Pan's Labrynth

I'm not a huge fan of fantasy. In fact, I pretty much hate fantasy, a reason why extravaganzas like Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter simply do not interest me. I like my stories firmly rooted in reality, which tends to be messier and more complex than parables and fables and clean fights between good and evil. Sometimes, in the hands of a master like the great Japanese animator Miyazaki, fantasy transcends its limitations and is emotionally and dramatically real. But this doesn't happen in most fantasy movies and it certainly doesn't happen, much to my chagrin, in Guillermo del Toro's Pan Labrynth.
I have been trying to understand why I disconnected from the film pretty soon after it started. I think the main reason is that, as is true in many works of this genre, none of the characters are multidimensional. They all represent something, but they are really no one. It is a credit to some of the talented actors in this film, particularly Maribel Verdú (from Y tu mamá también), that they try with all their might to infuse human verisimilitude to characters that are woefully underwritten.
The premise of the movie is potentially interesting. At the time of the Spanish Civil War, a little girl is brought to the house of a fascist captain in the woods who is still fighting the defeated Republican forces. Her mother has married this awful man and the girl, who is an avid reader of fairy tales, escapes into fantastic stories to deal with her increasingly deteriorating reality. She finds the courage to deal with the situation by inventing a fantastical quest that will have consequences in reality. So far, so good. The problem is that the Spanish Civil War was a very real bloodbath in which the Spaniards went against each other with terrible ferocity, and to this day it has left a national wound that has not really closed. If it becomes the stuff of legend, it loses its place in historical reality, which is where it should remain, in my opinion. It brought to mind that unspeakably offensive movie by Roberto Benigni, Life is Beautiful (give me a break), where in order to escape reality some guy clowns around in a concentration camp. Pan's Labrynth is not at all as revolting and tasteless as that, but for me, there is no room for fantasy when it comes to the history of human terror.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions. The intentions of Pan's Labrynth are certainly immaculate: it is supposed to be a powerful message against fascism, against those who obey without questioning, against those who hate books and imagination, against the precision and heartlessness of perfect order. But somehow, it failed to move me. Somehow it managed to make me not care about this child, and I think it was because it was too busy sending AN IMPORTANT MESSAGE. It was thoroughly devoid of wit or a sense of humor. It is a huge problem when filmmakers take themselves and their material so seriously. If they can't crack a joke, if they don't know the wonderful empathetic powers of comic relief, or at least of irony, they lose me at hello.
The fantastical creatures were not particularly engaging, and in fact, the main faun was so utterly cheesy and hammy that I resented every time he made an appearance. I disliked him intensely. This was no Puck or Ariel or any of those bona fide fairies that have a sense of mischief and a sense of humor. This was ponderous fantasy, with a solemn and important theme, and solemnity is utterly boring. Which is puzzling, because I saw Mr. Del Toro in an interview and he struck me as a smart, witty, engaging, articulate man. Sadly, little of that was in evidence in his movie.

The Golden Globs 2007

I watched a lot of it and it kept going on. I took a break to cook dinner and when I came back to check, Warren Beatty was still blathering on and on. The only fun part was to see people getting increasingly sloshed. Every time the camera swooped on her, Annette Benning was drinking and in excellent cheer (good for her). I missed all the important wins, but didn't miss the best speeches of the night, the divinely hilarious one by Hugh Laurie, the dead serious one by Peter Morton, writer of The Queen, (which except for one, lonely enthusiastic applause, who I assume to have been Alec Baldwin or a Sheen, seems to confirm the cowardice of Hollywood stars when it comes to wearing their politics in public) and the articulate, poignant one by America Ferrera, who had the entire female population of the Globs crying what looked like authentic, salty tears. Meryl Streep was also very cool, making a detailed mention of all the actresses and all the movies with great roles for women this year and mentioning all the small, smart movies that people never get to see in Podunk, and the fact that the wardrobe of her movie was donated to charity. She packed more useful info in her speech than anyone I've ever heard. It is evident that the Brits will always win the battle of wit, because most Americans seem to possess none. The presenters who are meant to be funny like Ben Stiller or Steve Carell were as stiff and about as funny as a casket. For a moment there it seemed that the ridiculous foreign press association was only giving awards to anybody with a British passport, but then I guess they ran out of Brits.
I'm very happy for Forest Whittaker, who is a giant, and for Martin Scorsese, and for Helen Mirren, who deserves it (though I think getting two for two Elizabeths is tacky, though not her fault). But guess what, Hollywood is tacky. Tom Hanks was ultra tacky in his presentation of the Special Award for Warren Beatty, Eddie Murphy was mega tacky when he thanked David Geffen for convincing him to make the movie for less money. Kyra Sedgwick was stupid enough to thank her publicist and her lawyer. People who do that should be banned from award shows and their statuettes confiscated. Poor Ben Stiller came out to present and you could hear the room in a massive break, yakking on top of him. Tacky. Although perhaps he deserves it.
As for the fashions, I think Cate Blanchett is starting to lose it; the worst dress of the night was a tie between Tina Fey and Julia Louis Dreyfuss (does funny necessarily mean you have no taste?).
Cameron Diaz was wearing a beautiful dress, but what's with the goth hair (and the cheek implants)? She looks awful. And it was almost flabbergasting to see formerly stunning Salma Hayek wearing a white satin number that looked like a drapery from Caesar's Palace fell on top of her, with super tacky platform shoes more befitting a disco drag queen, disheveled eyebrows (Frida happened like 10 years ago already) and looking quite matronly. There was an overhead shot at the red carpet of her boobs that was mortifying, to say the least. It made me a little sad, cause I actually admire her and was happy for her Ugly Betty win.
The people who looked stunning, which were many, you figure them out. We're here to bitch.

Children of Men

The previews I saw for Children of Men made it seem really unpalatable. There was a big disconnection between the schmaltzy clunkiness of the preview and the rave reviews that came later. If it had not been for the reviews, I would have missed one of the best movies of the year.
Alfonso Cuarón has many virtues as a director and they are all in evidence in this powerful, spectacular movie. My favorite virtue of his, which was much in evidence in the great Y tu mamá también, is his ability to weave many different moods and tones into a coherent emotional whole. Just as in Y tu mamá también he achieved a lovely melancholy undertone to the picaresque adventures of the two main characters, here he melds an urgent, moving emotional core to what is essentially an action movie. Or perhaps it's the other way around. His refreshing lack of sentimentality is what makes this possible: his movies are emotionally complex. Cuarón seems allergic to melodrama and to sentimentality, and I hope he is never cured. That is what I love about his films, the playfulness and sense of humor, the complexity, not of storytelling but of human emotion, the truthfulness of feeling. A couple of small details, like angelic choral music in a redemptive scene or the name of a ship at the end are as much as he is willing to concede to sentimentality; not much, considering that the fate of mankind is at stake.
Children of Men is an apocalyptic movie about a future that is too close to home. It is apocalyptic, yet not futuristic. That is, the immediate future looks less like the Jetsons and more like a nightmare out of Hyeronimus Bosch. It takes place in 2027, which is just around the corner, and it's not a happy sight. In this world torn apart by conflict and self-destruction, the discourse that we hear today from the likes of Bush and Donald Rumsfeld has come to pass. Illegal immigrants are put in cages and deported, they are sent to detention camps closely reminiscent of Guantánamo and Abu Ghraib, the environment is almost all toxic waste. The premise that the entire world suffers from collective infertility doesn't seem at all farfetched. What makes the movie harrowing is how close we are to being in such a state. It's almost as if the filmmakers are saying "wipe the self-satisfied grin off your face and don't get too comfortable, for we are already there".
This is a movie where there is no detachment. The camera follows the hero like a shadow and it feels as if you are there with him, right next to the explosions, shockingly close to the violence, with the point of view of the naked eye, not of the language of the camera. Yet amidst the incredible chase scenes and the beautifully exploding mayhem, Cuarón and Lubezki are capable of achieving quiet, luminous moments of grace.
I was frantically looking in the credits for whoever was responsible for the production design, which, with the entire art department, deserves a standing ovation and an Oscar (imdb says it's Jim Clay and the great Geoffrey Kirkland). I don't think I remember (except for High and Low by Kurosawa) a film that is more crammed with visual information. Because of the wide angles, the frame is full of details, and it takes a few moments to get used to so much coming from the screen. The context is as much in the foreground as the characters. I heard Cuarón say in an interview that this was his and the great cinematographer Emanuel Lubezki's approach in Y tu mamá también and they use it here as well, albeit on a much grander scale. There are not a lot, if any, traditional set ups of close up, medium shot, and reverse takes in Children of Men. The camera is fully engaged in the world around the characters. As you may have already heard, there are several extended shots in this film that are absolutely mindboggling. The piece de resistance is a climactic nine minute (or so) extended tracking shot without a single cut. However, to their credit, Lubezki and Cuarón so immerse you in the dramatic narrative that you barely notice there is a tour de force in progress. It is a thing of breathtaking power and beauty.
In Clive Owen (long live his mother, as they say in Spain, praise the Lord for making him, a bona fide movie star with tons of talent), Cuarón has found a perfectly reluctant hero and one of the main reasons why the movie works at an emotional level. Owen plays Theo, a jaded ex-activist, embittered and hurt by the loss of his son and who has grown inured to the horrors around him. I will not give you the entire plot of the movie, as Anthony Lane did in his review, because you must see for yourself. But Owen gives a sharp, moving performance of a despondent human being who is slowly wakened from his apathy by having to perform a heroic deed almost against his will. As the world collapses around him, what Theo has that many others don't is basic human decency. It's as simple as that. It is not grandiloquent outrage or a self-righteous belief in freedom and democracy or none of that crap that gets bandied about by the bad guys nowadays as an excuse for their self-interested mayhem. Theo drinks, he smokes, he winces at the grief of others and he wears his task quite uncomfortably on his sleeve. Harrison Ford, Bruce Willis or any of those simplistic, grandiose fools, he ain't.
In the end, what I most admire about Children of Men, besides it's undeniable artistry, and despite some of its commercial inclinations, is its commitment to protest. Cuarón does not shy away from shocking violence, but it is not much different from what you see on CNN any given day: people's limbs torn out by bombs, ethnic strife, a generalized disregard for human life. The movie has a strong, quietly indignant point of view about the state of affairs today, and that is what makes it so relevant, so powerful and so disturbing.

The world is full of creeps

I attended the premiere of a film. A young woman was one of the stars. In the movie she bares her breasts for half a second. She walks around wearing sexy clothes. She is very attractive.
At the reception, she was swarmed by old, salivating men chatting her up, telling her how wonderful she was. They all looked like they were about to take a bite. I don't know if she realized how creepy it was.
I heard some guy telling her that when he shoots his movie, she can be sure he's going to find a role for her in it.
I thought they made this shit up in the movies.
We, the not so spectacular looking, can only surmise the power that young beauty can wield, particularly in the field of alte cockers. What do you get in exchange for your looks and your youth? A wardrobe? A career? Perks? If you possess them, the beauty and the power, I hope you are smart and make the best of it. I hope you steer clear of icky people and their icky motives.

Notes on Notes on a Scandal

Who doesn't love British trashy movies? They are the best kind of trash. Literate, gossipy trash, enacted for our enjoyment by gifted actors with plummy accents. Like Damage, remember that one with Jeremy Irons and Juliette Binoche and the amazing Miranda Richardson? Or The Mother, with a buck naked Daniel Craig? Or even Prick up your Ears, with Gary Oldman and Alfred Molina. There is something utterly delightful at seeing the Brits lose their emotional marbles in lurid little stories. I love it.
Hence, Notes on a Scandal is a highbrow guilty pleasure, based on a novel by Zoe Heller, with a witty screenplay by Patrick Marber (of Closer fame) and well directed by Richard Eyre.
It doesn't quite work for a number of reasons, which I will go into later, but the reason to see it is for Cate Blanchett, who will be Judi Dench when she grows up, and Judi Dench herself, who is our age's Sarah Bernhardt. And then there is Bill Nighy, whom we adore.
I know we are all tired of Dame Judi getting nominated every year. We are tired of the Judi Dench drill. I am even more tired of the Clint Eastwood drill, because Dame Judi is talented, whereas El Clinto is unjustly overrated. However, this is one performance of La Dench that truly deserves a nomination. I'm still rooting for Helen Mirren (Judi would have been equally as splendid as Elizabeth II, if she weren't tired of playing every single Queen of England in every movie, always).
Dench is freaking scary. Her level of actorly proficiency is truly frightening. She is also quite fearless. She uses her scariness and and her fearlessness to chilling effect as Barbara, an embittered spinster teacher in a bad public school in London.
You take one look at Barbara, with her greasy bad perm and her pursed lips and you know bile courses through her veins. It certainly oozes from her mouth and her innermost thoughts. What a delight to listen to such articulate nastiness! One of the problems I have with the movie is that it gives away her badness from the very beginning, which makes it hard to believe that Blanchett, who becomes her victim, would be so naive as not to notice that this woman is a dangerous harpy. However, one forgives a lot because the dialogue is deliciously sardonic, and extremely literate, and since a lot of it is rendered by Dame Judi in a voiceover, you just let yourself listen to the way she inveighs a word like "invent" (as in "he did not invent it") with what would amount to polonium-210 in the physical world.
There are a couple of willful-suspension-of-disbelief moments in this movie which almost ruined it for me. However, as we live mired in Hollywoodland where characters are usually one-dimensional, and female characters are virtually non-existent, it was refreshing to see two complicated characters that were not easily explained. Barbara, as all good sociopaths, has a vulnerable side. Like the Lieutenant of Inishmore, she loves her cats more than her people, yet her loneliness makes her vulnerable to love. Her scariness is a hoot, her intelligence is amazing, but her quiet moments of devotion are why Dame Judi kicks major, incredible butt. La Blanchett, meanwhile, shows her very considerable chops by not even attempting to outperform her colleague, and she turns in a careful, utterly believable and realistic portrayal of a conflicted, bored woman, a woman sheltered by a life of privilege. Because, you must know that this being a British movie, it is about class. And class is what the Brits do superduper-well.
So while the contrivances of the movie take it a bit into the realm of "I'm not quite buying this", the artistry and truthfulness of the performances keep it firmly anchored in reality. Plus, it is thoroughly enjoyable.

Note on Phillip Glass scores: every movie nowadays seems to have one. They all seem to sound the same. It is getting to be almost self-parodic. The score for this movie is gorgeous and it works (the critics disagree with me on this one), but it is distracting, because it is so Phillip Glassiesque.