Eagerly anticipating this week ... (5-24)

Eagerly anticipating this week ... (5-24)
Alex Garland's Civil War (2024)

5/31/2017

After the Storm/海よりもまだ深く (Umi yori mo Mada Fukaku) (2016) - Koreeda's striking portrayal of a disappointing man



+ Best Japanese Movie of the Year

The faces of the four main characters of Hirokazu Koreeda's After the Storm adorn this pleasant poster

Ryota is an under-achiever, a gambler and a disappointment to his mother and ex-wife. During the period up to and during the 24th annual typhoon in Japan, he tries to make up for his flaws, especially because he wants to keep his son in his life.

After the Storm is the 12th theatrical fiction feature from Japanese master writer-director Hirokazu Koreeda (Nobody Knows/Dare mo Shiranai (2004)), who presents another great drama with humanistic insight, once again asserting himself as one of the truly unique and gifted filmmakers around today. The original title is taken from an old Japanese pop song that is heard in the film and which translates to 'even deeper than the sea'; strictly speaking a better title than After the Storm, which only refers to an actual storm that the action takes places around.
The film's unassuming cinematography leaves the space wide open for the actors, and they honor this with some terrific performances: Hiroshi Abe (A Yell from Heaven/Tengoku Kara no Êru (2011)) is right on as Ryota, who is a bum of a man, but one whom Abe's resourceful portrayal makes sympathetic even through his stealing, lying and wasting away of his money. Ryota has loafed through too much of his life with a goal for himself that he hasn't been able to make happen, while he has let the most important things, his nearest relations, fall apart. We come into his life at a time when this becomes crystal clear for himself as well, though he is unable to make up for his flaws and change the way his life has turned out.
All the actors here give honest, terrific performances, but two that especially also deserve singling out are those of Kirin Kiki (Lake of Tears/Umi no Koto (1966)) as Ryota's very direct, endearing mother and young Taiyô Yoshizawa (Kamisama no Wadachi (2017)) as his intelligent son, who may or may not be following in his father's footsteps, more or less inevitably, just as Ryota seems to have followed in his father's.
After the Storm doesn't match the greatness of Koreeda's recent masterpiece Like Father, Like Son/Soshite Chichi ni Naru (2013), and may appeal to a narrower audience, - certainly to Koreeda fans, - simply because it is very talky, deliberately contemplative in its form and may appear slow. It doesn't have much action; much of the plot moves through dialog, and the result is an entirely realistic drama with universally recognizable behavioral patterns and themes such as divorce, unfulfilled ambitions, gambling, parental responsibilities, neglect - all of it seen against Koreeda's stories' usual arena that is Family.
The film wouldn't achieve the level of impact it does if it wasn't for the outstanding dialog as well, which is both character-specific, wise and funny. In fact After the Storm is surprisingly funny; honest and unapologetic in its dealing with Ryota's vices, family strings and Japanese traits. It deals with the past, sometimes nostalgically but also as a burden that needs overcoming daily, and is both poetic and ultimately moving, another Koreeda treasure that shouldn't be missed.

Related posts:
 

Hirokazu Kore-eda: 2016 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]
2016 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2013 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED III]
2013 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]

Like Father, Like Son/そして父になる (Soshite Chichi ni Naru) (2013) - Koreeda's magnificent reflection on upbringing and family 
 








Watch a short trailer for the film here

Cost: Unknown
Box office: In excess of 5.1 mil. $ and counting
= Uncertain
[After the Storm premiered 18 May (Cannes' Un Certain Regard section) and runs 117 minutes. Koreeda began thinking up the film in 2001, visiting his mother who lived alone in a housing complex following the death of her husband, Koreeda's father. Shooting lasted 1½ month from May 2014 on, during the year that Koreeda was also shooting his Our Little Sister/Umimachi Diary (2015). 89k paid admission to the film in its opening weekend in Japan, where it grossed 3.1 mil. $ (60.8 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were France with 815k $ (16 %) and South Korea with 672k $ (13.2 %). In North America, it opened #47 to 27k $ in 6 theaters and peaked at #46 in 35 theaters and grossed 252k $ (4.9 %). The box office sheet is incomplete with several markets missing. The film was nominated for an Asian Film Award. After the Storm is certified fresh at 95 % with a 7.9/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of After the Storm?

5/30/2017

Edge of the City (1957) - Poitier gleams in Ritt's idealistic debut



The firetruck red of this poster for Martin Ritt's Edge of the City indicates the socialist politics it promotes

A young man arrives to the New York Harbor without any inclination to share his name or his background but eager to find employment. He finds a good friend but also trouble with a corrupt foreman.

Edge of the City is the debut movie for Martin Ritt (Hud (1963)), an attempt at social realism that lifts relevant issues such as racism and exploitation of manual laborers. It was written by Robert Alan Aurthur (The Philco-Goodyear Television Playhouse (1951-55)), based on his last hour-long episode on the said show titled A Man Is Ten Feet Tall (1955).
Edge of the City is a film with a clear, liberal authorship, - SPOILER the mysterious hero (John Cassavetes (The Virginian (1966), TV-series)) turns out to be a deserter! -  but it undeniably seems a bit superficial.
Sidney Poitier (Duel at Diablo (1966)) is wonderful as the film's second hero, a rather flawless character, obviously an inspirational, idealized American negro character intentionally written to collide head-on with the racist stereotypes often found in American films at the time. Additionally, Ruby Dee (Touched by An Angel (1999), TV-series)) is strong as his wife; Cassavetes is good, and so is Kathleen Maguire (Flipper (1963)) as the blond, (whom Cassavetes doesn't exactly fall for, - in fact, the film contains an innuendo of homosexuality on the character's part, which was also very uncommon at the time, and which the MPPCA noted but allowed since it is so subtle that most probably misses it), and Jack Warden (The Cosmic Voice (1986)) as the villainous foreman. Inevitably, the film is reminiscent of Elia Kazan's masterpiece On the Waterfront (1954), whose heights it doesn't reach, but it is still a solid, incensed crime drama.






Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: 493k $
Box office: Reportedly 760k $
= Big flop
[Edge of the City premiered 4 January and runs 85 minutes. Financing studio MGM figured they couldn't play the film in the segregated South and budgeted the film lowly, giving black-listed Ritt only 10k $ and 15k$ for Poitier. Cassavetes' paycheck is not known. Shooting took place in New York, including in Harlem and at a Manhattan railroad yard. The release was delayed, because the studio was uneasy with the film's controversial theme of interracial brotherhood, but following a successful screening, it was released and met with praise by the NAACP, Urban League and the American Jewish Committee, but also with boycots in the South and small audiences. According to MGM, the film made 360k $ (47.4 % of the total gross) in North America and incurred a 125k $ loss, despite fine reviews. The film was nominated for 2 BAFTAs, - one for 'Best Film from Any Source' and one for Best Foreign Actor (Poitier). 1,848 IMDb users have given Edge of the City a 7.2/10 average rating.]

What do you think of Edge of the City?

5/27/2017

Top 10: Best comedies reviewed by Film Excess to date


1. Airplane! (1980) - Jim Abrahams, Jerry Zucker, David Zucker 


2. Blazing Saddles (1974) - Mel Brooks



3. Bridesmaids (2011) - Paul Feig



4. Ace Ventura: Pet Detective (1994) - Tom Shadyac




5. Annie Hall (1977) - Woody Allen



6. Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy (2004) - Adam McKay


7. The Extra Man (2010) - Shari Springer Berman, Robert Pulcini



8. The Big Lebowski (1998) - Ethan Coen, Joel Coen




9. The Boss of It All/Direktøren for Det Hele (2006) - Lars Von Trier


10. The Blues Brothers (1980) - John Landis

Other comedy masterpiece reviewed to date by Film Excess

Anything Else (2003)

Other great comedies and a short reviewed by Film Excess to date (in alphabetic order)

The 40 Year-Old Virgin (2005)
A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence/En Duva Satt på en Gren och Funderade på Tillvaron (2014) 
Argo (2012)
Bad Santa (2003) 
Bean/Bean: The Ultimate Disaster Movie/Bean: The Movie (1997) 
Beavis and Butt-Head Do America (1996)
Begin Again/Can a Song Save Your Life? (2013) 
The Boys in the Band (1970) 
Café Society (2016)
Coffee and Cigarettes (2003) 
Date Night (2010)
Despicable Me 2 (2013)
Driving Miss Daisy (1989) 
Dumb and Dumber/Dumb & Dumber (1994)
The Electric House (1922, short)
Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex* (*But Were Afraid to Ask) (1972)
The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared/Hundraåringen Som Klev Ut Genom Fönstret och Försvann (2013)
The Incredible Burt Wonderstone (2013)
Klown/Klovn - The Movie (2010)
The Lego Movie (2014) 
MacGruber (2010)
Moonrise Kingdom (2012) 
Speed Walking/Kapgang (2014) 
Spy (2015)
The Triplets of Belleville/Les Triplettes de Belleville/Belleville Rendez-vous (2003) 
We're the Millers (2013)
What's Up, Doc? (1972)

Other good comedies reviewed by Film Excess to date (in alphabetic order)

17 Again (2009)
American Graffiti (1973)
The Ballad of Cable Hogue (1970) 
Bananas (1971) 
Black Sheep (1996) 
Bowfinger (1999
Caddyshack (1980) 
Casa de Mi Padre (2012) 
Casino Royale (1967) 
Due Date (2010) 
Mean Girls (2004) 
Sex Tape (2014) 

Mediocre, poor and/or failed comedies reviewed by Film Excess to date (in alphabetic order)

1941 (1979)
2001: A Space Travesty (2000)
30 Minutes or Less (2011)
A Good Year (2006)
Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls (1995)
Airplane II: The Sequel (1982)
American Reunion/American Pie: Reunion (2012) 
Any Which Way You Can (1980)
Blades of Glory (2007) 
Bringing Up Baby (1938) 
The Cannonball Run (1981) 
Cedar Rapids (2011) 
City Lights (1931) 
Coming to America (1988) 
Crime Busters/I Due Superpiedi Quasi Piatti/Trinity: In Trouble Again/Two Supercops (1977) 
Disturbia (2007) 
Dumb and Dumber To (2014) 
Ed Wood (1994) 
Girl Most Likely/Imogene (2012) 
Hail, Caesar! (2016) 
Magic Mike XXL (2015) 
Meeting Spencer (2010) 
Minions (2015) 
Mr. Peabody & Sherman (2014) 
She's Funny That Way (2014) 

[76 titles in total]

Previous Top 10 lists:

The best action movies reviewed by Film Excess to date
The best adapted movies reviewed by Film Excess to date
The best adventure movies reviewed by Film Excess to date    

The best big flop movies reviewed by Film Excess to date
The best B/W movies reviewed by Film Excess to date
The best true story movies reviewed by Film Excess to date
The best big hit movies reviewed by Film Excess to date  

The best biopic movies reviewed by Film Excess to date
Best 'box office success' movies reviewed by Film Excess to date 

Best car chases in movies reviewed by Film Excess to date

What do you think of the lists?
Which comedies would top your list?

5/24/2017

Existenz/eXistenZ (1999) - Cronenberg's 1990s-flavored VR nonsense



+ Most Deserved Flop of the Year


Jude Law handles a strange weapon on this rust-colored poster for David Cronenberg's Existenz


A prominent video game designer brings an inexperienced hunk with her into her virtual reality game universe, where they go through various strange things, - but what is real, and what is the game, - and is it even important to be able to differentiate?

Aficionados of the 1990s sensibilities and styles might rate this film by great Canadian writer-director David Cronenberg (Eastern Promises (2007)) higher, as it is a film that feels very much of its time: Jude Law (Road to Perdition (2002)), pretty and uncharacteristically oblivious here, at one point asks game designer Jennifer Jason Leigh (Dolores Claiborne (1995)), (and I am paraphrasing), if she would like to play eXistenZ benevolently with him, or something like that, (eXistenZ is the name of the game in the film.) And the film is full of lines and plot points that are postmodernist nonsense on full steam like that. The whole film feels a bit like a tiring update of Cronenberg's earlier, much better Videodrome (1983), which charted similar territory. (Existenz is also Cronenberg's first original screenplay since Videodrome.)
Besides this, the body-related aspects of the film, which are a natural part of most of the works of body-horror maestro Cronenberg, are mostly simply curious and gross in Existenz, SPOILER as when Law licks a wound on Leigh's back, or when she loses things in his hole, (which is not what you may think.)
None of the characters in the movie stir up any considerable interest, and the film is built up like a Chinese box, which on the surface can seem fascinating. But the problem is that we are never supposed to ask questions of the preceding box, - because the construction is ultimately hogwash.

Related reviews:

David Cronenberg: Cosmopolis (2012) - Cronenberg/DeLillo/Pattinson's speculative limo lullaby

A Dangerous Method (2011) - Cronenberg's rather disappointing waltz with the fathers of modern psychology 

Eastern Promises (2007) - Cronenberg invites us to meet the Russian mob in London
A History of Violence (2005) or, Who Is Tom Stall? 

Spider (2002) - Cronenberg takes us to the tormented (and slightly dull) mind of a schizophrenic 

1999 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess 
Dead Ringers (1988) or, Brothers and Their Instruments 

The Dead Zone (1983) - Eerie sci-fi/horror King-adaptation  
The Brood (1979) or, Marital Fury and Craze!    






Here, Cronenberg and star Ralph Fiennes talk about Cronenberg's following film, Spider (2002)

Cost: 15 mil. $
Box office: 2.8 mil. $ - North America only
= Box office disaster
[Existenz premiered 16 February (Berlin International Film Festival) and runs 97 minutes. Cronenberg was inspired to the plot after conducting an interview with novelist Salman Rushdie for Shift magazine in 1995, centered on the Iranian fatwa imposed upon the writer due to his controversial novel The Satanic Verses. Shooting took place from April - July in Ontario, Canada. Leigh lost a part in Eyes Wide Shut by starring in Existenz. The film opened #15 to an 810k $ first weekend in 256 theaters in North America, which was its peak. It was released around the same time as another sci-fi movie about an alternate reality and existential ambiguities, which wowed the public infinitely more: The Matrix grossed 463.5 mil. $ globally. Few numbers from other markets are known, but it seems fair to project the global gross of Existenz around 5 mil. $; according to Cronenberg biographer Bart Beaty, the film was "one of the biggest bombs of the Canadian film industry." Cronenberg was eventually forced to return to matter with more popular appeal in his great A History of Violence (2005). Existenz won the silver prize in Berlin. Existenz is fresh at 71 % with a 6.7 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Existenz?

5/23/2017

Even Dwarfs Started Small/Auch Zwerge Haben Klein Angefangen (1970) - Herzog teases us to react with uniquely odd experimental drama



An unusual poster for Werner Herzog's Even Dwarfs Started Small, which begs us to squint to make out what it is showing us, which is in itself quite funny

A group of dwarfs revolt against the institution they inhabit, and in fits of childlike glee destroy what they can there.

Even Dwarfs Started Small is the second film from great German writer-director Werner Herzog (Fitzcarraldo (1982)). It is an experimental drama in B/W that seems to be inspired by dreams, although it doesn't resemble any dream I've ever had. Some have opined that it has nightmarish qualities, but the contagious laughter and sheer silly glee of the dwarfs bar me from really feeling this alleged aspect of the film.
Because of the immobile, flat structure of the action, (it is not appropriate to really call it a plot), in which things just appear to happen without much in the way of causality, Even Dwarfs Started Small feels long. Some of the episodes in it are amusing, and the unique oddity of the whole movie is also hard not to embrace I find, - even if the meaning in it, - if indeed there is any, (which it is fair to be skeptical about), - escapes me.

Related posts:

Werner HerzogJack Reacher (2012) - Highly entertaining, dark hero-vehicle for Tom Cruise (actor) 

2010 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I] 
Happy People: A Year in the Taiga (2010) - Herzog and Vasyukov invite us to meet a remote, tough Siberian people 
The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans/Bad Lieutenant (2009) or, Werner Herzog's Bad Lieutenant

Cobra Verde/Slave Coast (1987) - Herzog and Kinski's final work delves into the madness of slavery 









Watch the first minute of the film here

Cost: 0.2 mil. $
Box office: Unknown
= Unknown
[Even Dwarfs Started Small premiered in May (Cannes) and runs 96 minutes. It was shot on Lanzarote, Spain. Stories about the production include that Herzog would direct one actor not to laugh and then tease him with a barrage of funny faces during the shot, so the guy would break down in laughter throughout the scene. One actor was overrun by the car driving in circles but was unscarred and immediately ready for more shooting. The same actor later caught fire, which Herzog put out, whereupon he swore that he could throw himself in a cactus patch and allow his actors to film it, if no one else was injured during shooting. No one was, and Herzog kept his promise. The film was released unrated in a small release in North America a few months after playing at the New York Film Festival. It played in West Germany and, years later, in Spain, Japan, Portugal, Greece and Australia. Herzog released 4 documentaries before his next fiction feature, which paired him with his 'muse' through many following films (Klaus Kinski), Aguirre, the Wrath of God/Aguirre, der Zorn Gottes (1972). 5,227 Rotten Tomatoes users have given Even Dwarfs Started Small an average rating of 3.7/5.]

What do you think of Even Dwarfs Started Small?

5/22/2017

Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room (2005, documentary) or, Something Wrong in America



The corporate villains of Alex Gibney's Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room smirk on its deft poster


The story of giant energy corporation Enron gets unfolded: Its fraud, key figures, culture, sins and victims.

Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room is a fabulous documentary by New-Yorker master documentary writer-director Alex Gibney (The Ruling Classroom (1980)), based on the same-titled 2003 book by Bethany McLean (All the Devils Are Here: The Hidden History of the Financial Crisis (2011)) and Peter Elkind.
Gibney keeps an impressively high number of balls in the air and somehow still manages to serve this fundamentally exciting, scandalous story with what feels like the perfect number of plot points, experts, words and minutes. More than once the film uncovers decidedly horrifying details. It is an alarming and dispiriting, blessedly sober journalistic accomplishment.
Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room achieves an added gleam of absurd theater from Gibney's use of Tom Waits songs. Along with many other also fine choices from popular music, he skillfully applies a side character to the Enron disaster; namely that it was more than a unique one-time incident based on a gathering of especially rotten apples in one executive branch, - that the real reason behind it must be a larger, cultural issue.
- Ouch!

 

Related post:

 

2005 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I] 








Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: 0.7 mil. $
Box office: 4.8 mil. $
= Huge hit
[Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room premiered 22 April (USA) and runs 109 minutes. The film opened #40 in 3 theaters to a 76k $ first weekend in North America, where it peaked at #16 in 151 theaters and grossed 4 mil. $ (83.3 % of the total gross). It was released in 6 foreign markets. The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets for it were Australia with 419k $ (8.7 %) and the UK with 303k $ (6.3 %). Roger Ebert awarded the film 3.5/4 stars, one notch harder than this review. The film was Oscar-nominated as Best Documentary, which it lost to March of the Penguins. It was also nominated for the Grand Jury Prize in Sundance and won the Best Documentary Award from the Film Independent Spirit Awards. Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room is certified fresh at 97 % with an 8.1 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room?

Eagerly anticipating this week ... (4-24)

Eagerly anticipating this week ... (4-24)
Niclas Bendixen's Rom (2024)