As with the first movie, this is clearly “Meh-” material: as Mark Kermode put it I think, it passes the time until Indy 4 well enough. But as with the first movie, it must be said that it’s mostly a good “meh-”. It’s bookended by a build-up and finale that are almost identikit copies of their original counterparts (“it’s a little gold man …” anyone?) but it has its moments like a chase down the tiny backstreets of London, a foray into Buckingham Palace, a nice scene around Paris’ Statue of Liberty (which reminded me I really must remember to see that next time I go).

It’s a Bruckheimer movie, so you should expect plausibility to go entirely out of the window, and that it certainly does around the point where Nicolas Cage manages to kidnap a President who seems almost willing to be kidnapped – even that’s a fun sequence, though, I’ve gotta admit. Likewise the stuff with Helen Mirren and Jon Voight as “mom and dad” feel often hideously like pandering to the older audience, but, y’know, it’s Mirren and Voight, it’s hard to complain. If you don’t watch movies often then it’s the last thing you want to waste your time on; otherwise, knock yourself out.

My first Shirley Temple movie in years (and I’ve only seen a handful at most) and one of my first truly “old” movies in far too long. I was pretty apprehensive on both counts but I probably couldn’t have picked a better movie to re-introduce me to old Hollywood.

There’s little to speak of by way of story – it’s the Depression and the White House appoints a New York theatre man as Secretary of Amusement (great idea, right? I thought so too, lol). There’s a slight love story in the mix. It’s really more an excuse for 70 minutes of lavish song and dance numbers, a lively comedy duo called Mitchell & Durant pre-empting Rik Mayall and Adrian Edmondson by decades throwing each other around an office, lol; even a talking penguin at the end. What it comes down to is, it’s a lot more than just a Shirley Temple movie, and considering the runtime that’s pretty impressive. I enjoyed every second of it and would certainly watch it again.

I feel the need to write this review as quick as possible because the more time that passes, that less I have to think about the movie. This is just a really generic tale that tells most of us nothing we haven’t heard before yet presents everything in this, “omg, did you hear?” kind of way. Even the poster is overly sensational – “What, you think we could make this up?!” Like, wow – the US kinda-sorta funded the current hash in the Middle East; a selfish senator saw a skinny orphan and had a change of heart; this is not news to me. I think the most succinct thing I can say of this movie is how about half an hour in I was saying to myself, “so, it’s not Catch-22 ...” ... I didn’t even like Catch-22 as a movie, lol, I much preferred it on stage. With Mike Nichols behind it, this movie should’ve been so much more scathing, even blatant, about what it’s saying; that there’s been even a whiff of Oscar buzz about it is laughable. The Eighties production design, the hair and makeup, are disastrous. It’s about the most epitomous of last year’s glossy but worthless movies I’ve yet seen.

“I disapprove of women in pantsuits. The world doesn’t need any more Hilary Clintons.”

Thus begins the story of a man who makes Swimming with Sharks’ Buddy Ackerman look like a pussycat, lol. I loved director Billy Ray’s Shattered Glass – in fact I’m annoyed that I haven’t seen it a second time in the past four years – and this is kind of a neat inversion of the story there, despite still being based of course on a true story. Ryan Phillippe sort of does the Hayden Christensen part, posing as a clerk for Robert Hanssen, played by Chris Cooper. It’s Hanssen, however, who turns out to be the deceptive one; but not before Phillippe has warmed to him in quite a deeply human way – and maybe we have too. Cooper is fantastic enough to make that seemingly impossible thing occur – I like the almost comic presentation of Hanssen at times, he almost reminds me of George C. Scott Sterling Hayden in Dr. Strangelove or something, like the thing about Catherine Zeta Jones and his paranoia. It’s good to see Laura Linney again, too.

I can’t for the life of me explain why I loved this but I did. Had I time to watch it again before the year is out (not that I’ve much of an excuse – at 88 minutes it’s astounding how much it covers), it’s likely it’d be topping my end of year list, and along with Away From Her it’s one of two films I really think should be up for Best Picture at the Oscars in February though I know there’s not a cat’s chance in hell with either (not to say I might not get ballsy and switch them into my predix at the last minute).

It’s ultimately the work of a liberal smart and world-wearied enough to know that a lot of the politics he once fought for have today gone too far just like the politics of the “enemy” – to the point where there are a lot of people like the student here who are supremely intelligent but so jaded by cynicism they feel not only that the world is beyond saving but also that they’re “above” saving it … that the world doesn’t “deserve” their help because of the way it’s beaten them down.

It’s been said many times that one doesn’t need sex, violence, and coarse language if you actually have something to say. It’s amazing that this movie manages to be just as scathingly political a film as Brian De Palma’s Redacted while being resolutely, humblingly mature about it and giving time to the other side too. It kind of made me feel ashamed for having praised the starkly crude De Palma movie so much. This one leaves you really thinking twice over the cynicism about politics so many of us have not so much taken for granted as absorbed into a status quo. I think this is that rare thing of a movie that could change people – or at least make them think about changing … or indeed, just having an opinion to begin with.

Another that really might, perhaps even should, become an annual tradition. I knew that this movie would be vastly improved on a second viewing and I wasn’t wrong. In fact, if anything, I understated it. This shoots up my list of faves on this viewing, it’s either amazing or downright frightening how the movie has “aged” in only 2 years, aged well I have to say, but the relevance is just shockingly tangible, and I think it will only become moreso in years to come (for better or worse).

I’m surprised by how much I wrote on the first viewing, because what I failed to mention then – what I thought I had said – was that I was honestly, bizarrely now I think back, underwhelmed by it the first time. What I also forgot to say there was, in short, it’s mindblowing … frightening, uplifting, hopeful, quirky, sexy, sleek, and at all times astonishingly consistent for all the turns and tones it takes.

Incidentally, I couldn’t help incorporating and egg-bread based snack into this viewing too, lol. Not quite eggy-in-a-basket – didn’t have the patience – but I think along with a November 5th viewing slot, this also should be incorporated into the ritual lol.

There’s tons more to say about it – luckily, there’ll be tons more opportunities to do so.

October 12th, 2006:

They’re comparisons I really didn’t want to make, but they’re kinda hard not to, so I’ll just get them out of the way – this is very much “1984” meets “Phantom of the Opera”. I kinda stole the Phantom reference from Roger Ebert’s review which I read while watching, but I think I would’ve come to the same conclusion myself by the end of the movie. Personally, I found V resembled less the Phantom and more Tim Burton’s Batman (certainly in the first 10-20 minutes, at least till he starts on the alliteration) or, even more than anything, Vincent Price’s Dr. Phibes (I think it was the jukebox in his lair that clinched it, I don’t know why) ... but I definitely see the similarity. The “1984” comparison is particularly hard to avoid when you have John Hurt frequently appearing with in an almost emotionless face on a giant telescreen

But for all its familiarity, this movie is still quite a marvel, peaking with a twist part way that truly blew my mind for a moment, and finally delivering the Natalie Portman performance that I’ve been waiting for ever since 1996’s Beautiful Girls (Closer was close but, on reflection, no cigar). And any movie that has you running out of the room halfway to make some eggy in a basket has got to be worth recommending. I think this is one that will improve exponentially on repeat viewings.

ps. Oh yes, and mustn’t fail to mention the wonderful little girl who says, “Bollocks!” to the BS news towards the beginning of the movie, lol. Such things no movie should be without.

spoilers

“I forgot the wheatgrass!”

OMG Anna Chlumsky is back And this time it’s not societally reprehensible to fancy the hell out of her lol. Which, it goes without saying, I do. This is one of those movies that, even before I finally saw it, seemed to get better the more I heard about it. The concept – guy accidentally invents a car engine that runs on human blood which, in a future where fuel prices have risen to a prohibitive level, is handy – pauses ... I mean, come on, you have to applaud that concept, it’s frankly genius, lol, but wait there’s more. I then found out it features one of my earliest movie crushes who has been pretty much off the map almost a decade (not that I’m complaining – her “farewell”, a straight-to-video movie with Christina Ricci, Gold Diggers, actually felt genuinely like I was dreaming when I found it on tape lol, so much did I fancy them both at the time). Then the movie begins, Chlumsky puts me immediately in mind of Angela Bettis in May – then I realise, the blood thing? It’s totally Little Shop of Horrors stylee!

Chlumsky is a kooky blonde girl in thick-rimmed glasses who works in a little nondescript vegan hut selling wheatgrass to our hero, a kindergarten teacher who’s more anxious than the kids to leave at three in the afternoon to get home and use said wheatgrass in his experimental engine project. Chlumsky’s hut is in a little clearing opposite another hut which, a handpainted sign tells us, sells Meat and is owned by a sexy brunette in black. Somewhere in the vicinity is a grey building that a typing-challenged subtitler tells us is the GOVEMREN- GOVERNMENT. It’s almost a Lars Von Trier/Thomas Vinterberg type world, a la Dogville, Manderlay, Dear Wendy – everything either labelled, or might as well be because there’s only one of each thing.

“Oh. God. I needed a whole person.”

It’s also another in a series of horror movies I’ve watched this past week or so which has that wonderful (for want of a better word) moment where it suddenly stops being funny. The government man’s monologue at the end almost reaches the level of South Park in its insanity – “Killing people for fuel is not racist … us has beaten ‘em. Us. Spell it out. U.S.” Yes, the concept of the movie isn’t just a funny coincidence. And the ending – all heart-stopping 2 minutes of it – is really, really, far from funny. It really took me aback for a second and I didn’t like it, but as the credits rolled, I suddenly realised how insanely good this movie might be.

I’ve had a number of false starts on my marathon this year. I can’t think of a better way of starting a day or night (or both!) of horror movies than this, though. Hilarious, bloody, short, fresh, freaky and finally more serious than you’ll ever see coming – I don’t think there’ll be a blacker comedy outside of Sweeney Todd this year. I honestly didn’t want this to end. My only criticism is there’s nowhere near enough of Anna – and though I won’t deny the effectiveness, I think I really could’ve done without the point blank shooting of the little girls at the end.

Another long overdue review … this is going to get random and gushy ‘cos it’s amazing after countless viewings how this one continues to blow me away.

Everytime I watch this I think it’s going to lose something; but, everytime I watch it, it seems only to become more intense, to move and inspire me more. I need to watch it more often. There are so many more great moments in this movie than I ever come to it expecting. First and foremost the one thing that will satisfy almost anybody, I think, is the soundtrack. I’m constantly wracking my brains over why this movie is so hard to find these days (it’s on TCM here in the UK about twice annually, and you’ll find about as many VHS copies on eBay each year too … well worth grabbing, I promise) and the most logical seems to me that there are a lot of expensive music rights involved (including Lennon / McCartney’s “Give Peace a Chance”) (my other most prominent theory is simply to do with how stunningly relevant the movie remains, the cynic in me believing that no major media corporation with all today’s political pressure would want to make available a movie like this … I swear there’s every chance it would lead to uprising if enough people saw it).

Anyway, it’s one of the great movie soundtracks, the easiest comparison is to Cameron Crowe’s selections for his movies … the movie itself actually kinda resembles Almost Famous to me in a lot of ways – Bruce Davison looks a lot like Patrick Fugit in places, and his position in relation to the main story is similar, a spectator swept along by one of the 60s-70s’ many wild waves.

There’s the love story – the way I react to Linda (beautiful Kim Darby, another aspect of the movie that seems to improve with each viewing) and Simon (Bruce Davison) in this movie definitely leads me to believe it’s purely a personal thing, I can’t put into words how I feel my insides churning when these two look at each other … only to say it’s a similar feeling to that I get when talking to my own true love. There’s some amazing chemistry between these two actors. When they’re on the fairground ride, as she mouths, “do you love me?” to CSNY’s “Our House” – that would be the moment I instantly pinpoint as to why I love this movie so much. Well OK, that and the final line – “PROVE YOURSELF ALIVE!” – set to Buffy Sainte-Marie’s “The Circle Game”.

The violence in the end scenes had me shaking on this viewing even more than I did the first time. As with a number of other movies (Soldier Blue and Dawn of the Dead spring to mind), I found myself wondering if I was seeing a different cut altogether. It’s a truly horrifying finale – I finally recognised Bud Cort (Harold in Harold and Maude) this time round, and I think maybe that was a factor in how much the ending got to me – I was a lot more into his character, and watching him in those final scenes is almost too much to bear. It’s the way the movie swishes from the light to the dark – 30 minutes earlier you were laughing at him holding his nose in the presence of a couple of people smoking pot; suddenly his life is on the line for no reason but pure pathetic human stupidity. I think that’s what the movie captures best about James Simon Kunen’s book, the way Simon is a spectator, neither on one side nor the other with any particular level of commitment. Depending on how you view it, the movie arguably highlights the craziness, the lack of direction of the protestors just as much as it does that of the pigs, the politicians, the authorities. Kunen’s book is all about that ambivalent approach to things and as you might have noticed from this site’s URL, I’m all about ambivalence