Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
Okay... looks like the MATRIX RELOADED reviews have started landing online. I saw one at DVD Talk, another at The Digital Bits, and there's a fairly disappointed one from Nick Nunziata over at CHUD. Sounds like it’s got great sound and picture, and decent extras. The lack of any commentary is going to make some fans crazy, but I’m willing to bet we never hear one from the Wachowskis. They’ve been pretty clear about not wanting to explain the films, wanting to let them speak for themselves. I’m debating if I’m going to pick the disc up now or if I’m going to just wait and get the inevitable box set that’ll be coming some time next year. I’m not saying it’s been announced, or even rumored, but come on... you know it is. There’s no way Warner is going to ignore a potential double-dip that sweet. Just create an extra disc of stuff we haven’t seen... maybe even stuff they intentionally hold back... and put that in as the bonus, and we’ll all pony up to get the entire trilogy. I’m sorry. Does that sound paranoid? Or is that just the abused consumer in me, knowing that I’m going to do exactly what they want and give them the money both times? I’ll kick and scream, sure, but I’ll still cough up for the films more than once.
I’m going to kick today off with my featured review, and it’s not a new title... but it seems like a timely one, since we never got around to doing the right thing earlier in the week...
FEATURED REVIEW: SINGIN’ IN THE RAIN
It’s the easy choice when you think of Donald O’Connor. After all, “Make ‘Em Laugh” is one of the most joyous and energizing musical sequences in all of film. It’s one of those things that never fails to entertain me, no matter how many times I’ve seen it. It is the very definition of classic, and it’s amazing how, as good as it is, it’s not his best moment in the film. O’Connor’s at least as great in the “Moses” number, a comic duet of sorts with Kelly.
And, astoundingly, that’s not the best moment in the film, either. Which is why SINGIN’ IN THE RAIN endures, year after year, and should always be on the short list when someone asks, “What’s the best musical ever made?” As Latauro pointed out in his comments in yesterday’s AICN Down Under column, the film’s song score was assembled from songs that were performed first in other movies, something that almost never resulted in something special. The screenplay by Adolph Green and Betty Comden is a thing of sublime joy, one of the most knowing comedies about filmmaking ever. This is a wonderful look at the moment when movies switched from silence to sound, and the effect it had on the people who were already stars at that point. Jean Hagen is brutally funny in the film, a monstrous powderpuff, and Debbie Reynolds is adorable. There’s a sunniness to her performance which manages to never be cloying or overly sweet. Kelly and O’Connor are hilarious together, and as good a musical this is, I always think of it as a comedy first.
When Warner Bros. released SINGIN’ IN THE RAIN on DVD last year, they set a standard for their own releases that they have yet to surpass. First of all, they got everyone to record material for the audio commentary. Debbie Reynolds, O’Connor, Cyd Charisse, the screenwriters, and even Baz Luhrmann, who talks about the influence the film had on him. Then, on the second disc, you get to look in-depth at the songbook that influenced the writing of the film with excerpts of the songs in other films. It’s wild, seeing “Singin’ In The Rain” as performed in THE HOLLYWOOD REVUE OF 1929, or “Good Morning” from BABES IN ARMS. Arthur Freed and Nacio Herb Brown wrote these songs, and it’s in the flexible nature of how they can be performed and how they play in different contexts that the songs are really proven. The sound and picture on this disc is as good as it can be. Colors are rich and vibrant, and it looks like the absolute best restored print possible. This is one of those titles that any serious film collection must feature, and watching it again this week, I was touched by just how eternal the performance of Donald O’Connor was. How many musicals are there that you can recommend even to people who hate musicals? Not many, but consider this one.
FROM THE SHELF
While I’m thinking about Warner Bros. and musical comedies, one of the titles that I saw for the first time this week was Christopher Guest’s A MIGHTY WIND, the latest in his series of improvised comedies starring a sort of rotating ensemble of comic character actors. I had heard over and over that A MIGHTY WIND was the weakest of the three films he’s made like this, so I went into it expecting very little. Overall, I think WAITING FOR GUFFMAN is the broadest and most obvious of the films, I think BEST IN SHOW is the funniest, and I think A MIGHTY WIND is the most honest. It might not be as fall-down funny as the earlier films, but these performers have really hit a stride together, and the result is something that I didn’t expect, something that becomes quite moving.
In particular, I want to say that Eugene Levy deserves a Best Supporting Actor nomination for his work as Mitch, one half of a folk duo that fell apart when their romantic relationship crumbled. One of several acts reunited for a tribute concert to a recently-deceased manager who once represented all of them, Mitch and Mickey (Catherine O’Hara) are the reason to watch the film, in my opinion. Don’t get me wrong... there’s great chemistry between Michael McKean, Harry Shearer, and Guest as The Folksmen, a folk trio who frequently opened for Spinal Tap over the years. By now, these three actors have been playing music together for so long that they’re not pretending to be an old band, reunited. They really are an old band. The exact opposite is true of The New Main Street Singers, a “neuftet” headed by John Michael Higgins that also includes Parker Posey and Jane Lynch. They are the prototypical plastic cornball folk act, hilarious in their polished phoniness. Posey and Lynch both had to learn how to play the guitar to be able to play their parts, but to their credit, they seem perfect in the final film. There are also great comic turns by Larry Miller, Jennifer Coolidge (who may be the single strangest person working in movies right now), Bob Balaban, Ed Begley Jr., and the always uproarious Fred “Wha’ Hoppened?!” Willard, who Guests professes to be stumped by in the audio commentary. “I have no idea where Fred gets it.” This sort of film is perfect for many of these performers, allowing them to improvise and craft these characters.
The payoff to the whole thing is with the work done by Levy and O’Hara, though. These two have been working together since the old days of SCTV, and I always loved the way that cast played off of each other, the way they seemed to take such great delight in each other’s bizarre creations. It always made the show more cohesive than SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE, more lived in, more real. One of the rules of great comedy is that it skirts dangerously close to the sad. Pathos has been an important tool for comic filmmakers since the silent days. Levy has proven himself to be one of the most reliably funny men in movies over the years in films like SPLASH and AMERICAN PIE, and he was a big part of the success of BRINGING DOWN THE HOUSE earlier this year, something I recognize even if I despise that film. Maybe the runaway blockbuster status of that film will help, though, in the effort to get him a Best Supporting Actor nomination for A MIGHTY WIND. And make no mistake... he deserves it. What starts as a cartoon somehow becomes something very real and very moving. Part of it is the surprise of Levy’s singing voice. He’s really good. The songs that were chosen for Mitch and Mickey really aren’t funny in an obvious way. Written for the most part by Michael McKean and his wife Annette O’Toole, the songs are lovely and lyrical, and one number is set up as their signature, “The Kiss At The End Of The Rainbow.” One of the big questions in the film is how they’re going to handle the song at the reunion concert, and I was surprised how much I got invested in the moment. I’ve heard many people say the film brought them to tears, and I thought they were exaggerating. Then I saw the film, and now I understand. Levy. Best Supporting Actor. The nomination is the right thing to do, and I hope Academy members don’t overlook this pitch-perfect work when handing out the kudos in a few months.
The DVD is great, with an informative and conversational commentary track by Guest and Levy together, and the deleted scenes add nearly a half-hour of smart and funny material to the mix. Sound and picture is excellent, and my one big complaint is about the shitty Warner Bros. cardboard snap case thingamajig. Still, as I understand it, those are on the way out and Warner has reconsidered the way they’re going to package future titles starting with THE MATRIX RELOADED. Can’t wait to see the packaging to see if it’s truly an improvement. Let’s hope.
An example of a disc that is so overstuffed that I actually doubt I’ll ever get to the extras is New Line’s WILLARD. First thing I did when I popped the disc in was find the Crispin Glover video for “Ben” and play it real, real loud. What a freakshow. Even better, there’s audio commentary by Crispin about the video, and it reveals Crispin to be enormously entertaining and engaging, and he makes sure to plug both of the feature films he’s self-funded, something I admire. He has been really smart about how he mentions the films at any opportunity, since they’re micro-budget movies that are very personal to him. When he works in studio features and does publicity for them, he always takes advantage of the opportunity to steer attention to his smaller work. That’s cool. The video’s less than three minutes long, so Crispin’s talking at an incredible rate from the moment the thing starts, and it ends up being packed with info. I haven’t heard the feature commentary, which also includes the director, Glen Morgan, as well as co-producer James Wong and R. Lee Ermey, but I hear it’s pretty good. In fact, the commentary and the making-of documentary “The Year Of The Rat” have both been given great reviews, so I’m sure I’ll go back and check out the documentary as early as possible. First time through the disc, I just enjoyed the great transfer and the excellent sound reproduction. It’s a full anamorphic 2.35:1 transfer, and it handles the film’s darker palette quite well.
Overall, I don’t think the film’s particularly great, but it’s so rare that anyone casts Crispin as the lead in something that I’m probably willing to forgive a lot. And it’s not a bad film. Morgan does a nice job of heaping crap on Willard (Glover), and his relationship with the rats that live in his basement unfolds with a certain dreamlike inevitability. It’s not very surprising, though. Basically, people treat Willard badly, he gets some revenge, and then things get out of control and destroy him. It’s very faithful to the original, right down to reproducing the first film’s narrative weaknesses. What ultimately carries the film is the performers themselves. Glover does some great work and hits some high notes, and I have no doubt that it’s Ermey’s aggressive asshole routine here that won him a role in the CHAINSAW remake. If you flipped for this one in theaters, or if you’re in the mood for some solid Glover insanity, then WILLARD is a heck of a nice disc, and worth picking up.
Blue Underground, a specialty label that’s put out a few cool titles so far, including the Larry Cohen films I mentioned a few columns back, just put out a Christopher Lee Collection that consists of THE BLOOD OF FU MANCHU, THE CASTLE OF FU MANCHU, and THE BLOODY JUDGE. They’re also selling them separately, which is how I picked up the fourth title in the box, CIRCUS OF FEAR. Short review: whole lotta circus, not nearly enough fear. Which is not to say that it’s a bad film, because it’s not. It’s just not the horror film the title would imply. Instead, it’s a small-scale British crime film in which a robbery leads to double-crosses, old scores are settled by people long though dead, and a mysterious masked lion tamer may be the key to all the secrets. Christopher Lee plays a good portion of the film with a ski mask on, meaning we just get his eyes, but he manages to steal the film from every actor around him just the same. The film’s been given the best transfer I would imagine is possible based on the source material. It’s a 1.66:1 anamorphic transfer, and it looks surprisingly clean overall. There’s an audio commentary with director John Moxey, and I would hope it focuses on the film’s rather rough history. Originally, when it played America, it was only printed in black and white and had 22 minutes cut from it. Retitled PSYCHO CIRCUS, I would imagine it must have been incomprehensible. This DVD not only restores the 22 minutes and returns the film to color, but it actually adds another 8 minute sequence that was never in the original prints. If you’re a fan of crime films and are looking for something you’ve probably never seen to satisfy your Christopher Lee jones, then CIRCUS OF FEAR is a sweet little gem well worth your time.
This past week, we finally made it to “The Box Part I” and “The Box Part II,” the Quentin Tarantino episodes of ALIAS: THE COMPLETE FIRST SEASON. He didn’t direct. He didn’t write. He’s just an actor, and he looks like he’s having enormous fun playing a really sleazy former SD6 agent who shows up to take his revenge and get hold of something in the vaults of the LA bureau. Director Jack Bender pays obvious tribute to McTiernan’s DIE HARD (right down to a McTiernan Supply truck in the parking garage), and he has a lot of fun with the conventions of the genre. Jennifer Garner delivers some darn fine ass kickin’ in this particular episode, and every character takes a beating at one point or another. I love the way people carry damage from one episode to the next on this show, and the fate of Sloane’s finger made me particularly giddy.
I also finally finished up POINT OF NO RETURN, the BABYLON 5 Season Three box set. What a brutal, evil cliffhanger. J. Michael Straczynski’s goal to create a five-season novel seemed to being paying off beautifully at this point in the show’s run, and the most remarkable thing about this mid-point is that he wrote every single episode for the season, something I can’t recall ever seeing anyone else do on a one-hour dramatic series. I can understand why he felt like he had to micromanage this particular year of the series, since so many of the show’s important storylines, set in motion over the 44 hours prior, finally pay off here in spectacular fashion. It’s been a delight to discover the show this way, and out of all the TV series so far on DVD, this one has most proven to me the value of doing these season-by-season collections for people who have never seen a show before.
Saw RUSSIAN ARK late on a Saturday night, in one of those hazy end of the week moods, just looking to disappear into something. Turned out to be an absolutely fascinating choice, too. There’s no other film like it that I can name. Imagine taking a guided tour of the Russian Heritage museum with Stanley Kubrick as your guide. That’s sort of what it feels like to get absorbed by this one of a kind masterpiece. I’m a big fan of Godfrey Reggio’s films (KOYAANISQATSI and POWAQAATSI), and my reaction to this film is similar... almost purely visceral. On one level, the film is a game, a dare of sorts. An hour and a half, one unbroken take, a cast of thousands... it sounds impossible, and I found myself waiting for the cheat, the hidden edit that never came. Besides... after a while, you lose track of the technical trick and just get pulled in. There’s so much going on here at every moment, as well as an unsettling, surreal quality to everything, and the way we gradually piece together what’s going on is engrossing. It’s a ghost story, a history lesson, and a brain-bending headgame all at once. Essentially, we are walked through either Russian history or a recreation of it (and we’re not sure which at first) by a mysterious figure, the Marquis. At times, we pause to look at this detail or that from the various paintings on display, or we dip into a scene as we wander past, only to suddenly move on to something totally different. I’m not sure I know any more about Russian history now than I did before I saw the film, but I think maybe I have a better idea of how Russians feel about that history.
On the other hand, I’m absolutely sure that I am dumber for having seen DREAMCATCHER. Yes, I know you warned me. And I laughed when you warned me. “No, no, it can’t be that bad,” I said. “Lawrence Kasdan. William Goldman. Look at that cast.” Oh, lord, why didn’t I listen? I had no idea just how incredibly wrong-headed a film it was, and now, having seen it, I’m having a hard time believing that I really sat through it. One of the biggest problems is with the source material itself. Written as Stephen King was recovering from his life-threatening car accident, DREAMCATCHER is a mess, a hodge-podge of ideas from other earlier books and dark, cynical ruminations on recovering from an accident and ‘50’s alien invasion movies, and it never gelled into a coherent whole on the page. But that’s okay... King’s books frequently flounder in the actual plotting. It’s his remarkable voice that carries readers through his lesser efforts. No matter what he’s writing about, King always writes so well that he can fool you into thinking you’re reading something worthwhile.
But seeing this brought to life onscreen... even with a cast as good as this and a technical crew that gives the film an insanely polished look and state of the art FX... even with all of that, it just lays there, a Frankenstein monster with no spark to bring it to life, bits and pieces that have no business connecting. The film never figures out what story it’s trying to tell, and by the time it starts trying to bring old friends with a childhood secret, psychic powers, aliens from space, monsters that live in your butt, psycho military guys, and a retarded superbeing together, it’s so hopelessly out of control and off the tracks that you just have to sit and marvel at the absurdity of the entire enterprise.
There are many nice technical touches here, but for every one thing I liked, there were at least five things that were just stupefying. What’s with Damien Lewis and his “Mr. Gray” voice? Is it typecasting to ask a Wahlberg to play retarded? What’s with Morgan Freeman’s eyebrows? Do the psychic powers really serve any narrative purpose other than giving Goldman a shortcut to exposition? Is the “warehouse of memories” one of the goofiest ideas to be realized on film this year? Are the shit weasels a totally wasted and ultimately boring menace? Is this really the same Lawrence Kasdan who wrote RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK?!
I’ll give Warner Bros. this much... the disc looks and sounds great. If you’ve suffered blunt force trauma to the head and you have a burning desire to watch and rewatch this sad spectacle, then you can’t go wrong with the presentation here. For anyone who values their grey matter, don’t even pick this one up off the rental shelf. It really is one of the year’s worst, and a low point in the film legacy of Stephen King.
I’ve got so many other titles I wanted to write about, and I want to go over stuff coming out this week, and I wanted to mention that I’m going to attend a Lucasfilm presentation about the INDIANA JONES discs next Saturday, but right now, I’m about two hours away from being picked up by a shuttle that will take me to the airport where I am actually going to take a real vacation. Not a long one, but a real one. I’m not even taking a pen and paper with me. I won’t sign on to a computer the whole time I’m gone, and I won’t be seeing a single DVD this week. I’ll be back in LA late Friday night, I’ll try to sneak in a midnight show of KILL BILL somewhere, since I won’t have seen it yet (unless some kind employee at the Walt Disney World AMC theaters at Pleasure Island would like to sneak me into an advance screening by calling Harry and asking him how to get hold of me... hint, hint), and then I’ll be back here with a new column for you a week from now. Next time, we’ll cover the SCARFACE collector’s box, 2FAST 2FURIOUS, the Criterion STRAW DOGS, the recent BROTHER FROM ANOTHER PLANET release, a bunch of Errol Flynn titles (KIM, MASTER OF BALLANTRAE, and of course ROBIN HOOD), that amazing new KIDS ARE ALRIGHT DVD, and much more.
Until then, the Question for Discussion is this: what is your favorite adaptation of a book to film that is NOT currently available on DVD?
"Moriarty" out.
