Inglourious Basterds (2009)

The opening scene of Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds is so tense, so disquieting, so rife with real human drama that I almost assumed that Tarantino would try something different with this latest film. In this scene and a handful of others scattered across the film, Tarantino's trademark dialogue sounds more subdued and realistic than usual, and he demonstrates his skill at orchestrating tension followed by sudden releases of violence. But the film soon dissolves into an overlong, self-indulgent, violence-glorifying mess, filled with so many film references that one wonders if there is an original thought in the whole film. In short, Inglourious Basterds is just like every other movie Tarantino has made.

The titular Basterds are led by Lt. Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt, in an amusing turn), a soldier from Tennessee whose squad is intent on "doing one thing, and one thing only - killing Nazis." The Basterds eventually get involved with a plot by the British army to blow up a Parisian cinema during the premiere of Joseph Goebbel's new film, which Hitler and the top-ranking Nazis will be attending. The cinema is run by Shoshanna (Mélanie Laurent), a Jew who escaped death at the hands of SS Colonel Hans Landa (Christoph Waltz). Unbeknowst to the Basterds, Shoshanna has her own plot to kill the Nazis.

Inglourious Basterds is a perfect example of a film that is less than the sum of its parts. The ensemble cast - assembled from America, France, and Germany - is terrific. Christoph Waltz in particular is a standout, delivering an alternately funny and terrifying performance as Landa, "the Jew Hunter." The period production design and costuming is exquisite, and Tarantino's eye for composition is undeniable. I keep returning to one inventive shot late in the film, when a shot of a laughing woman's face projected onto a burning movie screen becomes like a ghostly apparition.

But in the end, Inglourious Basterds falls apart due to Tarantino's excesses. The script is unwieldy, with several scenes dragging on far too long. More importantly, Tarantino never establishes a tone, and the film bizarrely shifts from war drama to farce to action movie to parody. There seems to be no unifying vision behind the film, unless it's another opportunity for Tarantino to throw together a bunch of disparate genres and loosely attach them to a storyline. Francois Truffaut once said that a movie must simultaneously express an idea about cinema and an idea about life. Tarantino's films have never bothered with real life, and indeed his movies can often be reduced to a list of their influences, ranging from Jean-Luc Godard to Sergio Leone.

More than anything, Inglourious Basterds reveals what an immature filmmaker Tarantino is. It seems to me that the film possesses no higher artistic goal than to watch Jews beat up Nazis real good. By the final scenes, in which we are treated to close-ups of Nazis being pelleted in the face with machine guns, I felt sickened and numb. Tarantino's films, I think, are essentially escapist entertainment, but his violence is often so graphic that you feel repulsed rather than entertained.

There may have been a time when Tarantino's combination of violence and humor, and his mishmashing of various genres, seemed original. Now it is tired and stale, the product of a director who refuses to grow up. It remains to be seen whether Tarantino will ever put aside his B movies, stop wallowing in his own cleverness, and make a movie that actually means something.

Verdict: **/****

DVD Recommendation: If you want a refreshing antidote to Tarantino, check out Martin McDonagh's In Bruges. That film is as violent, funny, and profane as anything Tarantino has done, but its characters are real people and not broad caricatures. It features a twisty, unpredictable script and the surprisingly effective comic duo of Brendan Gleeson and Colin Farrell. Also check out my brother Matt's excellent blog post about the movie and the differences between McDonagh and Tarantino.

Network (1976)

Sidney Lumet's Network, like The Graduate, is a genre-bender of such generational importance and undeniable power that it is at first easy to overlook its flaws. Most of these trace back to Paddy Chayefsky's script, one of the most acclaimed in American film. It is an astute and prescient satire of American culture, yes, but it also has the unfortunate tendency to devolve into caricature and a lot of speechifying.

Network focuses on the fictional, lowly-rated television network UBS. When longtime, washed-up news anchor Howard Beale (Peter Finch) is fired, he announces on the air that he will kill himself. The controversy attracts much attention, so Beale is exploited and reinvented as "the mad prophet of the airwaves." Max Schumacher (William Holden), Beale's longtime friend and colleague, is fired and replaced by programmers Diana Christensen (Faye Dunaway) and Frank Hackett (Robert Duvall), who will stop at nothing to get high ratings.

What is admirable about Network is the prophetic nature of its satire. Many things about Network are unbelievable, but the trashy Howard Beale Show looks more and more familiar every year. Years ahead of his time, Chayefsky seems to have predicted today's profusion of tawdry talk shows and mindless reality TV. And yet he is not so naive as to assume that things were ever entirely different. The film's moral center is Max Schumacher, Holden's character, who fancies himself an emblem of respectable journalism. Yet even he goes along with the Beale hysteria at first, only protesting when he is fired. No one is let off the hook in Network - least of all the TV viewers themselves, who are portrayed as passive, complacent players in the whole machine. An extremely cynical view, yes, but one the film expresses quite cleverly. In the movie's most famous scene, young people from all across the country, prompted by Beale's mad ramblings, yell out the window that they're "mad as hell and not going to take it anymore," a line regurgitated by an eager audience before each taping of the show. It is a frightening scene, and one that perfectly expresses how the masses can get behind a mindless catchphrase while thinking they are saying something meaningful.*

That is a skillful device, but much of Chayefsky's script suffers from a lack of such invention. Rather, he resorts to characters dishing out carefully worded monologues. Mind you, they sound great - until you realize that no one speaks that way in person. Chayefsky's script also suffers from tonal inconsistency, bouncing somewhat incongruously from satire to farce to drama. And many of his supporting characters are goofy caricatures; actors like Peter Finch, Ned Beatty, and Robert Duvall have little to do but rant and rave. The only actors who manage to give fully rounded performances are Faye Dunaway, William Holden, and Beatrice Straight in a small role as Holden's wife. Holden, especially, is terrific, injecting his role with sarcastic bite while remaining a likable, flawed character who is fully aware of his faults and limitations.

If there is one person who elevates Network to something greater than the sum of its parts, I am convinced it is Sidney Lumet. The director lacks any obvious auteurist touches, but as with 12 Angry Men, he does a superb job of building dramatic tension. Network also reveals that Lumet has a talent for comedy, and he never lets the film become too self-important. Finally, Lumet and his cinematographer Owen Roizman create a series of memorable images, from the famous "mad as hell" scene to the final, indicting shot.

In the end, the overall effect of Network is so powerful that its many imperfections almost seem not to matter. In one of the film's most affecting scenes, Holden asks Dunaway to love him, "primal doubts and all." She cannot accept him that way, but I embrace Network, inherent flaws and all.

Verdict: B+

*I don't mean to get political, but I keep thinking of this video.

The Graduate (1967)

"Hello darkness my old friend. I've come to speak with you again."

Preview

Those lines, from Simon & Garfunkel's "The Sound of Silence", open and close The Graduate and they speak for much of the film's tone. Mike Nichol's film is, in some sense, a sex comedy. It also, in some sense, reflects the spirit of optimism and rebellion that characterized the 60s. Yet the pervading tone is sadness; this is above all a film about alienation and loneliness. The ending of the film is fondly remembered - the film's hero runs off with the girl of his dreams, getting on a bus as they begin their new life together. But the most telling shot comes when the couple sit down, and look at each other. They have nothing to say, nothing to share. There is a distance there that is unsettling. And then the sad chords of "The Sound of Silence" begin as the bus rolls off into an uncertain future.

I have spoiled the ending of the film, but The Graduate is so firmly ingrained in popular culture that I feel little guilt in doing so. Even those who are not familiar with The Graduate can feel its influence today. Of course, it launched the careers of such talented people as Dustin Hoffman and Mike Nichols, but its reach extends further. Released a year before the Summer of Love, The Graduate's frank depictions of sexual activity broke barriers in Hollywood. And it began the trend of popular music being incorporated into movie soundtracks. Yet despite all the imitators, The Graduate remains fresh today.

Benjamin Braddock (Dustin Hoffman) is the quintessential overachiever - track star, award winner, bright young scholar. But he returns home after college with no idea of what to do with his life. Soon enough, he becomes seduced by one of his parent's friends, the attractive Mrs. Robinson (Anne Bancroft). But soon after the affair breaks off, Benjamin falls in love with Mrs. Robinson's daughter Elaine (Katharine Ross).

This kind of material could be the stuff of soap opera, but not here. The film's director, Mike Nichols, initially looked for a typical Californian type - tall, blond, muscular - to play Benjamin. But Hoffman's nervous mannerisms won Nichols over, and the film is the better for it. Benjamin feels like an authentic person, as does Anne Bancroft's Mrs. Robinson, who hides a history of alcoholism and unhappiness behind her sexy sophistication. The two are also gifted comic actors, and the early seduction scenes are hilarious, and rightfully famous.
The Graduate is not a film that lives and dies by its acting, however. Director Nichols demonstrates an evident visual flair. At the very beginning of the film, I was struck by the simple image of a sad-looking Benjamin, in profile, gliding across a moving walkway at the airport. Throughout the film, Nichols create similar compositions that suggest Benjamin's utter loneliness. In one, he sits in a water suit at the bottom of an abandoned pool. In another, he stands in the middle of Elaine's college campus, dwarfed by his surroundings. These carefully composed images greatly enhance the film's mood.

I wish I could say that the film's second half was as good as its first. But Bancroft gets slighted in favor of Katharine Ross, playing her daughter Elaine. Although a great beauty, Elaine is also the dullest character in the film, with no discernible personality. Quite simply, nothing in the second half of the film matches the comedic heights or emotional depths of the first. Another problem throughout the film is the adult supporting actors, who all seem to be playing caricatures of superficial materialists. With the possible exception of Mrs. Robinson, there is not a single likable adult character, and this hamfisted generalization is tedious.

So yes, The Graduate does have its share of problems. But it casts such a captivating, almost effortless spell that its shortcomings are easy to forgive. The film is a snapshot of the 60s, to be sure, but to this day it has lost none of its emotional power. So here's to you, Mrs. Robinson.

Verdict: A-

Double Feature: Day for Night (1973) / 8 1/2 (1963)

“I demand that a film express either the joy of making cinema or the agony of making cinema. I am not at all interested in anything in between; I am not interested in all those films that do not pulse.”

So said François Truffaut, the renowned French director of such films as The 400 Blows and Jules and Jim. In addition to being one of cinema’s greatest artists, he was also one of its greatest patrons. Truffaut began his career as a film critic, and according to those who knew him, he had an encyclopedic knowledge of films and an unadulterated love for the filmmaking process. That love comes across in his 1973 film Day for Night, which examines the family dynamic that forms between the cast and crew of a lightweight studio film named Meet Pamela. An interesting counterpoint is Federico Fellini’s 8 ½, about a director whose long-in-development film leaves his personal life in ruin. Upon first glance, it would appear that the two films are polar opposites, but both films “pulse” with a creative energy and the joy of cinema that Truffaut was so adamant about.

Every frame of Day for Night is bursting with love for the movie-making process. Truffaut plays Ferrand, the director of the studio comedy Meet Pamela. Jean-Pierre Leaud is Alphonse, the temperamental young star. Jacqueline Bisset plays Julie, a slightly unstable actress who has the title role in Meet Pamela. Truffaut fills out his film with other movie types – the aging supporting actress, the script girl, and various crew members.

Day for Night takes the form of a series of vignettes rather than a developed narrative, giving us a fly-on-the-wall look at life on a movie set. We observe the crew film a busy crowd scene, a car chase stunt, a simple dining room scene, and all the while we pick up on various film-making techniques. We share in the frustrations of the crew, as a cat refuses to lap up milk on cue, or as the aging actress Severine stumbles over her lines. Off set, we witness the relationships that develop among the cast and crew – friendships, romances, flings. All the while, the cast and crew are seen as a family, who share good times and console each other during bad ones.

The center of the film, though, is Ferrand, played by Truffaut as a version of himself. Truffaut once said that when he first saw Citizen Kane, he realized that he had never loved anyone as much as that film. The same would certainly be true of Ferrand, who remains doggedly fixated on making his movie above all else. To be sure, Ferrand develops friendships with his actors, and is never emotionally distant. Yet when Ferrand tries to console Alphonse after a romance gone wrong, his advice is to focus on learning his lines, because “people like you and me are only happy in our work.” That is one of the film’s strongest scenes, and it exemplifies what is so compelling about Day for Night. Not only is Truffaut’s adoration of cinema infectious, but the movie is filled with truthful human relationships.

Federico Fellini’s 8 ½ is also ostensibly about the making of a movie, but it is not really a film about film in the way that Day for Night is. The protagonist of 8 ½ is Guido (Marcello Mastroianni), a celebrated director whose film and life are crumbling around him. On vacation at a resort spa along with his producers, writer, and potential stars, Guido is hounded from all sides by people who are telling him how to make his film. The truth is, Guido doesn’t know what film he wants to make, and he finds solace in drifting into his childhood memories and his fantasies, embodied by a luminous Claudia Cardinale as the woman of his dreams. At the same time, Guido has to compete with the real women in his life – his mistress Carla (Sandra Milo) and jealous wife Luisa (Anouk Aimee).

8 ½ is remarkable on many levels. Fellini’s film weaves seamlessly between reality and fantasy, past and present without seeming at all heavy-handed. Unlike Guido, Fellini is in full command of his craft, and each segment builds upon the last to create a fuller portrait of Guido. That is not to say that every single shot or symbol makes sense. In one bizarre outdoors scene, Fellini pans past a group of characters who smile directly into the camera, and move in perfect synchronization as if they are in a sort of dance. There is no apparent reason for this, except that Fellini, ever the visual stylist, thought it looked interesting. That is not a criticism, but rather an example of how Fellini refused to follow conventions, constantly experimenting with structure and movement and composition. The film was originally titled The Beautiful Confusion, and that is exactly what it is. Even when we don’t fully understand Fellini’s intentions, his masterful direction and Gianni de Venanzo lush black-and-white photography keep the audience fully involved.

I have probably made 8 ½ sound far too esoteric, but it is really quite an entertaining movie. Fellini kept a note attached to his camera that read “Remember, this is a comedy.” Indeed, it is a rather broad comedy at times. One of the film’s most memorable sequences is a dream envisioned by Guido, who imagines a harem filled with all of the women in his life. They dote upon him, giving him baths, washing his home and preparing dinner. In another scene, Guido remembers as a schoolboy visiting the severely overweight Saraghina (Eddra Gale), a prostitute who does a grotesque and hilarious dance on the beach.

Despite these comic scenes, though, I would not generally characterize 8 ½ as a comedy. Guido spends most of the film in an unhappy state, only taking comfort in his dreams and fantasies. Only in the end does Guido find happiness, as he abandons his movie and decides to pick up the scattered pieces of his life. “Life is a celebration,” Guido tells his wife Luisa, “let’s live it together!” Fellini, unlike Truffaut, seems to be concluding that life is more important than film. And yet Day for Night and 8 ½ are not at all incompatible; both emphasize the joy of making cinema in their own way. Truffaut points out the simple pleasures of movie-making, the day-to-day gratifications of being on a set. And Fellini, through the creation of 8 ½, shows us that he is an artist of the first order, using the tools of his trade to examine the pieces of a man’s life – a beautiful confusion indeed.

Day for Night: A
8 ½: A+

Simon Birch (1998)

Simon Birch is one of those movies, I think, that can easily be seen as either deeply moving or severely manipulative. I think it is both of those things at different points. To be sure, the film takes several missteps in terms of tone and character. But it also does generate a fair deal of emotion based simply on the story and some terrific acting.

The film tells the story of Simon Birch (Ian Michael Smith), a 12 year-old dwarf growing up in Gravestown, Maine in 1964. Simon, very much a free spirit, is scorned by his parents and frustrates the inhabitants of Gravestown with his outspoken attitude, particularly his belief that God has chosen him to be a hero. However, he forms a friendship with Joe Wentworth (Joseph Mazzello), and Joe's mother Rebecca (Ashley Judd) becomes something of a surrogate mother to Simon. The film is told in flashback, from the point of view of the adult Joe (Jim Carrey), who is visiting Simon's grave and says that Simon is the reason he believes in God.

The search for identity is a major theme in the film. Joe, the illegitimate child of the beautiful Rebecca, is simply trying to figure out who his father is. Simon is trying to discern what God's purpose for him is. These two characters form a bond because they consider themselves outcasts. The script clearly sympathizes with them, but the viewer may not. There is one scene in church where Simon is supposed to come off as intelligent and free-spirited. I just found him obnoxious and arrogant.

Nevertheless, Ian Michael Smith does very good work as Simon. His performance has the humor, charisma and warm-heartedness necessary for the character. Joseph Mazzello is perfectly capable of playing the "normal kid," Joe. But when the script calls for great emotion on his part, his performance leaves something to be desired. Ashley Judd and Oliver Platt deliver solid performances of likable characters.

But in my opinion the standout of the cast is David Strathairn, who plays Reverend Russell. His character is stiff and strict and is thus in direct conflict with Simon for most of the movie. However, it soon becomes apparent that there is more to Russell than meets the eye. Yet even in his early scenes Strathairn never dissolves into caricature. His Russell always seems to be haunted; he is clearly hiding something under his calm and composed facade. What he is hiding becomes all too clear by the end of the film. Strathairn is a celebrated character actor who has gained deserved acclaim in recent years, with his Academy Award-nominated performance in Good Night and Good Luck and his role in The Bourne Ultimatum. This performance shows just how much Strathairn is capable of; he turns a minor supporting role into a full-fledged human being.

Yet despite its strong cast, Simon Birch has some serious script flaws. As mentioned before, the character of Simon does not always come across as likable as he is supposed to be. Also, there is one scene involving a Christmas pageant that dissolves into rather cheap, crude humor. And finally, the script often bashes the viewer over the head, telling them what to feel.

There is one simple but very moving scene that is a happy exception to this tendency. I won't reveal the full details, but suffice to say it occurs after a sudden tragedy that Simon had a big part in. It is late afternoon, the day is getting darker, and Simon is running away. A wide shot shows Simon stopping at the middle of a bridge and looking toward the sky in desperation. He is dwarfed by his surroundings. He yells out to no one in particular: "I'm sorry!" He turns around and repeats it again. The scene is touching because it seems like a genuine outcry of grief, there are very few gimmicks to tell us what to feel. I wish the same could be said for the rest of the movie, which is narrated by Jim Carrey and tends to be sentimental and mushy.

Still, Simon Birch is an effective movie. Despite some script imperfections, it does derive a great deal of emotional power from its touching story and excellent cast.

Verdict: B -

Note: Thanks to Amy LaCombe, one of my Dad's colleagues, for the suggestion to review this movie.

You can see that bridge scene I was talking about here. It takes place from 7:53-8:24.