Just because its a theme song, doesn't mean its not true
by Paul (4 Comments) 
Tropic Thunder
Ben Stiller
Ben Stiller, Robert Downey Jr, Jack Black, Danny McBride, Tom Cruise
Rated R
Its hard not to look back on Tropic Thunder without finding several lines and situations that were out and out hilarious. A classic satire on Vietnam movies and war movie in general, Tropic Thunder is the story of a real life war in a fake movie that isn't being made, but was supposed to be made. A blockbuster movie, adapted from a novel written by a war veteran "Four Leaf" Tayback (played by Nick Nolte), with Hollywoods biggest stars of comedy (Jeff Portnoy, played by Jack Black), drama (5 time Oscar winner Kirk Lazarus, played by Robert Downey Jr) and action (Tugg Speedman, played by Ben Stiller).
During initial filming the actors aren't cooperating, the shots are failing the movie seems doomed (the fake movie, not the real movie -- yet); in an effort to get more "authentic" acting, first time director Damien Cockburn, takes the actors to the jungle and drops them off (hiding cameras throughout). Unfortunately, Damien gets blown up by a land mine; which the actors believe is just an effect; and real drug lords happen upon the heavily "armed" actors and begin to attack. What ensues is a long series of misunderstandings, not unlike Three's Company (but set in a jungle).
There are fairly hilarious moments, but also very long periods of tired and dull moments. The absolute best part of the movie is Tom Cruise. Yes, Tom Cruise. Who plays a bald, fat, hairy, crass movie executive - pretty much Jerry Maguire (if Jerry Maguire were real and not a Hollywood invention), as well as the opening "fake" trailers (for movies the actors; Tugg Speedman, Kirk Lazarus, Jeff Portnoy). The movie is both violent, vulgar, campy and boring. Other than that, its good, but not great; and certainly not something one has to see on the big screen.
Why so serious?
by Paul (1 Comments)
The Dark Knight
Christopher Nolan
Christian Bale, Heath Ledger, Aaron Eckhart, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Gary Oldmam, Michael Caine, Morgan Freeman
Rated PG-13
The superlatives and accolades that have been tossed at The Dark Knight are to the point where you almost feel like hating the movie just because its so popular (I'm looking at you Luke -- but seriously, I have the tendency as well). There's very little else one can say that hasn't been exhausted.
The Dark Knight is fantastic. Its plot complex, the characters subtle, mysterious and realistic, the dialog engaging and though provoking, Ledger is phenomenal (and sadly his death is probably his best shot at getting an Oscar, not his amazing performance). As near to perfect as a film can be, The Dark Knight delivers. What always sets the great films apart from the good films is one thing -- a challenge to our comfort and a universal theme that resonants with the time. The obvious part is The Joker's part of "terrorist", and Batman's role of rescuer/hero. The not so obvious part is that the hero is a villain. Vilified and hunted. The most important and impacting line from the entire movie is at the end; as Chief Gordon and his son watch Batman motor off into the horizon (reminiscent of old westerns, like Shane):
Because he's the hero Gotham deserves, but not the one it needs right now...and so we'll hunt him, because he can take it. Because he's not a hero. He's a silent guardian, a watchful protector...a dark knight.
Often the things we need aren't the things we want. We want the world to be without suffering. We want everyone to be fed. We want to be rich, to be happy, to be protected. We never want to know the cost. We never want to know the sacrifice. We never want to know the natural consequences. If a hero is truly a hero, then they see those things we ignore, and do what has to be done anyway. That, to me, is the most poignant insight into our American culture that cinema has attempted in the last 5 years.
There's no golden ring at the end of the ride
by Paul (0 Comments)
Rescue Me -- Season 1
Denis Leary, John Scurti, Andrea Roth, Lenny Clark
TV-MA
Since canceling cable several months ago, I've actually had even more time to devout to quality television (and movies). I had succumb to the "because its on I'll watch it" blindness. But no more. I'm now finding the time intentionally watch shows that have been recommended.
One of the first we've dove into is "Rescue Me". I recall watching an episode or 2 many years ago, and for some reason never kept up. On the surface "Rescue Me" follows the life of New York City firefighter Tommy Gavin and his cohorts at Engine 62, especially dealing with the aftermath of September 11th. While life at a firehouse is in itself feverish and exciting, its the relationship of the firefighters, and their families that drive the show.
The central character of the show is Tommy Gavin (Denis Leary). Tommy Gavin is a prick. Tommy is opinionated, verbally and physically abusive, manipulative, racist, emotionally detatched and unsympathetic alcoholic. Once he's on his job he's a man of steal who will do anything to make sure every one is rescued -- usually risking his life and the safety of his crew. His wife and he recently separated; and she now lives directly across the street so that he walk over and criticize her parenting skills or spy through the window on her new boyfriend. Tommy breaks the rules -- like the unwritten rule that firefighters never get involved with firefighter widows. So Tommy gets involved with Sheila, a loud mouthed, dramatic, passionate 911 widow -- the widow of Jimmy Keefe (Tommy's cousin and best friend). Throw into this mix the fact that Tommy is tormented by the ghosts of all those he could not save, and one ghost in particular; Jimmy.
The show follows the travails, failures, chaos and tragedy that seems to rest on the shoulders of these brave men. Men who find penance in their work. Men who find salvation in their work, which redeems their failures and shortcomings. Even with their problems these men hide their pain, their hurt and their heart (because real men can only make fun of each other, never cry and never need help). Rescue Me is hilarious, uncomfortably realistic, and often moving. If you don't mind realistic domestic issues (including sex and abuse), harsh language; I highly recommend you put this show in your cue.
A Man of Destiny, A Boy Of Dispair
by Paul (1 Comments)
The Last American Man
Elizabeth Gilbert
Penguin Books
Pages: 288
In ancient Jerusalem, during Yom Kippur the people would cast their sins and burden upon a ceremonial goat (a scapegoat) and sent it off to the wilderness to perish. A symbolic gesture -- a literal escape goat -- much like the confession of sins and doing the Rosary, the scapegoat has come to symbolize unjust treatment of someone innocent, when truly its someone whose sacrificed for the sake of others absolution. Eustace Conway was born to be a "Man of Destiny" and that destiny seems to be to carry the burden of his families sins and burdens to the wilderness.
In The Last American Man Elizabeth Gilbert explores the life of Eustace Conway, a North Carolina man whose life mission is bring people back to earth -- quite literally -- by teaching them the skills to live off the land and reconnect with how mankind is supposed interact with the earth. Eustace is no hippie, no fly by night environmentalist, no liberal tree-hugger -- he loathed the comparison, no Eustace is a frontier man, a modern Daniel Boone or Davy Crockett; a man that could build a cabin, kill a squirrel at 50 yards with a knife and travel across the country on a horse in under 4 months.
From a young age Eustace immersed himself in outdoors, raising hundreds of turtles and taking notes and writing journals, not just observing nature, but examining and learning from it. He could do anything he set his mind on; identify plants and trees, birds and fish, make clothing from leather (leather he tanned and made himself) and live off the land around him for weeks. He could escape.
Life was far from perfect. Eustace was ruled by a tyrannical father -- who belittled him daily, openly encouraging Eustace's brothers and sisters to mock and laugh at him. A father who cast his own disappointment and impossible expectations upon his first son. His mother was the daughter of frontier man, a near mirror of Eustace, a mother who could never please her or take her rightful calling (of taking his place at leader of the "Camp Sequoyah For Boys"). His mother tried her best to encourage him, to be diligent and to always believe he could do anything if he set his mind upon it. And he did just that -- always hoping that one day it would be enough to make his dad pleased and proud.
So Eustace left, and took the hurts and shame of the family with him off to the wilderness, where he managed to hike the Appalachian Trail, ride horseback across the country, kayak in Alaska, ride a wagon across the north, purchase hundreds of acres of land in Boone North Carolina (while living just off the land in a teepee) and founded Turtle Island Preserve while spreading his message to kids, classrooms, colleges, radio and TV. But never has he found satisfaction or contentment from the one place he needs it most -- a father who accepts him for who he is.
The Last American Man is a slap to our collective faces. We've lost what it means to a man, your even human in the purest sense of existence; to know our world, to make it thrive and continue the cycle of stewardship and care giving, of truly providing and reusing and releasing our dependence upon worthless things:
... in nature everything is connected, circular. The seasons are circular. The planet is circular, and so is its passage around the sun. The course of water over the earth is circular, coming down from the sky and circulating through the world to spread life and then evaporating up again. ... I live in a circular teepee and I build my fire in a circle, and when my loved ones visit me, we sit in a circle and talk. The life cycles of plants and animals are circular. ... but we modern people have lost sight of that ... They live in boxes. They wake up every morning in the box of their bedroom because a box next to them started making beeping noises to tell them it was time to get up. They eat their breakfast from a box where they throw that box away into another box. Then they leave the box where they live and get into a box with wheels and drive to work, which is just another big box broken up into lots of little cubicle boxes where a bunch of people spend their days sitting and staring at the computer boxes in front of them. ... Break out of the box ... You're not handcuffed to your culture!"
The Last American Man, Pages 18-19
That doesn't mean any of us will live in a teepee on our own land in the wilds of North Carolina, but we certainly learn more about how to grow our own foods, use our hands to make and build and exert some healthy energy, use less resources, care for what we have; without being a fanatic or spaced-out idealist. All the while the contrast of a man so full of energy and vigor and passion and knowledge -- so attune to life; finds himself alone, looking for approval from a father, a wife and companion, unable to lift the burdens put on his shoulders.
Carry the light
by Paul (7 Comments)
The Road
Cormac McCarthy
Alfred A. Knopf Publishers
Pages: 287
At some point in all our lives we wonder what might the world be like if all the things we knew, had grown accustomed to were gone. Destroyed. Vanished in some global war or catastrophe. Its not a new story; as old as man, the idea of judgment on humanity, of rapture and apocalypse., but Cormac McCarthy deftly and mercilessly takes us on a small journey through narrow vision of the old story. "The Road" is as much about the end as it is the beginning but more than anything its about small hopes in purposeless times.
"The Road" focuses on the journey of 2 people with no names; simply a father and son, who along with meager possessions (like loose blankets, canned goods and a grocery cart) head south in the hope of something more than scorched earth. We don't know what happened, but that its been years and all things have run out; been rummaged and foraged and spoiled and all that's left are the remnants of humankind left to his own devices for survival. The man protects his boy with a single gun with 3 bullets -- to keep the bad guys away. Bad guys who will take anything, eat anything. The walk on dead and quiet roads and paths; a blackened sky, ashen haze over everything; black sooty rivers and streams. No calls of animals or birds.
As they journey we gather glimpses of what was and what is and how it all fell after -- after the happening, the bright light, the slight rumble, the very night the boy was born. A child with no memory of blue skies, birds or animals, cities or people, nothing but burning and fires, death and walking and starving. Yet his father knows the boy carries the flame, the fire -- he's chosen. So then walk for the south, the ocean.
In what might seem like a bleak and hopeless message, McCarthy paints the perfect portrait of sacrifice and love and that hope can transcend despair. For me, it felt like the countless dreams I've had of watching the world end, of not being able to protect my family and my fear or treading where McCarthy goes -- the depravity of man when they cease to believe in life or hope. I highly recommend the book, for those who aren't faint of heart or disturbed (there are gruesome portraits of man doing to other man/woman/child -- though never graphic or grotesque or shocking for the sake of shocking).
The book is being made into a movie, tentatively set to release in the fall of 2008, directed by John Hillcoat and starring Viggo Mortensen (whom I actually pictured as the father when reading the book -- he and Christian Bale).
Let me speak plainly
by Paul (2 Comments)
There Will Be Blood
Paul Thomas Anderson
Daniel Day Lewis, Dillion Freaser, Paul Dano
Rated R
Daniel Plainview liked to speak plainly. Frankly. A solitary man bent on gaining riches; just enough to leave everyone behind him. He dug his wells deep, chipping away at rock and soil, sifting through the mud for the black gold -- oil. Men came to help and drill and by the meat of his own hands he built a small empire on the backs of men he called "family". One day a boy -- Paul -- a quiet kid approached Daniel. Unassuming and shy and seemingly harmless. Just a boy looking for some money, innocently enough disclosing where there might be a place to find oil. Greed. Victory. Consumed Daniel, and his life spiraled downward as he gained more, defeated his foes, found his wealth and power. At the cost of "family" and friends and sanity.
There Will Be Blood is a methodical family saga replete with the praises of hard work and the destruction of vanity and greed. Set in the early twentieth century, Daniel Plainview is an oil man. A politician. A preacher. He uses what he has -- an orphan child, a fake brother -- to gain communities trust, to buy more land, to drill more wells, to get further away from his own head. Eventually he meets his equal -- in the boy-preacher Eli Sunday -- who spouts spiritual drama to gain his own wealth and pride and praise. As the Plainview family grows in wealth, and Eli Sunday grows his church -- both spiral toward each other and down a path of misery.
There is no traditional story arch, more of a peek at pivotal moments and incidences. The revelation that the truth is far more brutal than the masks Eli and Daniel wear. You can say the right words, fool people into seeing things as you want them to be seen, but the truth of who you are catches up with you. The soundtrack (by Radiohead guitarist, Johnny Greenwood) plays its own role in the movie -- as the small spark of truth through an unbalanced, eerie pitch that pierces your skull, like the madness that quietly consumers the men. There Will Be Blood is beautifully filmed in the barren landscapes, bright and overpowering, subtle and revealing; the acting is riveting and brutal; feeling as if the story were true and still echoing today.
