Celluloid Heroes

It involves lifting, driving, and all sorts of other things a woman shouldn’t be doing, if you ask me.

The opening credits for North Country claim that the movie is “inspired on a true story.” That puts in near the lower end of the Hollywood food chain for “true” stories. At the top would be the actual true stories, which are understandably rare. Even the “truest” films tend to employ some level of creative license, compositing characters and compressing events to make the story more “cinematic.” The next level down would be “based on a true story,” which roughly translates to, “We made up some shit to tailor the story to the A-List actor that we busted our ass to sign.”

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Whoever wrote this episode should die!

Original Star Trek cast member George Takei has allegedly said that Galaxy Quest is more true to the spirit of the TV show than any of the other theatrical movies based on the 60s TV series. While I wouldn’t hold it up against Wrath of Khan, this affectionate 1999 spoof is definitely a better Trek film than any of the odd-numbered entries in the franchise.

Galaxy Quest fits a spot-on satire of virtually the entire Trek phenomenon, from the show itself to the actors and the fans, into a tight 102-minute running time. The designs of the ships, the costumes and the sets veers just far enough from the source material for the filmmakers to avoid being eaten alive by a horde of ravenous Paramount lawyers.

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Please God! We need a cab! One lousy fuckin’ cab!

Quick Change is probably the least famous of the good Bill Murray movies. This is a grown-up, more cynical version of the Murray characters from movies like Stripes and Ghostbusters. He’s Grimm, a fed-up city planner for New York City and he’s decided to get out of town with his girlfriend, Phyllis (Geena Davis), and best friend, Loomis (Randy Quaid). First, however, he’s going to rob a bank.

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Let he who is without sin
Be the first to condemn
La vie bohème

Christopher Columbus, the director of Home Alone and Mrs. Doubtfire, seems like an odd choice to direct the film adaptation of an edgy, somewhat avante-garde musical like Rent. Unfortunately, the results tend to bear out the first impression created by this news. While the music and performances live up to the expectations formed by the Broadway play, Columbus’s direction fails to impress. His cinematography and staging tend toward the pedestrian, more appropriate to a beer commercial than a bohemian musical.

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Looks like you got a pretty serious Zorgon problem there.

You know, when I was six-and-three-quarters, if I’d gotten the family home sucked into space and nearly blown up by robots and flesh-eating alien lizards, not to mention flash-freezing my sister, I would have been grounded for, oh, at least a week.

Zathura is an adaptation of a children’s book by Chris Van Allsburg, who also wrote the books for Jumanji and The Polar Express. As a story, Zathura is similar to Jumanji, in that a game plunges a family into in adventure that seems to take over their house. As a movie, I enjoyed it far more than Polar Express. The young heroes in this movie are much less passive and lacked the creepy thousand-yard stares of Express’s computer-generated characters.

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Will somebody show this poor asshole the way out of town?

The Frisco Kid is a genial comedy desperately in search of a narrative thread. This story of a hapless Polish rabbi (Gene Wilder) finding his way across the American Old West with the help of a genial bank robber (Harrison Ford) has a good heart and some funny moments, but no sense of direction. It hits the high points of western clichés, like train robbers, Chinese railroad workers, a hanging posses, horse being spooked by a rattlesnake and a climatic showdown on a dusty street. The real problem is that the central relationship, between Wilder’s Rabbi Avram Belinski and Ford’s Tommy Lillard, has no story arc. They meet, they bicker, they reach San Francisco.

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There’s nothing more real than a mirage.

Nine Lives is the movie equivalent of an anthology of short stories, incorporating the tales of nine women whose lives have trapped them inside personally untenable situations. It’s also a stylistic experiment, because each story is filmed in a single, unbroken eleven to fifteen minute take. This unique approach turns each episode into a one act play. It also gives the stories an immediate, fly-on-the-wall quality that heightens the sense of reality onscreen.

The stories themselves lack any grand, life-changing arc that you expect from more conventional movies. These are moments out of nine lives (natch) captured voyeuristically. The script by writer/director Rodrigo García captures the natural rhythms of the way people talk (rather than the way movie characters talk). The characters are sharply etched portraits of largely unremarkable, but compelling people we might know, but in shoes we’re glad we’re not walking.

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It’s not the money’s fault it was stolen.

Danny Boyle, director of 28 Days Later and Trainspotting, and Frank Cotrell Boyce, screenwriter of 24 Hour Party People, have pulled a Robert Rodriguez, turning from decidedly adult fare to produce superior family entertainment. Millions is, in fact, even better than the original Spy Kids, enjoyable for all ages rather than just juvenile wish fulfillment.

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I don’t get it.

The Aristocrats is literally a one-joke movie, but unlike a lot of lame comedies out there, this time it’s intentional. What we have here is a 90-minute dissection of what is allegedly the world’s filthiest joke. What’s most interesting about The Joke is that it’s not really funny. At least, the punchline is a total anti-climax compared to what has gone before.

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You better get married soon. You’re starting to look… old.

After My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Nia Vardalos seemed poised for huge success. Expectations were diminished slightly when the follow-up sit-com, My Big Fat Greek Life, sank like the Titanic. No, better make that the Lusitania, since Titanic stayed afloat longer than the TV show.

The premature cratering of the series shouldn’t take anything away from what she achieved in this inspired adaptation of her one-woman stage show. Rita Wilson certainly knew what she was doing when she persuaded husband Tom Hanks to produce Vardalos’ acerbic love letter to her Greek heritage.

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I tried to save my life but it didn’t work.

Damn it, I know I’m supposed to like this movie. I am a movie buff with a great deal of patience for slower, offbeat films. And Miranda July’s directorial debut has a keen sense of character and as a writer, she’s got a terrific ear for the way people talk. The problem with this film is its lack of focus. The plot has a bad case of attention deficit disorder as July crams a Robert Altman-sized cast into its brief indie-film running time.

The film would have been better served by focusing more closely on the relationship of its central characters, socially awkward shoe salesman Richard (John Hawkes) and socially awkward aspiring performance artist Christine (July). Any one of the numerous subplots would have been interesting but just not all of them. When July titled the film “Everyone We Know,” she wasn’t kidding.

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Promise me you won’t let nobody turn you into no cripple, you won’t become no charity case, and you’ll stand on your own two feet.

The most amazing thing about Jamie Foxx’s performance in Ray is how when the real Ray Charles appears briefly on screen toward the end of the movie, there is no jarring disconnect with the rest of the picture. Foxx has Charles’s vocal mannerisms down so perfectly that, when asked to lip-synch to the real performer’s recordings, it is seamless.

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