Bubble
Directed By: Steven Soderbergh
Starring: Debbie Doebereiner / Dustin James Ashley / Misty Wilkins
Rating:

Firstly, am I the only that constantly confuses Steven oderbergh with David Cronenberg? (At least I can spell their names properly) And secondly, the only Soderbergh films that I have seen previously are the Ocean’s films, Traffic, and The Good German (which I didn’t care for). I can see now that I definitely need to explore more of his earlier work. It’s not all George Clooney and heists.

I randomly picked up Bubble at the library a few days, thinking it was from the director of Eastern Promises and A History of Violence. With that in mind, I really wasn’t expecting the style of the film. About 20 minutes into it, I had to check the director on IMDb.

It’s quite an unusual film, more in the style of the Dogme 95 movement than anything else. I learned afterwards that the three main actors hadn’t acted before and the scrpt was improvised. This definitely makes sense, and I thought that it worked out very well. Everything about the film felt real and not forced. I was especially impressed with the subtelty.

There’s an alternate ending on the DVD, which personally I didn’t care for. I’m very glad that they didn’t use it, as it completely ruins the realistic quality of Bubble. I vastly prefer the ending that I did see. Everything isn’t wrapped up in a nice narrative box. There’s a lot to think about in terms of the characters and their motivations, and especially varying degrees of conflict. And of course, toss a little religion into the mix.

Bubble could almost be qualified as a short film, clocking in at 73 minutes. For me the length was perfect. With a film like this that doesn’t rely havily on professional actors and a developed script, I’m not sure how it would have fared with another half hour or so. The story was concise and intriguing.

I’m not going to summarize the film. I’d rather just recommend that you get a copy and watch it.

American Teen
Directed By: Nanette Burstein
American Teen, the latest documentary from Nanette Burstein (The Kid Stays in the Pictures / On the Ropes) is equally fascinating and moving. It follows the senior year of four High School students in Warsaw, Indiana. Burstein and her crew chronicle the lives of the students closely, capturing rare moments of beauty, truth, and doubt.

Although I really liked the film, it took me a while to get into it. It starts on their first day of school, and when we’re first introduced to the main subjects, they seem cliché. You have the basketball jock (Colin Clemens), the popular girl (Megan Krizmanich), the artistic, liberal girl (Hannah Bailey), and the self-professed nerd (Jake Tusing). I’m watching a documentary about High School and they’re focusing on stereotypical teens? Great. After a while, however, I realized that there’s so much more to these people than meets the eye.

Along those lines, I was interested in Colin Clemens’ story, especially with regards to his father. His father is very up-front about the fact that he can’t afford to put Colin through college after he graduates from High School. He basically says that he has two options. The first is to get a scholarship from basketball, and the second is to join the Army. You’d expect Colin’s father to be overbearing, pushing Colin to do well in basketball, but he isn’t. I was impressed with the love he showed throughout the film. It was very uplifting and genuine.

As a documentary, it is indeed quite an impressive undertaking. I heard that they ended up filming over 1,000 hours of footage over a 10-month period of time. Nanette Burstein said in an interview that they had other subjects, but due to different problems, etc. they ended up with only four. I think it worked out well in the end. I’m not sure if I could have handled watching a documentary involving that many people. I felt like I knew each person individually by the end of the film and felt sorry to see them go.

At times it seemed like Burstein was waiting for the fantastic to occur, to be ready to capture it on film. When those moments do come, they really are awesome and penetrating. There are moments when I felt embarrassed, as if I were reading a friend’s diary or personal letter. In those moments, the façade is pulled back and you see glimpses of real people in real life situations.  Those moments helped quell my questions about how aware they are of the cameras recording their every move. I’m sure some of what was on-screen was a show, but underneath it all they seem very honest and open.

The film is largely made up of filmed instances in their lives, b-roll of their surroundings, and interviews with each individual. Sometimes scenes of computer animation, which I didn’t think worked, would accompany these interviews. I thought that they successfully helped to convey visually what each person was talking about, but it really took me out of the experience of watching a film.

This film reminded me of “7-Up”, an on-going series by Michael Apted. Starting in 1964, they documented the lives of seven-year-old British students from differing backgrounds and asked them what they thought about government, their future, etc. They have continued to get together with the same subjects every seven years. The last segment, 49-Up, was release in 2005. Both “7-Up” and American Teen show us different economic perspectives and backgrounds.

American Teen is a great fly-on-the-wall experience. Looking at the different lives of these students I see parts of myself in each one of them. There’s a lot to learn from observing others; the decisions they make and the ones they don’t.

I hope Nanette Burstein takes note of Michael Apted and decides to do a follow-up to American Teen several years from now. That would be fascinating.

(American Teen will be released in theaters on July 25 in the United States)

The Happening is the latest from director M. Night Shyamalan (The Sixth Sense). I’ve enjoyed most of his past work (including Lady in the Water). I wanted to see this without knowing too much about the film. So on Thursday afternoon I turned off my RSS feeder and pretty much avoided the Internet like a plague. Armed only with the knowledge of the previews, I watched The Happening Saturday afternoon.

The story follows Elliot and Alma Moore (played by Mark Wahlberg and Zooey Deschanel), a couple living in Philadelphia, the setting of most of Shyamalan’s films. A catastrophe strikes in New York, causing large numbers of people to commit suicide. Fearing the growing threat, Elliot and Alma flee Philadelphia in an attempt to escape the attack.

The Happening has a peculiar balance between humor, seriousness, and the morbid. The film was advertised as M. Night Shyamalan’s first film with an R-rating (”for violent and disturbing images”), which I think ended up being a problem for the film. Many people have compared him to Alfred Hitchcock (”the master of suspense”), and rightly so. In previous films, Shyamalan has worked well in the PG-13-rating. He’s great at introducing suspense and startling the audience. Think of the sprinklers in Lady in the Water. With his latest film, however, the horror is just…there. There were suspensful moments that I liked (the trees, he tracking shot with the policeman and the cars, etc.), but a good deal of it seemed there just to justify the rating than advance the story.

The acting in the film didn’t do it for me, either. Mark Wahlberg and Zooey Deschanel, two good actors I might add (Think The Depareted and All the Real Girls), just didn’t seem to fit. Should we blame the acting or the script? I don’t know. Coupled with that is the on-the-nose dialgue.

I liked the relationship between their characters. The change in Zooey’s character from the beginning to the end is especially intriging to me. I would have loved to see more development between their characters.

Now I loved the concept of the film. The idea behind the film. It’s so fantastic, but it’s also somewhat believable, which is a feat in itself. As far as the story is concerned, I also loved the way it ended. A really nice touch.

I guess it boils down to how much M. Night Shyamalan was trying to make The Happening feel like a classic “B” disaster flick and how much of it just didn’t work. Maybe I need to watch more movies like Invasion of the Body Snatchers and The Thing.

Intolerable Cruelty is one of the Coens more commercial films and is seemingly underrated. I think this is largely due to the script actually being written by three other writers, not the Coens themselves. Miles Massey (George Clooney) is a well-established divorce attorney. He even has a marriage contract named after him: The “Massey pre-nup”, which is reportedly impenetrable. At the top of his game, Massey is bored with his job and accomplishments. He is also smitten by the foxy Marylin Rexroth (Catherine Zeta-Jones), who is in the process of divorcing her husband in the hopes of acquiring a hefty alimony. Massey has been hired by Marylin’s train-loving husband (Edward Herrmann) to represent him. When all is said and done, will these two opposites attract or repel?

The film is a dark romantic comedy and deals with such themes as love, revenge, and ultimately, power. The characters in Intolerable Cruelty are perfectly cast. George Clooney, channeling Cary Grant, and Catherine Zeta-Jones, the femme fatale, have a dynamic on-screen chemistry from day one. Clooney’s character is also similar to the character he plays in the Coens’ O Brother Where Art Thou? In that film, Everett is obsessed with his hair, and in this one, Miles Massey is obsessed with his teeth. In one interview, Clooney claimed his characters in these two films are part of the “Idiot trilogy”, which will conclude with Hail Caesar (a new project from the Coen Brothers, now in pre-production).

Even the supporting characters are played well, with great performances from Geoffrey Rush, Cedric the Entertainer, Paul Adelstein, Billy Bob Thornton, Edward Herrmann, and Richard Jenkins. Each character is unique and contributes to the overall story. Intolerable Cruelty is a step back to the older screwball comedies where Katherine Hepburn, Spencer Tracy, and especially Cary Grant reigned. It’s witty and intelligent, while at the same time being off-the-wall with a dark dash of the Coens tossed into the mix. Although the script is written by other writers, there is still a clear Coen feel throughout the film, especially with the opening scene and Wheezy Joe.

There are times in the film when the Coens seem to rely too heavily on plot devices to move the story forward, but it ends up being an enjoyable film, one that I enjoy watching again and again.

Short Review: Mario Kart meets Death Race 2000

Speed Racer, directed by the Wachowski brothers, is a visually stunning adaptation of the cartoon of the same name. The story follows the career of Speed Racer (Emile Hirsch), a young man who lives for the thrill of the race. He’s a natural at what he does and quickly attracts the attention a major corporation that wants to bank on his increasing talent.

The Wachowski’s don’t hesitate with the special effects in this film; they go all out, and I think this was a wise decision. I haven’t seen the original Speed Racer, but from what I hear it was an anime. With that in mind, the adaptation is the closest I’ve ever seen to a live-action anime. If they had tried to make it look realistic, I don’t think it would have worked at all; it would have come out looking horribly fake, rather than vibrant and in it’s own world.

I loved the visual transitions that were used throughout the film as well. They were very unique and didn’t cramp the pacing at all for me. You have to see it to believe it.

The story was pretty straightforward, which was expected, and had some great parallels between similar character arcs. The scenes with Spritle and the chimp seemed out of place at times and tossed in for a few quick laughs before jumping back to the story again. I thought those could have been either cut in places or trimmed down.

All in all, Speed Racer was a lot of fun. It’s definitely style over substance, but man is the style good.