Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with a coupla movies I didn't see 'cause I'm in Vegas. Sad... But Monki did see them and wants to tell you about 'em. So here the boy is, fresh from his 3rd jerk of the day, so he's nice and chipper and friendly. Enjoy!
Hey folks, Monki here sending in my last SXSW review. My SXSW experience is ending early this year, but I’ll get to that in a bit. I caught two movies tonight both worth talking about, one seriously impressed me more than the other.
A SCANNER DARKLY
Richard Linklater is a revolutionary filmmaker. His work on Waking Life paved the way for many a Toyota commercial, and for this graphically remarkable film. Everyone has seen the roto-scoping techniques that have gone into this movie and I’m sure you’ve got an idea of the visual style of the film. The usage of animation (or is it really animation?) works really well in this movie. Certain ideas, like the constantly changing suit, would be insanely difficult to pull off with CGI blended with real footage. The colorful animated world allows for so much more.
The story takes place in Orange County, California seven years in the future. A new drug has hit the market and has about twenty percent of the nation addicted. Keanu Reeves plays a super-undercover cop bent on finding various dealers of this drug and putting them away. Using the ever-changing person suit, not even his co-workers know his true identity, which is a good thing because he has actually become addicted to the drug. The fun starts when he is placed in charge of investigating himself as a dealer.
Woody Harrelson and Robert Downey Jr. make up Keanu’s best pals. Woody plays a guy who is just a little bit too paranoid about everything going on around him, and Downey plays a conspiracy theorist whose theories turn out being closer to the truth than he ever imagined. Winona Ryder acts as Reeves’ love interest in the film.
As I said before, the look of this film is incredibly impressive. I found myself blown away by the abstract, yet realistic animation used throughout. It took a little while to get used to, but by the end of the film you hardly notice that you are watching not human actors, but rather their animated counterparts. I give credit to Linklater for not using the animation as a gimmick, but rather a tool to tell the story.
That being said, the story has its problems. The film jumps around from being comedic to incredibly serious very quickly, it can be a bit jarring. A big twist towards the end of the film was telegraphed from a mile away, and the end of the film goes on for a bit too long. Of course, this was the very first mass-audience screening of the film, so I’m sure some tweaking is still in order.
Harrelson and Downey work well together and have a great scene discussing a bicycle and it’s various gears. They come across as pals who enjoy jabbing each other like most good friends do. Keanu goes back to playing his Neo character again, caught up in something much bigger than himself, trying to figure it all out.
The film was okay, and I’m sure the 100% finished product will deliver a bit more than what we saw. Oh, for you Austinites, keep an eye out for local celeb Alex Jones. His scene in particular made me laugh.
What I’m most excited about is seeing this technology put to use by someone other than Linklater. He has created a new court, a new game, I’m just anxious to see someone else take a shot.
AWESOME: I F*CKIN’ SHOT THAT
Holy crap.
Let me preface this whole bit by saying I’m a HUGE Beastie Boys fan. I have unfortunately never seen them live in concert due to circumstances out of my control. I actually did have a ticket to their show in Dallas with Rage Against the Machine, but Mike D fell off his bike in New York and broke his collarbone. The tour was postponed, and ultimately cancelled when Rage Against the Machine disbanded. I was crushed. I still have the tickets around here somewhere.
That being said, let me repeat; HOLY CRAP.
If I were to get hit by a bus tomorrow and for some reason never have the ability to go to a live Beastie Boys concert, I would actually be okay with that. This film captures the experience of their live show perfectly.
Back in 2004 the Boys had an idea to give 50 fans Digital-8 cameras at their Madison Square Garden show. These fans were told they could do absolutely anything they wanted as long as the NEVER STOPPED FILMING. What resulted was an authorized bootleg of that concert, and the best performance of any musician captured on film I have ever seen.
The film starts with the general set-up of the idea, showing the room full of fans, and then goes right into the concert and doesn’t stop for an hour and a half. The grittiness of the digital-8 works in favor of the whole project. It gives it this voyeuristic feel that shooting with HD just wouldn’t do. In fact, the only mark against the movie for me is the usage of some higher-quality cameras for a few angles. The digital-8 just has the feeling of someone showing off something that they recorded that they weren’t supposed to.
The editing on this piece is just incredible as well. Two cameras were placed on both of Mix Master Mike’s turntables and the cutting goes back and forth along with the slider on his mixer, the result is a whirlwind of editing and cuts that seriously rock your head. If you can’t stand the Mtv insanely-fast style of editing, you may want to sit this one out. The faster paced songs are matched with faster-paced editing, and the slower songs are matched with slowing down of the shots and tweaking of the colors and what-not. The result is a performance piece that will make you want to get up and rock. Watch this movie on a big screen with a few hundred of your closest friends, and crank that stereo up to eleven because you are going to want to have this one kicking you in the chest.
Enjoy Adrock, MCA and Mike D from every possible point of view from the Garden, from the cheap seats all the way to the side of the stage. I can’t say enough about this movie. It was the perfect way for me to finish off my SXSW 2006 experience just as the music-philes turn the town upside down and take all the good parking.
Tomorrow (well, today, really) I board a plane and head off to lovely Bermuda for the Bermuda International Film Festival where we will be keeping tabs on some more great films from all over the world. Until then, back to the banana tree I go!
-Monki
