Tuesday, September 1, 2009

Recently Viddied / Briefly Noted

Drag Me To Hell, Sam Raimi (2009)

After the earnestly enjoyable Spiderman series (ignoring the frenzied and unsatisfying third installment, the first two are all sunshine and clean lines - narrative, architectural - and pure heroism with nary a borrowed nihilistic streak in sight), some pure Raimi. He's such a joyous horror filmmaker, if that doesn't sound overly contradictory. Here is a moralistic tale buried in mud and bodily deposits, E.C. terror filtered through human sympathy. And it's wickedly good fun in a cinema, as the full row of Japanese schoolgirls who sat behind me during the film will attest. Easily Raimi's best film since Army of Darkness.

Public Enemies, Michael Mann (2009)

The Scorsese Syndrome - for anyone else a masterpiece, for Mann, merely decent. The problem here is his inability to make the Depp/Cottilard relationship resonate, which means the film's final third, played for tragic love, just...sits there. And the DV cinematography, which was so lustrous and sudden and swoonworthy on Miami Vice (and Collateral to a lesser extent), here is jerky and simply an aesthetic misstep. Still, when the gunfights kick up, always Mann's speciality, you understand his decision. The man captures the fleeting moment better than almost anyone else working in cinema.

The Magick Lantern Cycle, Kenneth Anger (1948-80)

A massive jumble, obviously, going from Anger's early Genetesque Fireworks to his ridiculous Lucifer Rising, all Egyptian codswallop and mystic portentousness. But what a creamy middle - the blissed out texture of the unfinished Puce Moment, the hallucinatory Inauguration of The Pleasure Dome, and the rightly famous Scorpio Rising. Though the last is a little longer than it needs to be. Still, across its varied moods and ideas, from non-narrative sexual worship to borrowed Crowleyisms, some kind of "history of the 20th century". Dirty secret: all of the good stuff was at the beginning. Sucks to be young, eh?

Art School Confidential, Terry Zwigoff (2006)

Outsider schtick with little charm, and a stacked deck that's positively no fun to deal. Needs to be harder and meaner with the delusions and phoniness of art schools, and not merely self-pitying and sour. Plus Zwigoff stills knows fuck-all about narrative and tempo and basic filmic "feel". Bad Santa has its charms, but Ghost World is one of the decade's most overrated films, mockery of white blues bands notwithstanding. Still, there's always Crumb. Sometimes subjects really do all the work. Oh, and Sophia Myles is pretty gorgeous too.

Mr and Mrs Smith, Alfred Hitchcock (1941)

God, what oddness. Not necessarily Hitch's worst film, but his least distinctive, almost completely devoid of his usual visual/verbal wit and narrative force. When he unleashes an occasionally magnificent moving camera shot, it's almost totally unjustified. And for a screwball, this one plays out at about half the pace required. Still, there's Lombard, and a nicely insouciant opening ten minutes of silliness. But that's about it.

Exiled, Johnnie To (2006)

Only lasted half an hour on this one before our DVD trigger got itchy. He's close to worshipped on certain film blogs we've been known to frequent, but this one is recycled Woo with an extra dash of poseurishness and self-consciousness. Which, I think you'll agree, is already enough unbelievability for one night. Just rent Hard-Boiled if you haven't already seen it, and The Killer for the really transporting emotional moments (i.e. flat-out maniacal melodrama). Still, I won't judge To until I've seen his supposedly wonderful Sparrow.

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