10-ish Minute Review: #Horror

This is going to be the first 10-ish Minute Review that should actually hit close to 10 minutes of writing time. Because this movie is terrible.

If you’re a fan of watching a gaggle of tweenage girls snipe and giggle at each other in overlapping (and mostly indiscernible) dialogue, try on clothes, and take pictures of each other then, by all means, pop this movie on.

If you’re like me, your eyes will start glazing over until minute 47 when stop the movie to do other things. Anything really. Eat an entire sleeve of Saltine crackers. Take up philately. Anything.

The setup is simple. A group of 12-year old super-rich girls gather for an overnight at a super-fancy modernist mansion filled with contemporary art. These are horrible children who spend their time bullying each other through their ever-present smartphones or, when convenient, to each other’s faces. We suppose, based on the genre and synopsis, that they will be terrorized or go all Children of the Corn or

Come something.

The first 20 minutes are promising–Timothy Hutton is good as a twitchy, easily distracted surgeon dad and the setting is intriguing–but then there’s a laughable, crammed-in exposition scene in which some nameless adult explains that the mansion may be haunted because of something-something-crazy-artist-murder-and-they-never-found-his-body.

And then we begin the interminably long scenes of tweenage girls doing what this movie assumes tweenage girls do: take selfies and be shitty to each other.

Full disclosure: I have no idea who tweenage girls do. Maybe this is what they do all the time. I hope not.

The point is that regardless of their accuracy depicting of the daily life of tweenage girls, these scenes are INCREDIBLY BORING. Worse yet is the decision to shoot them in a pseudo-artsy documentary style. Lots of jump cuts and weird angles of tweenage girls just… doing’ stuff. No movement on the plot, no character development. You just get to watch tweenage girls do stuff and be shitty to each other. It’s mind-numbing.

Maybe something interesting happens after minute 47. Maybe I missed out on some insightful social commentary or, at least, something entertaining.

Being boring is a cardinal sin for movies, especially genre movies, and for that sin I send #HORROR goes right to… well, not Hell exactly. Wherever halfway-watched movies go.

Movie purgatory? Whatever, I don’t care. My philately is calling.

Come for the nothing–don’t waste your time, stay for the “see previous”.

 

10-ish Minute Review: FRIDAY THE 13th

FRIDAY THE 13th, the story of a nice sweater-wearing woman who goes all Grendel’s mother on summer camp counselors.

While borrowing heavily from 1978’s HALLOWEEN, it’s a faster-moving horror flick–probably because the story is less complex. And also because it eschews exposition until the end of the 2nd act when Mrs. Voorhees explains a bit about why she’s stabbing everyone in the neck and/or axing them in the face.

Until then, it’s all camp shenanigans (featuring Kevin Bacon!) that turn into bloody mayhem (also featuring Kevin Bacon!).

This lack of front-loaded exposition (which I enjoyed) ties into the cinematography of the movie (which I also enjoyed).

Perhaps it was more of a budgetary decision (and this was a low-budget movie meant to ride HALLOWEEN’s coattails) rather than a creative one, but I liked the fact that the film was so dark. Not dark as in “grim” but dark as in “lacking light.”

Most of the film’s action takes place over one very bad night and the filmmakers weren’t afraid to fill the frame with pitch blackness. This isn’t the typical carefully-lit Hollywood “night-time” that allows you to see all the details in a frame while pretending that it’s actually dark. Instead, FRIDAY THE 13th has entire sequences in which the frame is almost drowning in impenetrable blackness. Sometimes you can see a poorly lit character, sometimes bits of the setting. But a lot of time: black.

Does it make it harder to catch all the details of a character running through the woods at night? Yes. But the filmmakers opt for the emotion rather than the detail. What’s more evocative, someone running around or a claustrophobic blackness teeming with the unseen?

While I may be over poeticizing there (and I definitely am), the decision to go with the blackness over detailed fake-night is the better one.

Not only does it give them movie a more organic feel (along with a load of unsteady Steadicam shots) but it also fits in with the structure of the movie. Because the filmmakers opted to go with a  JAWS-ian “hide-the-monster-until-the-last-possible-second” approach, embracing a frame filled with darkness fits. Until Mrs. Voorhees arrives and reveals herself as the killer, the audience knows as much as the characters they’re watching, which is about bupkis: (a) the camp is cursed and (b) horny teenagers are getting splattered.

So the audience is in the dark figuratively and literally, which is a nice dovetail of plot and cinematography to find in FRIDAY THE 13th.

Come to watch the development of some foundational slasher movie tropes, stay for the famous jump scare at the end.

**Yes, those are action figures of Mrs. Voorhees and young Jason from the original FRIDAY THE 13th in the picture above. Yes, I want them. No, I’m not going to pay $150 for them.

 

10-ish Minute Review: THE MOTHMAN PROPHECIES

Daniella, having seen this movie at some point in the foggy past, remembered THE MOTHMAN PROPHECIES as a scary thriller/suspense-y/horror-y flick. We shrugged off the fact that it was in the “Drama” section of Casa Video rather than “Horror,” because, hey, they had SNAKES ON A PLANE in the “Horror” section so maybe it was just a slight misclassification.

Turns out it was. But only because it should’ve been shelved in the “Fancily Edited Movies with No Suspense and No Point” section. And that section doesn’t exist. At least not at Casa Video.

The story, as it is, centers around Richard Gere, a well-coiffed newspaper reporter, trying to figure out who the mysterious Mothman character is that’s showing up in a small West Virginia town. People have seen the Mothman. People have heard the Mothman’s fuzzy digital voice on the phone. The Mothman has whispered weird koans in people’s ears that seem to foretell disasters: “99 on 9 in Denver” is interpreted as a warning about a plane crash that kills 99 people. And so on. The Mothman hasn’t really harmed anyone, but he’s hanging around, harassing people like a bored teenager.

As Richard Gere is pulled further into his pursuit of answers, the movie tries to tread the fine line of “Are these people consumed with a mass paranoia?” or “Is there a supernatural creature harassing the citizens?” Or, in other terms, is THE MOTHMAN PROPHESIES a psychological thriller or a monster movie?

Spoiler alert: we never find out. Or… it’s actually neither?

What is the Mothman? Why is this happening? Hewing close to truth (and this is a “based on real events” movie), these questions aren’t answered. Using his newspaper reporter resources, Richard Gere analyzes some recordings of the Mothman and finds out that its fuzzy digital voice isn’t human. He talks to a doctor who became enamored with the Mothman and ruined his life. And that’s about it. Outside of one split-second appearance that’s written off as a hallucination, the  Mothman monster only appears on-screen as frantic sketches in people’s notebooks–everyone’s least favorite scary movie trope. See above.

So after almost two hours of characters explaining what they heard, telling what they saw, and the audience hearing the fuzzy digital Mothman voice on the phone a few times, we’re treated to no answers and no resolutions.

…which could work if the movie wasn’t structured as a star-driven drama (the movie is told through the perspective of, and is ostensibly about, Richard Gere’s main protagonist character).

But it is.

So here’s the problem: because the actual interesting questions of the movie aren’t answered (what is the Mothman/why is this happening), but this is a star-driven movie, the filmmakers are forced to try to structure the story so that our protagonist gets a cathartic, redeeming ending.

This is rather clumsily set up by having his wife die tragically at the beginning of the movie. Giving Richard Gere a sad backstory enables the filmmakers to switch the main question of the movie from “What is the Mothman?” to “Will Richard Gere be able to let go of his past?” And thus, toward the end, the Mothman sends Richard Gere a message that his dead wife will call him on the telephone at some appointed hour. Will Richard Gere give into the Mothman luring him deeper into the rabbit hole and answer the telephone or will he be able to LET GO OF HIS PAST and not answer the telephone?!?!?!

Yes. By switching the main question of the film from “What is the Mothman?” to “Will Richard Gere let go of the past?” the emotional resolution of the film boils down to whether or not he answers the goddamn landline telephone. He doesn’t. Hooray?

The lameness of this is pretty clear. I see it. You see it. The filmmakers saw it. That’s why this is not the real ending of the film. Instead there is a climactic effects-budget-busting action set piece in which a bridge collapses and Richard Gere must save his potential new love interest from a watery grave.

And, since this a Richard Gere movie, he must be the hero somehow. Simply not answering a landline telephone is not enough for star movie actor. So he has to show off all his brave hero moves by saving innocent bystanders when the bridge is collapsing and then rescuing his potential love interest by utilizing the Hollywood powers that allow him to swim down to a sunken car, hold his breath for 3 minutes while performing rescue actions, see in perfect clarity at the bottom of a fast-moving river full of bridge debris at night, and escaping the sunken car so he can haul up her unconscious body while both of them are wearing full winter clothing.

When in doubt: ACTION SEQUENCE. Even if it doesn’t fit the tone or central ideas of the story.

It’s this lack of clarity in what THE MOTHMAN PROPHECIES is about (and even what kind of movie it is) that makes it a frustrating viewing experience. It’s a fascinating real-life story that’s crippled by its star-driven structure.

Come for the over-the-top editing and cinematography (at least they had fun), stay for the feeling of ennui that washes over you when the credits roll.

 

 

 

Peltier’s Top 5 for 2013

A little bit about this list: First, the year of the film is not limited to an American 2013 release date. So basically anything is game. But, as I looked back at my diary, I soon realized that films like THE GODFATHER: PARTS I & II and CASABLANCA and classics of the like would dominate, and would not allow other films (some may call “lesser”) to shine. I decided to add another rule for my Top 5–the films listed here are first-time viewings during this past calendar year. I will also amend my list to reflect, as Tyler Smith has suggested, where I saw each film. Here we go.

1. Allen’s CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS (1989), DVD at Dr. Carl Freedman’s lovely home

2. Lean’s LAWRENCE OF ARABIA (1962), 70mm print at the Aero Theatre in Santa Monica

3. Wong’s IN THE MOOD FOR LOVE (2000), 35mm print at the UCLA Billy Wilder Hammer Theatre

4. Bunuel’s THE DISCREET CHARM OF THE BOURGEOISIE (1972), 35mm print at Tarantino’s New Beverly Cinema

5. Achache’s THE HEDGEHOG (Le hérisson) (2009), 35mm print at Tarantino’s New Beverly Cinema

Austin Film Fest, Day 6: Some Inspiring Shit

In doing a Google image search for “beside still waters” (the title of my current favorite film of the fest), I discovered a lot of truly awful paintings. Typing “beside still waters movie” generates much better results. Like this.

 

So I’m a day behind already. Not hard to imagine since I’ve gotten back to my backyard cabin after 1am most nights after screenings. Last night was one of those nights. But it was worth it because I had some great festival moments catching two movies, BESIDE STILL WATERS and HANDY, instead of going to either of the two parties my badge got me access to. Maybe next year, parties filled with drunken filmmakers! 

Both movies were inspiring for totally different reasons. BESIDE STILL WATERS is, as mentioned, my current festival fave despite appearing, on the surface, to be the kind of movie I’d crap on. But I didn’t crap on it. Because it didn’t crap on me as movies of this type often do.

Logline: “In this BIG CHILL for Generation Y, a group of childhood friends come together for the last time at the scenic lake house where they all grew up, to comfort each other, rekindle old flames and drunkenly stumble down memory lane.”

I think I’m enthralled by the film because 1) I’m the same age as the writers/director, so I “get” the themes; 2) the chemistry and energy of the cast extended into the theater because the director and his friends the movie was based on were in attendance, and they were having a GREAT time; 3) it deftly handles comedy and pathos; 4) it doesn’t over-extend itself or feel undercooked; 5) there’s a sequence that uses pre-lap audio in an Archer-esque way that is all about anal sex–but not in a shitty teen comedy way. Which I appreciate.

After spending so many hours sitting and watching and taking notes, my conference energy was seriously flagging, but this movie gave me a bit of a boost. It feels as relevant as any movie I’ve seen to someone in their late 20s and its cinematic and tightly paced and feels “real”. Whatever that means. Maybe how the characters and situations in the film don’t feel like someone’s attempt to recreate what people born in the mid-80s do/say/feel/experience. “Real.”

The title is kinda junky, but nothing’s perfect.

And the next film is a great example of nothing being perfect. Oh, HANDY, you absolutely bizarre… thing. HANDY is about a hand that separates itself from the body of a terrible writer and decides to go off into the world, where it gets tutored by the best writer in Sicily, falls in love with another separated hand and makes pizza and gets lost in the desert and lots of other fairly batshit crazy stuff. Eventually there’s a hand rebellion and talking head footage of a US military officer and there’s voiceover narration and Franco Nero and the problem of hands being infertile and the hand becomes a movie star and ALL SORTS OF ABSOLUTELY CRAZY SHIT.

It was interesting–not quite enough to keep me entertained–but it was so idiosyncratic and basically ignored standard plot structure, and so I stuck around just to see where it would go. By the end it was almost 1 in the morning, the theater was freezing, and I was pretty glad it was over. But I was excited to hear from the director to figure out who could’ve hatched such an insane movie. Vicenzo Cosentino gave one of the best post-screening Q & A’s I’d seen. He seemed kinda feverish and admitted he wasn’t feeling great, but he gave pretty straightforward no-bullshit answers to the questions. And his perseverance is pretty inspiring. (Pardon any missed details below)

Did I mention that Italian legend Franco Nero is in this movie? He is. And he’s basically the reason this feature exists in the first place. As Vincenzo told it, he made a short based on the detached hand idea that won an award at a festival that Nero was at. They struck up a conversation in which Nero found out that Vicenzo had no money or budget for a feature based on the short and offered to act in it for free if Vicenzo wanted him to. Well, Vincenzo had no plans to turn the short into a feature, but he had a legend lined up for a role in a feature so… he made a feature. And that night, after the awards ceremony, he went to his hotel room and wrote a 20 page part for Franco Nero, caught him at the airport the next day and showed him the pages. To which Franco Nero replied, “You’re fucking crazy. But these pages are great. I’ll do it.”

Thus began a 4-year odyssey during which Vicenzo, with no money or real help, made a feature film starring detached hands. That skateboard. And fall in love. And start wars. And travel the world. 

Yes, Vincenzo travelled the world to get shots to put in his sequence where the two hands that fall in love do the same. So he illegally got footage in places like the Eiffel Tower and the Pyramids of Giza because no one realized he was making a movie about hands.

And he made clothes for his hands. And props (including a tiny bag of tortilla chips). And he filmed in his house, turning part of it to a pizza place. His Q & A was actually probably better than the film because it revealed the lengths he went to as a filmmaker to finish his first feature, no matter how weird it is. Living in a van during film school and so on. Accepting that he was a crew of one shooting a movie about hands. Just going for it.

And now he has a finished movie. It’s not a great movie, but it is a memorable movie. And Vincenzo acknowledges that maybe that’s better in the long run. Because, he explained, he could’ve made some horror movie and it would be one among a million horror movies. But this is the only movie starring hands. So hopefully whatever buzz he gets pays off for him! 

Austin Film Fest, Day 4: THE ART OF THE STEAL Steals the Day

 

Two things that really stood out on the day: the film fest crowd is WAAAAY different than the Australian Rules Football guys I’d been hanging out last weekend (the National tournament was in Austin–if you don’t know the sport, YouTube it) which isn’t much of a surprise. But it hit me when a panelist this afternoon made the following reference to people’s arbitrary taste, “Hey, some people hate to watch Star Wars. And some people love to watch the Phantom Menace.” As a joke, it killed. We are not in jockland anymore. And hopefully, I won’t be tempted to de-cleat anyone this weekend.

The second thing: if you can, stay downtown somewhere. You never know when you’ll bump into the Finnish director of a short film who’ll ask you to go pound some beer with him at 1am. That 4-mile drive to the backyard cabin you’re renting can be a buzzkill. Next year I can concentrate on partying.

I went to a couple panels today. The first, “How to Work the Conference,” was a helpful reminder to not be an introverted spaz. The second was called “New Television, New Media” and featured the creators of Netflix’s HEMLOCK GROVE along with an AMC exec. I left my notes in the truck and I’m not gonna walk out and get them, but one of the main takeaways from that panel was that we may be close to a truly “novelistic” media form. Longer than a feature, one writer, one director, no structural restrictions. But even now, a show like HEMLOCK GROVE, which the creators conceived as a 13-hour movie, is still under the thrall of “old” TV practices. For instance, they were required to so a 13-hour long season because the show needs to be packaged as a “TV series” for foreign distribution and not a 13-hour movie. Also, the creators felt that a 42-minute episode was the sweet spot to shoot for, but once production was underway, they were asked to add 10-ish minutes to each episode to fill them out. Despite feeling they were already paced too slowly. 

So the dream of a (big-time, mainstream) web-based series approaching a truly new format isn’t quite realized.

Then I adjoined to eat gyros, drink a beer, and play skee-ball.

The opening film of the festival, COFFEE, KILL BOSS is a bit of an AFF darling because the script was a semi-finalist two year ago. It was an up-tempo Ten Little Indians-esque thriller/farce on corporate America that had some strains of 30s/40s crime comedies. Peter Breitmayer as the office asshole was the standout.

The ushers cleared the theater, so I got in line for the next showing at the Paramount Theater, THE ART OF THE STEAL, a heist flick starring Kurt Russell. The badge line stretched from the theater doors, around the corner, down the block, and around the next corner. A massive, massive line.

But good Christ I’m glad that didn’t deter me. THE ART OF THE STEAL (written/directed by Jonathon Sobol) is the best movie I’ve seen in awhile. Slickly made and entertaining and satisfying and flat-out hilarious. And smart in the way that heist movies need to be so you don’t feel cheated. I’m too tired to write anything more profound than MOVIE = GOOD.

(And I have to be up in 6 hours so I can see Shane Black talk about injecting comedy into action scripts. Weeeee!)

By the way, I also took a headfirst dive into twitter today, so you can follow my dumbs musing on the Austin Film Fest via @tylerresmith. Hooray for more timesucks!

Cumulative beer tally:
Southern Tier Pumpkin Ale
Independence Stash IPA
Austin Beerworks Fire Eagle IPA
Independence Brewery Convict Hill Oatmeal Stout
512 Brewing Pecan Porter
Modelo Especial
Full Circle Blur (banana hefe)
Lonestar
Shiner Prickly Pear
Dogfish Head American Beauty

Current *best* TX beer:
(tie) Independence Stash IPA & 512 Pecan Porter

Breaking Apart Bad

Anyone who has been following Breaking Bad for the past five seasons knows the stakes are in the clouds for this upcoming Sunday’s series finale, and we’re cringing still from Walter’s phone conversation with Jr. You know what I mean when I say devastating character transformations, this one is a heart snatching monster. What I’d like to shine some light on are two key foreshadowing scenes that I will base my Breaking Apart Bad prediction. The airlock is open, let’s take a jump shall we?

One. Jesse watches his girlfriend/family member (the series is emphatic on family values and themes) Andrea shot before his very eyes, and Brock is threatened to be next. Now, let’s throw that scene up in the air, let it float alongside us as we rocket down to Earth. Rewind to Hank’s death. Let me make two very important distinctions. One, here is the first scene where Walter loses a family member, right in front of him. Walter’s demons catch up with him, and the reversal is complete. All the lives he wasted to get to his position. It’s been a persistent element of the plot. Two, right before Hank dies, he’s got this just perfect line, “Walt, you’re the smartest guy I know, but you’re too stupid to see it. He made up his mind ten minutes ago”. Bang. Jack shoots Hank dead in the sand, right after Hank sticks it to Walt, one simple truth. You can’t read people. Fast forward to my prediction.

Jesse, having seen the (second) love of his life murdered in front of him, and with Walt’s revelation that he watched Jane die from overdose with Jesse sleeping soundly at her hip, I predict a confrontation between Walt, Jesse, Tod, and Jack, since Walter is going to storm the castle and get his fat barrels back, where Jesse will die in front of Walt and say something along the lines of “Walt, you’re the brightest bitch I know, but you’re too stupid to realize, it was never about your family. It was always about you”. Something to stick to Walt in the same fashion as Hank.

Two. My second prediction is volatile and subject to the most scrutiny and comes from an abundance of scenes where Walt has taken on an aspect of someone he kills. One. Crazy Eight. After Walt makes his prisoner a sandwich and cuts off the crusts as requested, Walt from then on, makes sandwiches for himself without crusts. Two, when Gus reveals his plan to poison the Cartel boss, Gus lays out a towel in front of the toilet and vomits up the toxic drink he just downed. Walt sees this in passing, and from then on, lays down a towel to do his vomiting. Walt picks up traits, and when he’s in the diner at the beginning of season five, we see his name is changed on his ID and his last name is Skylar’s maiden name, Lambert. What does this mean? I predict Walter kills Skylar.

If you have kept up with the series, you know on that note the floor has been opened to debate. Hold nothing back, because our friends in the Bad world definitely aren’t this coming Sunday.

New Fellowship for Emerging Writers at Universal Pictures!

A new fellowship, just announced, from Universal for emerging writers.

From the website:

“The Emerging Writers Fellowship is an exciting new program at Universal Pictures that is designed to identify and cultivate new and unique voices with a passion for storytelling. We are looking for talented screenwriters who have the potential to thrive, but don’t have access to or visibility within the industry.”

Winners will work full-time for a year at Universal (!) as well as sit in on meetings, receive mentoring, and pitch ideas.

Applications open September 3rd, with Universal only accepting the first 500 applications.

Requirements: full-length screenplay, two (2) letters of recommendation, resume, statement of purpose.

Universal’s site and the information within is linked across this entire sentence.