Celluloid Heroes

Give us your bombers, sir, and you can have our baskets.

In late August of 2003, there was a special screening of this film at the Pentagon, a few months after President Bush declared “Mission Accomplished” from the deck of the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln. The Department of Defense was not shy about their belief that the film offered valuable and necessary insight into the problems of fighting an insurgency in the Islamic world. In short, the American military had no illusions that the fight in Iraq was far from over, even if the politicians were pretending otherwise. If you needed any other evidence that this forty-year-old film was still uncommonly relevant and current, note the film was also banned by the French for five years after its release. Clearly, the French didn’t like to be reminded of past trangressions that far outstrip anything that U.S. forces in Iraq have been accused of.

(more…)

Scott Nehring, the creative force behind Nehring the Edge, suffered a heart attack this week and is in the hospital. We send our best wishes for a speedy recovery. Head over to his site to leave your own wishes.

You have the power to kill but not negotiate. In Somalia, killing is negotiation.

Ridley Scott’s fact-based epic is probably the most patriotic anti-war movie ever made. It successfully honors the men and their mission, while simultaneously acknowledging the politics that ultimately made their sacrifices rather futile in the end. It may be the first modern war movie about a truly modern war and watching it now, I realize that the current occupants of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue have either not seen this movie or have at least never internalized the lessons from the events depicted. The prior tenant may have learned the wrong lesson from the Battle of Mogadishu, but at least he was paying some attention.

(more…)

One day, not today, not tomorrow, not this season, probably not next season either but one day, you and I are gonna wake up and suddenly we’re gonna be like every other team in every other sport where winning is everything and nothing else matters.

Sports films about plucky collegiate or high school underdogs overcoming the odds have become a significant sub-genre in recent years. Dating back to Hoosiers, recent examples include Glory Road and Remember the Titans. The success of that last film was the impetus for the recent spasm of similar films. The most recent member of the roster, We Are Marshall, certainly doesn’t disgrace the team, but neither does it stand out from the crowd. Eschewing flash for sound fundamentals, this movie keeps punching for four quarters.

(more…)

Money’s only something you need in case you don’t die tomorrow…

Oliver Stone’s reputation as a wide-eyed provocateur of the left is mostly founded around one movie, the unfortunate JFK, and those who only see him through the prism of that one movie might expect Wall Street to be nothing less than a lacerating indictment of the entire capitalist system. The director’s target is more specific than that, however. His father was a stockbroker, so Stone isn’t about to trash the entire profession, but he does take aim at some of the more egregious excesses of the mid-eighties.

Keep in mind that this was before day trading and the days of CNBC and cable news channels with a full time stock ticker running across the bottom of the screen, so elements that seem familiar to us in 2007 were actually somewhat revelatory in 1987. Thus, Stone’s insider’s look at the world of corporate raiders and leveraged buyouts was pretty eye-opening at the time.

(more…)

If it makes you feel any better, you only let him get away with attempted murder.

In this movie, Anthony Hopkins does not rehash his portrayal of Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs, but you could be forgiven for thinking that he does based on the marketing campaign for this entertaining if illogical courtroom thriller.

Don’t get me wrong, this movie features some smartly written scenes and some genuinely clever plot twists, but the success of the villains scheme depends on some truly mind boggling coincidences. Vegas hookers have been forced to swallow far less during your average spring break.

(more…)

Once you get married you only hang out with other married people. Why? ‘Cause no single person could stand to be around you.

I’ll be the first to admit that Chris Rock is not my cup of tea when it comes to stand up comics. He’s smart and he is funny, but there is something in his delivery and demeanor that I find off-putting for some reason. Needless to say, a new Chris Rock movie is not high on my list of “must see” pictures. Imagine my surprise when I found both his acting and directing to be among the best parts of this intelligent but deeply flawed comedy.

Despite able and attractive actors in the lead roles, I Think I Love My Wife is hampered by a sitcom story that’s simply too thin to support a feature-length film. After establishing its players and their situation, it spends the middle parts of the film running them in circles until the end.

(more…)

Patton will lead the assault. I would prefer Montgomery, but even Eisenhower isn’t that stupid.

This movie serves as both an unofficial sequel and thematic bookend to The Longest Day. It has an undeserved reputation for being overlong, ponderous and dull. It’s none of those things but I can understand how it could appear that way to people expecting a more conventional war movie.

A Bridge Too Far details, at great length and in exacting detail, the Allied debacle known as Operation Market Garden, an over-ambitious plan by General Sir Bernard Law Montgomery to end World War II by Christmas, 1944, by kicking down the undefended back door of Germany. The main problem with the battle plan was that it depended entirely on Murphy’s Law being repealed. For it to work, nothing could go wrong and, of course, everything did. That focus on the human price of hubris in war, of even the good guys succumbing to “victory disease,” makes this an atypical war movie at the time, more similar in theme to war movies made twenty years later.

(more…)

Well, I wouldn’t argue that it wasn’t a “no holds barred, adrenaline fueled thrill ride,” but there is no way you can perpetrate that amount of carnage and mayhem and not incur a considerable amount of paperwork.

In your typical American spoof of an over-amped, testosterone-pegged action film, the standing cliché seems to be to cast the hero as an incompetent bore, an anti-intellectual simpleton who bumbles his way through a handful of elaborately staged but unimaginative stunt scenes. Also, someone usually gets kicked in the crotch; often more than one someone.

Hot Fuzz, from the British creative team that brought us Shaun of the Dead, takes the exact opposite approach. Namely, they made a smart movie with noticeable dearth of foot to testicle contact. Not surprisingly, it is a hell of a lot funnier than all three Rush Hour movies combined, even if you toss Delta Farce onto the scales.

(more…)

Something is seriously fucked up!

You know, I had the funniest feeling I wasn’t going to like this movie.

Obvious puns aside, it was almost like I had seen it before. Wait, I had seen it before. It was 1993 and back then it was called Groundhog Day and it didn’t suck. (more…)