Troy

Saw it. Editing is fairly clean, (no strobe flashing), but the camera is too close in to see a lot of the close combat. Again, Western filmmakers should take their cue from the Hong Kong filmmakers (Tsui Hark would have done a better job, I think), who in turn took their cue from classic '50s Hollywood musical filmmakers--action is dance, and the choreography should be crystal clear.

As for Pitt--eh, he does well, considering. His schtick in Twelve Monkeys was the most annoying thing about it (anyone saw the Chris Marker orignal?), and he's usually best in comic roles--the flash in Thelma and Louise, the funny gypsy bit in Snatch (which I otherwise didn't like). Interview for a Vampire would be a classic thanks to Philippe Rousselot and Neil Jordan, but you have to turn the volume down so you don't hear the dialogue--Cruise and Pitt play the world's most wearisome gay couple.

It's BIG. And unimaginative. Homer's estate should sue for the use of his name in the publicity. This is Safe As Houses epic filmmaking, in the Stanley Kramer vein. Even as popcorn fare, it lacks crispness (it's 2 hours and 43 bloated minutes, for crying out loud...).

Talk about Dogville

>Well, the film clearly isn't intended as realism

No, I suppose the anti-Americanism is there to be purely provocative (it doesn't come out of any recognizable or legitimate source of complaint that I can see--mostly I think from hearsay, secondhand). Which is why I enjoyed it as it is, hanging there, a piece of masturbation really, with no real connection to reality (not exactly a bad thing: I like masturbatory pieces as much as any--maybe more than most).

>Alienation, presumably

The Brechtian mode, presumably. Brecht did it with labeled objects and idealized, unparticularized locatons, props, characters, something Von Triers tries to do here. Then he adds the jump-cut editing, which isn't really called for--we already have the Brecht devices, we're already alienated.

The editing style seems more of a fallback to his previous style from Breaking the Waves onwards, a sort of default style. It's a nice way of evoking verite cinema that isn't really verite cinema, but when doing what is essentially a theater piece, well, I don't think it makes sense.

As for the camera style--some critic called "fluid" but it's more woozy than anything, swish pans when they aren't really called for, more calling attention to itself than trying to create a point of view. Actually I prefer Thomas Vinterberg's handling of the camera in The Celebration (tho I thought that was also conceptually and psychologically a fraud--maybe my favorite Doggie Style filmmakers aren't really Dogme filmmakers, the Dardannes brothers, Belgians who just make their movies, and don't do fancy ironic publicity campaigns while making them).

Dogville

Finally saw Lars Von Trier's Dogville, three hours of Nicole Kidman being dragged through the mud.

And what can I say? I've no problem with the anti-Americanism, I enjoy a piece of anti-American diatribe as well as anybody, more than most, but I don't think the movie is about condemning American capitalism at all; I think those who cry 'anti-American' are doing so for the wrong reasons. The America on view here is unrecognizable--the people talk like they're speaking translated English, with a huge dollop of pretension, and they behave and think like they're from another planet. I think when you take aim at any target--the Catholic Church, white European culture, America the Plentiful--you got to know what you're talking about; you got to know your target, and take accurate aim. Von Triers doesn't know what he's talking about, and doesn't really care; the ostensible target was picked because it was big and obvious.

The film is stylized--ho boy, is it ever stylized. People mention Thornton Wilder, but another inspiration I'd say is Robert Altman's McCabe and Mrs. Miller, where another set of strangers converge on a village full of hypocrisy and prejudice (only the villagers in Altman's film are recognizably Americans). And Altman's a useful name to bring up--Von Trier's set is as beautiful as anything I've seen recently, beautifully lit, with subtle lighting effects that suggest the many variations of weather, and he chops up that beautiful space and set with nervy jump cuts and wildly swinging handheld shots. Why go for an open-space set when you cut up all that space with your editing? That's Von Trier's perversity speaking, and in this case I think it doesn't work.

The actors are mainly very strong, but they don't play characters that make sense--though Patricia Clarkson and Miles Purinton (who plays her eldest son) stand out. Kidman is perhaps the prettiest doll Von Trier has gotten his hands on to date, but her character here remains pretty and doll-like, despite the abuse, and by film's end her character leaves the realm of human plausibility altogether. There are several scenes that show Von Triers gift for depicting emotional torture--Purinton, Stellan Skarsgard, and Clarkson by turns tormenting Nicole Kidman--but the impact comes from the sheer ferocity of the acting, not from any understanding of the character's personalities or of how ordinary humans interact.

So while this is a very entertaining--though at three hours rather overlong--piece of dog turd, it's not very believable; the moral and dramatic shocks are fun even hilarious, but have no weight. I've enjoyed my coprophilic meal, but it left me wanting something more substantial and satisfying.

Lav Diaz and Khavn de la Cruz win Hubert Bals Grants

Lav Diaz (Batang West Side (West Side Avenue, 2001), Hesus Rebolusyunaryo (Jesus the Revolutionary, 2002)) and Khavn de la Cruz (Pugot (Headless)) both won Hubert Bals grants for script development, a prize of about 9,000 Euros.

An interview with Lav Diaz:

http://film.indiefilipino.com/item.php?id=54

Batang West Side (article on the 3 hour version):

http://movies.groups.yahoo.com/group/noelmoviereviews/message/277

Hesus Rebolusyunaryo

http://movies.groups.yahoo.com/group/noelmoviereviews/message/290

 

Fawlty Towers

Just saw again the first four episodes of John Cleese's wonderful, wonderful Fawlty Towers, the dysfunctional hotel run by the inimitable Basil Fawlty (Cleese), and his battle-wagon wife, Sybil (Prunella Scales). Amazing how many belly laughs and guffaws the show can still inspire, and this is probably my third or fourth viewing (still, it's been years).

Even more amazing is the short documentary on the real Basil Fawlty--Donald Sinclair, manager and owner of the Gleneagle, an ex Navy commander who (as Ray Marks, present manager of the Gleneagle puts it) thought running the Gleneagle "would have been a wonderful job, if it wasn't for the guests. The guests spoiled his job."

According to legend, the Monty Python troupe once booked rooms at the Gleneagle, in the seaside town of Torquay; they still remember some of the things Sinclair did to them there. Pythoner Eric Idle carried an alarm clock inside his briefcase at the hotel reception; when Sinclair heard the ticking he said "My God, there's a bomb in there!" and threw it off a cliff. Later, Pythoner Terry Gilliam sat down to a meal and ate American style, cutting up the food first before picking up the pieces with his fork; Sinclair, passing by, picked up Gilliam's knife and snapped "we don't eat like that here!"

Eventually the entire Python troupe moved to another hotel--all except Cleese, who stayed. Apparently, he thought there was an idea for a TV show here somewhere.

It wasn't only the Pythoners that suffered; one guest asked for a drink at the bar, to which Sinclair replied by slamming down the grill and saying "the bar's closed." When his friend invited him to a nearby hotel to drink, Sinclair informed him that if he isn't back by 11 pm, the front door will be locked. He comes back late, and just as Sinclair threatened, the front door was locked. "This is ridiculous," he said, "my wife and daughter are in there," and started banging on the door; a light turned on in a window, and Sinclair popped his head out and said "I told you I'd lock the doors by 11!" The guest replied: "If you don't open the doors I'm going to knock them down!" Three or four minutes later, Sinclair opens the door, lets him in, bangs the door behind him loud enough to, as the guest put it, wake everyone in the hotel, and yells "Don't let that happen again!"
 
Sinclair was also hard on the hired help. He hated builders, and would yell and curse at them; one Greek waiter was so fed up with Sinclair's treatment of him he jumped into a taxi and demanded to be driven to London. Rosemary Harrison, who once worked for Sinclair, describes how when one waiter, tired of waiting for Sinclair to make the tea, took a teapot meant for another table. Sinclair stopped the serving of breakfast and "went up and down the tables like a policeman, questioning the guests. He came across a set of teapots at a table for two. He realised because of their size they were meant for a table for four, and he asked the guests for a description of the waiter."

Sinclair was apparently so appalling that when his wife had to go out shopping, she would lock him up in their room, and say to the staff "don't let him out, he's only going to upset you." Ian Jones, owner of the nearby Coppice Hotel, said "fugitives from the Gleneagle used to come knocking on our door, pleading accommodations."

He was, as Cleese would put it, "the most wonderfully rude man I have ever met."

On documentaries (and a bit on "Bowling for Columbine")

All docs distort the truth, one way or another; maybe one of the greatest documentaries ever made, Triumph of the Will, paints a portrait of Adolf Hitler as godlike (the antidote to this is Resnais' Night and Fog).

I'm interested in the truth, of course, and I'm glad when I know whatever distortions the documentary does--in fact, I think it's necessary in appreciating the doc. But I'm also interested in the art of storytelling. On that score, Bowling for Columbine is as seriously flawed--as if Moore were atop some soapbox, pontificating.

BSST

I had bacon, I had tomatoes, I had bread, but no lettuce (I don't really keep it handy since I'm convinced it's mostly made up of water); so instead of a BLT (Bacon, Lettuce, Tomato) I did a BSST--Bacon, Spinach Salad, Tomato--sandwich.

So--baked eight strips of Krunzler maple-smoked bacon at 350 degrees for thirty minutes; toasted four slices of Italian bread, cut thick; laid bacon on the bread, laid baby spinach leaves on top of that, drizzled on that my homemade salad dressing (four tablespoons olive oil, two of balsamic vinegar, one of dijon mustard, pinch of salt, fresh cracked pepper, a crushed garlic clove, and honey to taste), laid on slices of Roma tomatoes, drizzled more salad dressing, served open-faced.

Crisp maple-sweet bacon, faintly bitter spinach leaves, tart 'n sweet dressing, juicy fresh tomatoes, all on a bed of toasted Italian bread. Simple and classy.