String Samurai

Directed by Lance Mungia (1998) Starring: Jeffrey Falcon, Justin McGuire, Stephane Gauger

In the universe of Six-String Samurai, Russia launched an atomic bomb at the United States and conquered most of the country.  What was left became Lost Vegas, ruled by Elvis as its King.  However, the King is dead and Lost Vegas is looking for a new one.

Enter Buddy (Falcon), a traveling swordsman-rocker who is walking to Vegas to claim the throne.  While on his way there, he saves the Boy (McGuire) from a pack of modern cavemen, I suppose, and he reluctantly brings him along.

The film is episodic, with various battles cropping up for Buddy to defeat.  A weird culture has sprung up, created from a perverted sense of 1950s TV culture.  Wandering fighters abound with their guitars, often running into Death himself (Gauger) who is also seeking the throne.  Death is a masked, heavy-metal guy followed by his three archers while he goes around collected guitar picks from dead men.

The world in this post-apocalyptic movie is decidedly unnerving.  Here is the perfect TV family, who turn out to be crazy cannibals while an outpost of Russian soldiers continue to carry their guns around, even if they ran out of bullets in ’57.

The fight scenes are really awesome, in a classic martial arts film sense..  I was really impressed by the filming of those, which looked as if they relied on tradition fight-scene techniques created with lot’s of cuts and Falcon’s own bravado.  Buddy as a character comes off fairly aggravating when he isn’t fighting– maybe because he only has an annoying kid to interact with, besides the many villains?  Mostly the Boy cries or yells, and when he does talk, it’s about cars.  In that sense, he’s really useful, finding a car, motorbike, and bicycle so that Buddy can get to Vegas.

The music–provided by the Red Elvises, who appear as a Russian group with great shoes– is really fun while watching Buddy wander around the Wastelands.  A few of the villains created for this world are a little inexplicable– the Wind Farm people just show up for instance, and are… peculiar.  I can’t tell if these are people who were mutated by the atomic blast or were just so separate from society that they formed their own one.

Even though it has it’s faults, Six-String Samurai is so entertaining, I can forgive it.  The dialogue is catchy and the belief in a meandering bad-ass like Buddy becoming the next King makes him a hero I can root for.

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra

Time to take up drinking.  Ugggghhhhh…

Image from http://www.reviewstl.com/gi-joe-movie-review/

Directed by Stephen Sommers (2009): Starring: Adwale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Christopher Eccleston, Sienna Miller, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Byun-hun Lee, Rachel Nichols, Ray Park, Channing Tatum, Marlon Wayans, Dennis Quaid

I had next to no expectations coming into this movie, besides my friend’s commendation that it’s hilariously bad.  And so it is.

Some Notes:

1) Christopher Eccleston and Joseph Gordon-Levitt are villains here.  Way to make me root for the bad guys, movie.  It doesn’t help that while watching, I discover that Byun-hun Lee is marvelous and Sienna Miller is really only good when she’s evil.

2) The lead up to the Paris set piece here is that McCullen wants to get revenge on the French for torturing his ancestor.  And this probably has something to do with his wearing a ruby pin the entire time, I don’t know.

3) The CGI is really bad in some places, but really good in others.  Why?  It already looks like they’re spending the entire budget on special effects, so why scrimp on the CG in certain scenes?  I don’t understand.

4)I missed the Brendan Fraser cameo.  Was it towards the beginning, when I wasn’t paying any attention?  Although I like that he invented that his character is a descendant of Rick O’Connell.

5) Explosion-riffic. So that’s… something.

6) Okay, this goes back to “Way to Make me Root for the Baddies.”  While I’m not saying the performances were all that great, the villains definitely get the best of the writing in this movie.  Even Eccleston’s “menacing” lines are better than the half-hearted jokes Marlon Wayans is given. JoGo’s voice as the eeeeevil Dok-tor entertains me as well, although I’m curious to know if that’s his voice transmografied or with a different voice actor or what.

7) Sienna Miller’s character is called Baroness because she… married a Baron?  Who’s name is “Baron de Cobray,” by the way. For fuck’s sake.  Meanwhile, she’s passing when she’s evil, but when she plays her “good” self, she’s really annoying and fake.  Besides Casanova, I can’t think of another movie that I’ve seen her in and I can’t recall if she was any good in that. I also hold that while she can rock out wearing the glasses, that shade of brown just doesn’t suit her.

8 ) It’s another case of the White Kid is Better at You in Ninja School.  I always thought Snake Eyes was Asian-Anerican, but my knowledge of G.I. Joe is hazy.

9) While I’m not knocking how the flashbacks are segued into the story (usually some object in the scene sparks off a memory), it’s usually jolting enough to through off the pacing.  A large portion of the movie is flashbacks, and it becomes distracting.

10) I really hope that the villains just hang out and mess with their cell phones for the sequel, while the good guys are all Action Packed.  They might as well jump the shark in this franchise and make it completely tongue in cheek humor.

Hot Fuzz

Directed by Edgar Wright (2007) Starring: Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Timothy Dalton, Jim Broadbent, Paddy Considine, Rafe Spall, Bill Bailey

For being overly exceptional at his job, Nicolas Angel (Pegg) is promoted and then transferred out of the London police to the seemingly safe village of Sanford.  While making arrests for minor offenses and being greeted by the overly friendly Neighborhood Watch, Nick is bothered by the lax atmosphere of Sandford’s police department and they are bothered by his by-the-book attitude.  Except for Danny (Frost), who finds Nick awe-inspiring.  He spends the start of their partnership asking him questions based on his collection of cop-action films, such as “Ever fired your gun in the air and yelled, ‘Aaaaaaaahh’?”

What’s great about Edgar Wright’s and Simon Pegg’s Blood and Ice Cream Trilogy is that (so far) the movies create an authentic tone for the genres they are parodying as much as they create the humor.  So there is an excellent Buddy-Cop film in Hot Fuzz just as much as there is the parody of a Buddy-Cop film.

Edgar Wright’s direction is very energized, especially in the quick editing department.  There are some beautiful edits here, such as when a murder happens while Nick and Danny are watching movies.  It gets across as very action-packed, usually for comedic effect.  I watched the timer during my second-watching, and the big explosively action ending lasts a good thirty minutes!  Excellent.

It’s endlessly quotable and visually stunning.  I’m not sure what technique Wright used for the mugshot scenes, but it looks excellent.  There’s an equal amount of visual gags as well as verbal ones, mostly caused by quick-cutting between scenes.  The characters are bad ass, hilarious, and comfortably domestic, making it feel like watching real people as much as watching over-the-top movie characters.

RDJ Week 2: Kiss Kiss Bang Bang

Directed by Shane Black (2005) Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Val Kilmer, Michelle Monaghan

Harry Lockhart (RDJ) is a small time thief who gets mistaken as an actor while he’s escaping from the cops.  They send him out to LA to get detective lessons from Private Eye Gay Perry (Kilmer), who he meets at a party along with unrecognized friend-from-high-school Harmony (Monaghan).  The plot involves a slew of dead bodies and cases that are structured the same way as the Johnny Gossamer pulp novels that get tossed around in the story.

This movie is about as quotable as a 1940s film noir, although leaning more towards the darkly comedic than hard-boiled.  I picked it up from the winning recommendations of Caitlin and Alex, and damn!  It does not disappoint. (although it does not disappoint in the weirdest of ways).

This has everything a good dark comedy should have: Excessive nudity and violence, followed up by characters who could not react realistically to these situations even if they tried.  Harry is an idiot, although a rather likable idiot, who is just trying to get the girl and maybe get an acting gig out of it.  Harmony had a hard childhood, leading up to the harder let down of Hollywood not being the promised land she saw in her favorite books.  And Gay Perry is just trying to get everyone’s shit together.

Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is quotable and utterly fun.  It seems like a really re-watchable movie too, just from how quick it was and the rapid-fire dialogue.  I was really surprised with the movie as a whole– not sure why, but I didn’t expect an entire neo-noir set up, which was quirky in execution, whether that was with editing, music, or the characters themselves.  Val Kilmer played Gay Perry really well, more as a reactionary character to whatever Harry had going on in his life, often disposing the best one-liners.

I have a prediction that late at night this week, I’m going to want to watch this movie over again.  And that’s a great sign for movies in my book.

The Hurt Locker

Oscar Frontrunner 2010.

On a brief note of personal bias: Ho shit, I do NOT like the shaky camera. I’ve never been a big fan of it.  While it just strikes me as annoying when it’s on a TV, the screen above me was more in your face and visceral than I’ve ever had it before.  The camera actually mimics the actions of the camera placed on robots they use to first dig up the bombs, so it makes sense to use this shaky sensation.  I felt really sick an hour into the movie though and came out of it with a headache.  I thought it was just me, but my friend felt the same way.

So when it comes to Cinematography or the Photography of the film, no I didn’t like it much.  The movie itself was really powerful though, even if I can’ t really relate to SSG. William James (Jeremy Renner).  The fact is, I felt like I was watching a movie about a psychopath in Iraq at the beginning.  He begins to reveal more human emotions later on, such as when he finds a body bomb, sure that it’s the little kid named Beckham who sells DVDs in the market.

In terms of war movies, this one is intense.  The sound editing is very specifically placed, where there are gun shots attacking your ears as well as the subtle sounds of bomb diffusing, usually with the call to prayer whispering in the background.  As much as the movie is about James, it’s also about America soldiers in Iraq and the effects this causes on both sides.  While I can’t understand the motivations of the bombers, the interactions between soldiers and the populace feels tensed.  They may not be the war-situations, the exchanges of bullets or the detailed bomb diffusing, they are calms before the storm.

On James’ character, he’s not the psycho that I thought he was in the middle of the movie, but he’s certainly not a healthy individual.  The movie suggests that diffusing bombs has turned him into an adrenaline junkie, acting like a prime jackass around the members of his team at first before proving that he’s an okay guy mid-film.  He still drags them into dangerous situations, taking greater risks.  He doesn’t, on the other hand, show too much concern for the life which he left behind, including his infant son.

The best way to describe The Hurt Locker is that it’s a movie about modern war.  It talks about this war as a war between people, instead of a war between nations.  This is probably the best way of looking at the current situation, if we must cling to it as such at all.