HART'S War may not resemble the action adventure flick promised by MGM's dishonest marketing campaign - but for the first third of its two hours, it is a riveting, beautifully shot drama that promises a refreshing, authentic modern take on WWII POW stories like "Stalag 17."
It's a promise betrayed. "Hart's War" quickly morphs into a messy double message movie with motifs and clichés lifted from military courtroom films like "A Soldier's Story" and "A Few Good Men."
Colin Farrell plays Lt. Tommy Hart, an Ivy League law student who rose to the rank of officer's aide in World War II thanks to his senator father. He becomes a German prisoner of war, ans after a brutal interrogation, he finds himself at a POW camp where Col. McNamara is the senior U.S. officer.
McNamara suspects that Hart gave the enemy key information and expresses his disapproval by sending him to bunk with the enlisted men. When two black officers from the famous Tuskegee-trained 332nd Fighter Group (nicknamed the "Spookwaffe") arrive at the camp, McNamara sends them to the same hut.
Led by bigoted Sgt. Bedford (Cole Hauser), who is also the camp's source of goodies like cigarettes and boots, the men not only refuse to treat the black pilots with the respect due to officers, they actively abuse them. When Bedford is found murdered, one of the black officers, Lt. Scott (Terrence Howard) is assumed to be the culprit.
McNamara persuades the crafty German Commandant, Col. Visser (Marcel Iures) - a civilized, cultivated man when he isn't hanging Russian "subhumans" - to allow the POWs to try Scott, and orders Hart, a former law student, to take the defense.
The ensuing military tribunal provides the film with an attractive implosive structure. But the absurd twists and turns grow so convoluted that World War II practically disappears as a backdrop. Nazis SS officer Wilhelm Visser in particular, is more likable than most of the American prisoners of war.
"Hart's War" is about many things - class, racism, courage and nobility among them - but it weakens any points it might have made by not providing the necessary character motivation for those that embody them. Scott gives a moving speech about the plight of black officers to an audience that clearly has it in for him, yet is pegged to make a self-sacrificing gesture for that same group. The Colonel is shamed into a courageous act. Hart himself is established early on as a coward and liar. Oddly, the only character that intrigues and gains any sympathy is the cultured SS Major. But eventually, every idea in this film is flushed down the latrine of heroism.
John Q. Archibald (Academy Award-winner Denzel Washington) is an ordinary man who works at a factory and takes care of his family. His wife Denise (Kimberly Elise) and young son Michael (Daniel E. Smith) are his world. But when Michael falls seriously ill and needs an emergency heart transplant operation that John Q. can't afford and his health insurance won't cover, he vows to do whatever it will take to keep his son alive.
The hospital, which is run by Heche as a hard-nosed administrator and includes Woods as a doctor on the money hussle, wants the kid kicked out if the parents can't cough up the dough. With time and options running out, a desperate gamble becomes his only hope -- he takes the emergency room hostage. Duvall and Liotta show up as the senior cops on the case, Duvall as the cool negotiator, Liotta as the preening hotshot. The media swarms the place and makes asses of themselves, the usual stupid cliched depiction of reporters by Hollywood. Even the citizens behind the barricades, cheering John Q. on, so reminicent of Dog Day Afternoon that I was waiting for the cries of "Attica !! Attica !!".
This film tries to play us for chumps every bit as much as HMOs do, going for easy indignant cheers, easy righteous solutions and easy Hollywood feel-good fuzzies. Myself, I want to be told a story and sold on its emotional veracity, but I want it to be done honestly. Don't slap me in the face to make me angry, don't rub onions in my eyes to make me cry and don't insult my intelligence by reducing the complexities of human sentiment to Pavlovian button pushing.
Washington and Elise in particular seem perfectly suited to their roles as a struggling, small-town working class couple who are shocked to discover that their young son has a heart condition. Both deliver sound performances, adn are really the only two characters that aren't as shallow as a comic book character. Ann Heche, James Woods and Ray Liota all play charicature stereotypical bureauocrats. Someone called central casting and asked for 3 people that everyone would hate. There was next to nothing in character development in the lot of them.
In the Bedroom takes place in a small Maine community called Camden. Here, it's not all that uncommon to see chipped wooden houses on every other corner or sleepy-eyed churches that feature old rusty bells hanging in the steeple. The aura of small-town life is apparent and could pass for a Norman Rockwell painting. Among this quaint town's residents are a prototypical middle-aged couple named Matt and Ruth Fowler (Tom Wilkinson and Sissy Spacek). Matt is a distinguished physician and native Mainer. New Yorker Ruth is a high school choral music teacher who enjoys her occupation. The Fowlers have one child named Frank (Nick Stahl), a college graduate student studying architecture, who has returned home for the summer while working as a lobsterman to earn some extra money.
But Frank is tempted to stick around, blowing off his privileged Ivy League education, mainly due to his love affair with an older woman, thirtysomething Natalie Strout (Marisa Tomei). Frank's parents aren't too thrilled about his involvement with Natalie, particularly since her working-class roots are somewhat uncouth for their taste. Besides, things are rather complicated with Natalie's estranged ex-husband Richard (William Mapother). With all the turmoil, Field's characterss tumble toward tragic circumstances that will shake their existences. Part weepy love story, part thriller, the deliberately paced action is infused with predictable psychological insights and spiky dialogue. Director Todd Field reveals an eye for perceptively odd imagery from everyday situations - a mother struggling with her baby at sports day, stunned mannequins in a shop window, a niggling cut finger - which add to the overriding taughtness of tone. The ominous chords in the soundtrack, set the tone of this contemporary tragedy, which hooks carries you throughto the end. Much of the power of this character-based story comes from the outstanding performances, particularly from Tom Wilkinson and Sissy Spacek, as the WASPish husband and wife. The performances are astounding and the players click with a noteworthy potency. Both Wilkinson and Spacek are engrossing as a mature couple going through the motions of a distant, straining marriage. Wilkinson's Matt is a man saturated with inner conflict while he nonchalantly tries to defeat the demons inside. Spacek's Ruth is a complex tortured soul whose inner turmoil fascinates as we watch it methodically unravel in a quiet explosion. As the soul-searching rogue Frank, Stahl brings some much-needed vibrancy to a role that could have easily been dismissed as inconsequential. And Tomei is also effective as the bouncy, married New England sassy-talking gal who is both desirable and directionless. She is radiant as the forbidden fruit that Frank finds so captivating and inescapable.
In the Bedroom is based on the short story "Killings" by Andre Dubus. The script (by Field and co-writer Robert Festinger) has an unassuming, hypnotic momentum that carries the storyline along in a clumsy fashion. The characters are as intriguingly handled as the unspeakable criminal act that takes place in the movie. Field knows how to incorporate the smallest details that invoke the seeds of a tragedy. The pacing is slow sometimes dreadfully so, but it makes for an enticing drama.
This isn't a bad movie by any means, but after all the hype over this (how did it get a "best picture" nomination??) film, I was severely disappointed. I expected so much more.
In I Am Sam, Penn - an actor I admire - puts on one of the most shameless displays of Oscar lust in recent memory. He plays Sam Dawson, a nice guy with the mental and emotional capacity of a 7-year-old. Sam has generally done pretty well for himself. He works at Starbucks, where he obsessively-compulsively lines up the sugar, Equal and Sweet’N Low. He lives on his own. He has a loyal circle of friends.
One thing Sam isn’t is sexually challenged. A one-night stand results in a baby girl whose mom cuts out as soon as the umbilical cord is cut. An avid Beatles fan, Sam names his daughter Lucy (as in "in the sky with diamonds") and raises her himself. He apparently does a good job. At 7, Lucy (Dakota Fanning, eerily good) is bright, funny, confident, caring. Then government bureaucracy strikes and the court wants Lucy to live in Laura Dern’s foster home. Sam and Lucy would rather she not. So, with the help of Rita--an initially reluctant lawyer (Michelle Pfeiffer), Sam decides to fight for his daughter.
The latest in a long line of talented actors playing retarded, developmentally/emotionally handicapped people, Sean Penn brings to mind Dustin Hoffman in Rain Man, Juliette Lewis in The Other Sister, Edward Norton in The Score, Brad Pitt in Seven Monkeys, Leonardo DiCaprio in What's Eating Gilbert Grape and even Russell Crowe in A Beautiful Mind.
While it is understandable that actors desire an opportunity to show their range, the reality of it is that it is easy for very good actors to do this heart-tugging handicapped shtick. This film though is so emotionally dishonest that it makes Rain Man look like a documentary. Penn delivers a credible performance, though I think Hoffman and DiCaprio's performances were better. Dakota Fanning makes this film worth watching... a fresh face and remarkable ability to speak intelligently and actually act makes her a best bet for an Oscar in the not too distant future. Michelle Pfeifer delivers her usual high quality performance as the workaholic lawyer.
Itnent on using the 'Retarded Guy' to show us the error of our ways. Sure, he's retarded, but at least he's devoted to his daughter -- which is more than you can say for the endless parade of contrasting examples the movie sets up for us. (One guy keeps correcting his son during a classroom presentation, a divorcing couple argues over which partner should be stuck with the kid, Rita herself doesn't spend enough time with her son -- and so on.)
I am Sam is manipulative, contrived and shamelessly sentimental and totally without surprise. I wish that Hollywood would quit cranking out pithy attempts to toy with our emotions, and deliver movies that call for character development, plot lines that have twists, and acting that is more acting than impressions of handicapped people. Mickey Rooney started this handicapped mess with Bill in 1981, and it should have ended there.
For an actress such as Nicole Kidman, who has had such a splendidly successful year with movies (2001's "Moulin Rouge" and "The Others"), Birthday Girl could not have come at a more inopportune time. Indeed, her cinematic roll has come to a screeching halt. Kidman is in her usual fine form, but her strong performance is at the service of an unfortunate cinematic misfire. Not surprisingly, "Birthday Girl" has been on the shelf since 1999, and is only now being released due to her recent popularity. Kidman is probably wishing that it were left on the shelf.
Nicole Kidman as Nadia, a Russian mail-order bride selected by a meek British bank clerk named John (Ben Chaplin) over the Internet, Kidman is nearly wordless for a good half-hour of the film (she doesn't speak English, much to her new fiance's chagrin). This provides the best comedic parts of the movie, with John attempting to send her back until she decides to act out his sexual fantasies -- courtesy of studying his hidden porn stash -- in a desperate attempt to stay (it works).
French actors Cassel ("Brotherhood of the Wolf") and Kassovitz ("Amelie") Birthday Girl is a romantic-comedy-crime-story-thriller, but the romance is weak and ineffective, the comedy falls flat 90% of the time, the thrills are less than thrilling and the crime is decidedly predictable and daft. An incredibly unsatisfying, trifling film that will be quickly forgotten.
lantana (lan-´tä-na) n. a genus of tropical shrub with small, colorful blooms that hides a dense, thorny undergrowth.
The lantana bush, on its surface, is a lovely plant, filled with exotic flowers. Beneath this beauty, however, hides a thick, thorny growth. The lantana serves as a central symbol in Ray Lawrence's new film, an ominous, beguiling psychological drama that is a labyrinth of love, sex and deceit.
In Lantana, police detective Leon Zat (Anthony LaPaglia), consumed with guilt about cheating on his wife, becomes embroiled in a missing persons investigation. Lawrence (best known for BLISS) and writer Andrew Bovell (who adapted the screenplay from his own play) use the crime-story format to study four sets of married couples. These couples' secrets and lies crisscross Leon's investigation and illuminate the personal crisis he must resolve.
The film stars Anthony LaPaglia, Academy Award-winner Geoffrey Rush (Shine), and Oscar-nominated actress Barbara Hershey (The Portrait of a Lady). Adapted by Andrew Bovell, from his stage play Speaking in Tongues.
This Austrailian film surely rates high in the Australian community having won the following awards:
Winner of 5 2001 Australian Independent Film Awards:
Best Picture
Best Actor (Anthony LaPaglia)
Best Actress (Kerry Armstrong)
Best Director
Best Screenplay
One of my favorite film formats is the multiple story lines that seem unconnected until near the end where the connections and relationships become clear. Lantana could have ranked with Two Days in the Valley, Pulp Fiction and Nashville, and Short Cuts, but lacks the film making mastery that gives those films their lasting qualities. Employing a similar approach,to the multiple story line films, Lantana examines how the lives of various characters converge, and intersect over the course of a short period of time.
For the briefest of moments, someone not paying attention might mistake Lantana for a mystery. After all, there is a body, a missing person, indications of foul play, and several police detectives. But don't be fooled -- it's not really a murder mystery at all... while the title sounds like some kind of new Latin dance, Lantana is actually an examination of human interaction.
To give the film some credit, it does a decent job portraying masculine anxiety in reacting to a situation too much like a stereotypical woman would. The real problem is that during sympathetic moments, emotive speeches seem forced on most all of the players. While the acting is basically impeccable, the conversations are unreal and difficult to accept, even at their most dramatic climaxes. It doesn't help that, when these men are trying to talk to one another, there is repetitive whining about how men aren't suppose to cry or show emotion.
Still, what keeps things interesting is that every person involved is heavily flawed. They lie and cheat and find it difficult to learn from their mistakes. There's always hope, in a new scene filled with tension, that some kind of new barrier will be breached, that some catharsis will come through. The plot is hazy enough, as are its characters, that any twist or change is unpredictable. Watching the little details that come from the characters' interactions on each other rings true enough.
What also works are the dysfunctional marriage scenes between husbands and wives, with a lot of communication via looks and stares rather than accusatory speeches.
Definitely an enjoyable movie even though it lacks some depth that would have driven it to the top internationally as well as in Australia.
The difference between a "true story" and a story "based on true events" is like the difference between "juice" and a "juice-flavored drink." The Mothman Prophecies proudly boasts that it is based on true events. This much really happened: Back in 1966-67, many residents of the tiny Ohio River town of Point Pleasant, W.Va., reported seeing a mysterious creature dubbed the Mothman. According to several accounts, the black-winged beast took humanoid form, stood about 7 feet tall and had glowing red eyes.
John Keel, a self-styled investigator of paranormal phenomena, drove from his New York home to look into those reports. Before long, strange stuff started happening to Keel as well, and his book -- the one from which this movie was adapted -- documents those bizarre occurrences and connects them with UFO sightings and the arrival of creepy men in black.
THis film had the feeling of an X-Files episode starring Richard Gere as Fox Mulder and Laura Linney as Dana Scully. Unfortunatley, it was too trite, forced and full of tired stock devices such as the eccentric expert in the paranormal, to come anywhere close to being enjoyable. What could have been a tight, kicky thriller gets lost in a weepy tale of a widowed husband trying to come to grips with his wife's death.
In the hands of M. Night Shyamalan (The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable), a subtle filmmaker who weds supernatural elements to a keen understanding of psychology, this might've been interesting. David Lynch (Mulholland Drive, Twin Peaks) also could've had fun with the odd characters and unexplained occurrences of this small town.
But what we are left with isn't worth the 2 hours it takes to get through the popcorn bucket. Stay home and rent a movie.... you'll be glad you did!
Amelie is looking for love, and perhaps for the meaning of life in general. We see her grow up in an original if slightly dysfunctional family. Now a waitress in central Paris, she interacts curiously with her neighbors and customers. Little by little, Amelie realizes that her path to happiness requires here to take her own initiative and reach out to others.
Little Amelie Poulain (Flora Guiet) had anything but a normal life. Misdiagnosed, by her father, Rufus (Raphaël Poulain), with an unusual heart defect, she was educated by her mother at home and spent much of her childhood alone, developing a vivid imagination. Now, adult Amelie (Audrey Tautou) is healthy, quite pretty and works in a small cafe. When Princess Diana is killed in the fateful car crash in 1997, Amelie finds an old metal box stuff with a child's memorabilia hidden in her bathroom wall, she decides to try to find the owner, thinking that, if she is successful, it is a sign that she should make it her job to bring happiness to those around her.
Through her detective work, she finally locates the box's owner and secretly watches him emotionally go through his old treasure, changing the lonely man's life. This prompts her to bring together one of her coworkers, hypochondriac Georgette (Isabelle Nanty), and an ill-tempered customer, Joseph (Dominique Pinon). She then sets her sights on an old, shut-in neighbor, Dufayel (Serge Martin), through the miracle of video, shows him a world of wonder outside the confines of his home. She also becomes smitten with a lonely young man, Nino (Mathieu Kassovitz), who works in an adult video store and moonlights as a funhouse spook. He also collects discarded pictures left at photo booths around Paris, creating an imaginative portfolio with his finds.
When the local grocer (Urbain Cancelier) picks on his simple, but kind, assistant Lucien (James Debouzze), Amelie begins a campaign to drive the cruel man crazy and make Lucien finally like his job. She also helps her building concierge resolve a longtime remorse over a husband who left decades before. The rest of the numerous cast members all lend their efforts to create a wide variety of folks populating Amelie's world.
Ameli is a fabulusly whimsical and quirky yet clever little film with originality and style galore as pretty Amelie works hard to make positive changes in the lives of those around her. With a variety of gimmicks that are sometimes ridiculous and sometimes sublime, but always entertaining.
Nearly everyone in the theatre was laughing at one point or another during this wonderful movie, some of us were laughing a lot, and I for one was howling at several points. This movie is a 'feel good' movie that really delivers. Do NOT miss this one!
