Netflix Challenge: The Way We Were

Directed by Sydney Pollack (1973)

Starring: Barbara Streisand, Robert Redford

I spent 90% of my time wondering what Streisand saw in Redford and the other 10% remembering when Sex and the City and Gilmore Girls referenced this (one better accomplished than the other).

The Way We Were is about career girl and activist Katie (Streisand) who hopelessly crushes over the talented, but slack Hubbell (Redford).  Katie has to work to support herself through college, but finds out during their creative writing class that Hubbell has pure talent.  They talk a few times before graduation and reunite during the war at a bar.  Katie continues to act as emotional support for Hubbell when he’s in town, until he admits that he is attracted to her and they begin their relationship.  The problems arise when Katie’s serious opinions about current events come in contrast with Hubbell’s rich friends’ jokes.

After the war, Katie and Hubbell are married and move to Hollywood so that Hubbell can work on the screenplay adaptation of his first novel.  While Katie is able to make her own friends in Hollywood, she feels like working in the movies is going to harm Hubbell’s artistic drive.  Hubbell continues to come at odds with Katie’s activism, especially during the Blacklist and McCarthyism.  Katie accuses Hubbell of always taking the easy way out, and I completely agree with that interpretation.  Possibly because the film is predominantly centered on Katie, it’s never obvious why Hubbell decides to go along with what’s happening around them.  He doesn’t have much personality besides “pretty” and “attracted to Katie”.  He doesn’t even participate with his friends’ jokes or conversations much.

The episode of Sex and the City that references The Way We Were explicitly is the finale of season two “The Ex and the City.”  The conclusion involves Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker) comparing Big’s new engagement to the ending of The Way We Were and decides that Big wants a simple girl with straight hair, because he can’t handle a wild, free woman (ostensibly with curly hair).  I can’t deny that Parker has a passing resemblance to a young Streisand, but watching the movie makes any genuine comparison fall flat.  Carrie isn’t an activist – if anything, she more closely resembles the friends of Hubbell that Katie has the most trouble with.  She quotes the movie to Big and when he doesn’t catch the reference she treats that like a symbol of all the failures in their relationship, without any self-reflection that she probably isn’t the Katie she tries to color herself to be.

In contrast, the Gilmore Girls episode “Say Something” references the film in a very emotionally effective manner.  After her break-up with Luke, Lorelai (Lauren Graham) calls him and gives him a rambling message about how she needs her best friend, just like when Katie calls up Hubbell.  Not only does it reference a specific scene, but the emotional integrity between the two are more genuine.  Lorelai isn’t a Katie-type anymore than Carrie Bradshaw is, but she is in pain and misses her partner.  The emotional parallelism is just as strong as the original scene.   In contrast, it doesn’t lead to the couple reuniting, possibly because the writers acknowledge that just by drawing strong comparisons to a classic movie doesn’t mean that that particular scene is without fault.  Most of the scenes from the film where Katie has to beg for Hubbell to make the relationship work seem unfair to her as an equal partner in a relationship.  Even her carrying their child to term makes Katie seem more like a martyr than an independent woman.  The scene in Gilmore Girls updates that for Lorelai’s character, removing a lot of the condescension from the original.

What’s interesting about the legacy of The Way We Were in these references is how the film is presented.  In Sex and the City, it is celebrated and lambasted as a “chick film.”  The three characters who continue to believe in monogamous romance love the movie and can sing along to the theme from memory.  It’s consumed as a group by women of a particular generation and so an important part of female culture.  In contrast, Gilmore Girls references it as a movie that Luke and Lorelai had watched together, a more intimate experience of watching a film.  Instead of assuming that it is a wholly female experience, it is used as a means of allowing communication between two characters.  By referencing that scene, Lorelai is able to ask for Luke to come by, even though they are still in the early sections of a bad break up.

The Painted Veil

Directed by John Curran (2006)

Starring: Edward Norton, Naomi Watts, Toby Jones, Liev Schreiber, Anthony Wong Chau Sang

The Painted Veil is a very pretty movie, which probably isn’t the most articulate way to begin this review, but it sure is hard to deny.  From costumes (Ruth Myers) to cinematography (Stuart Dryburgh) to score (Alexandre Desplat), it’s pretty astounding.   The romantic drama based on the novel by W. Somerset Maugham follows the marriage of Walter and Kitty Fane (Norton and Watts), who begin problematically.  Walter, a bacteriologist in China, proposes to Kitty after only two meetings.  She accepts, only after hearing her mother lament about her spinsterhood, and their marriage proceeds awkwardly to Shanghai.  Two years later, Kitty has an affair with Charles Townshend (Schreiber), an important British official stationed in China.  Walter uncovers the affair and as revenge takes Kitty into the middle of a cholera epidemic in the country, saying she must go or he will divorce her.

It seemed like this was going to be about distasteful people and the awful things they do to one another.  I was also apprehensive that the film would take to blaming the wife for everything, and while Kitty is not innocent in her marriage, she’s also a figure under considerable strain. She is immature, sheltered and spoiled in her upbringing, but is expected to marry as her duty to her family.  Walter claims he loves her when all her really knows is that she’s pretty, but carries expectations that she will be the charming, loving housewife.  In that dialogue, their marriage is representative of the Problem that Has No Name that Betty Friedan discussed – what happens when a woman is given no expectations besides marriage, then has the expectation of maintaining the emotional bond?

In the country, Kitty is frustrated by how little she can do.  Watts is often shot standing in the middle of a room, incapable of accomplishing anything without becoming frustrated by her situation.  She goes to their nearest neighbor in the town, the stationed commissioner Waddington (Jones), who lives with his Chinese mistress.  How she reacts to their relationship shows just how little she understands romantic love, turning away rather than admitting that their relationship works.

The backdrop of revolutionary China sets the British ex-pat drama under a dangerous air.  While Walter attempts to prevent cholera from spreading, he alienates the local Chinese who see him as threatening their livelihood and traditions.  He has to work with Colonel Yu (Sang) who is equally as suspicious of Walter’s motives, but reluctantly helps him persuade the locals to follow the scientist’s instructions.  I’m not at all familiar with the source material, but based on the Wikipedia it looks like a lot of the changes they made helped develop the story into a mature, modern interpretation.

Ceremony

Directed by Max Winkler (2010)

Starring: Michael Angarano, Reece Thompson,  Uma Thurman, Lee Pace

Ceremony feels like an adult Rushmore.  It tries so hard to be like a Wes Anderson film or to follow the tradition of Quirky Independent American dramedies, and it makes for a pretty enjoyable movie.   Sam Davis (Angarano), a picture book author, drags his friend Marshall (Thompson) out of the city for a vacation.  What they’re really doing is crashing the wedding of Sam’s pen pal Zoe (Thurman), who he’s in love with.

It seems like Ceremony scratches an itch I needed: moving from the city of New York to a New England mansion, where every wedding guest hangs around to drink and wander around the beach.  Every main character has a serious personality flaw, from Marshall’s acknowledged anxiety disorder to the narcissism of Zoe’s fiance, Whit (Pace).

(And can we talk about Lee Pace in this movie for a second?  After Pushing Daisies I would have thought that he’d be stuck in the Nice Guy type, but that guy is proving he’s got range.  Especially the range of an asshole, which Whit is, but in a quasi-likable kind of way.  He’s just so handsome!  and clueless.  I can’t hate the clueless.)

It’s a surprisingly tight story, despite the languid nature of the wedding guests.  The wedding stretches out over a weekend, filled with parties and drinking and awkward sleeping arrangements.

Actually, what I really like about this movie is the ending.  It’s perfectly emotionally resonant, which might have to do with its choice of music, but I also just like how non-formulaic the characters’ actions are.  What Sam gets from the experience of crashing the wedding and trying to steal the bride is that he’s more similar to Whit than he could have imagined.  The character who shows the most growth is Marshall, even when he spends most of the second half looking for his missing pair of shoes.

The fact is, even later in life than we’d like to admit, Max Fischer and the other ghosts of high school still remain.  Sam and Marshall are in their early twenties, but it doesn’t make them any more mature.  Sam wants to have an adventurous life, but he pursues that goal without consideration for the people he involves and it’s fun to watch him realize that.

Love and Other Disasters

Written and Directed by Alek Keshishian (2006)

Starring: Brittany Murphy, Matthew Rhys, Catherine Tate, Santiago Cabrera

Love and Other Disasters is a completely unoffensive romantic comedy set in London and referencing the career of Audrey Hepburn.  Roommates Jacks (Murphy) and Peter (Rhys) try to figure out their romantic relationships which are constantly compared to their own, platonic situation as best friends.  Both of them are working at major UK magazines, both of them enjoy brunch, both of them are consistently unsatisfied with their love lives.  While Peter can’t find a man who matches the fantasy in his head, Jacks won’t break up with her convenient boyfriend James (Elliot Cowan) even though she knows she’s not in love with him.

The film is structured very similarly to Audrey Hepburn, William Holden comedy Paris When it Sizzles (1964), with a screenplay’s directions introducing the characters based on a screenplay Peter is working on.  Jacks is explicitly styled to resemble Holly Golightly, especially contrasting the  movie with the novella’s handling of Paul’s sexuality.  While underscoring her own relationship with Peter, it also plays out in the meet-cute, romantic plot between Jacks and Paolo, the new photographer’s assistant.

Love and Other Disasters is stylish and cute, perfect for Sundays with nothing to do atmosphere.  Murphy’s casting is a little over the top with a repeated American-English accent noted in the screenplay, but a wardrobe chic enough to make up for her slightly too-shiny characterization.  Catherine Tate is, as always, fun to watch and her anecdotes about failed relationships with a Jamaican and phone-sex operator punctuate the neuroses of the others.  On the whole, the young upper-crust of London seem fun, more than a little shallow, and very worthy of a Hepburn-esque rom com.

I prefer the gay storyline, although it is comparatively straight (haha) forward to the mistaken sexual identity-immigration-flightly girl straight line.  There’s a final scene that is the perfect argument for the best and worst situations with epilogues, but I think it’s a great cap to such an escapist movie.

Mr. Jealousy

Written & Directed by Noah Baumbach (1997) Starring: Eric Stoltz, Annabella Sciorra, Chris Eigeman, Carlos Jacott

Lester Grimm (Stoltz) has the bad habit of becoming obsessed with his current girlfriend’s ex-boyfriends.  When he gets into a relationship with Ramona (Sciorra), he tries his hardest to not fall into his old habits, but when he follows her writer ex-boyfriend Dashiell Frank (Eigeman), he winds up joining group therapy under his best friend’s name.

Mr. Jealousy takes the cast from Kicking and Screaming but sets them into a slightly more grown up reality: they all live in New York, have jobs they either love or hate, and are searching for “The One.”  Lester and Ramona’s relationship seems smoother than smooth, until Lester’s following habit rears its ugly head.

If there’s one great thing about Baumbach scripts is that they manage to have intelligent people speak realistically.  The dialogue is still stylized, as all movie dialogue ends up being, but there are the awkward moments and the weird, inside jokes between friends.  In that regard, Baumbach is a master.  He also manages to make overused plots into something that’s fun to watch while his neurotic characters work through the phases in their lives.

Eric Stoltz is easily the most likable guy in the universe, even as a jealous boyfriend, and Chris Eigeman is still really entertaining as a witty, if highly disorganized and messed up guy.  The cast works really well together as a whole, maybe because they’ve gotten used to each other since Kicking and Screaming?  All the winning scenes for me happen between the guy characters, who are struggling to figure out what it means to be adults, versus the romantic plot.  It’s emphasized enough, I just can’t detach it from Lester’s personality rather than the driving force of the film.

Considering I watched in twice in three weeks, there is something in Mr. Jealousy that’s really entertaining, even if its just that seeing smart people live in New York and have problems, while God narrates from above (Have I mentioned the voice-over narration?).

The Age of Innocence

Directed by Martin Scorsese (1993) Starring: Daniel Day-Lewis, Michelle Pfeiffer, Winona Ryder

To begin with, I complete understand the love that Daniel Day-Lewis gets now.  In The Age of Innocence, he plays Newland Archer who is engaged to May Welland (Ryder) when he meets her cousin, the Countess Ellen Olenska (Pfeiffer).  Because Olenska left her abusive husband, she is an outcast in New York society, but her out-of-step actions intrigue Archer to the point of infatuation.  Ryder seems tailor-made for wearing the costumes in these films, but I remain ambivalent about Pfeiffer’s casting.  She dons a reedy voice for her role as Olenska, but sticks out more from her cast mates by looking, well, too nineties.

Everything about this movie is pretty: pretty costumes, gorgeous set-design, cinematography that uses classic techniques, and best of all, food porn.  Every time there’s a party scene, the camera takes sweet time looking over the food that’s being served, including a long sweep over a table laden with desserts.  More importantly, New York City in the 1870s is beautifully reconstructed, especially for set design and costumes.  It gets high marks in all areas that count the most for costume-flicks.  The cinematography, while it lends great lighting to the food, also works its hands in the most important scenes, such as when Archer watches a boat pass a lighthouse or when he believes that everyone in Society knows about his affair, while a red light flashes on him, then off again.  Actually, all of the colors in the movies turn out fantastic, as if Technicolor has been brought in to make the roses a little more yellow and Olenska’s gown a little more scarlet.

 

I haven’t read the novel by Edith Warton, but with the addition of voice-over, I got the impression that what was being constructed was the novel for the screen, rather than a mere adaptation.  The film feels like an epic on that scale alone, while it becomes punctuated by parties, dinners, and nights at the opera.  The plot develops primarily through letters, which get spoken accounts by the writers, and conversations, which often happen off-screen, since not all of the conversations of-interest happen while Archer’s in the room.  It’s all social intrigue and he-said, she-saw and filial influence running amuck with these rich people, who come to define what the upper class is in Manhattan.

When it came to the denouement, it seemed pretty set in stone.  That’s how these Forbidden Love stories tend to go, although in this case, society had directly prevented Archer and Olenska from running off together, all through the influence of honor and family ties.  I can’t fault May from keeping Archer in New York– she was securing her happiness as much as he would have by traveling– but the epilogue scene in Paris, as an older Archer walks around the city with his adult son (played by Robert Sean Leonard, who just seems made for this sort of role in the early 90s) gave a necessary conclusion to this drama.

 

How to Lose Friends and Alienate People

Robert B. Weide (2008) Starring: Simon Pegg, Kirsten Dunst, Jeff Bridges, Megan Fox, Gillian Anderson

What had been rumored as a “meh” comedy proved it had earned its reputation, although admittedly, I did like Kirsten Dunst quite a bit (and the reference to The Apartment was a nice touch).

Sidney Young (Pegg) is an obnoxious journalist for his humor magazine.  When it catches the eye of media tycoon Clayton Harding (Bridges), Young is offered a job in New York, writing for a major periodical.  There, he tries to ingratiate himself to the next It-Girl Sophie Maes (Fox) while forming a reluctant friendship with fellow writer Alison Olsen (Dunst).

I feel like Pegg was given a role that was a lot like Tim on Spaced, except not nearly as likable.  Admittedly, Sidney has his moments usually when he’s bonding with Alison.  Dunst’s performance surprised me with how good it was, possibly because I had forgotten she was a good actress to begin with.  During the later half, when their settled into their roles as friends, the characters are sympathetic, funny, and interesting, but the weird quips and odd situations from the first half make it a little tiresome to get to that point.  However, when the plot shifts to an adaptation of  The Apartment between Sidney, Alison, and their boss Maddox it becomes a decent plot.

In general, movies and TV shows about the ugly sides of the entertainment industry are really boring.  The first time around, they’re revealing, but they are such a bore to slog through.  The material taken from Toby Young’s memoir are really frustrating, from the obnoxious mannerisms to the fact that celebrities and the cynics that cater to them are boring.  Luckily, the romantic plot tied it together for a satisfying end.

 

The Science of Sleep

Directed by Michel Gondry (2006) Starring: Gael Garcia Bernal, Charlotte Gainsborough, Alain Chabat, Miou-Miou

This was one of those movies that got hyped up a lot when I was in high school, but ended up on my list of Indie Disappointments.  Michel Gondry creates an interesting premise of a young man who gets his dreams and reality confused while he lives in France after his father’s death.

Gael Garcia Bernal plays Stephane in a tri-lingual role, which is impressive in itself, but he’s given pointedly childish material to work with.  While Stephane is stuck with a job he hates and reluctantly falls in love with his neighbor Stephanie (Gainsborough), he is extremely petulant.  His dreams take place in a TV studio, where he’s the host for a cooking or music or talk show.  He’ll venture into the office of his boss or explore the stop-motion animated world, which is at once a cave.

Gondry crafts the unreality of Stephane’s dreaming very well.  Set pieces tend to fold together while the dream logic is paramount, between what the water is made of (cellophane) and how the dream-characters act.  When Stephane begins to act outside of his dreams, such as leaving Stephanie a letter he wrote while asleep, he gets caught in problems.  Stephane is childish in everything: He hates his mother’s boyfriend and his boring coworkers.  He continues to sleep in his childhood bed even though he’s outgrown it.  Most notably, he keeps up the charade of not-being the neighbor of Stephanie, even after she’s found out.

What’s genuine are the scenes where Stephane and Stephanie share their imaginations.  They’re sweet little sets with a flexible reality as the characters come up with brilliant ideas.  However, these ideas never come to fruition, and it’s the fault of both characters.  Stephane won’t make a move, while Stephanie is reluctant to get hurt.

The dream sequences won me over, but they didn’t make up for the thin, character-driven plot in reality.

A Star is Born

Directed by George Cukor (1954) Starring: Judy Garland, James Mason, Jack Carson, Charles Bickford, Tom Noonan

A Star is Born is an epic at 176 minutes long, complete with a lengthy song-and-dance number, a strange avant-garde sequence, and plain, good acting.  I watched it thinking “Huh, the depressing Singing in the Rain,” since it follows a similar, Hollywood-centric plot and has the same amount of prestige attached to it.

When Norman Maine (Mason) appears drunk at a benefit, his dignity is saved with the quick thinking of Esther Blodgett (Garland), who dances him into the wings after he walks on stage.  Norman is stunned by this show of kindness and follows her orchestra to their after-work hang out, where he insists that Esther should become a star.

During the lengthy “Born in a Trunk” sequence, we follow Esther’s career as much as her character’s career (and even Garland’s).  Esther becomes a star over night with the new name “Vicki Lester.”  She and Norman run off to get married, but around the same time his studio has to drop him, leaving him adrift, with only an alcoholic past anchoring him to Hollywood’s collective memory.

A Star is Born stands as a testament to Hollywood’s Technicolor Melodramas, but it experiments with a lengthy photo-montage of what Norman and Esther are doing between their first meeting and getting her to the studio. ( If you’ve seen La Jetee, it’s a bit like that.)  It’s referential towards the industry, commenting that the dance sequence for one of Esther’s new movies will go beyond An American in Paris.  Norman’s career is a testament to the ins and outs of the studio system, right down to how the studios handled the personal lives of their stars.

It is a giant time-suck of a movie, but it’s a consistently great movie, so it’s worth your three plus hours of attention.

Thanksgiving Pick: Hannah and Her Sisters

Written and Directed by Woody Allen (1986) Starring: Mia Farrow, Dianne Wiest, Barbara Hershey, Michael Caine, Woody Allen, Carrie Fisher, Max von Sydow

For the holiday movie selection for the fine Turkey-bird season, here’s a classic from Woody Allen (which I had no idea was framed around Thanksgiving): Hannah and Her Sisters.

[Interspersed with inter titles that remind me of an episode of Frasier,?] Hannah and Her Sisters follows a very dramatic family across several years, beginning with the big Thanksgiving dinner.  An interior monologue from Elliot (Caine) tells us that he’s in love with his wife, Hannah’s (Farrow), sister Lee (Hershey).  However, he’s never had the courage to tell her, and instead follows her around and produces awkward conversations.  In the kitchen, Holly (Wiest) is asking for money from Hannah again, hoping to hold up a catering service while pursuing an acting career.

The driving plot comes from Hannah and her sisters’ relationships and careers, another story follows Mickey (Allen), Hannah’s ex-husband and hypochondriac, who gives up his job in television after a possible cancer scare.  He explores different religions and remembers his past with Hannah’s family, from turning to artificial insemination after finding out he’s infertile to a disastrous date with Holly after the divorce.

Mickey’s place in the story isn’t apparent until the very end, but his vignettes and flashbacks allow for a bit of dramedy-relief from the sisters’ stories.  Elliot eventually tells Lee he loves her and they begin an affair, often switching between the guilt at what they’re doing to Hannah as much as the satisfaction they both receive by being with each other.  Holly and her friend April (Fisher) meet David (Sam Waterston), a rich architect, at one of their catering jobs, which perpetuates their acting-rivalry with a love triangle.  Hannah, meanwhile, seems almost out of step in the story: She is a successful actress who takes care of her children, her parents, and her sisters.  The drama that emanates from her life seems to be everything she doesn’t know.

The story is well-balanced between the various plots and each sister has a neurotic moment where they question their place in the family or in the shared-family business of dramatic arts.  Where Hannah is talented, Holly is not; where Holly is focused, Lee is aimless.  By the time the final Thanksgiving scene rolls around, everyone’s situations have changed, whether it’s apparent or not.  A very taut, well-defined drama with an amazing cast.