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Announcement: Short-content feeds

Phillip Winn — Sun, 26 Aug 2007 12:00:00 EDT

Sunday, August 26, 2007, marks the switch of all Blogcritics.org article feeds from full-content to short-content. This is the result of several converging factors, and is unfortunately a permanent decision (as permanent as any decision can be on the web, that is). We are aware of all of the reasons that this is a Bad Idea, and we are aware that some of you will be quite upset about having to click on something to read the free content, and we're sorry. Unfortunately, despite great effort, full-content feeds are not currently economically viable. Two other factors are involved: full-content feeds have resulted in an unprecedented level of content theft, with BC content appearing on many websites, usually spam sites, without attribution or permission. This duplicate content causes a cascading set of problems, not the least of which is that search engines generally aren't favorable to duplicate content, and don't always guess correctly. Finally, our RSS advertising partner is strongly in favor of short-content feeds. We hope that you'll continue to subscribe to BC via RSS, and when an article grabs your eye, it's only a click away, still free on the BC website. Thank you for your understanding.

Philly Film Fest Day Fourteen: In Loving Memory

David Dylan Thomas — Fri, 20 Apr 2007 13:22:57 EDT

The Philadelphia Film Festival came to a close with awards and a screening of Adrienne Shelly's Waitress. As far as the awards went, the only thing I really noted was Severance winning Danger After Dark. The Danger After Dark program (which I tend to gravitate towards) includes all the horror and, up until recently, Asian gangster films (which were given their own spin-off program this year). The most fun I had at any Danger After Dark screening this year was Severance, so it was nice to see it get some love.Waitress is a funny, sweet, endearing tale about a waitress (Keri Russell) in a small town who makes pies and suffers under the petty dictatorship of her husband (Jeremy Sisto) who just got her pregnant, complicating her plan to run away. Her new doctor (Nathan Fillion) offers a ray of hope as the two fall in love, but ultimately she has to deal with her husband, her baby, and her life. A straightforward rom-com premise executed effortlessly by all involved. Since I never really watched much Felicity, I had no opinion one way or another on Russell's acting chops, but she shines here, pulling off good-natured hopelessness with aplomb. Nathan Fillion shows another side of the dopey smartass he honed on Firefly with a lot more aw-shucks thrown in. He's evolving into a formidable comic talent. Cheryl Hines (Curb Your Enthusiasm) and Shelly portray Russell's fellow waitstaff, playing off each other with crackerjack timing. Hines in particular gives a performance that skirts Best Supporting Actress territory. Jeremy Sisto, Eddie Jemison, Andy Griffith, and Lew Temple all give top notch support.At the end of the credits, we see the words "In Loving Memory of Adrienne Shelley." In light of its sad backstory, Waitress ends up being a bittersweet tribute to Shelly as triple threat - writer, director, and actress.

David Dylan Thomas is a Philly-based writer/filmmaker who opines voraciously about dem pictures what move on the screen at DavidDylanThomas.com.

Philly Film Fest Day Thirteen: Men on the Moon

David Dylan Thomas — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 18:17:42 EDT

I was not expecting much from David Sington's documentary In the Shadow of the Moon. This is nothing against Signton, of whom I'd yet to hear, but more the subject matter: the moon landing. There's a very 'been there, done that' feel to space travel now, and to think that there was some new insight to be had seemed unlikely.Fortunately, I was completely wrong.The inspiration for the film, as described by Sington in a Q&A after the screening, informs the premise. Of the six and a half billion people on the planet, only nine have ever been to the moon, so it seemed like a good idea to him to, you know, talk to them. The result is the story of the Apollo missions as told by the astronauts who flew them.The film does nothing more complicated than mixing old footage with new interviews, yet I was impressed by how potent (and beautiful) some of those old images still are. Yes, I did think of the early MTV spots when seeing the stages break away, but that only made me realize why MTV picked those images -- tying themselves to a revolutionary idea for a generation that didn't have one. And that is part of the goal of this movie; one of the younger audience members said she had no reference point for the events depicted in the film but once she saw them, she realized they had a power she never appreciated.The film elucidates certain aspects of the "tired" story that I hadn't appreciated. There's the fact that while today - with a few tragic exceptions - space flight is considered to be routine, at the time rockets were about the most dangerous thing you could be around. A montage of spectacular explosions drives this point home in the film. There's the fact that John F. Kennedy (and his brother, for that matter) did not live to see the seed he planted grow to fruition under the administration of his nemesis, Richard Nixon. Then there are the three astronauts who died before the project even got off the ground. And the fact that in the final moments before the lunar module actually touched down, it seemed pretty certain that the whole mission would fail because they couldn't find a suitable place to land in the narrow window of time they had to do it. And there's the speech Nixon was to give if the first mission didn't make it back. In one of the film's more eerie moments, one of the astronauts reads it. But Sington finds a global spin to the story that's even more compelling. The context of the flight has America at war in Vietnam while at home the country eats itself from within. One of the astronauts even talks about his guilt at being in the space program while his air force buddies were being shot down abroad. However, even though a large part of the program was a race against the Russians and it was an American flag planted upon arrival, upon their return, astronauts saw in country after country they visited people saying "WE did it." It was a global victory.Now, watching this I'm thinking, "What a contrast with the way the world feels about America right now." And I'm thinking, "What great achievement could America get behind today that would show the world the ways in which we don't suck?" My answer was solving the global AIDS crisis. Hold that thought.In the Q&A, someone asked Sington if he deliberately pointed out the world reaction (he shows footage in many different countries of people reacting to the news of the landing and then greeting the astronauts on tour) as a contrast to the worldview now. His answer was that, in a sense, he did. His motivation to make the film had to with his fascination with America (he's British) and to him, "This is America." The optimism and confidence that motivated the space program showed what America could be and served as a juxtaposition to the cynicism and fear that he felt motivated Vietnam. Today he sees the Iraq war born of decisions motivated by fear and uncertainty, but sees no juxtaposing mission motivated by optimism and confidence. His suggestion, however, was not AIDS. Wanna take a guess?Climate change.Sure enough, there are little bits and pieces of the movie in which the astronauts talk about the impact of seeing the Earth from an alien world and one of them points out how surprisingly fragile it seemed while another upon returning gained a new appreciation for how crappily we treat the planet and even pointed out that now, if you look at the planet from afar, cities have their own atmospheres.That's not to say that In the Shadow of the Moon is trying to be the next An Inconvenient Truth. It's really not. But what it does try to do is to give the viewer a vision of an America that believes it can achieve anything both from the collaboration of the many and the individual strengths of nine brave citizens who are willing to risk everything. And it succeeds.

David Dylan Thomas is a Philly-based writer/filmmaker who opines voraciously about dem pictures what move on the screen at DavidDylanThomas.com.

Philly Film Fest Day Twelve: The Age of The Office

David Dylan Thomas — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 13:50:51 EDT

There are very few movies worth seeing just for one scene (Phantom Menace comes to mind - hate Jar-Jar, love the Darth Maul battle), but Fair Play is one of them. In the second scene, corporate newbie Alexandre plays squash with his boss, Charles. Simple enough. But the way writer/director Lionel Bailliu ratchets up the tension throughout, you'd think it was a lost scene from Glengarry Glen Ross. It's twenty solid minutes of "oh, no you di'n't!" To say that one scene makes the movie kind of implies that the rest of the movie is no great shakes, but I wouldn't go that far. It does, however, get a little repetitive with scene after scene of corporate intrigue played out against some sort of sport or competition (golf, running, canyoneering). It's a rich metaphor, but a little on-the-nose in execution. On the other hand, Bailliu does a good job of gradually upping the stakes so the whole opera builds to a pretty satisfying conclusion.The performances are all top-notch, with Eric Savin turning in a multi-faceted depiction of Charles, keeping us, and himself, guessing as to just how far he'll go to save his skin. Benoit Magimel and Jeremie Renier do a great job of trying to outsleaze each other as Jean-Claude and Alexandre, respectively, while Melanie Cotillard shines as the innocent (but not really) Nicole. And Vincent Cassel's dad Jean-Pierre has a nice turn as the boss of it all. It's interesting to see how corporate culture keeps coming back in this fest. In addition to this, Severance and The Boss of It All, you've also got Claude Chabrol's latest, A Comedy of Power, with Isabelle Huppert investigating corrupt CEOs. Call it The Age of The Office.

David Dylan Thomas is a Philly-based writer/filmmaker who opines voraciously about dem pictures what move on the screen at DavidDylanThomas.com.

Philly Film Fest Day Eleven: Flawed Men and the Women Who Love Them

David Dylan Thomas — Mon, 16 Apr 2007 14:50:28 EDT

If there was a theme to today's films, it was that you really don't choose who you love. Or you do, and it's just kind of inexplicable. Okay, maybe there was no theme.Eagle vs Shark has been touted as New Zealand's answer to Napoleon Dynamite, and I can kind of see where they're coming from. You have the quirky characters, the curiously flat affect, but this has something else going on. In chronicling how wallflower Lily falls into and out of and back into love with perennial jerk Jarrod (imagine if Napoleon was just as geeky, but much more of a dick about it), writer/director Taika Waititi explores just how far love will go to find what's salvagable about a guy you'd dismiss at first, second, and fiftieth glance. Sweet, funny and, if the comparison must be made, a little bit deeper than Dynamite.In a much more real-world application of love conquers all (or at least tries really, really hard to) we have the doc The Killer Within, in which a renowned environmental psychologist reveals to his family, friends, and co-workers that he killed his college dorm mate in 1955. That January at Swarthmore, with no warning, student Bob Bechtel took a rifle and killed fellow student Holmes Strozier as Strozier slept, in what was meant to be the beginning of a killing spree that was to take out the entire dorm. Instead, Bechtel fired two more shots at random, dropped the rifle, and ran to his friend before confessing everything to the cops. Why he didn't carry out his plan is only one of a dozen mysteries at the heart of this film. Why come forward now? He'd served his time (after being found mentally unfit for trial he was shipped off to a mental institution for five years before being set free). Why did the victim's family forgive him? A note they sent to the judge was critical to his early release. If, as he claims, the killing was a Columbine-like response to being bullied, why does no one remember any such behaviour, in particular on the part of Strozier? Your feelings about Bechtel will likely shift more than once during the course of the film, as his family grapples with the revelation. Though his wife knew after their third date, Amanda, her daughter from a previous marriage and Carrah, a daughter they had after they were married, found out much, much later. It's particularly sticky for Carrah, who wouldn't exist if her father had been convicted and likely executed for his crime. To put it mildly, the film is a discussion starter.Which is exactly what filmmaker Macky Alston intended, as he said at the Q&A after the film. Three Swarthmore alums, two of whom were actually there on the night of the shootings, stood up to attest to their version of events, stressing that they had no memory of bullying. Alston explained how he became involved in the film, as Carrah was a student where he was teaching and informed him of her father's intention to out himself, inviting him to chronicle it. Carrah, by the way, was pro-death penalty until she heard about her father's past. Like I said, a discussion starter.

David Dylan Thomas is a Philly-based writer/filmmaker who opines voraciously about dem pictures what move on the screen at DavidDylanThomas.com.

Philly Film Fest Day Five: If American Idol Worked This Way, I'd Watch

David Dylan Thomas — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 14:16:59 EDT

It may seem strange to watch the sequel to a movie you've never seen, but, at the last minute, the fest couldn't get the print of Johnnie To's Election, so they showed the sequel, Triad Election (they were originally planning to show both). Fortunately, Triad Election holds up pretty well on its own, and with the exception of one or two character arcs, everything makes sense without the backstory.Triad Election follows the story of Jimmy, a criminal lieutenant everyone is expecting to run for chairman of his gang. Lok, the current chair, wants a second term, and will stop at nothing to get it. That's all well and good as long as Jimmy wants to go legit, but when he discovers that his business goals are inextricably tied to his becoming chairman, he has no choice but to run (I hear they're trying this with Gore). This, of course, pisses off Lok, and cold-blooded killing ensues.To's sequel is the old-school gangsta shit. Think Godfather, not Hard Boiled, with gloriously murky cinematography and a brooding score. To may not have anything new to say about the Faustian "But I don't wanna be a gangster!" aspects of the genre, but he says it well.

David Dylan Thomas is a Philly-based writer/filmmaker who opines voraciously about dem pictures what move on the screen at DavidDylanThomas.com.

Philly Film Fest Day Four: The Lighter Side of Lars Von Trier

David Dylan Thomas — Mon, 9 Apr 2007 21:47:11 EDT

From cartoonish depictions of religious fanatisicm we turn today to all-too-real depictions. Day Night Day Night is basically Maria Full of Grace with a backpack full of bombs replacing condoms full of coke. I saw it with a friend who pointed out that Paradise Now covers similar ground, but focuses on the politics, religion, and culture of its suicide bombers while this is more of a character study. Day Night Day Night does, in fact, feel like what would happen if Jim Jarmusch decided to make a movie about terrorists. Watching the main character, whose name we never learn and whose politics are never revealed, clip her nails or turn a light on and off over and over is just as important to director Julia Loktev's camera as watching her try on the last backpack she'll ever wear. This attention to minutae makes for an interesting counterpoint to the gravity of the subject matter. Would you bother to shave your armpits if you knew you would be dead by your own hand in a matter of hours? (This focus on preparation, by the way, leads to the creepiest girl-trying-on-different-outfits montage ever.)In the end, Day Night Day Night proves to be a very disturbing, yet almost calm, even-handed look at the least calm, even-handed situation one could imagine. On a lighter note, I saw a comedy by Lars Von Trier. Yes, that Lars Von Trier (like I'm going to say no, the Lars Von Trier who directed Norbit). The Boss of It All starts off as Von Trier's take on Office Space and evolves into his spite letter to actors, corporate culture, and people from Iceland. A very funny letter, as it turns out. With the exception of the so-so The Idiots, I really wouldn't have guessed Von Trier had it in him.Finally, Severance, the funniest horror film since Scream. Maybe funnier. Certainly bloodier. You may have seen this described as "The Office meets Deliverance" and that's more or less apt. In executing this concept, co-writer/director Christopher Smith and co-writer James Moran don't skimp on the scares to deliver the laughs, but the laughs are mostly what you'll remember. Also features Laura Harris, whom you may recognize as the terrorist hottie from season two of 24.

David Dylan Thomas is a Philly-based writer/filmmaker who opines voraciously about dem pictures what move on the screen at DavidDylanThomas.com.

Philly Film Fest Day Three: Taking on Grindhouse

David Dylan Thomas — Mon, 9 Apr 2007 16:55:29 EDT

I'll be honest. I skipped out a little on the fest today to go see Grindhouse. Amazing stuff. Especially Death Proof. Threatened to overshadow the up-and-coming indies I was to see later in the day. But these two very different films held their own.First up was Rocket Science, the first narrative feature from Spellbound director Jeffrey Blitz (and if you haven't seen Spellbound, stop reading this right now and buy, don't rent). I'm always interested to see what happens when a documentary filmmaker writes and directs his or her own feature. One assumes that a doc helmer has a pretty good handle on story as they have to cull a narrative from hundreds or even thousands of hours of footage, but can they handle dialogue? Can they work with actors? In the case of Blitz, the answer is an overwhelming yes.Actress Lisbeth Bartlett introduced the film by asking who in the audience had ever had a fear of public speaking. Nearly every hand shot up. Blitz, she explained, not only had that fear as a kid, but had it coupled with a stutter, which he was reminded of during his public speaking engagements to promote Spellbound. So he decided to draw upon his own childhood experiences to tell the story of a kid with a disfluency who joins the high school debate team.The result is a very charming, very moving, and very funny take on the coming-of-age flick which hearkens back to Lucas and Rushmore with its own unique flavor. It's coming out in August so keep your eyes peeled. I closed out the night, in the wee hours before Easter, with a movie about kee-raz-eee Christians, and no, I don't mean Alan Keyes, but that could make a good horror film, too. Now, as a Christian, I was curious how I would react to a movie where the premise is, basically, that Christians are a pretty scary bunch, when you think about it. On the far Evangelical end you have all that shouting and gesticulating and praying in tongues and in many places wacko far right political intolerance. But in the end, any religious fanaticism is scary, and I think that's where End of the Line gets a lot of its potency.This Canadian film starts out looking pretty bad. USA Up All Night bad, but not quite Sci-Fi Channel bad. And, to a certain extent, it does thrive on the schlocky zombie thriller aesthetic (any time you whip out the rubber fetus, you lose some credibility). But as the movie chugs along, the creep-out factor increases until you have a genuinely frightening and fucked-up chiller about zealots stalking non-believers through a subway system. In addition to the fairly surefire Fanatical-Christians-as-Army-of-the-Undead schtick it manages to throw in a few bigger scares into the mix (this is definitely the kind of film where the last two minutes make all the difference).

David Dylan Thomas is a Philly-based writer/filmmaker who opines voraciously about dem pictures what move on the screen at DavidDylanThomas.com.

Philly Film Fest Day Two: There's a Criminal Underworld in Oslo?

David Dylan Thomas — Sun, 8 Apr 2007 20:04:54 EDT

In Andrea Arnold's Red Road, Katie Dickie portrays a surveillance technician who becomes obsessed with one of her subjects. Turns out she recognizes him and is very concerned to see him out and about when he's supposed to be in jail. This all sounds very suspenseful and intriguing and it did win the Jury Award at Cannes last year, not to mention a crapload of Scottish BAFTAs and you know what? Boring. As. Hell.In spite of Oscar-caliber acting by Dickie (and Tony Curran as the object of her interest) and strong direction by Arnold, the movie itself is, well, dull. I will, however, give the film props for providing subtitles for the characters' thick Scottish brogue. It seems unusal at first but, trust me, you'll need them.I followed that up with the more uptempo Uro, in which an ex-soldier joins the eponymous Norwegian drug task force. Uro balances the elements of a crime drama with those of a family drama well while not having anything particularly new to add to either. If you really wanna get your undercover-cop-in-too-deep groove on, I'd sooner recommend Narc or Deep Cover, both of which are criminally underseen (or, of course, Undercover Brother). Still, I'd say it's a fairly promising debut for director Stefan Faldbakkenn (the Norse Michael Mann) and lead Nicolai Cleve Broch. (The Norse Ryan Phillipe - I mean that in a good way. Did you see my boy in Way of the Gun? He was the harshness.)

David Dylan Thomas is a Philly-based writer/filmmaker who opines voraciously about dem pictures what move on the screen at DavidDylanThomas.com.

Philly Film Fest, Day One: The State Does The Ten

David Dylan Thomas — Sat, 7 Apr 2007 09:28:10 EDT

The 2007 Philadelphia Film Festival got off to an absurdist start with The Ten, named after the Ten Commandments made famous by that TV series by Kieslowski. Paul Rudd is our guide through ten short segments each based on one of the commandments. If The State made a movie about the Ten Commandments, it would probably look like this. In fact, it basically is The State making a movie about the Ten Commandments since David Wain is directing after co-writing it with Ken Marino, and several State members appear. Although its sense of humor is very similar, The Ten, unfortunately, is not as consistently funny as The State (well, the small amount of The State that I've seen). Some of the skits are hilarious, others are "I see your point as to why that would be funny" as opposed to funny funny. Still, you have to respect a film that casts Winona Ryder in the "Thou Shall Not Steal" segment. In total, about four out of ten commandments stick the landing, especially "Thou Shall Not Take the Lord's Name in Vain." David Wain, Paul Rudd, and producer Jonathan Stern were consistently funny in their Q&A, claiming they stole the idea from Kieslowski and shot the film in 11 days. When asked about the possibility of a State movie, Wain said he'd love to but it would be a "logistical nightmare." Paul Rudd talked about how weird it was to act with a guy wearing a William Shatner mask when asked about his first role in Halloween: The Curse of Michael Meyers. David Wain, Paul Rudd and Jonathan Stern.

David Dylan Thomas is a Philly-based writer/filmmaker who opines voraciously about dem pictures what move on the screen at DavidDylanThomas.com.