Chaos Walking (2021, Doug Liman) is a nifty B-movie with the cast and budget of a tentpole. Within its humdrum YA trappings lies an uproarious sci-fi story dealing with hostility between the sexes.
Some people land on a new planet and colonize. But there’s one catch: the unfiltered thoughts of men can be heard there. The men in town don’t like that the women can know what they’re thinking, but they can’t know what the women are thinking. So they carry out mass gendercide. That’s the backstory.
As a result of this misogynist, homicidal dystopia there’s this one guy who, after his wife was murdered, finds true love with another man. They live on a farm, raise a boy, and have a really cute dog. They have a perfect life. The boy’s name is TODD HEWITT.
One day a girl falls from out of the sky and lands in the town. And Todd finds her. All Todd thinks about is how pretty she is, her yellow hair, kissing her, and protecting her. All the men in Chaos Walking are shallow and easy to read; but the women are strong, powerful, targets of male aggression we root for to rid themselves of their oppressors.
The girl, VIOLA, also has this portable dirtbike that’s really cool. Anyways, the potent subtext of Chaos Walking sets it apart from most shallow, empty product Hollywood’s churning out. And it’s such an unexpected mix of camp fun and big ideas (both church and state are harmful to women) nestled in its showcase device that it’s got instant mod cult favorite cred.
3/9/2021 AMC Madison Yards 8
Atlanta, GA
DCP
Coming 2 America (2021, Craig Brewer) is Crazy Rich Asians in Africa, padded with pop-culture references substituted for humor. But it also spends most of its runtime with callbacks to the original, in a similarly unfunny, desperate, way.
Coming 2 America doesn’t so much feel like a movie as it does a charity benefit variety show remembering when Eddie Murphy was still funny. I can’t recall the last time a sequel showed as many clips from its predecessor. The gratuitous pandering with returning cast reprising their roles is a ploy to get idiots to feel in the know because they can identify them from the first movie. Same problem with all the 90s pop culture references, which is most inexplicable.
Coming 2 America doesn’t so much feel like a movie as it does a lame 30 year high school reunion. There’s a party, decorations, and an endless assortment of dance numbers. The clip show within the movie allows us to share our memories of how everyone looked 30 years ago. We get to laugh at how fun it is to hear songs we haven’t heard in 30 years.
The blooper reel at the end proves this movie is made by people who aren’t funny but sat down and all asked each other what’s funny.
3/7/2021 Landmark Midtown Art Cinema
Atlanta, GA
DCP
And it’s probably best if you don’t read this because nobody wants to hear someone else talk about how the book was better than the movie and how it was ruined by whitewashing it the way Hollywood always does. And nobody wants to hear somebody give away a bunch of spoilers just to complain about a movie they didn’t like.
Cherry (2021, Anthony and Joe Russo) is a movie about junkies that feels like it was made by boring middle-aged white people whose target audience is boring, sheltered white teenagers. Everything this movie does misses the mark. The casting of the innocent, safe, boy next door with his squeaky high pitched voice and his dull, blank, kewpie doll are media bait targeting the youth market with the lure of counterfeit rebelliousness.
Also like every other Hollywood movie about junkies, Cherry conforms within the predictable arc of the rise and fall of a high that ends with loss, then punishment, then redemption through true love. There’re so many sappy scenes added that weren’t in the book. In the book Cherry and his wife cheat on each other habitually, and all of the love is drained from their marriage. But in the movie they’re ever-faithful and their love saves them from a harrowing bout with drugs that they manage to free themselves from. But the biggest divergence is the way they jettisoned the original ending. In the book, this despicable junkie couple just keep on carrying out the same acts of amoral, criminal desperation and shooting up heroin until you turn the page and it’s over. And what’s brilliant about that moment is it makes sense to depict addiction by showing characters that keep using. That’s what addiction is, right? But in the movie there’s now a new scene where the main character goes to prison. Cherry ends with him cleaning up and his wife apparently clean too, so they can live happily ever after. But why?
Okay, then there’s the score. Obnoxiously, Cherry is wall to walled with symphonic orchestral arrangements that range from tender to romantic. As if there’s nothing more tender and romantic than drug addicted white twentysomethings. And the songs that pop up are adult contemporary bland tracks pulled from the muzak sampler of a Starbucks. Whereas the book is a moral latrine of unsympathetic, nihilistic, broken, dying animals that builds its milieu through detailed backstories of a large body of characters, many of which come and go never to return; the movie follows a few characters and replaces the pathos its characters solicit with the word fuck and vomiting.
None of the methods of filming in Cherry make sense either. For all the drone and crane overhead shots and sweeping pursuit vehicle moves, does the narrative ever benefit from them? Why the p.o.v. from inside the rectum in the prostate exam? To whom is that humor aimed? And worst, why all the mannequin challenge shots? Maybe all of this has been market researched and will amass a huge fanbase of youth receptive to its charms so why should I care?
2/25/2021 Landmark Midtown Art Cinema
Atlanta, GA
DCP
Let’s say THE JANITOR embodies Cage’s eccentricities and obstinance to do his own thing—could that be a defining quality of an artist? The janitor has a job to do. He knows what he’s gotta do, what’s in it for him, and he keeps on schedule. And he never utters a line of dialogue. His silence could be seen as representing pure cinema.
But what stands in his way? What opposition is he confronted with? Take the kids for starters. The kids represent commerce. From rock n’ roll flicks in the 50s to superhero tentpoles, teens dictate what dominates the market in Hollywood. In Willy’s Wonderland the kids are in many ways the opposite of the janitor: they’re annoying, always talking, their acting is bad, their dialogue is poorly written and cheesy; for the most part their screen time is cringe-inducing. And it’s apparent he wants nothing more than to be left alone to do his job.
Then there are the evil possessed puppets, who might depict something like the easy cheesy over-used motifs of genre movies. So in this building called Willy’s Wonderland of course the janitor defeats both of these adversaries in time. The kids all get murdered. Who says he has to save them? He dismembers all the big colorful cartoon machines. Because they were in the way of him getting the job done.
The most enjoyable moment in Willy’s Wonderland is a scene where the janitor lets himself go in the reverie of a game of pinball. Cage turns it into something more. There’s dancing, and some contortions best left to be seen for yourself. In addition to the pinball, the janitor’s only other indulgence he allows himself is a can of soda he consumes heavily. Does the soda mean anything? Probably not.
Or does the soda represent artistic satisfaction? Fulfillment? The reward Cage gets from doing his own thing? And yeah, there is a survivor. One person. That segment of the demographic who get it, and their reward is that they get to come along for the ride, and share a soda.
2/13/2021 Plaza Theatre
Atlanta, GA
DCP
Chloé Zhao’s films feel like she finds some people who nobody cares about, then begins researching their way of life. Like De Sica or Larry Clark, she casts non-professionals for authenticity, or maybe to discover something poetic.
She films her marginalized menagerie in a western milieu, in touch with nature. Something wild in them yearning for freedom. An America without materialism, hi-tech interfaces, or decadence.
But her films are insufferable. Aside from the fact that Indians talk cool, and the curiosity to know more about life on the rez, what’s left is a bunch of really bad acting with a forced attempt at dealing with loss through an awkward, sentimental manipulation of fact with fiction. It’s not art just cause of the pretty horsies and sunsets.
The films have a quasi-neorealism aesthetic, and you wanna feel for the characters. There’s an insight into their habits and behavior. But the dramatic thrust of the narrative isn’t detached, on the contrary, it tries to connect but fails.
Nomadland (2020, Chloé Zhao) is a road movie about a homeless woman, who has no destination in the conventional sense associated with the genre. She takes crappy jobs here and there when she can find them. And we see her at work. Sounds amazing you say? Maybe even something like The Grapes of Wrath?
Nah. It’s the same problem as with Zhao’s other films. If Nomadland were a documentary I bet I’d like it. In cinema, there’s a difference between slow and boring, but you wouldn’t know it from watching this movie. The most exciting thing in this movie are some scenes about rock collecting. I’m not saying I have a problem with rock collecting, but I’ve found for the first time an activity that I doubt has any business in any movie ever made. I’m thinking, right now, there has to be another scene where rock collecting pops up in some other movie. There has to be an exception. Even just one. I’ll have to get back to you on that.
FERN has experienced loss. It defines her. The difference between loss and trauma, is trauma is easily rendered cinematically. Loss, on the other hand, is boring. We’ve all experienced loss. So what? Loss alone isn’t enough to compose a character off of.
2/07/2021 AMC Southlake 24
Morrow, GA
IMAX
0. Introductionalizing Maunderings
OR
Methodological Preliminaries
Eagle-eyed long-timers may notice I never did manage to publish a 2019 roundup of HEAVY TUNES. Therefore for 2020, I shall start with a shortcut: this precap.
I. Opening the Box
Like a lot of music fans, I have succumbed to the dread forces of streaming, ensuring that my access to music is dependent on a router my cable company bought in nigh-infinite bulk and gave me for "free", and putting my tastes at the mercy of arcane legal maneuverings between those who want to pay artists little and those who want to pay them less. Instead of looking for music to listen to myself (by reading Twitter, the only workable music discovery service left), I let the streaming service find it for me, and I stream even stuff I already own because I feel guilty about paying the service money, so I want to get my money's worth. I use a service that is unpopular, so no pretty popsicle-stick diagrams of my year graced my inbox and then plagued your social feeds. But they did send me a playlist of how they saw my year, which I reproduce below, and subsequently annotate.
...seems about right. Mostly comfort listens, the things I returned to again and again.
II. The Long Version: The Commentariat on The Comfort Listens
III. Other and Else
The main thing that landed on me this year that isn't reflected up there is the unbelievably fun Ummon by Slift. French Hawkwind, with screamy drone-vocals and lots of fun riffs. Basically perfect. And French!
Also I listened a lot to the Mike Bagetta / Mike Watt / Stephen Hodges band MSSV. Mostly instrumental, which I needed at work a lot, and the joy and searching the band palpably experiences was also a needed infusion this year.
Oozing Wound, great shit. Ganser, also excellent. Lucidvox! MF Doom. The Paranoid Style, A Goddamn Impossible Way of Life, record-store-person rock, with great hooks and lyrics. Rediscovered the great Ferocious Eagle, who remind us "be not weary, be not weak". Finally realized that being the only fan of godheadSilo still standing meant it behooved me to investigate Enemymine and Dead Low Tide, both of which it turns out ... I like! Some other stuff, too, I am certain.
IV. The Future, Which Is Where We're All Going
I think I enjoy the effort to listen to no more than one album by any given artist per day, and I think I'll continue it. I've tried a few historical listens, where I pick an artist and listen to what they did in order, day by day, but never managed to complete any of these. If I do, and if it seems interesting, I'll put it here. If you want to see a somewhat accurate version of what I'm listening to, you can do so here: https://libre.fm/user/Clsn.
V. Previous Years in HEAVY TUNES
The music works. So much of the tone of Promising Young Woman comes from the songs. The opening alone was worth the price of my admission. Seriously, Charli XCX? I already love it. “Boys” is Charli at her most playful, and its 8-bit NES coin sounds in the soundscape is not just fun, it says something about her demographic. But somewhere around the midpoint there’s a scene where CASSIE goes batshit aggro way over the top to the “Liebestod,” in a set piece that for me shows that character eschewing verisimilitude for emotional authenticity. That scene’s my whole basis for relating to her. And not that at this point I can even rank the music selections but there’s also a montage to Paris Hilton’s one hit, “Stars Are Blind,” that goes so far as to make me wonder why I can’t think of any other movie to knock me over with applause at the alchemy of worthless art into precious art.
But no it wasn’t only the music. The narrative is an airtight genre psychological thriller morality trap. And it doesn’t cop out. Yet still it manages to stay dangerous. Its tone is traumacore. And the central protag is so volatile but not for one second would I say crazy.
12/23/2020 AMC Madison Yards 8
Atlanta, GA
DCP
Remember the first time someone told you there was a documentary about Apocalypse Now (1979, Francis Coppola) that was even better than the movie itself? How Martin Sheen had a heart attack while filming WILLARD’S breakdown? How Brando was so fat that KURTZ could only be filmed from the neck down, and hidden in deep shadows?
And what about Heaven’s Gate (1980, Michael Cimino)? Which did you hear about first: the movie or Steven Bach’s Final Cut: Art, Money, and Ego in the Making of Heaven’s Gate, the Film that Sank United Artists?
What is Citizen Kane (1941, Orson Welles) about? That’s a fun topic for conversation. Or a really boring one in an intro film theory context. In the latter it’s supposed to illustrate the point that there is no one definitive answer.
What is Mank (2020, David Fincher) about? How the screenplay to Citizen Kane came about. And herein lies its weakness. Whereas Welles was a showman, Fincher is a craftsman. In her essay “Raising Kane,” Pauline Kael long ago fired shots at Welles usurping the credit owed to Herman Mankiewicz and Gregg Toland. So, we already have a detailed look at the intriguing making of Citizen Kane. When I say weakness, I mean the heart of the damn thing. Mank is hollow.
For instance, take the protagonist of Citizen Kane, and for that matter, Fincher’s Citizen Kane: The Social Network (2010, Fincher). Kane and Zuck are mostly depicted as powerful rich men with fragile egos who build an empire but are fated to lose grasp of attaining the love of a woman they desire. What makes those films compelling are the tragic glimpses into their character; it’s the stuff we don’t like about them that makes us, if we’re lucky, identify with their humanity. Mank is in every way their opposite: weak (politically and professionally), far from Rockefeller (though by no means a pauper), with an invincible ego, and a loyal, perfect wife depicted as nothing more than an unquestioning longsuffering servant to him.
Don’t mistake Mank for the cinnamon roll narratives of Citizen Kane or The Social Network either. Another way The Social Network is such a brilliant story in terms of point of view is that it’s not entirely focused on the making of Facebook. I mean it starts that way sure, but for me the moment it becomes sublime is when we begin jumping between the two litigation scenes, resulting in what we thought was the chronological order of the film being altered on the spot to become flashbacks. Or not only that, but take the Henley Regatta and its amazing opening with tilt shift lenses and Reznor-Ross electronic “In the Hall of the Mountain King” montage; what does any of it have to do with inventing Facebook in the sense of linear narrative? It comes out of nowhere. On the other hand, every scene in Mank is about the screenplay; its motivation; its obstacles; its method.
But once the form of Mank becomes identifiable, the fun begins. It’s an historical comedy. (Fincher’s first comedy?) And finely crafted within the guise of resembling a creation of its period. Mank isn’t compelling as a character because he doesn’t need to be. He’s witty, wry, and hilarious.
And the imaginative pitch meeting at Paramount between Selznick, Von Sternberg and the writers takes routine exposition and springboards into an example of fine comedy timing, execution, and delivery. Especially Von Sternberg’s punchline. When before has Fincher been this steeped in classic comedy? I wasn’t sure if I was making a trite observation about the hubris symbolism in the scene where Mank tries to light his cigar in the inferno blasting from W.H.’s fireplace or if in fact Fincher intended it to be indicative of the type of rubbish one would find in the pretentious artiness of the period?
Technically Mank is a marvel of Fincher’s powers of opulence. The framing and lighting of the black and white images is pristine. He throws in a nifty montage. I remain a subscriber to the cult of Fincher. There’s so much to be found in his choices. What about at the first Hearst dinner the way Thalberg sits next to Mayer sharing a settee, while Norma Shearer is in her own chair next to him? In every aspect it’s a movie about the love of movies for people who love movies made by one who love movies. And it is exhilarating to be transported during the third act into the completion of the screenplay. At 327 pages, crashing with a thud upon delivery to Houseman, with its original title framed upside down: American (maybe a little redundant that the effect is repeated again later), Mankiewicz’s first draft is a worthy subject of legend.
12/20/2020 Landmark Midtown Art Cinema
Atlanta, GA
DCP
