I have a confession to make, and that is — despite my love of movies and music and television and books and video games and the like — I tend not to be very up to date on my media consumption. There’s simply too much for me to pay attention to, and it usually costs more money if I acquire it right away. So my efforts are focused on sifting through the best of older media. It’s just a better use of my time and energy.
However, thanks to more disposable income and free time post-graduation, 2010 was a large step toward the present for me. I saw a lot of movies, bought some video games, and even listened to some of this year’s albums which, in the past, was practically unheard of but for a few bands.
Despite this, my coverage is not great. Consider this a warning that the upcoming list — loosely defined as “My Top 25 Favorite Pieces of Entertainment and Art That Were Published in 2010″ — is flawed in a variety of ways, the most notable of which is that I simply haven’t seen or listened or read or played everything* in 2010.
*Notable holes in my coverage include: all TV drama, most non-blockbuster films. I will catch up on these eventually.
Also, in case the title didn’t make this clear, this is an account of my personal taste. What follows is a list of things that moved and engaged me. I make no contention that these selections represent what I believe would be valuable to the mass public or even my close friends.
Yes, it’s boneheaded to combine all different media into one list. Each format of art and entertainment is incompatible with the others. But I couldn’t get respectable lists out of any individual medium, and I wanted to honor my favorites across the board, so I decided to mash all of them together.
Anyways, let’s just get on with this mess. Without further adieu, my top 25 favorite movies, albums, TV shows, books*, video games, and other thingies from 2010.
*There are actually NO books on this list. I read a lot in 2010 but little to none that was published this year.
The Invention of Lying just doesn’t know what it wants to be. It spends its first third belaboring its premise — a world where people are incapable of lying — with the same joke over and over. Then it shifts to a Yes Man-type attempt at an inspiring tale. Then it shifts into a religious satire. And finally into a generic romantic comedy. It’s all a bit discombobulated and, unfortunately, unsatisfying.
Though the cast is full of lovable stars, they feel a bit strangely used and discongruous. Ricky Gervais leads the pack and only sometimes does a good job. He absolutely nails the satirical elements, but the conventional portions of the film fall short in spite of Gervais’s prodigious charms.
Jennifer Garner stars opposite Gervais and she is as winning as always. There’s not much chemistry between her and Gervais, primarily because her role is in the romantic comedy portion and that’s where Gervais falls flat.
The supporting cast is an all-star bunch but takes very odd roles: Louis CK is good at his deadpan but the character written for him contributes little. Rob Lowe as the foil doesn’t play to his strengths as an actor, and Jonah Hill’s contribution is very strange and short-lived. (Side note: Both CK and Lowe have appeared in the exemplary sitcom Parks and Recreation to much better effect.) Tina Fey and a few other stars appear for mere moments; why bring in the big guns if you have nothing for them to do?
The reason to see this film — aside from the first few minutes before the premise grows tired — is the extended scene where Gervais essentially invents God (“The Man in the Sky”). It is Gervais at his finest and most natural: biting, sarcastic, subversive. No other scenes in the film quite reach the hilarious heights of that atheistic satire of religion, even though later scenes toy with the idea — particularly a scene where an unkempt Gervais resembles a certain religious figure.
Others may be more hooked in by the premise than I was. I just thought a main character with all the knowledge and upper hand — he alone has the ability to lie in his world — was largely unappealing. But even if you buy the premise, large portions of the film have little to do with the film’s hook. Honestly, I can’t imagine anyone really loving this film unless they’re really smitten with Gervais. The film is just too schizophrenic to ring with any sort of truth.
There was a point about halfway into It’s Kind of a Funny Story when I was confident the film was headed into four-star territory. The set-up in this movie is phenomenal in three ways: the way it establishes its conflict, the way it introduces its colorful cast of characters, and the way it establishes a lightweight yet moving tone. While the second half of the film is a bit derivative and a let-down, the overall effect of the film is a fulfilling and inspiring one.
Sometimes the line between depression and happiness is razor thin, and Funny Story is about that line. Why is central character Craig (Keir Gilchrist) depressed? He has a loving family, he goes to a great school, he has friends, he has no particularly dark secrets. He’s just not very happy. He feels alone.
And so he begs a doctor to let him into the mental ward of the hospital, North 3, after he has a suicidal dream. He wants an easy way out. As soon as he gets there, he witnesses just how scary “real” mental disorders are. The patients — ranging from a bed-ridden Egyptian man who Craig shares a room with, to chronically depressed father Bobby, to quirky wristcutter Noelle — terrify and confuse him at first.
Central to Craig’s growth and ability to answer the questions he has about himself are Bobby and Noelle. Emma Roberts does a good job as Noelle, capturing a seductive balance of innocence and darkness. As you could probably guess from the posters, if not the casting decision alone, Noelle becomes something of a love interest for Craig, and they way they discover each other is adorable. It reminded me of a few of my favorite film romances, Before Sunrise and Garden State, in the earnest self-definition that it accompanies.
Meanwhile, Zach Galifianakis is astonishingly good as Bobby. He had me cracking up and on the verge of tears in the same scene. His presence is still a little bit uncomfortable, a la The Hangover. But where his star-making role primarily used Galifianakis as a comic crutch, he has a real character in Funny Story. Heartbreaking and moving, Galifiankis’s Oscar-worthy work alone is worth the price of admission.
The supporting cast does a solid job, though I came to question a few of the casting decisions. Particularly, I wasn’t a fan of the choice for Nia, Craig’s longtime crush. Zoe Kravitz never gives off a “Miss Perfect” vibe to match the characterization in the script.
The film never dawdles too long on Craig’s obsession with Nia, nor any conflict. It moves so briskly through the drama that I almost wish there was another 30 or 45 minutes to flesh it out. But the rapid pace has its perks: I dug the lightweight tone for most of the film. It would’ve been easily to screw up the tone of this film, but, for the most part, the the underlying giddiness never detracts from the seriousness of the topic.
Funny Story also briskly intercuts dream sequences and abstract representations of Craig’s mental state. Think 500 Days of Summer. There are also lots of flashbacks with narration and other tools that often get dismissed as contrivances but are a key part of this film’s experience.
The tone’s few trouble spots come towards the end. First, the film dips into some really tired romantic comedy tropes. I loved the blooming romance between Noelle and Craig for about two thirds of the film, until the generic third-act boy-loses-girl twist sends it into a nosedive from which it never fully recovers.
Even more troublesome is the questionable conclusion for the rest of the ward. After the film convincingly depicts the different ends of the spectrum of mental disorder spectrum, the conclusion of this film almost trivializes some of the more serious mental diseases.
There are people — such as this film’s Muqtada — who need more than a little joy and momentum to be cured. Some mental patients will always need serious therapy and medicine to cope with major issues. I did not detect an acknowledgment of that truth in Funny Story‘sending.
At the same time, dwelling on the patients with serious mental illnesses would’ve bogged down the film from its central theme, which bubbles with passion and rings of truth: We need to live our lives in a way that make us happy.
The presentation of this theme connected with me on a very personal level. I really empathized with Craig’s impulses, along with many of the particulars of his situation: While I’ve never been close to suicidal, I have seen a therapist for many of the same reasons Craig begs the doctor to check him into North 3.
There will be people who hate Funny Story for showcasing a white, upper-middle-class teenager without any serious problems who mopes around. For me, that was the main strength of the film: Anyone, anywhere, even someone as lucky and well off as me, can suffer from an unfulfilled life. But fulfillment doesn’t just magically happen: We have to earn it.
Today, The Social Network—aka “The Facebook Movie”—comes out to widespread anticipation and Oscar buzz. Upon first glance, I was barely interested in this project, but then I learned that Aaron Sorkin wrote it. And yes, the trailer was promising, the subject matter naturally relevant, and the hype and advance buzz have been so deafening that it would have been a 2010 awards’ season must-see anyway, BUT…without Sorkin’s name attached to it, I wouldn’t have nearly the same kinds of hopes for it.
It’s a shame that—as most popular entertainers tend to get—Sorkin has received his fair share of backlash over the years. His rapid-fire dialogue style has been parodied and mocked by those who don’t seem to realize that it succeeds not really because of its structure but by the quality of the words. His last movie, Charlie Wilson’s War, was met with yawns, even from me, and his last TV show, “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip,” was saddled with unfair criticism and never given the chance to succeed.
Yet none of that dampens my interest in The Social Network, largely because the man’s peak is so high, and because he has so frequently reached it.
For most people, it started with A Few Good Men, the Tom Cruise and Jack Nicholson courtroom drama that was actually dramatic. Aside from some unnecessary foreshadowing, Sorkin’s script thrived both in its structure and individual pieces of dialogue. (“You can’t handle the truth!”)
But for me, it all started with The West Wing, the immensely-acclaimed political drama centered around a fictional president’s inner circle of advisers. With a group of competent and devoted public servants representing something of a utopian vision, Sorkin created three-dimensional characters, challenged viewers’ intelligence, and infused episodes with comedy and wrenching drama alike.
The show was aided by superior acting across the board (not only by the principals but also guest stars like Timothy Busfield, Ron Silver, Oliver Platt, Mary Louise-Parker, and Matthew Perry), with special mention given to the actors who played, not coincidentally, the two most well-rounded and interesting characters: Bradley Whitford as Josh, the Deputy Chief of Staff, and Richard Schiff as Toby, the Communications Director.
While Sorkin wrote very few mediocre episodes, WW’s best moments typically featured one of those two characters. The exceptional Christmas episodes in the first two seasons softened both of them up with nary a hint of melodrama or pop psychology. The episode in which Toby learns about the president’s concealed multiple sclerosis not only captures a pitch-perfect tonal dichotomy—his anger contrasted with the levity of the rest of the staff—but also features a blinding, devastating monologue wherein Schiff blasts the president for his lack of foresight. Does he go too far? Conceivably, but he’s right, too, in and of his points.
The relationship between each of those characters and the president always represented the most fascinating dynamics. Similarly, the best staff conflicts occurred between Josh and Toby. In 4-1, an outstanding hour-and-a-half double-episode that merits multiple viewings despite its running time, they debate the philosophical nature of their candidate’s campaign style matched against a challenger whom they do not respect but who nevertheless has political potential. In 4-10, Toby doesn’t understand why Josh would give the former’s scarred father a second chance with him, but Josh comes back with, “You don’t know what I know—that I’d give anything to have a living father who was a felon or a sister with a past.”
Part of Sorkin’s gift was the way he infiltrated his episodes with deeper philosophical questions about governance. He was particularly intrigued at concepts of muddled authority; who would be in charge if the president was suddenly incapacitated for any reason? This notion informed the beginning of season two, Toby’s MS episode, and the brilliant end of the 4th season.
Said season—the best of his 4, a truly remarkable achievement—represented the end of Sorkin’s tenure with the show, as a contract dispute with NBC forced him off the air. The concluding storylines left him retiring at the top of his game; the birth of Toby’s children and Zoe Bartlet’s kidnapping provided incredibly powerful moments, and the final shot capped it all off.
When I told someone that, by that season’s end, the lack of a vice-president was going to matter, the response was, “Oh, God, they’re not going to kill the president, are they?” And that, of course, would have been lame. Instead, Sorkin wrote his own metaphor. The final image of Martin Sheen walking out of the oval office, having abdicated power to his political enemy but leaving before the coronation was complete, angry and frustrated and resolute at once, was the perfect way for Sorkin to walk away. There might have been a show beyond that, but there didn’t need to be.
Sorkin returned to TV with “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip,” a drama that aired on NBC for just one season back in 2006-07. Thanks to the success of WW and the strong cast, including old Sorkin hands Perry, Whitford, and Busfield, the show was one of the season’s most anticipated. For whatever reasons, though, it never gained traction with an audience, blogs trashed it so much that Sorkin became fed up with the Internet, critical reaction seemed muted, and NBC canned it after just one season.
To be sure, S60 was not its predecessor. But it, without question, deserved another season. Especially when considering that the baseline for network television appeals more to advanced primates than humans, the fact that S60 didn’t succeed can perhaps be viewed as an indictment of its superior level of intelligence. Arrogant as that may sound, it was my primary thought as I went through its season a couple weeks ago.
Now, you might say, WW was smart…and it was. But S60 possessed neither as many recognizable actors (Martin Sheen, Rob Lowe) nor a subject matter as inherently compelling. (No one even watches SNL anymore, so why would people want to watch a show about making it?) And WW never really cleaned up in the ratings category anyway. Based on a ranking of all shows during a week, the episodes of the first 4 WW seasons averaged weekly ranks of 27th, 13th, 7th, and 26th. Higher numbers than S60 drew, but it was really the critics who ate it up.
In S60, Sorkin drags on the Matt-Harriet roller coaster too long without sufficient momentum, and the storyline and resolution of the captured POW brother at the end are unconvincing. The personal subplots (such as Danny and Jordan’s relationship) are less developed and give the actors less to do than those in WW.
Yet S60 has some great episodes in its own right, especially the fourth one, “West Coast Delay,” and others that focus more on the professional, rather than personal, aspects. Sorkin still created a cast of characters who had room to grow, if NBC had given them more time. Especially in the early episodes (and in a couple exchanges between Matt/Danny and studio exec Jack Rudolph that come late in the season), the back-and-forth dialogue still sparkles, and one can sense that the writing is simply on a higher plane than one typically sees in television—free of clichés and easy answers, lines challenging what comes before and after them. It’s the kind of dialogue that you watch, smiling at every turn, refreshed that the conversation never veers towards simplicity or overwroughtness.
Many commented that S60 was a metashow reflecting the way Sorkin worked himself, and there seem to be indications that this is true. Matt’s relationship with Harriet was supposedly based upon Sorkin’s relationship with the actress Kristen Chenoweth, with whom he had arguments similar to the ones his characters have. And there’s more than a hint of pride (and irony) in the line, “Nobody can write 90 minutes of television every week by themselves; he’d be dead by the sixth show.” Sorkin is known to write his show’s episodes single-handedly, and at the beginning of West Wing’s run, he was writing two shows at once (“Sports Night” being the other).
Sorkin never submits to laziness, but he’s coyly enjoyed reusing certain plot points and lines of dialogue throughout his works. (For example, it’s hard to see a mere coincidence between him assigning drug problems to Leo in WW and Matt and Danny in S60, given that he’s faced similar problems in his life; and in American President, for example, Michael Douglas makes numerous comments that Martin Sheen paraphrased later on WW). But I’ll be interested to see if anything seeps into The Social Network, which seems to exist in a category all to its own. Either way, thanks to that and an adaptation of Michael Lewis’s iconic baseball book Moneyball on the horizon, I’m feverish with anticipation of where he’ll turn next.
Given that Network has opened to a ridiculous 98 score on Metacritic—with no recognizable actors carrying it—I’d say the rest of the world is with me on that.
The opening sequence of The American President is so good, it would be enough to carry the rest of a mediocre film into watchable status. Thankfully, though, it doesn’t represent the extent of the pleasures here, in the film that eventually pushed Aaron Sorkin to write a little show called “The West Wing.” Here (with subsequent partners Martin Sheen and Joshua Malina on hand as side characters), he focuses his attention not on the president’s inner circle but on the man himself—and one key woman.
President Andrew Shepard (Michael Douglas), recently widowed, faces the prospect of attending a state dinner alone. Meanwhile, a liberal environmentalist group has hired a gun-ho lobbyist named Sydney Ellen Wade (Annette Bening) to press the White House to campaign for a bill aggressively fighting fossil fuel emissions. When the president walks in on a meeting where Sydney blasts him, he’s kind of intrigued, intrigued at her passion and pluck and lack of political correctness. He asks her to be his date to the state dinner.
It’s hard to imagine a sitting president ‘dating,’ so to speak, and Sorkin milks the hesitancy that the public would likely feel. Shepard wants nothing of it; when asked by aides to give them something to say about “the Sydney issue,” he responds that there’d better be something wrong in Australia. By creating opposition forces (in this case, Republicans) who attempt to discredit Shepard with character attacks and defame Wade’s name, Sorkin adroitly conveys his message regarding media and politics. As one character notes, would FDR ever have been elected, in a wheelchair, if he’d had to campaign in front of a television? It’s doubtful, and other anachronistic historical situations (such as political affairs that reporters used to keep quiet) are not mentioned—but they’re implied and understood nonetheless.
What’s perhaps most notable, on first blush, in The American President, is the remarkable chemistry between Bening and Douglas—the acting here is never short of exemplary. Think of the scene in the ‘dish room’; before the two share their abbreviated first kiss, Bening conveys wonderment, little-girl embarrassment, and doubt with nary a word. Likewise, Douglas, who’s never been one of my favorite actors, gives in my mind his finest career performance, drenching his character in realism and warmth. Like Bening, he never overplays the moment—not the laughs, not when he chides aides, not when his presidential challenger (Richard Dreyfuss) begins spreading lies. These are remarkably controlled performances.
The acting is matched by the writing, with scenes that slide between above-average and exceptional. The aforementioned opening scene displays rapid-fire walk-and-talks that would become a Sorkin trademark in “West Wing,” but, good as they are, I was struck by something else. Note the way we become aware of the president’s status as a widower: his press secretary (Anna Deavere Smith, the NSA in “WW”) casually mentioning that they can’t parade their boss around as the ‘lonely widow.’ The room goes quiet for a moment before she apologizes to his instant forgiveness. A lesser movie would have beaten us over the head with this information; Shepard might have stared mournfully at a photograph of a woman on his desk, or his daughter might have melodramatically imparted the news. Sorkin, though, integrates it seamlessly into the free-flowing scene, and the exchange reveals several details about the characters, including the president’s informal relationship with his staff and his lack of pretension.
Likewise, the subplots involving the political battles being fought by the staff—over gun control and environmental regulations—are skillfully handled. Not every scene is exceptional, but the film moves with the kind of supremely entertaining smoothness that far, far too films achieve (or, at times, seem to aspire to). Every exchange bristles with some kind of conflict, and Sorkin includes character-defining situations for all the key players; for example, an early scene where Shepard plays pool with his chief of staff (Sheen) feels even more integrated in the story after the second such scene. The president, frustrated over the disapproval of his relationship with Sydney, wonders why Sheen always liked to give advice but never wanted to run for anything himself, never wanted to put himself out there. If I did, he replies, “you’d be the most popular history professor at the University of Wisconsin.” It’s a devastating line, though one that doesn’t ruin Sheen’s character because we understand that it comes, partly, from the staff’s exasperation with the president’s passivity.
Director Rob Reiner (A Few Good Men) makes good decisions himself (major props for never cutting back to shocked looks from Sydney’s sister during her first phone call with Shepard), but the most credit has to go to the actors and Sorkin. He’s never afraid to ask the arresting questions, the ones on everyone’s mind that nevertheless sometimes go unsaid. Early on, Sydney’s boss (John Mahoney) bluntly inquires, “Are you sleeping with him?” And at the end of the aforementioned pool scene, the president ponders, “If Mary hadn’t died three years ago, would we have won?” The ironic recognition that he might have won his first election with help from that event but now is vulnerable to character attacks just completes Sorkin’s critique of modern politics. Few critiques, however, can legitimately be leveled here.
The trailer for Charlie Wilson’s War and its IMDB page promise two very different movies. The latter will remind you of the tremendous amount of talent that has been gathered in front of and behind the camera, but the former promises only a breezy, lazy film about a potentially weighty topic. Believe the trailer.
War, based off George Crile’s book of the same name, chronicles Congressman Charlie Wilson (Tom Hanks), a Playboy representing a district in Texas that doesn’t want anything, and his covert funding of Afghans after the invasion of the Soviets in 1979. Director Mike Nichols and writer Aaron Sorkin strive for comedy, not drama, though, but it strangely all feels muted. I would have preferred the film to not be so light-hearted, but that would have been easier to take if it was funnier. War is borderline-competent, but hardly inspiring.
The cause of the Afghans is brought to Charlie’s attention by Joanne Herring (Julia Roberts), who, apparently, has enough time on her hands to be concerned about such things. No other motivation is provided for her. Charlie, it turns out, sits in a powerful position in Congress, and with one phone call he can double the U.S. budget for Afghanistan. Joanne wants more, though, and so before long he’s on a plane to Pakistan and walking through refugee camps, which finally gets his attention. The final player is Gust Avrakotos (Philip Seymour Hoffman), a CIA operative who seems permanently miscast in his role (Gust, not Philip).
I mentioned before that a fair amount of talent was assembled for this flick—a jaw-dropping amount, really, when you think about it. Even the cinematographer and composer have been nominated for Oscars, and when you line up Hanks, Roberts, and Hoffman with Nichols (Closer) and Sorkin, you expect greatness. Sadly, everyone here has been better, especially Sorkin, whose screenplay and storyline don’t measure up to his other pronounced successes, both in film (The American President, A Few Good Men) and television (“The West Wing” and “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip”). There are chuckles to be had, and there’s nothing embarrassing, but it’s not nearly as funny as I expected, and Sorkin removes almost altogether the dramatic undercurrent that gave his other work heft. Likewise, Hanks, Roberts, and Hoffman are all fine, but they’ve done better work—not coincidentally, I imagine, because they’ve been pushed harder elsewhere.
Since the roles are basically cut-outs, the stars were just included for box office receipts and, with the possible exception of Hoffman, could have been played by just about anyone. Roberts’s blatantly gratuitous bikini shot falls under the same money-seeking category; Nichols doesn’t even bother to be subtle about that or try to justify it with a reason.
War moves forward reasonably, and there’s a story beneath the sheen, but the ending is far from dramatic—though, I suppose, the film isn’t supposed to be. It’s all here, as shown faithfully by the trailer. The first scene shows us Wilson in a hot tub with naked women and drugs, and within about 60 seconds, his attention is drawn to a television report about the war in Afghanistan. The rest of the film plays out just the way you’d expect it to, replete with belly dancers, assistants who look like models (including Amy Adams, who’s much too gorgeous to be relegated to such a small role), and heavy liquor served at ten AM. It’s all a bit act, but the funniest parts (such as an exchange between Hanks and Hoffman about U.S. policy in Afghanistan) were already shown in the trailer. It just doesn’t seem like the kind of movie that would have taken very long to make; and before you know it, it’s done, clocking in at just over an hour and a half long.
Curiously, at the very end of the film, perhaps in an attempt to place Charlie’s actions into context, Nichols and Sorkin give us a hint about the unintended consequences of Charlie’s actions, and suggests where we went wrong. The expression on Hanks’s face at his recognition ceremony—and, of course, the postscript—implies dissatisfaction with what he did. Hey, Aaron—there’s the drama. That’s what I wish this film had explored.
With the much-anticipated The Social Network dropping in theaters this Friday, I thought it appropriate to look back on the career of the inimitable writer Aaron Sorkin. A comprehensive piece will be arriving later this week, but for now, let’s review a few of his most prominent films.
Rating: 3 stars (out of 4)
A Few Good Men is one of those movies, like Remember the Titans, that runs so smoothly on the strength of a well-written script and solid acting that you don’t realize in retrospect how standard its structure is. It is immensely enjoyable and can be watched a few times without losing its luster, so long as you don’t expect it to change the world. It works better than a movie like Titans because it doesn’t concern such a retread theme and because the writing is stronger.
At the beginning of the movie, two Marines, Pfc. Louden Downey and Lance Cpl. Harold Dawson (James Marshall and Wolfgang Bodison) enter the barracks of Pfc. William Santiago, stationed in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba and assault him. Hours later he is pronounced dead, presumably from poison that was on a rag stuffed down his mouth. Santiago had recently petitioned base commander Nathan Jessup (Jack Nicholson) for a transfer off the base; for this, he was willing to rat out Dawson for illegally firing a round across the fence line into Cuba.
The question the Navy doesn’t want discovered is whether the two Marines were sent to Santiago’s room on someone’s orders, to perform a “code red,” an informal procedure of punishing a wayward member of a platoon. In the hopes that the case is buried, they assign defense of the Marines to a young, carefree lawyer, Daniel Kaffee (Tom Cruise), who lives in the shadow of his late, extremely successful father and has a track record for plea bargains. Lieutenant Commander Joanne Galloway (Demi Moore), however, is determined to go deeper, and she refuses to let Kaffee give up on the case.
The back-story emerges, slowly, which I like, and the blame frequently shifts parties. Do we blame the Marines for their actions? Santiago for ignoring the proper chain of command in selling out a peer? Jessup, who was in charge of everyone involved? Or what about his right-hand man, who may have delivered his order to attack Santiago? Did Santiago even die as a result of the attack or because of a pre-existing condition? Even at the end, there is no definitive answer: everyone had a hand in the incident, and you are left to determine the proportions of guilt for yourself.
Predictability comes, though, in the film’s procedure. The bulk of the time is spent either in the courtroom or in Daniel’s apartment, where he and Joanne and assistant counsel Sam Weinberg (Kevin Pollak) prepare the defense. Unfortunately, I have to agree with Roger Ebert, who noted that the movie makes its ending even more predictable because it telegraphs it: Daniel announces ahead of time what their strategy is for questioning Jessup on the stand. The climactic Cruise vs. Nicholson showdown, riveting already, could have been even better if we didn’t know exactly what was coming. Sadly, as Ebert noted, “We are not allowed the pleasure of discovering Cruise’s strategy for ourselves, and Nicholson’s behavior seems scripted and inevitable, and is robbed of shock value.”
I don’t share all of Ebert’s negativity about the film, though, thanks to its other merits, notably its good pacing and skillful handling of the rising action. Sharp writing abounds (no surprise given that Aaron Sorkin wrote the screenplay based on his own play). When Joanne tells Daniel he isn’t right for the job, he says, “You don’t know me. Normally it would take someone hours to discover I’m not fit for the defense.” And Nicholson’s concluding monologue on the stand, though foreshadowed too explicitly, is positively electric.
Some small details work, while some don’t. The dead father that Cruise’s character has to live up to has been around the block a lot, but it’s not overplayed and does add depth. The movie wins points with me for not having Daniel and Joanne character become attached romantically, which seemed all-too-obvious thanks to their good looks and rocky beginning. Finally, a couple of the courtroom moments seemed a little fake in that they would never stand in real life, but that’s relatively insignificant.
The acting is reliable on all fronts—down to Kevin Bacon as the lead attorney for the prosecution, but most especially the lead actors. Cruise’s charismatic-when-he-wants-to be Daniel who discovers the joy in doing the right thing, and Nicholson’s widely-praised Jessup sneers and snarls and cuts through his words with a heartless intensity that you can feel from your living room.
A Few Good Men doesn’t break any new ground, but it’s a great yarn and asks an important question: When, if ever, can your conscience allow you to override orders from a superior as a member of the United States military? Seeing this movie might cause you to think about that a little deeper.
Is The Town ‘Heat meets The Departed,’ as the ads portray? No—it’s better. Is it Gone Baby Gone, Ben Affleck’s scintillating first directorial effort? Not quite, although comparing anything with a Dennis Lehane adaptation (hello, Mystic River and Shutter Island) is unfair. Should it put the final nail in the coffin of the notion, put forth on the basis of some wooden performances, Affleck has no cinematic talent? One can only hope.
As in Gone, Affleck makes a gritty side of Boston an integral character in his story. This time it’s the suburb of Charlestown, which supposedly endures the most bank robberies, per capita, of any town in the country. But this is no moral drag—our protagonists, led by Affleck’s Doug MacRay—are doing the pilfering. See that security guard over there, the one who’s 5’10”, 225? “He’s about to get robbed.”
In the film’s opening robbery, MacRay’s crew microwaves security tapes, checks for fake rolls of bills, and persuades the bank manager named Claire (Rebecca Hall) to open the vault—all neat touches that keep one’s interest amidst the usual “Get down on the floor!” stuff. (Are you listening, Inside Man?) But when Jim (Jeremy Renner) abducts said bank manager and lets her go with a vow of silence, Doug realizes he has a problem. Fearing Jim’s impulse control, he agrees to supervise and befriend her to stay abreast of what she’s thinking, and something resembling a romance blossoms between the two.
Other subplots include the FBI’s efforts (led by Jon Hamm, from TV’s “Mad Men”) to track down these serial robbers and the friction between Doug and Jim over their past and future. The latter represents the most interesting conflict in the movie, making it a bit frustrating that it’s not developed more, especially alongside the other, more conventional threads. The thrills of The Town are its characters, much more nuanced and shaded than the ones in most crime dramas (cough, Heat). Jim is the hot-wire act of the group, the one who can’t resist pounding one of his hostages to a pulp or arrogantly taking off his hockey mask during an attack on a couple neighborhood thugs. Renner is excellent at making him a tightly-coiled, twitchy little punk; when he surprises Doug and Claire at a café, his menacing insouciance clash perfectly with Doug’s nervousness and Claire’s befuddlement.
When Doug declares that he wants to flee Boston, Jim reminds him that he served 9 years in jail in order to keep him alive. But that’s not enough for Doug, who doesn’t want to stay in the same place he and his cronies have lived their whole lives; with Claire, hopefully, he’ll get away from the FBI, from his white-trash childhood flame, Jim’s sister (Blake Lively, as up-and-down as she is in “Gossip Girl”), from memories of his imprisoned father (Chris Cooper, predictably excellent), from streets that he can’t walk down without fear of being attacked for one reason or another.
As such, The Town is more character-driven than the previews would suggest, and it thankfully provides its talented ensemble cast moments to shine (as so many movies don’t). I wouldn’t have minded more Cooper, as always, but in addition to him, Pete Postlethwaite (florist-by-day, kingpin-by-night), Hall, and Renner all leave impressions. Even Affleck himself isn’t half-bad, suggesting depth in his character’s indecision over his profession and his loyalty to his old friends versus his new one.
And as director, Affleck imparts a reassuring sense of pacing, a calming sense of quietude, a remarkable command of tone. He uses numerous establishing shots of the neighborhood, whether from overhead or street-level, of buildings about to be inhabited, reminding us that the sense of place defines everyone here. The chase scenes all emphasize the narrow, seemingly dead-end streets of Charlestown, features that keep said scenes fresh and propulsive; they’re not Bourne-style, uber-crisp chases, but they’re not supposed to be—just like the robbers, Affleck is thoughtful and skilled, but intentionally rough around the edges. Even those distorted nun masks remain in memory, demonstrating that movies can still startle people, if they know where to look.
The Town is imperfect enough that I’ll have to see it again to truly understand its place with other solid films. The FBI’s work is standard fare, and there’s a hint of flab in the ending after Doug’s crew leaves the location of their final caper, but Affleck (co-writer of the adaptation of the script, based on a novel) redeems it with his character’s final phone call to Claire. Indeed, I was greatly relieved that the ending avoids natural pitfalls, from minor to potentially devastating. I love when I can foresee a movie’s last line and hope I’m right, and that’s exactly what happens here. My favorite dialogue, though, comes when Jim and Doug prepare one final escape from danger. “See you in Florida,” the latter says, to which Jim replies, “See you when you get back.”
Earlier this year, Leonardo DiCaprio teamed up with Martin Scorsese for the astonishing Shutter Island, a profoundly disturbing foray into the mind of someone who didn’t always know what was real. Now, a few months later, he’s paired himself with Christopher Nolan for Inception, a profoundly dizzying foray into dreams and reality. From the guilt-ridden memories of a dead wife down to the nature of illusion and perception, Inception shares more than a few similarities with Shutter, and, while Inception is a very different type of film, the quality and impact are very nearly the same—which is extraordinary praise. All told, DiCaprio has put together one of the best years for an actor in the past decade.
Inception’s plot, enveloped in secrecy as hype mounted before its July 2010 release, seemed labyrinthine when the teasers and trailers were leaked, and watching it once hardly clears everything up. To sum up as much is necessary: Cobb (Leo) practices a form of theft called extraction, whereby he breaks into a person’s mind, invading their dreams to exploit their subconscious at a time when its defenses are lowered. He’s recruited by a wealthy businessman named Saito (Ken Watanabe) for a more dangerous, more captivating, idea: “if you can steal an idea from someone’s mind, why can’t you plan one there?”
Thus, the “Inception” of the title represents planting an idea in someone’s mind, while he dreams, that is subsequently believed to be self-conceived. A fascinating concept, to be sure, and it’s one that, the film implies, Cobb has been toying with for years. He’s most attracted to Saito’s offer, however, because he’s promised the ability to return to America, something that hasn’t been possible since the death of Cobb’s wife Mal (Marion Cotillard). So he enlists long-time associate Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), an architect named Ariadne (Ellen Page), and other merry men, much like Danny Ocean assembled his team of thieves.
Soon, Cobb and his team are hurtling themselves into dreams within dreams within dreams; before seeing this movie, I already thought that ‘false awakenings’ were perhaps the creepiest thing I could contemplate, and here, the subject would have to ‘wake up’ 3 times to actually return to reality. And in the process, Nolan creates some of the most astounding, awe-inspiring visual sights I’ve ever seen: a Parisian city folding over on top of itself like an Origami creation; water bursting through the sides of a building in a dream as a person is dropped into a bathtub; a freight train barreling down a highway, tossing aside cars as though they’re flies; structures that disintegrate, piece by piece, into the ocean; and, above all, that zero-gravity fight scene that has left me and everyone else jaw-dropped. It simply has to be seen to be believed, probably should have been longer, and—along with everything else—should ensure that Nolan has all of the technical and visual Oscars locked up for 2010.
The idea that Cobb’s team are instructed to plant concerns the heir of a wealthy corporation (Cillian Murphy) dissolving his father’s empire, but Inception truly advances the motif of family devastation and reconciliation through Cobb, in his motivations for accepting the job and his own subconscious guilt that has been dogging his work. Nolan, who spent 10 years working on the script, drives the plot forward with a remarkable amount of efficiency and stability—upon subsequent viewings, the film feels more coherent, not less, and everything just seems to fall into place precisely where it should. The notion of dreaming, of invading someone else’s mind, of challenging the idea that everything that occurs inside our head is ours and ours alone, faces stricter and stricter tests as the film progresses. And, simultaneously, Nolan ratchets up the action as the climax approaches, helping obliterate the potential torpor that could be engendered by a two-and-a-half hour running time.
I won’t get too bogged down in discussing theories and deciphering plot details; that’s not the subject of a movie review. But I’ll say a few things to indicate how much I’m fascinated by this discussion. It’s critical to note that it seems that Nolan, in the world he created, did not actually give us/his characters a way to differentiate dreams from reality—only to differentiate being in someone else’s dream or not. Unless that top was a special type of totem (which I haven’t ruled out), it can’t differentiate reality from a person’s own dreams. Because of that, and because the top may not have been Cobb’s actual totem (since it was his wife’s), the final shot—fascinating as it is, theoretically—is more a red herring than anything else.
I’ll say that I’m immensely intrigued by the scene where Cobb tests out his chemist’s (Dileep Rao) sedative, wakes up and tries to spin the top, and doesn’t actually do so—was he still in a dream from that point onward? And I’m essentially convinced that the last scene does not represent ‘reality’…a position that, of course, hardly limits the number of possibilities of what did happen.
At first, I thought that Inception, though great, had a bit of an inherent ceiling built into it, since it was more of an action-packed thriller than an intense psychological study (compare with the superior Shutter). And several reviewers noted that it resonated more strongly on an intellectual and visceral than an emotional level, and that may be true. But, upon further reflection, I realized that I was fascinated by the notions that Nolan floats: that, once it takes hold, an idea can rarely be eradicated or changed within someone’s mind; that we have no way of knowing whether our world is real or not (Descartes’s “Dream Argument” that also informed Shutter) and, critically, that it doesn’t matter whether that top was about to fall over or not.
That is where Inception truly hits me like a ton of bricks; the more I’ve debated it with people afterwards, the more I’ve come to accept a very similar theme to Shutter. We wonder what was real, and what was just in Leo’s head—and we debate theories proposing that everything we saw was a dream, or that someone was performing inception on him—and we decide that the distinction doesn’t matter. Scorsese’s film emphasized the blur between sanity and insanity; here, the blur between dreams and reality is used to tell us that what’s ‘all in our heads’ can be real. In Cobb’s mind, he had resolved his guilt, had moved his way past the stress that was infesting his life, had forgiven himself to the point where he could see his children. His turning away from the totem at the end indicates that he doesn’t particularly care, that he shares a philosophy put forth about halfway through the film, a line that when I first heard I immediately stored in my brain as a potential movie theme: “Their dreams have become reality; who are you to say otherwise?”
So, yes, there are a couple tiny flaws within Inception; I still wonder if it could have been more philosophical, but, as I have to tell myself, not every great movie has to be brooding and contemplative. Inception has it—that indefinable trait that enables it to still floor you, still leave you drained and tired, still make you want to remain planted in your seat during the credits, after 4 viewings in 3 weeks. It’s the trait that makes it stick in your mind long afterwards, that keeps you awake at night as you toss and turn its ideas around in your head like a spinning washing machine. It’s not just a complex plot that invites discussion about ‘what happened’; it’s more than that. It’s not just filled with delectable visual treats. It’s all of those things—and my, is it those things—but it’s a classic, a 4-star movie instead of a 3 or 3.5, because it has it.
Made in a time when movies simplify themselves, cater to the least common denominator, and bank on re-makes and sequels and adaptations, Nolan’s movie is an incredibly creative work, and every aspect of it is performed with pristine crispness, as though everyone involved realized its potential and didn’t want to be the weak link. The cinematographer (Wally Pfister) and film editor (who at one point has to piece together scenes from 4 different locations and dreams states while still keeping us on point) have to be recognized at Oscar time along with Nolan. Hans Zimmer’s score is an outstanding touch, something else that buzzes around in head long afterwards. From the actors, there’s not a bad performance here, as supporting characters from Page to Watanabe to Cotillard to Tom Hardy enliven the screen. But at the center of it all, in almost every scene, is DiCaprio, who trims his performance of any movie-star fat yet still commands the screen. In a scene at the end, when he closes his eyes and makes his entire body sigh, feeling the weight of his guilt leaving himself, he imparts a bit of his character into everyone in the audience.
The world’s strongest virus, Cobb says, is an idea, because we can’t forget having thought something, and we can’t deny what we believe, even if we rationally think otherwise. So, in your mind, is your top still spinning? And do you care?
The Annie Awards are essentially the Oscars for animation. Since 1992, they’ve been handing out awards in the category of Best Animated Feature. And, much like the Academy Awards have a bunch of categories I don’t care about (Best Documentary, Best Makeup, anything involving a short film, etc.), The Annies have their fair share of categories that are largely inconsequential: Best Animated Home Entertainment Production (aka Best Straight-to-DVD), Best Animated Short Subject, and a couple more.
There’s also something suspicious about the Annies. It’s so blatantly self-congratulatory. The biggest sponsors for the show are Dreamworks, Disney, Nickelodeon, Sony, Pixar, Warner Bros., and a few other companies: in other words, the people funding the awards are the major recipients. Still, very few of the choices have been illogical, so it’s hard to believe they’re a complete sham.
(Edit: There has been some talk thie year about the alleged corruption of the Annies. Pixar backed out of the awards. Read about it here.)
Looking back over the history of nominations and choices, I made a few frustrating observations. (Note that, from this point on, I’m only talking about the Best Animated Feature category.) First is the nomination system, which has chosen anywhere from 1 to 6 films per year to put on the ballot. Also, the films nominated by year weren’t always released in the same calendar year.
For example, The Iron Giant (release date: 8/6/99) won the 1999 award, but Toy Story 2 (11/24/99) won the 2000 award. From that, it seems like the cutoff comes some time between August and November. But then, why was Millennium Actress (9/14/02) honored the same year as Looney Tunes: Back in Action (11/14/03)? There’s just no justifiable logic evident there.
It’s a shame the set-up of the award is a head-scratcher. From a historical perspective, I would’ve loved to have seen the Annies represent a single calendar year. That would’ve made it easier to develop a snapshot of what animated films were important when. (It also would have been fun to see who would’ve won a duel between the #5 and #4 greatest animated films of all time according to IGN.)
Here’s a list of winners by year. I’ve also included my favorite film of the bunch (that I’ve seen) and, just for kicks, the film with the best rating on IMDb. Again, I want to stress that I don’t really understand the organization by year, at least up until around 2004 when it regularized. Even for those early years, when the groupings by year didn’t really make sense, I’m just sticking with the list of provided nominees.
1992
Winner: Beauty and the Beast
Bebe’s Kids
FernGully: The Last Rainforest
–
My pick: Beauty and the Beast
IMDb’s pick: Beauty and the Beast
1993
Winner: Aladdin
Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland
Once Upon a Forest
–
My pick: Aladdin
IMDb’s pick: Aladdin
1994
A uniformly strong and popular set of nominees this year.
Winner: The Lion King
The Nightmare Before Christmas
Batman: Mask of the Phantasm
–
My pick: The Lion King
IMDb’s pick: The Lion King (#144 on IMDb’s top 250 list), edging Nightmare (#237)
Just one nominee, which is kind of strange. But not entirely inappropriate. Honestly, no one else stood a chance. Toy Story was hugely popular, influential, and acclaimed.
Winner/My Pick/IMDb’s pick: Toy Story (#148)
1997
No clear frontrunner.
Winner: Cats Don’t Dance
Hercules
Space Jam
–
My pick: Hercules
IMDb’s pick: Cat’s Don’t Dance
1998
Winner: Mulan
Anastasia
I Married a Strange Person!
Quest for Camelot
–
My pick: Mulan – but to be fair, I haven’t seen any of the others in their entirety
IMDb’s pick: Mulan
1999
A very strong year that would be even better if Toy Story 2 was included.
Winner: The Iron Giant
A Bug’s Life
South Park: Bigger, Longer, Uncut
Tarzan
The Prince of Egypt
–
My pick: The Iron Giant with apologies to… well, every other nominee
IMDb’s pick: The Iron Giant edging South Park by a hair
2000
A one-horse race unless you dig Chicken Run a lot more than I do.
Winner: Toy Story 2
Fantasia 2000
The Road to El Dorado
Chicken Run
Titan A.E.
–
My pick: Toy Story 2
IMDb’s pick: Toy Story 2 (#228)
2001
Winner: Shrek
Blood: The Last Vampire
The Emperor’s New Groove
Osmosis Jones
–
My pick: Shrek though I’m a huge Groove fan
IMDb’s pick: Shrek
2002
Another great year, one of the best to date.
Winner: Spirited Away
Monsters, Inc.
Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron
Lilo and Stitch
Ice Age
–
My pick: Too close to call between Spirited Away and Monsters, Inc.
IMDb’s pick: Spirited Away (#57)
2003
Winner: Finding Nemo
Brother Bear
Millennium Actress
Looney Tunes: Back in Action
Triplets of Belleville
–
My pick: Finding Nemo
IMDb’s pick: Finding Nemo (#154)
2004
Winner: The Incredibles
Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence
Shrek 2
The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie
–
My pick: The Incredibles
IMDb’s pick: The Incredibles (#184)
2005
Winner: Wallace & Gromit: Curse of the Were-Rabbit
Howl’s Moving Castle
Madagascar
Chicken Little
Corpse Bride
–
My pick: Wallace & Gromit over Corpse Bride – haven’t seen Howl’s, though
IMDB’s pick: Howl’s Moving Castle
2006
Winner: Cars
Happy Feet
Monster House
Open Season
Over the Hedge
–
My pick: Over the Hedge, because I have to choose something
Easily the most controversial year. I’ve read a few articles alleging different things – from conspiracy and bribery to stupidity – for Wall-E not winning this award. While I think Wall-E is a bit overvalued and Panda a bit undervalued, the choice is quite baffling given the buzz and respect Wall-E received.
Winner: Kung Fu Panda
Wall-E
Bolt
$9.99
Waltz with Bashir
–
My pick: Wall-E, though I tip my hat to Panda
IMDb’s pick: Wall-E (#48)
2009
While the Annies got some buzz in ’08 for choosing the wrong movie, they got some buzz in ’09 for the freaking incredible slate of movies that had come out that year. Seriously, 2009 was the best year for animation ever, and it’s not even close. A few good ones weren’t even included.
Winner: Up
Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs
Coraline
Fantastic Mr. Fox
The Princess and the Frog
The Secret of Kells
My pick: Hard to decide. So stacked. Every one I’ve seen (all except Kells) has a solid claim for one reason or another. I’ll go with Up.
IMDb’s pick: Up (#84)
2010
The nominations won’t come out for several months, but here are my early projections:
Projected winner: Toy Story 3
How to Train Your Dragon (edit: if conspiracy theories hold true, Dragon might win)
Despicable Me
Tangled
Legend of the Guardians (or possibly Megamind if Guardians tanks)
The Illusionist (to get something foreign on there)
–
My pick: Toy Story 3 with a hat tip to Dragon
IMDb’s pick: Toy Story 3 (#10 currently… though it will inevitably drop to the mid-40s at the highest)
