The Second mrbasehart Film Challenge!

[mrbasehart]

Quick update to the list.  I can't get Cheerleader Ninjas (Youtube blocks anyone from outside the US from accessing that link), but I did find a copy of Skyjacked, which I'd previously removed. 

[Relaxing Dragon]

Quick update to the list.  I can't get Cheerleader Ninjas (Youtube blocks anyone from outside the US from accessing that link), but I did find a copy of Skyjacked, which I'd previously removed. 

Seems you lucked out once more, but I'll figure out a way to get the high-budget, high-brow, critic-and-audience-approved Ninjas on you one of these days.

[mrbasehart]

I even had it on my hard drive, long before the film challenge.  I deleted it for space reasons and now it's impossible to get online. 

[THE QUEEN!!!]

The Chipmunk Adventure is... well, it's a movie.  It stars the Chipmunks and *sigh* The Chipettes, who through utterly retarded circumstances race each other around the world in hot air balloons for $100,000.  Little do they know that they're actually jewel smugglers too, ferrying the illicit gems to all corners of the world hidden in stuffed dolls, which prompts misunderstandings and run-ins with various underworld characters and some borderline offensive "native" people who try and sacrifice them to a volcano god, but through the power of tonally skewed pop music and montage, they all narrowly escape doom and return home safely.  I really hated this movie.  I'm not a fan of the Chipmunks in the first place - aside from their voices, I think Alvin is an asshole, Theodore a glutton and Simon a bore - so enduring my third feature length movie with them involved was just about enough for the mild discomfort of the furry chappies to tip into outright loathing.  That aside, the cartoon is beautifully made, with some scenes rivaling anything Disney were doing at the time for elaboration.  Pity about everything else.

I never said it was good--in fact I said it was bad. Actually I had given you so many good movies, or at least entertaining ones, I felt too nice and I threw this one in as torture. Ha ha ha!! Or better yet, MWA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!! 

[mrbasehart]

I knew there was an evil side under all those niceties, Queenie. 

Lilies of the Field is a rather charming and gentle comedy from the early 60s, and stars Sidney Poitier as a drifter who gets involved with a bunch of German Nuns in their attempts to build a Chapel for a small community.  Poitier won an Oscar for the role - the first ever to go to a black man - and it's a believable journey he undertakes, initially building the chapel for the money, then for the sense of accomplishment, and finally because of the bond he's formed with the Nuns.  I wouldn't say it was remarkably funny, and it rather meekly steers away from any kind of racial tension in the movie, but it's a fine film nonetheless.

[mrbasehart]

The Best Years of Our Lives is a stonkingly long (weighing in at just under 3 hours) drama about 3 servicemen who arrive home from the war and all experience problems getting back into normal life.  One is a bank manager who may have too much invested in ex-servicemen for the good of the bank's profits; another is a bomber captain who discovers he has no workable skills in civilian life; and another has lost both his hands (played very courageously by real veteran and amputee Harold Russell).  The whole thing has the classy sheen of a Goldwyn production and has some great performances, but even though it's 3 hours long, I felt that some of the drama was a little undercooked and predictable: the bank manager's story just kind of fizzles out and I think the bomber captain's story could've done with a little more grit.   It also plays quite safe with the ending, which I guess is understandable considering it was made in 1946.  Despite my problems with the movie though, it's a well crafted drama that never resorts to hysterics to make some points that are, I expect, pertinent now.

[mrbasehart]

Dr Who and the Daleks is the first big screen adaptation of the long running British TV science fiction show, and I expect it will infuriate some fans.  Now, I've said before that I'm not a big fan of Dr Who in general, but even I know that this movie version makes some pretty radical changes to the format that has seemed to work so well for the small screen.  He's not a Time Lord for one, rather an eccentric inventor who comes up with the TARDIS which whisks them to another planet where some Daleks are co-habiting a planet with a peaceful race that they want to exterminate (what a surprise).  The problems with the movie are numerous: frankly, the bad guys are ridiculous.  They look quite cool, but they have no menace whatsoever, coming across more as a proto-Lucas android than any real threat.  And don't get me started on their voices.  The plot feels like a watered down Time Machine plot (made a few years earlier) and feels totally predictable in its events and outcome.  It looks cheap, has only a couple of decent performances, and Roy Castle is incredibly annoying as the comic relief.  Despite its problems though, I never found anything outright bad or offensive, but I suspect that though its title bears the name, this is not the Dr Who movie people are looking for.  I'll watch the sequel soon and see if anything's different.

[THE QUEEN!!!]

The Best Years of Our Lives is a stonkingly long (weighing in at just under 3 hours) drama about 3 servicemen who arrive home from the war and all experience problems getting back into normal life.  One is a bank manager who may have too much invested in ex-servicemen for the good of the bank's profits; another is a bomber captain who discovers he has no workable skills in civilian life; and another has lost both his hands (played very courageously by real veteran and amputee Harold Russell).  The whole thing has the classy sheen of a Goldwyn production and has some great performances, but even though it's 3 hours long, I felt that some of the drama was a little undercooked and predictable: the bank manager's story just kind of fizzles out and I think the bomber captain's story could've done with a little more grit.   It also plays quite safe with the ending, which I guess is understandable considering it was made in 1946.  Despite my problems with the movie though, it's a well crafted drama that never resorts to hysterics to make some points that are, I expect, pertinent now.

I think it covers a lot of ground pretty efficiently, though. Those are the three types of homecomings--the kid who left his lifelong girlfriend and loving home and lost his childhood and hands; the father whose kids grew up while he was gone; and the classic couple who met during a dance and got married in a whirlwind without getting to know each other. But I see what you mean that they could have gone further in some places and gone more into the PTSD that Dana Andrews's character is clearly suffering from.

To me, what takes this movie from "nice, interesting little film" to "masterpiece" is simply two wonderful characters and performances--the obvious one is Harold Russel. Had it been an actor it wouldn't have the same effect as someone who really did lose his hands in the war and really did have to go through the adjustment and everything, it wouldn't have had the same effect. THe other is the highly incredible and underrated Myrna Loy who makes so much out of what could have been a nothing part. Honorable mentions go to the incredible Virginia Mayo and the veryt believable Frederic March who I've always been a fan of. But without Harold Russel what's the point?

[mrbasehart]

To me, what takes this movie from "nice, interesting little film" to "masterpiece" is simply two wonderful characters and performances--the obvious one is Harold Russel. Had it been an actor it wouldn't have the same effect as someone who really did lose his hands in the war and really did have to go through the adjustment and everything, it wouldn't have had the same effect. THe other is the highly incredible and underrated Myrna Loy who makes so much out of what could have been a nothing part. Honorable mentions go to the incredible Virginia Mayo and the veryt believable Frederic March who I've always been a fan of. But without Harold Russel what's the point?

Homer's absolutely the heart of that movie, because he's not acting and because he was in the war.  It's a shame then, that his story is given short shrift compared to the relatively painless integration of Frederic March's character.  There are hints of his alcoholism in the story, but it's never brought up pr addressed in a manner that's meaningful.  I could go on about Myrna Loy for pages, as I think she's wonderful.  Virginia Mayo is just downright sexy, though I think she's actually better in comedic roles. 

Onwards!

High and Low is a long and thoughtfully paced police-procedural about the kidnapping of a small boy and the police's efforts to recover him.  It's more complicated than that, but suffice to say that the police are more invested in finding the ransom money more than usual.  Apparently adapted from an Ed McBain novel, it has a sweaty intensity that's gloriously harnessed by Akira Kurosawa as the police slowly but surely get closer and closer to the culprit.  It's funny that Kurosawa is mostly known for his Samurai movies, when his contemporary ones are just as good: Stray Dog and Ikiru are also fantastic movies that sometimes get overlooked when compared with Rashomon or Seven Samurai.  The only downside to the movie for me was the relatively anti-climactic ending and a wishy-washy motive for the bad guy. 

[mrbasehart]

OSS 117: Cairo, Nest of Spies is a French comedy, parodying the spy genre.  It's ground that's been well worn ever since the fruition of the spy genre in the 50s (Matt Helm or the Flint movies) and most recently with Austin Powers, but what perhaps separates this from the rest of those movies is that OSS 117 has been around as long as Bond, though this more recent incarnation feels heavily influenced by more recent fare.  Despite its familiarity however, Nest of Spies turns out to be pretty fun, with enough laughs and ideas to sustain its running time.  Hubert Bonisseur de la Bath is a French operative called on to travel to Egypt and investigate the murder of his friend, which is somehow tied into the local Muslim insurrectionists and other shady sorts.  de la Bath is a competent agent, able to get the job done in a round about way, and always has great hair, though he does have quite a bit of the Clouseau gene running through him, leading to some funny little misunderstandings.  As with the spy genre, there's a few attractive ladies who can't make up their mind to either kill him or hump him.  The movie looks pretty good, the guy playing the spy is fun, and while there are a fair number of miss to hits in the joke category, it fairly zips along in its best moments.

[mrbasehart]

The Bride of Frank:  Thank you electronsexparty, for recommending this film to me.  I've said a few times before that most films are average - on a scale of 1 to 10, most films fall in between 4 and 6 - and that only the exceptional reach the highest peaks or lowest depths.  The Bride of Frank is just such a movie.  A genuine 1 out of 10.  I hadn't seen one in a while, and thought that I'd seen so many bad films, that my bar had lowered so much that I could appreciate at least one good thing in any movie.  Even ironically.  Not so! The Bride of Frank is completely devoid of any merit, lacking in any competence, and utterly without a single redeeming factor.  Seemingly trying to emulate John Waters' movies of the 70s, it takes a ramshackle approach to an old man's desire to "get some titties" and his subsequent murderous adventures when he puts a personal ad in the paper.  The difference is is that Waters' creations were colourful grotesques, wallowing in taboos sure, but surprisingly likable (whether or not that's the skill of someone like Divine or Waters is hard to say) but here... it's a repelling parade of ugliness and ill-judged humour that lacks the skill and outrageous charm of something like Pink Flamingos.  It's a hard thing for me to quantify in words, the difference between the two, but onscreen it's as clear as can be.  Atrocious. 

[mrbasehart]

A 2.  That movie is terrible, but it has a fascinating quality to it.  It's so banal, but it's also really weird. 

Though I will say that although it's only a factor of one, the difference for me is much larger. 

[mrbasehart]

Completely scientific. 

[mrbasehart]

Okay, final one today.

Tokyo Decadence is an erotic drama about a young woman who works as a prostitute, whose inscrutability hides a recent trauma.  She meekly sleepwalks through her assignations without joy or objection (save for a couple of potentially nightmarish scenarios), until she breaks and goes hunting for the boyfriend she broke up with months before.  That's it for plot, as the movie mostly relies on atmosphere and subtext to tell a wider story.  Which is... I have no idea.  I watched it for 100 minutes and I'm no wiser about the movie.  It didn't seem to mean anything more than an excuse to show some mildly erotic sex, but it never really degenerates into something as leering as porn, so I struggled to understand just why the movie is like it is.  Other than that, I really have no opinion on the quality of the movie.  If you'd ask me about it in real life, I'd reply with a shrug.  It's a shrug of a movie.  With tits.

[mrbasehart]

White Dog is a 1980 movie about a young woman who runs over a beautiful white alsatian on her way home one night.  Unclaimed after she pays for its recovery, she takes it home only to discover that it's been trained as a "White Dog" which is a dog that's trained from birth to attack black people.  Despite protests from her friends, she finds an animal trainer (a black one) who tried to reprogram the dog before it can attack another person.  It's a very simple story, but what it manages to do rather brilliantly is present a portrait of racism in general, embodied in the dog as a feral, unthinking force that has no rationality beyond what colour it can see.  The movie also has the slightly unsettling air of a horror movie, and may at first glance be lumped in with a film like Cujo, but it's far more intelligent and composed than that.