Inception

I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand-
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep- while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?

Christopher Nolan may have made a deliberate nod to Poe's 'A Dream Within a Dream' in staging the opening of Inception, his most challenging work to date - or else Poe's poem planted that virulant idea in his head. Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) wakes up on a beach, soaked, his face planted in the sand as we meet him. He has lost much, we discover. It is the cost of infiltrating the dreams of his marks, stealing their secrets, and selling them. What a thief, what a crimescene.

It comes as no surprise that Nolan began writing this film while making Memento ten years ago. It was pitched to the studio during the making of Insomnia, and subsequently took another eight years to write. That's no surprise either. Though some will criticize the characterizations overall, the plot is myriad and absorbing. It is driven truly by just one man - Cobb - and everyone else reacts believably to his actions. they are, reasonably, the support characters in his story. That is all about rejoining his family after exile, the details of which I will not reveal here.

It's just as well this film took a while coming to us. Nolan has had some time to up his game in reviving the Batman franchise, among his other projects. He was trusted with a formidable budget, one large enough to meet the demands of creating a world bound only by the limits of human imagination. And we must trust him to guide us through these dreams and their rules, which are all well explained and lend needed structure to a grandiose open world.

This is, in one sense, a heist film, which by itself endeared it to me, but aside from that it is a story about a criminal whose craft has cost him the most important thing in his life. Nolan appears to be fascinated by the bending of reality and perception - Insomnia was largely about trying to shape the way people see and remember not just ourselves but the people and events we have been party to. Memento was about seeing the world in a way that's truncated and backwards, but still with purpose. And it's clear from watching The Prestige that he is interested in tricks and deception and the extent to which people are willing to take those illusions to get what they want.

Much of that comes together here - there are constant warnings about the confusion of dreams versus reality, the real versus the fake. How the audience chooses to react to all of it will depend strongly on one's opinion about how important those distinctions are. And while there are sections of the film that sound laboured in discussing its themes, Nolan thankfully does not attempt to resolve any of the questions raised. Those questions are asked loudly and forcefully, but we are meant to ponder the answers.

You could dissect the ideas for years, making this a rewarding watch. The cast, composed entirely of the deeply talented and mostly of the A-list, is very well suited to the material. DiCaprio is the anchor, and we care for him and the fate of his wife (Marion Cotillard). The team Cobb assembles is a great mixture of smooth operators. Each is so well matched to their role that it's surprising the production trivia reveals there were ever any other choices.

Inception is a big, brilliant package of ideas. Its plot somewhat outstrips its characters, but not nearly enough to detract from the enjoyment of watching it, and them. Opinions may vary, but to me, Nolan has solidified himself as one of the smartest, most original directors working today. And like all good storytellers, he respects his audience enough to trust them with the depth and complexity of his words, his pictures - his dreams.

You Might Have Missed...

This day, on which I have started work for the second day in a row at 4am, I have had some time to think - and though lately, no time to go out and see new movies, I have had time to revisit some old ones - not necessarily all-time favourites, but maybe ones you haven't seen.

1. The Rundown

Yes, the one with Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. And Stifler. Honestly, if you dismissed this movie because of who was in it, give it a shot. It's fun as hell, and features in one scene a guy getting a record player tossed at his back. Also, Rosario Dawson looking phenomenal, and Christopher Walken attempting to explain the tooth fairy to Brazilians. Recommended.

2. War of the Worlds

Another one I suspect some folks may have skipped over thanks to Tom 'I'm going to mention placenta during an interview' Cruise. I've never had an issue with him, beyond that his range is limited. But here, he's used in utterly unsympathetic light to begin with, barely functioning as the patriarch guiding his kids through the alien attack on earth. The tripods, visualized long ago in illustrations for the H.G. Wells original, are brought to graceful and terrifying life here by ILM. I'd say this is worth checking out just to see the mise en scene. Also Tim Robbins digs a tunnel, which, hopefully someone will remember, is not the only thing he can do.

3. Wet Hot American Summer

Get stoned and watch this. And cry laughing. I saw this when I was much younger (for those of us in our mid-twenties, much-younger is anything below 18 I guess) and didn't get it. But then, I didn't get Rushmore the first time I saw it either. Summer is amazingly absurd, just the right amount of random, and light enough to watch during the summer (it's been raining, so there's something you can do).

4. Brick

This is an all-time favourite. Everyone I know, well, they've heard me talk about Brick, but I never get tired of it. It's the detective novel goes to high school story of drugs and a murder, revealed in dialogue that couldn't possibly have been common in the 30s, let alone now. It's awesome, despite this. I have an admitted dude crush on Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who is good enough to play this material straight as an arrow, despite a couple scenes where the writing clearly winks at some of the inherent absurdity. The film's world sticks to its conventions, and to that end, you get a backdrop of broken rules, sidestepped law, and femme fatales. This, combined with TV's Veronica Mars, is my noir template for the new millenium.

5. Spirited Away

Honestly, the more I think about it, I think I either wasn't paying attention when I first saw this, or fell asleep, because upon re-watching it, I had the kind of experience you only get when you have not seen what you're seeing, ever before. I would never claim to be an expert on Japanese animation, so this film really blew my brain up. It is vibrant and imaginative and bold in a way (and with a tone) that doesn't exist on this continent. Mesmerizing.

6. The Insider

This, too, is one that has never left me since the first time I watched it. A little research reveals that the story as told in this film is skewed against CBS more than a little, and knowing that doesn't affect my enjoyment at all. This is the story of a corporate whistle-blower, the first to openly and with inside-knowledge, out the addictive quality of cigarettes. A producer for 60 Minutes draws the story out of him against great resistance and inevitably high stakes, then has to deal with corporate maneuvaring to make sure it even gets aired. Al Pacino and Russell Crowe play very well together, lending dimension and completely understandable motivation to their characters. Michael Mann directs, pulling everything together in a phenomenally sober, nimble and elegant package. It's his best movie, and I do love Heat, as well.


That's it for now, god willing I'll be reviewing something new soon.

Kick-Ass! (Don't bring the kids)

Oh my god, don't bring ANY kids, ever.

Sorry to jump right in there, but don't do it. I remember the tone and imagery of the trailer for this film being very poppy and fun - and in a way, it is. But this is fun for adults, comic origins and all. Think Sin City. But, if you can picture it - violent-er.

My overall impression of Kick-Ass is that I liked it - it was well-crafted, tightly executed storytelling that delivered, far more viscerally than expected, on all the notes one hopes for when seeing a superhero film. It isn't trying for the kind of verisimilitude found in M. Night Shyamalan's Unbreakable, but instead, as the narration suggests, occupies the territory of 'what if'? What if some normal people decided to be super heroes? The answer seems to be a zero-sum game for morality.

Roger Ebert, whose opinions of film I find at least fascinating, and with whom I normally find common ground, has written off Kick-Ass as morally bankrupt - an exercise in peverse brutality whose messages, satirical or otherwise, cannot redeem it. Harry Knowles at AICN defended the film, citing mostly generational differences as the reason why Ebert can't look past the admittedly thick layer of explicit mayhem to identify the point. Ebert acknowledged that indeed, the film is satire - but of what?

I would argue that Kick-Ass is a satire of our obsession with tragedy and wrong-doing, but with seeing it and not necessarily trying to change it. The film seems to suggest that is because of the cost. The only people here who actively do good get done in - or nearly done in, 11-year-olds notwithstanding. And they kill the bad guys, rather than tying them up, Spidey-style for the cops. And when I say kill, I mean it. Dudes get murdered. As comic-violence goes, this is not. It's pretty much just violence-violence, beginning with the main character getting knifed in the stomach and escalating from there. That 11-year-old I mentioned kills about as viciously as the bride did in Kill Bill. She was trained to do so by her own father. Ebert isn't wrong - that is nearly impossible to swallow.

So again, what is the point? I have to believe that the writers of the comic itself and the makers of this film don't just think it's cool to stage and execute a story in which an 11-year-old (Mindy!) ruthlessly and brutally murders criminals with her old man. Maybe the point is that in this world - and let me be clear that I am referring to the world of Kick-Ass and not reality - this is what it has come to. The cops are inept or corrupt or simply AWOL. The normal citizenry is apathetic, or worse, utterly fascinated by the broken quality of their world, but only so far as it fuels their You-Tube enabled voyeurism. All that is left is for kids and their parents to suit up and break heads (and necks, and wow, so much other stuff).

So that seemed the necessary ethical/moral comment on a deeply satirized piece of storytelling. And if you can get on side with that, or not, it's fine. I think there is adequate room to maneuver on both sides of this argument.

The film itself, as I said, is terrifically well put together. The casting is dead on across the board. I could single someone out, but I think I'd have to single everyone out because each note was struck with just the right performance. Each character here is well-motivated and well-written, and there's a wealth of depth in the themes and ideas (clearly) to get people talking. Music, editing and cinematography also contribute to this being a very tight, exciting package.

I guess the paradign shift here is this - People read comics and watch films about heroes to have their sense of heroism and riteousness provoked and energized. They love conflict, too, and a good bad guy is deeply compelling. So Kick-Ass gives us a world between comics and reality - where real people try to be heroes and have to lose some heroism in the process - they really become bad good-guys. It's the cost, I guess.



Notes on extra, random thoughts:

- Chloe Moretz has a Clint Eastwood sneer. She's going places, based on just this and 500 Days of Summer.

- The way Nicholas Cage spoke while in costume rested on a perfect line between funny and irritating.

- The sequences in the youtube video with the strobe light, and the sequence that begins by passing into the warehouse surveillance footage were tremendous.

- Mark Strong plays every role I've seen him in with amazing conviction and so I'd like to see him play a good guy soon - even as this dangerous, murdering mob man, he clearly loved his kid, and that kind of subtlety has potential beyond playing baddies.

One Day I Will Post Something Timely

Or, as an alternative title, I considered, "Review: She's Out of My League". Because, well, that's what I'm doing. Late.

A good analogy lept to mind today - relationships rot from the inside. If they're going to rot, that is. And if they do, that seed of disharmony begins in there somewhere and spreads until neither person (nor both) can contain the decay, and it falls apart. There is truth to that. It happens all the time. It can happen when people have good, supportive friends and family, people who try to help hold things up with you. I've seen even these ideal situations fail because inside the skin of that pairing, there was something wrong.

She's Out of My League isn't about this phenomenon, but instead about the opposite - the failures that can befall two essentially compatible people and their relationship because the people and circumstances surrounding them seem set against them at every turn. It's a compelling way to approach the telling of a love story, and it makes you wish that the rest of the world would just leave them alone, no matter how unrealistic that is.

Canadian Jay Baruchel is Kirk, an airport security worker (officer?) who does a kind deed for Molly. Molly (Alice Eve) is a stunning well-to-do event planner, and thanks to being mistreated by her last boyfriend, she's drawn to the safe, nice guy quality of Kirk. To his amazement, they begin dating, and that's where the trouble starts. The fact that they are in any way associated becomes the guffaw of their friends and family. Slowly, the firm belief seeps inside the walls and the only two people whose feelings should matter begin to listen to the feelings of everyone else.

Overall, this is a fun movie to watch, and it had a lot more meat on its bones than I expected. I've discussed all that now, so the only other thing you need to know is that it's worth seeing - it's funny, and surprisingly genuine. A competent, amusing supporting cast surrounds the leads nicely. Recommended for people who want a little more brain to their rom com.

Beautiful

well I met you at the blood bank
we were looking at the bags
wondering if any of the colours
matched any of the names
we knew on the tags
you said see look at that - that's yours
stacked on top with your brother's
see how they resemble one another
even in their plastic little covers

and I said I know it well

that secret that you know
that you don't know how to tell
it fucks with your honour
and it teases your head
but you know that it's good girl
'cause it's running you with red

then the snow started falling
we were stuck out in your car
you were rubbing both my hands
chewing on a candy bar
you said ain't this just like the present
to be showing up like this
as the moon waned to crescent
we started to kiss

and I said I know you well

that secret that we know
that we don't know how to tell
I'm in love with your honour
I'm in love with your cheeks
what's that noise up the stairs, love
is that christmas morning that creaks

and I said I know it well
and I know it well
and I know it well
and I know it well
and I know it well
and I know it well
and I know it well
and I know it well

-Bon Iver

Oh, Joss. How you play with our hearts.

This post will be rife with Joss Whedon fan discussion (or commentary, since I think you need some kind of two-way conversation to qualify as discussion) and also spoilers regarding all episodes of Dollhouse (of which only one remains to air next week) and also of Firefly. I'll try not to really talk about Buffy or Angel very specifically because I'd like to keep this whole thing under a million words.

But seriously, if you aren't all Whedon-current, bail out now.

Imagine a world where all the Joss Whedon shows are merely teased and never realized. All of them. As in, imagine for a moment that Buffy ended, say, when Angel went to hell. Or that Angel ended when the Irish half-demon guy died. Doyle! I liked Doyle, man, why did he have to die? Because he's in Joss' world, and that is a damned unsafe place. It's not like other showrunners have never killed off a character or two, but seriously. Oh, Wash.

Dollhouse, the Whedon show whose destiny seemed doomed from the first episode, joins Firefly as something very unique, very niche, and very short lived. I want to be clear that Firefly stands in my mind as the pinnacle of missed opportunities, as in, given the choice I'd save it and not the ever weirder Dollhouse. Alas, neither was to be for more than the exact amount of time necessary to get people invested. Oh, the episodes that never were.

Both of these Whedon shows really make me sad because I have watched the OTHER two to their conclusion. And, damn it. Because remember what happens to Giles as Buffy went on? Willow? SPIKE? Remember the growth? And on Angel, the line was a little squiggly, but it got us all to Fred's arc. To Wesley's. These are the moments we'll miss. Who knows where Dollhouse would have gone eventually. I assume still the apocalypse, but I also assume it would have taken longer to get there.

For an interim amusement, please go here and laugh hysterically at other commentary regarding a certain broadcaster and their handling of other beloved 'properties'. Honestly, it's like watching a belligerent drunk try and wrestle a pig.

Moving along, Whedon and Co have managed to retain their crown not only in producing shows that resist wide interest while simultaneously being awesome at best and merely unique at worst, BUT also - writing just the best villains!

I can't think of a villain that was ever made central in a Joss Whedon show that was not totally engaging. I'm sure there have been ones that weren't quite as terrific, but each one I can some up with is memorable (obviously) and delicious to watch. Most recently, Boyd, who is crazy and driven by a choice that is less crazy by far. Alpha - the flip side of Echo's coin who Alan Tudyk made both scary and funny. Angel, Spike, Drusilla, The Mayor. Oh, The Mayor! He was just so nuts and yet so much the doting Dad. Plus I think there was a witch in there somewhere and some flaying which left an impression.

Whedon's stuff doesn't always land on two feet, or four feet, but man do they make cool leaps. Here's a not-insane idea, Joss: try and make your next idea something that can be put together more cheaply. You can do plenty with little money. And get Enver Gjokaj. That dude is the SHARK FROM JAWS.

Up In the Air

This is a late post, both because I haven't posted since August and because this film came out on Christmas Day. But what do I care, I just want to write a review. Maybe one day I'll write one on time, but dreams are so fleeting.

Up In the Air is a film for the times. The way I felt Fight Club was a film for the turn of the millennium, this is a film for now. Countless news stories fly around like loose sheets of paper in a cold draft - they all have figures about unemployment rates, percentages of cuts to budgets and payrolls, about the struggle of the everyman and woman just to make end's meet - but they are abstractions of the situation. Up In the Air tells the story on the ground. It's a tough story to watch.

While others are grounded by the obligations of their lives, Ryan lives everywhere, owing no loyalty to anyone save his frequent flyer program. He likes it that way, and even if we do not share the desire to live like him, we can believe as we look on that he is happy. Mostly.

George Clooney plays Ryan, who is hired to fire those people whose superiors don't have the guts to do so themselves, and he doesn't take the job lightly. He may enjoy the lifestyle of detachment this job affords him, but he doesn't enjoy dismissing people from their work - instead he focuses on genuinely pushing these people towards the opportunities now open to them in the light of unemployment. An easier sell coming from a man who believes in the unencumbered life. During seminars held in tiny hotel conference rooms all over America, Ryan asks that his audience imagine the components of their lives - things AND people - stuffed into a backpack that they must tote around; the straps, he points out, weigh heavily.

Clooney plays a potentially unlikable character very sympathetically, and he is supported and complimented by Vera Farmiga and Anna Kendrick. Farmiga's Alex does a lot to draw Ryan back to ground level, and Kendrick arrives as Natalie - the new blood at work who pitches firings over webcam to save airfare. Ryan protests so Natalie has to go on the road with him to see what the job is really like.

Not surprisingly, it's bleak. Especially now. It's a testament to the performances in this film that you can feel the contrast between the desperation of the world versus the connections, even momentary or midguided ones, as bright candles grouped in a large, cold room. Hope is in short supply, and though we know this having lived through the world ourselves lately, this film really puts you in front of the locomotive. Still when characters are looking at one another in the eye, they are sharing something real, very nearly holding each other for warmth, and we can feel it.

Ryan, to me, becomes more admirable as the film develops - he demonstrates the desire to be there for others even though he is doing his best to fly safely above all human drama. A credit to the screenplay is that the reasons for Ryan being this way are only (maybe) hinted at - we are left to assume he was either hurt or just was always this way - either explanation would be fine. Ryan is no less caring for his past, whatever it is, and he takes risks that we want him to take and we go with him in feeling vulnerable.

This is Jason Reitman's third film, and he has solidified himself as one of the best directors working today (before this he helmed Thank You for Smoking and Juno). This is stark, engaging filmmaking that will demand repeat viewings in the future, perhaps after this climate shifts. For now, it is too real - a credit to everyone involved.