853. The Crying Game (1992)

Running Time: 112 minutes
Directed By: Neil Jordan
Written By: Neil Jordan
Main Cast: Stephen Rea, Miranda Richardson, Forest Whitaker, Jaye Davidson, Adrian Dunbar
Click here to view the trailer

"IT'S IN MY NATURE"

Because my wife and I were both off from work today, because she felt like watching one more movie with me and because she didn't want to watch any of the ones I previously had scheduled, I let her pick just one more replacement from the DVD shelf. This time around she chose "The Crying Game", a movie that she bought and that I'd never seen.

The film begins at a carnival where black British soldier Jody (Whitaker) has picked up a girl, Jude (Richardson) and is trying to show her a good time, before trying even harder to get her into bed. However, as it turns out, the girl was just a decoy and a member of the IRA (Irish Republican Army) and along with her cronies - Fergus (Rea) and Maguire (Dunbar) - they kidnap Jody and try to use him as leverage to get other members of the IRA out of custody. From there they hole up in a desolate area, where they keep Jody tied to a chair with a cloth sack over his head. After a while, Jody and Fergus strike up conversation and actually become quite chummy, despite the promise that if their comrades are not released in three days, Jody will be shot. Knowing that he'll die no matter what, Jody asks Fergus to take his wallet and look up his girlfriend, Dil (Davidson). Jody wants Dil to know that at the end of his life, he was thinking about her. When the three days are up and the deed is set to be done, Fergus takes Jody out into the woods and knowing that Fergus won't shoot him in the back, Jody takes off running. Fergus pleads with him to stop, but when Jody makes it to the road he is run over by a military truck. Following that, the house where Jody was being kept is raided and everyone except Fergus is seemingly killed. Now, Fergus intends to keep his promise, heading to London to find Dil. He finds her quickly enough and the two strike up a romance of their own, but their relationship is saturated in secrets...from both sides.

SPOILER ALERT!

Don't really have a whole lot to say about this one, so I'll probably be keeping it short, sweet and to the point. I liked the movie for sure, but am not sure how it will fair on the upcoming TOP 20 list. It may be a case of too little, too late or even a case of following something stellar ("Blue Velvet") and not being able to come close to it's greatness. The film was like two movie split in two, with the first one being the relationship that buds between Fergus and Jody and the second being the relationship between Fergus and Dil. If I had my way, the Fergus/Jody stuff would've been lengthened by about twenty or so minutes, just to add another layer of icing to the cake. I would applaud that Jordan was able to establish and cement that relationship so quickly though and make everything that follows believable. I guess it's just that I was enjoying Forest Whitaker and thought he may have gotten knocked off a bit too quickly.

From Jody's death we get into the Fergus/Dil stuff and it was fine, but I did have a few gripes. Let me first say that I knew beforehand that Dil was going to be exposed as a man, so that was something that was already spoiled for me. However, it didn't effect my enjoyment of the picture, because I looked more forward to the inevitable scene where Fergus told Dil all about what happened to Jody and expected a really emotional, heart wrenching scene. Instead, it sort of pops out of nowhere when it does finally happen and it's during a part in the film where the character of Dil is all hopped up on pills, so the emotional reaction is nil. I was really disappointed by all of this, as it seemed to be what we were building to and it never really paid off. I also didn't like the return of Jude and Maguire. I felt the picture would have benefited more if we'd have just kept exploring the relationship between Dil and Fergus, Fergus trying to figure out his own sexual preference and how he was going to break it to Dil that he knew Jody and was partly responsible for his death. Anyway, those are significant gripes, but I liked the picture for the most part. It was engaging, the acting was superb (British film - what do you expect) and there were enough little moments that made the picture worth seeing. Thumbs up, but if I'd had it my way, things would've played out a little differently.

RATING: 7/10  Not bad in the least, just not how I pictured it turning out. It's a good film, but like I said, I think it will be too little, too late as it pertains to "The Crying Game" and the TOP 20 list.

MOVIES WATCHED: 698
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 303

June 3, 2013  4:23pm

607. CARRIE (1976)

Running Time: 98 minutes
Directed By: Brian De Palma
Written By: Lawrence D. Cohen, from the novel by Stephen King
Main Cast: Sissy Spacek, Piper Laurie, Amy Irving, William Katt, John Travolta
Click here to view the trailer

DON'T PISS OFF CARRIE!

My wife's second choice to replace the two movies from the 40s that I couldn't get a hold of, is "Carrie" - the 1976 feature directed by Brian De Palma and adapted from a Stephen King novel. This one also came off of our DVD collection and despite the fact that I bought it, I'd have to say I wasn't crazy about it this time around.

The film starts at a typical, American high school, just after a girls gym class, as the young ladies are in their locker room, showering and changing. Carrie White (Spacek) loses herself under the warm water of a shower head and as she lathers her body, she begins to have her period. You see, apparently this is Carrie's first period and having no prior knowledge that her body would begin to do this, she freaks out and thinks she's dying.  Of course, the other students laugh and throw tampons at her, urging her to "plug it up". Carrie is embarrassed to death and is only saved when the gym teacher comes to her aid. Later, we learn that Carrie's home life is a little bit odd, as her mother is a hardcore religious enthusiast, who now believes that Carrie has committed sin by beginning menstruation. Her mother, Margaret (Laurie) locks her in the closet and forces her to pray, in hopes that God will forgive her for becoming a woman. Back at school, the girls who were involved in the tampon throwing incident are being heavily punished by gym teacher, Miss Collins (Betty Buckley). They're sentenced to a week's worth of detention, with her and if they don't appear, they'll be refused tickets to their senior prom. Meanwhile, Sue Snell (Irving) one of the girls involved in the locker room incident, is starting to feel guilt for her role in the event and decides to sacrifice her date, Tommy Ross (Katt), so that Carrie can go to the prom with him and experience what it's like to be accepted at high school. Oh and Carrie is discovering something else about her body; that she has the power to move things with her mind. What will happen when Tommy escorts Carrie to the prom?

SPOILER ALERT!!

You aren't going to hear me say this often, if ever again, so listen carefully: I don't like "Carrie" because I've read the novel and am of the opinion that it is better than the film.

Whew! That was hard. I'm not much of a reader, but years ago, mainly because my brother was such a big fan of Stephen King and I wanted to see what all the hubbub was about, I picked up a copy of Carrie and read it. I had already seen the movie at that point, but was still surprised to learn that there were many differences between the film and the novel. One of the main differences and one of the reasons I just can't like this movie, is the ending, which sees Carrie White not only burn down her high school, but proceed to leave the high school, walk through town and basically burn the entire town to the ground - houses, businesses, everything. Sure, I completely understand that the year was 1976 and to undertake such a feat as to burn down an entire town on film would've cost a lot more money than this production probably had, but dammit, the heart wants what the heart wants! In 2002, they remade "Carrie" for the first time, as a television movie and at least they included a shot of a town being burned to the ground, but that was about the end of it. This fall, Hollywood will take another crack at "Carrie", when a new version comes out around Halloween. While I'm sure this new version will be shoddy at best, here's hoping they go balls to the wall and produce a more faithful adaptation.

But, it wasn't just the fact that the film wasn't as good as the book, as I had other gripes too. The ending just seems to stretch on forever and ever, as De Palma uses a slow motion effect and makes the spilled pigs blood feel like spilled molasses. That score got really old, really quick too and it just kept playing and playing and wouldn't quit. It's just not a very eventful film, as De Palma takes too much time establishing everything and not enough time focusing on what makes the book great. Piper Laurie was amazing as Margaret White, but the rest of the cast was filled out with amateur teenagers/twenty-somethings that just couldn't cut the mustard when it came time to bring the acting muscle. The film had some good to it and it had that gritty, 70s horror movie feel and in that case you want those non-experienced actors, because that goes along way in making it more fun. My wife and I had a blast making fun of the actors, their expressions and their silly wardrobes. However, "Carrie" shouldn't JUST BE your typical horror fest, because it's based on a King novel and King puts a lot more effort into his work than that and deserves a higher class of film.

RATING: 5.5/10  I was gonna' go '6', but I really don't think it's even that good. I wanted to like it, but ultimately it's flaws were too prevalent and I couldn't get past that.

MOVIES WATCHED: 697
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 304

June 3, 2013  11:13am

739. Blue Velvet (1986)

Running Time: 120 minutes
Directed By: David Lynch
Written By: David Lynch
Main Cast: Kyle MacLachlan, Isabella Rossellini, Dennis Hopper, Laura Dern, Hope Lange
Click here to view the trailer

TROUBLE UNTIL THE ROBINS COME

Since my wife and I were both off tomorrow and needed a couple of movies to watch, I decided to let her do the honors in picking the two movies that would replace "The Ghost and Mrs. Muir" and "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre". All she really had to work with was our DVD collection, so (with a little urging from yours truly) her first selection was "Blue Velvet".

Jeffrey Beaumont (MacLachlan) is home from school because his father has just been placed in the hospital, after suffering a severe stroke. One day, while walking home from visiting his father at the hospital, Jeffrey crosses a field and happens upon a human ear lying in the grass. He takes the ear directly to the police station and an investigation is opened. Jeffrey, perhaps driven by boredom and the fact that nothing ever happens in his crummy, little hometown of Lumberton, goes to visit the police detective that night, Detective Williams, who is also a neighbor. Det. Williams tells him that he'll have to stop asking questions about the case, but promises that once everything blows over, he'll tell him all about it. While walking home, he runs into Sandy Williams (Dern), the detective's daughter, who walks with him and tells him tidbits of the case she heard, since her bedroom is right above her father's office. She recalls hearing the name Dorothy Vallens (Rossellini) over and over and knows that she lives in an apartment building, not far from their street.  Jeffrey is fully intrigued by the prospect of murder happening right in the middle of Lumberton and can't stay away from the case. Jeffrey schemes to break into Dorothy's apartment and find out more about the ear and what's really going on with Dorothy Vallens. He pulls Sandy in with him and what Jeffrey ultimately finds out is that Dorothy's husband and son have been kidnapped and are being held by psychopath Frank Booth (Hopper). Frank is holding Dorothy's family hostage so that, in turn for keeping them alive, she'll do sexual favors for him.

In dreams, I walk with you. In dreams, I talk to you. In dreams, you're mine, all the time. Forever.

I first encountered David Lynch in 2005. I was working at a Movie Gallery and a friend & co-worker couldn't stop talking about a movie he'd been renting everyday, for the past week. We got free rentals at this particular video store and every night, I'd notice this co-worker return and re-rent the same film, over and over again. One night, we got to talking about it and it turned out that the film was called "Mulholland Dr." and was directed by somebody named David Lynch. I'd seen "Blue Velvet" before, but nothing else of this David Lynch's and since I liked "Blue Velvet", decided that I'd give this "Mulholland" movie a try...when he was finished with it. It turned out that the reason he kept renting it, over and over again, was because he couldn't figure it out. Apparently every night he'd watch it, try to crack the code that was "Mulholland Dr." and fail. Even back then I considered myself a fairly smart guy when it came to films, so I was sure that I'd rent it, figure it out in one sitting and be proud as punch when I returned to work the next day to shed some light on my friend's ongoing investigation. Except, it wasn't quite that easy and Lynch had stumped even me. It wasn't so much the unsolvable qualities of "Mulholland Dr." though that got me going, but rather the dreamlike atmosphere, the characters that had both human and inhuman qualities and the pure weirdness. Anyway, I decided then that I was going to become a HUGE David Lynch fan, watch everything of his that I could get a hold of and probably watch them over and over again, not unlike my friend and his obsession with "Mulholland". However, a few years later, after I got married, I revisited some of Lynch's filmography and decided that maybe I went a little too gaga for this guy and that really, he only had two masterpieces: "Mulholland Dr." and "Blue Velvet", with the latter being the most mentally accessible.

What's not to like about "Blue Velvet" really? Oh sure, there's a TON of cursing, some nudity and a bunch of sexual content & dialogue, but if you're a big boy or girl, you can handle and what you'll get in return is an amazing time at the movies. "Blue Velvet" works on so many levels, whether you're the type of movie goer that likes to dig a little deeper or whether you're the type that just likes to sit back and enjoy the ride - "Blue Velvet" will accommodate all tastes. Isn't it funny how sometimes the scariest films are the ones that you wouldn't necessarily classify as horror films? I'd consider "Blue Velvet" to be ONE OF the freakiest movies I've ever seen and it's because we're dealing with real people here. I have no doubt that there are people walking the streets right now, somewhere in the country I live in, somewhere in the state I live in, perhaps somewhere on the street I live on, that are just as psychotic as Frank, if not worse. To me, one of the things this film represented was the birth of evil. When we open, we zoom in on Anytown, USA. A fireman waves hello from his truck, roses outside of a white picket fence are highlighted and a man waters his lawn. It all has a very "Leave It to Beaver"-esque quality and while we're never told when the film takes place, I'd assume it takes place in the 50s or so.

Now then, when you hear the word "evil", you probably don't think of the suburbs circa 1950, where Peggy Sue, the homecoming queen and Bobby, the football quarterback could go down to the candy store and get a couple of sodas, all the while flipping through the jukebox to find their favorite tune, presumably something they heard on 'Bandstand'. No, you probably don't think of that when you hear the word "evil". In fact, what you probably think of is something current, perhaps something you saw on the news or perhaps you think of something artificial, like green pea soup spewing out of the mouth of Linda Blair. Maybe you even think of something biblical, but certainly there was a time when the general consensus says evil didn't exist in our country and kids could walk home from school freely without being nabbed and the worse thing to happen on a Friday night was maybe a car race between the Sharks and the Jets. So to me, this film smashes that misconception and says, "Yes, evil has always existed and even in the most unlikeliest of places; on Main Street in Anytown, USA, with a very neat girl and a very neat guy.

The whole film feels unreal and sometimes the line between reality and dream are a little blurred, as Jeffrey falls further and further down the rabbit hole and is constantly pulled between the world of the good (Sandy)and the world of the evil (Dorothy and Frank). The film incorporates elements of voyeurism, film noir and sadomasochistic behaviors. I'd even go so far as to call Frank Booth ONE OF the greatest and scariest movie villains of all-time, right up there with Hitchcock's most evil characters. Dennis Hopper, that once young kid who played opposite James Dean in "Giant" and "Rebel Without a Cause", shatters every preexisting thought you ever had about him and gives you a new persona to remember. Don't forget to keep your eyes peeled for Dean Stockwell and his Roy Orbison lip-synch. Every scene is carefully constructed and essential to moving the story. Lynch had been on the scene since 1977, but didn't really cement his name until 1986 and the release of "Blue Velvet".

RATING: 9/10  I can't go all the way because there were a few flaws (too few to mention), but it's still a damn good movie and proof that whether you love him or hate him, David Lynch knows how to make an outstanding film.

MOVIES WATCHED: 696
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 305

June 3, 2013  1:37am

202. Letter from an Unknown Woman (1948)

Running Time: 86 minutes
Directed By: Max Ophuls
Written By: Howard Koch, Stefan Zweig, from the novel Brief einer Unbekannten by Stefan Zweig
Main Cast: Joan Fontaine, Louis Jourdan, Mady Christians, Art Smith, Howard Freeman
Click here to view the trailer

"BY THE TIME YOU READ THIS LETTER, I MAY BE DEAD..."

After "Letter from an Unknown Woman" there are only three films left for me to watch that come from the decade of the 1940s. To be honest, the 40s really haven't been too kind to me, nor I to them. As I write this, only ten movies from THE BOOK, from the 40s, have been granted an appearance on my TOP 20 lists and I don't have high hopes for this one either.

The film is told almost entirely in flashback. The film opens with Stefan Brand (Jourdan), a concert pianist, arriving home at night and finding a piece of mail. The mail (that is the letter from the title) is from Lisa Berndle (Fontaine) and we slip into our flashback. We head back to when Lisa was a teenager, in Vienna, living in a closely set group of apartment houses and remembering back to one day when a moving van showed up outside the residence. It was Stefan and he was moving into one of the vacant apartments. Lisa recalls being infatuated with him, despite not even seeing him for the longest time. She'd hear his music from the courtyard and happily daydream about the man behind the melodic tones. One day, as he's exiting the building, she holds the door open for him and is put into a dream world when he smiles back at her and thanks her. Time goes on and Lisa recalls her mother remarrying and having to move away from the building and resisting the idea passionately. The new family moves to Linz and Lisa eventually settles in and swallows the pill she's been served. Fast forward years later and Lisa is back in Vienna, working at a dress shop. Through a series of events, she and Stefan meet and he's infatuated with her. He courts her for the evening, as the two have dinner, visit an amusement park (in the winter) and ride on a novelty train. They (in not so many words) pledge their love to one another, but the following day, Stefan announces that he must go away for a concert. While he's away, Lisa learns of her pregnancy (by Stefan) and wanting to be the one woman who never asks him for anything, she doesn't bother telling him about it. Years later Lisa is married to a wealthy man and raising her son, but does she ever see Stefan again?

Honestly, I think I have to blame myself for not liking this one, as I just wasn't in the mood for this sort of thing last night. I was never going to love "Letter from an Unknown Woman", but I think under different circumstances, I would've liked it a bit better. In fact, I was totally taken by surprise by this movie, because going into it I had absolutely no clue what it was even about, so maybe that worked against it too. Judging by the title, the film sounded like a murder mystery and the word "unknown" alone got my mind to thinking that this film must be filled with intrigue. As it turns out, it was just a melodramatic love story about a girl who gets a crush on a semi-celebrity and kind of goes a little crazy. I mean, Lisa turns the stalker dial all the way up to '11' and somehow we're still supposed to be rooting for her, hoping to God she gets the guy. Look, if Lisa had existed in the real world, we'd be wrapping her firmly in a straightjacket and ushering her directly into her personalized padded cell. But this is Hollywood in the golden ages folks, where stalkers were considered romantics and Humphrey Bogart was ALWAYS...ALWAYS a bad ass.

Am I reading far too much into this or is it possible that Lisa made up the entire letter? I mean, what are the odds that this world traveled pianist is going to give this girl the time of day, let alone fall in love with her? If you think about it, we never get a confirmation from Stefan that this letter and the contents are genuine. Sure, he looks a little rattled at the end, but hearing from a stalker can rattle a guy...I'd think. I'd really like to think that Lisa was indeed mad and that everything contained within the letter is utter make believe on her part. Even the whole part about him not remembering her, when they hook up again, years later is just too hard to believe and sounds like something a man hating female might be disillusioned over. I'm probably totally off track and I guess what I'm trying to say is that romance like this just doesn't exist outside of the world of an overly melodramatic movie. Call me a skeptic, but it's true. The performances were fine and had I seen him in something a little more my style, I would've absolutely loved Louis Jourdan. He oozed that classic Hollywood star look and backed it all up onscreen. Fontaine was kind of *meh*, playing it a little too cool and quiet and I'll take "Rebecca" any day over this. All in all, it was an utterly average night at the movies and maybe someday, when I'm feeling extra sentimental and overly romantic, I'll give this one another go around.

RATING: 5/10  Another incredibly mediocre film and now I really need things to pick up to send this season off the same way it started...with a BANG!

MOVIES WATCHED: 695
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 306

June 2, 2013  8:02pm

204. Force of Evil (1948)

Running Time: 82 minutes
Directed By: Abraham Polonsky
Written By: Abraham Polonsky, Ira Wolfert, from the novel Tucker's People by Ira Wolfert
Main Cast: John Garfield, Beatrice Pearson, Thomas Gomez, Marie Windsor, Howland Chamberlain

IT'S A TOUGH RACKET

Quick update to the final movies I'll be watching for the blog: I was ultimately unable to get a hold of "The Ghost and Mrs. Muir" and "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre", so my hopes of finishing up the 1940s is out the window. No worries though and I shouldn't have any trouble tracking them down when I reactivate my Netflix membership, whenever I come back from my short hiatus. Anyway, last night I took in "Force of Evil", which I still had from Netflix, so let's talk about that, shall we?

"Force of Evil" was directed by Abraham Polonsky and starred John Garfield as Joe Morse. Joe is a big time lawyer, who mainly works off of Wall Street, but we find out right away that Joe isn't just a defender of the law, he's also a breaker of it. The plot revolves around a numbers racket, that's something like the modern day lottery. Every day, in the newspaper, three numbers are posted. The day before, people can lay down bets on what they think the three numbers will be and based on how much they bet, is what they'll win. The numbers are somehow picked based on the random choosing from the track races and it's a big racket, that pulls in a lot of dough. There are places around town that people call banks, and these are the places where you lay your bets and if you win, you go to the bank to collect your earnings. Joe's brother, Leo (Gomez) operates one of the smaller banks. Anyway, Joe and a gangster friend of his are planning to fix the numbers racket so that the number '776' comes in on July 4th. Apparently a lot of people play that particular number on July 4th, due to it's association with the Declaration of Independence and the formation of America. When that number actually hits on July 4th, all of the banks in town are going to go belly up and that's when Joe and gangster Ben Tucker are going to step in and clean-up. Joe tries to warn his brother of the impending catastrophe that will happen at his bank, but Leo plans to run a clean business and doesn't want help from his brother, a known scum. Meanwhile, Joe kindles a romance with Leo's ex-secretary Doris (Pearson).

Yeah, I didn't care for this one that much. I've found that if you're going to give me a heist/racket movie, you need to keep it as simple as possible, focus all of your details into the planning and staging of the heist/racket and certainly don't muck it up with a romance. Take Kubrick's "The Killer" for instance (a movie that was wrongfully excluded from THE BOOK). There's a movie where we don't have to sit through any romance and all we're given is the intricate, gory details of five men and their attempt to knock off a horse track. Simple and awesome. In "Force of Evil", you start out pretty strong, as a voice over narration from Joe informs us that he plans to make his first million bucks on July 4th and then we trace the steps backwards and find out what he's talking about. It starts out pretty interesting - Joe and Ben Tucker plan to somehow rig the numbers racket (which, like I mentioned, just came off as an illegal lottery) and make off with tons of loot. But it got all mucked up with too many unnecessary details, a sibling rivalry, the Joe/Doris stuff and ultimately I honestly couldn't wait for this one to just end. Actually, I had an easier time getting through nearly three hours of "The Thin Red Line", than I did getting through eighty minutes of "Force of Evil". It's not that it was bad or anything, it's just that I think I was expecting a whole lot more and what I got wasn't anything even remotely close to worth writing home about. When you present me with a film noir, my hopes are always going to be a little higher, because they really are my types of movies. I love the mood, the atmosphere and the style, but I also like a certain level of simplicity and that wasn't given to me here. It was just too complicated. Give me "The Big Heat" (cops' family gets killed, he wants revenge), "Detour" (accidental murder) or "The Asphalt Jungle" (group of guys pull of a jewel heist) any 'ol day of the week. They were simple, awesome and so much fun. "Force of Evil"? Not so much.

RATING: 5/10  I'll give it a few notches for the things I mentioned (good style, good mood) and for decent acting & that final scene with Joe descending multiple hills to find his brothers corpse. That was gold, the rest...*meh*.

MOVIES WATCHED: 694
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 307

June 1, 2013  5:17pm

934. The Thin Red Line (1998)

Running Time: 171 minutes
Directed By: Terrence Malick
Written By: Terrence Malick, from novel by James Jones
Main Cast: Jim Caviezel, Nick Nolte, Sean Penn, Elias Koteas, Ben Chaplin
Click here to view the trailer

LIFE AND DEATH, BEAUTY AND UGLINESS

Right now the current goal is to put in a little extra effort and finish up this season on Wednesday. Whether or not I get to that point will have to be seen, but I did knock off the longest picture I have left last night and from here on out, it's basically smooth sailing.

Terrence Malick's first feature film came in 1973, with the release of "Badlands" and his third feature came in 1998 with the release of "The Thin Red Line". In the span of those twenty five years Malick made one other picture; "Days of Heaven", and then disappeared for about twenty years. Apparently during his absence, he was off somewhere in the boondocks pondering the meaning of life, because while "The Thin Red Line" is a war film, it's just as much a philosophical examination of life, nature and spirituality. The film is set during World War II and starts out with an inner monologue by Private Witt (Caviezel), an American soldier who's gone AWOL and has holed himself up on an island, inhabited by natives in the South Pacific. He ponders a bunch of stuff - ideas and dialogue that totally lost me and left me with an "oh my God, this is going to be a long movie" feeling. From there we get some other inner monologues, from different characters - really deep stuff, that usually doesn't come up in basic conversation and just came off as mumbo jumbo to this viewer. Then we get into the real meat of the picture, as C Company is commanded to take control of a hill - a hill that is being heavily guarded by Japanese troops, where they've placed a bunker, barricaded themselves up and have machine gun artillery at their disposal. Any attempt to climb the hill can easily be seen by the Japanese. It's a scene that lasts well over an hour and is really well done, as Malick mixes the ugliness of war, with the beauty of nature: blood streaking across blades of green grass;  dozens of men climbing a hill, while swaying grass envelopes them and the sky, filled with smoke, half orange and half blue.

I guess I sort of delved into my own opinions while writing that plot synopsis didn't I? Oh well. Like I said, the beginning and end is a bunch of crap. Sure, there are some moments tucked away in there and the film has the tendency to sort of drag your ears in, whether you want to hear what's being said or not. But all in all, I can tell you that this film lost me before we even got into the taking of the hill. Once we got there, I had mentally prepared to dislike this movie, but they started to slowly win me back. There's no denying the beauty of the picture. Malick obviously knew what he wanted and worked in conjunction with his director of photography to get the shots that would transform this film from just your typical piece of WWII fodder into something really special. Yes, I'm admitting this film is something special, despite not fully being on board. The photography is gorgeous, the cast is brilliant, the score is moving and the action in the middle is really well done. Had they been able to fill the beginning and end with something more engaging, I'd have been gaga over this movie. It's my own fault, as I guess I'm just not your philosophical type. I don't ponder the meaning of life or the relationship between man and nature. No, I definitely don't do that. I also don't buy that soldiers do that, as a matter of fact. Listen, I don't want to knock any soldiers with this review, but usually these guys are a lot more gruff and gung ho. They're not your life pondering types.

The film was a good war film and one that I could give a moderate seal of approval. I didn't love it or anything, but nor did I hate it. It really made you wonder about war and life, I guess and wonder how many of these little moments were created on the battlefield. How many men drew their last breath, while being held by their brothers in arms? How many men begged their fellow soldier to write home to their wives, knowing that they were done for? How many men died alone, with no one to tell their final secrets to? Maybe it goes a little way in helping me to understand why there are so many war movies, because maybe I'm finally starting to realize how many war stories are out there and yearning to be told.

RATING: 6/10  Can't go any higher than that and I highly doubt (unless I have a severe change of heart) that it'll be making any TOP 20 list.

MOVIES WATCHED: 693
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 308

May 30, 2013  12:19pm

932. There's Something About Mary (1998)

Running Time: 119 minutes
Directed By: Bobby Farrelly, Peter Farrelly
Written By: Ed Decter, John J. Strauss, Peter Farrelly, Bobby Farrelly
Main Cast: Cameron Diaz, Ben Stiller, Matt Dillon, Chris Elliott, Lee Evans
Click here to view the trailer

CRUDENESS + HEART = *MEH*

We're getting down to the wire here ladies and gentlemen and I am officially within ten movies of wrapping up this season, making a new TOP 20 list and having only 300 movies left to go before my journey comes to an end.

The movie starts out in Providence, Rhode Island, circa 1985, as we zoom in on a 16-year-old Ted Stroehmann (Stiller). Ted is far from a ladies teenager, sporting braces and a awkward haircut. It's nearly time for the prom and while Ted gets shot down from one girl, he's surprised when Mary Jensen (Diaz) asks him to the dance. Mary is one of the popular girls at school, but she doesn't act like it, as she's actually nice and when she asks Ted to the dance he's shocked, but obviously accepts. On the night of the prom, however, a mishap that involves him accidentally peering into Mary's bedroom window while she's undressing and him catching his manhood in his pants zipper, sees Ted being loaded into an ambulance and his dream prom date canceled. Fast forward to present day and Ted is a struggling novelist who still thinks about what could have been with Mary, as he realizes he still has feelings for her. His friend Dom (Elliott) urges Ted to hire a private investigator and gives him the number of Pat Healy (Dillon), a sleazeball who offers to go to Miami (where Mary now lives) and track down Mary for Ted. When Pat arrives in Miami, he tracks down Mary fairly quickly, but ends up falling for himself and when he comes back to Rhode Island he tells Ted the worst facts he can possibly think of to detract his attention away from Mary. Pat then moves to Miami and begins a relationship with Mary. Having stalked her for a few weeks, he's found out what kind of man she's looking for and pretends to be her ideal suitor. Ted, however, still can't get Mary out of his mind and decides to take the leap anyway, heading to Miami to see Mary and tell her how he feels.

The Farrelly Brothers arrived on the scene in 1994, with the release of "Dumb and Dumber" and became a staple of 90s comedies that paved the way for guys like Judd Apatow to carry on the legacy of crass, crude comedies. "There's Something About Mary" was their third film (after "Kingpin") and due to heavy promotion and an image of Cameron Diaz running a handful of semen through her hair, the film did big numbers and put the Farrelly's on the map. I had mixed feeling about the film. On one hand, the film does have some heart, the principle actors are pretty funny and if we're talking about cast, the real shining star of the show is Matt Dillon, who turns on a performance not unlike Kevin Kline's performance in "A Fish Called Wanda (except not as good). The film is a little on the long side for a comedy, but it flows along quite nicely and provides a suitable number of laughs to keep things chugging along. However, its the type of film that I'll laugh at while it's playing, but then kind of feel guilty/silly for even finding humor in such ridiculousness after it's over. Like I've said before on the blog, as I grow older I'm just having a harder and harder time accepting these comedies, even though they were films I would've howled at when I was a teenager, when they came out. It kind of makes me proud of myself for growing out of such silliness and being able to go back and find that comedies used to be movies that could stand on their own two legs without any trouble. Guys like Buster Keaton and W.C. Fields who made a living making people laugh and didn't need bodily fluids or a multitude of curses to do so. I'd really like to see someone come along and make a really funny comedy that didn't involve nudity, fart jokes and the F word in every scene. Come on Hollywood, surely there's someone out there that can do this, even if only for an experiment to see if it can even be done in the 21st century.

In most people's opinion the Farrelly's never did better than "There's Something About Mary", although I have a soft spot for "Me, Myself & Irene" and "Stuck On You", the latter of which I actually saw in the theater (went to see "The Two Towers" and it was sold out, so what was a guy to do?). "Irene" is incredibly crass, but blends in an equal amount of heart and it works better and "Stuck On You" tones the crudeness way down and actually has a decent cast to back up the work - Greg Kinnear and Matt Damon. Despite Stiller's decent performance and Dillon's great one, "Mary" just doesn't have the cast or the story to back up the promotion that went behind it and in my eyes, it really all hinges on the shock value: a guy zipping his "bits" into his fly, Mary streaking semen through her hair and Dillon catching a dog on fire, while trying to shock it back to life with the frayed ends of a lamp cord. While you may go so far as to howl while watching it, I think true film fans are either going to feel guilty for doing so or write it off as a movie that they had fun with, but would never take seriously. I did a little bit of both and can deduce that it had absolutely no place among the likes of "A Clockwork Orange", "Once Upon a Time in the West" or "Manhattan", among hundreds of others.

RATING: 5.5/10  FUN FACT: The words to the tune that plays when Ted is pleasuring himself to the brassiere advertisement are "beat out that rhythm on the drum" and is from "Carmen Jones". Great touch!!

MOVIES WATCHED: 692
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 309

May 29, 2013  9:49pm