Movies By Month: July 2011, part 1

I watched even more movies than usual this month, due to various happenings:  a mild hangover, an extremely lazy Sunday, a few more days off work than usual, the strong desire to do anything except clean my apartment, etc.  So I’ve broken July’s reviews into two posts.

The Wizard:  1989 “adventure dramedy” directed by Todd Holland and starring Fred Savage, Jenny Lewis, Luke Edwards, Christian Slater, and Beau Bridges (in the time before his eyebrows fully took over the upper half of his face).  Jimmy (Edwards) develops an unnamed mental disorder after the death of his twin, and his mom and step-dad are thinking about sending him to a home for disabled children.  His brother Corey (Savage) decides this is totally bogus and busts him out.  They head west, realize that Jimmy’s a video game savant, and befriend a cute runaway with a mommish haircut (Lewis).  The trio decide to put Jimmy in the “Video Armageddon” tournament to win a huge cash prize and prove that Jimmy is still mentally with it.  The mom hires a private detective to track the kids down, and the father and other brother (Bridges & Slater) set out to find them before the P.I. does.  It is a story of adventure, redemption, and the Nintendo Entertainment System.  There is gratuitous product placement, including use of the Power Glove, and dammit, that’s just fine with me.  In the words of their nemesis Lucas Barton:  “I love to Glove.”

The Magnificent Ambersons:  2002 TV movie (I should have known!) remake of the original 1942 Orson Welles film that was supposedly more faithful to his script and editing notes.  Directed by Alfonso Arau, and starring Madeleine Stowe, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Bruce Greenwood, and Gretchen Mol.  It was intolerable.  Rhys Meyers was just awful.  I love him, but he cannot pull off bratty.  I turned it off after 30 minutes, a-feared I would die of boredom.

The Good Shepherd:  2006 thriller about the birth of the CIA, directed by Robert De Niro and starring Matt Damon, Angelina Jolie, and a bunch of other awesome people.  A tale of rich white dudes running the country behind the scenes, not trusting anyone, killing enemies and friends who know too much.  It’s good, but pretty much a total bummer.

Centurion:  2010 Neil Marshall action film about the famous Lost Ninth Legion of Caledonia starring Michael Fassbender (purr), Dominic West, and Olga Kurylenko.  The Romans are inhabiting the Scottish Highlands and fighting the Picts.  The Ninth Legion is sent out to do some more fighting with some more Picts when they’re betrayed by their mute guide, Etain.  The few raggedy survivors now have to avoid the Picts, rescue their captured general, and return safely to Roman territory.  All whilst being hunted by Etain and her band of merry mercenaries.  It’s pretty gory (apparently Picts had flesh so soft that it exploded on impact), and fairly predictable.  But I liked that at no point was there a romance angle with Etain and anyone.  She’s just a pissed off Pict (you’d be angry if someone cut your tongue off, too) who’s out to kill dudes, and has no time for longing glances and seducements.  It’s fluffy but good.  I’d recommend, if you’re into this kind of thing.  Or if you enjoy the Fassbender.

Persuasion:  2007 PBS movie based on the Jane Austen novel, starring Sally Hawkins and Rupert Penry-Jones.  Anne was engaged to Frederick when they were young, but due to the mores of Edwardian society regarding status and money she broke off the engagement.  Now she’s approaching Old Maid territory (unmarried at 27!  The scandal!).  Frederick went off and made a fortune in the navy, and now he’s back in town, looking all dapper in his frock coat.  Can he forgive Anne for breaking his heart?

            As an Austen adaptation goes, it’s awesome.  I love Hawkins (have you seen Happy Go Lucky?  Because it’s adorable and she’s adorable in it and you should).  I love all this stuff.  If you are also into this stuff, definitely see it.

Class of 1984:  1982 Mark L. Lester action thriller, starring Perry King, Roddy McDowall, Timothy Van Patten, and a young Michael J. Fox.  Andrew Norris (King) is an optimistic teacher who’s just transferred to a school with a serious disciplinary problem.  It’s essentially run by a gang of punks who deal drugs, pimp, fight, and use copious amounts of hairspray.  But Norris is going to turn things around.  He’s going to fight and win.  With classical music!  Turns out the gang leader is actually a talented pianist.  Sadly, Norris doesn’t allow him to join the band.  So the gang goes totally shithouse and starts killing, raping, destroying lives. 

            It’s completely over the top.  Ludicrous.  I don’t know if I would say I liked it, necessarily, but it was definitely entertaining.  The best part was watching the behind-the-scenes snippets in the Special Features, because Lester kept saying how this was a clarion call to the public about the state of our schools.  Stuff like this happens every day!  The massacre of lab animals!  If we had just listened to the warnings set forth in this movie!  If he honestly set out to shine a light on the evils lurking in our public schools, maybe he should have reeled it in just a touch.  It was so outlandish as to be campy.  So entertaining, but not educational.  Oooh, see what I did there?  WORD PLAY.

Super 8:  2011 sci-fi J.J. Abrams film, produced by Spielberg and starring Elle Fanning, Joel Courtney, and Kyle Chandler.  Joe (Courtney) and his friends are making a zombie movie when they witness a train derailing which turns out to be part of a government conspiracy.  Someone made the comparison of it being like The Goonies crossed with E.T.  I can’t remember who said that, but it’s dead-on.

            It’s unabashedly Spielbergian, but that’s okay.  The acting is excellent all around (I’m always impressed by child actors who can be convincing instead of just cute), and the special effects are outstanding.  I loved it.  That pyromaniac kid in the braces (played by Ryan Lee) made the movie for me.

All Good Things:  2010 mystery directed by Andrew Jarecki and starring Ryan Gosling and Kirsten Dunst.  David Marks (Gosling) is the son of a powerful NYC real estate mogul who just wants to run an organic market with his girlfriend Katie (Dunst).  When he caves to real pressure from his father (Frank Langella) and perceived pressure from Katie and takes up the family mantle, his life starts to slowly unravel.  He’s terrible at his job, there are misunderstandings in his marriage, and, oh yeah, he’s clearly schizophrenic.  Katie goes missing, he goes into hiding after being questioned by the cops, and then shit gets weird.

            It was just all right.  The movie was based on the life of Robert Durst, and is pretty close to the real deal.  Which is messed up.  I don’t know.  I thought reading about Durst was more interesting than the movie.

The Battleship Potemkin:  1925 silent Russian propaganda film directed by Sergei Eisenstein.  The crewmen of the Potemkin are sick of eating borscht or whatever, so they overthrow their cruel superiors and in doing so endear themselves to the people of Odessa.  It’s an important film, thought of by many as the finest propaganda film ever made (eat your heart out, Riefenstahl), one of the best silents ever made, historically and culturally significant, the Odessa Stairs scene is iconic bla bla bla.  I’m not a fan of silents.  I mostly watch them because I feel like I should.  They are the Brussels sprouts of my movie diet, if you will.  But I’ll admit this is close to the top of the list for me.

My Left Foot:  1989 biopic directed by Jim Sheridan and starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Brenda Fricker (the mom in So I Married an Axe-Murderer), Ray McAnally, and Fiona Shaw (the muggle aunt in Harry Potter).  I put off watching this movie for over a month.  Every night I would come home from work and find it staring at me from atop the DVD player, and every night I would ignore it because I wanted to watch something fluffy and mindless and I figured this would be unspeakably sappy and depressing.  I should have known that DDL would never associate with himself with anything that’s less than spectacular (you shut your mouth, Gangs of New York is an excellent movie).

            The movie is based on the life of Christy Brown, a man born with cerebral palsy in the 1930s to a large working-class family in Ireland.  It’s heartwarming and at times the tiniest bit sappy, but never depressing.  Brown is a scrappy, funny SOB and his antics keep the film from being saccharine. 

Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows Pt. 2:  2011 finale to the awesome movie series.  I love these movies.  I decided early on not to read any of the books until all of the movies had come out lest my happy feelings towards the movies diminish.  So I had no idea what was going to happen.  It was a nice ending to it all, but definitely not my favorite in the series.  My two favorite characters didn’t die, so that was good. 

Kidulthood:  2006 British drama that follows two days in the lives of a group of London teens.  It’s like Thirteen or Kids but British.  There’s suicide, fighting, drug use, awkward casual sex, popularity contests, pregnancy.  The standard totally sad stuff.  I practically needed a slang dictionary; I only picked up about 75% of the dialogue.  I didn’t realize they were saying the word “blood” until like halfway through the movie.  Clearly I’m not up on my London teen-speak.  It’s good, just sad in the way that most teen dramas make one feel sad.  I liked that the ending leaves some things unresolved.

That’s Dancing:  1985 documentary about the history of dance on film, specifically the MGM musical.  I’m a sucker for dance and/or musical retrospectives.  In this one we see Gene Kelly talking about breakdancing and ragging on chubby chorus girls, and Ray Bolger without a scarecrow costume on (which is weird).  I liked it, but that was to be expected.  I like anything involving Gene Kelly.  Except Xanadu.