peter jackson's THE LOVELY BONES (2009)

(click to read via METRO PULSE)

clint eastwood's GRAN TORINO (2008)

the first thing we notice, of course, is that cocked scowl. it was there when A Fistful Of Dollars first introduced him to the world, and it's very much there on Clint Eastwood's face throughout most of Gran Torino, the film that will allegedly steal his grizzled visage away from the screen for good; he was handsome once (maybe still) and his features have only sharpened as he's aged, but the sharpest of all is that unmistakable expression. Clint Eastwood, it would seem, is perpetually one step away from giving you the ass-whooping you've always deserved.

there's no denying that Gran Torino's Walt Kowalski (Eastwood, who also directs) has found plenty to scowl about. we first meet him at his wife's funeral, glaring at his bored, immodest grandchildren and listening to the empty words of an earnest rookie priest. receiving guests later that afternoon, he grouses about the crowd in his house and speaks testily to his two sons, who seem no more interested in his grief than he does in theirs. as they finally pull away, the retired auto worker quietly condemns his son's Japanese SUV, spits on the ground, and turns his attention to his neighbors, who have spent the afternoon celebrating a birth.

Walt's problem with these people (if he needs a reason) is the same as his problem with most of his Detroit neighborhood, which has been slowly and steadily overtaken by immigrant communities, particularly the southeast Asian Hmong. a Korean War vet, Kowalski looks upon them with undisguised, bluntly racist contempt, and they're prone to returning his gaze with fascination. Kowalski is, after all, as much a relic as his twin prize possessions: the M1 Garand rifle in his basement and the mint-condition 1972 Gran Torino in his garage.

naturally -- or, if you rather, by considerable contrivance -- our crochety, despicable hero is coaxed into a reluctant relationship with the neighboring Lor family. circumstances surrounding Kowalski's reflexive rifle-wielding confrontation with a gang of Hmong hooligans bring the teenage Thao (Bee Vang) into his home through a customary indentured servitude, while Thao's plucky older sister Sue (Ahney Her) seems to sense the old man's loneliness, and brings him into their home in return.

so there we are: Gran Torino is, at least at first, a film about racism and its reconciliation, with no small bit of the boring baggage that sort of film typically entails. screenwriter Nick Schenck goes to great pains to paint Kowalski as a bigot, but falls there and elsewhere into a tendency to tell rather than show; we are spared honest examination of his mindset in favor of abundant, casual epithets, ugly in the wrong way because they find no weight to carry. there is even a flatly superfluous scene between Kowalski, Sue and some black street toughs, existing only to emphasize the "wow he's racist but those guys were validating his prejudices" angle (as well as the "wow its badass when Clint pulls a gun on dudes" angle, which i have much less quarrel with.)

luckily Gran Torino slowly snaps out of its Crash-Lite sermonizing as Kowalski and Thao's relationship develops, and we come to understand what has drawn Eastwood to this story, particularly as an onscreen swan song. Kowalski's cantankerousness, it seems, is rooted just as firmly in masculine identity as racism, and he goes to increasing lengths to encourage the quiet, submissive Thao to pursue manly self-sufficience, especially when the Hmong thugs (led by Thao's cousin Spider) ride in on the third act.

while Thao remains fairly inert (it's evident that the majority of the Hmong actors are non-professionals) this thematic re-evaluation finally gives Clint something to do besides slur and sneer, and it becomes clear that Walt Kowalski has more in common with Dirty Harry Callahan than just the name on the marquee. the racism, resentment, and resistance to change are all outlets for rage, forged in war and tempered for decades by a manly life but newly impotent in the face of a world moving on. Kowalski clings to his own empowered experience as he clings to his Gran Torino; if he is a relic, he is unashamed.

it becomes clear, then, that Gran Torino is not simply the labored cross-cultural melodrama we've figured it for, but a meditation on a career on the screen, now too in decline thanks to age and changing times; Eastwood may be American cinema's most important masculine figure -- that cold scowl is an iconography in and of itself -- and whether or not his performance lives up to the legend (it doesn't, sorry) he's certainly rooted out a thoughtful curtain call in Gran Torino.

it's a good thing, however, that he plans to continue directing films. once the quotation marks are firmly in place around Walt Kowalski, Gran Torino's lazy character study sputters to a stop, dutifully hitting its marks and building to a nearly surprising ending but apparently content to have left its audience behind in fond daydreams of woolen ponchos and .44 magnums. (maybe we're happier that way anyway?) farewell, scowl, and godspeed.

(from the KNOXVILLE VOICE)

wes anderson's THE DARJEELING LIMITED (2007)

stefan ruzowitzky’s THE COUNTERFEITERS (2007)

it’s not particularly hard to see why Stefan Ruzowitzky’s Die Fälscher (The Counterfeiters) walked away with 2007’s Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film. even if the Academy hadn’t so typically snubbed more notable films like Persepolis and 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days, Ruzowitzky’s handsome, inessential tale of the Third Reich’s counterfeiting efforts is still just the kind of flick that usually grabs the award: palatable, prestigious, and neutered by bland, Americanized cinematic traditions.

that’s not all bad, of course, and The Counterfeiters is, if nothing else, evidence of that. based on a memoir by its lone non-amalgamated character, the film is a necessarily fictionalized account of Operation Bernhard, which saw the Nazis recruiting bankers and printmakers from prison camps into an operation to faithfully reproduce British and American currency, first in hopes of economic sabotage and later with the loftier goal of continuing to finance their doomed military struggle. the audience’s window into this rich subject is fictional master counterfeiter Solomon Sorowitsch (Karl Markovics, showcasing a DeNiro-like intensity), who is imprisoned in 1936 and eventually recruited for Bernhard by the same detective (now a Major in the SS) who busted him years earlier. heading the counterfeiting operation, Sorowitsch sympathetically butts heads with “coworker” Adolf Burger (August Diehl), a printer and political agitator preoccupied with sabotaging Operation Bernhard, no matter the cost to him or his fellow prisoners.

The Counterfeiters uses this testy, philosophically-charged relationship between Sorowitsch and Burger as a jumping off point to address some compelling ethical questions, made all the more immediate by the backdrop of the Holocaust. are Bernhard’s participants morally obligated to undermine the force that has so harshly imprisoned them, yet now given them meager creature comforts and a chance at survival? would their sabotage and subsequent martyrdom mean anything when a new group of prisoners came in to replace them? and if they continue to cooperate, are they anything less than Nazi collaborators?

it's a credit to Ruzowitsky’s talents that these questions very rarely bog down the film’s smart pacing or considerable dramatic intrigue, and that most of them are explored with surprising, thoughtful depth. but the focus afforded these quandaries also makes the lesser among them seem labored and overcooked, and thus undermines them in the end. it’s unfair, perhaps, to ask true profundity of a film like The Counterfeiters, but it’s equally unfair that it should get our hopes up.

(from the KNOXVILLE VOICE)

akira kurosawa's RASHOMON (1950)

ben affleck's GONE BABY GONE (2007)

it turns out Ben Affleck isn't a complete cosmic waste of space, just that he was on the wrong side of the camera! Gone Baby Gone is a slick, capable and occasionally impressive debut from everyone's eleventh-favorite romantic lead, drawing a lot of strength from a great cast (it is, for instance, damn clear who got whatever acting genes there are to be had in the Affleck lineage) but even more from an uncommonly well-drawn portrait of the smaller corners of a big city. even if it didn't share Amy Ryan, Michael K. Williams and Dennis Lehane with The Wire, there would still be easy parallels to draw between the two: GBG's Dorchester streets are as finely textured as those of The Wire's Baltimore, featuring faces and types you don't often see in movies but quite plainly belong where they pop up, which is all the more conducive to the startling depth of the character constellations. in the end it's a pity that Lehane's lopsided narrative doesn't squeeze more comfortably into a feature film, but Affleck's still to be commended for a job finally well done.

todd field's LITTLE CHILDREN (2006)

it's been a long time since a movie affected me quite so much as Little Children, and days later i still can't put my finger on why; the film as a whole is dour, uncomfortable and a little overwrought, focusing sometimes lazily (though always eloquently) on the same bourgeoise malaise done to death by inferior but more accessible films like American Beauty. on the other hand, though, Field and Perotta's emotional and psychological incisions fearlessly graze bone throughout, whether presenting a sad man resigned to his monstrousness (Jackie Earle Haley's scene in the parked car will bother me for the rest of my life) or a pair of adulterers wrestling poignantly with the situation they so carelessly careened into hopelessness and hurt. in a lot of ways Little Children recalls the work of Todd Solondz: it's self-consciously shocking, and even occasionally blase in its deviant provocation. but Solondz snickers at his characters, and at the audience squirming in their seats; Field, on the other hand, maintains an austerity even in rare moments of levity, and while Little Children may be a hard film to sit through, we aren't ever left to question what it's made us feel.

tony gilroy's MICHAEL CLAYTON (2007)

woody allen's CASSANDRA'S DREAM (2007)

it’s not easy being a Woody Allen fan. American cinema’s comic laureate has released a film practically every year since his 1969 debut Take The Money And Run, running the gamut between ribald gag-a-minute comedies and philosophically smothering chamber dramas as he carved out a body of work as curiously personal as it is significant. a handful of his films are among the all-time greats, and at least fifteen more aspire closely to greatness. but several others are just okay. and, to be very honest, an increasing number are damned dreadful. such is the curse of productivity.

in 2005, however, Woody’s diminishing batting average was unexpectedly bolstered with the home run that was Match Point, a sharp, wicked tale of luck and murder set across the pond from his beloved New York City. besides being better than anything he’d made in at least half a decade, the film exhibited an encouraging restlessness in Allen’s craft, and at the age of seventy he proved he could still surprise his audience. was it his newest muse, Scarlett Johansson, or perhaps the United Kingdom itself, that so inspired him? his subsequent film, the middling Scoop, suggests not. so perhaps it was the straightfaced, low-key crime drama?

the answer, for better or worse, lies in Cassandra’s Dream, Match Point’s opposing bookend in his British trilogy. the film centers around Ian and Terry Blaine (Ewan McGregor and Colin Farrell), two lower middle class South Londoners with a propensity for living beyond their means: Terry chases spurts of good and bad luck to the dog tracks and high-stakes private poker games, while Ian daydreams of hotel investments and woos a beautiful actress with optimistic lies. as the chasm between means and aspirations expands, their successful Uncle Howard (Tom Wilkinson) blows into town with a dark proposition dressed up in language of generosity and family loyalty: a former associate is preparing to testify regarding unsavory business practices, and must be dealt with. capital D, capital W.

and thus the brothers Blaine are faced with a tough decision, and its consequences reverberate through the rest of the film: one brother tries to cope with guilt and fear, the other with their absence. superficially, Cassandra’s Dream echoes Match Point in its form: Allen again plays the film straight (he stays behind the camera, for one) and pulls off another impressive exercise is style and restraint. in content, however, the film is much closer to 1989’s Crimes & Misdemeanors, an earlier masterpiece dealing with the spiritual implications of murder gone unpunished.

sadly, Cassandra’s Dream lives up to neither. one of the main problems is the characters: as with Match Point, he has little trouble bridging the cultural divide, but here the added problem of social class proves trickier; Allen has his heart set on nuance and realism, but his scripting undoes him, taking little care to disguise what amounts to a poored-down version of his typical milieu. this becomes a serious problem as the film progresses, as the story and its psychology hinge entirely on Ian and Terry’s desperation, but time and time again their plight rings untrue, and so the events in motion around them carry the weight of contrivance.

even worse, the film’s conscious echoes of Crimes & Misdemeanors end up working against it as well, if only because C&M is a much more definitive piece of work; Allen borrows against his own ideas a little too enthusiastically, and though Terry’s plight adds another dimension to the struggle, his weakness seems somehow affected and dramatically insufficient. Ian’s arc does push the story into pulpier territory than C&M dared tread, and the film is engaging throughout, but it’s hard to ignore the soft hum of a coasting filmmaker, especially by the film’s abrupt, unsatisfying finale, a small wonder of boring irony.

ah, but then, I’m only rough on Woody because I love him so. (this isn’t an uncommon affliction among Allen apologists.) Cassandra’s Dream is still in many regards an impressive 38th feature film by a onetime standup comedian, branching out confidently as it does into unfamiliar territory that proves just slightly beyond its grasp. and as much as Match Point has probably spoiled fans into hoping he’s got another ace up his sleeve, for the moment it’ll suffice to be quietly thankful that he’s still making stabs at greatness amidst a slow decline of recycled whimsy. see you next year, Woody.

(from the KNOXVILLE VOICE)