The Hudsucker Proxy

The Hudsucker Proxy is one of the Coen Brothers' minor entries in the pure comedy genre. It is by no means terrible, in fact, it is very funny, but compared to most of their remaining oeuvre, it lacks something. It is able to keep the laughs moving, but they come a little cheaper then usual.



The story concerns Norville Barnes (Tim Robbins), a recent college
graduate, who inadvertently winds up as CEO for a giant
corporation after the untimely demise of the company's founder. Barnes
is given the position by the former CEO's right-hand man, Sidney J.
Mussburger (Paul Newman) to scare the stock market so that the
company's stocks will come down in value enough that the board can buy
a controlling share before the public is able to. Jennifer Jason Leigh
plays Amy Archer, a Pulitzer winning journalist who falls for Barnes
after labeling him an idiot in her paper.




The Hudsucker Proxy is a play on the screwball comedy movies of the late thirties to early fifties. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington especially comes to mind. The idea seems to be that Proxy is a send-up of the screwball genres. The typically eccentric characters and borderline ridiculous situations are pushed a little bit further then usual. However, the movie seems to actually be a screwball comedy, albeit with a bit higher octane fuel then normal. It fails to really push the genre over the edge.



The characters are amusing, but two-dimensional. Barnes is intelligent, but naive. Archer is the typical movie reporter - always sarcastic, always unwilling to make real inter-personal contact. Mussburger is the vile company man whose eye never leaves the bottom line. They don't make for very interesting characters, but as caricatures, which is what a comic farce needs at times, they do their jobs adequately.



Stylistically, the film is a typical Coen Brothers postmodern mish-mash of a particular film era, this time the forties. The snappy dialogue, naive protagonist, and cynical, worldly leading lady are obvious throwbacks. The Coens have definitely done their research and make perfect use of the various era-specific devices, including Citizen Kane-esque over-the-top visuals. This filmic playfulness adds a lot to the comedy, at least for someone who is aware of film conventions in the black-and-white days.



That leads to one of the films biggest accomplishments- while Proxy is replete with elements that only a certified film buff could immediately grasp, it is very accessible to modern audiences who aren't aware of what is going on between the lines. The dialogue, story, characters, and situations are funny in themselves, but the references to film history make the text richer for those with some knowledge of cinematic history (at least those who aren't repelled by the mile-wide postmodern streak).



Overall, this is a very funny movie, but it can't match the bizarre humor found in other Coen films such as Raising Arizona, or The Big Lebowski. By sticking too close to the material to which they make homage, they may have fallen short. Making a screwball comedy is not the same as making a satire of screwball comedies. The film maker siblings didn't drop the hula hoop completely, they just couldn't keep the pace up to their usual level.



Technorati Tags: movie review, coen brothers, hudsucker proxy, tim robbins, paul newman, jennifer jason leigh, screwball, movies, movie, film, cinema, review

The fine art of Shark Jumping

"Jumping the shark" refers to that point in a TV series where everything just goes south. Remember the final season of the X-Files when Mulder was replaced by that other guy? Or on Enterprise when they went back in time and found Nazi aliens? Both of those are definitely shark-jumping points. Usually shark jumping involves the show's creators coming up with a bunch of really dumb ideas to try and reinvigorate a series, or they just come up with a bunch of ideas so bad that no one has ever tried them before. Turns out, the phrase comes from an episode of Happy Days where Fonzie literally jumped over a shark on water skies.



What brought this whole issue to mind was the last episode of Sleeper Cell's second season. Sleeper Cell is a TV show on Showtime about a FBI officer, Darwyn Al-Hakiem who infiltrates an Islamic fundamentalist terrorist cell. What is really great about this show is that the main character is, himself, a Muslim. The entire issue is dealt with in a much more mature fashion than anything Fox News would try to foist on the viewing public. The differences between true Islam and that of the terrorists are shown in detail. The reasons why terrorists become so hateful are explored as well, to a much deeper degree then "they hate our freedoms."



Then, after spending two seasons explaining how true Muslims don't target innocents, and don't go after revenge, Darwyn loses it, convinces the CIA to fly him to London, where he masquerades as a mujahadin, convinces the villain's wife to go with him, flies to Yemen, surreptitiously puts a GPS tagged satellite phone in her bag, gets brought to the villain's camp, where the tagged phone becomes the homing beacon for a missile. A homing beacon that the villain's wife is carrying. As if that weren't enough, Darwyn and his arch-nemesis then have a Rambo-esque shootout, leaving Darwyn with a few bullet holes.



Ridiculous. Not only was this whole segment stupid and over-the-top, it completely changed a) the show's entire storytelling dynamic, and b) the personality of the main character. I really don't understand how the creators could have lost touch like that. Sure the second season was a little lackluster compared to the first, but that's mainly because the first did such a good job exploring its themes that a second was unnecessary.



One day, all television and movie producers will learn that making things not suck is a really good idea.



Honestly though, that's probably wishing for a bit too much, even if it is Christmas Eve.





Technorati Tags: tv, television, sleeper cell, islam, muslims, happy days, fonzie, jumping the shark, terrorism

Grindhouse

There are a couple of trailers up now for the new movie(s), Grindhouse from Quentin Tarantino & Robert Rodriguez. This is an interesting concept they're trying out. The whole thing is that they are each making a feature length movie, but the two will be shown back-to-back. Very strange, indeed.

The two movies are very much in the vein of the old "grindhouse" movies. Grindhouse is an exploitation genre, generally focusing on sex. A lot of them were porn movies masquerading as documentaries about nudists and such. QT & RR's Grindhouse will probably have lots of sex, but it looks like the main focus is going to be schlocky horror-action, a la From Dusk 'til Dawn.

That leads me to my one problem with the whole thing. While I love Tarantino as much as the next person, and Robert Rodriguez is pretty cool, too, I worry that they may not be able to really give us something all that different from what they've already done. Tarantino's Kill Bill already used up the exploitation genre's post-modern, inter-textual reference quota. From Dusk 'til Dawn did the whole action-horror B movie thing as well as it can be done. What more do they really have to offer us?

I guess I should just have a little faith. Tarantino hasn't delivered a truly bad movie thus far, so why would he now? Plus, there's a girl with a machine gun for a leg. How can that possibly be anything less then awesome?

I guess we'll have to wait and see.

Trailers:







Technorati Tags: grindhouse, grind house, quentin, tarantino, robert, rodriguez, rose, mcgowan, sex, violence, movies, trailers, film, planet terror, death proof

Thirteen Moons by Charles Frazier

When I read Cold Mountain a few years ago, I was awed by the imagery,

haracters, and the way that the story unfolded. The writing was superb; without being overly verbose, Frazier was able to wring out every last detail from a scene.

His second book (after a decade long hiatus), is a similar sort of thing, but not as masterfully rought. The story concerns the extraordinary life of Will Cooper. Adopted by a Native American chief at a young age, he heads down the river of life, working his way through the rapids of politics, war, and many other, more amorous, pursuits. All the while, he is stuck on one thing: a girl he won at cards named Claire. She flits in and out of his life, but he is never able to hold on to her for very long.



Thirteen Moons deals heavily with loss. The Native Americans lose their land, Will his life's love. Frazier depicts this life as unavoidable. Will tries everything to save the land for his adoptive Nation, but has some trouble holding on to it. The intruding white colonialism, with all of its high-and-mighty God-said-so, does what it takes to consume. The victims of this intrusion are rendered impotent when the U.S. lays claim to land that doesn't rightly belong to them. Only through sheer force of will and a lot of luck is any of the land saved. The theft of the Natives homeland is unavoidable, because those who are making the rules do so thanks to the inalienable rights that gunpowder brings.



The relationship between Will and Claire is interesting. Will wins Claire in a card game, but is never really able to lay claim to her. She refuses to let him keep her. Though he never uses his winning as a reason for her to stay with him, he seems to think about it fairly regularly. However, he can't bring himself to claim her as winnings, as it would cheapen her. She would become an object, and he has no interest in owning her. He wants her to be a part of his life of her own accord. This means she would have to detach herself from her husband who, in some ways, is willing to treat her as an object. For a long time, he leaves her on the shelf. Then, when he finally finds the need for her, he takes her off and puts her to use. At many times, it seems as though she makes the long-term decisions for herself and that she could leave to be with Will at any time, but really the fact is that she deferrers all her decisions, in regards to how she will spend her life, to her husband.



Will Cooper himself narrates as if he is writing his autobiography. He does so with a lot of wit and a good mixture of self-congratulation and self-debasement. He claims not to remember a lot of things, owing to their distance in the past, but is quite able to recall the exact smell from a particular river bank on a particular day, so it isn't clear if his claiming to have a faulty memory is reliable.



This book is very episodic, which sometimes leaves it a bit disjointed. It has the feeling of being Will's journal, a medium which often gives rise to rambling tangents. This can be a good device to add the wanted mood to the story, but it seems to occasionally leave important parts of the story untold, or fails to blend to disparate sections together in a way that shows why these two particular portions are juxtaposed.



Overall, the book is very good, but not as impressive as Cold Mountain. It is funnier and easier to read, but it doesn't exude the same level of emotion or provide the same kind of attachment to the characters and setting. Of course, it isn't very fair to constantly compare Thirteen Moons' performance to that of its predecessor, as their are many, many other books in the world which can't even attempt to reach the heights that Thirteen Moons has.



3.75/5

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Technorati Tags: books, book review, thirteen moons, cold mountain, charles frazier, civil war, native americans, indians, will cooper, cherokee, the south

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Indian athlete fails "gender test"

At the recent Asian Gamers athletics competition, an Indian woman won a silver medal in a track race. Everything normal so far. Then they subject her to a "gender test," and she fails. I don't really understand what constitutes a "gender test," and I have great difficulty with the nomenclature, which is why I keep surrounding it in quotes. What's really weird is that this same woman passed this test last year. So, what happened? She grew a penis since last year? I'm a little confused.

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Golden Globes

Lets take a moment to examine the Golden Globe nominations, shall we?
For starters, 2006 has been a rather weak year for American cinema in general. Nothing (thus far- my hopes are high for Guillermo del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth, however) has really stood out in my mind the way Woody Allen's Match Point, or Michael Haneke's Cache did last year. Both of those are exceptionally well-made films that dove deep into the various themes they took on.

Nothing this year has really succeeded, in my mind, the way those and a few other films did last year. The Departed is a great movie. Brick is pretty awesome. The Proposition and The Prestige were both very interesting. Babel, though a little disappointing, was more-or-less sound.

Anyway - here are some of the nominees and my opinion about the particular category

Best Picture - drama:

BABEL
BOBBY
THE DEPARTED
LITTLE CHILDREN
THE QUEEN
I'd like The Departed to win, personally, but I've only seen that and Babel so far. The reviews for Bobby have been a little lackluster, so I'm not really sure what's going on there.

Best Picture - comedy:

BORAT: CULTURAL LEARNINGS OF AMERICA FOR MAKE BENEFIT GLORIOUS NATION OF KAZAKHSTAN
THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA
DREAMGIRLS
LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE
THANK YOU FOR SMOKING

I've seen all except Dreamgirls and The Devil Wears Prada in this category. Borat is a definite surprise here. It's a pretty funny movie, but not really the kind of stuff awards are made from. I'd like Little Miss Sunshine to win, I think. It is one of the few notable comedies this year. Missing from this category, I think, is Michel Gondry's The Science of Sleep. It is quite the exceptional film and deserves some recognition. Gondry's career has made him kind of a wunderkind, so I'm sure at least one of his future efforts will make the award show cut.

There's another strange nomination further down the list; Running With Scissors is one of the worst reviewed movies of this year, but pulled a "Best Actress- Comedy" nomination for Annette Bening. I suppose acting can be good despite a bad flick, but it's a little surprising.

Leonardo DiCapprio and Clint Eastwood are both competing against themselves, which is kind of different as well.

Other then that, everythings more or less normal. I'm a little sad about the whole thing, but with a year like this has been, I guess the nominations can't be helped.

First post, and some comments about Fresno

Having used MySpace for a good while now, I've decided I'm not overly fond of the blogging interface. I also decided that I wanted to feel special. So, now I have my own website, sort of. I suppose that makes me just a little bit special. Considering it is free and all, I guess I'm not that special, but still.



Probably, this will more or less be like my MySpace blog, with me writing random crap occasionally and amusing/irritating a few choice people. In other words, it will be like most people's blogs, except for one key difference: I can spell. I also know not to talk in the passive tense, and I have a keen sense of hyphen usage. Plus, my vocabulary is fairly extensive.



Anyway -

As many people know, and a few others are starting to realize, Fresno is a pretty lame place. However, in the past 24 hours, It's coolness went up ten-fold. A new movie theater opened. This theater, the Criterion Cinemas 16, is operated by North American Cinemas. They have promised to reserve three (I think thats the number anyway. It's a nice number.) theaters for movies made outside of the Hollywood Studio machine. That is exciting news. What is also exciting about that is I never have to go to another Regal-operated theater again. That is fantastic. Regal has had a literal monopoly on Fresno theaters for two or three years. I'm happy to say that the movies they think I should be watching are no longer the only movies playing in town.



That accounts for only part of my increased respect for this hell-hole.



Tower Records went bankrupt last year. They have been slowly sliding into retail oblivion since then. That is good news- while the store may have had a 8/10 when it comes to selection, their prices left something to be desired. Everything was sold at MSRP. That is ridiculous. In the era of eCommerce, nothing should be sold at MSRP. It just isn't competitive. So now Tower Records is leaving us for good.



Thats not the good news. The good news is that it is to be replaced by something much, much cooler - Fresno's very own Rasputin Music. I used to work at the Berkeley store, and I can assure you, Rasputin's is orders-of-magnitude cooler then Tower Records ever was beating even the Tokyo Tower Records (the biggest record store in the world). Their prices are competitive with places like Best Buy, and they tend to have a much better used section, (though I won't promise miracles in that regard as they'll be limited to stock brought in from Fresno...ites). Selection wise, they easily defeat even the best stocked Tower Records. 9/10 there. They miss that crucial last point as they don't always order enough copies for the street date.



I found this out when I went to Tower today to pick over the corpse. Actually, my manager from the Berkeley store was there going through some stuff, so I talked to him for a bit. They should be opening around the end of February, so I look forward to that whole heartedly.





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