|
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
|
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|
|
|
Also this issue: All the Small Things Arachronism Fest Shorts |
|
|
|
|
 |
|||||||||
July 18-24, 2002
screen picks
Chris Marker Retrospective (Sat., July 20, 7 p.m., free, International House, 3701 Chestnut St., 215-895-6542, www.ihousephilly.org) It might seem odd that International House's Chris Marker mini-retro -- drawn, like free programs to follow on July 27 and Aug. 3, from the collection of Leonard Guercio -- includes a movie he didn't direct, Joris Ivens' 1962 ...A Valparaíso, a documentary portrait of a mid-sized Chilean town for which Marker wrote the narration. But as the four films in the program, which runs a little under two and a half hours, demonstrate, narration has always been central to Marker's canon, which takes a uniquely playful and emotionally-driven approach to exposing the machinery of cinema.
There's no better example than La Jetée (1962), which may be the best-known experimental half-hour short ever produced. Composed almost entirely of still frames -- close attention is required to spot the one genuine moving shot -- Marker's futuristic "photo-novel" abstracts cinema almost to its essence, using narration, lap dissolves and camera position to bring to life the story of a post-apocalyptic man obsessed with an image from his past. (If this sounds at all like 12 Monkeys, it's because Terry Gilliam openly swiped the film's central conceit.) On the one hand, La Jetée is perfect film-class fodder, but on the other, the film's preoccupation with images, as opposed to shots, perfectly mirrors the main character's obsession, even if you imagine the character was created to fit the method rather than the other way around. La Jetée might have been the Memento of its day, but Marker doesn't feel the compulsion to point out all his tricks before the curtain goes down, which means the movie lingers rather than jarring you up and setting you back down.
The Koumiko Mystery is perhaps even more beguiling. Set against the backdrop of the 1964 Olympics in Tokyo, the film becomes a microcosmic encapsulation of the romance between subject and object, between filmmaker and filmed. Koumiko Muraoka, a young woman whom Marker claimed to have picked out of the stands, is painted as an elusive Godardian nymphet for whom pop culture and philosophy exist on the same level. Marker's approach is kaleidoscopic, impatient, frequently digressing into narrated history lessons or seeming tangents, but always returning to Koumiko, who remains as tantalizingly impenetrable to Marker as Tokyo itself. It's worth noting that in French, the word "Mystery" precedes Koumiko's name, since such mysteries as are even defined are not about her so much as they are her, and she is them. The Koumiko Mystery remains somewhat impenetrable itself, but it's possible to love it without fully understanding it.
More conventional documentaries, ...A Valparaíso and 1971's The Train Rolls On, don't have the same richness. Train begins with a stunning recapitulation of early-20th century Soviet history before settling into a hagiography of Alexander Medvedkin, who helped organize the Soviet Union's 1932 "Cine-Train" project, which crammed a train car filled with a film crew and developing and projection equipment and sent it around the country, often using film to show workers how to produce more efficiently. Given that nothing remains of the Cine-Train-produced films, Marker often simply plops the camera down in front of Medvedkin and lets him reminisce, which might seem less deadly if the film's first half weren't so visually dense and enthralling. As it is Train starts to feel like a cross between propaganda and getting stuck next to a boring relative at Thanksgiving dinner.
Say Anything…/Jerry Maguire/Vanilla Sky ($19.98/$27.95/$29.99 DVD) It may seem a bit odd when, midway through his Jerry Maguire commentary, Cameron Crowe remembers filming the scene in question and says, "That was the moment I knew I wanted to direct." Considering that Crowe was in the middle of filming his third feature, you'd think he would have cemented that career choice long before. But then, Crowe's never seemed like a born director, which is one of the things that make his movies work. What you remember from a given movie is not this or that bravura shot, but a scrap of dialogue or a moment of performance, or the perfect way a song invades the room at just the right instant. Watching Say Anything... again after perhaps a 10-year break, I was amazed how awkwardly the famous shot of John Cusack holding up his boom box fit into the overall narrative; it's like it was stuck in the middle because it had to go somewhere.
Of course, re-watching a movie, particularly one with as strong an emotional charge as Say Anything, after a decade-plus layoff is a risky proposition at best, but it's astonishing how well Cusack's performance holds up. As Crowe reveals on the disc, the central character trait behind Cusack's Lloyd Dobler was "optimism as a revolutionary act," which is to say he's a man who recognizes the possibility that things might go badly, but chooses to act as if they won't. He's not a naif or a dreamer, so much as a warrior against despair; it's fitting that his dream career is kickboxing. "Why can't you just decide to be in a good mood and be in a good mood?" an exasperated Lloyd asks, as if force of will could move the planets. This far down the road, Ione Skye's unconvincing brain looks even less worthy of Lloyd's affections -- the only thing about him that doesn't make sense is why he's set his sights on her (especially since the women he's friends with are leagues more interesting).
Jerry Maguire, the movie that convinced Crowe he wanted to direct, is better-looking but not as appealing: the Diane Court to Say Anything's Corey. Say what you will, though -- the fucker plays. Even though Crowe is on the verge of celebrating his own craft -- you can practically hear him snickering behind the camera -- you have to be some sort of break-dancing robot not to squeeze out a few during the movie's most tear-jerking scenes. (If you'd like to continue enjoying it, though, steer clear of the back-slapping commentary with Crowe, Cruise, Gooding and Zellweger, and do likewise for Vanilla Sky, whose jaw-droppingly self-indulgent digital nattering features "live accompaniment" by Crowe's wife Nancy Wilson, guest appearances by their children, and a real-time phone call to Cruise and Shalom Harlow's answering machine.) Vanilla Sky might be Crowe's first movie as a "director," which is to say it's visually elaborate, structurally intricate, and becomes less interesting every time you watch it. Don't lose hope, though. Maybe Crowe will go back to being a journalist, and who knows what kind of movies he'll make then.
Branded to Kill (Mon., July 22, 2 a.m., Sundance Channel; $29.95 DVD) Sundance Channel's monthlong rummage through the Criterion Collection's treasure chest turns up a bunch of acknowledged classics (Cries and Whispers, The Passion of Joan of Arc) as well as this nutball curiosity, directed by Japanese B-auteur Seijun Suzuki. The missing link between Samuel Fuller and Jean-Luc Godard, Suzuki has only a passing interest in plot, which leaves this off-kilter gangster movie free to devote screen time to the central hit man's obsession with the smell of boiling rice or the fatal consequences of errant butterflies. Referenced in Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai and psychic kin to Blue Velvet, Branded to Kill is the kind of movie you should stumble across on late-night TV, but you might consider watching it on purpose all the same.
